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Contract   Listen
noun
Contract  n.  
1.
(Law) The agreement of two or more persons, upon a sufficient consideration or cause, to do, or to abstain from doing, some act; an agreement in which a party undertakes to do, or not to do, a particular thing; a formal bargain; a compact; an interchange of legal rights.
2.
A formal writing which contains the agreement of parties, with the terms and conditions, and which serves as a proof of the obligation.
3.
The act of formally betrothing a man and woman. "This is the the night of the contract."
Synonyms: Covenant; agreement; compact; stipulation; bargain; arrangement; obligation. See Covenant.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Contract" Quotes from Famous Books



... decrees his minority, disables him from entering into a contract of any kind, though it scarcely needs any statement from me to assure my hearers that the law does not secure, nor does the majestic arm of that law exact, from ...
— A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians • James Bovell Mackenzie

... and by raising the price of provisions and post-horses through a track of five thousand miles. My information is authentic, for I had a casual acquaintance with him in England. There was some talk of a contract for supplying our army from England, and I saw Fitzloom often on the subject. I have spoken to him to-day. This is by no means the first of the species that we have had in Germany. I can assure ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... have concealed it in a drawer rather than run the risk of boring anyone with its perusal. Snaggs, however, will be fashioned of more pachydermatous material and will daily make himself such a nuisance that they'll give him an order, and possibly a long contract, to get rid of him. By a proper system of book-keeping he will also save me from the occasional blunder of sending the same article to the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 22, 1920 • Various

... thousand swordsmen, and had always about him a company of young men of the equestrian class ready for all occasions, whom he styled his Anti-Senate. Having had a law enacted, that no senator should contract a debt of above two thousand drachmas, he himself, after death, was found indebted three millions. This was the man whom Marius let in upon the Commonwealth, and who, confounding all things by force and the sword, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... Territory All economic activity is concentrated on the largest island of Diego Garcia, where joint UK-US defense facilities are located. Construction projects and various services needed to support the military installations are done by military and contract employees from the UK, Mauritius, the Philippines, and the US. There are no industrial or agricultural activities on the islands. When the Ilois return, they plan to ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... first on one side, then on the other, being true to either side while the contract lasts. In all there must be the makings of many ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy

... such was the fear from the preponderance of the Negro population that a special act was passed to encourage white immigration. Legislation "for the better ordering of slaves" was passed in 1690, and in 1712 the first regular slave law was enacted. Once before 1713, the year of the Assiento Contract of the Peace of Utrecht, and several times after this date, prohibitive duties were placed on Negroes to guard against their too rapid increase. By 1734, however, importation had again reached large proportions; and ...
— A Social History of the American Negro • Benjamin Brawley

... also having a Sunday school for the children. At Ft. Amity similar conditions prevail. On both colonies a good moral influence is found and there are no evil surroundings; hence in neither colony is there a local officer of the law. In the contract which every colonist signs on taking his land there is a ...
— The Social Work of the Salvation Army • Edwin Gifford Lamb

... and Geodetic Survey: Superintendent, confidential clerk to Superintendent, the normal or field force, general office assistant, confidential clerk to general office assistant, engravers and contract engravers, electrotypist and photographer, electrotypist's helper, apprentice to electrotypist and photographer, copperplate printers, plate-printers' ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland

... a rough calculation of the resources of the printing office and of the output, and saw how little hope there was for a business drained dry by the all-devouring activity of the brothers Cointet; for by this time the Cointets were not only contract printers to the town and the prefecture, and printers to the Diocese by special appointment—they were paper-makers and proprietors of a newspaper to boot. That newspaper, sold two years ago by the Sechards, father and son, for twenty-two thousand ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac

... wanted Uncle Peter to introduce a bill in the City Council forcing all of the property owners on the Square to put down the pavement in front of their houses, at small payments per annum, the town assuming the contract at six per cent. Uncle Peter refused, because he said that he felt a smooth walk around the Square would call out what he called ...
— The Tinder-Box • Maria Thompson Daviess

... making grants to foreign powers, whether by way of loans or subsidies, and pointed out that the only real difference between a loan and a subsidy was that, in the case of a loan England would not be able to get rid of the payment, whereas a monthly subsidy could be stopped if the contract was broken. ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt

... be entered on his prayer-list. The merchant wrote his name in the traveler's book, and then proceeded to inform Mr. Graves that he had determined not to be a Christian, and that he had taken too big a contract if he expected to pray him into the kingdom. But the traveler simply said, "I confidently expect my prayer to be answered." When they met again the merchant had been converted, and, amid tears of rejoicing, another name was checked off the list. The merchant's name was Samuel M. Sayford. Mr. ...
— The Art of Soul-Winning • J.W. Mahood

... who later on took charge of the Hooghly Mills, and finally of Jardine Skinner & Co.'s two mills, they occupied rooms on the first floor of 23 or 24, Strand Road, North. It was here I negotiated with them the very first contract that was ever passed in Calcutta for hessian cloth for shipment to America. I forget how long they remained there until they removed to their present offices. I may here mention that they first of all commenced operations with ...
— Recollections of Calcutta for over Half a Century • Montague Massey

