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Lack   Listen
noun
Lack  n.  
1.
Blame; cause of blame; fault; crime; offense. (Obs.)
2.
Deficiency; want; need; destitution; failure; as, a lack of sufficient food. "She swooneth now and now for lakke of blood." "Let his lack of years be no impediment."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Lack" Quotes from Famous Books



... flush mantled the man's cheek. He cursed himself inwardly for his lack of self-control. The girl would have his whole secret out of him in another half-hour if he ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... their anxiety to have Carlton lunch with them, and to hear him tell of the progress of his love-affair. There was not much to tell; the Hohenwalds had come and gone from the hotel as freely as any other tourists in Paris, but the very lack of ceremony about their movements was in itself a difficulty. The manner of acquaintance he could make in the court of the Hotel Meurice with one of the men over a cup of coffee or a glass of bock would be ...
— The Princess Aline • Richard Harding Davis

... that the PRIME MINISTER spent last week-end in the country is said to have caused intense annoyance to the KAISER, who considered that it showed a lack of respect ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 9, 1914 • Various

... curious case of lack of integrity of the will in a man of fifty-five. When he had once started on a certain labor he seemed to have no power to stop the muscular exercise that the task called forth. If he went to the barn to throw down a forkful of hay, he would never stop ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... English government officers, in defiance of the Queen's proclamation of neutrality! So far has English sympathy overflowed. We have heard of other steamers, iron-clad, designed to furnish to a slavery-defending Confederacy their only lack,—a navy for the high seas. We have heard that the British Evangelical Alliance refuses to express sympathy with the liberating party, when requested to do so by the French Evangelical Alliance. We find in English religious newspapers all those sad degrees in the downward-sliding scale ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe

... guiding genius and through the hearts of us all. One who had seen him, as I did, stand uncovered in the presence of his new Washington hand-press, the day that dynamo of Light was erected in the Argus office, could never suppose him to lack humanity or the just reverence demanded by ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson

... said, who was himself sturdily put together. Dave Thomas was neither as tall as Tod nor as stocky as Frank; He looked undersized, in fact. But his "red hair and readier tongue," his friends declared, more than made up for any lack of size. At any rate, no one ever offered a second time to carry the heaviest end of ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Air on Lost Island • Gordon Stuart

... after reaching middle age, are usually heavy and lack agility, but my grandmother was in this also an exception. She was fully sixty when I was born; and when I was seven years old she swam across a swift and wide stream, carrying me on her back, because she did not wish to expose me to accident in one of the clumsy round boats ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman

... that wealth, science, and civilisation are the work and property of man, in just that proportion we shall be tempted to keep them selfishly and exclusively to ourselves. The man of science will be tempted to hide his discoveries, though men may be perishing for lack of them, till he can sell them to the highest bidder; the rich man will be tempted to purchase them for himself, in order that he may increase his own comfort and luxury, and feel comparatively lazy and careless about their application to the ...
— Sermons on National Subjects • Charles Kingsley

... distant that it seemed but half life-size, Each vital part marked with a little ring. And when the spears were hurled, six trembling stood Fixed in the beast, piercing each vital part, Leaving the victory in even scale. For these was set far off a lesser mark, Until at length by chance, not lack of skill, The victory so long in doubt was won. And then again the people wildly shout, The prince victor ...
— The Dawn and the Day • Henry Thayer Niles

... followed suit, would have worked cheerfully under her direction. But Magdalen, whose serene cheerfulness had flagged of late, fell painfully below her sister's expectation. Fay came to the conclusion that it was more lack of imagination than callousness on her sister's part which held ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley

... Mr. Gerridge. Whatever may have drawn Mrs. Ransom from my side, it was not lack of affection, or any doubt of my sincerity or undivided attachment ...
— The Chief Legatee • Anna Katharine Green

... night audience." Newgag, having abandoned all idea of making a hit, or of acting the part any further than the mere delivery of the speeches went, was no longer inordinately nervous. When he first entered he was a trifle frightened, and his unavoidable lack of prepared stage business made him awkward and embarrassed for a time. The awkwardness remained, but the embarrassment eventually passed away. He spoke in his natural voice and retained his actual manner. When the action required him to laugh, he did so, exhibiting ...
— Tales From Bohemia • Robert Neilson Stephens

... the lack of which in many men leads them to distresses, sometimes to disasters. He knew when ice would bear, and directly it would bear, he was content to trust himself on it, but he did not stamp upon it unnecessarily, to prove ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens

... the continuous unreason of the love-driven male, we say, "Love is blind"; seeing his light-mindedness, we say, "Love has wings"; seeing his evident lack of intelligence and purpose, we make him a mere child; seeing the evil results of his wide license, we euphemistically indicate some pain by ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman

... whatever happened he must make a good case for Punsonby's, and that whoever was to blame for this unhappy incident it was not an august firm which paid its fourteen per cent. with monotonous regularity. "We lack—ah—definite knowledge to proceed any further in this matter than—in fact, than we have proceeded. Definite knowledge" (the girl was all the more bewildered by his cumbersome diplomacy) "definite knowledge was promised but has not—in fact, has not come ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace

... without thinking. Thought is doubtless of high value; our first endeavour should be to think as often and as well as we can; but, for all that, it is somewhat beside the mark to believe that the possession, or lack, of a certain faculty for handling general ideas can interpose an actual barrier between men. After all, the difference between the greatest thinker and the smallest provincial burgher is often only the difference between a truth that can sometimes ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck

... place, everything he did not like, was at once abolished or altered. But in spite of all the defects of the house and its surroundings, and the appalling road from the station (nearly nine miles) and the lack of rooms, so many visitors came that there was nowhere to put them, and beds had sometimes to be made up in the passages. Chekhov's household at this time consisted of his father and mother, his sister, and his younger brother Mihail. These were all ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov

... shame!' Sidwell whispered to her mother; and the reply was a look which eloquently expressed Mrs. Warricombe's lack of sympathy with ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing

... government troops are off to Manono; no word of Mataafa. O, there is a passage in my mother's letter which puzzles me as to a date. Is it next Christmas you are coming? or the Christmas after? This is most important, and must be understood at once. If it is next Christmas, I could not go to Ceylon, for lack of gold, and you would have to adopt one of the following alternatives: 1st, either come straight on here and pass a month with us; 'tis the rainy season, but we have often lovely weather. Or (2nd) come to Hawaii and I will meet ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... coupled with rough treatment he received, and lack of good food, soon made him ill. He was so weak that he could not help himself, and with that he was kept under guard. So he had no chance to escape or send his wife or ...
— Tom Swift and his Photo Telephone • Victor Appleton

... slavery which they have adopted serves to supply the lack of field-labor only. The demand for domestic servants must be met by forays on tribes which have good supplies of cattle. The Portuguese can quote instances in which blacks become so degraded by the love of strong drink ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone

... the most common forms of hinged joint in use to-day is that formed by using the "butt" hinge, and many troubles experienced by the amateur, such as "hinge-bound," "stop-bound," and "screw-bound" doors, etc., are due to a lack of knowledge of the principles of hingeing. Hinges call for careful gauging and accurate fitting, otherwise trouble is ...
— Woodwork Joints - How they are Set Out, How Made and Where Used. • William Fairham

... where, under voluntary rationing, people go round and find other food and get along with the supplies there are, under compulsory rationing there would always be a tendency to demand their ration and to make trouble about the lack of ...
— Women and War Work • Helen Fraser

... lack of authorities, medical and non-medical, on this point. Few who weigh them well will deny that there is such a thing as too large a family; that there does come a time when a mother can rightfully demand rest from her labours, in the interest of herself, her children, and society. When ...
— The Physical Life of Woman: - Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother • Dr. George H Napheys

... belonged to the Montfiquets; it was here that the abandoned mines were situated that had been mentioned to Licquet as Allain's place of refuge. Though obliged to abandon the Chateau de Mandeville, where, as well as at Rubercy, the gendarmes had made a search, d'Ache did not lack shelter around Bayeux. A Madame Chivre, who lived on the outskirts of the town, had for fifteen years been the providence of the most desperate Chouans, and d'Ache was sure of a welcome from her; but he stayed only ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre

... stood about six feet three; his face was long and brown and grave; his figure was spare and strong. Atop his head he wore the sacred Arizona high-crowned hat, around his neck a bright bandana; no coat, but an unbuttoned vest; skinny trousers, and boots. Save for lack of spurs and chaps and revolver he might have been a moving-picture cowboy. The spurs alone were lacking from the ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White

... unillumined page, And trust its meaning to the flattering eye That reads it in the gracious light of love. Ah, wouldst thou clothe thyself in breathing shape And nestle at my side, my voice should lend Whate'er my verse may lack of tender rhythm ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... precautions. One warm-hearted officer seems actually to have sallied out to meet his comrades, and it was not till his greeting of them took the extreme form of handing over his rifle that the suspicion of danger entered the heads of his companions. But if there was some lack of wit there was none of heart in Sladen and his men. With forty-five Boers to hold down, and 500 under Fourie, De Wet, and De la Rey around them, the little band made rapid preparation for a desperate resistance: the ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle

... brothers, having the same fatherland and sharing the same proscription, they tell one another their sufferings. He who has money shares it with those who have none, he who has firmness imparts it to those who lack it. They exchange recollections, aspirations, hopes. They turn, their arms extended in the darkness towards those they have left behind. Oh! how happy they who think no more of us! Every man suffers and at times ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo

... and women who have become unhappy in regard to their attitude toward the social order itself; toward the dreary round of uninteresting work, the pleasures narrowed down to those of appetite, the declining consciousness of brain power, and the lack of mental food which characterizes the lot of the large proportion of their fellow-citizens. These men and women have caught a moral challenge raised by the exigencies of contemporaneous life; some are bewildered, others who are denied the relief which ...
— Democracy and Social Ethics • Jane Addams

... than to bring to the table those who had to leave it next day, and to give a better passage to those who would have come exposed to the wretched lot endured by the soldiers; and, when they wish to give habits, there is no lack [of men] here in Manila. Therefore, scarcely were they come to Manila when they left. That year the first archbishop who has belonged to the islands sailed, namely, Don Pedro Vazquez de Mercado, a secular. He had been bishop in Nueva Espana, and, although any office ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXIV, 1630-34 • Various

... say King Lear or Mary Queen of Scots, and goes about hunting for a living person as near as possible in appearance to the original, and then costumes and slavishly reproduces him or her, without any show of judgment or insight after the model is once selected. And this lack of insight into character seems deplorably prevalent among our figure painters, for how often we see in the exhibitions the model with a "good head" tamely reproduced over and over again—here as a monk, there as a Polonius, Thomas a Becket, a "blind beggar," "His Excellency," a pensioner, or ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss

... Georgia, in 1831, speaking of the slaves he says, "They are a nation of HEATHEN in our very midst." "What have we done for our poor negroes? With shame we must confess that we have done NOTHING!" "How can you pray for Christ's kingdom to come while you are neglecting a people perishing for lack of vision around your very doors." "We withhold the Bible from our servants and keep them in ignorance of it, while we will not use the means to have it read and explained to them." ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... he could recite in his classroom pages of Scott's novels, which he had not read since early youth. He had no intention of allowing my memory to grow flabby from lack of use. I often repeat a verse he asked ...
— Memories and Anecdotes • Kate Sanborn

... enemies appeared there was in such an occupation plenty of time in which to think and dream of God and man and love and duty. Very often, however, the dreamer's reveries were interrupted, and at such times there was no lack ...
— Hebrew Life and Times • Harold B. Hunting

... assuredly persist in regarding the married woman as a corvette duly authorized by her flag and papers to go on her own course, while the woman who is a wife in all but name is a pirate and an outlaw for lack of a document. A day came when Mme. de la Garde would fain have signed herself "Mme. Castanier." The cashier was put ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne

... Conquest. The Normans brought in not only the most permanent, but the most important invasion of alien immigrants, who affected and directed the development of English habits and character, and of the English constitution. There is little wonder that William had no lack of followers in his attempt, for the England of the eleventh century must have appealed to the Normans, the Picards, and Burgundians, of his mingled company, much as South Africa still calls our younger sons to-day, as a land of ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook

... dislike any sort of contest, or squabble, or competition, or storm. My strength is in my calm, my serenity, my sunshine. In excitement I lose my head, and my heels, too. I cannot carry any citadel by storm. I lack the audacity and spirit of the stormer. I must reduce it slowly or steal it quietly. I lack moral courage, though I have plenty of physical and intellectual courage. I could champion Walt Whitman when nearly every contemporaneous ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus

... as to the reason why our forefathers preferred to rear their houses with the upper storeys projecting out into the streets. We can understand that in towns where space was limited it would be an advantage to increase the size of the upper rooms, if one did not object to the lack of air in the narrow street and the absence of sunlight. But we find these same projecting storeys in the depth of the country, where there could have been no restriction as to the ground to be occupied ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield

... confirming the inference reached somewhat mechanically by the scrutiny of his actions. They play to the latter the part of the soul to the body, and thus contribute to the rather anatomical result of the dissecting process a spiritual element it would otherwise lack. But if this is so even of the outward career, it is far more deeply true of the inner history, of that underlying native character, which masterfully moulds and colors every life, yet evades the last analysis except when the obscure workings of heart and ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan

... banquet disappears merrily; there being no lack of the usual conserves, pasties, and geometrical bread-envelopes—supposed to contain something, but consumed without the ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner

... whatever his deficiency in other virtues, certainly did not lack courage, made a strong effort at self-possession, and without replying to the Colonel, whose remark had not been directly addressed to himself, said in his most rollicking tone, "Yes, Mrs. Haughton, Charles was ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... that the Lord is good; Happy the man who seeks refuge with him. Revere the Lord, O holy ones, For those who revere him lack nothing. Though young lions feel want and suffer hunger, Those who seek the Lord shall ...
— The Children's Bible • Henry A. Sherman

... He did not know how it was to be done, but he did know it must be done. "Get" her they should not. Whatever it had been his mother had feared for him, nameless though the horror was, from that he must save Lily. Mickey had thought it must be careless nurses or lack of love. Yesterday's papers had said there were some children at one of the Homes, no one ever visited; they were sick for love; would not some kind people come to see them? It must have been that she feared. He could not possibly know it was the stigma of having been a charity child she had been ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter

... they rode into the cottonwoods of Lone Tree Spring. Chad lifted her, stiff and cold from lack of circulation, to the ground. She clung to his coat sleeve for a moment dizzily before she limped forward to the live-oak that gave the place its name. The girl sank down beside the water-hole with her back to the ...
— Steve Yeager • William MacLeod Raine

... enumeration of the lack of variety of food and the poverty of their new homes, could not deter us from our determination to dine with them, almost in ...
— On the Indian Trail - Stories of Missionary Work among Cree and Salteaux Indians • Egerton Ryerson Young

... that the strain began to tell. Mr. Patteson had been worn with anxiety for his father, and no doubt with awe in the contemplation of his coming Episcopate, and was not in a strong state of health when he left Kohimarama, and the lack of animal food, the too sparing supply of wine, and the bare board bed told upon him. On the 24th of July he wrote in a letter ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge

... believed Dick's strange reserve and lack of spirits to be due to his fear of the law and the dread prospect of having to appear in court, endeavoured indirectly (and very cleverly, as she imagined) to ease his mind. She did not wish him to think he had done no wrong, or that she did not regard his ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson

... as well as the triumphs of the star-voyagers. Cochrane wanted to get back to Earth. So far as television was concerned, it would be unwise. The ship and its crew would travel indefinitely without a lack of sponsors. But for once, Cochrane agreed ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... settling the estate, of which he was one of the executors, scarcely realized his loss; but when he returned to Rivermouth a heavy sense of loneliness came over him. The crowded, happy firesides to which he was free seemed to reproach him for his lack of kinship; he stood alone in the world; there was no more reason why he should stay in one place than in another. His connection with the bank, unnecessary now from a money point of view, grew irksome; the quietude of the town oppressed him; he determined to cut adrift from all and go abroad. ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... of "Menaphon"[141] is hardly more probable, but it takes place in the country of Arcadia, a fact that predisposes us to treat with indulgence any lack of reality; moreover, it contains touches of true poetry, and is perhaps, all considered, the best of Greene's romantic novels. In common with most of this author's tales it abounds in monologues and dialogues; heroes think aloud and let us into their ...
— The English Novel in the Time of Shakespeare • J. J. Jusserand

... the aisles of potted plants in the conservatory. She was very learned. She explained the origin of each flower, its native soil, the time and manner of its transportation. Perhaps she was surprised at his lack of botanical knowledge, he asked so many questions. But it was not the flowers, it was her voice, which urged him to ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath

... you be sure of?—but I could see why Lena thought she would. She was a little unhealthy thing, dark and sallow and sulky, with thin lips that showed a lack of temperament, and she had a stiffness and preciseness, like a Board School teacher—just that touch of "commonness" which Lena relied on to put him off. She wore a shabby brown skirt and a yellowish blouse. ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors

... been able to learn, there is a fairly general consensus of opinion that this is due to a lack of the proper kind of early training in the home. As often as this question has come up in my presence, it has always been answered readily and confidently to this same effect, and the answer has met with unanimous approval of men ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)

... breach serious and hostilities likely to be protracted. Sometimes a whole week would go by without the two houses ceasing to stare sullenly across at each other, the situation in Milly's camp being aggravated by the lack of a clothes-brush. In such moments of irritation, Milly's husband was apt to declare that his mother-in-law had abundance of clothes-brushes, for, he pertinently asked, how did she manage during her frequent business tours in the country? ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... and Protection, is one of the worst things, into which the Devil by his Temptations would be hurrying of us. He would fain have driven our Lord unto a Suspicion of Gods care about Him, said the Devil, You may dy for lack of Bread, if you do not look better after your self, than God is like to do for you. It is an usual thing for Persons to dispair of Gods Fatherly Care Concerning them; they torture themselves with distracting and amazing Fears, that they shall come to want before they dy; Yea, they ...
— The Wonders of the Invisible World • Cotton Mather

... Lack of business confidence increased greatly. Money rates advanced. Security values fell; imports greatly exceeded exports. Silver certificates were at 83. Something was about to snap in the general business machine. National ...
— A Brief History of Panics • Clement Juglar

... said Alice, taking the words out of my mouth, 'and what is more, we are going to have her repaired for you. She isn't much hurt.' So the boy stammered out the best kind of a 'thank you' that he could manage, and the look in his eyes made up for the lack of words. That was the time that he came nearest to crying. But Alice saved him by asking what he was going ...
— The Valley of Vision • Henry Van Dyke

... Army as I have seen it in this division. I have seen the work done by this organization for ten months, under all sorts of conditions, and it has always been of the highest character. At the start, the Salvation Army was handicapped by lack of funds, but even under adverse conditions, it did most valuable work in maintaining cheerful recreation centres for the men, often in places exposed to hostile shell- fire. The doughnut and pie supply has been maintained. This seems a little thing, but it has gone a long way to ...
— The War Romance of the Salvation Army • Evangeline Booth and Grace Livingston Hill

... into the study. The Vicar felt that he was a man of singular suggestions. His straight build, his height, his carriage arrested the attention and the clear cut of his cold face held it. One of his marked suggestions was that there was unusual lack of revelation in his rather fine almond eye. It might have revealed much but its intention was to reveal nothing but courteous detachment from all but well-bred approach to the demand ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... see, at least so much as suited their pictures—but as they were not, generally speaking, exclusively sky-painters, but painters of subjects to which the skies were subordinate, they may be fairly held excused for this their lack of ballooning after the "cirrus;" and we thank them that they were not "glare-seekers," "threading" their way, with it before them, "among the then transparent clouds, while all around the sun is unshadowed fire." ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various

... Your Majesty and Your Majesty's subjects. Should I in my enthusiasm at any time violate any of the established rules of court etiquette, please always remember that it is due to my ignorance and not to any lack of deep and sincere respect or that affection which I and all true Anglo-Saxons have for your person as representing the head of that great people and the ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney

... be as impartial and just as words can express, or the imagination paint—though it be as pure as the gospel, and breathe only the spirit of Heaven—it is powerless; it has no executive vitality; it is a lifeless corpse, even though beautiful in death. I am famishing for lack of bread! How is my appetite relieved by holding up to my gaze a painted loaf? I am manacled, wounded, bleeding, dying! What consolation is it to know, that they who are seeking to destroy my life, profess in words to be my friends?" If the liberties of the ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... they themselves criticize? Why do not they reason? Charity herself after weighing these Essays carefully has no alternative but to assume that the Authors either have not the courage, or that they lack the ability, to descend to a free discussion, and risk all on a stand-up fight. A kind of guerilla warfare: half a dozen arrows, and a hasty retreat: such is their mode of attack! But this method, though it may occasion annoyance, is quite unworthy ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon

... one—from the baths mostly—refreshed and perfumed, ready to gaze with fashionable lack of interest on the spectacle of this public auction. They had exchanged greetings with the praefect and with Hortensius Martius. They all knew one another, were all members of the same caste, the ruling caste of Rome. Young Escanes was now there, he who wanted a cook, and Caius Nepos—the ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... we are the richest and strongest nation in the world, let it not be recorded that we lack the moral and spiritual idealism which made us the hope of the world at the time ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Richard Nixon • Richard Nixon

... sea-coal or Scotch coal, and with stable-litter, you will have a fuel much more economical than coal itself. But, though this is the practical proposal of the fly-sheet, its main interest lies in its lamentation over the lack of the normal fuel. "Some fine-nosed city dames," it says, "used to tell their husbands, 'O husband! we shall never be well, we nor our children, whilst we live in the smell of this city's sea-coal smoke! Pray, a country-house for our health, ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... wide range of his subjects, however, deprives his papers when taken together of the weight which might attach to a series of related discussions. And, remarkable as is De Quincey's aptitude for analysis and speculation, more than once we have to regret the lack of the "saving common-sense" possessed by many far less gifted men. His erudition and insight are always a little in advance of his ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey

... have to make the best of it, will you not? It is perfectly natural to feel as you do, after setting your heart on the other plan, and I am sure it does not mean any lack of affection ...
— The Story of the Big Front Door • Mary Finley Leonard

... Mr. Falconer was remarked by several young ladies, to whom it appeared that Miss Gryll had lost her two most favoured lovers at once. However, as she had still many others, it was not yet a decided case for sympathy. Of course she had no lack of partners, and whatever might have been her internal anxiety, she was not the least ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock

... grandmammy talk bout what happen in dey day, but I never didn' live in slavery time. My mammy, she been broke her leg long time fore freedom come here en I remember she tell me often times, say, 'Julia, you didn' lack much of comin here a slavery child.' Honey, I mean she been in de family way right sharp ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves • Works Projects Administration

... letter of his to her mother. She did not dare because—well, because she lacked a little faith. That is it, I am afraid. And for that sin she was her own punishment. For in this day, and in many days to come, the pure joy of her love was vexed and clouded, all through a little lack of faith; while for him, perfect in his faith, his ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister

... mons veneris is almost destitute of hair, and the labia rather undeveloped, while, "as far as is known," sexual instincts and desire are entirely absent. These latter facts, I may add, would seem to suggest that, in spite of the health of the subject, there is yet some concealed lack of development of the sexual system, of congenital character. In a case recorded by Plant (Centralblatt fuer Gynaekologie, No. 9, 1896, summarized in the British Medical Journal, April 4, 1896), in which the internal sexual organs were almost wholly undeveloped, and menstruation ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... almost impossible to associate with pleasant family gatherings or the joyous voices of young children; a grim desolate-looking house, that seemed to freeze the passing traveller with its cold blank stare, as if its gloomy portal had a voice to say to him, "However lost you may be for lack of shelter, however weary for want of ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon

... it had been a glimpse of heaven, and was disturbed lest it might have been a portent of death. But his mind was too active, his nature too independent to sit down under superstition. If he died on the desert, it would not be through lack of effort ...
— The Valiant Runaways • Gertrude Atherton

... is really sick," explained the boy; "and there's no humbug about his ailment, either. I heard the doctor tell my mother that it was partly due to a lack of substantial food for years. You see, the woman herself was ill for a long time, and her husband worked himself to skin and bone trying to provide for her. Then she got over her trouble, and now it's his turn to go under. He has tried to work a number of times, but fainted ...
— The Chums of Scranton High Out for the Pennant • Donald Ferguson

... you," she replied, and wondered at the lack of warmth in her own voice. "Perhaps I shall." But she could not help feeling that in some way she had seen ...
— Stubble • George Looms

... some of these old photographs and you will see that they differ from this. They lack the 'L' mark. Some have circles, others a very different series of pits and elevations, a set of characters when examined and measured under the microscope utterly different from those in every ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve

... others were taken along the north side of Donner Lake, and far up toward the summit. Some of these wagons never were returned to the lake, but were left imbedded in the snow. These efforts to cross the Sierra were quite desultory and irregular, and there was great lack of harmony and system. Each family or each little group of emigrants ...
— History of the Donner Party • C.F. McGlashan

... her brother's arms, walked away to the window, and from thence looked down to that path beneath the elms which was the spot in the world which she thought of the oftenest, but as she gazed, there was no lack of loyalty in her heart to the man to whom she was betrothed. It seemed to her as though those childish days had been in another life, as though Owen had been her lover in another world,—a sweet, childish, innocent, happy world ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope

... Portmouth, N. H., attempt to enlist in the Colonial Army, and are given employment as spies. There is no lack of exciting incidents which the youthful reader craves, but it is healthful excitement brimming with facts which every boy should be familiar with, and while the reader is following the adventures of Ben Jaffrays and ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic

... be his future home! What a big place it was! Why, hundreds and hundreds of white rabbits could live in that house and never lack ...
— Bumper, The White Rabbit • George Ethelbert Walsh

... cases of masturbation in very early childhood—2 in girls, 1 in a boy—in which the practice had been acquired spontaneously, and could only be traced to some source of irritation in pressure from clothing, etc.[303] Probably there is often in such cases some hereditary lack of nervous stability. Block has recorded the case of a girl—very bright for her age, though excessively shy and taciturn—who began masturbating spontaneously at the age of two; in this case the mother had masturbated all her life, even ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... title and security of tenure Marcia was empress of the world, and she had what empresses most often lack—the common touch. She had been born in slavery. She had ascended step by step to fortune, by her own wits, learning by experience. Each layer of society was known to her—its virtues, prejudices, limitations and peculiar tricks of thought. Being almost ...
— Caesar Dies • Talbot Mundy

... many errors, yet the charms of his style and the play of his happy disposition throughout have continued to render it far more popular and readable than many works on the subject of much greater scope and science. Cumberland was mistaken, however, in his notion of Goldsmith's ignorance and lack of observation as to the characteristics of animals. On the contrary, he was a minute and shrewd observer of them; but he observed them with the eye of a poet and moralist as well as a naturalist. We quote two passages ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving

... man that is at variance with himself will hardly be at one with others. You have said much to me that is unjust, and, perhaps, unseemly; but I won't reproach you; your anger and trouble make wild work with your words. When one of my people falls into sin, I ever find it is so through lack of prayer. Ah! Captain Devereux, have you not of late been remiss in the ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... caressing hand on his arm—"forgive my lack of manners. I'm—I'm—perchance I'm over weary. We country maids are not used to so much pleasure as you've given me in London." She leaned languorously toward Ashley and he, made presumptuous by her change of tone, slipped his ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various

... scowers, to make more spoil and wrack: That palfrey never more tastes corn or hay; So that few days exhaust the famished hack. But not afoot does fierce Orlando stray, Who will not, while he lives, conveyance lack. As many as he finds, so many steeds — Their masters slain — he presses for ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto

... astounded. He had expected an angry start as a precursor to a fierce scene between them; but the man paid not the slightest heed to either of the visitors. There was a dreamy look in his lack-lustre eyes, and his heavy lips moved slightly, as if ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn

... nine-men's morris[BJ] is filled up with mud; And the quaint mazes in the wanton green By lack of ...
— Ariadne Florentina - Six Lectures on Wood and Metal Engraving • John Ruskin

... before I yield the floor, I want to say that this meeting has been worth while just to have been the occasion of our all becoming better acquainted with our friend and neighbor, Mr. Simms. Whatever may have been the lack of understanding, on our part, of his qualities, they were all cleared up by that speech of his—the best I have ever ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick

... the lap of luxury,—for thus did I unblushingly describe my own modest establishment,—to embrace a nurse's vocation and labor for the good of humanity, including herself, of course. The education—or the lack of it—was the drawback everywhere, and also the youth of the applicant, twenty-five being a more acceptable age ...
— The Making of Mary • Jean Forsyth

... Beauharnais v. Illinois[236] the Court sustained an Illinois statute which makes it a crime to exhibit in a public place any publication which "portrays depravity, criminality, unchastity, or lack of virtue of a class of citizens, of any race, color, creed or religion" or which "exposes the citizens of any race, color, creed or religion to contempt, derision, or obloquy." The act was treated by the State ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin

... in these recollections was the licking of an intolerable bully, a certain wild-cat element in him making up for lack of weight. But, alas for justice, "I—the victor—had a black eye, while he—the vanquished—had none, so that I got into disgrace and he did not." A dozen years later he ran across this lad in Sydney, acting as an ...
— Thomas Henry Huxley - A Character Sketch • Leonard Huxley

... room, where he received me with great kindness. Mr. ——— is an old gentleman with a white head, and a large, florid face, which has an expression of amiability, not unmingled with a certain dignity. He did not rise from his arm-chair to greet me,—a lack of ceremony which I imputed to the gout, feeling it impossible that he should have willingly failed in courtesy to one of his twenty-five million sovereigns. In response to some remark of mine about the shabby way ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... Avoidance of this lack of uniformity in the product, and the great desirability to duplicate the normal bean as far as possible, necessitated the development of a method of extraction of the caffein from the whole raw bean without a permanent alteration ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers

... it; every word of it," interrupted Costigan in turn. "That's the way they are. Reasonable, passionless. Funny—they lack a lot of things we have, but they've got a lot of things that I wish more of us Tellurians had too. Give me the plate—I'll talk for Triplanetary," and the beam ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith

... following the river bank, the ground declined gradually towards a black-looking, turgid and overgrown swamp. While, from the direction in which the gambler approached, a low, dense, thorny bush grew, made up of branches almost skeleton in their lack of leaves. It was a forlorn and uninviting spot, calculated to dishearten anybody with a heart less big and an enthusiasm ...
— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum

... wiser, especially in the ways of the world; and, oddly enough, one of the features that worried us most in the whole situation was how he was ever going to get on, in the worldly sense, without her. He was to suffer not only from the loss of her counsel but from the lack of her indorsement. There are certain women who are a form of insurance to a man; and Anne gave a poise and solidity to Julian's presentation of himself which his own ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various

... to leave and follow Thee,' and remember how my wife died in a tenement in New York City, gasping for air and asking God to take the little girl too. Of course I don't expect you people can prevent every one from dying of starvation, lack of proper nourishment and tenement air, but what does following Jesus mean? I understand that Christian people own a good many of the tenements. A member of a church was the owner of the one where my wife died, and I have wondered if following ...
— In His Steps • Charles M. Sheldon

... rags which partially cover her beggars, but depends on England and France for most of the little clothing she has. Italy is naturally a land of abundance and luxury, with a soil and climate scarcely equalled on earth; yet a large share of her population actually lack the necessaries, not to speak of the comforts, of life, and those who sow and reap her bountiful harvests are often without bread: Switzerland has, for the most part, an Arctic climate and scarcely any soil at all; and yet her people are all decently clad and adequately ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley

... knaue and beg? Is there not wars? Is there not imployment? Doth not the K[ing]. lack subiects? Do not the Rebels want Soldiers? Though it be a shame to be on any side but one, it is worse shame to begge, then to be on the worst side, were it worse then the name of Rebellion can tell how to ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... as hosts, is a sensation of the first water. There will be a stream of callers after you have appeared in church on Sunday. You will have a busy time driving over the country returning their calls, and after these formalities are over the invitations will begin. I don't think you will find any lack of hospitality." ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... empty hours of his leisure weighing on him like a burden, heard that music rise about him, as he moved along the saloon-dotted sidewalk, with something of the mild surprise of a swimmer who passes out of a cold into a warm current. For lack of anything better to do, he had been upon the point of returning to his ship, where she lay in her dock. He had not spoken to a soul since he had come ashore at sundown, and the simple music was like a friendly prompting. He hesitated a moment for he was not a frequenter of missions ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon

... my friend, Awhile stern England's prisoner, then unloosed Like some poor dolt unworth captivity, Time serves me now for ceasing. Why not cease?... When, as Shades whisper in the chasmal night, "Better, far better, no percipience here."— O happy lack, that I should have no child To come into my hideous heritage, And groan beneath ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy

... my faith in the infallibility of my own class, to hear such severe animadversions on them, from a person who professed herself as much a disciple of Carlyle as any working man; and who evidently had no lack either of intellect to comprehend or boldness to speak out his doctrines; who could praise the old monasteries for being democratic and socialist, and spoke far more severely of the clergy than I could have done—because ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al

... along the pole; the lama would sit beside the driver. The escort, of course, would walk. The old lady, equally of course, would talk a great deal, and by what he had heard that conversation would not lack salt. She was already ordering, haranguing, rebuking, and, it must be said, cursing ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling

... of the Legion lay dying in Algiers, There was lack of woman's nursing, there was dearth of woman's tears; But a comrade stood beside him, while his life-blood ebbed away, And bent, with pitying glances, to hear what he might say. The dying soldier faltered, as he took that comrade's hand, And ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth

... together and in silence retraced their steps to Brudenell Heights. Both were brooding over Ishmael's defeated hopes and over that strange fatality in the lot of the poor that makes them miss great fortunes for the lack of ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... displaying all the angularity of his bones under a yellowish hide with roughened hair that was shedding dreadfully, as Lorraine had discovered to her dismay when she removed her green corduroy skirt after riding him. Yellowjacket's lower lip sagged with senility or lack of spirit, Lorraine ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower

... did an everyday experience move him to song, and he is at his best in the realm of philosophic poetry, where he has no equal. This philosophic tendency predominates even in his ballads, which are often the embodiment of a philosophical or ethical idea. While they lack the subtle lyrical atmosphere of Goethe's, they are distinguished by rhetorical vigor and dramatic life. Their very structure is dramatic, as an analysis of 18 and ...
— A Book Of German Lyrics • Various

... baby may be constipated because the proteins are too high, the fat too high, the food of an insufficient quantity or quality, or the milk have been boiled, while weak babies really may lack the muscular power to produce a bowel movement. With the help of your physician endeavor to arrive at the cause of the constipation, and, if the baby is two or three months old, from one to two teaspoons of unsweetened prune juice may be administered. ...
— The Mother and Her Child • William S. Sadler

... the frame; the barrel of eggs and tubs of butter, brought all the way from Ohio, were ranged in the store-room; a suitable quantity of salt pork and flour was purchased from the commissary; and, there being no lack of game of every description, the offering of our red children, we ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie

... silences caused the most acute pain. She felt helpless and inclined to run away, or scream, or do something to create a diversion. She would watch the hands of the clock, hoping that each minute might bring a remark from somebody. But the other people did not seem to mind the lack of conversation; and once she counted ten whole minutes during which no one said anything except what was necessary in passing and handing eatables! How different her tea-party might be, she thought, if only—But then she stopped, thinking ...
— Hunter's Marjory - A Story for Girls • Margaret Bruce Clarke

... coming and going of the friars, too, the village people have become well used, and the infrequent excursionists, for lack of intelligence and of any knowledge that would refer to history, look at them without obtrusive curiosity. It was only from a Salvation Army girl that you heard the brutal word of contempt. She had come to the place with some ...
— The Colour of Life • Alice Meynell

... broke in, "until you played all those records; and then it came over me I couldn't sing like that if I tried a thousand years. I just haven't got the temperament. Those continental people have something that we lack—they're so Frenchy, so emotional, so full of fire! I've tried and I've tried and I just can't do it—I just can't ...
— Silver and Gold - A Story of Luck and Love in a Western Mining Camp • Dane Coolidge

... carefully-tended grass plats to the stoep where the Mayor of Gueldersdorp, with the matron, house-surgeon, secretary, and several prominent members of the Committee—including Alderman Brooker, puffy-cheeked and yellow-eyed for lack of a night's rest—waited. Military Authority saluted Civic Dignity, shook hands, and the thing was done. ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... win her bread honourably. With this hast thou naught to make, but do thou take the daughter of a King or a Count. Nay more, what wouldst thou deem thee to have gained, hadst thou made her thy leman, and taken her to thy bed? Plentiful lack of comfort hadst thou got thereby, for in Hell would thy soul have lain while the world endures, and into Paradise wouldst ...
— Aucassin and Nicolete • Andrew Lang

... moved into and around urban areas within Afghanistan. Gross domestic product has fallen substantially over the past 15 years because of the loss of labor and capital and the disruption of trade and transport. Millions of people continue to suffer from insufficient food, clothing, housing, and lack of medical care. Numerical data are ...
— The 1996 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... want, n. deficiency, lack, dearth, scarcity, need, default, absence, shortness, inadequacy, paucity, insufficiency, scarceness; desideratum, requirement; destitution, distress, straits, privation, indigence, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... great want which explains many of the things we do. Whatever may be our other reasons for going to school, it affords us the opportunity to meet and work and play with other boys and girls to our pleasure and profit. One of the objections often raised against life in the country is the lack of opportunity for association with other people. But life in the country is not so isolated as it once was; and one may be very much alone in a city crowd, where nearly all are strangers to one another, and where there is very little real association ...
— Community Civics and Rural Life • Arthur W. Dunn

... his white boss's lack of sanity was characteristic of Indian regard for the reckless. The reason, the driving power of his chief's character was lost to his primitive mind. The act was all he had power to judge by, and the act of voluntarily visiting the headquarters of the Bell ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum

... while the poor valet who has been the means of it meets with a violent and positive proof of his anger. No thought was ever more carried away by its own speed. "His handwriting, when he tries to write, "is a mass of disconnected and undecipherable signs;[1211] the words lack one-half of their letters." On reading it over himself, he cannot tell what it means. At last, he becomes almost incapable of producing a handwritten letter, while his signature is a mere scrawl. He accordingly dictates, but so fast that his secretaries can scarcely ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... with him, composed of thoroughly well-disciplined men, who under so able a leader were very effective. Smith's command was nearly double that of Forrest, but not equal, man to man, for the lack of a successful experience such as Forrest's men had had. The fact is, troops who have fought a few battles and won, and followed up their victories, improve upon what they were before to an extent that can hardly be counted by percentage. The difference in result ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... connecting drawing rooms Dick and Greg moved with a grace and lack of consciousness greatly in contrast with their semi-awkwardness in their earlier High School days. Many pleasant ...
— Dick Prescott's Third Year at West Point - Standing Firm for Flag and Honor • H. Irving Hancock

... and water pollution because of a lack of waste conversion equipment; Gulf of Riga and Daugava River heavily polluted; contamination of soil and groundwater with chemicals and petroleum products at military bases natural hazards: NA international agreements: party to - Air Pollution, Hazardous Wastes, Ship Pollution; signed, ...
— The 1995 CIA World Factbook • United States Central Intelligence Agency

... to produce any authority on the subject, that this Court has power to grant to the defendant a new trial in case it should appear that in the haste and in the lack of opportunity for examination which necessarily attend a jury trial, any material error should have been committed prejudicial to the defendant, as otherwise no means whatever are provided by the law for ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... you meikle joy, for I have had my fears about your situation for some time; but now that the business is brought to such a happy end, I would like to hear all the true particulars of the case; and that your tale and tidings sha'na lack slackening, I'll get in the toddy bowl and the gardevin; and with that, I winket to the mistress to take the bairns to their bed, and bade Jenny Hachle, that was then our fee'd servant lass, to gar the kettle boil. Poor Jenny has long since ...
— The Provost • John Galt

... winter wheat fields, progress was very slow; the mills of 1860, and I may even say of 1870, being but little in advance, so far as processes were concerned, of those built half a century earlier. The reason for this lack of progress may be found in the ease with which winter wheat could be made into good, white, merchantable flour. That this flour was inferior to the flour turned out by winter wheat mills now is proven by the old recipe for telling good flour from that ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 303 - October 22, 1881 • Various

... the faculty for his lack of discipline, and young Darwin came near getting himself into difficulty by declaring, "Professor Henslow teaches his pupils in love; the others think they know a ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard

... surplice white That defunctive music can, Be the death-divining swan, Lest the requiem lack ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy

... would be good anywhere. The world, released from its iron band, would leap forward to marvelous prosperity; there would be no financial panics, for there could be no contraction; there would be no more torpid 'middle ages,' dead for lack of currency, for the money of a nation would expand, pari passu, side by side with the growth of its population. There would be no limit to the development of mankind, save the capacities of the planet; and even these, through the skill of man, ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly

... the problem of physical beauty can be solved and demonstrated, and the representations of Venus can be proved to possess or to lack the beautiful, we choose to leave now, as we should be compelled to do after discussion, the decision of the question to those who raise it. It is of little avail to prove a work of art beautiful,—of less, to prove it ugly. Spectators and generations cannot ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various

... primarily of subsistence farming and fishing. The islands have few mineral deposits worth exploiting, except for high-grade phosphate. The potential for a tourist industry exists, but the remoteness of the location and a lack of adequate facilities hinder development. Financial assistance from the US is the primary source of revenue, with the US pledged to spend $1 billion in the islands in the 1990s. Geographical isolation and a poorly developed infrastructure are ...
— The 1998 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... the smallest part of it," said Bob. "To farm that five thousand acres in cotton this season would take round a hundred thousand dollars, and," he laughed, "I lack considerable over ninety-nine thousand of having ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby

... himself as such while he was present, nor would it befit any one but the devil to declare all that he said. At the same time it must be added that I am not quite convinced that it was a spirit, but my opinions on this I cannot give here for lack of time." ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang

... chauffeur, motioning him to go on. George heard a shout but did not look up, for he could not imagine anybody's shouting at him, and he was too engrossed in the question "Was it Lucy?" He could not decide, and his lack of decision in this matter probably superinduced a lack of decision in another, more pressingly vital. At the second and louder shout he did look up; and the car was almost on him; but he could not make up his ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington

... few Russians, footsore, weary, and heavy-eyed from lack of sleep, trailed into camp with sullen faces, and we were afraid there was going ...
— Three Times and Out • Nellie L. McClung

... leaned over and put her cheek against his forehead. I have always admired Nobs; but this was the first time that it had ever occurred to me that I might wish to be Nobs. I wondered how he would take it, for he is as unused to women as I. But he took to it as a duck takes to water. What I lack of being a ladies' man, Nobs certainly makes up for as a ladies' dog. The old scalawag just closed his eyes and put on one of the softest "sugar-wouldn't-melt-in-my-mouth" expressions you ever ...
— The Land That Time Forgot • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... that he sulkily complied, looking the while as if he would like to murder the man he was forced to obey. One hears so much nowadays of the black population having equal rights with the white inhabitants, that it is well to remember how ferociously their lack of civilization occasionally comes out. Doubtless there are cruel men both white and black, but for downright brutality the nigger is hard to beat, and it is also quite certain that whom the latter does not fear he will not ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson

... "You have made the most of your opportunities. Your wrist is strong and supple, your eye quick. You are a match, now, for most men who have not worked hard in a school of arms. Like almost all our countrymen, you lack precision. Now, let ...
— With Frederick the Great - A Story of the Seven Years' War • G. A. Henty

... failed to conciliate her; there was an accent of compassion in it that ill-suited her pride, and a lack of admiration that was not less new ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... modesty. "I remain humble, but with dignity," she writes to a friend; "that is, in depreciating myself I do not suffer others to depreciate me." She had the instinct of the artist who knows how to offset the lack of brilliant gifts by the perfection of details, the modesty that disarms criticism, and a rare facility ...
— The Women of the French Salons • Amelia Gere Mason

... invitation to come to this faithful God for wisdom to assist and help. For after he had said, "My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations—and let patience have her perfect work"; he adds, "If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him" (James 1:2-5). Here is more than an invitation, here is a promise—it shall be given him; and all to show us what a faithful Creator we have committed our souls unto. Doth any lack ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... this time that he formed an intimacy with Petrarch, which, notwithstanding marked diversity of temperament, character and pursuits, was destined to be broken only by death. Despite his complaints of the malevolence of his critics in the Proem to the Fourth Day of the Decameron, he had no lack of appreciation on the part of his fellow-citizens, and was employed by the Republic on several missions; to Bologna, probably with the view of averting the submission of that city to the Visconti in 1350; to Petrarch ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio

... uniform?—that is to say, that the whole consisted of similar elements. It seems difficult to avoid coming to this conclusion, at least under the qualification that, possibly, various bodies, under peculiar circumstances attending their formation, may contain elements which are wanting, and lack some which are present in others, or that some may entirely consist of elements in which others are ...
— Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation • Robert Chambers

... are set in work by them whereby mariners are best employed. Not one. It is pitiful! ... This last year at Yarmouth there were three hundred idle men that could get nothing to do, living very poor for lack of employment, which most gladly would have gone to sea in Pinks if there had been any for them to go in.... And this last year the Hollanders did lade 12 sail of Holland ships with red herrings at Yarmouth for Civita Vecchia, Leghorn and Genoa and Marseilles ...
— Andrew Marvell • Augustine Birrell

... afflicted with the whole catalogue, that the mistress who discovers her hired girl to be possessed of a single good quality, the reverse of any I have named, as for example, economy, neatness, or a conscientious devotion to the interests of her employers, although she may utterly lack any other, fears to dismiss her, for fear that the next may prove an average 'help,' and have not a solitary good point. A girl who combines all the above-named good qualities is a rare treasure indeed, and the possessor of the prize is an object of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... attack, and repaired every breach in the walls as fast as made. The damage done by day was made good at night. For the garrison there remained a small supply of grain, which was given out by mouthfuls, and there was besides a considerable store of salted hides, which they gnawed for lack of better food. The stock of animals had been reduced to nine horses, and these so lean and gaunt that it seemed useless ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... a pool, after Tam had ascertained that no many-armed squid or cuttlefish lurked within it. And while Ulysse disported himself like a little fish, Arthur did his best to restore him to his natural complexion, and tried to cleanse the little garments, which showed only too plainly the lack of any change, and which were the only Frank or Christian clothes among them, since young Hope himself had been almost stripped when he came ashore, and wore the usual garb of ...
— A Modern Telemachus • Charlotte M. Yonge



Words linked to "Lack" :   demand, famine, need, deficit, absence, mineral deficiency, have, miss, tightness, shortness, deficiency, shortage, want



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