"Magnificent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that Marco Polo must have caused among his townsmen when he swaggered in. He and his crew were bronzed by the sun, were dressed as Tartars, and could speak their native Italian with difficulty. To convince the Venetians of their identity, Marco gave a magnificent entertainment, at which he and his officers received, clad in oriental dress of red satin. Three times during the banquet they changed their dress, distributing the discarded garments among their guests. At ...
— Journeys to Bagdad • Charles S. Brooks
... would be by a man whose analytical and speculative faculties predominated over all the rest. The writer was, indeed, in those days, marvellously like Coleridge,—subtile in analysis to excess, of gorgeous imagination, bewitching discourse, fine scholarship, with a magnificent power of promising and utter incapacity in performing, and with the same habit of intemperance in opium. By his own account, his "disease was to meditate too much and observe too little." I need hardly explain that ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various
... Alonzo Cheyne, instructor in English; a remarkable teacher, in spite of the finicky mannerisms which Tom imitated. And when, in reading aloud certain magnificent passages, he forgot his affectations, he managed to arouse cravings I thought to have deserted me forever. Was it possible, after all, that I had been right and my father wrong? that I might yet be great ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... called maro round their loins, the chief, on particular occasions, wrapped his person hi voluminous folds of a species of native cloth, made from the bark of the Chinese paper-mulberry. Romata wore a magnificent black beard and moustache, and his hair was frizzed out to such an extent that it resembled a large turban, in which was stuck a long wooden pin! I afterwards found that this pin served for scratching the head, ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... political and religious rights and duties were thoroughly discussed by strong and earnest statesmen and theologians,—that of Andrew Marvell, the friend of Milton, and Latin Secretary of Cromwell, deserves honorable mention. The magnificent prose of Milton, long neglected, is now perhaps as frequently read as his great epic; but the writings of his friend and fellow secretary, devoted like his own to the cause of freedom and the rights of the people, ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... and peaches. And we were good dutiful children and strictly obeyed her commands. And yet in that very year, just as if Nature had resolved to be satirical at our expense, our gardens and orchards overflowed with an abundance of magnificent fruit. And there we allowed them all to rot. We had a doctor in those days, a fine old fellow, who, when the danger was at its height, went fearlessly from house to house. He had white hair, rosy cheeks, ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... mean—things about each other, like I've said. So, as far as we can tell, we—fit. He said he couldn't guarantee that we'd be happy; that no pair of people could be sure of that till they'd tried. But he said it looked to him like the most wonderful, magnificent adventure in the world, and asked if it looked to me like that, and I said it did. Because it's true. It's the only thing in the world that seems worth—bothering about. And we both think—though, of course, we can't be sure we're thinking ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... superficial difference of breeding and of class. This mention of money offended her taste, seeming to lower the level upon which their extraordinary and—to her—terrible conversation had thus far moved. It hurt her with another kind of hurting—not magnificent, not absorbing, but just common. That in speaking of money he was protecting himself, proudly self-guarding his own honour and that of his mother, Lesbia Faircloth, never, in her innocence of what is mean and mercenary, occurred ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... almost to despair, were compelled to worship their God, and to hide like a work of darkness the universal, sacred privilege of humanity. Before their eyes proudly rose the temples of the dominant church, in which their haughty brethren indulged in ease their magnificent devotion, while they themselves were driven from the walls, expelled, too, by the weaker number perhaps, and forced, here in the wild woods, under the burning heat of noon, in disgraceful secrecy to worship ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... private property, so vividly depicted by Mill, showed no signs of mitigation, the remedies he anticipated had made no substantial progress. The co-operation of the Rochdale Pioneers had proved a magnificent success, but its sphere of operations was now clearly seen to be confined within narrow limits. Profit-sharing then as now was a sickly plant barely kept alive by the laborious efforts of benevolent professors. Mill's indictment of the capitalist system, ...
— The History of the Fabian Society • Edward R. Pease
... longer contain myself, but burned; and that magnificent stretch of forest that lay between Agincourt and Abbeville, covering five square miles, I burned; and Abbeville I burned; and Amiens I burned; and three forests between Amiens and Paris I burned; and Paris I burned; burning and burning during four months, leaving ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... Her magnificent hair flashed crimson in the candle-light, as she turned her head hither and thither, searching with an easy grace for the things she wanted in the tray. Exercise had heightened the brilliancy of her ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... worsted-work, and fell back into her own thoughts—as completely forgotten by Mr. Thornton as if she had not been in the room, so thoroughly was he occupied in explaining to Mr. Hale the magnificent power, yet delicate adjustment of the might of the steam-hammer, which was recalling to Mr. Hale some of the wonderful stories of subservient genii in the Arabian Nights—one moment stretching from earth to sky and filling all the width of the horizon, at the next obediently ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... another fifty or sixty yards of the darkness, and found fewer of the badly shaken Orconites in our path. Now, in that thick obscurity, I sensed that we were nearing the magnificent, tapering hull ...
