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Assay   Listen
noun
Assay  n.  
1.
Trial; attempt; essay. (Obs.) "I am withal persuaded that it may prove much more easy in the assay than it now seems at distance."
2.
Examination and determination; test; as, an assay of bread or wine. (Obs.) "This can not be, by no assay of reason."
3.
Trial by danger or by affliction; adventure; risk; hardship; state of being tried. (Obs.) "Through many hard assays which did betide."
4.
Tested purity or value. (Obs.) "With gold and pearl of rich assay."
5.
(Metallurgy) The act or process of ascertaining the proportion of a particular metal in an ore or alloy; especially, the determination of the proportion of gold or silver in bullion or coin.
6.
The alloy or metal to be assayed. Assay and essay are radically the same word; but modern usage has appropriated assay chiefly to experiments in metallurgy, and essay to intellectual and bodily efforts. See Essay. Note: Assay is used adjectively or as the first part of a compound; as, assay balance, assay furnace.
Assay master, an officer who assays or tests gold or silver coin or bullion.
Assay ton, a weight of 29,166 2/3 grams.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Assay" Quotes from Famous Books



... smothered cry, and fled. The birds moved rustling in their nests, and a flash of joy lit up the eyes of the dancers, when suddenly a warm wind, growing in strength as it swept through the place, blew out every light. But the low moon yet glimmered on the horizon with "sick assay" to shine, and a turbid radiance yet gleamed from so many eyes, that I saw well enough what followed. As if each shape had been but a snow-image, it began to fall to pieces, ruining in the warm wind. In papery flakes the flesh peeled from its bones, dropping like ...
— Lilith • George MacDonald

... task, requires courage. The discourse was an able essay. An agent will assay the ore, and forward a receipt. Contemn a mean act; but do not always condemn the actor. They were to seize the fort, and cease firing. They affect great grief; but do not effect their purpose. Do you dissent from my opinion? The hill was ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey

... knowed you'd be. Well, here I am—I didn't get to the assay office at Pardo; an' I'll never get there now." He paused and then ...
— 'Drag' Harlan • Charles Alden Seltzer

... thederward Periury Dyffydence and Apostasy. I shall tell you more Wyth boldnes in yl to bere hym company. Thyse .xiiii. knyghtes made vyce that daye. To wyn her spores they sayd they wold assay ...
— The Assemble of Goddes • Anonymous

... religious that something is lost by refinement—at least, that there is danger that the plain, blunt, essential truths will be lost in aesthetic graces. The laborer is getting to consent that his son shall go to school, and learn how to build an undershot wheel or to assay metals; but why plant in his mind those principles of taste which will make him as sensitive to beauty as to pain, why open to him those realms of imagination with the illimitable horizons, the contours and colors of which can but fill ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... possessions or owning good household furnishings had a few silver spoons; nearly every person owned at least one. At the time America was settled the common form of silver spoon in England had what was known as a baluster stem and a seal head; the assay mark was in the inner part of the bowl. But the fashion was just changing, and a new and much altered form was introduced which was made in large numbers until the opening reign of George I. This shape was the very one without ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle

... on it," declared Trask. "When four cups of sand will assay that much gold, consider what's in a mile ...
— Isle o' Dreams • Frederick F. Moore

... any use. It is a low-grade ore, I should say, and tunnelling and shoring would eat it up. Wipe it off the books. There are thousands of acres of this kind of land lying around loose from here to the Cumberland Valley. It may get better as you go down—only an assay can tell about that—but I don't think it will. To begin sinking shafts might mean sinking one or a dozen; and there's nothing so expensive. I am sorry, Jack, but wipe it out. Some bright scoundrel might sell ...
— Peter - A Novel of Which He is Not the Hero • F. Hopkinson Smith

... find one or two, but when he came to follow them up, why the stuff didn't assay worth a cent, or else it was just a little pocket he had happened to find. What do you think ought to be done with these bones?" again ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and Simon's Mine • Ross Kay

... out, when no malicious thief Robs my good name, the treasure of my life? O Jupiter, let it with rust be eaten, Before it touch, or insolently threaten The life of any with the least disease; So much I love, and woo a general peace. But, he that wrongs me, better, I proclaim, He never had assay'd to touch my fame. For he shall weep, and walk with every tongue Throughout the city, infamously sung. Servius the praetor threats the laws, and urn, If any at his deeds repine or spurn; The witch Canidia, that Albutius got, Denounceth ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson

... but the path is here! I assay it. Let the bloom fall like a flake—dropt from the torch of a friend! Beautiful revellers, happy companions, I see and obey it; Follow your torch in the night, follow your path ...
— The Lord of Misrule - And Other Poems • Alfred Noyes

... quartz still adhering to it, the particles are put into a big iron mortar and well beaten, and the process above described is repeated. The gold is then ready for weighing and buying, and there is usually no difficulty in settling the price with English diggers, the price varying according to the assay of the gold.[12] ...
— A Boy's Voyage Round the World • The Son of Samuel Smiles

... "did you notice that the last blast left nearly the whole face of the drift in ore? Then, did you notice as we met the car coming out, it had long drills in it, and the shift boss was following it up close? No blasting will be done to-night, but the drillings will be saved for assay, and I tell you the plan is that we shall tell no tales out of school. Believe me, that cage will not be safe again till as much stock shall be taken in as is needed by ...
— The Wedge of Gold • C. C. Goodwin

... not full needfully, Steadfast and faithful is not shown to be, By length of time my heart would that assay Whereon itself was set to love alway— To wit, a husband with that true love filled Such as no lapsing time has ever killed. This, then, was the sole reason that I drew My kin to hinder for a year ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. V. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre

... lover and observer of nature could feel or express; and Lowell's "Al Fresco" is full of the luxurious feeling of early summer, and this is, of course, the main thing; a good reader cares for little else; I care for little else myself. But when you take your coin to the assay office it must be weighed and tested, and in the comments referred to I (unwisely perhaps) sought to smelt this gold of the poets in the naturalist's pot, to see what alloy of error I could detect in it. Were the poems true to their last word? They were not, and much subsequent investigation ...
— A Year in the Fields • John Burroughs

... the Government assay office in Frankfort during the last year have developed the fact that gold, platinum, palladium, and selenium are found in old silver coins and also in ores which were formerly supposed to be nearly pure sulphides and oxides of lead ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various

... wain; Grief as an ocean's for some sudden isle Of living green that stayed with it a while, Then to oblivious deluge plunged again! Grief as of Alps that yearn but never reach, Grief as of Death for Life, of Night for Day: Such grief, O Song, how hast thou strength to teach, How hope to make assay? ...
— English Poems • Richard Le Gallienne

... with this View, the Hopes of restoring to the Publick their greatest Poet in his Original Purity: after having so long lain in a Condition that was a Disgrace to common Sense. To this End I have ventur'd on a Labour, that is the first Assay of the kind on any modern Author whatsoever. For the late Edition of Milton by the Learned *Dr. Bentley is, in the main, a Performance of another Species. It is plain, it was the Intention of that Great Man rather to Correct and pare off the ...
— Preface to the Works of Shakespeare (1734) • Lewis Theobald

... assay house, where the diamond drill cores showed the ore from the heart of the hills; and there at last Rimrock found his tongue as he ran ...
— Rimrock Jones • Dane Coolidge

... francs in ounces and carats alone, without a penny thrown into the account for the costly workmanship bestowed upon them! But we followed into a large room filled with tall wooden presses like wardrobes. He threw them open, and behold, the cargoes of "crude bullion" of the assay offices of Nevada faded out of my memory. There were Virgins and bishops there, above their natural size, made of solid silver, each worth, by weight, from eight hundred thousand to two millions of francs, and bearing gemmed books in their hands worth eighty thousand; there were bas-reliefs ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... scale. But soon after these had been examined, Dr. Andrew Spaarman, professor of physic, and inspector of the museum of the royal academy at Stockholm, and his companion, C.B. Wadstrom, chief director of the assay-office there, arrived in England. These gentlemen had been lately sent to Africa by the late king of Sweden, to make discoveries in botany, mineralogy, and other departments of science. For this purpose the Swedish ambassador at Paris had procured them permission from the French ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson

... in a dead, colorless monotone that scarcely moved his lips. "But no man ever came into this place yet, and went out again to say he didn't get his chance. I know a few specimens who make a profession of pleading that. They're quitters—and they assay a streak of yellow ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans

... all with rich array, Of pearl and precious stones of great assay; And all the gravel mix'd ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott

... &c (attempt) 675; analysis &c (investigation) 461; screen; trial, tentative method, tatonnement. verification, probation, experimentum crucis [Lat.], proof, (demonstration) 478; criterion, diagnostic, test, probe, crucial test, acid test, litmus test. crucible, reagent, check, touchstone, pix^; assay, ordeal; ring; litmus paper, curcuma paper^, turmeric paper; test tube; analytical instruments &c 633. empiricism, rule of thumb. feeler; trial balloon, pilot balloon, messenger balloon; pilot engine; scout; straw to show the wind. speculation, random shot, leap in the dark. analyzer, analyst, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... the form of Flossy and Freddy. Flossy and Freddy were float rocks. They had been picked up by Maud and Manfred on their face value and welcomed to the family circle. They had been assayed at the provincial assay office and found to contain a valuable percentage of real collateral; so our hero and heroine could not be reproached for taking them into their arms and allowing them the freedom of their home pastures. But, ah! this is where the evil one sneaked on to the happy hearth-rug—they took ...
— Skookum Chuck Fables - Bits of History, Through the Microscope • Skookum Chuck (pseud for R.D. Cumming)

... I guess he's got to have them," he explained. "I don't know any reason why we shouldn't send him the best we can. This lot should assay out, anyway, several ...
— The Gold Trail • Harold Bindloss

... vanquished foe retired from our shores, and left to the controlling genius who repelled them the gratitude of his own country, and the admiration of the world. The time had now arrived which was to apply the touchstone to his integrity, which was to assay the affinity of his principles to the standard of ...
— Washington's Birthday • Various

... of envy? For that he himselve her ne winnen may. He speaketh her reprefe and villainy; As manis blabbing tongue is wont alway. Thus divers men full often make assay. For to disturben folk in sundry wise, For they may ...
— Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse • Various

... lugged me over to his room across the street and—and was hospitable. He made me talk and I told him how I was fixed. He told me who he was and said he thought he could find a job for me. And he did. He was partner with a man named Hogan in an assay office and knew a good many mine managers and superintendents. The next day I went to work running an air-drill at four dollars a day. That's how I met Ed. We got to be pretty good friends after that. Later I went over and roomed with him. He was only two years older than I, ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour

... few stairs we yet had made assay, Ere by the vanished shadow the sun's setting Behind us we perceived, I ...
— Dante's Purgatory • Dante

... Johnson came instructed from the school To please by method, and invent by rule. His studious patience, and laborious art With regular approach assay'd the heart; Cold approbation gave the ling'ring bays, For they who durst not censure, scarce ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume I. • Theophilus Cibber

