"Common" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... other, reading at last in each other's speechlessness some comfort in this strange common knowledge, for which, indeed, there were no human words, which must be forever borne dumbly between them. Then slowly, with solemn tenderness, the obligation of that unspoken knowledge came into Evelyn Strang's face. She saw the youth standing there with ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... in a secret ioy with new budding conceits my burning hart, and leauing off vulgar and common follies, I began to consider of the intelligible effect of honest loue, and withall of the cleerenes of the skies, the sweete and milde aire, the delightfull site, the pleasant countrie, the green ...
— Hypnerotomachia - The Strife of Loue in a Dreame • Francesco Colonna
... a boy upon this occasion. See! our Carlo! You recognize that dancing speck below there?—he has joined himself—the poor lad wishes he could, I dare swear!—to another bigger speck, which is verily a lady: who has joined herself to a donkey—a common habit of the sex, I am told; but I know them not. That lady, signor Ugo, is the signorina Vittoria. You stare? But, I tell you, the game cannot go on without her; and that is why I have permitted you to knock the ball about at your own pleasure ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... By common consent they paddled slowly at the outset, wisely refraining from exhausting their strength in the first mile or so, as is so apt to be the case with inexperienced paddlers. The Winnebagos had paddled together so ...
— The Campfire Girls at Camp Keewaydin • Hildegard G. Frey
... understand—is a Mrs. Vane Bridgeman, a Christian Scientist and Spiritualist. She is very rich, and magnificently idiotic. She supports all foolish charities. She has almshouses for broken-down mediums on Sunnington Common in Kent. She has endowed a hospital for sick fortune-tellers. She gave five hundred pounds to the home for indigent thought-readers, and nearly as much to the 'Palmists' Seaside Retreat' at Millaby ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... which his own father had told him on the Keeling Islands about beautiful little Kathleen Holbein and her father? He was on the point of seizing the hermit by the hand and telling him what he knew, when the thought occurred that attacks by pirates were common enough in those seas, that other fathers might have lost daughters in this way, and that, perhaps, his suspicion might be wrong. It would be a terrible thing, he thought, to raise hope in his poor friend's breast unless he were ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... insolence, dulness, rigidity, on the one hand, and sensibility, quickness, flexibility, on the other. What Arnold lamented was that England has too often been represented in Ireland, and here also when Irish questions were discussed, by "the genuine, unmitigated Murdstone—the common middle-class Englishman, who has come forth from Salem House—and Mr. Creakle. He is seen in full force, of course, in the Protestant North; but throughout Ireland he is a prominent figure of the English garrison. Him the Irish see, see him only too much and too often"—and ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... the government, until the arrival of a viceroy, to his faithful partners of the Royal Audience, and in January, 1150, he embarked with the royal treasure on board of a squadron for Panama. He was accompanied to the shore by a numerous crowd of the inhabitants, cavaliers and common people, persons of all ages and conditions, who followed to take their last look of their benefactor, and watch with straining eyes the vessel that bore him away from ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... enemy, or filching it craftily from those less shrewd than ourselves (if, indeed, there were any such in New England), or winning it by selfish competition with a neighbor; in one or another of which fashions every son of woman both perpetrates and suffers his share of the common evil, whether he chooses it or no. And, as the basis of our institution, we purposed to offer up the earnest toil of our bodies, as a prayer no less than an effort for the advancement ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Dartmouth was of no common dye. He was an English seaman; and he had laid a plan for betraying Portsmouth to the French, and had offered to take the command of a French squadron against his country. It was a serious aggravation of his guilt that he had been one ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... In common politeness the prince could hardly refuse this request, and the princess set about inventing every kind of amusement for him, and succeeded so well that two months slipped by almost unnoticed, in balls, spectacles and in hunting, of which, when unattended ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Andrew Lang.
... sentence hath his force and strength, And dead I am that here appear to live; For how, alas! can this my life have length When she is hence, that life and sense doth give? But since, alas! I must be only he, Whom Fortune vows to make a common game, Armenio, my foe, do this for me— With my revenge to end my open shame. To help thee to digest thine injury, ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley
... Can't you take one of them?" replied Holford. "What!" said Vane, "would you have me steal a dory then?" "Do you make it a matter of conscience," replied Holford, "to steal a dory, when you have been a common robber and pirate, stealing ships and cargoes, and plundering all mankind that fell in your way! Stay here if you are so squeamish?" and he left him to consider ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... exalted above, and dissimilar from, all creatures, which lie levelled before him on one common plane of instrumentality and inertness, God is one in the totality of omnipotent and omnipresent action, which acknowledges no rule, standard, or limit save his own sole and absolute will. He communicates nothing to his creatures, for their seeming power and act ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... to hear it. The consequences to the poor man have been very sad. He has had no regular employment since, and his family are now suffering for even the common necessaries of life." ...
— Words for the Wise • T. S. Arthur
... was to be found of what furnishes ordinary apartments, neither benches, nor trestles, nor forms, nor common stools in the form of a chest, nor fine stools sustained by pillars and counter-pillars, at four sols a piece. Only one easy arm-chair, very magnificent, was to be seen; the wood was painted with roses on a red ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... "What very common papers!" I said, looking up at the walls with an imaginary eye-glass. "I am always accustomed to a great deal of gold on the papers. It lightens up ...
— The Boys and I • Mrs. Molesworth
... we who have the sense of humor," he added. "When our common people laughed at the Emperor in his uniforms, they showed the same sound sense that appears in 'Yang Kee.' I thank you, my dear friends, for listening to me so kindly and without anger, but I hope to preach these ideas to your people, and as I take my text from your national ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... O, may we repay this debt To regions solitary yet Within our spreading land! There brethren, from our common home, Still westward, like our fathers, roam, Still guided ...
— Hymns for Christian Devotion - Especially Adapted to the Universalist Denomination • J.G. Adams
... all over, and we regret very much to say, that it is very much the characteristic of English mobs. What an uncommonly strange thing it is that people in multitudes seem completely to get rid of all reason—all honour—all common ordinary honesty; while, if you were to take the same people singly, you would find that they were reasonable enough, and would shrink with a feeling quite approaching to horror from anything in the shape ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... water-proof coats, brand-new, and of which they were considerably proud. New clothes had not been a common ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... tempers are so common that Fenwick's would scarcely have called for notice if it had not been that, on one occasion, a remark of Sally's about a rather more vigorous emeute than usual led her mother, accidentally thrown off her guard, to reply: ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... were kept. The public officers and functionaries of all classes were gradually dismissed, and their places given to informers, or to the old nobility. As the common people cooled, they became undeceived, and it was found that they had gained neither in riches nor in loyalty. The commissioners, instead of adding as they expected to the popularity of the government, ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... the life of the occasion, and all went merry as a marriage-bell. Seven months later, Lord Dorrington returned, and a week after that, the loss of the Dorrington jewels from the Devonshire strong-boxes was a matter of common knowledge. When, or by whom, they had been taken was an absolute mystery. As far as anybody could find out, they might have been taken the night before his return, or the night after his departure. The only ...
— R. Holmes & Co. • John Kendrick Bangs
... in China or among the natives of India, we claimed civil advantages which were connected with religious usages, little as we might value those forms in our hearts, we should think common decency required us to abstain from treating them with offensive contumely; and, though unable to consider them sacred, we would not sneer at the name of Fot, or laugh at the imputed divinity of Visthnou."—Courier, ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... it needs must be, my friends, That one be guilty of our common harms: And since that Marius is accounted free, Sylla with all his ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... Pigs" is a phrase too vulgarly common not to be well known to your readers. But whence has it arisen? Either in "NOTES AND QUERIES," or elsewhere, it has been explained as a corruption of "Please the pix." Will you allow another suggestion? I think it possible that the pigs of the Gergesenes (Matthew ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 56, November 23, 1850 • Various
... the most common birds of the Amazon is a kind of grey-eyed, noisy, mimicking magpie, locally called guache or japim or jappelin (Cassicus icterranotus), quite amusing with its energetic movements, its observant habits, its familiar interest in everything and everybody, ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... family. Instead of nagging at the boy and urging him on to attempt things which are impossible to his inferior intelligence, his parents should take him out of school and put him at some kind of work which he could do. If the boy had been the son of a common laborer he would probably have left school early and have become a dependable and contented laborer. In a very simple environment he would probably not ...
— The Measurement of Intelligence • Lewis Madison Terman
... sin of murder! And thus, under the strange pretence of reverence for the matrimonial law, they would have violated at once the dictates of humanity, the principles of reason, and the constitutions of heaven. So common is it for transgressors to "strain at a knat and swallow a camel;" and so uniform the course of guilt, which never walks alone, but draws with it a train ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... feeling sure of the support of the sheikhs, who had assisted him to his present position, only sought to temporise. He soon received the further support of the Mamluk beys of Bardisi's party, who forgot their personal grievances in the desire to be revenged upon the common foe; at the same time, twenty-five French Mamluks, urged thereto by M. Drovetti, deserted the ranks of Elfi's adherents and ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 12 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... as if they were a lash, stung me beyond endurance. I made a step to strike him, and we might have been at it, like common brawlers, only he saved us from that shame. He had been waiting with his left foot in the stirrup. When I drove at him he swung on to the back of Mack, who turned half round, as a spirited horse does in the process of being mounted. This threw his big body between us, but ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne
... the well-grounded idea in his mind that Africa did not end, according to the common belief, at Cape Nam [Portuguese for "not"], but that there was a region beyond that forbidding negative, seems never to have rested until he had made known that quarter of the world to his own. He fixed his abode upon the promontory of Sagres, at ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps
... the house has all the irregularity of an old castle, consisting of various towers, projections, buttresses, and gables. Some of the windows show tracery of a superior order, and others have huge common sashes, introduced by the tasteful Mr. Perry aforesaid. The court on this side is surrounded by battlemented walls, and has a massy square gatehouse leading into the old garden, or pleasaunce, which sloped away down toward the Medway, but is now merely a grassy ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... settle his brother Alick in a farm, and to support John through his University course as a medical student. This and similar services to the family circle were rendered with gracious disclaimers of obligation. "What any brethren of our father's house possess, I look on as a common stock from which ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... diverse. Here we come into that very narrow, but important, region, where sex as sex manifestly plays its part; where the male as male and the female as female have each their body of perceptions and experiences, which they do not hold in common; here one sex cannot adequately represent the other. It is here that each sexual part has something radically distinct to contribute to the ...
— Woman and Labour • Olive Schreiner
... for this old "thumb" tradition, that "a man had the right to whip his wife with a stick no bigger than his thumb," is found in an early edition of Phillip's Evidence. That book was authority in English common law and in it Phillips is quoted as saying, that according to the law of his day a husband "might lawfully chastise his wife with a reasonable weapon, as a broomstick," adding, however, "but if he use an unreasonable weapon, such as an iron bar, ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... actresses, since, I am sure, there is a great deal of latent talent in society here both for opera and the drama: the girls, too, are generally well educated; are pretty, have much expression, a naturally easy carriage, and great imitative powers. The latter talent is singularly common amongst them; and I have met, not one, but many young women, who would imitate the peculiarities of any actress or actor just then before the public with an ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... subdued and hushed, as must be when the master lies low. The servants walk on tiptoe; the common smile is checked; conversation dwindles into compressed whispers, as though they fear by ordinary noise to bring to life again the unloved departed. All is gloom and ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... never quitted Stones Hill for a single instant. Keeping ever close by the work of excavation, he busied himself incessantly with the welfare and health of his workpeople, and was singularly fortunate in warding off the epidemics common to large communities of men, and so disastrous in those regions of the globe which are exposed to the ...
— Jules Verne's Classic Books • Jules Verne
... of the manner in which he spent his time she would have been horrified, and would certainly have spared her encomiums on his improved conduct and the absence of the unsatisfactory reports which had before been so common. ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... was to clear a way and prepare a road for a genius greater than his own. Nothing is falser. To understand Berlioz one must shake off the hypnotic influence of Bayreuth. Though Wagner may have learnt something from Berlioz, the two composers have nothing in common; their genius and their art are absolutely opposed; each one has ploughed his ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... us!" begged Belle. "I was going to have the permanent wave put in mine, but it costs twenty-five dollars, and it's awfully tiring, Hazel said. Besides, I think it's getting rather—common." ...
— The Motor Girls on Waters Blue - Or The Strange Cruise of The Tartar • Margaret Penrose
... 3839. Is it a common practice for the fish-curer to advance the money for a boat, or to supply the boat to the men and receive payment from them by instalments?-It is generally the understanding, that if a crew get a ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... The canaille, he said, were the common folk, whose part in this world was to be ruled. He explained further that to belong to the upper or ruling class it did not suffice to be well-born (though this was almost essential); one must also cultivate the manners proper to that station, and appear, ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... credit for a while; there is a further reason, which is plain and scandalous. When the late party was at the helm, those who were called the Tories, never put their resentments in balance with the safety of the nation, but cheerfully contributed to the common cause. Now the scene is changed, the fallen party seems to act from very different motives: they have given the word about; they will keep their money and be passive; and in this point stand upon the same foot with Papists and Nonjurors. ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift
... never came out of the eggs of geese, Linda would declare with some pride of spirit that the son was not like the father; that the son had never been known to be idle. She had not attempted to defend the father, of whom it seemed to be acknowledged by the common consent of all Nuremberg that he was utterly worthless, and a disgrace to the city which had produced him. But Linda now felt very thankful for the assurance of even his presence. Had it been Ludovic's mother, how much better ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope
... missionaries and teachers. He was seldom known to tell the truth and possessed very few redeeming qualities. Although greatly disliked by many of the Indians, he was the acknowledged head of the war party and by common consent assumed the direction of all the hostile tribes in their ...
— Reminiscences of Pioneer Days in St. Paul • Frank Moore
... the Princess of Egypt, cannot live as the wife of a common man who falls from a throne to set himself upon the earth, and smears his own brow with mud for a uraeus crown. When your prophecies come true, Seti, and you crawl from your dust, then perhaps we may ...
— Moon of Israel • H. Rider Haggard
... listened: there was silence for a minute: then the limping step was heard again: again it ceased. The woman went to the door and looked out. Over the sandy, wind-swept common to the left the darkness brooded, the outlines of a broken bit of sea-wall, and of some giant boulders, said to be remains of a dolmen, emerging dimly therefrom like threatening phantoms; to the right moaned the long, grey sea, and in front was the waste of salt marshes and rocks, with ...
— A Loose End and Other Stories • S. Elizabeth Hall
... been sadly neglected of late. The parcels actually did cease coming, and the two conspirators hugged themselves with delight that it had not been necessary to tell their secret so no one knew what sillies they were. By common consent they barred chain letters as a topic of conversation, and had almost forgotten the hateful packages when one morning Peace received a letter from Miss Truman, still a teacher in the Parker School, saying that she had just mailed a large box addressed to ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown
... Switzerland, varies from five to eight per cent. Here and there in rare instances we find a few copper or bronze lamellae amongst the piles. The pottery is now of finer clay, better kneaded; and ornamentation, including chevrons, wolves' teeth, and mammillated designs, is more common. The handle, however, is still a mere projection. The third period, which we may date from the transition from stone to bronze, is largely represented; copper weapons and tools are already numerous, and bronze is beginning to occur. The stone hatchets and hammers ...