— The Winged Men of Orcon - A Complete Novelette • David R. Sparks
... Vandecar's words seemed to leave his mind at intervals; then his expression showed that he realized the truth of them. He swayed forward; but crouched back once more against the wall. Fledra rose silently to her feet, her ready intelligence grasping the great fact that she was free, that the magnificent stranger had come for her, that he claimed her as his. She was free from Lem, from Lon, free to go back to Flukey. Lem's menacing shadow had lifted slowly from her life, cast away by her own blood. For an instant there ...
— From the Valley of the Missing • Grace Miller White
... pewter cistern was formerly part of the furniture of a well- appointed dining-room; the plates were rinsed in it, when necessary, during the meal. A magnificent silver cistern is still preserved in the dining-room at Burghley House, the seat of the Marquis of Exeter. It is said to be the largest piece of plate in England, and was once the subject of ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... in your own interest. It would be a different matter if you would take some short but interesting story of mediaeval court life from Spanish history, or, better still, some anecdote, and pad it out with other anecdotes and witty phrases of your own. There were magnificent courts then; ladies, you know, poisonings. Karmazinov says it would be strange if you couldn't read ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... parting which we had heard about at Abingdon, where it had taken place, and whither Charles had accompanied her from Oxford. She stayed at Bedford House in Exeter, where she was delivered of a daughter, who was named Henrietta, being baptized in the cathedral in a magnificent new font erected especially for the occasion. The Queen left the city on July 14th, and sailed from Falmouth to France, where she stayed at the Court of Louis XIV. Twelve days later the King reached Exeter, and called to see his infant daughter, and he again stayed ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... the desk and asked for some wafers and a Directory. Then, returning, I fastened the torn fragments upon a clean sheet of paper, discovered the address of the writer, and then left the cafe. The house was situated in the Rue Chaussee d'Autin. For fully half an hour I paced up and down before his magnificent dwelling-place. Was he alive? Had the reply of Charles been in the affirmative? I decided at last to venture, and rang the bell. A liveried domestic appeared at my summons, and said that his master did not receive visitors at that hour; ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... interred on the "Infernal Hill," the hill on which criminals were buried. Up to the present his desire could not be fulfilled. The City of Assisi waited to make that place of ignominy a worthy abode for the remains of its most saintly and illustrious citizen. A magnificent double-church was erected on the spot. The Sovereign Pontiff declared that henceforth the place shall be called "Hill of Paradise" and later on laid the corner-stone for the new edifice. The lower church was completed in 1230. The elaborate portal is a plan of Baccio ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe
... nature responded to the "call of the wild." But you who know his prairie-tales must have read between the lines,—for who, unless he loved the "honk" of the wild geese, could write, "to those who have heard it year by year it is the sweetest, most insistent of music. It is the spirit of the wild, of magnificent distances, of freedom impersonate"? ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... base as to reveal their counsels and give oracles, e viscerum sterquiliniis, out of the bowels and excremental parts of beasts? sordidos deos Varro truly calls them therefore, and well he might. I say nothing of their magnificent and sumptuous temples, those majestical structures: to the roof of Apollo Didymeus' temple, ad branchidas, as [6528]Strabo writes, a thousand oaks did not suffice. Who can relate the glorious splendour, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... gentlemen, and the Constable at their head, received the Duke of Alva at the first gate of the Louvre; the Duke would have kneeled down, but the King refused it, and made him walk by his side to the Queen's apartment, and to Madame's, to whom the Duke of Alva had brought a magnificent present from his master; he went thence to the apartment of Madam Margaret the King's sister, to compliment her on the part of the Duke of Savoy, and to assure her he would arrive in a few days; there were great assemblies at the Louvre, the show the Duke of Alva, ...