... with the endorsement. When all the parcels have been opened, and found right, the moneys contained in them are mixed together in wooden bowls, and afterwards weighed. Out of the said moneys so mingled, the jury take a certain number of each species of coin, to the amount of one pound for the assay by fire. And the indented trial pieces of gold and silver, of the dates specified in the indenture, being produced by the proper officer, a sufficient quantity is cut from either of them, for the purpose of comparing with it the pound ...
— The Mirror, 1828.07.05, Issue No. 321 - The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction • Various

... thought to send him to Cairo, least the people there would rebell, by occasion of the captain of Cairo which died a few dayes before. Howbeit he departed not so suddenly, and or he went he thought to assay it he might do some thing for to please the Turke, aswell for his honour as to saue his person, and was marueuous diligent to make mines at the bulwarke of England for to ouerthrow it. And by account were made 11 mines aswell ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, - and Discoveries of The English Nation, v5 - Central and Southern Europe • Richard Hakluyt

... said this, the dervish presented the barber's son with a purse of gold, took his leave, and the youth returned home. Great was the surprise of the sultan, when the metals in the furnace were all melted, to find them converted into a mass of solid gold, which proved, on assay, to be of the purest quality. Every one was questioned as to what he had cast into the furnace, when there appeared no reason to suppose the transmutation could have been effected by such an accidental mixture of metals. At length ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous

... echoed Van incredulously, staring at the assay records which showed in merciless bluntness that six different samples of reputed ore had proved to be absolutely worthless. "The samples you assayed first showed from ten to one hundred and fifty dollars to the ton, ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels

... almost pathetic and to which one cannot refuse his sympathy without sensible loss. But for the eager make-believe of that time we should still have to hoard up much rubbish which we can now leave aside, or accept without bothering to assay for the few grains of gold in it. Washington Irving had just the playful kindness which sufficed best to deal with the accumulations of his age; if he does not forbid you to believe, he does not oblige you to disbelieve, and he has always ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells

... was an easy problem," answered Professor Dodson. "We don't even need an assay to determine ...
— The Boy Ranchers in Death Valley - or Diamond X and the Poison Mystery • Willard F. Baker

... seruice; Yet to speake truely for my owne part (I speake but for my selfe) I desire not to make so neere riding: For in my opinion our enemie is ouer craftie, and we ouer weake (except the greater grace of God) to assay such hazards, wherein ...
— Daemonologie. • King James I

... angle. Translating from Greek to English, he observed, like Tyndale, the differences and correspondences between the two languages. His Doctrinal of Princes was translated "to the intent only that I would assay if our English tongue might receive the quick and proper sentences pronounced by the Greeks."[346] The experiment had interesting results. "And in this experience," he continues, "I have found (if I be not much deceived) that the form of speaking, called in Greek and also in English ...
— Early Theories of Translation • Flora Ross Amos

... about their large families, and now and again about their fitness for their holy office,—and there are few congregations that, at one time or another, are not worried by, as well as about, their pastors. The miner is worried when he sees his ledge "petering out," or finds the ore failing to assay its usual value. The editor is worried lest his reporters fail to bring in the news, and often worried when it is brought in to know whether it is accurate or not. The chemist worries over his experiments, and the inventor that certain things needful ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James

... by the sleeve; "Sir," saith he, "will you our wine assay?" I answered, "That cannot much me grieve; A penny can do no more than it may." I drank a pint, and for it did pay; Yet, sore a-hungered from thence I yede; And, wanting money, I could ...
— English Satires • Various

... sat with awful sway, 790 Your conscience taught your duty to obey: He might have had your Statutes and your Test; No conscience but of subjects was profess'd. He found your temper, and no farther tried, But on that broken reed, your Church, relied. In vain the sects assay'd their utmost art, With offer'd treasure to espouse their part; Their treasures were a bribe too mean to move his heart. But when, by long experience, you had proved, How far he could forgive, how well he ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... I assay it alone," I replied, not displeased at his refusal. "I am cramped from sitting in the ...
— Beyond the Frontier • Randall Parrish

... active speed Dismounted from his bonny steed, To seize the arms, which, by mischance, Fell from the bold Knight in a trance. These being found out, and restor'd 615 To HUDIBRAS their natural lord, As a man may say, with might and main, He hasted to get up again. Thrice he assay'd to mount aloft, But, by his weighty bum, as oft 620 He was pull'd back, till having found Th' advantage of the rising ground, Thither he led his warlike steed, And having plac'd him right, with speed Prepar'd again to scale the beast, 625 When ORSIN, who had newly drest The bloody scar upon ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler

... valuable. Jist how much gold they is there, I don't know, but they is lots of it. Two or three more weeks an' Williams would have struck it from the other side. Now listen, lad: sell out, do you hear me, sell out. It'll bring a handsome price on assay; but sell now, or Williams—" and his voice dropped to a mysterious whisper and he looked suspiciously about him, "or Williams will get the best ...
— Buffalo Roost • F. H. Cheley

... sifted: 'tis the master-day, 'tis the day that is judge of all the rest, "'tis the day," says one of the ancients,—[Seneca, Ep., 102]— "that must be judge of all my foregoing years." To death do I refer the assay of the fruit of all my studies: we shall then see whether my discourses came only from my mouth or from my heart. I have seen many by their death give a good or an ill repute to their whole life. Scipio, the father-in-law of Pompey, in ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... thought herself fully entitled to assume the privilege of ironical reproach, which she was pleased to exert, "your character improves upon us, sir—I could not have thought that it was in you. Yesterday might be considered as your assay-piece, to prove yourself entitled to be free of the corporation of Osbaldistone Hall. ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... brought to trial, and the result was that nearly three hundred Jews were found guilty and condemned to be hanged. This was during the mayoralty of Gregory de Rokesle (probably Ruxley, Kent), the chief assay master of King's mints, a great wool merchant, and the richest goldsmith of his time. This Mayor passed a series of ordinances against the Jews, including one to the effect that the King's peace ...
— Memorials of Old London - Volume I • Various