— Manners and Monuments of Prehistoric Peoples • The Marquis de Nadaillac
... accosting each other in a friendly way in the streets. Everybody seemed to know everybody else, although they might not have met before. Eye attracted eye, and smiles appeared to broaden mutually with the sympathy of a common interest. The women were sad but speaking cheerily in order to hide their emotions. In the long summer twilight, the boulevards were filling with crowds. Those from the outlying districts were converging toward the centre of the city, as in the remote revolutionary days, banding ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... wag of the head that implied a large mental reservation. At sea it was better to proceed with caution. To be prepared for emergencies—to expect the worst and to be ready for it—was the part of plain common sense. And Skipper Bill o' Burnt Bay was ...
— Billy Topsail & Company - A Story for Boys • Norman Duncan
... when Ruskin was about forty years old, there came a great change. His heaven-born genius for making the appreciation of beauty a common possession was deflected from its true field. He had been asking himself what are the conditions that produce great art, and the answer he found declared that art cannot be separated from life, nor life from industry and industrial conditions. A civilization founded upon unrestricted ...
— The King of the Golden River - A Short Fairy Tale • John Ruskin.
... inhabitants—the monks and dogs of the hospice, the road-keepers in their refuge huts or cantoniere, or the garrison of a fort guarding these important thoroughfares. The flanking valleys of approach draw to themselves the human life of the mountains. Their upper settlements show a certain common physiognomy, born of their relation to the barren transit region above, except in those few mountain districts of advanced civilization where railroads have introduced through traffic over the barrier. At the foot of the final ascent to the pass, where often the carriage road ends and where ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... of confederation seems to be quite dependent upon such preliminaries, as mutual confidence, and a measure of common necessity, in order to such a ...
— A Winter Tour in South Africa • Frederick Young
... practiced with Mr. Morris. He was persuaded that a disposition existed in the cabinet of London to retain things in their actual situation until the intentions of the American government should be ascertained with respect to the war supposed to be approaching. If America would make a common cause with Great Britain against Spain, the way would be smoothed to the attainment of all their objects, but if America should incline toward Spain, no adjustment of the points of difference between the two nations would be made. He therefore ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... achieved during and after the period of partition may now be indicated. Stanley's great journey down the Congo in 1875-1876 initiated a new era in African exploration. The numbers of travellers soon became so great that the once marvellous feat of crossing the continent from sea to sea became common. With increased knowledge and much ampler means of communication trans-African travel now presents few difficulties. While d'Anville and other cartographers of the 18th century, by omitting all that was uncertain, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... work together at gardening, they must needs succeed at agriculture; and they were seized with an ambition to cultivate the farm. With common sense and study of the subject, they would get through it beyond ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... were young men of birth, who (their means not answering to their extravagance) had been put in prison by creditors, and redeemed thence by lord Timon; these young prodigals thenceforward fastened upon his lordship, as if by common sympathy he were necessarily endeared to all such spendthrifts and loose livers, who not being able to follow him in his wealth, found it easier to copy him in prodigality and copious spending of what was not their own. One of these flesh-flies was Ventidius, for whose debts ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... indeed, irresistible. Racial movements have mixed all peoples; the oceans have become the world's common highways; the air is filled with voices speaking from city to city and from continent to continent; an international postal system makes the world's ideas one; there is quick participation of mankind in the fruits of invention and research. ...
— Prize Orations of the Intercollegiate Peace Association • Intercollegiate Peace Association
... struggle for independence, the Dutch trafficked freely with the Spaniards, got rich by the trade, paid enormous taxes to support the war, and achieved their liberty. But the Dutch fought to rid themselves of a tyrant, while our first care was to set up one, Cotton, and worship it. Rules of common sense were not applicable to it. The Grand Monarque could not eat his dinners or take his emetics like ordinary mortals. Our people were much debauched by it. I write advisedly, for during the last two and a half ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... and before he was twenty had risen to be head ostler and married his master's daughter. Keats then became manager of the stables, and his father-in-law, who was comfortably off, went away to live in the country. John's parents were not poor, nor were they common people. In all they had four children, two boys besides John, and a little girl, and they determined to give their children a good education. They would have liked to send their boys to Harrow, but finding that would cost too much they sent ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... as there were in the town! From Concord Common roads branch off in all directions like the spokes of a wheel. The oldest road, by which the British troops made their entry and exit, runs northeasterly to the Hawthorne house and Lexington with a firm, dry sidewalk for more than a mile; another goes northwesterly to the battle-ground ...