... yawns, and when he laughs violently, tears come into the eyes. Now, in all these cases I observe that the orbicularis muscle is more or less spasmodically contracted, as also in the crying of a child. So, again, when the muscles of the abdomen contract violently in a propelling manner, and the breath is, I think, always held, as during the evacuation of a very costive man, and as (I hear) with a woman during severe labour-pains, the orbicularis contracts, and ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin

... in his conscience he has a fear of 'damnation', which only makes itself felt, however, in unexalted moments. Such thoughts are set aside as 'mere old wives' tales' in the triumphant hour of his signing the contract. ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne

... forgiveth always suffereth many evils. Servants and strangers and enemies always disregard him. No creature ever bendeth down unto him. Therefore it is, O child, that the learned applaud not a constant habit of forgiveness! The servants of an ever-forgiving person always disregard him, and contract numerous faults. These mean-minded men also seek to deprive him of his wealth. Vile-souled servants also appropriate to themselves his vehicles and clothes and ornaments and apparel and beds and seats and food and drink ...
— Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 1 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa

... contract me to 'em both; First to Don Lodowick: him I never lov'd; Mathias was the man that I held dear, And for his sake ...
— The Jew of Malta • Christopher Marlowe

... draw it back again, he was pronounced innocent; but if, on the contrary, the hand remained fixed in the marble jaws, the person was declared to have sworn falsely and was pronounced guilty. The marble mouth was supposed by the superstitious to contract or expand itself according to the moral character of the arraigned person. No reason has been given why this singular marble mask should have been placed in this church, nor is anything known of its previous history. Some have conjectured that ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan

... pauper lunatics are sent to asylums under contract or arrangements between justices, etc.: Plymouth, Chichester, Portsmouth, Southampton, Devizes, Salisbury, Chester, Derby, Barnstaple, Bideford, Dartmouth, Exeter, South Molten, Tiverton, Tewkesbury, Bridgewater, ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke

... it like that till we get some splints," continued Gwen. "You see, if the muscles contract, the rough ends of the broken bone might pierce a blood vessel, or do dreadful damage. Some of you bring some sand and make a pillow under her head, then she'll be more comfortable. What we want next ...
— The Youngest Girl in the Fifth - A School Story • Angela Brazil

... scholars, occasions which rarely happen; such as congratulations and condolences, and neglect those without which life cannot proceed. It is possible to pass many years without the necessity of writing panegyricks or epithalamiums; but every man has frequent occasion to state a contract, or demand a debt, or make a narrative of some minute incidents of common life. On these subjects, therefore, young persons should be taught to think justly, and write clearly, neatly, and succinctly, lest ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson

... Show me the Irishman who would steal a roof off an almhouse! He don't exist. Of course, if an Irishman had the political pull and the roof was much worn, he might get the city authorities to put on a new one and get the contract for it himself, and buy the old roof at a bargain—but that's honest graft. It's goin' about the thing like a gentleman, and there's more money in it than in tearin' down an old roof and cartin' it to the junkman's—more money and ...
— Plunkitt of Tammany Hall • George Washington Plunkitt

... are working partners. You already know that most hot bodies shrink, or contract, on cooling. The early rocks were hot. As the outside shell of rock cooled from exposure to air and moisture it contracted. This shrinkage of the rigid rim of course broke many of the rocks, and here and there left cracks, or fissures. In these fissures ...
— Agriculture for Beginners - Revised Edition • Charles William Burkett

... The contract with Locke and Nesham was for 3380 pounds, exclusive of the flooring, the wood-work, and other fittings of the interior. For this 1200 pounds was set aside, but the sum was much exceeded, and there were many offerings from ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge

... very sorry to think of giving his children to the Buso, and he went from place to place, hoping to find some friend who would help him. All the time, the days of the falla ("time of contract") were slipping by. He could get nobody to help him. Now it lacked only two of the nine days' falla. And while the children were asleep, Tuglay said to his wife, "Let us run away, and leave our babies here asleep, because ...
— Philippine Folk-Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss, Berton L. Maxfield, W. H. Millington,

... of this altered situation upon the writer of history at the present time? On such an extensive field of operations, which has to be cultivated so intensely, he finds himself compelled to contract the scope of his operations; he can only take up very narrow ground. So in many instances he limits himself to a period, or even to a single reign, to a particular class of historical personage, or to some special department ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall

... the event of the marriage of said John Glenarm to the said Marian Devereux, or in the event of any promise or contract of marriage between said persons within five years from the date of said John Glenarm’s acceptance of the provisions of this will, the whole estate shall become the property absolutely of St. Agatha’s School, at Annandale, ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson

... benevolent exception: it is in water; for if we start with water at thirty-two degrees, we find the remarkable phenomenon of cold expanding all below thirty-two, and heat expanding all above. If we take water at 212 degrees and withdraw it from the heat, it will continue to contract till we reach thirty-two; then the law is reversed, and the water expands. Now the reversion of this law, at this particular point, is wonderfully expressive of Divine forethought and benevolence. ...
— The Lost Ten Tribes, and 1882 • Joseph Wild