... rings and ornaments of the very purest gold, but of rude, native manufacture, which are found among the gold-dust from Africa. I doubt whether the American public will accept them; it looks less to the assay of metal than to the neat and cunning manufacture. How slowly our literature grows up! Most of our writers of promise have come to untimely ends. There was that wild fellow, John Neal, who almost turned my boyish brain with his romances; he surely has long ...
— P.'s Correspondence (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... Iohn Falstaffe. What a Herod of Iurie is this? O wicked, wicked world: One that is well-nye worne to peeces with age To show himselfe a yong Gallant? What an vnwaied Behauiour hath this Flemish drunkard pickt (with The Deuills name) out of my conuersation, that he dares In this manner assay me? why, hee hath not beene thrice In my Company: what should I say to him? I was then Frugall of my mirth: (heauen forgiue mee:) why Ile Exhibit a Bill in the Parliament for the putting downe of men: how shall I be reueng'd on him? for reueng'd I will be? as sure as his ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... inquiry—Were the Bible miracles probable? science answers in the affirmative. To the further inquiry—Did they actually occur? the answer of science is again, and very emphatically, in the affirmative. If we liken them to gold, she has made her assay and says the gold is pure. Or the Bible miracles may be compared to a string of pearls. If science seeks to know whether the pearls are genuine, she may apply chemical and other tests to the examination ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... the presence; there he hears surpriz'd The mortal charge of felony devis'd: Stern did the monarch look, and sharp upbraid For foul seducement of his queen assay'd: The knight, whose loyal heart disdain'd the offence, With generous warmth affirm'd his innocence; He ne'er devis'd seduction:—for the rest, His speech discourteous, frankly he confess'd; Influenc'd with ire his lips forwent their guard; He stood ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham

... bogus autographs of Mrs. Eddy, cash offerings at her shrine—no crutches of cured cripples received, and no imitations of miraculously restored broken legs and necks allowed to be hung up except when made out of the Holy Metal and proved by fire-assay; cash for miracles worked at the tomb: these money-sources, with a thousand to be yet invented and ambushed upon the devotee, will bring the annual increment well up above a billion. And nobody but the Trust ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... where ben our swerds become: Our enemies bed for the ship set a sheepe. Alas our rule halteth, it is benome. Who dare well say that lordship should take keepe: I will assay, though mine heart ginne to weepe, To doe this werke, if wee will euer thee, For very shame to keepe ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation, v. 1, Northern Europe • Richard Hakluyt

... ther assay office is closed up. Jim Dallam, as ran it, his mother is dead, an' he got leave ter go back East. Ther nearest assay office now is at Monument Rocks sixty ...
— The Girl Aviators on Golden Wings • Margaret Burnham

... illustrate its pronunciation. Lands in the diocese of Bath and Wells lying by the pleasant river Perret, and almost up to the gates of Bristol, constituted the earliest possessions of the De Wellesleighs. They, seven centuries before Assay, and Waterloo, were 'seised' of certain rich leas belonging to Wells. And from these Saxon elements of the name, some have supposed the Wellesleys a Saxon race. They could not possibly have better blood: but still the thing does not follow from the premises. Neither does it follow from ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey

... rather the best that can be selected from it, yields about the same proportion of the alkaloid as was obtained by Niemann and Maisch, but it has been shown that, by the older processes of assay used by them, much of the alkaloid was probably lost or destroyed, and that much better results are generally ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 492, June 6, 1885 • Various

... pretty sight, after this anecdote, to see us sweeping out the giant powder. It seemed never to be far enough away. And, after all, it was only some rock pounded for assay. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... dishonest when and as they think it is to their advantage to be so. Those men want to get to Dawson, and they know the Police would never let them across the Line. I'm their only chance. They'll stand assay." ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach

... Pete, I 'm blamed if I know; leastwise, I ain't got no sure prove-up. I tell ye thet girl's just about the toughest piece o' rock I ever had any special call to assay. I think first I got her good an' proper, an' then she drops out all of a sudden, an' I lose the lead. It's mighty aggravating let me tell ye. Ye see it's this way. She 's got some durn down East-notion that she's ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish

... the fourth grade and, as we have already stated, 9 years of age. As a result of the test she was transferred to the fifth grade. Later she skipped again and at the age of 14 is a successful student in the second year of high school. To assay her intelligence and determine its quality was ...
— The Measurement of Intelligence • Lewis Madison Terman

... what if we assay'd to steal The clownish Fool out of your father's Court? Would he not be ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson

... mighty walls revered,— Thy ramparts, by the god of battle feared,— Thy gates,—thy towers, whose frowning crests assay Amidst the clouds towards Heaven to force a way? How well I love thy beauties to behold, Thy noble monuments, thy mansions bold, Thy simple porticos, thy perfect plan, Thy squares symmetrical: their space, their ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello

... to him aloud, but what should she cry? If she did not, an opportunity, perhaps the last, on which hung eternal issues, would be gone for ever! Each moment's delay was a disobedience to her conscience, a yielding to love's sinful reluctance! With "sick assay" she heaved at the weight on her heart, but not a word would come. If Ian would but speak again, and break the spell of the terrible stillness! She must die in eternal wrong if she did not speak! But no word would come. ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald

... alembic the very juices the craftsman conjured withal, you come down to the seamy wood, and Art is gone. Nay, but your Morelli, your Crowe, ciphering as they went for want of thought, what did they do but screw Art into test- tubes, and serve you up the fruit of their litmus-paper assay with vivacity, may be,—but with what kinship to the picture? I maintain that the peeling and gutting of fact must be done in the kitchen: the king's guests are not to know how many times the cook's finger went ...
— Earthwork Out Of Tuscany • Maurice Hewlett

... waters, so that although no longer within reach of bullets the defeated troops were still pursued by songs of victory. Their thanksgivings ended, the Calvinists withdrew into the forest, led by their new chief, who had at his first assay shown the great extent of ...
— Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... valise, please," said Nevada. "It weighs a million pounds. It's got samples from six of dad's old mines in it," she explained to Barbara. "I calculate they'd assay about nine cents to the thousand tons, but I promised him to ...
— Options • O. Henry

... that we had a sufficient quantity of the lode matter for a trial assay, and we spent the better part of the afternoon picking out pieces of the ore on the small dump and in chipping more of them from the exposed face of the seam. It was arranged that one of us should take the samples to town after dark, for the sake of secrecy, and we put in what daylight ...
— Branded • Francis Lynde

... nor stirs; 255 Ah! what a stricken look was hers! Deep from within she seems half-way To lift some weight with sick assay, And eyes the maid and seeks delay; Then suddenly, as one defied, 260 Collects herself in scorn and pride, And lay down by the Maiden's side!— And in her arms the maid she took, Ah wel-a-day! And with low voice and doleful look 265 These words did say: 'In the touch of this ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... "They've struck pay dirt at Dynamite! Chunks of sylvanite that sweat gold in the fire. Assay thirty thousand dollars a ton. Whole streaks of it. Vein's twelve foot wide. The whole town's stampedin' by way of White Cliff Canyon. I'm goin'. Got a pick an' shovel in the car. Aunt Mirandy, she ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn

... that, struggling to be free, Art more engag'd! Help, angels! Make assay! Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart with strings of steel, Be soft as sinews of ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett

... mould with grosse unpurged ear; And yet such musick worthiest were to blaze The peerles height of her immortal praise, Whose lustre leads us, and for her most fit, If my inferior hand or voice could hit Inimitable sounds, yet as we go, What ere the skill of lesser gods can show, I will assay, her worth to celebrate, 80 And so attend ye toward her glittering state; Where ye may all that are of noble stemm Approach, and kiss her sacred ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton

... earlier dramatists, unless, indeed, Mrs. Page's remark on Falstaff's letter may be cited as an illustration:—"What an unweighed behaviour hath this Flemish drunkard picked out of my conversation, that he dares in this manner assay me." ...
— Notes & Queries 1849.12.22 • Various

... own judgment. In the supplementary volume of Pope's edition, it had been suggested by Sewell that our great writers should be treated in the same way as the classics were, and the idea was put into practice by Theobald, who could say that his method of editing was "the first assay of the kind on any modern author whatsoever." By his careful collation of the Quartos and Folios, he pointed the way to the modern editor. But he was followed by Hanmer, who, as his chief interest was to rival Pope, was content ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith

... melancholy, and cheer the heart Of those black fumes which make it smart; To clear the brain of misty fogs, Which dull our senses and Soul clogs; The best medicine that e'er God made For this malady, if well assay'd." ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer

... Assay Marks.—These consist of the initials of the maker, the Queen's head for the duty (17/-on gold, 1/6 on silver, per oz.), a letter (changed yearly) for date, an anchor for the Birmingham office mark, and the standard or value mark, which is given in figures, thus:—for gold of 22-carat ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell

... experience which he had gathered during his nightly labours, enabled him readily and satisfactorily to solve the difficulty and suggest a suitable remedy. His reward for this achievement was the permission, which was immediately granted him by the manager, to make use of his own assay-furnace, in which he thenceforward continued his investigations, at the same time that he instructed the manager's son in the art of assaying. This additional experience proved of great benefit to him; and he continued to prosecute his inquiries with much ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles

... kind of death for 'em. Hunts-man, your horn: first wind me Florez fall, Next Gerrards, then his Daughter Jaquelins, Those rascals, they shall dye without their rights: Hang 'em Hemskirk on these trees; I'le take The assay of these my self. ...
— Beggars Bush - From the Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher (Vol. 2 of 10) • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... their labour of all seasons of the year; for there is no time of the year in which the ploughman hath not some special work to do: as in my country in Leicestershire, the ploughman hath a time to set forth, and to assay his plough, and other times for other necessary works to be done. And then they also maybe likened together for the diversity of works and variety of offices that they have to do. For as the ploughman first setteth forth his plough, ...
— Sermons on the Card and Other Discourses • Hugh Latimer

... to lay this charge on thee - On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor - I come to lay this charge on thee With solemn speech and sign: Should things go ill, and my life pay For botchery in this rash assay, You are to take hers likewise—yea, The month the ...
— Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with - Miscellaneous Pieces • Thomas Hardy

... travesty of their transactions. He was doubtless often hard put to it for a living, but the variety of his attainments served him in good stead. He possessed or gained some reputation as a mining expert, and making his way down into Cornwall, he seems for some years subsequent to 1782 to have been assay-master and storekeeper of some mines at Dolcoath. While still at Dolcoath, it is very probable that he put together the little pamphlet which appeared in London at the close of 1785, with the title "Baron ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe

... of every swain. On her this god Enamour'd was, and with his snaky rod Did charm her nimble feet, and made her stay, The while upon a hillock down he lay, And sweetly on his pipe began to play, And with smooth speech her fancy to assay, Till in his twining arms her lock'd her fast, And then he woo'd with kisses; and at last, As shepherds do, her on the ground he laid, And, tumbling in the grass, he often stray'd Beyond the bounds of shame, in being bold To eye those parts which no eye should behold; And, ...
— Hero and Leander and Other Poems • Christopher Marlowe and George Chapman

... into the actuating motives for any line of human endeavor you will find that vanity figures about ninety per cent, directly or indirectly, in the assay. The personal equation is the ruling equation. Women want to be thinner because they will look better—and so do men. Likewise, women want to be plumper because they will look better—and so do men. This ...
— The Fun of Getting Thin • Samuel G. Blythe

... fail'd, Policy often hath prevail'd; And what—an inference most plain— Had been, Crape thought might be again. Under his pillow (still in mind The proverb kept, 'fast bind, fast find') 1220 Each blessed night the keys were laid, Which Crape to draw away assay'd. What not the power of voice or arm Could do, this did, and broke the charm; Quick started he with stupid stare, For all his little soul was there. Behold him, taken up, rubb'd down, In elbow-chair, and ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... place is owing the assay-office, for marking standard wrought plate, which, prior to the year 1773, was conveyed to London to receive the sanction of that office; but by an act then obtained, the business is done here by an assay master, superintended ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton

... them, he will lay him down in the midst, as a shepherd mid the sheep of his flock. So soon as ever ye shall see him couched, even then mind you of your might and strength, and hold him there, despite his eagerness and striving to be free. And he will make assay, and take all manner of shapes of things that creep upon the earth, of water likewise, and of fierce fire burning. But do ye grasp him steadfastly and press him yet the more, and at length when he questions thee in ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.

... water's side, as if they had been used to a keeper's call. On an excursion off the route they were following they overtook two canoes laden with bread. Among the bushes they found a refiner's basket. In it were quicksilver and saltpetre, prepared for assay, and the dust of ore which had been refined. It belonged to some Spaniards who escaped; but the natives, their companions, were caught. One of them, called Martino, proved a better pilot than Ferdinando and the old man. Naturally the refining apparatus suggested ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing

... can hold; so bent he seems On desperate revenge, that shall redound Upon his own rebellious head. And now, Through all restraint broke loose, he wings his way Not far off Heaven, in the precincts of light, Directly towards the new created world, And man there plac'd, with purpose to assay If him by force he can destroy, or, worse, By some false guile pervert; and shall pervert; For man will hearken to his glozing lies, And easily transgress the sole command, Sole pledge of his obedience: So will fall He and his faithless ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton

... for offering little; and he would not receive less if he offered none. The amount received by him depends wholly on the degree of his agreeableness. Pride makes an occasional host of him; but he does not shine in that capacity. Nor do hosts want him to assay it. If they accept an invitation from him, they do so only because they wish not to hurt his feelings. As guests they are fish ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm

... the warden, causes it to be melted, delivers it to the moneyers, and when it is minted receives it from them again. 3. The comptroller, who sees that the money be made according to the just assize, overlooks the officers and controls them. 4. The assay-master, who sees that the money be according to the standard of fineness. 5. The auditor, who takes the accounts, and makes them up. 6. The surveyor-general, who takes care that the fineness be not altered in the melting. And, 7, the weigher ...
— London in 1731 • Don Manoel Gonzales

... she: then King Arthur spake: "Albeit indeed I dare not take Such praise on me, for knighthood's sake And love of ladies will I make Assay if better none may be." By girdle and by sheath he caught The sheathed and girded sword, and wrought With strength whose force availed him nought To ...
— The Tale of Balen • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... whereat grieued, That so his sickenesse, age, and impotence, Was falsely borne in hand, sends out arrests On Fortenbrasse, which he in briefe obays, Receiues rebuke from Norway: and in fine, Makes vow before his vncle, neuer more To giue the assay of Armes against your Maiestie, Whereon olde Norway ouercome with ioy, Giues him three thousand crownes in annuall fee, And his Commission to employ those souldiers, So leuied as before, against the ...
— The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke - The First ('Bad') Quarto • William Shakespeare

... whole plant at loose ends, while they are about it, just because your ego has a pain in its psychological digestion. People have got to go on being married and buried, even if you can't make a scientific assay of the doctrine of the Atonement. Well," the doctor rose and emptied out his long-cold pipe; "that's all. I wish you luck, Brenton, and I'll help you all I can. Whatever I think about your mental calibre, I do believe that you are honest; and, ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray

... companion of his way, A goodly Lady clad in scarlet red, Purfled with gold and pearl of rich assay, And like a Persian mitre on her head She wore, with crowns and riches garnished, The which her lavish lovers to her gave; Her wanton palfrey all was overspread With tinsell trappings, woven like a wave, Whose bridle rang with golden bells ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall

... espy; Then looks again, and doth his own haste blame So in a doubting pause, this cruel dame A little stay'd, and said, "The rest I call To mind, and know I have o'ercome them all:" Then with less fierce aspect, she said, "Thou guide Of this fair crew, hast not my strength assay'd, Let her advise, who may command, prevent Decrepit age, 'tis but a punishment; From me this honour thou alone shalt have, Without or fear or pain, to find thy grave." "As He shall please, who dwelleth in the heaven And rules on earth, such portion must ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... my mind I often strove, And tried my trouble to remove: I sung, and utter'd sighs between— Assay'd ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano

... companion[*] of his way, A goodly Lady clad in scarlot red, 110 Purfled with gold and pearle of rich assay, And like a Persian mitre on her hed She wore, with crowns and owches garnished, The which her lavish lovers to her gave; Her wanton palfrey all was overspred 115 With tinsell trappings, woven like a wave, Whose bridle rung with golden bels and ...
— Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Book I • Edmund Spenser

... interposition of Congress and of the Executive "for the early extinguishment of the Indian title, a consequent survey and sale of the public land, and the establishment of an assay office in the immediate and daily reach of the citizens of that region." They also urge "the erection of a new Territory from contiguous portions of New Mexico, Utah, Kansas, and Nebraska," with the boundaries set forth in their memorial. ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 5: James Buchanan • James D. Richardson

... that sin we mowe er day Wel stele away, and been to-gider so, What wit were it to putten in assay, In cas ye sholden to your fader go, If that ye mighte come ayein or no? 1510 Thus mene I, that it were a gret folye To putte that ...
— Troilus and Criseyde • Geoffrey Chaucer

... a weary assay, On the lone couch wearily! Rising at midnight again to pray, Wearily, wearily! And if through the dark dear eyes looked in, Sending them far as a thought ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald

... circulars showing WHY fuel is wasted and HOW 25 to 50 per cent., can be saved; also, HOW to construct reduction works for mineral ores of half the present weight and cost, to do three times the work with the fuel now used, and save 98 per cent. of assay; also, the opinions of distinguished engineers, address B. F. ...
— Scientific American, Volume 40, No. 13, March 29, 1879 • Various

... quartz ledge that caused the excitement was distinctly in evidence, indeed, when the Tahoe Railway roadbed was being graded, this quartz ledge was blasted into, and the director of operations sent a number of specimens for assay, the rock looked ...
— The Lake of the Sky • George Wharton James

... hand should not inspire The beauty only, but the fire; 20 Not the form alone, and grace, But act and power of a face. Mayst thou yet thyself as well, As all the world besides, excel! So you th'unfeigned truth rehearse (That I may make it live in verse), Why thou couldst not at one assay,[2] The face to aftertimes convey, Which this admires. Was it thy wit To make her oft before thee sit? 30 Confess, and we'll forgive thee this; For who would not repeat that bliss, And frequent sight of such a dame Buy with the hazard of ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham

... How Long, and in the following spring had a flattering offer for the claim if it assayed as well as we said it would, so Buck, our expert, went out to the Aladdin with an assayer and the purchaser. The assay of the Aladdin showed up very rich indeed, far above anything that I had ever hoped for, and so we made a sale. But we never got the money, for when the assayer got home he casually assayed his apparatus and found that his whole ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye

... plain, simple fact, inseparable from the belief in Christ's love—that He wishes you and every soul of man to love Him, and that, whatever else you bring, lip reverence, orthodox belief, apparent surrender, in the assay shop of His great mint all these are rejected, and the only metal that passes the fire is the pure gold of an answering love. Brethren! is that what ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren

... I say, being declared by Jason of Cyrene, in five books, we will assay to abridge in one volume. We will be careful that they that will read may have delight, and that they that are desirous to commit to memory might have ease, and that all into whose hands it comes might have profit." How concise and Horatian! He then describes his literary ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... can, to recover it." "Find a way?" said Calandrino: "how can we compass that?" "Why," replied Buffalmacco, "'tis certain that no one has come from India to steal thy pig: it must have been one of thy neighbours, and if thou couldst bring them together, I warrant thee, I know how to make the assay with bread and cheese, and we will find out in a trice who has had the pig." "Ay," struck in Bruno, "make thy assay with bread and cheese in the presence of these gentry hereabout, one of whom I am sure has had the pig! ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio

... basen. The fyrst bagge of a galon, every on of the other a potell. Fyrst do in to a basen a galon or ij of redwyne, then put in your pouders, and do it in to the renners, and so in to the seconde bagge, then take a pece and assay it. And yef hit be eny thyng to stronge of gynger alay it withe synamon, and yef it be strong of synamon alay it withe sugour cute. And thus schall ye make perfyte Ypocras. And loke your bagges be of boltell clothe, and the mouthes opyn, and ...
— The Forme of Cury • Samuel Pegge

... in painting, this graduating which gives right proportion and, with proportion, a sense of distance, of atmosphere, is called Value. Let us, for a minute or two, assay this particular meaning of Value upon life and literature, and first upon life, or, rather upon one not negligible ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... rode to the second knight and smote him, and so he did to the third knight. Then he alighted down and bound all the three knights fast with their own bridles. When Sir Lionel saw him do thus, he thought to assay him, and made him ready silently, not to awake Sir Launcelot, and rode after the strong knight, and bade him turn. And the other smote Sir Lionel so hard that horse and man fell to the earth; and then he alighted down and bound Sir Lionel, and ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch

... both, we would strongly recommend that the State set its own standard for the composition of inks to be used in its offices and for its records, have the inks manufactured according to specifications sent out, and receive the manufactured products subject to chemical assay. In this way only can there be a uniformity in the inks used for the records throughout the State, and in no other way can a proper standard ...
— Forty Centuries of Ink • David N. Carvalho

... is it impossible for anyone to weigh the quantity or to assay the quality of dramatic instinct—whether in his own or another's breast—but it is as nearly impossible for anyone to decide from reading a manuscript whether a play will succeed or fail. Charles Frohman is reported to have said: "A man who could pick out winners ...
— Writing for Vaudeville • Brett Page

... raised this spirit to disquiet himself: let him bethink how to lay him again. If he cannot, I will assay to make some help, and to lay him in this fashion. The station days were not the Lord's days, together with those fifty betwixt Easter and Pentecost (on which both fasting and kneeling were forbidden), as the Doctor thinketh, but they were certain set days of fasting; for they ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie

... generally believed that mind has its seat in the brain and the nervous system. Later investigations, however, seem to show that it is the product of the whole physical organism. There is no chance to measure or weigh or still less assay the qualities of the machine. It is certain that the quality of the mind depends very little upon either the contour or ...
— Crime: Its Cause and Treatment • Clarence Darrow

... for surveying the provinces in Mysore, recently conquered from Tippoo Sultan; professor of Hindostan in the College of Calcutta; judge of the twenty-four pargunnahs of Calcutta; a commissioner of the Court of Requests in Calcutta; and assay-master of the mint. His literary services being required by the Governor-General, he left Calcutta for Madras, and afterwards proceeded along with the army in the expedition against Java. On the capture of the town ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various

... anything to tell at that time—I hadn't received any assay reports, and I didn't know whether the thing was worth telling; but shortly after you left the returns came in, and they showed remarkable values. Now here is the wonderful part of the story. Unknown to me, my man had sent out other samples and a letter to ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach

... and drink and revel and vomit. Let the rhythmed tinkling of dances be ordinary, the cries, the uncontrolled delights, the uproar of all pleasures, even the bloodiest and most shameful in the theatres. He who shall assay to dissuade from these pleasures, let him be condemned as a public enemy. And if any one try to alter or suppress them—let the people stifle his voice, let them banish him, let them kill him. On the other hand, those that shall procure the people these pleasures, and authorize ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand

... too onct," replied Frenchy with sarcasm. "Went and lugged fifty pound of it all th' way to th' assay office—took me two days! an' that there four-eyed cuss looks at it and snickers. Then he takes me by di' arm an' leads me to th' window. 'See that pile, my friend? That's all like yourn,' sez he. 'It's worth about one simoleon a ton at th' coast. They ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford

... as well as any other; and it conveys no idea but that of a very pleasant country and very hospitable inhabitants. Nothing absurd and shocking in amity and good correspondence with France. Permit me to say, that I am not yet well acquainted with this new-coined France, and without a careful assay I am not willing to receive it in currency in place of the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... railroad nearer, and no one was interested there much as yet. If I'd advance him another thousand, though—I'd been backing him a thousand dollars at a time—he'd go back and file regular, and when I'd had an assay made, if the thing looked good, he'd sell to me ...
— The Dominant Dollar • Will Lillibridge

... you forget the principles of your youth, and the instructions of the sacred Druids, you shall fall from happiness, never to regain it more. But if you come forth pure and unblemished from the fierce assay, your Imogen shall be yours, the Gods shall take you into their resistless protection, and in all future ages, when men would cite an example of distinguished felicity, they shall say, as fortunate as Edwin of the vale." Edwin bended ...
— Imogen - A Pastoral Romance • William Godwin

... given up all that was in their power, when they had given a bond for what they had not, (for they were only the treasurers of other people,) that the bond would not have been rigidly exacted. But what do Mr. Hastings and Mr. Middleton, as soon as they get their plunder? They went to their own assay-table, by which they measured the rate of exchange between the coins in currency at Oude and those at Calcutta, and add the difference to the sum for which the bond was given. Thus they seize the secret hoards, they examine it as if they were ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke

... sending also the investigations that were made in regard to no ship leaving last year; and about not compelling any one to assay gold that is mined ...
— The Philippine Islands 1493-1898, Vol. 4 of 55 - 1576-1582 • Edited by E. H. Blair and J. A. Robertson

... historians have represented this measure as having for its very object to create additional confusion, and render himself, and his own dictatorial power, more necessary to the state. It has not appeared to us in this light. We see in it a bold but rude assay at government. In this off-hand manner of constituting a Parliament, we detect the mingled daring of the Puritan and the Soldier. In neither of these characters was he likely to have much respect for legal maxims, or rules of merely human contrivance. Cromwell was educating ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various

... of a mad philosopher. That which would remain in the cupel if one should assay a phantom. The ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce

... to render any real service to humanity was when he was engaged by the directors of a Company for working certain gold mines in Devonshire which were being greatly boomed, and to which the public was subscribing heavily, to go down to Devonshire to assay the ore. I fancy they expected me to send them a report likely to further tempt the public. If this was their expectation, they were mistaken, for after a few experiments I went back to town and told them that there was ...
— George Du Maurier, the Satirist of the Victorians • T. Martin Wood

... come hard, but we might put it over. Our pay was pretty good and the construction boss could get us a check as we go on if the work was approved. Of course, if we were pushed, we could sell out the Bluebird. The assay's all right and one or two of the big syndicates are looking up copper. Still I don't want ...
— Partners of the Out-Trail • Harold Bindloss

... the greater part of the boats was to put off for the first assay. Malcolm would have made one in the little fleet, for he belonged to his friend Joseph Mair's crew, had it not been found impossible to get the new boat ready before the following evening; whence, for this one more, he was still ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald

... pan—but no gold. After the entire contents was retorted with quicksilver and burned out there was not twenty-five cents worth of gold. The Captain assured me that his partner had taken several ounces out of the claim and had sent it to the assay ...
— The Sheep Eaters • William Alonzo Allen



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