— Sketches from Concord and Appledore • Frank Preston Stearns
... in his arms and kiss away her tears as he ought to have done, and plead and pet and soothe as she planned he should do, poor child. It wasn't his way. He strove to appeal to her judgment and to her common sense, but could not reach them. And then came to him the great sorrow of his mother's death, peaceful, placid, hopeful though it was,—and then when she was laid away and he faced the world again, he found that there were outstanding claims against the homestead ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... October, accordingly, the siege, which had lasted seven weeks, was raised, and Don Frederic rejoined his father in Amsterdam. Ready to die in the last ditch, and to overwhelm both themselves and their foes in a common catastrophe the Hollanders had at last compelled their haughty enemy to fly from a position which ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... end of that six months that the event took place which was to restore Sir Oliver to liberty. In the meanwhile those limbs of his which had ever been vigorous beyond the common wont had acquired an elephantine strength. It was ever thus at the oar. Either you died under the strain, or your thews and sinews grew to be equal to their relentless task. Sir Oliver in those six months was become a ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... gardens, which, with a very little attention, not always bestowed, become very ornamented and useful, producing, not only the many beautiful trees and shrubs of the country, but every fruit, flower, and vegetable, common in England. The houses are generally of two, sometimes of three, stories in height, well built of brick or stone, and covered with shingles of the peppermint tree; some few are still only weather boarded. The bricks are of a good and durable quality, and the free-stone ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction No. 485 - Vol. 17, No. 485, Saturday, April 16, 1831 • Various
... build barricades, and conflicts occurred in the streets, but the National Guard remained true to the army and the King, and the revolt was soon put down. The government of Louis Philippe resorted to severe repressive measures, and trials for sedition were common. In Germany a revolutionary appeal to arms, made at a popular festival at the Castle of Homburg, near Zweibruecken, resulted in renewed reactionary measures. The German Diet, at the instance of Metternich, declared that the refusal of taxes by any ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... the trade and have a secondhand shop of my own, full of poetical rubbish, and every sort of literary odds and ends, picked up at random, and all cast higgledy- piggledy into the same chaotic receptacle. His customers are as little like ordinary shoppers as he is like common tradesmen. They are in part the Canadians who work in the brickyards, and it is surprising to find how much business can be transacted, and how many sharp bargains struck without the help of a common language. I am in ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells
... of Dr. Haven, who assumed the Professorship of History and English Literature. No name on Michigan's long Faculty roll has been more honored than his. He brought to the University not only well-grounded ideals of true scholarship, but also a broad culture, not too common in those days, and an inspiring interest in literature and art which left a deep impression. It was such spirits as Dr. Tappan, Dr. Frieze, and Andrew D. White, who was also of that early company, that set for the University standards in academic life and ideals ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw
... inland counties did not understand these subtle distinctions. Sir David Lindsay, in the curious drama, published by Mr Pinkerton, introduces, as one of his dramatis personae, Common Thift, a borderer, who is supposed to come to Fife to steal the Earl of Rothes' best hackney, and Lord Lindsay's brown jennet. Oppression also (another personage there introduced), seems to be connected with the borders; for, finding ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... itself, and were made by persons who have seen what they relate, according to the papers which have been found, the summary of which composes the relation which is being sent there. I believe that those of Gomez Perez and his son, and common tradition must be as fresh in the minds of people as if their expeditions were taking place, and that these were true reports of those former governors; and that they proceeded with so great zeal, that their zeal served to make us determine to thank them by responding. But this, forsooth, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XIV., 1606-1609 • Various
... that nonsense, but I see you're worse than ever. I'm perfectly willing to be friends with you, and I've forgiven you for throwing those mice at us at Lake Dean, but I certainly don't see why I should be friendly with all those common girls ...
— A Campfire Girl's Happiness • Jane L. Stewart
... coast is subject to hurricanes from August to October (in general, the country averages about one hurricane every other year); droughts are common ...
— The 2002 CIA World Factbook • US Government
... round at the sound of approaching steps, stood suddenly upright, thrusting the more dilapidated boot behind the other, and wondering with what purpose the two girls had sought him. One he recognized as a type common enough throughout the Dominion—kindly, shrewd, somewhat hard-featured and caustic in speech; but the other, who looked down on him with thinly-veiled pity, more resembled the women of birth and education whom he had ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... selected. She could not bear to be addressed as the Foundress, saying that she was a worthless creature who did nothing but offend God. Never was she heard to speak of herself, except to depreciate her own merit. She followed the common rule with regard to food and rising, except, indeed, that she often anticipated the hour of the latter, early as it was. Although she had received the gift of uninterrupted prayer, and could speak admirably to seculars who applied to her for advice, among ...
— The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the Incarnation • "A Religious of the Ursuline Community"
... of fact, Topelius accepted his defeat with a good grace; but the crew of the wrecked Leslie, who were in the same employment and loyal to their firm, took the thing more bitterly. Rough words and ugly looks were common. Once even they hooted Captain Wicks from the saloon verandah; the Currency Lasses drew out on the other side; for some minutes there had like to have been a battle in Butaritari; and though the occasion passed off without blows, ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... should be woven out of esparto and so should the rope itself, this kind of grass being least liable to rot. The rope and noose itself should both alike be stout. The log or clog of wood attached should be made of common or of holm oak with the bark on, three spans in length, and a palm ...
