"Plain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of which obscurity is for that the motion of human discourse cannot attain to the simplicity of the divine knowledge, which if by any means we could conceive, there would not remain any doubt at all; which I will endeavour to make manifest and plain when I have first explicated that which moveth thee. For I demand why thou thinkest their solution unsufficient, who think that free-will is not hindered by foreknowledge, because they suppose that foreknowledge is not the cause ...
— The Theological Tractates and The Consolation of Philosophy • Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius
... Over our heads and far away, clouds turned the rolling mountains to snowpeaks that dazzled in the sun, and under our eyes seemed to lie all Scotland, spread out like a vast brocaded mantle of many colours: the plain of the Forth, the Ochil hills and the hills of Fife; the purple peaks round Loch Lomond, and here and there a glitter of water like broken glass on a floor of gold. Ten counties we could see, and eight great battlefields which helped to make Scotland what it is. The horizon was carved in shapes ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... feeling of interest in Mary's character and misfortunes, that but few open and direct censures of her conduct were then, or have been since, expressed. People execrated Bothwell, but they were silent in respect to Mary. It was soon plain, however, that she had greatly sunk in their regard, and that the more they reflected upon the circumstances of the case, the deeper she was sinking. When the excitement, too, began to pass away from her own mind, it left behind it a gnawing inquietude and sense ...
— Mary Queen of Scots, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... Crown, it very soon slipped off the heads of the Carolingian successors and rolled back onto the Italian plain, where it became a sort of plaything of a number of little potentates who stole the crown from each other amidst much bloodshed and wore it (with or without the permission of the Pope) until it was the turn of some more ambitious neighbour. The Pope, once more ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... expected in this changeable latitude. Captain Breaker was as perplexed as any one, however skilful, must have been in the same situation. It was impossible to know what the chase would do, though it was plain enough, since she put out her lights, that ...
— Within The Enemy's Lines - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... departmental hand. They have their own morality. My line of inquiry would appear to him an awful perversion of duty. For him the plain duty is to fasten the guilt upon as many prominent anarchists as he can on some slight indications he had picked up in the course of his investigation on the spot; whereas I, he would say, am bent upon vindicating their innocence. ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... cold water, then dry it before the fire. Put half an ounce of butter in a frying-pan; when quite hot throw in the rice, fry it a light colour, add a dessertspoonful of grated cheese and a little cayenne and salt. A dessertspoonful of plain tomato sauce may be added or not. The rice ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 354, October 9, 1886 • Various
... seen as a child, and remembered as a place past all speech beautiful, and yet failed ever to realize in after years, or to make any one remember, or, save fleetingly in dreams to see once more, since the picture-book is never, never chanced upon again. Sometimes he had dreamed of a great sunny plain, with armies marching; sometimes he had awakened at hearing the chimes, and fancied sleepily that it was infinite music; sometimes, in the country in the early morning, he had had an unreasonable, unaccountable ...
— Romance Island • Zona Gale
... did not scruple, now and then, to introduce an anecdote from history, or borrow an allusion from some non-scriptural author, in order to enliven the attention of his audience, or render an argument more plain. And the good man had an object in this, a little distinct from, though wholly subordinate to the main purpose of his discourse. He was a friend to knowledge—but to knowledge accompanied by religion; and, sometimes, his references ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... hairpins I mean those long double-pronged ornaments of flexible metal which are called kanzashi, and are more or less ornamented according to the age of the wearer. (The kanzashi made for young girls are highly decorative; those worn by older folk are plain, or adorned only with a ball of coral or polished stone.) The new hairpins might be called commemorative: one, of which the decoration represents a British and a Japanese flag intercrossed, celebrates the Anglo-Japanese ...
— The Romance of the Milky Way - And Other Studies & Stories • Lafcadio Hearn
... indolence. Writing on Aug. 1, 1780, after mentioning the failure of his application to Lord Westcote, he continues:—'There is an ingenious scheme to save a day's work, or part of a day, utterly defeated. Then what avails it to be wise? The plain and the artful man must both do their own work.—But I think I have got a life of Dr. Young.' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... her eyes wide and wondering, and on her face that rapt look which Morris had caught in his sketch of her, singing in the chapel. At the edge of the base of this remarkable effigy, set flush on the black marble in letters of plain copper was her name—Stella Fregelius—with the date of her death. On one side appeared the text that she had quoted, "O death, where is thy sting?" and on the other its continuation, "O grave, where is thy victory?" and at the foot part of ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard
... from all parts to Medina. Our chief desire was to follow the apostle of God, and imitate him. When we came to Dhul Holaifa, the apostle of God prayed in the mosque there; then mounting his camel he rode hastily to the plain Baida, where he began to praise God in the form that professes his unity, saying, 'Here I am, O God, ready to obey thee; thou hast no partner,' etc. When he came to the Kaaba, he kissed the corner of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... that such was the case. Had Mr Tombe given the usual address of Nethercoats, nothing further would have been demanded from him on that subject. But he had foolishly presumed that the question had been based on special information as to his client's visit to London, and he had told the plain truth ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... in London, but springing from Caxbury. Here in this book is a genealogical tree of the Stephen Fitzmaurice Smiths of Caxbury Manor. You may be only a family of professional men now—I am not inquisitive: I don't ask questions of that kind; it is not in me to do so—but it is as plain as the nose in your face that there's your origin! And, Mr. Smith, I congratulate you upon your blood; blue blood, sir; and, upon my life, a very desirable ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... she could see the rider's figure grow small, as it receded across the plain. The night had come and the great level brooded solemn under the light of the first, serene stars. In the middle of the camp Daddy John's fire flared, the central point of illumination in a ring of fluctuant yellow. Touched and lost by its waverings the old man's figure ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... though I often tried to, when I got on such a hunt after an idea, until I had caught it, and when I thought I had got it, I was not satisfied until I had repeated it over and over; until I had put it in language plain enough, as I thought, for any boy I knew to comprehend. This was a kind of passion with me, and it has stuck by me; for I am never easy now when I am handling a thought until I have bounded it north, and bounded it south, ...
— Questionable Amusements and Worthy Substitutes • J. M. Judy
... plain in the heat of the midday sun and you return the same way the next morning after a rainy night—what has happened? The ground which yesterday looked so parched and barren is now covered with millions of tiny blades. Where has this sudden life come from? It was there all the time. ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... It was plain that Emily never had. "I—I'm afraid I don't understand," she faltered. "You say he was in the second story of a building and he stepped on—on ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln
... pursue, Henry Ware had said nothing; but all the primitive impulses of man handed down from lost ages of ceaseless battle were alive within him; he wished them to go, he would show the way, the savage army would make a trail through the forest as plain to him as a turnpike to the modern dweller in a civilized land, and his heart throbbed with fierce exultation, when the decision to follow was at last given. In the forest now he was again at home, more so than he had been inside the palisade. ...
— The Young Trailers - A Story of Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... tells us, were many who had hitherto been "professors of Christ Jesus' gospel according to the brightness thereof." He denounces Christopher Vittel, the joiner, as "the only man that hath brought our simple people out of the plain ways of the Lord our God," and complains how "he driveth the true sense of the Holy Ghost into allegories," and contendeth that "otherwise to interpret the Holy Scriptures is to stick to the letter." ...
— The Digger Movement in the Days of the Commonwealth • Lewis H. Berens
... the most important evidence available to the student of natural selection in man. The conclusion to be drawn from them seems plain. Natural selection, which has in the past never had an opportunity to act upon the Negro race through tuberculosis, is now engaged in hastening, at a relatively rapid rate, the evolution of this race toward immunity ...
— Applied Eugenics • Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson
... "Yes, to dust, plain ordinary dust, but dust of the lightest kind," was the reply. "If you could go up in the air a hundred miles, the sky above you in the middle of the day would be jet black and the sun would shine down on you like a great bright-blue ball, without any white glare around ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... It was plain that Theodose was beginning to take wing toward higher social spheres; elegance was becoming a constant thought in his mind. He appeared in a dress suit and varnished shoes, whereas his two associates received him in frock-coats ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... which was worth all the rest, she bred them up very religiously, being herself a very sober, pious woman, very house-wifely and clean, and very mannerly, and with good behaviour. So that in a word, expecting a plain diet, coarse lodging, and mean clothes, we were brought up as mannerly and as genteelly as if we had been ...
— The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c. • Daniel Defoe
... I went to Narragansett Pier to work as a chambermaid for the summer. In the fall, I came back to Boston and obtained a situation with a family, in Berwick Park. This family afterward moved to Jamaica Plain, and I went with them. With this family I remained seven years. They were very kind to me, gave me two or three weeks' ...
— Memories of Childhood's Slavery Days • Annie L. Burton
... at its head, had been formed against France, and that our troops were opposing the Allies in various parts of Europe. The Elector of Bavaria had joined his forces to ours, and had already done us some service. On the 12th of August he led his men into the plain of Hochstedt, where, during the previous year, he had gained a victory over the Imperialists. In this plain he was joined by our troops, who took up positions right and left of him, under the command of Tallard and Marsin. The Elector himself had command of all. Soon after ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... position at Fontenay, where he was joined by General Sandoz, from Niort. The country around the town was unfavourable for the Vendeans, being a large plain, and the result was disastrous to them. The Republicans were strong in cavalry, and a portion of these fell on the flank of the Vendeans, while the remainder charged them in rear. They fell into disorder at once, and the cavalry captured ...
— No Surrender! - A Tale of the Rising in La Vendee • G. A. Henty
... tormentor, "it was as plain as A B C to me that night, and I chuckled right smart to myself when I saw you innocently pin them, on your breast. It was simply delicious! But"—suddenly laying her hands on the pretty brown head—"bless you, my children! you have my unqualified sanction and I'll put my whole ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... mule about, end for end, retraced some part of the way we had gone, and, striking into another path, led me to the mountain village, which was, as we say in Scotland, the kirk-town of that thinly peopled district. Some broken memories dwell in my mind of the day breaking over the plain, of the cart stopping, of arms that helped me down, of a bare room into which I was carried, and of a swoon that fell upon ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... inner Ceramicus, where Aspasia resided. The building, like all the private houses of Athens, had a plain exterior, strongly contrasted by the magnificence of surrounding temples, and porticos. At the gate, an image of Hermes looked toward the harbour, while Phoebus, leaning on his lyre, appeared to ...
— Philothea - A Grecian Romance • Lydia Maria Child
... College Carmarthen, where his piety—which was an adage—was above that of any student. Of him this was said: "'White Jesus bach is as plain on his lips as the purse of ...
