"Sift" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... business, Mr. Theydon," he said. "The worst part of it is that it seems to be spreading in an ever-widening circle. If it goes much further we'll be obliged to run in every Chinaman in London, and sift out the decent ones from the heap until we reach the unpleasant residuum. Are you worried about things? If so, I'll send a man to mount ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... nation's ills to cure, To mend small fortunes, and set up the poor; And oft times neatly make their projects known, By mending not the public's, but their own. The poor indeed may prove their watchful cares, That nicely sift and weigh their mean affairs, From scanty earnings nibbling portions small, As mice, by bits, steal cheese with rind and all; But why should statesmen for mechanics carve, What are they fit for but to work ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... that anthropologists must sift and winnow their evidence, like men employed in every other branch of science. And who denies it? What anthropologist of mark accepts as gospel any casual ...
— Modern Mythology • Andrew Lang
... the wisest men have thought our ignorance incurable, conceiving it to arise from the natural dulness and limitation of our faculties. And surely it is a work well deserving our pains to make a strict inquiry concerning the First Principles of Human Knowledge, to sift and examine them on all sides, especially since there may be some grounds to suspect that those lets and difficulties, which stay and embarrass the mind in its search after truth, do not spring from any darkness and intricacy in the objects, or natural defect in the understanding, so ...
— A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge • George Berkeley
... Henry Jones. The narrative of Browning's life, in the earlier chapters, makes no pretence to biographical completeness. An immense mass of detail and anecdote bearing upon him is now available and within easy reach. I have attempted to sift out from this picturesque loose drift the really salient and relevant material. Much domestic incident, over which the brush would fain linger, will be missed; on the other hand, the great central epoch ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford
... possibly be settled without him. One might have supposed that the present question was one which would require his particular handling. Ultimately it would, no doubt; but meanwhile he would let his lieutenants sift the various issues raised, and send up to him only the ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... Underwood, his faculties fully restored, "I want to know the meaning of this; let us sift this whole thing to ...
— At the Time Appointed • A. Maynard Barbour
... more racing chatter to be heard at the great hairdressers' than almost anywhere else outside a race-course. Some of it is worth hearing, most of it is valueless. The difficulty, as elsewhere, is to sift the wheat ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates
... delay to cross-examine the man or to sift the true from the false in his story, since it was clear to me that he had run into a company of Basutos, or rather been beguiled thereto by Rodd, and lost our cattle, also his companions, who were either killed as he said, or ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... this Sigismund Zaluski left St. Petersburg in March 1881, after the assassination of the late Czar, in which he was seriously compromised. He is said to be an out-and-out Nihilist, an atheist, and, in short, a dangerous, disreputable fellow. Will you sift the matter for me? I don't wish to dismiss the fellow without good reason, but of course I could not think of permitting him to be engaged to my niece until these charges ...
— The Autobiography of a Slander • Edna Lyall
... the poet, and not that of the moralist or preacher, how shall he sort and sift, culling this virtue and that, giving parts and fragments instead of the entire man? He must give all, not abstractly, ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs
... not yet begun to sift into the sky next morning when Lee dressed and tiptoed to the kitchen. She carried saddlebags with her and into the capacious pockets went tea, coffee, flour, corn meal, a flask of brandy, a plate of cookies, and a slab of bacon. An old frying-pan and a small ...
— A Man Four-Square • William MacLeod Raine
... housekeeper, and the best rooms were quickly opened and warmed, and the sorrowful, weary lady lay down to rest in their comfort and seclusion. Charlotte did not find their friend as unprepared for the event as she supposed likely. Private matters sift through the public mind in a way beyond all explanation, and "There had been a general impression," he said, "that the late squire's widow was very ill done to by the ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... am determined, for your brother's sake, to sift the story to the very bottom. In fact, I think—to end all doubt—I shall put the direct question myself to ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... the daughter made him answer: "I have not the time, my father, 490 I must clean the largest cowshed, Tend our herd of many cattle, Grind the corn between the millstones, Through the sieve must sift the flour, Grind the corn to finest flour, And ...
— Kalevala, Volume I (of 2) - The Land of the Heroes • Anonymous
... everybody and every function, having risen, as it were, step-by-step from the ground floor to the roof. He should be level-headed, yet impressionable; sympathetic, yet self-possessed; able quickly to sift, detect and discriminate; of various knowledge, experience and interest; the cackle of the adjacent barnyard the noise of the world to his eager mind and pliant ear. Nothing too small for him to tackle, nothing too great, he should keep to the middle of the road and well in rear of ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... relentlessly, "an' I says t' Mis' Deacon Whittle: 'Who counted th' money 'at was found on Andrew Bolton's body?' I says. 'W'y,' s' she, 'th' ones 'at found him out in th' woods where he got lost, I s'pose.' But come t' sift it right down t' facts, not one o' them ladies c'd tell f'r certain who 't was 'at found that body. The' was such an' excitement 'n' hullaballoo, nobody 'd thought t' ask. It wa'n't Deacon Whittle; n'r it wa'n't th' party from th' Brookville House; ner Hank Simonson, ner ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley
... time during the summer. I couldn't get much out of him because he could speak only a few words of English, and I can't speak any Dog Rib. Besides, you can't go much on what an Indian tells you. When you come to sift down their dope, it generally turns out to be nine parts lies and the other part divided between truth, superstition, and guess-work. Constable Darling, at Fort Resolution, said he'd received no complaint, ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... abandoned all hope of life; even the images of his family seemed blotted from his memory. He worked in the dark in order to make himself more comfortable on the chests, burrowing down into the straw for the sake of its heat. When the morning breeze began to sift in through the little window he fell slowly into a heavy, overpowering sleep, like that of criminals condemned to death, or duellists before the fatal morning. He thought he heard shouts in German, the galloping of horses, ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... hour since the sun had set in a blaze of splendor behind a crotch of the hills, but dusk had softened the vivid tints of orange and crimson and scarlet to a faint pink glow. Already the mountain silhouette had lost its sharp edge and the outlines were blurring. Soon night would sift down over the roof of ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... for a fresh invasion of England, which was put a stop to by Elizabeth's death, since the King of Spain declined to take up arms against his old ally, King James. Fawkes's own statements in his examinations have been proved to consist of such a mass of falsehood, that it is scarcely possible to sift out the truth: and all that can be done is to accept as fact such portions of his narrative as are either confirmed by other witnesses, or seem likely to be true from circumstantial evidence. His contradictions of his own previous assertions were perpetual, and where confirmation is accessible, it ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... to sift the matter. As a first step he went to see Surya Bai's old attendant, who was still in prison. From her he learned enough to make him believe she was not only entirely innocent of Surya Bai's death, ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... have come to you," continued Agatha, very seriously. "I am employed by those whose identity I must not disclose to sift this mystery of Colonel Weatherby to the bottom, if possible, and then to fix the guilt where it belongs. By accident you have come into possession of certain facts that would be important in unravelling the tangle, but through ...