— The Princess of Cleves • Madame de La Fayette
... centuries, by the Indian, the African, and the Turkish proselytes of the Koran. If the Christian apostles, St. Peter or St. Paul, could return to the Vatican, they might possibly inquire the name of the Deity who is worshipped with such mysterious rites in that magnificent temple: at Oxford or Geneva, they would experience less surprise; but it might still be incumbent on them to peruse the catechism of the church, and to study the orthodox commentators on their own writings and the words of their Master. But the Turkish dome of St. Sophia, with an increase of splendor ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... the cool, fragrant leaves brush against her face. Here, too, were sweet-scented rushes, of which she gathered an armful for Rose, who loved them; and in this place she made the acquaintance of a magnificent blue dragon-fly, which alighted on her oar as she lifted it from the water, and showed no disposition to depart. His azure mail glittered in the sunlight; his gauzy wings, as he furled and unfurled them deliberately, were like cobwebs powdered with snow. He evidently expected to ...
— Hildegarde's Holiday - a story for girls • Laura E. Richards
... the same event the language of ancient prophecy was magnificent, but seemingly contradictory: for it foretold a Messiah, who was to be at once a sufferer and a conquerer. The Star was to come out of Jacob, and the Branch to spring from the stem of Jesse. The Angel of the Covenant, the desire of all nations, was to come suddenly ...
— The world's great sermons, Volume 3 - Massillon to Mason • Grenville Kleiser
... account of the uncertain light, lost his track. At length he emerged into the rocky scenery of the mountain side, and an indistinct light in the distance served to guide his steps. He now entered between two rocks of great height; till a magnificent waterfall almost blocked up the way. The Baron stepped cautiously forward, and after apparently passing through a cavern, the scene opened and displayed (for, to his surprise, the light was greatly ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... her—so's my back would hide her from the rest of the bunch. She says a little bit of society went a long ways with her, and where was the Kid? Before I can answer her along comes Helen Dear and she plumps down at the table and starts to tell us what a magnificent man Mister Van Ness was. She claims she never seen such a perfect gentleman in her life. I liked to snickered out loud at the disappointed way she pulled that one and then the Kid, G. Herbert and Van Ness suddenly comes around a ...
— Kid Scanlan • H. C. Witwer
... employments at school and college, we cannot possibly dismiss it without presenting the reader with a specimen of these ingenious effusions. In an ode with a Greek motto, called Granta, we have the following magnificent stanzas. ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... Pomp and Show? and that do not think within themselves when they have married such a rich Person, that none of their Acquaintance shall appear so fine in their Equipage, so adorned in their Persons, or so magnificent in their Furniture as themselves? Thus their Heads are filled with vain Ideas; and I heartily wish I could say that Equipage and Show were not the Chief Good of so many Women ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... Soho.—At twelve o'clock on Monday the 14th instant, by Order of the Assignees, Mr. Marshall will sell by Auction on the Premises, in one Lot, All that extensive, commodious, and magnificent House in Soho Square, lately occupied by Mrs. Cornelys, and used for the Public Assemblies of the Nobility and Gentry. Together with all the rich and elegant Furniture, Decorations, China, &c., thereunto belonging, too well-known and universally ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 28. Saturday, May 11, 1850 • Various
... woman—the necromancy of female grace—there was no more ready and willing subject than Ivan; and here, at last, he had found grace personified, incarnate, the highest ideal of all his wildest and most cherished dreams. His most magnificent "castle" had never contained a princess half as fair as this one. Her figure was rather above the medium height, supple and slender. Her feet and hands were small, her wrists well rounded, her fingers long and white, ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... all possible quickness. His first thought was that she probably had not heard the magnificent piece of daring. It was too bad. Probably he never could do it again. Then he turned and discovered that he had left the door of the telephone booth ajar. Chubbins might not have heard ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... morning at the station in Hamburg, Wilhelm found himself clasped in a pair of strong arms and pressed to a magnificent fur coat. Inside this warm garment there beat a still warmer heart, that of Paul Haber, who had received a letter from Wilhelm the day before, telling him of his dismissal from Berlin, and that he was leaving for Hamburg by the last train before midnight, and whom neither ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... ground where the spirit which had nerved it in Virginia was transferred to the soldiers of the Union. With men of the North the struggle was now for home first, for conquest afterwards, and the tenacity and courage with which they held their ground for those three bloody days attest the magnificent impulse which the defense of the fireside imparts to the heart and to the arm ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... many others which fell too far within the German lines to be observed. Rockwell had been given the Medaille Militaire and the Croix de Guerre, on the ribbon of which he wore four palms, representing the four magnificent citations he had received in the order of the army. As a further reward for his excellent work he had been proposed for promotion from the grade of sergeant to that of second lieutenant. Unfortunately the official order did not arrive until a ...