... to move, declining even to discuss the matter further, but proceeded quietly and unswervingly with her arrangements. The failure to complete her contract at the Imperial Theatre involved her in a large sum of money by way of forfeit, but this she paid ungrudgingly, feeling as though it were the first step along the new road of renunciation she ...
— The Lamp of Fate • Margaret Pedler

... my breast to the genial influences of the refreshing sea-breeze, which at sunrise, as this was, is indescribably pleasant. But what a gloomy prospect was now before me!! I was growing weaker every minute; my limbs were beginning to stiffen and the muscles to contract, and I thought there was no help probably nearer than Ain Tarad; what was to be done? I could not travel the distance, and I must perish miserably by slow degrees, from starvation and exhaustion, in the dreary desert; far better, thought I, had the spear done its ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke

... of the heart is this:—The auricles and ventricles expand; blood rushes into the auricles from the channels supplying them, and distends them and the ventricles; the auricles contract and fill the ventricles below quite full (there are no valves above the auricles, but the force of contraction is not sufficient to return the blood to the veins); the ventricles contract; the mitral and tricuspid valves close; the valves leading to the arteries open; blood ...
— How it Works • Archibald Williams

... said the King. "There may be some unpleasant features about the ceremony that would annoy me, so I'll bid you good day and leave you to carry out your contract. One word, however: If you fail, I shall burn you at the stake!" Then he beckoned to his soldiers to follow him, and throwing wide the door of the house ...
— The Scarecrow of Oz • L. Frank Baum

... think the perfection of civilization consists in preaching against slavery and then trying to perpetuate it, in order to get hold of some cotton; the French in suppressing family pamphlets, annulling the sacred contract of marriage, building iron-cast ships, cooking frogs, snails, and cats, making fancy coats, and topping off the human head with elegant hats and bonnets; the Austrians in the manufacture of shin-plasters for their soldiers, and the making and breaking of constitutions for ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne

... a chat with their daughter," T'an Ch'un proceeded, "she said that, besides the flowers they wear, and the bamboo shoots, vegetables, fish and shrimps they eat from this garden of theirs, there's still enough every year for people to take over under contract, and that at the close of each year there's a surplus in full of two hundred taels. Ever since that day is it that I've become alive to the fact that even a broken lotus leaf, and a blade of withered grass are alike ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... United States law, is a transfer of personal property as security for a debt or obligation in such form that the title to the property will pass to the mortgagee upon the failure of the mortgagor to comply with the terms of the contract. At common law a chattel mortgage might be made without writing, and was valid as between the parties, and even as against third parties if accompanied by possession in the mortgagee, but in most states of the Union ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various

... in case any accident occurs to him, even though it be produced by his own fault. We now add that the Supreme Court of the United States has decided that such a law does not take the shipowner's property without due process of law. That, says the Court of Appeals, is different, for "the contract and services of seamen are exceptional in character ... When he is sick or injured he is entitled to be cared for at the expense of the ship, and for the failure of the master to perform his duty in this regard the ship or the ...
— The Making of Arguments • J. H. Gardiner

... which radiated from "Standard Oil," there occurred a financial crash, and the people saw their savings, invested in what they supposed were the legal and absolute titles of ownership in the material things of their country, suddenly decline in value and contract to prices representing a loss to them of billions of dollars. Throughout the misery and suffering this terrible collapse occasioned, "Standard Oil" remained undisturbed as before and amid all the confusion kept ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson

... became heavily clouded, as if he had been forced into an alliance with one he hated, rather than had just made a voluntary engagement with the woman he loved. My soul shuddered at this commencement of a contract which I had dared to make unsanctioned by my father's consent. At length my sighs seemed to startle my husband; and suddenly turning round, he cried, 'Therese, this marriage must not be told to the palatine. I have been precipitate. It would ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter

... signet ring up and down her little finger. The finger, the one which advises the world of the fact that some man in it has singled you out of the ruck as being fit for the honour of wifehood, was unadorned, showing neither the jewels which betoken the drawn-up contract, nor the pure gold which denotes the contract fulfilled. Those two had grown up in the knowledge that they would some time marry, though never a word had been uttered, and being sure and certain of each other, they had never worried, or forced the pace. And then Jill ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest

... limited intelligence can now perceive that, even if we felt ourselves powerless to pursue our secular policy for the defence and protection of Christians in the East, nothing compelled us to witness the marriage contract between Germany and the Grand Turk, to overwhelm them both with good wishes for their perfect union, to lend them our aid in establishing ...
— The Schemes of the Kaiser • Juliette Adam

... had no contract. The contract of a skilled girl provided that she should serve at the factory for a specified period and that if she failed to do so, she should pay back twenty times the 5 yen or whatever sum had been advanced to her. Obviously 100 yen would be ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott

... hard to talk when the thermometer registers more than twenty degrees of frost, for the lips stiffen and contract into wrinkles like the lips of a very old woman. Perhaps neither of the watchers was in the ...
— Barlasch of the Guard • H. S. Merriman

... capital of what has for many years been a State had a population of several thousand inhabitants living in tents, and within a hundred days a population of fifteen thousand people, mostly men, an electric system in operation, a street-railway under contract, streets, alleys, parks, boulevards, stores, and bridges, four thousand houses under construction, five banks, fifteen hotels, fifty grocery stores, six printing-offices, and three daily papers—about as striking ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley

... sudden force, at once subdued the too vivid characters in which her sense of her powers had been expressed. So quick was the revulsion of feeling, I had not time to check her triumph by reproof; ere I could contract my brows to a frown she had ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell

... sudden emergencies, to which all governments as well as individuals are exposed, could not be met promptly and efficiently. Public credit, he said, could only be established by the faithful discharge of public debts in strict conformity to the terms of contract. In the case in question the contract was to pay so much money to the holders of the certificates, or to their assignees. This was plain, and nothing but a full and faithful discharge of the nominal value of the debt could satisfy the contract. Thus he argued concerning the principal, ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... work by the day and not by the job. On a piecework contract he would starve to death. And a third reason was that all through the country the peasants, by request of the Government, were slaughtering their surplus beeves and sheep and swine, so there might be more forage for the army horses ...
— Eating in Two or Three Languages • Irvin S. Cobb

... de Saint-Martin et de Sombran, was maintained as a noble one by order of the Royal Council of State of June 20, 1678. He descended (I) from Bernard de Monet, esquire, captain of the chateau of Lourdes, who had as a son (II) Etienne de Monet, esquire, who, by contract dated August 15, 1543, married Marguerite de Sacaze. He was the father of (III) Pierre de Monet, esquire, "Seigneur d'Ast, en Bearn, guidon des gendarmes de la compagnie du roi de Navarre." From him descended (IV) ...
— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard

... By the time their contract, renewed from week to week, had been operating for two months, Pellams began to wonder just where the point of the joke came in. People had become used to the condition. The House could rely on him and his singing, and girls came oftener than ever to Sunday supper. ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field

... swindle. They would be almost sure to get into a tight place and lose all their money; and there was no end of expense that one could never foresee; and the house might be good-for-nothing from top to bottom—how was a poor man to know? Then, too, they would swindle you with the contract—and how was a poor man to understand anything about a contract? It was all nothing but robbery, and there was no safety but in keeping out of it. And pay rent? asked Jurgis. Ah, yes, to be sure, the other answered, that too was robbery. It was all robbery, for a poor man. After half an hour of such ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair

... The singular contract between the prairie merchant and his ci-devant guide has just reached conclusion as a rustling is heard among the branches of the cottonwoods, accompanied by a ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid

... for compulsory military service; conscript service obligation - 12 months in land or air defense forces or police; a small portion of Mongolian land forces (2.5 percent) is comprised of contract soldiers; women cannot be deployed overseas ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... had certain rigid rules of conduct which he prided himself on observing to the letter, without for a moment suspecting that their raison d'etre lay in his own interests. His commercial morality only required him to keep within the law. His final contract with myself was, I admit, faithfully carried out, but the terms of it would not have discredited the most predatory business man ...
— The Crack of Doom • Robert Cromie

... shall give, there were no internal services in the United Kingdom, but there were four companies operating air lines from London to Paris, one of which held the contract for the carriage of mails. There were also air mail services between London and Brussels and Amsterdam. The mileage flown and the number of passengers and the weight of goods carried were considerable, while the number of letters steadily increased, especially ...
— Aviation in Peace and War • Sir Frederick Hugh Sykes

... The marriage accordingly took place at the Hotel de Lorges, on the 8th of April, 1695, which I have always regarded, and with good reason, as the happiest day of my life. My mother treated me like the best mother in the world. On the Thursday before Quasimodo the contract was signed; a grand repast followed; at midnight the cure of Saint Roch said mass, and married us in the chapel of the house. On the eve, my mother had sent forty thousand livres' worth of precious stones to Mademoiselle de Lorges, and I six hundred Louis in a corbeille filled with all the ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon

... modest as it was. He had to explain this before he moved to a single room next the office where he worked all day. He kept house on a green oil-cloth table-cover, one chair, one charpoy, one photograph, one tooth-glass, very strong and thick, a seven-rupee eight-anna filter, and messing by contract at thirty-seven rupees a month. Which last item was extortion. He had no punkah, for a punkah costs fifteen rupees a month; but he slept on the roof of the office with all his wife's letters under his pillow. Now and again he was asked out to dinner where he got both a punkah and ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... when men, ignoring the teaching of history, strove to solve problems by means of abstract speculations; the attempt to study the origin of phenomena instead of the facts of their progressive manifestation. The social contract is nothing but the description of the collective development to which society tends. The scheme was visionary: but, as a protest against unjust monopolies which existed in that age, it woke up a response in society (cfr. Mill on Liberty, p. 47-50); ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar

... parliaments were held. Here Heraclius, the patriarch of Jerusalem, presented to Henry II. the keys of the Holy Sepulchre, and invoked his aid in the crusade against the Saracens. Here the bishops assembled and excommunicated Longchamp, Chancellor and Regent of the country. Here the marriage contract between John of Gaunt and Blanche of Lancaster was signed, when there were great rejoicings in the ancient town, and tilts and tournaments took place daily. These gay scenes must have greatly disturbed the tranquil life of the monks, and contrasted ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield

... pianos of this day must envy the manufacturers of the good old times when they remember that then the would-be purchaser had to look up the maker and court his pleasure. He had to sign a written contract, the terms of which sound droll enough to us. The time limit for construction was from six to twelve months and the payments were, generally, so much cash, so many casks of wine, a certain amount of ...
— How the Piano Came to Be • Ellye Howell Glover

... advance-guard of the Greek race that inhabits the great island of Cyprus has been subject to British government since 1878, when the provisional occupation of the island by Great Britain under a contract similar to that of Lausanne was negotiated in a secret agreement between Great Britain and Turkey on the eve of the Conference at Berlin. The condition of evacuation was in this case the withdrawal of Russia from Kars, and here likewise it never became operative till it ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth

... and the Emperor of the Empire are in power for a fortnight and in exile for another one. So Ninian says. He told Roger in his last letter that he had had to kick the emperor's backside for him for interfering with the railway contract.... Oh, by the bye, Rachel's produced an infant. She says it's like Roger, but Roger hopes not. He says it's like nothing on earth. He came to see me off from Euston yesterday and when I asked him to describe it to me, he said he couldn't ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine

... Cleve, the explosive Duke, whom we saw at Berlin and Konigsberg at the wedding of this poor Lady now deceased, had in the marriage-contract, as he did in all subsequent contracts and deeds of like nature, announced a Settlement of his Estates, which was now become of the highest moment for Johann Sigismund. The Country at that time called Duchy of Cleve, consisted, ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. III. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Hohenzollerns In Brandenburg—1412-1718 • Thomas Carlyle

... declares, does nothing to prevent sweating; the workmen declare that "Government contract work is the worst of all, and the starved-out and sweated-out tailor's last resource . . . there are more clergymen among the customers than any other class; and often we have to work at home upon the Sunday at their clothes in order to get ...
— Queen Victoria • E. Gordon Browne

... the inherent weaknesses of the South, the insecurity of investment, violation of the right of property and of contract, the jeopardy of life, and over-assessment of taxes on property held by Northern Whites—as constituting the causes underlying the failure of investors to direct their monies to Southern enterprises. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 7, 1922 • Various

... and prestige were involved. To prove the Lani human would destroy Outworld Enterprises on Kardon. Yet this thought did not bother him. To his surprise he had no qualms of conscience. He was perfectly willing to violate his contract, break faith with his employers, and plot their ruin. The higher duty came first—the duty ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone

... been very surprising to us to see in these our times that some people, who really at heart have the interest of women upon their minds, have been so short-sighted and reckless as to clamor for an easy dissolution of the marriage-contract, as a means of righting their wrongs. Is it possible that they do not see that this is a liberty which, once granted, would always tell against the weaker sex? If the woman who finds that she has made a mistake, and married a man ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... recently received official information of my triumph, which my family are now engaged in celebrating at Calcutta with paeans of transport, illuminations, fireworks, an English brass band, and delicacies supplied (on contract system) ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey

... and to get a version of the whole Iliad and Odyssey he gave a large retaining fee, a palazzo, and a farm in the Campagna, and made a deposit of ten thousand pieces of gold to be paid on the completion of the contract. ...
— The Great Book-Collectors • Charles Isaac Elton and Mary Augusta Elton

... Mrs. Stuart a substitute with every European language at her finger-ends. Seriously, Edith, you must consider that contract at an end—my promised wife can be no one's paid companion. Pardon me, but you must see ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming

... also, will be at once struck with the look of greater substantiality and completeness in everything he sees here. No temporizing, no makeshifts, no evidence of hurry, or failure, or contract work; no wood and little paint, but plenty of iron and brick and stone. This people have taken plenty of time, and have built broad and deep, and placed the cap-stone on. All this I had been told, but it pleased me so in the seeing that I must tell it again. It is worth a voyage across the Atlantic ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs

... old Mervin in that hunting trip had been entirely accidental, and he had been astounded by the marriage contract which Mervin shortly after proposed between the two families. Ordinarily even Jude Cartwright, with all his self-esteem, would never have aspired to a star so remote as Mervin's daughter. The miracle, however, happened. He saw ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand

... whether it will adopt as its national ideal a spiritual or an earthly bond in Marriage, the seeking in it of a spiritual unity, or the regarding it as merely a physical union. The one is the religious idea of Marriage as a Sacrament; the other the materialistic idea of it as an ordinary terminable contract. The student of the Lesser Mysteries must ever see ...
— Esoteric Christianity, or The Lesser Mysteries • Annie Besant