— Mary Louise • Edith van Dyne (one of L. Frank Baum's pen names)
... live, and in a lifetime he had served honour scrupulously. What if it were but a myth, but a legend of fools, a destroying idol worshipped by brave and brainless visionaries, who had more courage than intelligence, more desire to do right than discernment to sift right from wrong? Pity that so many daring, honest men should have been spitted on rapiers, cloven with sabres, riddled with bullet-holes, for the sake of a vain breath, emptier than the glass he had raised to his lips last night! And yet—he might search, and deny, and argue, and scoff—honour ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford
... "difficulties of mind and body." I might better have said "difficulties of body, mind and character," or even character alone, for, after all, when you come to sift things down, it is the character that is at the ...
— Nerves and Common Sense • Annie Payson Call
... was well worn off the revelers, and they showed signs of weariness. Miller, noticing it, ordered the Indian war-dance as given by the Cheyennes. That aroused every one and filled the sets instantly. The fiddlers caught the inspiration and struck into "Sift the Meal and save the Bran." In every grand right and left, we ki-yied as we had witnessed Lo in the dance on festive occasions. At the end of every change, we gave a war-whoop, some of the girls joining in, that would have put to shame any ...
— Cattle Brands - A Collection of Western Camp-fire Stories • Andy Adams
... the next morning to the moan of wind and the sift of snow clouds past their walls. Staring through his peep-hole, George distinguished only a seethe of whirling flakes that greyed the view, blotting even the neighbouring huts, and when the early evening brought ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... therefore to be jealous, what Use the Devil may make of them, with reference to the Affairs of Government; but Rulers may most of all think, that the Lord Jesus from Heaven calls upon them, Satan has desired that he might Sift you, and have you; O Look to it, what ...
— The Wonders of the Invisible World • Cotton Mather
... was more of the light of understanding. She looked from one to the other. Her lips moved, but no sound came from them. It was a tense moment. Would she be able to answer? Would the obviously injured brain be able to sift out the right reply from the mass of words ...
— The Moving Picture Girls in War Plays - Or, The Sham Battles at Oak Farm • Laura Lee Hope
... backwards and forwards with the motion of the bough while the wind crooned him to sleep. The cradle would sometimes be placed upright against a tree-trunk, so that Tecumseh's eyes might follow Tecumapease as she helped to grind the corn in a hollow stone or sift it through baskets; or, again, while she mixed the meal into cakes, and carefully covered them with leaves before baking them in ...
— Tecumseh - A Chronicle of the Last Great Leader of His People; Vol. - 17 of Chronicles of Canada • Ethel T. Raymond
... hath desired to have you (My Apostles), that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for thee (Peter) that thy faith fail not; and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren."(179) It is worthy of note that Jesus prays only for Peter. And why for Peter in particular? Because on ...
— The Faith of Our Fathers • James Cardinal Gibbons
... soon released, and taken by the duke his villa of Belriguardo. Probably this excursion was designed to soothe the perturbed spirits of the poet. But it may also have had a different object. Alfonso may have judged it prudent to sift the information laid before him by Tasso's enemies. We do not know what passed between them. Whether moral pressure was applied, resulting in the disclosure of secrets compromising Leonora d'Este, cannot now be ascertained; nor is it worth while ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... conditions to perform its particular work under the strong pressure of responsibility to the nation at large; that our public affairs should be got into a state in which there should be no impunity for foolish or faithless conduct. In this way the public judgment would sift out incapability and dishonesty from posts of high charge, and even personal ambition would necessarily become of a worthier sort, since the desires of the most selfish men must be a good deal shaped by the opinions ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... Holmes. But my wife does. It is frightening her to death. She says nothing, but I can see terror in her eyes. That's why I want to sift the ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... hours had awakened suspicions which the lightest accusations might confirm. He remembered his son's guilt; the facility of his escape; and it might be that treason stood on the very threshold, ready to strike. He determined to sift the matter; and the guard now summoned, the parties were separated—each awaiting ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... two parts of common soda, one part of pumice stone, and one part of finely powdered chalk; sift it through a fine sieve, and mix it with water. Rub the marble well all over with the mixture, and the stains will be removed; then wash the marble with soap and water, and it will be as clean ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... accepted blindly rather than the acquittal at Rome. At any rate, the council had an express commission to re-open the whole case, and indeed had met for no other purpose; so, if they were not to do it, they might as well go home. The Westerns were determined to sift the whole matter to the bottom, but the Eusebians refused to enter the council. It was in vain that Hosius asked them to give their proofs, if it were only to himself in private. In vain he promised that if Athanasius was acquitted, and they were still unwilling to ...