— The Sportsman - On Hunting, A Sportsman's Manual, Commonly Called Cynegeticus • Xenophon
... commerce advances; yet, in its termination and ultimate effects, serves, in some measure, to break the bands of society, to substitute mere forms and rules of art in place of ingenuity, and to withdraw individuals from the common scene of occupation, on which the sentiments of the heart, and the mind, ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.
... C," said Raphael, laughing a little. "But I am so sick of hearing about culture, I say more than I mean. Judaism is so human—that's why I like it. No abstract metaphysics, but a lovable way of living the common life, sanctified by the centuries. Culture is all very well—doesn't the Talmud say the world stands on the breath of the school-children?—but it has become a cant. Too often it saps ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... was my privilege and pleasure to work in the very closest co-operation with him. My friendship with the Admiral was of very long standing. We had during many years exchanged views on different naval subjects, but principally on gunnery questions. I, in common with other British naval officers who had the honour of his acquaintance, had always been greatly struck by his wonderful success in the post of Inspector of Target Practice in the United States Navy. That success was ...
— The Crisis of the Naval War • John Rushworth Jellicoe
... views. In his Phenomenology a variety of interpretations of the world and of the meaning and destiny of life are scrutinized as to their adequacy and concreteness. When not challenged, the point of view of common sense, for instance, seems concrete and natural. The reaction of common sense to the world is direct and practical, it has few questions to ask, and philosophic speculations appear to it abstract and barren. But, upon analysis, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... varying in value from 0 pence to 1500 pounds which were lost by a heedless public during the year, about 10,000 of which articles were restored to the owners. We had to regulate the street traffic; inspect common lodging-houses; attend the police and other courts to give evidence, and many other things which it would take me much too long to enumerate, and puzzle your pretty little head to ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... servant came back with disappointing news. There were carnation pinks in the king's greenhouses, and roses with golden hearts, and lovely lilies; but there was no rosemary. Rosemary was a common herb and grew, mostly, in country gardens, so the ...
— The Story-teller • Maud Lindsay
... like the d'Harcourt, crowded at night with noisy women tawdry in ostrich plumes, cheap feather boas, and much rouge. The d'Harcourt at midnight is ablaze with light, but the crowd is common and you move on up the boulevard under the trees, past the shops full of Quartier fashions—velvet coats, with standing collars buttoning close under the chin; flamboyant black silk scarfs tied in a huge bow; queer broad-brimmed, black hats without which no ...
— The Real Latin Quarter • F. Berkeley Smith
... to think Truax isn't honest enough," contended Jack Benson. "He's certainly a fine workman. As to his being sulky, you know well enough that's a common fault among men who spend their lives listening to the noise of great engines. A man who can't make himself heard over the noise of a big engine hasn't much encouragement to talk. Now, a man who can't find much chance to talk becomes sulky ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies - The Prize Detail at Annapolis • Victor G. Durham
... best aims. Since we have been here I have realized the difference between us that I only felt vaguely before. You belong to these people. You have their ways and it is not all education, either. This is why I feel your people could not have been in the common walks ...
— The Girls at Mount Morris • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... by his bedside. He shall see as I didn't forget him in trouble. On'y to think him a real gent with a handle to his name and lots of money to come in for when he's one-and-twenty. Right as a trivet yes'day morning and now in such a hobble as this, just like any common chap as goes and kills his mate. They can't hang him, but I s'pose they'll give it to him pretty hot, poor chap! Juries is such beasts, they'd take 'n give it to him hard because he's a real gent, ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... ration it was divided between us. Our great longing was for bread and molasses, just as it had been with Hubbard and me when we were short of food, and we were constantly talking of the feasts we would have of these delicacies when we reached the Post—wheat bread and common black molasses. ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... can't stand the expense. They're all keepin' up with Lizzie, but on the wrong road. The girls are worse than the boys. They go out o' the private school an' beat the bush for a husband. At first they hope to drive out a duke or an earl; by-an'-by they're willin' to take a common millionaire; at last they conclude that if they can't get a stag they'll take a rabbit. Then we learn that they're engaged to a young man, an' are goin' to marry as soon as he can afford it. He wears himself out in the struggle, ...
— Keeping up with Lizzie • Irving Bacheller
... R.A.M.C. Before he left he took the opportunity of explaining to Bastin how much better it was in such a national emergency as existed, to belong to a profession in which a man could do something to help the bodies of his countrymen that had been broken in the common cause, than to one like his in which it was only possible to ...
— When the World Shook - Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot • H. Rider Haggard
... painful facts of the case—that the old Alcalde, who was respected and even loved by every one, should have failed in so pitiful a way to make any attempt at saving his young relation. But the mere fact that the soldiers had cut the throat of their officer surprised no one; it was a common thing in the case of a defeat in those days for the men to turn upon and murder their officers. Nor was throat-cutting a mere custom or convention: to the old soldier it was the only satisfactory way of finishing off your adversary, or ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... people are always thinking, that I hear very often from men, and that I have no doubt that I should hear from many of you, one by one. You talk about your earlier religion as if it had been some sort of a bondage from which you had escaped. How common it is to hear men, especially in this region, say: "I would be, perhaps, religious, except that there was so much religion forced upon me in my earliest days. I was driven to church when I was a boy, in those old Puritan days. I went to school, where they forced prayers upon me all the time. ...