... exposure, and painful as the task assigned will be, I shall not refuse, even at the risk of losing all I covet by the confession; for, much as my happiness is at stake, I have too sincere a regard for you to allow you to contract any engagement with me without making this candid avowal. Now, Susan, answer me frankly—whether, in the first place, you wish me to discover the particulars of my early life; in the next place (if you decline hearing them), whether, ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat

... contract to work a specified time at some trade or other work must be released from their contract before application for an excuse from school will be considered. Any student leaving without a written excuse will ...
— Tuskegee & Its People: Their Ideals and Achievements • Various

... taken from them by the military, at prices they would never have thought of accepting, and often by force. Yes; and from widows, who had not even sons on commando, everything was taken away. If then the English, on their part, had broken the contract, were not the burghers perfectly justified in considering themselves no longer bound by the conditions which ...
— Three Years' War • Christiaan Rudolf de Wet

... Act of July 7, 1838, all the railroads then existing (in which the Buffalo & Niagara Falls Railroad must be included), or thereafter to be completed in the United States, were declared post-roads, and the Postmaster-General was thereby authorized, under certain restrictions, to contract for carrying ...
— The Postal Service of the United States in Connection with the Local History of Buffalo • Nathan Kelsey Hall

... mean that you are in a position to make a time contract with me?—provided you prove to be what ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers

... Coterie, or he could take passage on board the first ship bound for Australia, to remain there the rest of his natural life. He chose the latter, and I have appointed my agent, 'Smith, the book peddler,' as his guardian, to see that he carries out his contract to the letter. ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch

... military discipline, not one of them was suffered to move without the General's command. When once his features are under orders to be coldly severe, the lips may not give expression to joy, the eyes may not be clouded with sorrow, the eyebrows may not contract with rage, or lead anyone to suspect, by so much as a twitch or a jerk, that anything in the world outside has the slightest influence upon the business he may ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai

... meeting; I flouted the True Romance in the shape of the Pageant's second performance; I also missed the bazaar of St. Uriel's Native Church that was held on the Pageant ground. St. Uriel's structure had been put out to European contract; it was a very didactic building, so the Pageant-Master told us. We passed it on our way out ...
— Cinderella in the South - Twenty-Five South African Tales • Arthur Shearly Cripps

... some licks at those Huns tonight; honest to Gawd Ah would, Andy," muttered Chris in a low voice. He felt his muscles contract with a furious irritation. He looked through half-closed eyes at the men in the room, seeing them in distorted white lights and reddish shadows. He thought of himself throwing a grenade among a ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos

... comprising many advantages), nor on the score of his wages, which were extremely liberal; nor on account of the "old blighter's"—that is, Mr. Saffron's—occasional outbursts of temper, these being in the nature of the case and within the terms of the contract; nor, finally, by reason of Beaumaroy's airy insolence, since from his youth up the Sergeant was hardened to unfavorable comments on his personal appearance, trifling vulgarities which a man of sense could afford ...
— The Secret of the Tower • Hope, Anthony

... he and all his generation must remain slaves for ever, without hope of redemption or deliverance. And, without doubt, hard is his case, and well grounded are his complaints. Indeed the planter's concern only commences with the arrival of these slaves, and his contract made with the merchant, who, under the colour and authority of the laws, brought them into the country where he lives. For the purchase he makes he has also the sanction and countenance of law, which is in some measure a justification of his conduct. On provincial regulations, with respect ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 1 • Alexander Hewatt

... colonel understood the secret of its fastenings; and the bare thought of my venturing with her on the route by which I had hitherto made my entry into the oasis, was one that curdled my blood with fear. I could absolutely feel my flesh to contract whenever I painted the terrible risk that would be incurred in adopting a plan I had once conceived,—namely, that of lashing your mother to my back, while I again effected my descent to the ledge ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson

... forsaken the personal side of the question, when she was recalled to it by seeing the right hand in which the stylograph had been lying begin to twitch, the fingers to contract. There was no answering movement in the face—even when the sleeper at length firmly grasped the pen and suddenly sat up. Tims rose quickly, and then perceived, lying on the writing-board, a directed envelope and a half-finished note to herself. ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods

... the public pressed for solution as never before. The only suggestion at first discussed was arbitration. Enforced arbitration could not be effected in the absence of contract without infringing the workingman's right to labor or to decline to do so; in other words, without reducing him, in case of adverse decision by arbitration, to a condition of involuntary servitude. It looked as though no ...
— History of the United States, Volume 6 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews

... that he considered comparison disloyal. All the while that Cressida was singing reliably, and satisfying the management, Straka was singing uncertainly and making history. Her voice was primarily defective, and her immediate vocal method was bad. Cressida was always living up to her contract, delivering the whole order in good condition; while the Slav was sometimes almost voiceless, sometimes inspired. She put you off with a hope, a promise, time after time. But she was quite as likely to put you off with a revelation,—with an ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather

... another union in this world was not for him—that he had no right to exchange vows of eternal fidelity with any other woman. She had remained unwedded, and would so remain, he felt, to the end of her life. The legal contract between them was dissolved; but, since his brief talk with the stranger on the boat, he had not felt so clear as to the higher law obligations which were upon them. And so he had settled it in his mind to bear life's ...
— After the Storm • T. S. Arthur

... "Pioneers of France in the New World." Hbert's cottage seems to have stood between Ste.-Famille and Couillard Streets, as appears by a contract of 1634, cited by M. ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman

... certainties. She knew that she did not love George Holland; but she had not the courage to face Philistia as the girl who did not know her own mind. Philistia was very solid on such points as the sacredness of an engagement between a man and a woman. It was a contract practically as abiding as marriage, in the eyes of Philistia; and, indeed, Phyllis herself had held this belief, and had never hesitated to express it. So nothing was left to her but to marry George ...
— Phyllis of Philistia • Frank Frankfort Moore

... gets my goat how things began to pick up the very minute I threw up my contract. He's had ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton

... this year, and are always taking place all over Europe and America, have no kind of connection with these acts of violence. They like to believe that their privileges exist apart and are the result of free contract among people; and that the violent cruelties perpetrated on the people also exist apart and are the result of some general judicial, political, or economical laws. They try not to see that they all enjoy their privileges as a result of the same fact which forces the ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy

... quit the world and take the veil. But before doing so, and without informing any one, except her confessor, of her intention, she contrives a somewhat dramatic scene for the purpose of exposing her false lover. She comes into the presence of the king and all the court, produces her contract, claims Bertoldo as her husband, and demands justice of the king, adjuring him that ...
— Elizabethan Demonology • Thomas Alfred Spalding

... as a friend. Though he could not have known what the contract between his father and the voyagers had been, except so far as he had learned it from the subsequent events, he had voluntarily surrendered himself, and insisted upon seeing Fanny conveyed to a place of safety. Almost ...
— Hope and Have - or, Fanny Grant Among the Indians, A Story for Young People • Oliver Optic

... know how it is," said the captain, solemnly, "but I begin to feel a sort of somethin towards you youngsters that's very absorbin. It's a kine o' anxious fondness, with a mixtoor of indulgent tenderness. How ever I got to contract sech a feelin beats me. I s'pose it's bein deprived of my babby, an exiled from home, an so my vacant buzzom craves to be filled. I've got a dreadful talent for doin the pariential, an what's more, not only for doin the pariential, but for feelin ...
— Lost in the Fog • James De Mille

... precise terms that language could afford. But on the death of his father-in-law, he retracted his renunciation, and pretended that natural rights, depending on blood and succession, could not be annihilated by any extorted deed or contract. Philip had left a son, Charles II. of Spain; but as the queen of France was of a former marriage, she laid claim to a considerable province of the Spanish monarchy, even to the exclusion of her brother. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part F. - From Charles II. to James II. • David Hume

... poet's verse does not put a spirit of youth in every thing, but a spirit of fear, despondency, and decay: it is not an electric spark to kindle or expand, but acts like the torpedo's touch to deaden or contract. It lends no dazzling tints to fancy, it aids no soothing feelings in the heart, it gladdens no prospect, it stirs no wish; in its view the current of life runs slow, dull, cold, dispirited, half under ground, muddy, and clogged with all creeping things. The world is one vast infirmary; ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt

... with his aunt, dear," she replied, blandly. "It's a contract that we've drawn up between us. You know that I was always rather good in the part of ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner

... "les bonnes gens en seront offensez, les malins en feront leur risee," so now Coligny and the Huguenot gentlemen of his suite united with the Protestant ministers in begging him to renounce his present course of life, and contract a second honorable marriage. The latter held up to him "il pericolo et infamia propria, et il scandalo commune a tutta la relligione per esserne lui capo;" the former threatened to leave him. I have seen no injurious reports affecting ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird

... latter part of the summer father filled a hay contract at Fort Leavenworth. I passed much of my time among the campers, and spent days and days in riding over the country with Mr. William Russell, who was engaged in the freighting business and who seemed to take a considerable ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody

... suppose you make me an offer.' Then he said: 'How would $40,000 strike you?' This caused me to come as near fainting as I ever got. I was afraid he would hear my heart beat. I managed to say that I thought it was fair. 'All right, I will have a contract drawn; come around in three days and sign it, and I will give you the money.' I arrived on time, but had been doing some considerable thinking on the subject. The sum seemed to be very large for the amount of work, for at that time I determined the value by the time ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin

... universe, must be in a manner identifyed with that, simple, uncompounded essence, in which the universe is supposed to inhere. But this, it may be pretended, is utterly impossible and inconceivable unless the indivisible substance expand itself, so as to correspond to the extension, or the extension contract itself, so as to answer to the indivisible substance. This argument seems just, as far as we can understand it; and it is plain nothing is required, but a change in the terms, to apply the same argument to our extended perceptions, ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume

... I was havin' water put in my house, I dreamed that my sister who was dead told a friend of mine to tell me not to sign a contract and I didn't know there was a contract. And that next day a man come out for me to sign a contract and I said, 'No.' He wanted to know why and finally I told him, and he said, 'You're just like my mother.' It was two ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration

... is not in my power to comply with your proposal of easing the prisoners for a few days of their fetters. Much as my humanity may be touched by their sufferings, I should think it inexpedient to afford them any alleviation while they persist in a breach of their contract with me; and, indeed, no indulgence could be shown them without the authority of the Nabob, who, instead of consenting to moderate the rigors of their situation, would be most willing ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke

... that I have awarded the Indian Musq'oosis the contract to freight all my supplies from Grier's Point to my camp on Beaver Bay during the coming summer at twenty-five ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner

... he refused, and went away sorrowful, because this poor world looked very bright and alluring, and the path of self-denial and duty looked very forbidding. Or, if he was a man in middle life, perhaps he was commanded to abate his interest in plans for the accumulation of wealth, to contract his enterprises, to give attention to the concerns of his soul and the souls of his children, to make his own peace with God, and to consecrate the remainder of his life to Christ and to human welfare; and when this plain and reasonable course of conduct was dictated to him, he found his whole ...
— Sermons to the Natural Man • William G.T. Shedd

... it best, under the circumstances, to confide in full to Margery and her father concerning his own love affair, lest they might expect him to carry out the contract his cousin had made in regard to marrying his old ...
— Mischievous Maid Faynie • Laura Jean Libbey

... out to soil the little owner's clean, dainty fur, or cause the slightest smell. In fact, Stripes was altogether one of the cleanest and daintiest and most gentlemanly of all the wild creatures. But when he had to, he could contract those muscles around the oil sac with such violence that the deadly oil—blinding and suffocating—would be shot forth to a distance of several feet, right into the face of the enemy. And that, let me tell you, was never good for ...
— Children of the Wild • Charles G. D. Roberts

... and conduct, to become the ruler of these realms. It is remarked that he who has the worst title will make the best King. There is a story current of the existence of a black box in which is deposited the marriage-contract between the King and the Duke's mother, but some doubt, not without reason, whether such a black box exists, much more the contents spoken of. Be that as it may, many persons speak boldly of the Duke of Monmouth some day becoming King ...
— Roger Willoughby - A Story of the Times of Benbow • William H. G. Kingston

... advance of the date they will be needed. Furthermore, it is a relief to the patient to have her attendants selected. The possibility of premature delivery never interferes with engaging the nurse very early in pregnancy, for that accident releases both patient and nurse from their contract. ...
— The Prospective Mother - A Handbook for Women During Pregnancy • J. Morris Slemons

... the streets they are not taught to refuse intercourse with diseased men; thus their occupation becomes more and more dangerous as medical supervision is removed. They inevitably become diseased; sometimes contract mixed infections, which they pass on to their clients—the future husbands and fathers of the nation—and "The sins of the fathers are visited upon the children even unto the third and fourth generation." All this would be impossible if women ...
— Safe Marriage - A Return to Sanity • Ettie A. Rout

... consequence is that if the American newspaper reporters has a sort of hazy idea that Sonnino is either an item on the bill of fare, to be passed up on account of having garlic in it, or else a tenor which the Metropolitan Opera House ain't given a contract to as yet, y'understand, then the American public has got the same sort of hazy idea. So Mr. Wilson done the right thing traveling to Italy, even if he did have ...
— Potash and Perlmutter Settle Things • Montague Glass

... malignant fever. Nay, there is reason to believe that a person living according to all the Creator's laws, physical and moral, could hardly receive or communicate disease of any kind. How could a person in perfect health, and obeying to an iota all the laws of health—how could he contract disease? What would there be in his system which could furnish a nidus for ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott

... didst build." Out of these an other poet will make the line, (8.) "Dost dwell in halls which thou nor plann'dst nor built'st." An other, more tastefully, would drop the st of the preterit, and contract the present, as in the second ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... the contract took place on a Tuesday morning, and Mademoiselle Source devoted the rest of the day to the preparations ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant

... was very communicative. They were going to make the regular tour first, she said, but were to go on to the Tibetan frontier at the end, where Sir Ivor had a contract to construct a railway, in a very wild region. Tigers? Natives? Oh, she didn't mind either of THEM; but she was told that that district—what did they call it? the Terai, or something—was terribly unwholesome. Fever was what-you-may-call-it ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen

... was madly in love with her, and she had no fear of his sailing away without her. If so, there was Jawkins still. She had lulled the manager into such a feeling of security that he had run up to Scotland to undertake an important contract. An American billionaire, having rented the Trossachs for the season, had engaged him to superintend his arrangements. Titled people were at a premium since the discovery of the conspiracy, and Jawkins could command his own prices. His reply to this patron, "I will provide you with a pair of peers ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.

... cheated. But it is as impossible for a man to be cheated by any one but himself, as for a thing to be and not to be at the same time. There is a third silent party to all our bargains. The nature and soul of things takes on itself the guaranty of the fulfilment of every contract, so that honest service cannot come to loss. If you serve an ungrateful master, serve him the more. Put God in your debt. Every stroke shall be repaid. The longer The payment is withholden, the better for you; for compound interest on compound interest ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson



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