— Flying for France • James R. McConnell
... nothing now in the whole countryside quite so desolate and forlorn as the chateau of Montorgueil, with its once magnificent park, now overgrown with weeds, its encircling walls broken down, its terraces devastated, and its stately gates rusty ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... he liked best. He was a magnificent walker, easy, steady, unwearying. He knew every road and lane in the valleys, every footpath and trail among the mountains. But he cared little for walking in company; one companion was the most that he could abide. And, strange to say, it was not Dorothy whom ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... was ever dreamed than that the industry by which the nation lives, should be so managed as to secure for the men and women engaged in it their real prosperity, their best use of their highest powers. How far Scientific Management will go toward realizing the magnificent dream in the future, will be determined by the greatness of spirit and the executive genius with which its principles are sustained by all the people interested in its inauguration, the employers, the workers and ...
— The Psychology of Management - The Function of the Mind in Determining, Teaching and - Installing Methods of Least Waste • L. M. Gilbreth
... for his war policy. The actions of Tyler and of Polk illustrate the power inherent in the executive office. It might seem that the exercise of this authority, securing for us at small material cost the magnificent domains of Texas, California, and New Mexico, would have given these Presidents a fame somewhat like that which Jefferson won by the purchase of Louisiana. But such has not been the case. The main reason is that the extension of slavery ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... last. Rather! The "Umbrella-tree" magnificent! Spreads out in wet weather, and folds up when it's fine. Splendid specimen of the "Boot-tree" (Arbor tegumenpedis), and the quaint "Blacking-Brush Plant," which is its invariable companion. No time to spare, however—off again to the Grantully Castle, with pockets full of ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. July 4, 1891 • Various
... flattered himself that he had not been idle while he was there, and was now about to commence his more advanced stage of pupilage, under the great Mr. Beilby, in London, with hopes which were still good, if they were not so magnificent as they ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... country in these terms:—"These wretches, sir, in France and England, cannot march half a mile in any direction without finding a house where food can be had and lodging; whereas such is the noble desolation of our magnificent country that in many a direction for a thousand miles I will engage that a dog shall not find shelter from a snow-storm, nor a wren find an apology for breakfast."] miles— northwards for six hundred; and the sympathy of our Lombard ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... foreigners, with their Achs and Hechs! and surrounded by her crowned courtiers in frogged uniforms and moustachioed like sea-horses, a little before dinner time, when Kirby passed her, and the Emperor made a remark on him, for Kirby was a magnificent figure of a man, and used to be compared to a three-decker entering harbour after a victory. He stood six feet four, and was broad-shouldered and deep-chested to match, and walked like a king who has humbled his enemy. You have seen big dogs. And so Countess Fanny looked round. Kirby was doing ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... such a pleasing occupation. "But how to bring her to a moment's serious reflection?" Then as he exhibited his choicest collection of essences and perfumes, he at once arrested her attention by observing that these articles had almost risen to double value since the magnificent preparations made by the Earl of Leicester to entertain the Queen and court at his princely ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... colloquial expression, was knocked off her perch. She was one of those imperfectly self-assured individuals who are magnificent and autocratic as long as they are not seriously opposed. The least show of unexpected resistance goes a long way towards rendering them cowed and apologetic. When the new governess failed to express ...
— Beasts and Super-Beasts • Saki
... same parallels of latitude. I look upon it as a great chain to unite North and South."[342] Senator Shields of Illinois only voiced the inmost thought of Douglas, when he exclaimed, "The measure is too grand, too magnificent a one to meet with such a fate at the hands of Congress. And really, as it is to connect the North and South so thoroughly, it may serve to get rid of even the Wilmot Proviso, and tie us together so effectually that the idea ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... contents executed in the highest style of art. The Kirk in the Vennel felt the reflected glory, and promptly elected him an elder. A man must be a good man to come so regularly to ordinances and own such a van. The wife of this magnificent member of society was, like the female of so many of the lower animals, of modest mien and a retiring plumage. She sat much in the back parlour; and even when she came out, she crept along in the shadow of ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... productions written many years since, he is the author of two or three successful pieces recently produced. It is not the intention of the writer to follow the course of the Old Brompton Road, but he will at once return to the main road after alluding to the newly-formed magnificent approaches from this point to Kensington, by Exhibition Road and Prince Albert's Road, on the site of Brompton Park, now broken up. {62} A winter garden is in course of formation here, and the Horticultural Society intend to appropriate part of the ground for their annual fetes. The total amount ...
— A Walk from London to Fulham • Thomas Crofton Croker
... might well say, referring to this magnificent appeal, that the Cardinal had at length spoken English. It was easy to mystify the people in regard to theological utterances. They could be no longer deceived now that the Chief of the new hierarchy ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell
... convention, Miss Anthony learned, to her consternation, that she had prepared no speech for the occasion! She shut her up in a room at the Riggs House with pen and paper, kept a guard at the door, permitted no one to see her, and when the time arrived she was ready with her usual magnificent address. ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... February I was sent, on business connected with the stables at Maison Rouge, to the city of Metz. On the public promenade I met a magnificent woman. Complexion, blond. Nationality, English. We mutually admired each other; we fell into conversation. (She spoke French perfectly—with the English accent.) I offered refreshment; my proposal was accepted. We had a long and interesting interview—we ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... time the craft had reached the inner bank, and leaving the boat, and mounting into her sedan chair, she in due course contemplated the magnificent Jade-like Palace; the Hall of cinnamon wood, lofty and sublime; and the marble portals with the four characters in bold style: the "Precious confines of heavenly spirits," which the Chia consort gave directions should be changed for the four words denoting: ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... time he came to a king's palace. Now, although it was a magnificent palace, everyone living there was perfectly miserable, for one morning, without the least warning, an immense oak had sprung up, with leaves and branches so thick that they shut out the sun from all the windows, making the castle ...
— The Magic Soap Bubble • David Cory
... respective votaries were induced to perform pilgrimages. In Egypt the pyramids were built, partly for astronomical purposes, and partly as tombs for Saviours, claimed to have been kings, who had once ruled over the country; and why should we not recognize that magnificent structure known as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, at Jerusalem, as but another of those tombs of Saviours in which ...
— Astral Worship • J. H. Hill
... magnificent picture of the English country-house. The whole of the severe regular front, with its columns and cornices, was built of a white smoothly-faced freestone, which appeared in the rays of the moon as pure as Pentelic marble. The sole objects in the scene rivalling the fairness of the facade were ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... remonstrated Longman, after a long silence, pausing a moment in his bloody work and allowing his eyes to rest upon the magnificent buildings of the University, rearing above the town, "and Myry says that them what ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... all else contributed to his success in life, the most magnificent and commanding personal appearance. At that time—his ambition nothing abated by the many years which make men venerable,—he was a bankrupt in money, a bankrupt in reputation, and a bankrupt in morals—I speak only of his public morals, not his private,—a bankrupt in political character, pensioned ...
— The Trial of Theodore Parker • Theodore Parker
... bishop, and who was now a soldier again and a general. Next to the bishop-general sat the man who had been Vice-President of the United States and who, if the Democracy had held together would now have been in the chair of Lincoln, John C. Breckinridge, called by his people the Magnificent, commonly accounted the most ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler
... quarters in a very extensive and magnificent garden, which contained a number of large handsome buildings, and many admirable conveniencies fit for the residence of a great prince; but our soldiers had not then time to examine all its beauties, as it was more than a quarter of a league in length. I was not in this expedition, being confined ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... "As to the magnificent and powerful Due de Bouillon, sovereign lord of Sedan and general-in-chief of the armies in Italy, he has just been arrested by his officers in the midst of his soldiers, concealed in a truss of straw. There remain, therefore, only our two young neighbors. They imagine they have the camp wholly ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... magnificent views of the surrounding country, reaching as far as the Coteswold, Sedgebarrow, Malvern, Herefordshire, Welsh, and Monmouthshire heights, relieved intermediately by the windings of the Severn, cultivated plains, and woodland. ...
— The Forest of Dean - An Historical and Descriptive Account • H. G. Nicholls
... natural colours," replied Will, taking out the hook and then laying the magnificent fish down upon its side to ...
— Menhardoc • George Manville Fenn
... above the surface and vainly appealing for help as he was sinking for the second time; so, without pausing, the velocity he had gained in his run down the declivity carrying him on almost in spite of himself, Jupp took a magnificent header off the bank. Then,—rising after his plunge, with a couple of powerful strokes he reached the unconscious boy, whose struggles had now ceased from exhaustion, and, gripping fast hold of one of his little arms, he towed ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson
... I am going to Finmark, and involuntarily, as I write this, the thought occurs to me what a journey it would be for you; away from everything petty and artificial to a scenery which in its magnificent loneliness is without parallel in the world, and where the wealth of birds above us and fish beneath us (whales, and shoals of herrings, cod and capelans often so close together that you can take ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... struggle round the town hall, one of the most magnificent buildings in Europe; and for a time the resistance was effective, until the Spanish cavalry and the Germans under the traitor Van Eude charged down upon the defenders. Then they took refuge in the buildings, and every house became a fortress, and from window and balcony ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... Solemnly magnificent, every brilliant detail symbolically picturing the holy history of the Roman Catholic Church in the inexorable progress of its immense structure, which rises from the rock of Peter, with its beacons of faith and devotion piercing the fog of doubt and fear which surround ...
— The Profits of Religion, Fifth Edition • Upton Sinclair
... himself, in his office one day, Was shaving notes in a barberous way, At the hour of four Death entered the door And shaved the note on his life, they say. And he had for his grave a magnificent tomb, Though the venturous finger that pointed "Gone Home," Looked white and cold From being so bold, As it feared that a popular lie ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... of Raphael are beautiful, but what are they when compared with the heaving ocean, the clouds of sunset, and the pinnacles of the Alps? The dome of St. Peter's is man's noblest architecture, but what is it when compared with the magnificent rotunda of the skies? ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... and the great library she was conscious of vastness and magnificent distances, but, she thought, if necessary, ...
— Ptomaine Street • Carolyn Wells
... was still covered with Porter's and Hatch's disordered masses when Lee's strong array advanced, and the sight was magnificent. As far as the eye could reach the long grey lines of infantry, with the crimson of the colours gleaming like blood in the evening sun, swept with ordered ranks across the Groveton valley. Batteries galloped furiously to the front; far away to the right fluttered the guidons ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... own road and worked out her own magnificent destiny. Most of us now honour Washington and the citizen troops he led. We say they fought, as Hampden and their English forefathers fought, for a sublime ideal, freedom, and that they were chips of the old block. But let not distance ...
— The Framework of Home Rule • Erskine Childers
... know something of Venice, that wonderful and fairy-like city which seems to rise up out of the sea; with its bridges and gondolas; its marble palaces coming down to the water's edge; its gay ladies and stately doges. What a magnificent pageant was that which took place every Ascension Day, when the doge and all his court sailed grandly out in the "Bucentaur," or state galley, with gay colors flying, to the tune of lively music, ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various
... was to come out hunting himself. Lord Llwddythlw had come into the neighbourhood, and was determined to have a day's pleasure. Gorse Hall was full, and Hautboy, though his sister was very eager in beseeching him, refused to give way to his future magnificent brother-in-law. "Do him all the good in the world," said Hautboy, "to put up at the pot-house. He'll find out all about whiskey and beer and gin, and know exactly how many beds the landlady makes up." Lord Llwddythlw, therefore, slept at a neighbouring ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... and recompensed the present owners, keeping them as labourers, a most profitable speculation might be made out of the 'Ard el Huleh.'" The lake "might, with the marshy plain above it, be easily drained; and a magnificent tract of country, nearly twenty miles long by from five to six miles in width, abundantly watered by the upper affluents of the Jordan, might then be brought into cultivation. It is only now occupied by some wandering Bedawin and the peasants of a few scattered ...
— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various
... inestimable advantages. The editor, while giving this useful hint to seamen engaged on long voyages, is happy in having an opportunity of bearing this feeble testimony of honourable respect to the friend of his youth, under whom he had the happiness and advantage of serving, in that magnificent asylum of the brave defenders of the glory and prosperity of our king and country, for the last three years of the American war. Besides being an eminent and experienced physician, Dr Lind was a man of exemplary humanity, and of uncommon urbanity and singleness ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... actual sublimity, have a certain geological grandeur from the fact that they "have endured the battles and the storms of time longer than any other mountains" (Dawson). In some places, however, the Laurentian Rocks produce scenery of the most magnificent character, as in the great gorge cut through them by the river Saguenay, where they rise at times into vertical precipices 1500 feet in height. In the famous group of the Adirondack mountains, also, in the state of New ...
— The Ancient Life History of the Earth • Henry Alleyne Nicholson
... [58] This magnificent sheet of water I have ventured to name VICTORIA, after our gracious Sovereign. Its length was not clearly understood by me, in consequence of the word Sea having been applied both to the Lake and to the Nile by my local informants; and there ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... Diamond overlooking the St. Lawrence like the turret of some castle above the sea. Did a French soldier, removing his helmet to wipe away the sweat of his arduous climb, cry out "Que bec" (What a peak!) as he viewed the magnificent panorama of river and valley and mountain rolling from his feet; or did their Indian guide point to the water of the river narrowing like {14} a strait below the peak, and mutter in native tongue, "Quebec" (The strait)? Legend gives ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... glow most glorious. Happening to look back down the stream, while the Indian was catching a few of the struggling fish, I saw a long spreading fan of light like the tail of a comet, which we thought must be made by some big strange animal that was pursuing us. On it came with its magnificent train, until we imagined we could see the monster's head and eyes; but it was only Stickeen, who, finding I had left the camp, came swimming after me ...
— Stickeen • John Muir
... meant to try for takuo, a huge variety of the mackerel-tribe, or lahe'u, a magnificent bream-shaped fish, we had no need to go so far as the dangerous Tia Kau; three or four cable-lengths from the beach, and right in front of the village, we could lie in water as smooth as glass, and seventy fathoms in depth. Our bait was invariably flying-fish, ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... the air than anything except fused quartz. They are, however, very weak mechanically, and apt to crack by exposure to such changes of temperature as go on from day to day. It is clear, however, that in spite of this their magnificent electrical properties fit them for many ...
— On Laboratory Arts • Richard Threlfall
... higher up the river, and Cartier determined upon visiting that congregation of birch bark tents or huts, pitched on a spot of land called Hochelaga, now the site of Montreal. At Hochelaga the "new Governor" met with a magnificent reception. A thousand natives assembled to meet him on the shore, and the compliment was returned by presents of "tin" beads, and other trifles. Hochelaga was the chief Indian Emporium of Canada; it was ever ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... down long ago to the humdrum of married life, seems to me a far finer manifestation of the hither mysteries, a far greater triumph. What freshness, what perpetual rejuvenation they must possess! The more one regards such a thing, the more magnificent and far-reaching it appears. No philosophical bulwark against trouble can compare with it. Such love ceases to be a matter for novels and selected moments and certain lusty ages; ceases to be exceptional. It is the greatest of those ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... must see her hero absorbed day by day, and hour by hour, in the doings of a dazzling and magnificent creature like Delia Blanchflower. What food for torment, even ...
— Delia Blanchflower • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... administration become but two parallel series of errors and blunders, ending in war, calamity, and the necessity for a tyrant. When the nation feels its feet sliding backward, as if it walked on the ice, the time has come for a supreme effort. The magnificent tyrants of the past are but the types of those of the future. Men and nations will always sell themselves into slavery, to gratify their passions and obtain revenge. The tyrant's plea, necessity, is always available; and the tyrant once in power, the necessity of providing for his safety makes ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... expectations; the company was delighted. This over, the tent-room was opened for supper; it made a splendid appearance. All seemed happy and gratified; dancing was kept up till about two o'clock. The gardens looked magnificent, nothing could have added to the grandeur of the scene. I glory in the occasion, and that the Almighty has most bountifully provided us with the means. To my dear and much-valued wife I am indebted for the success of the entertainment. ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore
... Dorset Garden Theatre in 1676. But it is believed that she quitted or was taken from her profession—was "erept the stage," to employ old Downes's phrase—at an earlier date. The famous Prince Rupert of the Rhine was her lover. He bought for her, at a cost of L20,000, the once magnificent seat of Sir Nicholas Crispe, near Hammersmith, which afterwards became the residence of the Margrave of Brandenburg; and at a later date the retreat of Queen Caroline, the wife of George IV. Ruperta, the daughter of Mrs. Hughes, was married to Lieutenant-General Howe, and, surviving her husband ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... all recognize as such" is generally that which comes from the successful pursuit of our minor aim. Herbert Spencer says that every creature is happy when he is fully using his powers. I have known a girl with a magnificent voice who endured great hardships for a musical education, and who finally accomplished her purpose and enchanted the world with her singing. She was happy. Of course everybody expected her to be. But I have known another ...
— Girls and Women • Harriet E. Paine (AKA E. Chester}
... this time that Octavia began to teach Felice to play chess. The child hated it. It must have taken a sort of magnificent patience to teach her. For a long time no one save Mademoiselle D'Ormy had known what a struggle it meant for that gay little invalid to make herself lovely for that afternoon hour over the chess board. Yet, when the Major entered he would always find his daughter smiling from her heap of gay rose-colored ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke
... whenever I have been inclined to blame the natives for their indolence, some recollection of a fellow-countryman who has succumbed to the same influences has arrested my harsher judgment. I cannot recommend Nicaragua, with all its natural wealth, its perpetual summer, its magnificent lakes, and its teeming soil, as a place of emigration for isolated families, and even for larger schemes of colonisation I do not think it so suitable as our own colonies and the United States. A large body of emigrants would ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt
... the crown of a poet laureate was, in those days of magnificent ceremonials, attended with much really regal pomp. Dressed in a robe of purple velvet glittering with jewels, such as suited the taste for splendor of the time, and such as in truth well befitted a literary prince, Petrarch was conducted with much ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... hunters killed two rein-deer, a seasonable supply, as they were detained here twelve days. On the 16th July, they reached Nachvak, where the high rocky mountains, glowing in the splendour of the morning sun, presented a most magnificent prospect. About fifty heathen Esquimaux, who had encamped here, received them with loud shouts and the firing of muskets, and while they remained, behaved with great modesty, neither annoying them by impertinent curiosity, nor harassing them by importunate begging; they also attended ...
— The Moravians in Labrador • Anonymous
... The making of such a language "will prove the shortest and plainest way for the attainment of real knowledge," and the language thus made will be truly philosophical, or, to use our modern term, scientific. The labour bestowed by Wilkins on his magnificent project was immense, but the result was failure. "Sunt lacrimae rerum," and tears were never shed over a greater waste of ingenuity and heroic toil, if indeed a fine example of fruitless devotion is to be called waste. With apologies ...
— The Life and Times of John Wilkins • Patrick A. Wright-Henderson
... time previous to our weathering Cape Horn, very many of the seamen had redoubled their assiduity in cultivating their beards preparatory to their return to America. There they anticipated creating no small impression by their immense and magnificent homeward-bounders—so they called the long fly-brushes at their chins. In particular, the more aged sailors, embracing the Old Guard of sea grenadiers on the forecastle, and the begrimed gunner's mates and quarter-gunners, ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... Tippins escorted out of sacred edifice by Veneering, carriages rolling back to Stucconia, servants with favours and flowers, Veneering's house reached, drawing-rooms most magnificent. Here, the Podsnaps await the happy party; Mr Podsnap, with his hair-brushes made the most of; that imperial rocking-horse, Mrs Podsnap, majestically skittish. Here, too, are Boots and Brewer, and the two other Buffers; each Buffer with ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... a magnificent diamond, of such fine water, and so beautifully cut, as to be worth thirty thousand or ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... will reverently pause before the magnificent cenotaph of the great Earl of Chatham, which, though somewhat too confused and elaborate in its decorations, is not unworthy of the greatest of English ministers. Having achieved a higher reputation as a statesman and orator than any other public ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... through the long drawing-room towards the curtained doorway that led into the little boudoir. The drawing-room was a palatial apartment with stately French furniture that Dinah surveyed with awe. She could not picture herself as hostess in so magnificent a setting. She could only think of Rose de Vigne. It would have suited her flawless beauty perfectly, and she knew that Rose's self-contained heart would have revelled in ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... their beloved commander, by those most honourable and brave associates in arms, the captains of his own squadron, whom he so emphatically denominates, "the band of brothers." By these worthy and valorous officers, was their revered chief, the Hero of the Nile, presented with a magnificent sword; the hilt of which most appropriately represented a crocodile, very finely ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison
... Fancy yourself there. The scenery is beautiful; the climate is warm. There blooms the scarlet pomegranate amidst the dark laurel trees; from the hills a refreshing breeze is wafted over the orange groves and the magnificent Moorish halls, with their gilded cupolas and their painted walls. Processions of children parade the streets with lights and waving banners; and, above these, clear and lofty rises the vault of heaven, studded with glittering stars. Songs and castanets are heard; youths and ...
— The Sand-Hills of Jutland • Hans Christian Andersen
... went into a cafe newly established in the Rue Poissoniere, and was agreeably surprised to see Sophie, the pseudo-princess, sitting behind the counter in magnificent toilette, receiving the bows and the money of the customers as they passed before her, whilst M. Jerome—exactly in appearance as before, except that prosperity had begun to round him—was leaning ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 435 - Volume 17, New Series, May 1, 1852 • Various
... evening of April 4th I dined with the Lord Provost of Edinburgh. On Easter Day I attended the Kirk with the Lord Provost, hearing a magnificent sermon by Principal Caird, and in the evening dined with the Lord Advocate. On Easter Tuesday I dined with the Convention of Royal Burghs. On Thursday, April 9th, ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... upon resorting to so great an assembly. He turned round immediately, to discover whence the voice came, and as there was no man to be seen, concluded it was from heaven. He joined Iphitus, therefore; and ordering, along with him, the ceremonies of the festival, rendered it more magnificent and lasting. ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various |