— Addresses • Phillips Brooks
... a strong hold upon the affections of the people. With a large store of plain common-sense, with an even temper, an abounding good-nature, and a humor that cast wise thoughts into the form of pithy maxims and similes, he combined an unflinching firmness, and loyalty to his convictions of duty. He refused to be hurried ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... its appropriate officer. Over every ten millenaries he placed one general; and over an army of several bodies of ten thousand men, two or three dukes, one of whom had the superior command. When they join battle against their enemies, unless the whole army retreat by common consent, all who fly are put to death. If one, two, or more of a decury proceed bravely to battle, and the rest do not follow, the cowards are slain. If one, two, or more of the decury are made prisoners ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... Common to the Mineral Acids.—Stains and corrosions about the mouth, chin, and fingers, or wherever the acid has come in contact. The inside of the mouth, fauces, and oesophagus, is white and corroded, yellow or dark brown, and shrivelled. ...
— Aids to Forensic Medicine and Toxicology • W. G. Aitchison Robertson
... upon the Indians, such as destroying their corn, killing their domestic animals, and whipping the women and children. They carried with them, as articles of traffic, whiskey and other intoxicating liquors, and by distributing them in the tribe, made drunkenness and scenes of debauchery common. Black Hawk and the other chiefs of the band, remonstrated against these encroachments, and especially in regard to the introduction of spirituous liquors among their people: and, upon one occasion, when ...
— Great Indian Chief of the West - Or, Life and Adventures of Black Hawk • Benjamin Drake
... that worthy man had taken of him, and his having often invited him to become his guest, had been the occasion of others following his example; besides which, he had been the means of getting his pension increased to one hundred roubles a year, which is the common pay of an ensign in all parts of the empress's dominions, except in this province, where the pay of all the officers is double. Major Behm told us that he had obtained permission to take him to Okotzk, which was to be the place ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 17 • Robert Kerr
... compared to the Roman world. The authority of national aim is acknowledged, and privileges melt away before the common object ...
— The World's Greatest Books—Volume 14—Philosophy and Economics • Various
... other British officers to the headquarters of the governor of the town; and introduced them to him, giving him a lively account of the fight with the guerillas, and the manner in which the prisoners, armed only with clubs and the muskets of the soldiers no longer able to use them, had made common cause with the French and, joining them in the sortie, defeated the Spanish with heavy loss. The governor expressed, courteously, his thanks to the officers for the part they ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... sir. What objection could there be? The child is not a common child; she is one that anybody might like to have in the house. I should think you and my mother might enjoy it very much, especially with ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... evil report is that sanctification is an impracticable day-dream, unfit for everyday life and the common round of duties. "It is," so it is said, "all very well for ministers, and class leaders, and superintendents of Sunday-schools, and people who are not very busy in life to get sanctification, but it will not stand the strain and tension to which it would be subjected ...
— The Heart-Cry of Jesus • Byron J. Rees
... been accomplished by main strength and awkwardness, as the old phrase is. It was no place indeed for skill to evince itself; but people pushed about in the most incredible way when they tried to move, though mostly they did not try; they let their boats lie still, and sway with the common movement when the water rose and sank, or fluctuated unseen beneath them. There were more and more people of the sort that there can never be enough of, such as young girls beautifully dressed in airy muslins and light silks, sheltered but not hidden ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... only very temporary. As his breath, short from exertion, began to come more regularly, his thoughts dropped back from the tangle of weak helplessness into their proper common-sense groove. ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... there was I, Unshaved, and with erratic tie, And for that once I yearn'd to shun My social system's central sun. How could a sloven slave express The frank, the manly tenderness That wraps you round from common thought, And does not ask that you should know The love that consecrates you so. No; furtive, awkward, restless, cold, I basely seemed to set at naught That sudden bliss, undreamt, unsought. What must ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari Volume 98, January 4, 1890 • Various
... I began; and then I stopped. What could I say that would convince him? There was no common ground of argument on which we could meet; and after all it would be easier for him to die feeling that she had known. Strangely enough, I saw that ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... They cannot help these things. If Warden Smith could avoid it there would not be a single man sent down to that region of death. The mines are there and must be worked. Let this blame fall where it belongs. I must say injustice to our common humanity, that to work these two classes, the boys and old men, in those coal mines is a burning shame and outrage. It is bad enough, as the sequel will show, to put able-bodied, middle-aged men ...
— The Twin Hells • John N. Reynolds
... when the prosperity of Hrothgar was fully established, it came into his mind to build a great hall where he and his warriors and counselors could meet around one common banquet table and where, as they drank their mead, they could discuss means for increasing their power and making better the condition of their peoples. High-arched and beautiful was the great mead-palace, with towering ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V3 • Charles H. Sylvester
... trade union, no voice in Parliament, no means of educating himself in the intricate theory of the machinery he helped to build, the mechanic of sixty years ago was regarded by those above him in the social scale merely as a "hand." When, therefore, steamships became common, and men were needed to operate and care for the propelling mechanism, they were naturally drawn from the ranks of mechanics who were employed in the works to construct it. Stokers were enlisted, in a similar way, ...