— My Neighbors - Stories of the Welsh People • Caradoc Evans
... formidable appearance and the hornwork certainly on that side was not in the least danger of being taken by the English by an assault from the other side of the river. On the appearance of the English troops on the plain of the lake house Montguet and La Motte, two old captains in the Regiment of Bearn, cried out with vehemence to M. de Vaudreuil, that the hornwork would be taken in an instant, by an assault sword in hand, that we would all ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... of her philosophy are often characterised by an astonishing naivete. "God being All-in-all, He made medicine," she tells us; "but that medicine was Mind. . . . It is plain that God does not employ drugs or hygiene, nor provide them for human use; else Jesus would have recommended and employed them ...
— Modern Saints and Seers • Jean Finot
... lass will be dull with only us plain folk, and so I've got a concert for her. Now, what would you like to hear—the opera at Covent Garden, the Queen's ...
— Sarah's School Friend • May Baldwin
... plain, the road's as smooth, The posting not increased, You're scarcely stouter than you were, Not younger, ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh
... Plain for all folk to see, Horatius in his harness, Halting upon his knee: And underneath is written, In letters all of gold, How valiantly he kept the bridge In the brave days ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... all feel temper to be the first thing is plain from the fact that when we see two men quarrelling we seldom even try to weigh their arguments—we look instinctively at the tone or spirit or temper which the two display ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... Tlascalans,—inveterate enemies of the Aztecs,—slowly moved away from that blood-stained avenue of death, now little molested by their foes, and gradually recovering from their fatigue. On the seventh morning they reached the mountain height which overlooks the plain of Otumba, a point less than thirty miles from the capital. This plain they were obliged to traverse on their way to Tlascala, ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... ascends the lofty mountain to gaze upon the unfolding wonders of God. Let my liberated spirit not only look upward, but mount upward, as on eagles' wings, till rising above the Pleiades, and leaving the Milky-way to fade out in the receding distance, it walks with God on the ever-ascending plain, reached only by ...
— Autobiography of Frank G. Allen, Minister of the Gospel - and Selections from his Writings • Frank G. Allen
... I had crossed the greater part of the obscure plain, at its lowest dip and not far from the climb up to Radicofani, that I saw lights shining in a large farmhouse, and though it was my business to walk by night, yet I needed companionship, so ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... as plain as I'm pleasant—mind you're no to expect me to dance with you.' 'It's verra weel o' you, Miss Mary,' replied Andrew pawkily, 'to tak the first word o' flyting; but ye should first ken whether ye're come up to my mark ...
— The Proverbs of Scotland • Alexander Hislop
... condition we turn momentarily from the bright sunlight and look back into the darkened room, objects there will be much more plain to our vision than things outside which are illumined by the powerful rays of the sun. So it is also with the spirit, when it has first been released from the body it perceives sights, scenes and sounds of the material world, which it has just ...
— The Rosicrucian Mysteries • Max Heindel
... a time hath it proudly swept over prairie and hill, over river and plain, through sleeping gardens and drowsy cities, swiftly and quietly, bearing the little ones to the far, pleasant valley ...
— The Holy Cross and Other Tales • Eugene Field
... taking place in the Plain of Nero, meantime the rest of the barbarian army stayed very near their camps and, protecting themselves with their shields, vigorously warded off their opponents, destroying many men and a much larger number of horses. But on the Roman side, when those who had been wounded and those whose ...
— Procopius - History of the Wars, Books V. and VI. • Procopius
... volumes has been undertaken with the view of supplying the want of a class of books for children, of a vigorous, manly tone, combined with a plain and concise mode of narration. The writings of Charles Dickens have been selected as the basis of the scheme, on account of the well-known excellence of his portrayal of children, and the interests connected with children—qualities ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... the peril of incurring her aunt's displeasure, for not finishing, ere she returned, a representation of the garden of Eden in satin-stitch, according to her order. Eustace looked at the plan, and finding it would save time, they agreed that plain grass would look as well on a firescreen, as all the crocodiles and elephants which with literal deference to natural history Mrs. Mellicent had drawn up rank and file, on each side Adam and Eve. ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... aloof. Excepting that he wore a beard and robe, his appearance even had nothing in common with them; and his talar was not like theirs, embroidered with hieroglyphics, tongues, and flames, but of plain white stuff, which gave him the aspect of a ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... operations. Here they determined to encamp for the night on the margin of a small stream, where there was grass for the mule and shelter under the trees for the men. On making their way, however, to the place, they observed an Indian village down on a plain below, and, being uncertain as to the numbers or the temper of the natives, they were about to cross the stream and continue their journey a little further, when a party of six Indians suddenly made their appearance in front, and advanced fearlessly, making ...
— Digging for Gold - Adventures in California • R.M. Ballantyne
... publishers begin to respect him much more than formerly, and where even mammas are by no means uncivil to him. For if the pretty daughters are, naturally, to marry people of very different expectations, at any rate, he will be eligible for the plain ones; and if the brilliant and fascinating Myra is to hook an earl, poor little Beatrice, who has one shoulder higher than the other, must hang on to some boor through life, and why should not Mr. Pendennis ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... nearly dry, close to the stony hills: when full they must retain water for a long time. There is very little water in the main channel. At nine miles I found a large and excellent pool of water in one of the side creeks; it will last some time. It being now afternoon, and there being a nice open plain for the horses, I have camped. The river is now running through stony hills, which are very rough, composed of hard sandstone mixed with veins of quartz, some of which are very hard, much resembling marble with crystalline ...
— Explorations in Australia, The Journals of John McDouall Stuart • John McDouall Stuart
... asserts that, on the contrary, such a dollar is the very worst dollar conceivable. But a moment's reflection will satisfy any sane mind that such is the case. The demonstration is so simple that one feels like apologizing for making it. Yet it is in respect to principles just as plain as this one that people are constantly allowing themselves to be taken in by the supporters of the ...
— The Arena - Volume 18, No. 92, July, 1897 • Various
... stand in comparison, or rather—contrast, with those who surrounded her, and to know that in personal as well as mental advantages, she bore away the undisputed palm of preference—(the three teachers were all plain.) Her pupils she managed with such indulgence and address, taking always on herself the office of recompenser and eulogist, and abandoning to her subalterns every invidious task of blame and punishment, ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... that I never see a thousand or so of these boys on the big plain playing what they call football that I don't wish some American chaps were here to teach them the game. All they do here is to throw off their coats and kick the ball as far, and as high, as possible, and run like racers after it, while the ...
— On the Edge of the War Zone - From the Battle of the Marne to the Entrance of the Stars and Stripes • Mildred Aldrich
... walking was bad. Little mounds in the salty crust made it hard to place a foot on the level. This crust appeared fairly strong. But when it rang hollow under our boots, then I stepped very cautiously. The color was a dirty gray and yellow. Far ahead I could see a dazzling white plain that looked like frost or a frozen river. The atmosphere was deceptive, making this plain seem far away ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... which joins the ends of two pieces of metal as described in the foregoing part of this chapter. The ends are in plain sight of the operator at all times and it can easily be seen when the metal reaches the welding heat and begins to soften (Figure 46). It is at this point that the pressure must be applied with the lever and the ends forced together ...
— Oxy-Acetylene Welding and Cutting • Harold P. Manly
... coming from the South, and making their way for the river below us. They were about ten miles away and I could not tell by looking through my glasses just the exact number, but I could see them plain enough to tell they were ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... Egyptian litanies softly chanted behind the propylons of a temple built by some king two thousand years departed. But oftener their eyes ran ahead over the prow, and they walked again across the Forum of the city of their fathers, and drove across the Latin plain-land, and spoke their own dear, sonorous, yet ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... she, "I am a fool to weep at what I am glad of. I will answer you in plain and holy innocence. I am your wife, if ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan
... set out for Major Snowden's where we arrived at 4 o'clock in the evening. The gate (was) hung between 2 trees which were scarcely wide enough to admit it. We were treated with great hospitality and civility by the major and his wife who were plain people and made every effort to make our stay ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... partridge without aiming at it; and skill is acquired by repeated attempts. When you write a letter, give it your greatest care, that it may be as perfect in all its parts as you can make it. Let the subject be sense, expressed in the most plain, intelligible, and elegant manner that you are capable of If in a familiar epistle you should be playful and jocular, guard carefully that your wit be not sharp, so as to, give pain to any person; and before You write a sentence, examine ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... it was necessary to begin the daily march long before dawn in order to reach the new camping ground while it was still tolerably cool. We crossed the Kabul river at Nowshera, which place was then being made into a station for troops, and marched about the Yusafzai plain for three weeks. The chief difficulty was the absence of water, and I had to prospect the country every afternoon for a sufficient supply, and to determine, with regard to this sine qua non, where the camp should ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... to the days of Hammurabi. The theory has accordingly been advanced that the worship of Ramman came to Babylonia from the north, and since the cult of this same god is found in Damascus and extended as far south as the plain of Jezreel, the further conclusion has been drawn that the god is of Aramaic origin and was brought to Assyria through Aramaic tribes who had settled in parts of Assyria. The great antiquity of the Ramman cult in Assyria argues against a foreign origin. ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow
... buzz of corroboration answered him. It was plain that the assignment of Ivan's mission, publicly made as it had been the night before, had deeply impressed the children of the community. They closed around the two boys. The small Josephine laid a propelling hand upon Ivan's shoulder and tried to push him forward, with a vague idea of ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... Stephen's favourite places. And it happened that when they reached the solitary yew-tree near which Snip was buried, all the rest strolled on, and left Stephen and Miss Anne alone. Before them, down at the foot of the mountains, there stretched a wide plain many miles across, beautiful with woods and streams; and on the far horizon there hung a light cloud that was always to be seen there, the index of those great works where Stephen was to dwell for some years. Near to them they could discern, in the clear atmosphere, the ...
— Fern's Hollow • Hesba Stretton
... By that plain arrangement of the hair, by that costume of extreme simplicity, by the brow polished like marble and as hard and impenetrable, she recognized one of those gloomy Puritans she had so often met, not only in the court of King James, but in that of the King of France, ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... degrees his own and his father's fortunes came to seem by contrast mean and small. He fell readily enough into ways which, reasonable for Eudemius, were extravagant for him. But, in spite of his inclinations toward the life sybaritic, it was plain that he had no intention of getting himself in debt to Eudemius in any shape or form. When Eudemius judged the time to be ripe, he brought Varia upon the scene. This he did after his own fashion, studying carefully each effect ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... noiseless, went on in the darkness, and another like it seemed to rise from the plain and join it. Then they were lost to the sight of the pursuer, seeming to melt into and become a part of the surrounding darkness. Dick, perplexed and uneasy, returned to the fire. The second shadow must certainly have been that of a stranger. ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... as much. I knew your father, Eustace Loring, and though he would have made two of you, yet he has left his stamp plain enough upon your face." ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... himself and his service unto God, he counted it not right to withdraw the same, unless it should be plain that this was not the way wherein God would ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... barren promontory after a twopenny-halfpenny Dutch cockle-shell is a gross insult to the thousands of miles of sea between that point and any other land. Fortunately the little Dutch vessel had a name which sounds all right if only pronounced in plain English—Lioness in place of Leeuwin—but the vessel might have been called Rats, or Schnapps, or some other name even less dignified, and one that would have been adopted just the same. It is the principle of the thing that the great sea objects ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol 2 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... they were driven half distracted by the clamour of the streets. These men lived, upon the whole, lives of not immoderate labour: or, as one might say, of sober ease, They possessed little money, it is true, but the want of it did not appear to trouble them. Their houses were plain, their method of life simple, and clearly it had not entered their minds to covet any more sumptuous modes of life. All this is changed now. The daily press, which presents a thousand pictures of the bustling life of cities, goes everywhere, ...
— The Quest of the Simple Life • William J. Dawson
... is just as true, believe me, that a simple, plain sermon, exhibited and sealed by your life, is more valuable than a thousand ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... of this room was all too plain. It was fitted with compressors, leading to a tube that left the ship under water. A small but powerful crane was in place over a closed hatchway. The latter, when opened, was found to lead down into a second hold, also electrically lighted. The two ...
— Dave Darrin After The Mine Layers • H. Irving Hancock
... our route was through a woody country; we then reached a level plain nearly destitute of wood. On this plain we observed some hundreds of a species of antelope of a dark colour with a white mouth; they are called by the natives Da qui, and are nearly as large as a bullock. At half past ten o'clock ...
— The Journal Of A Mission To The Interior Of Africa, In The Year 1805 • Mungo Park
... as a necessary step towards discovering what is when the limits exist. They appear to their opponents to forget the limits in their practical conclusions. This political argument is an instance of the same method. The genesis of his theory is plain. Mill's 'government,' like Bentham's, is simply the conception of legal 'sovereignty' transferred to the sphere of politics. Mill's exposition is only distinguished from his master's by the clearness with which he brings out the underlying assumptions. The legal sovereign is omnipotent, for what ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) - James Mill • Leslie Stephen
... along the excellent railway in a style calculated to make the "limited express" look to its laurels, and in less than two hours drew up at the station of Aiasulouk. Here the western chain of hills which we had skirted ceases, and the great marshy plain of Ephesus opens out, the river Cayster meandering through it. The insignificant station-house and platform, with a small coffee-house and some dwellings, reminded me of a prairie station in our Western country. But the eye was at once attracted ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... child. I too looked round the room, and satisfied myself that she had really disappeared. Mrs. Finch, observing our astonishment, timidly enlightened us. The maternal eye had seen Jicks slip out cunningly at Herr Grosse's heels. The child's object was plain enough. While there was any probability of the presence of more gingerbread in the surgeon's pocket, the wandering Arab of the family (as stealthy and as quick as a cat) was certain to keep within reach of her friend. Nobody who knew her could doubt that she had stolen into Lucilla's bed-chamber, ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... dragging along, and then suddenly the door rasped open, jarring the whole room. The cowboy entered, pulling a disheveled figure—that of a priest, a padre, whose mantle had manifestly been disarranged by the rude grasp of his captor. Plain it was that the ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... Uncle Peter made his appearance; and as actors always play best to a good audience, the weeping ladies continued their lachrymose performance with renewed vigour. Uncle Peter was a plain man—plain in every meaning of the word; that is to say, he was very ugly and very simple; and when we tell you that his face resembled nothing but a half-toasted muffin, you can picture to yourself what it must have looked like under the influence ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, November 13, 1841 • Various
... throats. As the General drove to Government House, he was greeted by cries of "Avenge Majuba!" and "Bravo, General!" and by the amount of emotion expended and the universal expression of relief evidenced, it was plain that the Cape colonists, like the cockney Londoner, were prepared "to bet their bottom dollar" on the combination of Sir Redvers Buller ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... village maids and farm-servants, as she saw them, strolling along the lake shore, with their brothers and friends, on summer evenings, when their work was done—or sometimes rowing over the lake, their plain brown faces lighted up with innocent enjoyment, and their gay songs and happy laughter ringing ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood
... autumn night on the plain. The smoke-lapels of the cone-shaped tepee flapped gently in the breeze. From the low night sky, with its myriad fire points, a large bright star peeped in at the smoke-hole of the wigwam between its fluttering lapels, down upon ...
— American Indian stories • Zitkala-Sa
... hands.—Already, on the 4th of June, 1790, the Minister of War announces to the Assembly that "the military body threatens to fall into a perfect state of anarchy." His report shows "the most incredible pretensions put forth in the most plain-spoken way—orders without force, chiefs without authority, the military chest and flags carried away, the orders of the King himself openly defied, the officers condemned, insulted, threatened, driven off; some of them even captive amidst ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... of the whip; and the captains of the Spartan phalanxes and the chiefs of the Barbarian cohorts soon arrived with the insignia of their rank, and in the armour of their nation. Night had fallen, a great tumult was spreading throughout the plain; fires were burning here and there; and the soldiers kept going from one to another asking what the matter was, and why the Suffet did ...
— Salammbo • Gustave Flaubert
... held its own for a wearisomely long time, but at the end of two hours it thinned, then dwarfed into low jungle, and finally vanished altogether, and we had arrived on the soil of Unyamwezi, with a broad plain, swelling, subsiding, and receding in lengthy and grand undulations in our front to one indefinite horizontal line which purpled in the far distance. The view consisted of fields of grain ripening, which followed the contour of the plain, and which rustled ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... language his rancour could suggest, as a wicked, proffigate, dull, beggarly miscreant, whom he had taught out of charity; but also inveighed in the most bitter manner against the memory of the judge (who by the by had procured that settlement for him), hinting, in pretty plain terms, that the old gentleman's soul was damned to all eternity for his injustice in neglecting to pay for my learning. This brutal behaviour, added to the sufferings I had formerly undergone made ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... other hand, is the most unobservant creature under the sun. He rarely understands even what is going on under his nose. It is all very well to say that his superior mind is wrapt up in percentages, or absorbed in grand schemes for the regeneration of mankind. The plain truth is that he does not possess the faculty of applying his intelligence to everything within his range of observation. Evolution intended him to possess it; but education systems, which harbour very little respect for the laws of Nature, have found ...
— The Curse of Education • Harold E. Gorst
... minority, through all the struggling years between 1832 and 1865. She had once an engagement with the editor of a "State Journal" to write weekly for his columns during a year. This, at that time seemed to her a great achievement. But a few plain words from her upon the Fugitive Slave Law, brought a note saying her services were no longer wanted; "He would not," the editor wrote, "publish sentiments in his Journal, which, if carried out, would strike at the foundations of all law, order, and government," and added much ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... authority, he "was not a deep thinker, but he was a great word-painter ... he has the inspiration as well as the contortions of the Sibyl, the strength as well as the nodosities of the oak. ... In the French Revolution he rarely condescends to plain narrative ... it resembles a drama at the Porte St. Martin, in so many acts and tableaux. ... The raisers of busts and statues in his honour are winging and pointing new arrows aimed at the reputation of their most distinguished contemporaries, ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... now continually arriving from Algeciras, with troops and stores; and on the 26th the Spaniards began to form a camp, on the plain below San Roque, three miles from the garrison. This increased in size, daily, as fresh regiments arrived ...
— Held Fast For England - A Tale of the Siege of Gibraltar (1779-83) • G. A. Henty
... any place in the decrees of that Judge who ever does what is right, and in whom moral evil can have no place? The subject is one which it seems not given to man thoroughly to comprehend. Permit me, however, to remark in reply, that in a sense so plain, so obvious, so unequivocally true, that it would lead an intelligent jury, impannelled in the case, conscientiously to convict, and a wise judge righteously to condemn, all that is evil in the present state of things man may as certainly have wrought out for himself, as the criminals ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... race as it exists to-day, a product of sixty years of freedom; on the whole, a plain, honest, Anglicized people, with no peculiarity except a harmless ignorance and superstition. Looking at it in contrast with what it was at the beginning of the period, one cannot but be impressed with the wonderful ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various
... fill me up wi' bromide, and it just makes me crazy, sir. I'm all right, cappen, if I only had a drink. Just give me a drink, cappen,—the doctor won't,—and send me down to my station, sir. I know it's only in my head, but I see 'em plain, all round. You'll give me a drink, cappen, please; I know you'll give ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... leave the combat out!" exclaimed the knight. "Yea! or we must renounce the Stagyrite. So large a crowd the stage will ne'er contain." —"Then build a new, or act it on a plain." POPE. ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... conqueror home again, and he watches him more sharply than ever—this man, whose new name is borrowed from his taken town. CORIOLANUS of CORIOLI. Marcius, plain Caius Marcius, now no more. He will think it treason—even in the conquered city he will resent it—if any presume to call him by that petty name henceforth, or forget for a breathing space to include in his identity the town—the town, that in its sacked and plundered ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... of the word Humility? Was Manon to recognise in Marguerite, in the opinion of M. Armand Duval, her superior in vice or in affection? The second interpretation seemed the more probable, for the first would have been an impertinent piece of plain speaking which Marguerite, whatever her opinion of herself, would ...
— Camille (La Dame aux Camilias) • Alexandre Dumas, fils
... shoulders. "I should think the inference was plain," he insinuated. Then, looking at Craig fixedly, as though to take his measure, he added, "We are not out of touch with what is going on down there, even if we are several thousand ...
— The Gold of the Gods • Arthur B. Reeve
... theory to the duties the theory suggests, he "subsides into the meekest conservatism." (It must be remembered that this was written at an early stage in Galton's work.) This conclusion was entirely opposed to Noyes' practical and religious temperament. "Duty is plain; we say we ought to do it—we want to do it; but we cannot. The law of God urges us on; but the law of society holds us back. The boldest course is the safest. Let us take an honest and steady look at the law. It is only in the timidity of ignorance that the duty seems impracticable." ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... the woman's magnificent gift and miserable position, had her into our houses, to hear her sing and see if nothing could be done to give her the full use of her noble natural endowment. She was a plain young woman of about thirty, tolerably decently dressed, and with a quiet, simple manner. She said her husband was a house-paperer in a small way, and when he was out of employment she used to go out in the evening and see what her singing would bring her. Poor thing! it ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... "Got three kinds: plain, with claws, and them patent ones that picks up tacks by electricity. I hold by them and kin recommend ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland
... above the cracked bell that proclaimed the continual auction of Krist, Dass and Friend, dealers in the second-hand. In its vivid familiarity it seemed to make straight for the two Englishmen, to surround and take possession of them, and they paused. The source of it was plain—an open door under a vast white signboard dingily lettered "The Salvation Army." It loomed through the smoke and the ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... effective electro-motive power of 60 volts per lamp. The light is very steady, and the effect produced is most satisfactory. The dispensing with all clock-work movement and regulating springs makes this electric lamp of Mr. Mondos a simple and plain apparatus, capable of numerous applications in the industries, in wide, open spaces, in all cases where foci of medium intensity have to be employed, and where it is desired to arrange several lamps in ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 362, December 9, 1882 • Various
... a tall man, loosely put together, with iron-grey hair, stooping shoulders, and a look on his long-featured face at once dreary and gentle. She was small and dark, alert and pretty, and, from the crown of her neatly-dressed head, in its plain straw hat, to the soles of her sensibly ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann
... in dense evergreens and blooming bushes, the distance to it from the upper end of the meadows being about eight miles. The road leads through majestic woods with ferns ten feet high beneath some of the thickets, and across a gravelly plain deforested by fire many years ago. Orange lilies are plentiful, and handsome shining mats of the kinnikinic, ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... themselves under the master's eye The cook is said to take good care of himself, and certainly his appearance does not belie the insinuation, for he is by far the fattest boy in the lot. The school building is a plain, low cottage, containing a school-room, a sleeping-room for the male children, another for the female, and apartments for the master and mistress. There is also an old out-building attached, where the children ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... history and present developments of the smelting of iron and other metals, their purification, their alloying, and properties—as also a museum of paper-making and one of the steam engine and its modern rivals. In such cases the purpose of the museum would be plain enough and ...
— More Science From an Easy Chair • Sir E. Ray (Edwin Ray) Lankester
... such a thing as composition of different orders of landscape, though there can be no generalization of them. Nature herself perpetually brings together elements of various expression. Her barren rocks stoop through wooded promontories to the plain; and the wreaths of the vine show through their green shadows the wan ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... There are some self-complacent persons whose minds are so unapt to recognize the magnitude of a subject, or so averse perhaps to the contemplation of it if it be of tragical aspect, that strong terms accumulated to exhibit even what surpasses in its plain reality all the powers of language, offend them as declamatory exaggeration. Let it then be just observed, without one ambitious epithet, that since that period when ancient history, strictly so named, left off describing the state of mankind, more ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster
... a plain, unvarnished tale," said Tom, "but it's one that ought to be told, and in this very spot. Perhaps you don't any of you know, that in Dr. Marks' school it's ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... plain, mountains in west, hills and low mountains in east; rugged mountains and broad river valleys in Alaska; rugged, volcanic ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... pressures up to 160 pounds in pipes and fittings for low pressure lines, and any fittings for high pressure lines should have plain faces, smooth tool finish, scored with V-shaped grooves for rubber gaskets. High pressure line flanges should have raised faces, projecting the full available diameter inside the bolt holes. These ...
— Steam, Its Generation and Use • Babcock & Wilcox Co.
... particular hurry. He passed the night at a small temperance hotel, and next morning, after a plain breakfast, started out for a stroll into the country. He had written a note to his father before leaving Padbury merely stating his intention, and giving no address. There was nothing more to be done but to enjoy himself as a ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... attention to their studies during the next few days; but Frank Sedley made a severe struggle to do so, and succeeded very well. Perhaps he accomplished as much or more by his efforts to induce his companions not to be carried away by the fascinations of boating as by the efforts of his own will. It was plain enough that his father would not permit the Zephyr to interfere with the studies of the boys, and he represented this danger very strongly to his friends. They all did their best to keep their minds ...
— The Boat Club - or, The Bunkers of Rippleton • Oliver Optic
... swings easily in his hammock, recruiting strength for fresh exertion; and even when the winds howl their worst, give him a tight ship and sea-room, and he holds himself safe and laughs at the tempest. The explorer of trackless plain and aboriginal forest is in a very different predicament. He is never safe; his toils and tribulations are unceasing; danger may not exist, but he must ever guard against it, for he knows not where it may lurk. With him, security is temerity and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... "It's plain to be seen, Sarah," said Hugh, as he turned away, "that your boy is different. I certainly hope he'll grow up to be a man you'll be proud of. You won't punish him for what happened today, will you? We promised him we'd ask you to go easy with him; he was dreadfully alarmed about his clothes, ...
— The Chums of Scranton High - Hugh Morgan's Uphill Fight • Donald Ferguson
... short and blocky; his shoulders welted with brawn; his chest was two hairy hills, like a gorilla's, while across his stomach muscles lay ridged like ropes. His waist was thick with pones of sinew bulging over the hips, as one sees in the statue of Discobolus. It was plain that Greer had labored tremendously all his life and that his ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... appointments of their monastery. The carved-oak staircase was there, but the stairs wore carpetless, and the panelled and parqueted hall was bare of ornament, except for a picture, in a pale oaken frame, of the head of Christ in its crown of thorns. A plain clock in a deal case was nailed up under the floral cornice, and beneath it there hung the text: "Lord, who shall dwell in thy tabernacle, or who shall rest upon thy holy hill? Even he that leadeth an uncorrupt life." The old dining-room was now the community room, ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... loved his son, who was a good-for-nothing fellow, like Anzoleto, and at last discarded him; that she refused the son of an English earl, and, when he fell sick, his father condescended to entreat for him, just as the Count of Rudolstadt did for his son; that, though plain and low in stature, when singing her best parts she appears beautiful, and awakens enthusiastic admiration; that she is rigidly correct in her demeanor towards her numerous admirers, having even returned a present sent her by the crown-prince, ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... quarter of a mile lower down he came to where the river, that above wandered in three channels over a rocky bed, now glided sluggishly in one channel. It was like a ribboned lake, smooth in its slow slip over a muddy bed, and circling in a long sweep to the bank. On the level plain was a concourse of thousands, horsemen, who sat their lean-flanked Marwari or Cabul horses as though they waited to swing into a parade, the march past. The sowars Barlow had seen in the town were in front of him, riding four abreast, and at a command from their leader, opened up and formed ...
— Caste • W. A. Fraser
... "It was a plain, double-edged, admirably-tempered dagger—a very workmanlike article indeed. On the cross hilt of it I swore one day that I would live thenceforth for one thing alone—the discovery of the murderer of old D'Avray's child, whom I had promised him to care for before ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... hand, or south fork of the cross-roads, and gallopped on until they reached the branch road leading west. They turned into that road and pursued it mile after mile, through field and forest, mountain pass and valley plain, until, late in the afternoon, they reached another mountain range, and heard the roaring of a great torrent. They entered the black gap, and slowly and cautiously made their way through it. By the time they had emerged from the pass, the night was ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... donkeys get into grinding harness, and dogs lose their bones, and fools have their sconces cracked, and all run jabbering of the irony of Fate, to escape the annoyance of tracing the causes. And what are they? nine times out of ten, plain want of patience, or some debt for indulgence. There's a subject:—let some one write, Fables in illustration of the irony of Fate: and I'll undertake to tack-on my grandmother's maxims for a moral to teach of 'em. We prate ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... gardening again, and Anna wandered off alone. Aunt Sarah's calm words had no comfort in them. Delia's severest rebuke, even Mrs Winn's plain speech, would have been better. She went restlessly up to her bedroom, seeking she hardly knew what. Her eye fell on the little brown case, long unopened, which held her mother's portrait. Words, long unthought of, came back to her as she looked ...
— Thistle and Rose - A Story for Girls • Amy Walton
... The plain, unassuming appearance of Paul I. pleased Louis XVI. He spoke to him with more confidence and cheerfulness than he had spoken to Joseph II. The Comtesse du Nord was not at first so successful with the Queen. This lady ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... nightfall he came near frightening the life out of a shepherd. Not knowing where he was and hearing the bark of a dog he climbed up the bank to ascertain, if possible, his locality. He met the shepherd on top of the bank, who looked at him a moment and then scampered away across the plain as fast as his ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... signify. He's a schemer and an adventurer—I could see it in every lineament of his face—and, there's not a shadow of doubt in my mind, has got Edward interested in some of his doings. Why, isn't it as plain as daylight? Were not he and Edward all-absorbed about something while he was here? Didn't he remain a week when he had to be urged, at first, to stay a single day? And hasn't Edward been a different man since he left, from what he was ...
— The Good Time Coming • T. S. Arthur
... until the whole of this affair is made plain to me, all must be doubt and darkness. I know that my mission is to leave distrust and misery wherever my voice reaches, or my step can force itself in that household—yet they have all been kind to me, and most of all, ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... my old home," replied Lucy, in a half-affected tone of anger. "Or, to make it plain, I want to go, and ...
— Finger Posts on the Way of Life • T. S. Arthur
... replied the Saint of God, 'it is not our sister the Moon I saw in the well, but by the Lord, the true countenance of sister Clare, and so pure and shining so bright with a holy joy that all my doubts were instantly dispelled, and it was made plain to me that our sister enjoys at this present hour the full content God accords his chosen vessels, loading them ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France
... Galen, Hippocrates, and Hioscorides, down to Archbishop Cyril. He is not wholly free from superstition, as when making use of a green jasper set in a ring; but he observes that the patients recovered as soon when the stone was plain as when a dragon was engraved upon it according to the recommendation of Nechepsus. In Nile water he finds every virtue, and does not forget dark paint for the ladies' eyebrows, and ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... them again, and having the struggle renewed, he deliberately turned back and quickly ran to the spot where there were plain evidences to be seen of the ...
— Darry the Life Saver - The Heroes of the Coast • Frank V. Webster
... even what you list, and so do still: I am the king, but you must have your will. The plain truth is, we are not come in sport, Though for our coming this was our best cloak; For if we never come, till you do send, We must not be your guest, while banquets last. Contentious brawls you hourly send to us; But we may send ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... were acquainted with, and practised, many processes which we should now describe as operations of manufacturing and technical chemistry; and the practical usefulness of these processes bore testimony, of the kind which convinces the plain man, to the justness ...
— The Story of Alchemy and the Beginnings of Chemistry • M. M. Pattison Muir |