— The Arian Controversy • H. M. Gwatkin
... not go to the Duke, for I hold that, when a man has to sift carefully between what he must say and what he must not, it is best to do it on paper; but I went back to my lodgings and wrote to him that it was merely for her own advantage that the Duchess had behaved so, and because she thought that ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... called W. Hewer, and he and I, with pails and a sieve, did lock ourselves into the garden, and there gather all the earth about the place into pails, and then sift those pails in one of the summer-houses, just as they do for dyamonds in other parts of the world; and there, to our great content, did with much trouble by nine o'clock (and by the time we emptied ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... the columns of a journal, justly commanding the public confidence, it is necessary to re-examine the grounds on which they rest. This I propose to do, without regard to labor or space. I shall not rely upon general considerations, but endeavor, in the course of this discussion, to sift every topic on which the Reviewer has struck at the truth of history, fairly and thoroughly. On this particular point, of the relation of these two instances of alleged Witchcraft, in localities so near as Boston and Salem, and with so short an interval of time, general considerations ...
— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham
... close to nightfall. The slant sun was throwing its rays on less and less of the trail. They could see the shadows grow and the coolness of night sift into the air. They were pushing on to pass the rim of a great valley basin that lay like a saucer in the mountains in order that they might camp in the valley by a stream all of them knew. Dusk was beginning to fall when they at last reached the saucer edge and only the opposite peaks ...
— Wyoming, a Story of the Outdoor West • William MacLeod Raine
... sift this business, Margerison, as I had suspected for a good while more than I could prove. So to-day I sent a man to your brother, commissioning him to pretend to be an art-dealer and offer a sum of money for the insertion in 'The Gem' of an appreciative notice of some spurious objects. As perhaps ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... was a jungle plow. It was a powerful piece of equipment which would attack jungle on a thirty-foot front, knock down all vegetation up to trees of four-foot diameter, shred it, loosen and sift the soil to a three-foot depth, and leave behind it smoothed, broken, pulverized dirt mixed with ground-up vegetation ready to break down into humus. Such a machine would clear tens of acres in a day and night, turning jungle into farmland ready ...
— The Pirates of Ersatz • Murray Leinster
... after an hour, for the clouds that had hung heavy all day long began to sift down snow; and soon a blizzard howled through ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... of caribou rawhide, for caribou shrinks when wet, thus tightening the lacing where other materials would stretch. Above and below the cross-pieces he put in a very fine weaving; between them a coarser, that the loose snow might readily sift through. Each strand he tested again and again; each knot he made ...
— The Silent Places • Stewart Edward White
... involved. Any assumption of superiority, intolerance, or lack of sympathy, on the part of the geologist, toward the inadequate explanations and descriptions given him by the practical man, is likely to indicate a weakness or limitation in his own mental processes. The geologist's business is to sift out the fact from the inference, and not to throw over the whole structure because some ...
— The Economic Aspect of Geology • C. K. Leith
... soon as the temporary service was accomplished, the personal dignity and liberal arms which the count of Tholouse derived from the custody of the holy lance, provoked the envy, and awakened the reason, of his rivals. A Norman clerk presumed to sift, with a philosophic spirit, the truth of the legend, the circumstances of the discovery, and the character of the prophet; and the pious Bohemond ascribed their deliverance to the merits and intercession of Christ alone. For a while, the Provincials defended their ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... or, rather, posthumous sects, have disputed for the soul of the People, under the names of Fourierism, of Pantheism, of Communism, of Industrialism, of Economism, and, finally, of Terrorism. Look at them, listen to them, read them, analyze them, sift them, handle them; and say, if, with the exception of a vague deifying of every thing,—that is to say, of nothing, by the Fourierites,—there is a single one of these philosophical, social, or political sects, which ...
— Atheism Among the People • Alphonse de Lamartine
... the community attending to matters of such momentous concern to the future prosperity and happiness of the people of America. I think it my duty, as a citizen of the Union, to espouse their cause; and it is incumbent upon every member of this house to sift the subject well, and ascertain what can be done to restrain a practice so nefarious. The Constitution has authorized as to levy a tax upon the importation of such persons as the States shall authorize ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... not taken him long to sift out those who tolerated him from motives of pity or policy and those who really liked him, and he was not a little proud to class in the latter group both Mr. Rhinehart and the Scotchman, McPhearson. Mr. Rhinehart not only had boys of his own but was ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... hate when Vice brings forward refined arguments, and Virtue allows them to pass unchallenged. bolt to sift or separate, as the boulting-mill separates the meal from the bran; in this sense the word (also spelt boult) is used by Chaucer, Spenser (F. Q. ii. 4. 24), Shakespeare (Cor. iii. 1. 322, Wint. Tale, iv. 4. 375, "the fanned snow that's bolted By the northern blasts twice o'er," etc.). ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton
... good stories calculated to make laymen laugh at the expense of our holy religion. The said abbey by this means became fertile in proverbs, which none of the clever folks of our day understand, although they sift and chew them in order to ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... Never was handled right when I was a colt. Don't you wait fer me, feller, you jest sift along in and I'll come when ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... came from Lord Farquhart's friends. Lord Farquhart himself stood as though stunned. He walked away as though he were in a dream, and not until he was safely housed under bolt and bar in the sheriff's lodge could he even try to sift the matter to a ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... Ruby could hardly sift her emotions when she found herself panting and doubling in flight. The chase had started without her will or dissent; had suddenly sprung, as it were, out of the ground. She only knew that she was very angry with Zeb; that she longed desperately to elude him; and that he must catch her ...
— I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Lafayette and that Anti-jacobin Visit of his, reports, this day, that there is 'not ground for Accusation!' Peace, ye Patriots, nevertheless; and let that tocsin cease: the Debate is not finished, nor the Report accepted; but Brissot, Isnard and the Mountain will sift it, and resift it, perhaps ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... between fact and fancy. These old stories may be vague memories of past deeds, set in a frame of mythical details; or they may be ancient myths, solar or meteorological, which came to receive credence as actual occurrences. The task remains for special students of such matters to sift and analyze them, ...
— Aboriginal American Authors • Daniel G. Brinton
... specimen of this quality, which the hero of his story offers him—this quality which the hostilities of nations deify—he undertakes to sift it a little. While in the name of that virtue which has at least the merit of comprehending and conserving a larger unity, a more extensive whole, than the limit of one's own personality, 'it runs reeking o'er the lives of men, as 'twere a perpetual spoil'; while ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... has desired you, to sift like wheat; [22:32]but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not entirely fail; and when you recover yourself, confirm your brothers. [22:33]And he said to him, Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death. [22:34]And he said, I tell you, Peter, a cock shall not crow today, before ...
— The New Testament • Various
... amicably together, to bring these charges against her now?" "I can only tell you," answered the professor, "that there is a man in the house. I saw him enter." "Then come, and let us find him. Show him to us," retorted the incensed brothers, "for we will sift this matter to the bottom. Show us the man, and we will then punish her in such a way as will satisfy you." One of the brothers, taking his sister aside, said, "First tell me, have you really got any one hidden in the ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... the last pack in the morning, a heavy grey sky began to sift down thickly falling snowflakes gently as if not wishing to give alarm. But when we were fairly under way this mildness vanished, and the storm smote our caravan with fierce and blinding gusts, amidst which ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... of his life, still found sufficient time, sufficient calmness, sufficient power, to command his numerous armies; to govern twenty foreign nations, and forty millions of subjects; to enter solicitously into all the particulars of the administration of his states; to see every thing; to sift every thing to the bottom; to regulate every thing; in fine, to conceive, create, and realize those unexpected improvements, those bold innovations, those noble institutions, and those immortal codes, that raise the civil ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... powder and salt to the flour and sift them. Add the nuts, mix thoroughly and gradually add the milk. Knead this into a loaf, put it into a square pan, brush the top with melted butter, let it stand twenty minutes, and bake in a moderate oven three-quarters of ...
— Sandwiches • Sarah Tyson Heston Rorer
... willingly, Dye sodainely and bravely: So will I: Then let 'em sift our Actions from our ashes. I looke to-morrow to be drawne before 'em; And doe you thinck, I, that have satt a Judge And drawne the thred of life to what length I pleasd, Will now appeare a Prisoner in the same place? Tarry for such an ebb? ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... maggots cannot be gotten put some fresh manure in the jar and catch a number of live house flies and put them in with the manure and watch for results. Collect a jar of fresh manure with maggots and sift over it a little powdered borax and see what happens to the maggots. Where horse manure can not be properly disposed of, cheap borax is used to throw over piles of manure to destroy the maggots and prevent the flies from breeding in it. ...
— An Elementary Study of Insects • Leonard Haseman
... is, my friends. If we forget that all which is good and strong in us comes from God, and not from ourselves; if we are conceited, and confident in ourselves; then we cut ourselves off from God's grace, and give place to Satan the Devil, that he may sift us like wheat, as he did St. Peter; and then in some shameful hour, we may find ourselves saying and doing things which we would never have believed we could have done. God grant, that if ever we fall ...
— Town and Country Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... white, that weird, uncanny substance we call snow Is slowly sifting through the bare branches—and ever and anon My thoughts sift with the drifting snow, and I am full of pale regret. Yes, full of pale regret and other things—you know what I mean. And why? Because the snow must go; the time has came to part. Yes, it cannot wait much longer—like the flakes my thoughts are melting 'Tis here, 'tis there, ...
— Poems for Pale People - A Volume of Verse • Edwin C. Ranck
... History (1855), he combated the methods and results of Niebuhr. Other works are On the Use and Abuse of Political Terms, Authority in Matters of Opinion, The Astronomy of the Ancients, and a Dialogue on the best Form of Government. The somewhat sceptical turn of his mind led him to sift evidence minutely, and the labour involved in his wide range of severe study and his public duties no doubt shortened his ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... something more serious than accident here, Mr. Brently," said the captain. "I wish that you would make a personal and very careful examination of Mr. Caldwell's effects, to ascertain if there is any clew to a motive either for suicide or murder—sift the thing to ...
— The Return of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... is his wife who is seeking him, a perfectly respectable man, you know ... it's a long story. We have chased many a man supposed to be Endicott, and Mr. Dillon is the latest. I don't accept the theory myself. I know Dillon is Dillon, but a detective must sift the theories of his employers. In fact my work up to this moment proves very clearly that of all our wrong chases ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... moment Jan was silent. It presented itself to him as a new difficulty, that he was likely to be recognized. There was a flour barrel by the counter, and as he pondered he began mechanically to sift the flour through his ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... dealings of man with man, and nation with nation, I never should have suspected that they knew this all-important secret. And, with this eternal lesson written in your soul, do you ask me to sift new wisdom for you out of my petty existence of two ...
— Grandfather's Chair • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... said Dick, laying a huge but friendly paw upon Mrs. Carr's shoulder; "we're chased out." He put his head back into the kitchen, however, to file a parting petition for biscuits, which was unnecessary, for Mrs. Smithers had already found her rolling-pin and had begun to sift her flour. ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... BALLS.—Always sift your corn after it is popped. For home use, add butter and lemon flavor to your syrup. This is too expensive for retail and factory use, though some use lard sparingly. Boil molasses to a stiff ball, wet your tub, put ...
— One Thousand Secrets of Wise and Rich Men Revealed • C. A. Bogardus
... the day, and wet mirk blotteth out The heavens, and mid the riven clouds the ceaseless lightnings live. So are we blown from out our course, through might of seas we drive, 200 Nor e'en might Palinurus self the day from night-tide sift, Nor have a deeming of the road atwixt the watery drift. Still on for three uncertain suns, that blind mists overlay, And e'en so many starless nights, across the sea we stray; But on the fourth day at the last afar upon us broke The ...
— The AEneids of Virgil - Done into English Verse • Virgil
... And, with your heart broken, you would not sift the truth. She had committed no offence against ...
— Kept in the Dark • Anthony Trollope
... roast add six tablespoons of vinegar and small piece of butter; salt and pepper; stick six cloves in the roast; sprinkle two tablespoons of cinnamon and sift one cup of flour over it. Put in oven in deep pan or kettle with a quart of boiling water; roast until it is about half done and then strain over it three-fourths of a can of tomatoes; finish roasting it and when done add celery-salt to suit the taste, and one cup of sweet cream and some catsup, ...
— Recipes Tried and True • the Ladies' Aid Society
... gather gold, and dig for it as hard as if for life; sitting up by it at night lest any should take it from them, giving up houses and country, and wife and children, for the sake of a few feet of mud, whence they dig clay that glitters as they wash it; and how they sift it and rock it as patiently as if it were their own children in the cradle, and afterward carry it in their bosoms, and forego on account of ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... came around to help me, got kicks or blows of the fist, while I kept crying out in lamentation: "Ah! traitors! enviers! This is an act of treason, done by malice prepense! But I swear by God that I will sift it to the bottom, and before I die will leave such witness to the world of what I can do as shall make a score ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... the dark, the twinkles of the shipping only doubtfully point their whereabouts. The most brilliant may turn out the most remote, and the faintest at first the nearest after all. Your own motion alone can sift them into place. If we could voyage through the sea of space, it would be thus we might come upon some star-cluster and have the same delightful doubt which should become ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... of slander," says the Rev. F. W. Robertson; "you may publicly prove its falsehood, you may sift every atom, explain and annihilate it, and yet, years after you had thought that all had been disposed of for ever, the mention of a name wakes up associations in the mind of some one who heard it, but never heard or never attended to the refutation, ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... cannot fail to discover many vestiges of a primitive revelation of some of the principal truths of religion, although in the lapse of time they have been so distorted and mingled with fiction that it requires careful study to sift the few remaining grains of truth from the great mass of superstition and error in which they are all but lost. Among these truths may be reckoned monotheism, or the belief in, and the worship of, one only God, which ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier
... sugar into large bowl. Pour over them the scalded milk and boiling water. When this is lukewarm add the yeast cake dissolved in luke-warm water. Sift in flour gradually, beating with a spoon. Toss on a floured board and knead until smooth. Allow it to rise over night in a moderately warm place or until it doubles its original size. Cut down or knead and allow it to rise until light, then form into loaves or biscuits. ...
— Food and Health • Anonymous
... strychnine alkaloid is used, prepare the hot starch paste first. Then sift strychnine and baking soda, previously thoroughly mixed, into the hot starch paste and stir to a creamy mass. Proceed as in the above directions with sirup, ...
— Life History of the Kangaroo Rat • Charles T. Vorhies and Walter P. Taylor
... "But I'm also a Congressman, responsible to my district, my state and the whole country. Now, Rhinds, the whole thing is just here. I'm going to look into this matter, and I'm going to sift it all I can. If I find you're innocent beyond a question—then—well, you know ...
— The Submarine Boys' Lightning Cruise - The Young Kings of the Deep • Victor G. Durham
... beat upon his brain, and with them came the accustomed phenomena; the sense of some presence near, impending, yet impotent; suggesting by analogy and effect the misdirected efforts of a blind person seeking something in a room, or the painful attempt of one almost deaf, striving to sift out words from a confused murmur of sounds. The personality of Stella seemed to pervade him, yet he could see nothing, could hear nothing. The impression might be from within, not from without. Perhaps, after all, it was nothing ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard
... base to an incredible bulk, shooting straight to an incredible height and tapering exquisitely as it soars, it drops not foliage but plumage. To walk in a redwood forest at night and to look up at the stars tangled in the tree-tops, to watch the moonlight sift through the masses of soft black-green feathers, down, down, until strained to a diaphanous tenuity it lies a faint silver gossamer at your feet, is to feel that you are living in one of the old woodcuts which illustrate ...
— The Californiacs • Inez Haynes Irwin
... intellectual unwary—children and neurotic grown-ups. The cap-and-bells element is largely represented in Chapman's select company of German-American talent: the confetti of foolishness is thrown at us—we dodge, laugh, listen and no one has time to think, weigh, sift or analyze. There are the boom of rhetoric, the crack of confession, the interspersed rebel-yell of triumph, the groans of despair, the cries of victory. Then come songs by paid singers, the pealing of the organ—rise and sing, kneel and pray, entreaty, condemnation, misery, tears, ...
— Love, Life & Work • Elbert Hubbard
... knowne all, seene all, and said all. This proposition of his being somewhat over amply and injuriously interpreted by some, made him a long time after to be troubled in the inquisition of Rome. I would have him make his scholler narrowly to sift all things with discretion, and harbour nothing in his head by mere authoritie, or upon trust. Aristotles principles shall be no more axiomes unto him, than the Stoikes or Epicurians. Let this diversitie of judgements be proposed unto him, if he can, he shall be able to ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... Yes, it's become the talk of all the town, And make a stir that's scarcely to your credit; And I have met you, sir, most opportunely, To tell you in a word my frank opinion. Not to sift out this scandal to the bottom, Suppose the worst for us—suppose Damis Acted the traitor, and accused you falsely; Should not a Christian pardon this offence, And stifle in his heart all wish for vengeance? Should you permit that, ...
— Tartuffe • Jean-Baptiste Poquelin Moliere
... watching the kind, clumsy Koopf (who was yet so skilful at his own work) place the pretty globe with so much pride and pleasure. She kept sniffing, meanwhile, at the tantalizing perfume that seemed to sift downward from the feathers of the Plynck, as she stirred, ever so softly, ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker
... would be down on us, a dozen of them, at least. I fancy they'll let us alone now if we don't linger here. Let's sift along." ...
— Frank Merriwell's Pursuit - How to Win • Burt L. Standish
... for a moment. "I could use Thorndyke; he'd be the next guy to convince if we could find him. Or maybe Catherine, if we could find her. The next best thing is to get hold of that F.B.I. Team that called on me. There's a pair of cold-blooded characters that seem willing to sift through a million tons of ash to find one valuable ...
— Highways in Hiding • George Oliver Smith
... last. The place could not be better for my birdlets; shallow, tepid water, interspersed with muddy knolls and green eyots. The diversions of the bath begin forthwith. The ducklings clap their beaks and rummage here, there and everywhere; they sift each mouthful, rejecting the clear water and retaining the good bits. In the deeper parts, they point their sterns into the air and stick their heads under water. They are happy; and it is a blessed thing to see them at work. We will ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... is desired, whether it is bread, biscuit or cake, sift the flour over and over again to get it well impregnated with air. The more air it contains the more porous will be the finished product. Five ...
— Maintaining Health • R. L. Alsaker
... if there are no sandpits from which it can be dug, then we must sift it out from river beds or from gravel or even from the sea beach. This kind, however, has these defects when used in masonry: it dries slowly; the wall cannot be built up without interruption but from time to time ...
— Ten Books on Architecture • Vitruvius
... vituperative utterances, the catch phrases of radicalism, there remained the grains of truth. Starr knew that the masses of Mexico were suffering, broken under the tramplings of revolution and counter-revolution that swept back and forth from gulf to gulf. Still, it was not his business to sift out the plump grains of truth and justice, but to keep the chaff from lighting and spreading a wildfire of sedition through ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower
... the hour drew near at which Philinnion usually appeared, they were on the watch for her. She came, as was her custom, and sat down upon the bed. Machates made no pretence, for he was genuinely anxious to sift the matter to the bottom, and secretly sent some slaves to call her parents. He himself could hardly believe that the woman who came to him so regularly at the same hour was really dead, and when she ate and drank with him, he began to suspect what had been suggested to ...
— Greek and Roman Ghost Stories • Lacy Collison-Morley
... a situation will be forced to the conclusion that for her to hear such tales is nothing compared to the child's hearing them, and that his coming to his mother is proof of his own innocence. It is surely her first duty, no matter how difficult or unsavory the task, to sift out the wrong from the right, to show the child wherein the story is absurd, wicked, and harmful. At such a crisis the mother should be very careful not to show any offence because the child has brought her the story. She may condemn ...
— The Renewal of Life; How and When to Tell the Story to the Young • Margaret Warner Morley
... God we try them, don't we! Is it nothing to show a disposition to sift things and bring people to a strict account? I tell you it ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 6. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... forgot myself. But Mr. Forbes has a very strong reason for wishing to sift this matter to the bottom. Don't, girls,—oh, ...
— Two Little Women on a Holiday • Carolyn Wells
... the supposed coexistence of Mind and matter and the mingling of good and evil have re- sulted from the philosophy of the serpent. Jesus' demon- 269:6 strations sift the chaff from the wheat, and unfold the unity and the reality of good, the unreality, the ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy
... bowl, perfectly clean, and arrange the star tube and pastry bag, if you are going to use one. If not, get out a baking dish. Sift six tablespoonfuls of powdered sugar. Separate six eggs. Put three of the yolks aside (as you will only use three), and beat the other three until creamy. Beat the whites until they are very stiff but not dry or broken. Now add three tablespoonfuls of the sifted powdered sugar. Beat for ...
— Many Ways for Cooking Eggs • Mrs. S.T. Rorer
... may only collect the currents as they are generated, and supply what is called an alternating current, that is to say, a current which alternates or changes its direction several hundred times a second, or it may sift the currents as they are produced and supply what is termed a continuous current, that is, a current always in the same direction, like that of a voltaic battery. Some machines are made to supply alternating currents, others continuous ...
— The Story Of Electricity • John Munro
... ideas, to hold paragraph after paragraph, chapter after chapter, in his consciousness, so that each gives added illumination to the main thought and, at the end, the whole of the work stands out in its entirety. He must learn to grasp the central thought in each section as he proceeds—to sift the wheat from the chaff. The minor details have been of value in giving him the main thought, but the real ability of the good reader consists in dropping these minor details from the mind and holding steadily on to ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Literature • Ontario Ministry of Education
... be enough to sift this affair of my father's to the bottom, and if claims he has, to establish them thoroughly," he observed ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... strangers. Beyond them it was conglomerate, that fused and merged thing which seemed a thousand faces, yet one; that blended and commingled mass which we call the public. Out of the mass Joe Newbolt could not sift the lean, shrewd face of Curtis Morgan, nor glean from it the brown ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... hinted is probably no concern of ours. It is not for us to sift its truth, or to bring it to the attention of the individual it tarnishes. Obviously, society would become altogether impossible if each one of us were to constitute ourselves a sort of social police to arraign every accuser before the accused. We should thus, it is ...
— Vanishing Roads and Other Essays • Richard Le Gallienne
... roast them before a very hot fire for fifteen minutes basting them three or four times with butter. Have some slices of toast laid under them to catch the drippings. While the birds are roasting make a bread sauce as follows; roll a pint bowlfull of dry bread, and sift the crumbs; use the finest ones for the sauce, and the largest for the frying later; remove the onion from the milk in which it has been boiling, stir into the milk the finest portion of the crumbs, season it with ...
— My Pet Recipes, Tried and True - Contributed by the Ladies and Friends of St. Andrew's Church, Quebec • Various
... commit ourselves to a measurement. And they may be accurate observers without being good judges. They do not think so, and their bent is to glean hurriedly and form conclusions as hasty, when their business should be sift at ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... it would appear, must be a pauper; though his father must inevitably be a living sorrow, which one who tasted it has told us is worse than a dead one; though Denise would have nothing to say to him,—yet he was happier than he had ever been. He was wise enough not to sift his happiness. He had never spoken of it to others. It is wise not to confide one's happiness to another; he may pull it to pieces in his endeavour to find out how it ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... unable to go to him—I bring the case to you. Go, I beg of you, to Washington and plead with the congressman from this, your native district, and the Arkansas representative, who is your kinsman. Urge them to see the President and prevail upon him to sift the evidence. I realize most bitterly that I have no claim upon you, but oh, for God's sake, Madam, do what you can for a distracted father. Hanging! Oh, save him from that—and act quickly, for he has only five days to live. I am crazed ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... in an irregular manner, that sanction which in a regular manner he could not give, to the crimes of those who had recently hired him; and in order that a confused mass of testimony which he did not sift, which he did not even read, might acquire an authority not properly belonging to it, from the signature of the highest judicial functionary ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... real dirt farmers represented here than there had been in most of the homestead projects—men who were equipped to farm. But they were still in the minority. They picked up handfuls of the earth that the locators turned over with spades, let it sift through their fingers and pronounced it good. A rich loam, not so heavy or black as the soil back east, but better adapted, perhaps, to the climate. Aside from the farmers nobody seemed to know or care anything about the ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl
... continued, gently, "that faith failed thee. This cannot be so. Either thou hadst it not, or thou hast it. But who bade thee strike the point betwixt love and faith? Wouldst thou sift the warm breeze from the sun that quickens it? Who bade thee turn upon God and say: "Behold, my offering is of earth, and not worthy: thy fire comes not upon it: therefore, though I slay not my brother whom thou acceptest, I will depart before thou smite me." Why shouldst thou ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various
... I set him to beat out and sift some corn. I let him see me make the bread, and he soon did all the work. I felt quite a love for his true, warm heart, and he soon learnt to talk to me. One day I said, "Do the men of your tribe win in fight?" He told me, with a smile, that they did. "Well, then," said ...
— Robinson Crusoe - In Words of One Syllable • Mary Godolphin
... symptoms - discovered that I had typhoid fever, must have had it for months without knowing it - wondered what else I had got; turned up St. Vitus's Dance - found, as I expected, that I had that too, - began to get interested in my case, and determined to sift it to the bottom, and so started alphabetically - read up ague, and learnt that I was sickening for it, and that the acute stage would commence in about another fortnight. Bright's disease, I was relieved to find, I had only ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... rose to heights of eloquence. His thorough and practical mind enabled him to study, sift, and give form and substance to the broad political and economic conceptions of more idealistic men. Inheriting the narrow political creed of his father, he can scarcely be blamed if his mind came slowly ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... himself among the "Humids." I find among the Insensati, one man of learning taking the name of STORDIDO Insensato, another TENEBROSO Insensato. The famous Florentine academy of La Crusca, amidst their grave labours to sift and purify their language, threw themselves headlong into this vortex of folly. Their title, the academy of "Bran," was a conceit to indicate their art of sifting; but it required an Italian prodigality of conceit to have induced these grave scholars to exhibit themselves in the burlesque scenery ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... Totemism") were published in the Fortnightly Review, 1869-71. Any follower in the footsteps of Mr. M'Lennan has it in his power to add a little evidence to that originally set forth, and perhaps to sift the somewhat uncritical ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang
... while the mind alone A passionless statue stands. Oh, pardon, innocent one! Pardon at thine unconscious hands! "Murmurous with music not their own," I say? And in that saying how do I missay, When from the common sands Of poorest common speech of common day Thine accents sift the golden musics out! And ah, we poets, I misdoubt, Are little more than thou! We speak a lesson taught we know not how, And what it is that from us flows The hearer better ...
— Sister Songs • Francis Thompson
... If you are going to sift everything so, and get back of everything! I can't live in metaphysics: I have to live in the things themselves, amongst ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... Jack. Mason so thoroughly believes in the innocence of Darcy, and he sticks by his daughter's engagement so well, that he'd supply twice as much cash as was necessary to sift this to the bottom. So here's some to enable you to ...
— The Diamond Cross Mystery - Being a Somewhat Different Detective Story • Chester K. Steele
... Let us next sift and weigh the arguments from reason by which the dogma of the eternity of future misery is respectively defended and assailed. The advocates of it have sought to support it by four positions, which are such entire assumptions that only ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... concerned for whatever overtakes me. I have sifted the sands of France: now I sift those of England. Here I am held in the greatest kindness and honour imaginable by all whom I meet. Though I am useless as a child yet they are unwearied of me. The nurses in my Maharanee Baharanee's Hospital, which is by day a home and a house to me, minister to me as daughters ...
— The Eyes of Asia • Rudyard Kipling
... little man; "if you were to come to our committee meetings you would see for yourself. Everything is most carefully gone into; we endeavour to sift the ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... 'tis your Duty, my Dear, to warn the Girl against her Ruin, and to instruct her how to make the most of her Beauty. I'll go to her this moment, and sift her. In the meantime, Wife, rip out the Coronets and Marks of these Dozen of Cambric Handkerchiefs, for I can dispose of them this Afternoon to a ...
— The Beggar's Opera - to which is prefixed the Musick to each Song • John Gay
... flushed, perturbed Marcia with gentle, righteous, rigid inspection. She felt with the first glance that she was being tried in the fire, and that it was to be no easy ordeal through which she was to pass. They had come determined to sift her to the depths and know at once the worst of what their beloved nephew had brought upon himself. If they found aught wrong with her they meant to be kindly and loving with her, but they meant to take it out of her. This had been the unspoken understanding between ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... would-be historian of a woman's college to-day is in much the same relation to her material as the Venerable Bede was to his when he set out to write his Ecclesiastical History. The thought brings us its own inspiration. If we sift our miracles with as much discrimination as he sifted his, we shall be doing well. We shall discover, among other things, that in addition to the composite influence which these colleges all together exert, each one also brings to bear upon ...
— The Story of Wellesley • Florence Converse
... the dark shades, and giving you nothing hut "sweetness and light." Having never been in India myself, I can only claim for myself the right and duty of every historian, namely, the right of collecting as much information as possible, and the duty to sift it according to the recognized rules of historical criticism. My chief sources of information with regard to the national character of the Indians in ancient times will be the works of Greek writers and the literature ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller
... agendi, of throwing the whole man into a thing at one time, and out of it at another. In the bank and in his own study he was a devout worshiper of Mammon; in society, a courteous, polished, intelligent gentleman, always ready to sift and discuss any worthy topic you could start except finance. There was some affectation in the cold and immovable determination with which he declined to say three words about money. But these great men act habitually on a preconceived system: this ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... was to separate the coarse outer husk or covering of the kernel from the finer parts that make the meal. He had no sieve. His net was too coarse. It let both bran and meal go through. "I must make a net or cloth fine enough to sift or bolt my flour," said he. Such was now his skill in spinning and weaving that this was not hard to do. He had soon woven in his loom a piece of fine netting which allowed the meal to shake through, but held back the coarse bran or ...
— An American Robinson Crusoe - for American Boys and Girls • Samuel. B. Allison
... charms of this new science is that there is still so much to explore, so much to sift, so much to arrange. Ishall not, therefore, be satisfied with merely lecturing on Comparative Philology, but I hope I shall be able to form a small philological society of more advanced students, who will come and work with ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... they lay for years, heaped up at random, a mine of treasures which made the mouths of scholars water, but appalled them by the amount of labor, nay, actual drudgery, needful only to sift and sort them, even before any study of their contents could be begun. At length a young and ambitious archaeologist, attached to the British Museum, George Smith, undertook the long and wearisome task. He was not originally a scholar, but an engraver, and was employed ...
— Chaldea - From the Earliest Times to the Rise of Assyria • Znade A. Ragozin
... could. To the well and able, men or women, Rollo rarely ever gave anything but work, which he never refused. Every other need met a ready hand and open ear at Chickaree. Let no one imagine that the heads of that house led an easy life; to meet wisely the demands that came, to sift the false from the true, to apportion the help to the need, called for all their best strength incessantly in exercise. Being stewards of so much, less than all their time would not suffice to use it wisely. For let it be remembered, ...
— The Gold of Chickaree • Susan Warner
... the tale in his own fashion. It may be he will dwell long upon occurrences interesting to himself, and apart from the object of our inquiries; it may be he will equivocate unintentionally if cross-examined in detail; but truth will underlie his garrulous story, and by patient analysis we may sift it out, and ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... chagrin he discovered that as fast as he brought to light a "basis" for his selection, he was informed, after some perfunctory investigation by the employees of the State Land Office that these bases had already been used! Eventually the light of reason began to sift through the fog of despair and suddenly Bob had a very ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... along hard after I was freed. It is a hard matter to tell you what we could find or get. We used to dig up dirt in the smokehouse and boil it and dry it and sift it to get the salt to season our food with. We used to go out and get old bones that had been throwed away and crack them open and get the marrow and use them to season the greens with. Jus plenty of niggers then didn't have anything but ...
— Slave Narratives: Arkansas Narratives - Arkansas Narratives, Part 6 • Works Projects Administration
... should be relieved of the drag of these backward pupils. The special classes will become the clearing houses. The training should be largely manual and industrial and as practical as possible. As the number of classes in any school district increases, the classification will sift out those who are merely backward and a little coaching and special attention will return them to the grades. The others—the morons—will remain and as long as they are not dangerous to society (sexually or otherwise) they may live at home and attend the special classes. As they grow ...
— Applied Eugenics • Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson
... water and bring the salted water to the boiling point. When it is boiling rapidly, sift the corn meal slowly through the fingers into it, and at the same time stir it rapidly so as to prevent the formation of lumps. Any mush that contains lumps has not been properly made and should not be served in this condition, as it is unpalatable. ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 1 - Volume 1: Essentials of Cookery; Cereals; Bread; Hot Breads • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences
... too! You know him, Governor—a man whose nerves Are gossamers, too fine to sift the music Of the blasts that blow about our burly world, And only fit for harps whereon Zephyrus In Elysium might breathe.—And yet this man— Oh! you'd not believe it ...
— The Scarlet Stigma - A Drama in Four Acts • James Edgar Smith
... phenomenon had been accompanied by two tremendous volleys of thunder, to the infinite consternation of the multitude, who received it as a supernatural manifestation. But a member of the King's Privy Council, a satirical skeptic and mistruster of everybody's word but his own, undertook to sift the matter,—and adopting the dress of the Mystics, managed to introduce himself into one of their secret assemblies, where with considerable astonishment, he saw them make use of a small wire, by means of which ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... what to think or believe, but convinced that it was time he laid the whole matter before King Philip. His Catholic Majesty was deeply perturbed. He at once dispatched Don Juan de Llano, the Apostolic Commissary of the Holy Office to Madrigal to sift the matter, and ordered that Anne should be solitarily confined in her cell, and her nuns-in-waiting and ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... washing-up. In the communal households of the future I shall heave coal, sift cinders, dig potatoes, dust furniture or scour floors—any task will be mine which, though it makes me dirty, does not make me greasily dirty. But if I must wash-up, if I must study the idiosyncrasies of cold fat, treacly plates, frying-pans ...
— Observations of an Orderly - Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital • Ward Muir
... "Sift along, boys, don't ride so slow; Haven't got much time but a long round to go. Quirt him in the shoulders and rake him down the hip; I've cut you toppy mounts, boys, now pair off and rip. Bunch the herd at the old meet, Then beat 'em on ...
— Cowboy Songs - and Other Frontier Ballads • Various
... under discussion, Herodotus and Thucydides, but no others, were mentioned as proper object lessons. What are the merits of Herodotus? Accuracy in details, as we understand it, was certainly not one of them. Neither does he sift critically his facts, but intimates that he will not make a positive decision in the case of conflicting testimony. "For myself," he wrote, "my duty is to report all that is said, but I am not obliged to believe it all alike,—a remark which may be understood ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... make me a sieve, to sift my meal and part it from the bran and husk. Having no fine thin canvas to search the meal through, I could not tell what to do. What linen I had was reduced to rags: I had goat's hair, enough, but neither tools to work it, nor did I know how to spin it: At length ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe
... Worms may be easily destroyed. Any Summer euening when it is darke, after a showre with a candle, you may fill bushels, but you must tred nimbly & where you cannot come to catch them so; sift the earth with coale ashes an inch or two thicknes, and that is a plague to ...
— A New Orchard And Garden • William Lawson |