— An Ocean Tramp • William McFee
... common street-lamp got its opportunity, and it shone like a star. Isn't there a good deal of human ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... This is no question of the Pope and the Pope's person, but of the liberty of all the Church, and of all the Episcopate, of your liberty and mine, of the liberty of princes, peoples, and all Christian souls. Miserable man, have you lost all common sense, all catholic sense, even the ordinary sense of language?" In vain D confesses his errors, owns that he is converted, and implores mercy. "No," X replies in conclusion, "this is not enough; your tongue has ...
— Rome in 1860 • Edward Dicey
... on the following day. Pauline had dark shadows under her eyes, and there was a fretful note in her voice. Nurse declared that Briar and Patty had caught cold, and could not imagine how they had managed to do so; but Miss Tredgold said that colds were common in hot weather, and that the children had played too long in the open air on the previous night. In short, those who were out of the mischief suspected nothing, and Pauline began to hope that her wild escapade ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade
... innumerable trifles, absorbing amusements, tyrannical egotisms, and that pernicious flood of ephemeral literature, whose varieties are daily spawned upon all tables. The long, careful letters, full of thought, full of true personal interest and earnest general sentiment, so common two or three generations ago, are all but unknown now. There is no time left ...
— The Friendships of Women • William Rounseville Alger
... it can hardly be said that the attempted computations have added much of definiteness to that proposition. They have, indeed, proved that the period of time to be drawn upon is not infinite; but the nebular hypothesis, to say nothing of common-sense, carried us as far ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams
... arising from matter that is not alive is known as Spontaneous Generation. Two hundred years ago it was supposed to occur frequently. It was common belief that the beautiful pickerel weed which borders our Northern lakes, after freezing, went into a sort of protoplasmic slime out of which pickerel were produced. The eelgrass of the river was supposed ...
— The Meaning of Evolution • Samuel Christian Schmucker
... in its nest. But as he leans against the mother's bosom and follows her gaze, there is a serious and even grand expression in his eyes which Raphael and other painters always sought to give to the child Jesus to mark the difference between him and common children. ...
— Raphael - A Collection Of Fifteen Pictures And A Portrait Of The - Painter With Introduction And Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll
... the drawing-room, she would be no less admirably at ease on the tennis lawn, in the boat, on horseback, or walking by the seashore. Beyond criticism her breeding; excellent her education. There appeared, too, in her ordinary speech, her common look, a real amiability of disposition; one could not imagine her behaving harshly or with conscious injustice. Her manners—within the recognised limits—were frank, spontaneous; she had for the most ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... The fact that I would advance is, that swifts tread, or copulate, on the wing: and I would wish any nice observer, that is startled at this supposition, to use his own eyes, and I think he will soon be convinced. In another class of animals, viz., the insect, nothing is so common as to see the different species of many genera in conjunction as they fly. The swift is almost continually on the wing; and as it never settles on the ground, on trees, or roofs, would seldom find opportunity for amorous rites, was it not enabled to indulge ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... Ruskin, is 'that it should show, first, that the designer of it had a pretty fancy; next, that the maker of it had fine fingers; lastly, that the wearer of it has worthiness or dignity enough to obtain what is difficult to obtain, and common-sense enough not to wear ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... Marie, was tomahawked by unknown Indians, [ 1 ] who proved to be two brothers, instigated by the heathen chiefs. A great commotion followed, and for a few days it seemed that the adverse parties would fall to blows, at a time when the common enemy threatened to destroy them both. But sager counsels prevailed. In view of the manifest strength of the Christians, the pagans lowered their tone; and it soon became apparent that it was the part of the Jesuits to insist boldly on satisfaction for ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... colt, and vented her superfluous energy in climbing trees, walking fences, and running races, until Aunt Jane and her followers raised their hands and eyes in well-bred horror. But Jean's unselfish devotion to her mother, her real refinement, her quick understanding, and her sound common sense did much to atone for her hoydenish ways, and gave promise of the fine womanhood which lay before her. At first it had been a matter of some surprise, in the aristocratic old town, that Mrs. Adams and Mrs. Hapgood, representatives of "our first families," ...
— Half a Dozen Girls • Anna Chapin Ray
... mortified, went to the spot where the weapon lay, lifted it, poised it in his hand with great wonder, and examined it closely, as if he expected to discover more in it than a common hammer. He at length returned it to the owner with a melancholy smile, shrugging his shoulders and shaking his head as the smith asked him whether he ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... sometimes I had seen upon the face of a certain Zulu lady named Mameena, especially at the moment of her wonderful and tragic death. The thought made me shiver a little; I could not tell why, for certainly, I reflected, this high-placed and fortunate English girl had nothing in common with that fate-driven Child of Storm, whose dark and imperial spirit dwelt in the woman called Mameena. They were as far apart as Zululand is from Essex. Yet it was quite sure that both of them had ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... had been found to be infertile, or their mongrel offspring to be sterile, then it would have been said: These are not varieties but true species. Thus the old theory led to inevitable reasoning in a circle; and what might be only a rather common fact was elevated into a ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace |
