"Tolerably" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... freshness of initiation. This was why Mrs. Bonnycastle's expression of a wish to introduce him to three young ladies had startled him a little; he saw a certain process, in which he flattered himself that he had become proficient, but which was after all tolerably exhausting, repeated for each of the damsels. After separating from his judicious Bostonian he rather evaded Mrs. Bonnycastle, contenting himself with the conversation of old friends, pitched for the most part in a lower and ...
— Pandora • Henry James
... are parts where the negroes are tolerably thickly settled. The supervisor is a friend of my older brother, and he says that is an interesting part ...
— The Boy With the U.S. Census • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... of three-and-twenty are tolerably well-grown; it isn't a bad age to marry. Why, according to Debrett, my father was only three-and-twenty when he brought home a wife and son to ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... breadth. Its summit is a wide expanse of table land, the highest part of which is nearly seventeen hundred feet above the level of the sea. The whole of this unenclosed moorland is covered with gorse and heather, making it extremely gay in the summer time; it is also tolerably abundant in grouse and black game, and so fruitful in bilberries, that from 400 to 500 pounds worth are said to have been gathered on it in the course of a single season. On first hearing it, this sounds an improbable statement; but any one who has been upon the mountain in a good "whinberry season" ...
— A Night in the Snow - or, A Struggle for Life • Rev. E. Donald Carr
... was not a pleasant dinner. Mr. Desmond alone appeared not to mind the restraint, and he alone ventured to address the widow. She was polite, but far from sociable. We contrived to pass the afternoon tolerably, but not at all in the spirit which I wished to have prevail when I had friends to visit me, and all ...
— That Mother-in-Law of Mine • Anonymous
... passed tolerably quiet, for the Vauxhall adventures had given Madame Duval a surfeit of public places: home, however, soon growing tiresome, she determined to-night, she said, to relieve her ennui by some amusement; and it was therefore settled, that we should call upon the Branghtons ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... A tolerably regular tide set past the ship, N. N. E. and S. S. W., nearly one mile an hour; and it appeared by the shore to be high water about eight hours after the moon's passage, and the common rise to be ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... demonstrations of affection, except, indeed, from his little golden-haired Anna, who was refined and polished, and all that, which made a vast difference, as he thought. Still, he returned his mother's greeting with a tolerably good grace, managing, however, to tear himself from ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... pupil and teacher, offender and judge, performer and critic, chaperone and protegee, a prim, precise, old maid and a rollicking schoolgirl, a tomboy and a prude, a saint and sinner. What can result from such a combination? That we get on tolerably is a wonder. Some days, however, we get on admirably together, part of me paying compliments to the other part of me—whole days being given to this—until each of us has such a good opinion of herself and the other that we feel on equal terms ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... we put out again, and I was tolerably certain that if no other fish came to boat I should not break my heart nor die of grief. The taking of that handsome pair of spring salmon was an admirable tonic, and I resumed my Scott in a contented mood. After three chapters the mood was not quite ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior
... the rude fellow! Votini was well dressed—even too much so. He had on morocco boots embroidered in red, an embroidered coat, small silken frogs, a white beaver hat, and a watch; and he strutted. But his vanity was destined to come to a bad end on this occasion. After having run a tolerably long distance up the Rivoli road, leaving his father, who was walking slowly, a long way in the rear, we halted at a stone seat, beside a modestly clad boy, who appeared to be weary, and was meditating, with drooping head. A man, who must have been ...
— Cuore (Heart) - An Italian Schoolboy's Journal • Edmondo De Amicis
... of long loops the road ascended at a tolerably easy angle; the horse-bells tinkled, the driver shouted encouragement to his beasts, and within the vehicle went on a lively gossiping, with much laughter. Meanwhile the great moon had risen high enough to illumine the valley below us; silvery grey and green, ...
— By the Ionian Sea - Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy • George Gissing
... and paid for it tolerably stiffly, for at that period all agricultural prices were inflated—from the price of a lease to that of a calf. He covenanted to pay a certain fixed rental for so many acres of arable and a small proportion of grass for a fixed time. He covenanted to ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... "if it's trouble you're anxious for, it's quite likely you'll find it here. Nobody ever got anything worth having unless he fought for it, and we've taken on a tolerably big contract. We're going to open up this state for any man who will work for it to make a living in, and substitute its constitution for the law ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... Chaumonot in the same year rendered the same service for the Neutral Country. Sanson's map is fairly accurate for the upper lakes, when compared with some maps published at much later periods when the lakes had become tolerably well known to traders and travellers. It shows an acquaintance with the general contour of Lakes Erie, St. Clair and Huron, with several of the streams emptying into Lakes Erie and Huron on both the Canadian and the American sides, ...
— The Country of the Neutrals - (As Far As Comprised in the County of Elgin), From Champlain to Talbot • James H. Coyne
... natural, affectionate smile as he spoke, was tolerably satisfactory, certainly as to his estimate of his own fate; and it is to be hoped the reader is by this time sufficiently well acquainted with Elinor and Harry, to credit his account of the matter. From all we know of both, we are ourselves disposed to believe them very well qualified to ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... Rogers looked at him sharply. "When I say venturesome," continued 'Bias, "you'll understand I don't mean foolhardy. . . . Nothin' o' the sort. I want to hear o' something tolerably safe, into which a man might put a small sum he ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... separation an occasion of violent hilarity, and then she walked back into the foggy London street. The world lay before her—she could do whatever she chose. There was a deep thrill in it all, but for the present her choice was tolerably discreet; she chose simply to walk back from Euston Square to her hotel. The early dusk of a November afternoon had already closed in; the street-lamps, in the thick, brown air, looked weak and red; our heroine was unattended and Euston Square was a long way from Piccadilly. But Isabel ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 2 (of 2) • Henry James
... Whaup surly as a bear with a sore ear, on account of the tenuity of his fees; and Strachan, of course, in an extremely unconversational mood. So I had nothing for it but to eat and drink as plentifully as I could, and very thankful I was that the claret was tolerably sound. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... from Bath to Painted Post, though stony, is tolerably level. The adjacent mountains have a slaty appearance, with horizontal strata. Mr. Hall was disappointed at Painted Post, to find the post gone, broken down or rotted, within the last few years. It had been an Indian memorial, either of triumph or ...
— Travels in North America, From Modern Writers • William Bingley
... tolerably well. With great dexterity Don Carlo kept the crowd away from the entrances, while he corresponded by means of his vassals with the Viceroy, who consented to Naclerio's deposition—to the abolition of the duties on fruit and on wine. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... Through the whole treat, incentive to the taste. Locket, by many labors feeble grown, Up from the kitchen call'd his eldest son; Though wise thyself (says he), though taught by me, Yet fix this sentence in thy memory: There are some certain things that don't excel, And yet we say are tolerably well. There's many worthy men a lawyer prize, Whom they distinguish as of middle size, For pleading well at bar or turning books; But this is not, my son, the fate of cooks, From whose mysterious art true pleasure ...
— A Poetical Cook-Book • Maria J. Moss
... is lost, and I am left in the lurch without a portrait, I must have recourse to my own tongue, which, for all its stammering, may do well enough to state some truths that are tolerably self-evident. I assure you then, dear reader, that you can by no means make a fricassee of these tales which I here present to you, for they have neither legs, head, bowels, nor anything of the sort; I mean that the amorous intrigues you will find in some of them, are so decorous, ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... dinner with a tolerably composed countenance, a good appetite, and a well-digested scheme of vengeance in my mind. Uncle Ike was my only co-conspirator. I think I can see him now as he rolled back against the garden fence to laugh as I unfolded ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... Sunday morning the 24th ult, about four o'Clock, a Negro Lad named NEMO, born in Albany, near eighteen years of age, about five feet high full round fac'd, a little marked with the Smallpox, speaks English and French tolerably; he had on when he went away a double-breasted Jacket of strip'd flannel, old worsted Stockings, and a pair of English Shoes. Also a Negro Wench named CASH, twenty-six years old, about 5 feet 8 inches high, speaks English and French very fluently; she carried ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920 • Various
... dinner no plum-pudding or mince-pies awaited us certainly, but we had tolerably good beef, for a wonder, and lamb, merles, and ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... general in excellent condition, and the post-horses tolerably good; but we were in several places kept some time waiting for them. This is not to be wondered at, if we consider how little they have been accustomed to travellers ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... by Captain King, as of the Nat. Ord. Capparides, and thought to be a Capparis; it also bears a resemblance to the Adansonia described in Captain Tuckey's Congo. This was but a small specimen in fruit, of which the following brief description may convey a tolerably clear idea. In shape it something resembled the coconut, with a gourd-like outside, of a brown and yellow colour. Its length was five inches, and diameter three. The shell was exceedingly thin, and when opened it was found to be ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes
... corner." And at Enfield Elia was far from being happy or contented. Winter, however,—"confining, room-keeping winter," with its short days and long evenings, and cozy, comfortable fireside and cheerful candle-light,—he succeeded in passing tolerably pleasantly there; but the "deadly long days" of summer—"all-day days," he called them, "with but a half-hour's candle-light, and no fire-light"—were fearfully dull, wearisome, and unprofitable to him, "a scorner of the fields," an exile from London. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... more particularly a feature in the life of his fair landlady, which he had casually observed but scarcely ever thought of before. It was that she was markedly irregular in her hours of rising. For a week or two she would be tolerably punctual, reaching the ground-floor within a few minutes of half-past seven. Then suddenly she would not be visible till twelve at noon, perhaps for three or four days in succession; and twice he had certain proof that she did not leave her room till ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy
... considering the expropriation of all the licensed houses in the kingdom, this far-reaching proposal has not at present gone beyond the stage of inquiry and consultation, and it is tolerably certain that it will go no farther unless it is assured of no ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... misled by the specious, but foolish Hope of subduing rivetted Habits, and, as I may say, of altering Natures. The more foolish, as Experience might convince us, that there is hardly one in ten, of even tolerably happy Marriages, in which the Wife keeps the Hold in the Husband's Affections, which she had in the Lover's. What Influence then can she hope to have upon the Morals of an avowed Libertine, who marries perhaps for Conveniency; who despises the Tie; and whom it is too probable that nothing but Age ...
— Clarissa: Preface, Hints of Prefaces, and Postscript • Samuel Richardson
... mirror-like ocean; and Harry made out the polar star, and wished that there was a good breeze that they might steer by it towards England. The air was very chilly, but as they had saved several blankets, they wrapped themselves up, and kept tolerably warm. As they had not got a lantern or candle, or any means of striking a light, they could do nothing, and so they chatted away till they both went off to the land ...
— Adrift in a Boat • W.H.G. Kingston
... Kelson and Curtis had left him, Hamar lolled back in his seat, lost in thought. Thought, as he told himself repeatedly, should be the poor man's chief recreation—it costs nothing: and if one wants a little variety, and the walls of one's rooms are tolerably thick, one can think aloud. Hamar often did, and derived ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell
... joyously, "It opens upon the court-yard. I can overlook and count the wagons. I really think that here, although prisoners, we are tolerably safe. But, first of all, allow me to look to your wound: your clothes are ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... even of tolerably well-educated persons, often presents itself in a ludicrous light. Some question has arisen amongst them. No one has any clear or definite information upon it. They have had disputes about the simplest matters of fact involved in it. Yet no person there, down to the youngest, but would ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 430 - Volume 17, New Series, March 27, 1852 • Various
... but I told her that I understood the language tolerably well, and asked her why she wished ...
— A Jolly Fellowship • Frank R. Stockton
... "Tolerably tired at last of looking on the grim faces that surrounded us, we agreed to make our retreat; and descended into the garden, intending to pass out by the gate leading to the Quays. Here, however, we were met by a figure, at the sight of which we found ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 532. Saturday, February 4, 1832 • Various
... life that ought to have fortified her against surprise; but she wanted to scream like a little frightened girl as Dan Mavering stepped out of the parlour door toward her. The habit of not screaming, however, prevailed, and she made a tolerably successful effort to treat him with decent composure. She gave him a rigid hand. "Where in the world did you come from? Did you ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... go out nowadays, having already seen Florence tolerably well, and the streets being very hot, and myself having been engaged in sketching out a romance, [Footnote: "The Marble Faun."] which whether it will ever come to anything is a point yet to be ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... murdered us all; except perhaps my son, whom they thought ill-used by depriving him of Mim's instructive society. Howbeit, I was still stirring when they invaded me, and, by the help of the poker and a tolerably strong arm, I repelled the assailants; but that very night I passed from the land of Egypt, and made with all possible expedition to the nearest town, which was, ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... from being flogged. He left his wife, Mary, but no child. Of his intention to leave Elias saw not how to impart to his wife, lest she should in some way let the "cat out of the bag." She was owned by a Miss Portlock, and had been treated "tolerably well," having had the privilege of hiring her time. She had $55 to pay for this favor, which amount she raised by washing, etc. Elias was a member of the Methodist Church, as were all of his comrades, and well did they remember the oft-repeated lesson, "Servants ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... could reply, unless, by hauling to the wind, they diverged from the set course. This, and their isolation, made their loss very heavy. When they reached the rear of the French, the latter's column was tolerably formed, and Barrington's ships wore (w) in succession,—just as Harland's had done in Keppel's action,—to follow on the other tack. In doing this, the Sultan kept away under the stern of the enemy's rearmost ship, to rake her; to avoid which the latter bore ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... habitations of the very poor class of people. The richer families live in more comfortable style. Of the public buildings, the custom-house and the governor's residence are the most considerable, but both make a very indifferent appearance. In front of the governor's house, which occupies a tolerably large space of ground, in the upper part of the town, a sentinel is constantly stationed. This sentinel parades to and fro, without shoes or stockings, and not unfrequently without a coat, his ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... mules, while the men slaves walked along at a good pace. And the dealers by no means wore the villainous aspect that conventional observers look to see, but were plainly men bent upon business, travelling to make money. They regarded the slaves as merchandise, to be kept in tolerably fair condition for the sake of good sales, and unless Ruskin was right when he said that all who are not actively kind are cruel, there seemed small ground on which to condemn them. To be sure, they were taking slaves from market ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... examination was not very minute, seemed to be isolated, no two being found in the same locality. When the burials took place I could hardly conjecture, but it must have been, from appearances, from fifty to one hundred years. The bones that I took out on first appearance seemed tolerably perfect, but on short exposure to the atmosphere crumbled, and I was unable to save a specimen. No implements or relics were observed in those examined by me, but I have heard of others who have found such. In that State, Kentucky, there are a number of places where the Indians ...
— A Further Contribution to the Study of the Mortuary Customs of the North American Indians • H.C. Yarrow
... BE SOLD, A BLACK GIRL, the property of J. B——, eleven years of age, who is extremely handy, works at her needle tolerably, and speaks English perfectly well: is of an excellent temper, and ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... he purchased a cap and a sturdy walking stick. The stubble on his chin and cheeks began to irritate him intensely, but he could not rid himself of the idea that a barber's chair would be inviting danger. He was now tolerably certain that from one end of the continent to the other his presence was known. His life and his property, they would be after both. Even now there might be men in this strange town seeking him. The closer he got to New York, the more active ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... support; while in other cases, although its quantity continues undiminished, yet from some defect in its quality it does not furnish the infant with proper nutriment. Cases of the former kind are not unusual in young, tolerably healthy, but not robust women; while instances of the latter are met with chiefly among those who have given birth to several children, whose health is bad, or among the poor, who have been enfeebled ...
— The Mother's Manual of Children's Diseases • Charles West, M.D.
... excellent counterfeit: however, I saw several cubs amongst them not much larger than myself. After they had all smelt me, and the body of their deceased companion, whose skin was now become my protector, we seemed very sociable, and I found I could mimic all their actions tolerably well; but at growling, roaring, and hugging they were quite my masters. I began now to think that I might turn the general confidence which I had created amongst these ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... services of the choir were managed tolerably well, the vocal parts generally lagging a little behind the instrumental, and some loitering fiddler now and then making up for lost time by travelling over a passage with prodigious celerity, and clearing more bars than the keenest fox-hunter, to be in at the death. But the ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... it pleased us to indulge, we had a tolerably smooth voyage. On a clear cold Sunday morning we were sailing between a foreign river's banks, and Temple and I were alternately reading a chapter out of the Bible to the assembled ship's crew, in advance of the captain's short exhortation. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... which he had thought to attain, exasperated by the abandonment of his partisans, by the sarcasms of pamphleteers, he demanded securities and large indemnifications; and proposed such hard conditions that all accord with him became impossible. Thereupon he collected some troops around his standard, a tolerably large number of gentlemen, and rejoined the Duke de Lorraine, who was advancing upon Paris. Their united forces amounted to eighty squadrons and eight thousand infantry. Turenne had scarcely half that strength; but he manoeuvred so skilfully ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... mind, I own, is not at once prepared to be satisfied with gentle palliatives for such disorders" (Francis to Burke, November 3, 1790). This is a very terse way of putting a crucial objection to Burke's whole view of French affairs in 1789. His answer was tolerably simple. The Revolution, though it had made an end of the Bastille, did not bring the only real practical liberty, that is to say, the liberty which comes with settled courts of justice, administering settled laws, undisturbed by popular fury, independent of everything but ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... and the rainfall moderate. Except in the Sologne, the soil is generally fertile, but varies considerably in different localities. The most productive region is that on the east, which belongs to the valley of the Loire; the central districts are tolerably fertile but marshy, being often flooded by the Cher; while in the south and south-west there is a considerable extent of dry and fertile land. Wheat and oats are largely cultivated, while hemp, vegetables and various fruits are ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various
... well defined trail or footpath lay before them, running between the brushwood and palms and around the rocks. It did not look as if it had been used lately, but it was tolerably clear of ...
— The Rover Boys on Treasure Isle - The Strange Cruise of the Steam Yacht • Edward Stratemeyer
... to deserve consideration, who, instead of "after four years since the death of his brother Judas," would have us read, "and therefore after eight years since the death of his brother Judas." This would tolerably well agree with the date of the Maccabees, and with Josephus's own exact chronology at the end of the twentieth book of these Antiquities, which the present text ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... with another murder case. I have shown my aptitude for detective work and received, ere now, certain marks of your approval; but my head was not turned by them—at least I thought not—and I was tolerably sincere in my determination to keep to my own metier in future and not suffer myself to be allured by any inducements you might offer into the exercise of gifts which may have brought me praise in the past, but certainly have not brought me ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green
... Mazaro, some eighty miles in length, and fifty in breadth, is admirably adapted for the growth of sugar-cane; and were it in the hands of our friends at the Cape, would supply all Europe with sugar. The remarkably few people seen appear to be tolerably well fed, but there was a dearth of clothing among them; all were blacks, and nearly all Portuguese "colonos" or serfs. They manifested no fear of white men, and stood in groups on the bank gazing in astonishment at the steamers, ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... and that his body had been strapped up with rough wrappings. It appeared probable, therefore, that his captors had received orders to capture him alive, if possible; otherwise, knowing as he did the usual methods adopted by the Chinese and Koreans toward their wounded prisoners, he felt tolerably certain that he would have been barbarously destroyed while still unconscious—particularly as he had been the direct means of bringing a dreadful death upon so many of his assailants. As he thought of this he ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... trumpets to sound and rally his brilliant companies. The cannon was no longer heard, and a soldier announced that the King and the Cardinal were traversing the lines to examine the results of the day. He made all the horses pass through the breach, which was tolerably wide, and ranged the two companies of cavalry in battle array, upon a spot where it seemed impossible that any but infantry ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... the hope of finding in it some tell-tale echo or some peeping face. All I found was a much better book than her younger performance, showing I thought the better company she had kept. As a tissue tolerably intricate it was a carpet with a figure of its own; but the figure was not the figure I was looking for. On sending a review of it to The Middle I was surprised to learn from the office that a notice was ...
— The Figure in the Carpet • Henry James
... authorship of Paradise Lost, and had introduced, as joint authors of that poem, two Unknown gentlemen, respectively named Grungers and Scadgingtone. And Prince Arthur, nephew of King John of England, had described himself as tolerably comfortable in the seventh circle, where he was learning to paint on velvet, under the direction of Mrs. Trimmer and Mary Queen ...
— The Signal-Man #33 • Charles Dickens
... we not tolerably safe? We are under the guidance of an initiate; the poet himself promises to unveil the mystery of his inspiration for us. As Vergil kept Dante unscathed by the flames of the divine vision, will not our poet protect ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins
... commencement of the regency of the Duke of Courland, when a sedan-chair was set down before a small back door of the Duchess Anna Leopoldowna's palace; it had been borne and accompanied by four serfs, over whose gold-embroidered liveries, as if to protect them from the weather, had been laid a tolerably thick coat of dust and sweat. Equally splendid, elegant, and unclean was the chair which the servants now opened for the purpose of aiding their age-enfeebled master to emerge from it. That person, who now made his appearance, was a shrunken, trembling, coughing old gentleman; ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... encouraged me in this undertaking, that I should state that I alone am responsible for the execution of the translation. Whatever may be thought of it in other respects, I venture to hope that it may convey to the English reader a tolerably accurate impression of the contents and ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... that I know tolerably well the extent of your acquirements; and you must tell me if I forget any of them: according to my recollection, you learned the arts of writing, of playing on the lyre, and of wrestling; the flute you never would learn; this is the ...
— Alcibiades I • (may be spurious) Plato
... that sight, apposited with interest, can retain tolerably exact copies of sensations, especially if not too complex, such as of the human countenance and figure: yet the voice will convince us when the countenance will not; and he is reckoned an excellent painter, and no ordinary ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... in particular which I shall never forget. Almost spent with fatigue and fasting, we halted one evening near the house of a man, whose plantation bespoke him a tolerably good liver. He met us with a countenance strongly marked with terror, and begged for God's sake we would not ruin him, for that he had a large family of children to maintain. We told him that we were soldiers fighting for ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... the like post in Captain Carton's boat. I had a special station of my own, behind Miss Maryon, and no hands but hers ever touched my wound. (It has been healed these many long years; but, no other hands have ever touched it.) Mr. Pordage was kept tolerably quiet now, with pen and ink, and began to pick up his senses a little. Seated in the second boat, he made documents with Mr. Kitten, pretty well all day; and he generally handed in a Protest about something whenever we stopped. The ...
— The Perils of Certain English Prisoners • Charles Dickens
... a maid. In the course of my travels I expect to be in Brussels. If, therefore, you have anything to tell me or to ask of me, write to me at the Poste Restante of that city, and in the course of six mouths or so I am tolerably sure to send for the letter. In fact, I shall expect to find a letter from you. Do not think that I have forgotten you or your faithful services, though for a moment I am not able to call you to my side. ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins
... remained tolerably clear, owing to the constant presence of M. Noirtier, who caused himself to be carried to his granddaughter's room, and watched her with his paternal tenderness; Villefort also, on his return from the law courts, frequently ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... indeed prospered in his Affairs tolerably well for some time before this, and his Interest among the Clergy had got Ground for some Ages; but that was indeed a secret Management, was carried on privately, and with Difficulty; as in sowing Discord and Faction among the People, perplexing ...
— The History of the Devil - As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts • Daniel Defoe
... but all the same I am tolerably certain that Judith, being Judith, will enjoy prodigious merrymaking in Paris. She is absolutely sincere in her intentions—the earth holds no sincerer woman—but she is a self-deceiver. Her about-to-be-sequestered and meditative self was at that moment sitting ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... a title of nobility so antient, that it's original cannot clearly be traced out. Thus much seems tolerably certain: that among the Saxons they were called ealdormen, quasi elder men, signifying the same as senior or senator among the Romans; and also schiremen, because they had each of them the civil ...
— Commentaries on the Laws of England - Book the First • William Blackstone
... saying, the mousquetaire entered the room with a tolerably firm step, in full uniform and belted as usual. Monsieur de Treville, touched to the soul by this proof of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... another long minute. Then, with a hollow laugh: "I reckon you'll be tolerably disappointed, Uncle Sebastian. There was a time when I'd 'a' looked forward to leavin' Mendocino. I've had hankerin's, and I've got 'em yet—but I'm scared. I've never been outa the country but once. What c'n I do away from here? What ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... York, where many of the streets are tolerably well filled even at midnight, people get in the way of sitting up much later than in the country, and Dodger was no exception ...
— Adrift in New York - Tom and Florence Braving the World • Horatio Alger
... of our journey was tolerably easy; the emigrants were good-humoured, we had abundance of provisions, the country was well watered, and the cattle could obtain plenty of rich grass to keep up their strength. But as soon as we got out of the more civilized districts our ...
— In the Rocky Mountains - A Tale of Adventure • W. H. G. Kingston
... was now feeling tolerably cheerful about money matters; as he had paid off the hundred thousand francs he owed from his treaty in 1836, and hoped in fifteen months to have made arrangements for discharging all his debts; while three publishers, Dubochet, Furme, and Hetzel ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... compared to the other two, was the departure of James Tapster. Blanche felt sorry for him—genuinely sorry. But she philosophically told herself that no amount of money, even had Bill Donnington never existed, could have made Bubbles even tolerably happy tied to ...
— From Out the Vasty Deep • Mrs. Belloc Lowndes
... complex'. Use of the term connotes acceptance of the idea that in humans (and presumably other tool- and language-using sophonts) cultural evolution by selection of adaptive ideas has superseded biological evolution by selection of hereditary traits. Hackers find this idea congenial for tolerably obvious reasons. ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... the real sea-terms are pregnant with meaning; but those who undertake to expound them ought to be tolerably versed in the topic. Thus perhaps there was no great harm in Dr. Johnson's being utterly ignorant of maritime language, but it was temerariously vain in that sturdy lexicographer to assert that belay is a sea-phrase for splicing a rope; main sheet, for the ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... are rather more worthless than usual in the present case, because Mr. Carlyle is ostentatiously illogical and defiantly inconsistent; and, therefore, the term which might correctly describe one side of his teaching or belief would be tolerably sure to give a wholly false impression of some of its other sides. The qualifications necessary to make any one of the regular epithets fairly applicable would have to be so many, that the glosses would virtually ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. I - Essay 2: Carlyle • John Morley
... have the name tolerably correct, old fellow; likewise that delightful spot so lately honored by my residence. In brief, you have succeeded in calling the turn perfectly, so far as your limited information extends. In strict confidence I ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... maintained unaided the cause of the House of Hapsburg. It would be easy to multiply examples. And can we believe, in defiance of all reason and of all history, that, if the Roman Catholics of the United Kingdom had been tolerably well governed, they would not have been attached to the Government? In my opinion the Tories never committed so great an error as when they scourged away and spurned away the Roman Catholics. Mr Burke understood this well. The sentiment which, towards the close of his life, ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... generous information." There was cool irony in the tone. "You are tolerably well posted as to ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... attention. All this was accomplished before noon-time, when we went to our lodgings to brace ourselves up. The house being full of people the whole time, it was very difficult for us, though we obtained a room, to be tolerably alone during the day; but as the people who carry on this business desire to have much money spent, and as it was not for us to do so, we went out a great deal into different parts of the city, and returned there in the evening, where we ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... essential to the decisions of most business, and not least of the banking business, that they should be made constantly by the same persons; the chain of transactions must pass through the same minds. A large business may be managed tolerably by a quiet group of second-rate men if those men be always the same; but it cannot be managed at all by a fluctuating body, even of the very cleverest men. You might as well attempt to guide the affairs of the nation by means ...
— Lombard Street: A Description of the Money Market • Walter Bagehot
... did not. I was as anxious to leave as she was. Yet I am not a superstitious man. As proof of it, after the first effect of these events had left me I began to question my first impressions and feel tolerably ashamed of my past credulity. Though the phenomenon we had observed could not to all appearance be explained by any natural hypothesis; though I had seen, and my wife had seen, a strange woman suddenly become visible in a room which a moment before had held no one but ourselves, and into which ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... wrote these words, Balzac must have at last felt tolerably confident about a happy solution to his troubles. However, in a later letter to his mother, he says that the Wierzchownia party are going to Kiev for the great Fair, that he will avail himself of this occasion for the renewal of his passport, and ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... and six-toed Gratio Kelleia and ordinary men. In neither case is it possible to point out any obvious reason for the appearance of the variety. Doubtless there were determining causes for these as for all other phenomena; but they do not appear, and we can be tolerably certain that what are ordinarily understood as changes in physical conditions, as in climate, in food, or the like, did not take place and had nothing to do with the matter. It was no case of what is commonly ...
— The Origin of Species - From 'The Westminster Review', April 1860 • Thomas H. Huxley
... transparent shade; for the rest of daylight the dwelling sweltered and boiled unprotected. Round house and tree ran a mud wall, about five feet high, loop-holed at intervals. And just inside the house door was fastened a rack of three rifles, kept tolerably clean. ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... situation, expecting that the ship would go to pieces every moment, he continued till the afternoon, when the storm began to abate, and the sea became tolerably calm, and by the ebb of the tide the ship was much nearer the land than when she first struck. King Pippin now conceived hopes of gaining the shore, by means of a raft which he had constructed in the best manner he ...
— The History of Little King Pippin • Thomas Bewick
... discharged a few million tons of stones upon a small village, asked the mayor if he thought that a tolerably good ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... flowed along quite tolerably, and if it was not always jolly, at least there were no more quarrels or discords. The manager worked and worried himself thin and weary; the sailmaker greedily enjoyed his cheap comfort; Finkenbein shut one eye and lived on the surface of things; Holdria positively bloomed ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... Potter he imputes to his God; if we recall how in 604 the new events in the history of Western Asia led him to adapt his earlier Oracles on the Scythians to the Chaldeans who had succeeded the Scythians as the expected Doom from the North—then our way through the evidence becomes tolerably clear, except for the difficulty of dating a number of his undated Oracles. What we must not forget is the double, divergent intention and influence of Deuteronomy, and the fact that Josiah's reformation, ...
— Jeremiah • George Adam Smith
... some coffee. Further particulars as to their plans for the morrow were discussed, and finally they drew up a tolerably exact time-table which, to Frau Rupius' slight amusement, Bertha entered ...
— Bertha Garlan • Arthur Schnitzler
... row from the orchestra and by her side he recognised Mrs. Blackstone. They could only have just entered, for he was sure those two seats had been empty but the moment before. He felt tolerably certain Helen had not yet seen him, and he intended to take care she should not see him. Yet he had an ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... added to a Genius tolerably extensive, and an Education more liberal than is ordinarily allowed to Persons of my Sex, I flatter'd myself that it might be in my Power to be in some measure both useful and entertaining ...
— The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood • George Frisbie Whicher
... had arrived; fifteen minutes after, I strolled into the garden, and began to look over the little garden-gate in expectation of every moment descrying Agnes in the distance. Half an hour passed, and for ten minutes more I was tolerably quiet. From this time till half- past two I became constantly more agitated—agitated, perhaps, is too strong a word—but I was restless and anxious beyond what I should have chosen to acknowledge. Still I kept arguing, What is half an hour? what is an hour? A thousand things might have occurred ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... After them the light infantry and about fifty rangers, consisting in all of about two hundred men, followed, by whose vigilance and activity the commander imagined that the main body of the army might be kept tolerably quiet and secure. For three days he made forced marches, in order to get over two narrow and dangerous defiles, which he accomplished without a shot from the enemy, but which might have cost him dear, had they been properly guarded and warmly disputed. On the day following ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 2 • Alexander Hewatt
... behind the zinc-worker, stammering and venturing upon nods of her head by way of bowing. The brilliant light, a lamp burning on the bench, a brazier full of coals flaring in the forge, increased her confusion still more. She ended however, by distinguishing Madame Lorilleux—little, red-haired and tolerably strong, pulling with all the strength of her short arms, and with the assistance of a big pair of pincers, a thread of black metal which she passed through the holes of a draw-plate fixed to the vise. Seated ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola |
