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More "Desirable" Quotes from Famous Books



... surrounded in America by men who knew her wealth and prized her beauty, she was so much a figure in Virginia, that any reserve with regard to herself was noticeable. She was enough feminine to have pleasure in the fact that she was thought desirable by men; yet it played an insignificant part in ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... the practical Mr. Rushbrook that, even considered as a desirable business affair, the prospective completion of this contract provoked neither frank satisfaction nor conventional dissimulation on the part of the young lady, for he regarded her calm but slightly wearied expression fixedly. But he only said: "Then I shall ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte

... ask too much," said brother Lorenzo, waddling after his master, who was descending the stairs leading to the court-yard. "I really wish, your holiness, that it were asking too much, for then your dinner would be at least a little more desirable and heavier to transport! Was such a thing ever heard of? the father of Christianity keeps a table like that of the poorest begging monk, and is satisfied with milk, fruit, bread, and vegetables, while the fattest of capons and ducks are crammed in vain for him, ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach

... must be sold abroad in competition with European products and as consumers of manufactured articles which must be bought at home at prices made arbitrarily high by the protective tariff. In earlier times, farmers thus harassed would have struck their tents and moved farther west, taking up desirable land on the frontier and starting out in a fresh field of opportunity. It was still possible for farmers to go west, and many did so but only to find that the opportunity for economic independence on the edge of settlement had largely disappeared. The era of the self-sufficing ...
— The Agrarian Crusade - A Chronicle of the Farmer in Politics • Solon J. Buck

... of water, and this appears to indicate that the junction lines of land and water form by far the most important portions of the globe in which to study both the phaenomena of storms and waves. It is also very desirable that our knowledge of these phaenomena should, with immediate reference to the surface of the ocean, be increased, and in this respect captains and masters of vessels may render essential service by observing ...
— The Hurricane Guide - Being An Attempt To Connect The Rotary Gale Or Revolving - Storm With Atmospheric Waves. • William Radcliff Birt

... traveller suddenly therefore, running against them: and as early as the eleventh century of our era, triangular houses were universally forbidden by Law, the only exceptions being fortifications, powder-magazines, barracks, and other state buildings, which it is not desirable that the general public ...
— Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (Illustrated) • Edwin A. Abbott

... drawing show a design of a bedside stand. This is a very desirable piece of furniture and is simple and easy to make. Quarter-sawed oak is the best wood to use in its construction. The material should be ordered from the mill ready cut to length, squared and sanded. The following list of material will ...
— Mission Furniture - How to Make It, Part I • H. H. Windsor

... pencilled note to Lieutenant Cluverius, thinking an officer would be likely to receive a communication, when a private might not. Soon after sunset, my husband joined me, and soon after many friends. They were all ragged, mud-stained, and altogether unlovely, but seemed to me most desirable and welcome visitors. ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers

... pleased me better, but the distance was farther than the Commandant realized, farther, perhaps, than was desirable in the circumstances, so I was ordered to get on the car and come back ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair

... from the "tables" followed to catch the train, and we had the sad reflection that a fresh batch would soon arrive in time for the evening concert. Residents of Monaco and Monte Carlo are not supposed to be admitted, as it is not desirable that the half-frenzied losers should remain in these peaceful elysiums; a fresh and continuous stream of victims is ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux

... doctrine is found in the assumption that "life through Christ" is equivalent to continued conscious existence, and that "death" as the punishment of sin, is equivalent to annihilation. We have so fully discussed the meaning of these terms in the previous chapter, that it is not desirable to argue this point here. We agree with the Orthodox view, and differ from that of the annihilationists on this point. The God of the gospel is the Father of all his children—of the weakest, feeblest, and most ...
— Orthodoxy: Its Truths And Errors • James Freeman Clarke

... adopted, for among all the boys in school there was not one who knew how to manage affairs of this sort better than Dixon. He succeeded in getting within sight of one of the sentries without being stopped, made him understand, in some mysterious way, that secrecy was not only desirable but necessary, and in a few minutes whistled for his companions. Such a proceeding as this would not have been successful, nor would it have been attempted, at any other time in the history of ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon

... bore the fairy garment away with her. She bore it tenderly, almost reverently. It was more than a garment. It represented in her mind a new standard of all that was beautiful and exquisite and desirable. ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber

... Art. These lose very much by reduction, and should be seen with a lens magnifying 2-1/2 diameters. They are the designs of the pupils themselves (boys in their teens), and are examples of bold outline untouched after tracing. They are more elaborate than would be desirable for ordinary quarry glazing; being intended for interior work on a screen, to be seen close at hand ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall

... days in early spring, it immediately protrudes its buds; and the next morning a bitter frost cuts down every hope of fruit for that year, leaving the leaf as black as may be. Wherefore the east wind is desirable to keep ...
— The Amateur Poacher • Richard Jefferies

... sight, as she sat and dreamed on the low temple-roof, while we four Obstacles disported ourselves on different parts of the high pylon. The two Nubians wished to play a betting game with a kind of Egyptian Jack-stones, and it was not desirable that the pensive lady should behold them doing it. Observing the graceful figure of Mrs. East silhouetted against the sky's eternal flame of blue, and at the same time noticing that she could not see the waiting boat, ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... endeavour to build the road without incurring any bonded debt. Not until the last year of construction, 1885, were bonds based upon the security of the road itself issued for sale. It was doubtless desirable, if possible, to avoid the reckless methods by which so many American roads had been hopelessly waterlogged by excessive bond issues. The memory of the {156} St Paul and Pacific's six-million share capital as against its twenty-eight-million bonded ...
— The Railway Builders - A Chronicle of Overland Highways • Oscar D. Skelton

... question in Aggie's eyes, Jimmy pretended to be searching for his pocket handkerchief—but always with the vision of Aggie in her new Fall gown and her large "picture" hat at his elbow. Never before had she appeared so beautiful to him, so desirable—suppose he should lose her? Life spread before him as a dreary waste. He tried to look up at her; he could not. He feared she would read his guilt in his eyes. "What guilt?" he asked himself. There was no longer any denying the fact—a secret had ...
— Baby Mine • Margaret Mayo

... chance that took them to the Inglaterra Hotel—the disdain of its runner was more persuasive than the clamor of all the others who had boarded the steamer—found them a room, they soon discovered, in what was at once the most desirable and the most unlikely place. They might have the chamber until Tuesday, Lee was told, in an English inflected with the tonal gravity of Spain. It was hardly past eight in the morning, an awkward hour to arrive newly at a city, he thought, as they were carried ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer

... will be pursued on your part, and we earnestly pray that similar dispositions may be displayed on the part of France. The differences which unfortunately subsist between the two nations can not fail in that event to be happily terminated. To produce this end, to all so desirable, firmness, moderation, and union at home constitute, we are persuaded, the surest means. The character of the gentlemen you have deputed, and still more the character of the Government which deputes them, ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 4) of Volume 1: John Adams • Edited by James D. Richardson

... the so-desirable element of chance. It left opportunity for change of programme inasmuch as sunrise might disclose help in the shape of a passing ship. The matter would rest with Heaven, and pious men might lay them down to sleep with clear conscience, reflecting that, should it be the Will of Allah ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren

... A desirable assortment of books for boys, by standard and favorite authors. Each title is complete and unabridged. Printed on a good quality of paper from large, clear type. Beautifully bound in cloth. Each book is wrapped in ...
— Daddy Takes Us to the Garden - The Daddy Series for Little Folks • Howard R. Garis

... outside rim of the lens. This sleeve may be pushed out for one or two centimeters, and the particular spot under examination isolated from the adjacent parts without undue magnification. It is one of the popular fallacies that a high magnifying power is desirable in all cases of difficulty, but usually the reverse is the case in questions ...
— Disputed Handwriting • Jerome B. Lavay

... all events to avoid him; but when better hopes intervened, and represented that his enquiries were probably accidental, the wish of being finally acquainted with his sentiments, made nothing so desirable as an ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... of descent, printed in Volume II. of my Perceval studies is in the main correct, but there is still much analytical work to be done, in particular the establishment of the original form of the Perlesvaus is highly desirable. But apart from the primary object of these studies, and the results therein obtained, I would draw attention to the manner in which the evidence set forth in the chapters on the Mystery cults, and especially that on The ...
— From Ritual to Romance • Jessie L. Weston

... philology; to this the big man readily assented. 'Nothing will be required from you,' said he, 'but what you mention; and now and then, perhaps, a paper on metaphysics. You understand German, and perhaps it would be desirable that you should review Kant; and in a review of Kant, sir, you could introduce to advantage your peculiar notions about ex nihilo.' He then reverted to the subject of the Dairyman's Daughter, which I promised to take into consideration. ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow

... courses—which resembled each other in comprising between thirty and forty lectures, but differed largely in other respects—that the present treatise has grown. Seeing, however, that it has grown much beyond the bulk of the original lectures, I have thought it desirable to publish the whole in the form of three separate works. Of these the first—or that which deals with the purely historical side of biological science—may be allowed to stand over for an indefinite time. The ...
— Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) • George John Romanes

... Mercy Jenkins detailed to us early one Monday morning, and then, eager to communicate so desirable a piece of news to others of her acquaintance, she started off, stopping for a moment as she passed the wash-room to see if Sally's clothes "wan't kinder dingy and yaller." As soon as she was gone the ...
— Homestead on the Hillside • Mary Jane Holmes

... great wealth is not desirable, Lycurgus said that the Spartans should use only iron money. All the Spartan coins were therefore bars of iron, so heavy that a yoke of oxen and a strong cart were needed to carry a sum equal to one hundred dollars from one spot to another. Money was so bulky that it could neither be hidden ...
— The Story of the Greeks • H. A. Guerber

... another religion, or of no particular religion, advising and guiding an eminently religious people in their struggle for religious liberty. This could not always last; it was not natural, it was not desirable that it should last, though some years more were to pass away before Catholic Emancipation was to be accomplished by the union, the energy and the strategy of the ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee

... this world more to be pitied than the poor fellow who has served his first term of imprisonment or finds himself outside the gaol doors without a character, and often without a friend in the world. Here, again, the process of centralization, gone on apace of late years, however desirable it maybe in the interests of administration, tells with disastrous effects on the poor wretches who are ...
— "In Darkest England and The Way Out" • General William Booth

... period was short-lived. The dream, such as it was, came to an end. Hubert turned to his sister, in his bewilderment and disappointment. They had both counted so securely on the effect of experience and the pressure of events to teach Hadria the desirable lesson, and they were dismayed to find that, unlike other women, she had failed to learn it. Henriette was in despair. It was she who had brought about the ill-starred union. How could she ever forgive herself? How repair ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird

... Kharrak Singh's presence was highly desirable as an act of atonement, but if he came, the Rani and all her women must come too, and the journey would require a week instead of two days. "No," he said, "I trust Kunwar Sher Singh will return with me, and we will then arrange a feast and a ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier

... charges for pasturage might be paid for either by additional labor or in money, and to a good head-man they might be granted as a gratuity, and perhaps an additional acre of land allowed him to cultivate. It would be desirable that the negroes should, when quite free, work 11 hours per day in the short days, and 12 hours in the longer ones. I believe the shortest day's labor in England in the winter months in 10 hours' ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... bring out any previous transactions in the horse-trade line, as it would have some effect in this case. Then I asked him if he didn't know the horse he beat me out of was sound, a splendid rider, and that the mule was the worst one in the army. He admitted that he knew the animal was not a desirable animal, but he thought a recruit could get along with a kicking mule better than a chaplain. I had saved my best shot for the last, and I said, "knowing the mule was unsound, a vicious animal, and that my horse was sound and desirable, ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck

... Ho, the imperturbable, had permitted himself a fit of nerves ... Something must have happened. Something new. Something which threatened a danger not sufficiently emphasized before. In his former letter Li Ho had indeed intimated that a return was not desirable, but it had been an intimation based on general principles only. This was different. This had all the marks of urgent warning. "No more safe being married as per inclosed." This cryptic remark might mean that further enlightenment was to ...
— The Window-Gazer • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay

... of studying propositions to see what subjects are desirable for student debates is to consider first those propositions ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee

... made some remark respecting the happiness of young men who, like me, without care, without any fixed purpose, abandon themselves to fortune with that confidence which knows no fear, and telling me that the cardinal's letter made it desirable that he should do something for me, he promised to introduce me to three or four of his Turkish friends who deserved to be known. He invited me to dine with him every Thursday, and undertook to send me a janissary who would ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... dumb. Never had she seemed so far away from him as then; never had she seemed so desirable. He struggled with his voice, but no word came; and it ...
— The House of Mystery • William Henry Irwin

... the course has been devoted to history and biography, as it has seemed specially desirable to supplement the brief, unsatisfactory outlines of history with full ...
— The Two Great Retreats of History • George Grote

... to put Lucien, whom you would have loved, whom I would have loved, that divine representation of all that is young and desirable in man, before the reader, Balzac puts these words in his mouth in reply to an impatient question by Vautrin, who asks him what he wants, what he is sighing for, "D'être célèbre et d'être aimè,"—these are soul-waking words, these ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore

... every situation and every problem, and shrank from the common denominator and the underlying principle, he fell into step with his friends. As an Irishman, who had married into an Irish Catholic family, it was desirable that he should adopt no theories in America which would unsettle Ireland. He had learnt to teach government by party as an almost sacred dogma, and party forbids revolt as a breach of the laws of the game. His scruples and his protests, and his defiance ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton

... conversation among the Regulators before they waited upon him, he might have been flattered by the complimentary manner in which his name was handled. His talents and his muscle, no less than his growing popularity, were appreciated by the band, and it was more desirable to win him than it was to drive him out. They knew what a valuable acquisition he would be to their number. But he must stand one side, and wait for his turn before he aspired ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic

... further advantage of being able to retain a larger mounted reserve in hand for the initiation of a possible pursuit, and one should only depart from this principle when special circumstances make it appear desirable to advance rapidly after the decision of the fire fight, and the ground compels us to leave the led horses far behind the actual ...
— Cavalry in Future Wars • Frederick von Bernhardi

... the ordinary Boston brown bread is the most desirable for these sandwiches. Plunge the lobster into hot water; bring to boiling point, and simmer gently three-quarters of an hour; remove the meat, and cut it with a silver knife into dice. Now, sprinkle the lobster with a little salt, red pepper and a tablespoonful of ...
— Sandwiches • Sarah Tyson Heston Rorer

... while their shouts yet filled the air; while Raimond, somewhat taken by surprise, sought by signs and gestures to convey at once his gratitude and his humility, the Tribune-Elect, casting his eyes around, perceived many hitherto attracted by curiosity, and whom, from their rank and weight, it was desirable to secure in the first heat of the public enthusiasm. Accordingly, as soon as Raimond had uttered a short and pompous harangue,—in which his eager acceptance of the honour proposed him was ludicrously contrasted ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... dashing chariot of the day is just introduced by Charles Buxton, esq. The advantages arising from this improvement are obvious: in respect to their infallible quality of preventing the numberless accidents which daily occur by horses running away, they are peculiarly desirable. These bits are made upon a very simple construction; they give the person who has the reins in hand, the power of checking the horse by the most easy movement imaginable, however light in hand, or hard in mouth (boring ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold

... an extensive study of the Latin language, he felt a desire to study Greek that he might read the New Testament in the original, but he had no means to prosecute this study. While in doubt as to how he could attain so desirable an end the Reverend William Bradford, of Wintonbury, a small parish composed, as its name imports, of a part of three towns, Winsor, Farmington and Symsbury, offered to instruct him in the Greek language. This benefactor promised also ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various

... observations of this nature, and on analogous subjects, in the manuscript, which it has not been thought desirable to print. Among the rest are several pages from John Norden's "Surveyor's Dialogue", containing advice and directions respecting agriculture, of which Aubrey says, "though they are not of Wiltshire, they will do no hurt here; and, if my countrymen know it not, I wish ...
— The Natural History of Wiltshire • John Aubrey

... heard it disputed in conversation, whether it be more laudable or desirable, that a man should think too highly or too meanly of himself: it is on all hands agreed to be best, that he should think rightly; but since a fallible being will always make some deviations from exact rectitude, it is not wholly useless to ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson

... Lord George Gordon was a younger son of the Duke of Gordon; and because the Parliament had passed a Bill to relieve the Roman Catholics from some of the disabilities which seemed no longer desirable nor just to maintain, he instigated a body calling itself the Protestant Association to present a monster petition to the House of Commons, and headed a procession of at least fifty thousand to march with it to the ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole

... moodily out of the house. The Chugwaters lived in a desirable villa residence, which Mr. Chugwater had built in Essex. It was a typical Englishman's Home. Its name ...
— The Swoop! or How Clarence Saved England - A Tale of the Great Invasion • P. G. Wodehouse

... any desertion of the flock would be considered the worst form of apostasy, and that the deserter must take the consequences. To quote Brigham Young's own words: "The moment a person decides to leave this people, he is cut off from every object that is desirable for time and eternity. Every possession and object of affection will be taken from those who forsake the truth, and their identity and existence will ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn

... only physician to a poor princess; because Grunstein thought the position of under-officer was far too humble for him, and because Alexis Razumovsky, the former precentor in the imperial chapel, found it desirable to add to his name the title ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach

... gems of the most unselfish virtue. Such conduct, of course, is not universal. There are abundant instances of the opposite. But the truth remains that it is the worth which those who seem to lead the least desirable lives display toward others that assures us of their own worth. This, too, is the lesson of the oft-quoted and oft-misunderstood parable of the Good Samaritan, upon which here, for the moment, I should ...
— The Essentials of Spirituality • Felix Adler

... Is desirable that the reader should look up these localities upon a map of Switzerland, that he may be impressed with the growing grandeur of these ancient glaciers, even while they were retreating into the heart of the Alps; for in proportion ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various

... conditions. But he said, quite truthfully, that he had no idea of blackmailing me. It was just a fair bargain between us." She paused a little before she went on: "Now, you understand what brought us to Marut, and what made you such a desirable catch. We wanted to get clear away from the past and build up a new life. But we couldn't. One can't build up ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie

... till he was satisfied, when he came out; and the sultan exclaimed, "Well, what hast thou discovered in my mistress?" He replied, "My lord, she is all perfect in elegance, beauty, grace, stature, bloom, modesty, accomplishments, and knowledge, so that every thing desirable centres in herself; but still there is one point that disgraces her, from which if she was free, it is not possible she could be excelled in anything among the whole of the fair sex." When the sultan had ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 4 • Anon.

... did not know. It might be that he was simply satisfied with the sound of her voice. Or possibly he had not the least care as to her past or future. Simply disinterest! This latter feeling—despite the state of affairs was so desirable—touched her in some ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart

... possible, in ignorance, and prevent light from reaching that empire of darkness, the confessional. In that view, confessors are advised to be cautious "on those matters;" to "broach these questions in a sort of covert way, and with the greatest reserve." For it is very desirable "not to shock modesty, neither frighten the penitent nor grieve her." "Sins, however, ...
— The Priest, The Woman And The Confessional • Father Chiniquy

... and lowering them betimes; and, since she has a free hand, if, with this, she will take her husband's penis with it and "play" with it as her lover plays with her vulva—if they will do this, the cases are rare in which passion will not grow in the wife to almost any desirable extent. Under such "courting," the parts will all enlarge, the pre-coital secretion will flow in abundance; and, in due course, all will be ready for the second part of the act. This part of coitus is, really, one of the most enjoyable of the ...
— Sane Sex Life and Sane Sex Living • H.W. Long

... little impeded; but experience shows that confusion in terminology is apt to go hand in hand with confusion in ideas. As will be shown later, this seems to be particularly true of investigations into the history of marriage and sexual relationships. It seems desirable therefore to clear the way by classifying the ideas with which we have to deal, and by defining the terms ...
— Kinship Organisations and Group Marriage in Australia • Northcote W. Thomas

... every foreigner is taken for a physician, and the first demand is for medicines; if not the right medicines, then the wrong ones; if no medicines are at hand, the written prescription, administered internally, is sometimes found a desirable restorative. The earliest missionaries to the South-Sea Islands found ulcers and dropsy and hump-backs there before them. The English Bishop of New Zealand, landing on a lone islet where no ship had ever touched, found the whole population prostrate with influenza. Lewis and Clarke, the first ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various

... his God her own, so far as she had wit to gather what his God was. She accepted the situation with trust, and felt responsibility shifted on to "Mister Jan's" shoulders with infinite relief. He was very wise and knew everything and loved the truth. It is desirable to harp and harp upon this ever-recurring thought: the artist's grand love for truth; because all channels of Joan's mind flowed into this lake. His sincerity begat absolute trust. And, as John Barren and ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts

... words proscribed, for that would, under the circumstances, have led to the abnegation of relative duties and the disruption of society. It is accepted as a prevailing institution recognized by the civil powers. However desirable freedom might be, slavery was not inconsistent with the Christian profession: "Art thou called being a servant? care not for it: but if thou mayest be made free, use it rather."[e] The duty of obedience to his master is enjoined upon the slave, and the duty of ...
— Two Old Faiths - Essays on the Religions of the Hindus and the Mohammedans • J. Murray Mitchell and William Muir

... brought home livers from India, or assorted disabilities from all known quarters of the globe, and who desire nothing better than to lead steady-paced lives within walking distance of their favourite clubs. So Halfmoon Street remains quietly estimable, a desirable address, and knows it, and doggedly means to hold fast to ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance

... petty duties, the rare and barren pleasures—the library, the festival, the few concerts, the trivial plays. How easy it was to be good and noble when music such as this had become a part of one's life; how desirable was wealth when it could make possible such exquisite happiness as hers of the moment. Nobility, purity, courage, sacrifice seemed much more worth while now than a few moments ago. All things not positively unworthy became heroic, all things and all men. Landry Court was a young chevalier, pure ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris

... philosophical controversy—"The Enemy of Mankind." But it was well to denounce the devil himself, as the Society had nearly lost the credit of fearing him. Evelyn insists that "next to the propagation of our most holy faith," that of the new philosophy was desirable both for the king and the nation; "for," he adds, "it will survive the triumphs of the proudest conquerors; since, when all their pomp and noise is ended, they are those little things in black, whom now in scorn they term philosophers and fops, ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli

... particular enterprises in question were prevented. The adoption of a registry was refused, on the alleged ground of its inconsistency with the French institutions of the province, and no measure to attain this desirable end in a less obnoxious mode, was prepared by the leaders of the Assembly. The feudal tenure was supported, as a mild and just provision for the settlement of a new country; a kind of assurance given by a committee of the Assembly, that some steps should be taken to remove the most injurious incidents ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... you I shouldn't go to Chicago," said Sylvia calmly. "I think your going for Marian would only make a disagreeable situation worse. The Willings may not be desirable companions for her, but she has been their guest, and the motor run to Chicago was only an incident of the visit. We ought to be grateful ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson

... propose to lay down for you a plan of campaign, but simply to lay down the work it is desirable to have done, and leave you free to execute it in your own way. Submit to me, however, as early as you can, your plan ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman

... Hans could neither read nor write, but it must not therefore be thought that such acquirements were not valued in those days; on the contrary, it was considered at that time one of the very best and most desirable things in the whole world to be able to read, and one of the cleverest things in the world to be able to write; while he who was so happy as to be the possessor of a book, was esteemed one of the ...
— The Young Emigrants; Madelaine Tube; The Boy and the Book; and - Crystal Palace • Susan Anne Livingston Ridley Sedgwick

... way. At the present moment it is to me the only theme worthy of a man's entire attention. Perhaps that is the result of spring, as the poet says; but, anyhow, it presents new aspects to me each hour. Now, I have made this important discovery: that the girl I am with last seems to me the most desirable. That is contrary to the observation of philosophers of bygone days. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, they say. I don't find it so. Presence is what plays the very deuce with me. Now, how do you ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr

... heart and the understanding, we have avoided entering minutely into the technical methods of obtaining certain parts of knowledge. It was essential, in the first place, to show, how the desire of knowledge was to be excited; what acquirements are most desirable, and how they are to be most easily obtained, are the next considerations. In the chapter on Books—Classical Literature and Grammar—Arithmetic and Geometry—Geography and Astronomy—Mechanics and Chemistry—we have attempted to show, how a taste ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth

... Experiments are made by placing on the skin of the patient various receptacles filled with water at different temperatures. If great exactitude is desirable, Nothnagel's thermo-esthesiometer should be used. This is an instrument very similar to Weber's esthesiometer, but the points are replaced by receptacles filled with water of varying heat and furnished with thermometers. ...
— Criminal Man - According to the Classification of Cesare Lombroso • Gina Lombroso-Ferrero

... a small boa in their house to kill rats, but we found they were equally fond of chickens, and therefore not desirable inmates; for at Sarawak chickens were the principal animal food to be had, and it was necessary to keep ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall

... found that it was sometimes desirable to catch and tame one's own camels. Certain characteristics were assuredly more desirable than others, and seemed open to attainment if one but knew how. I experimented with processes, and worked out a method; simple, easy, safe and sure. Safe—unless overdone. ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman

... object to seek the opponent's horsemen in the direction which they themselves have selected—merely to beat them—need scarcely be insisted upon. That would be to take the law from the enemy and allow one's self to be diverted from the principal direction in which reconnaissance is desirable. ...
— Cavalry in Future Wars • Frederick von Bernhardi

... make her first appearance, I heard with infinite pain that from Mr. Hall, the younger partner of the firm which had enriched itself by Pickwick and Nickleby, and a very kind well-disposed man, there had dropped an inconsiderate hint to the writer of those books that it might be desirable to put the clause in force. It had escaped him without his thinking of all that it involved; certainly the senior partner, whatever amount of as thoughtless sanction he had at the moment given to it, always much regretted it, and ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... be desirable, I confess; of courts I know nothing, unmarried females being cyphers in Europe; and I hope better things than to think I ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper

... the council did know it to be the most desirable, but considered it impracticable; and he excused the council as well as he could by saying that inasmuch as nothing was really and rationally to be hoped for but a long continuance of the siege and wearying out of the English, they were naturally a little afraid of Joan's impetuous ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... grow and multiply with which He had endowed the trees and the herbage, but in addition to it, power to move from one place to another at will, power to enjoy, and to go in quest of that which seems to them desirable, that we have again the word, "God created," and also a new word, never before used about day or night, earth or sea, sun or ...
— Twilight And Dawn • Caroline Pridham

... within an hour or so a particular human clock might be expected to stop. It had never occurred to him, either, that a man had not a well-defined right to stop the clock of his own being whenever it seemed desirable or expedient. ...
— A Spinner in the Sun • Myrtle Reed

... his wife had never looked handsomer, finer, in fact, in all her life—quite the satisfactory, all-round, desirable sort of a woman a man's ...
— Told in a French Garden - August, 1914 • Mildred Aldrich

... so proud!" Ruth rejoined, looking fully as happy as Bab. "Just think how clever you are! The fame of being an author is more desirable than the money. I must tell Mollie ...
— The Automobile Girls At Washington • Laura Dent Crane

... the first time to see him, three of his family died; and when they came the second time, three more died; and as this rate of mortality was quite unusual in his family circle, he could only attribute it to foul magic. The presence of people who brought such results was of course by no means desirable. This neat message elicited with a declaration of the necessity of Budja's going to Gani with us, and a response from the commander-in-chief, probably to terrify the Waganda, that although Gani was only ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... excellent and gentlemanlike man—albeit a bookseller—Murray, of Fleet Street, is willing to give for our joint "Lives of the Poets," on the plan we proposed to the trade a twelvemonth ago, a thousand pounds. For my part, I think the engagement very desirable, and have no uneasiness on the subject, except my fear that you may be too much engaged to have to do with it, as five hundred pounds may not be to you the temptation that it appears to a poor devil like myself. ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles

... themselves in the centre of vast fields of floating ice, driving away from the bergs, which, influenced by under-currents, were still floating north, while the floes drove to the southward. It was very desirable to get clear of all this cake-ice, though the grinding among it was by no means as formidable, as when the seas were running high, and the whole of the frozen expanse was in violent commotion. Motion, however, soon became nearly ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper

... peasant; but these foreign invaders assumed the tone of princes and the insolence of conquerors. As employers they were usually harsh, and sometimes brutal. Nevertheless they were wonderfully wise in the matter of making money; they lived like kings and paid high salaries. It was desirable that young men should suffer in their service for the sake of learning things which would have to be learned to save the country from passing under foreign rule. Some day Japan would have a mercantile marine of her own, and foreign banking agencies, and foreign credit, and be well ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn

... interview next morning, and then the doctor left her, but not until with her soft hand in his, and her shining eyes upon his face, she said to him, "You think your home is not a desirable one for me. Can't you fix it up a little? Are there two parlors, and do the windows come to the floor? I hope your carriage horses are in good condition, for I am very fond of driving. Have you a flower garden? I anticipate much pleasure in working ...
— Cousin Maude • Mary J. Holmes

... neither necessary nor desirable, from the standpoint of an enlightened capitalism, that the control of government should rest entirely in the hands of "Big Business," or the "Interests." On the contrary, it is to the interest of capital that all capitalists, and all business interests of any permanence, should ...
— Socialism As It Is - A Survey of The World-Wide Revolutionary Movement • William English Walling

... restoring church and state to their scriptural foundation,—transferring both from allegiance to "the god of this world," (Matt. iv. 8; Luke iv. 5, 6;) to their rightful owner,—"the Lord and his Anointed." (Ps. ii. 2, 8.) When this desirable epoch arrives, for which the persecuted witnesses have long and fervently prayed, (ch. vi. 10,) gospel ministers and Christian magistrates will seek to do the will, and aim at the glory of God.—It is painful and pitiable to hear learned ...
— Notes On The Apocalypse • David Steele

... of Gaul, and again receiving at his hands the ornaments of the senatorial dignity. The father was afterwards invested with the government of Lucania, [83] and Aurelian, who soon admitted the abdicated monarch to his friendship and conversation, familiarly asked him, Whether it were not more desirable to administer a province of Italy, than to reign beyond the Alps. The son long continued a respectable member of the senate; nor was there any one of the Roman nobility more esteemed by Aurelian, as well as ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon

... politicians, priests, and so on; each particular set of interests desiring the particular consideration of the public treasury, and refusing the same amount of consideration to every other. It seemed highly desirable to him, as it did to Hegel, that all these interests should be heard; that they should be represented in a Parliament based upon as wide and liberal a suffrage as possible. But to intrust any one of these interests with the functions of government would, in his opinion, have been treason ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... satisfied. Let Bill Watkins be defeated for sheriff and Dunlavey was beaten. But there was much to be done before that desirable end ...
— The Coming of the Law • Charles Alden Seltzer

... which teaches girls to believe that it is a crime to marry a man without an assured income. Assured morality in a husband is a great thing. Assured good temper is very excellent. Assured talent, religion, amiability, truth, honesty, are all desirable. But an assured income is indispensable. Whereas, in truth, the income may come hereafter; but the other things, unless they be there already, will hardly be forthcoming. "Mr. Stanbury," she said, "your suddenness has quite ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope

... one hundred thousand," he corrected. "A one-year lease is not desirable; Loustalot was my sole client, and I've lost him ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne

... predictions have been corroborated by the events of the last half century—that the moral system of Feudal Japan, like its castles and its armories, will crumble into dust, and new ethics rise phoenix-like to lead New Japan in her path of progress. Desirable and probable as the fulfilment of such a prophecy is, we must not forget that a phoenix rises only from its own ashes, and that it is not a bird of passage, neither does it fly on pinions borrowed from other birds. "The Kingdom of God is within ...
— Bushido, the Soul of Japan • Inazo Nitobe

... had flagged a little in the autumn, and he was afraid that the strain of her devotion to Edith was beginning to tell upon her health. On Saturdays and Sundays they generally walked together, and he did his best to make his companionship desirable. Anne, given now to much self-questioning as to their relations, owned, in an access of justice, that she enjoyed these expeditions. Whatever else she had found her husband, she had never yet found him dull. But it did not occur to her, any more than ...
— The Helpmate • May Sinclair

... the family purse is small and empty, include also his family loyalty and affection, and over against them, we at present place nothing but a vague belief on the part of his family and himself that education is a desirable thing and may eventually help him "on in the world." It is of course difficult to adapt education to this need; it means that education must be planned so seriously and definitely for those two years between fourteen and sixteen that it will be actual trade training so far as it goes, with ...
— The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets • Jane Addams

... through the adoption of some system of stirpiculture, to breed all human beings to a common type, so that they would all be tall or short, fat or thin, light or dark, according to choice, it would not be a very desirable ideal, would it? And if we could get everybody to think exactly the same thoughts, to admire exactly the same things, to have exactly the same mental powers and exactly the same measure of moral strength and weakness, I do not think that would ...
— The Common Sense of Socialism - A Series of Letters Addressed to Jonathan Edwards, of Pittsburg • John Spargo

... stage of advancement in its development, it would seem highly desirable, before laying down the investigation, to obtain conclusive proof of the possibility of free flight, not only because there are excellent reasons to hope for success, but because it marks the end of a definite step toward the ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian

... wanted that girl for one of his men, they would give him her to wife. When a boy-child was born out of this marriage they would reserve him for breeding purposes if he was healthy and robust. But if he was puny and sickly they were not bothered about him. Many a time if the boy was desirable, he was put on the stump and auctioned off by the time he was thirteen years old. They called that putting him on the block. Different ones would come and bid for him and the highest bidder would ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration

... baron," said Jules, "I have something to say which makes it desirable that I should ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac

... to the unfortunate. Yet I can perceive that his views extend further than to myself, and that he does not expect to possess, at the same time, your friendship and my kingdom; which of the two he thinks the more desirable, must be manifest to every one. For, in the first place, he murdered my brother Hiempsal; and, in the next, expelled me from my dominions; which, however, may be regarded as our own wrongs, and as having no reference to you. ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust

... herself cup-bearer, wine-taster and handmaiden for their daughter. If it were necessary to engrave another fine line in old Ben's forehead in order to add a softer tint to Gloria's rose petals, she was sincerely sorry for Ben, but the desirable rose tints were selected with none ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory

... have mentioned that little Ruth Huckaback had been asked, and had even promised to spend her Christmas with us; and this was the more desirable, because she had left us through some offence, or sorrow, about things said of her. Now my dear mother, being the kindest and best-hearted of all women, could not bear that poor dear Ruth (who would some day have such a fortune), should be entirely ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore

... decanters were covered with cotton bags, kept wet with saltpetre and water, so that the evaporation carried on powerfully by the stream of air that flowed across the room, through the open doors and windows, made the fluids quite as cool as was desirable to worthies sitting luxuriating with the thermometer at 80 or thereby; yet, from the free current, I was in no way made aware of this degree of heat by any oppressive sensation; and I found in the West Indies as well as in the East, although the wind in the latter is more ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott

... axioms," in short, a rectilinear constitution which any school-boy may spout on leaving college. Like a handbill posted on the door of a new shop, it promises to customers every imaginable article that is handsome and desirable. Would you have rights and liberties? You will find them all here. Never has the statement been so clearly made, that the government is the servant, creature and tool of the governed; it is instituted solely "to guarantee to them their natural, imprescriptible rights." [1108] Never has a mandate ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... more than desirable that the student should know when he is reading the most approximate presentation accessible of what Shakspere uttered, and when that which modern editors have, with reason good or bad, often not without presumption, substituted for that which they received, I have given ...
— The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623 • George MacDonald

... my supper, and I had nothing to do but to wait for the constable and train-time, I did the very thing that Whitredge had advised me not to do; I couldn't get it out of my mind that freedom at any price was now the most desirable thing on earth—in the universe, for that matter. It was facilely easy to picture a future in some far distant corner of the country where I might begin all over again and make good. Other men had done it. Every once in a while I had read in ...
— Branded • Francis Lynde

... and philanthropy have aided and abetted machinery in the destruction of responsibility and self-reliance among the least desirable elements of the proletariat. In contrast with the previous epoch of discovery of the New World, of exploration and colonization, when a centrifugal influence was at work upon the populations of Europe, the advent of machinery has ...
— The Pivot of Civilization • Margaret Sanger

... another respect kinder to the poor than the rich; for as it thus makes the life after death more desirable, so it smooths the passage there. The wretched have had a long familiarity with every face of terror. The man of sorrow lays himself quietly down, without possessions to regret, and but few ties to stop his departure: he feels only nature's ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith

... cuneiform alphabet can never have been employed for ordinary writing purposes, but must have been confined to documents of some importance, which it was desirable to preserve, and which were therefore either inscribed on stone, or impressed on moist clay afterwards baked. A cursive character, it is therefore imagined, must always have been in use, parallel with a cuneiform one; and as the Babylonians and Assyrians are ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 3. (of 7): Media • George Rawlinson

... and the industrious Chinaman, who was barred out by the over-obsequiousness of the Congress of the nation, in deference to the Sand-Lot demagogues of the Pacific coast, headed by Denis Kearney, because it was desirable to conciliate their votes, even at the expense of consistency and the unity of the Constitution. That great document, while constantly affirmed to be the most broad and liberal compact ever devised for the governance of man, has always been found to be narrow enough to serve the purposes ...
— Black and White - Land, Labor, and Politics in the South • Timothy Thomas Fortune

... an age of corrupted literature, when that worldly wisdom or vain philosophy which God has declared to be folly, is again revived; in this age, when history has failed to represent the truth, and is only written for base lucre's sake, or to serve a sect or party, what can be so desirable to a Christian community, as to have placed in their hands a sincere and dispassionate account of the nations which surround us, and of the laws and manners and usages, whether civil or religious, which have passed, or are passing into the abyss of time? If the wisdom of God warns us "to ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... clear that there were difficulties in the way of the desirable understanding being arrived at, greater than either the lady was aware of, or than might usually be expected to attend ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope

... undertaking the management of Stone Court in order to place your nephew Fred there. The stock was to remain as it is, and they were to pay a certain share of the profits instead of an ordinary rent. That would be a desirable beginning for the young man, in conjunction with his employment under Garth. Would it ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot

... and the vigour of youth, no alms should ransom me, no desire of inactivity restrain me, from engaging in the laudable undertaking you preach; but since my weak age and the injuries of time deprive me of this desirable benefit (for approaching years bring with them many comforts, which those that are passed take away), if I cannot, owing to the infirmity of my body, attain a full merit, yet suffer me, by giving a tenth of all I possess, to attain a half." Then falling down ...
— The Itinerary of Archibishop Baldwin through Wales • Giraldus Cambrensis

... in a vague way as he watched them from day to day. He was beginning to like these big-hearted, big-muscled fellows, though there were those among them who were not desirable as friends. ...
— The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings • Edgar B. P. Darlington

... rain conducted to them through pipes leading from the roof. The water has thus taken up all the dust, soot, and other impurities found upon the roof, and, unless filtered, can not be considered desirable drink. The best cistern will include a filter of some sort, and this is accomplished in two ways. Either the cistern is divided into two parts, the water being received on one side, and allowed to slowly filter through a wall of porous brick, regarded by many as an amply sufficient means of purification; ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell

... in visiting the temple was to find a chamber with a narrow entrance, that could be held by half a dozen men against a number of foes; and it was desirable, if possible, to find one so situated that they might, in case of necessity, retreat into another chamber, or into the open air. Meinik was so confident, in the white man's power to combat even evil spirits, that he approached the temple with ...
— On the Irrawaddy - A Story of the First Burmese War • G. A. Henty

... this. But, if the truth is, as I presume, that M. Jean de Mauprat has not the least wish to hand himself over to justice, his threats are but little calculated to terrify me, and I shall take steps to prevent them from making more stir than is desirable." ...
— Mauprat • George Sand

... ever-applicable and world-famed Fables, strikingly pictured with excellent coloured and black and white drawings, and forming a most desirable volume alike for young and old, and a handsome addition to any library. Printed on rough art paper, 12 full-page colour plates. 144 pp. ...
— My Book of Favorite Fairy Tales • Edric Vredenburg

... a dose of bromid of potassium (4 drams) and sweet spirits of niter (1 ounce). The latter has the advantage of increasing the secretion of the kidneys. Iodid of potassium in one-half ounce doses every four hours has succeeded well in some hands. In severe cases, as a rule, it is desirable to begin treatment by a dose of aloes (4 to 6 drams) with the above-named dose of bromid of potassium, and this latter may be continued at intervals of four or six hours, as may be requisite to calm the nervous excitement. Fomentations ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture

... will you choose to write about?" said the teacher. One girl soon inquired, "Do you think that she would like to know how I am training my bird to sing?" Several other interesting topics were suggested. The finding of desirable purposes is not beyond ...
— How To Study and Teaching How To Study • F. M. McMurry

... of evidence that stands in the way of so desirable a proceeding, but that Doctor Colligan, thoroughly disgusted and shocked at ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope

... Darjeeling has long been discussed, and it appears that the engineering difficulties, though great, can nevertheless be overcome; but no active steps have as yet been taken toward the attainment of so desirable an object. The European residents of the town of Darjeeling number about fifty, and there are perhaps four times as many ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various

... to be sure of it, the more so, as at least one of the dear old creatures was somewhat pointedly referred to. If the dear old creatures were too bashful or too dull to assume their required places in the discussion, why then it would seem desirable that the dear old creatures should be taken by their heads and shoulders ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens

... pneumonia. And a white barn stares at you insolently. Whenever I see a white barn I prepare for bad luck. But a red barn, Archie, warms the cockles of your heart. It enfolds you like a canopy of dreams! I wouldn't have the red too glaring;—a certain rustiness of tint is desirable—" ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson

... conscious of it—Maurice's "forgetfulness" in regard to his wife became more and more marked, so it was a year of darkening loneliness for Eleanor. She was at last on that "desert island"—which had once seemed so desirable to her;—she had nothing to interest her except her music (and the quality of her voice was changing, pathetically); furthermore, Maurice rarely asked her to sing, so the passion had gone out of what voice she ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland

... expect to make a fortune, Kitty," said Jack quietly. "Do you think that is the one desirable thing? I shall never be a rich man. But riches are not the only thing that makes ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... Night), exceedingly destructive of the lives of elephants and steeds and human beings, twined round with cloth of gold, looking like a blazing meteor, equipped with a sling, fierce as a she-snake, hard as thunder, and made wholly of iron, smeared with sandal-paste and other unguents like a desirable lady, smutted with marrow and fat and blood, resembling the very tongue of Yama, producing shrill sounds in consequence of the bells attached to it, like unto the thunder of Indra, resembling in shape a snake of virulent poison just ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... a portable typewriter on the back seat. The car was locked and therefore no target, but it stirred his fancy. Thereafter he added a contingent requirement to his spotting. A car with a typewriter was more desirable than one without. ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith

... told by Mr. Ormsby, a new joke now and then well introduced by Mr. Gay, some dashing assertion by Mr. Rigby, which, though wrong, was startling; this agreeable blending of anecdote, jest, and paradox, kept everything fluent, and produced that degree of mild excitation which is desirable. Lord Monmouth sometimes summed up with an epigrammatic sentence, and turned the conversation by a question, in case it dwelt too much on the same topic. Lord Eskdale addressed himself principally to the ladies; inquired ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli

... Corbridge, "we shall resume possession of the subject of whom you have been kind enough to take charge during the time when we had no need of him. He will then be dematerialized in order that we may cause him to manifest himself in our seances whenever it may be desirable; but never, I may say, in the complete and perfect physical condition to which he was unintentionally materialized the first time. I promised you that I would give you at least three days' notice of our intention to resume work on this ...
— Amos Kilbright; His Adscititious Experiences • Frank R. Stockton

... place, when convinced of his duty, when he owns and feels, and is actually under the influence of the divine authority; whilst he is carrying on his views to the grave, the end of all temporal greatness; under this sense of things, with the better character and more desirable state present—full before him—in his thoughts, in his wishes, voluntarily to choose the worse—what fatality is here! Or how otherwise can such a character be explained? And yet, strange as it may appear, it is not altogether an uncommon one: nay, with some ...
— Human Nature - and Other Sermons • Joseph Butler

... Captain King and Mr. Dunlop, the King's astronomer at the Parramatta observatory, I halted the party this day in order to make hourly observations of the barometer, thermometer, the sky, etc. This plan had been strongly recommended by Sir John Herschel; and for our present purposes it was most desirable in order that we might ascertain how far the fluctuations of the atmosphere in two places so distant as Parramatta and Byrne's creek corresponded in these simultaneous observations. During our last ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell

... friend and companion for several months, and with it her own diminutive piece of work, a doily that she was supposed to be embroidering. Rita lay watching them with bright eyes, her eyebrows still nearer together than was desirable. At last, "Well," she said again. There was impatience and irritation in the tone, but there was ...
— Three Margarets • Laura E. Richards

... seemed of no party, I thought it was not impossible that he might join us; and though I did not wish much to dance at all-yet, as I was more acquainted with him than with any other person in the room, I must own I could not help thinking it would be infinitely more desirable to dance again with him than with an entire stranger. To be sure, after all that had passed, it was very ridiculous to suppose it even probable that Lord Orville would again honour me with his choice; yet I am compelled to confess my absurdity, by ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney

... It is now desirable to give, as briefly as possible, Jeanne's own account of the nature of her experiences, as recorded in the book of her trial at Rouen, with other secondhand accounts, offered on oath, at her trial of Rehabilitation, by ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang

... passed along the track through a country which, at every step, became more desirable, and at last emerged on an immense pocket where there was a concourse of gunyahs from which the smoke curled up, and in every gunyah was abundance. Some of the young men were throwing sportful boomerangs and spears; large parties were so absorbed in ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield

... built their new house out on the North Shore. At one time the society of that quarter had seemed, however desirable to the McComases, somewhat inaccessible. But the second wife was more likely to help Johnny thitherward than the first. Besides, the participation of the new pair in the scheme of dramatic uplift—however slight, essentially—had made the promised ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller

... One of the most desirable of all elements to introduce into our stories is that which encourages kinship with animals. With very young children this is easy, because during those early years when the mind is not clogged with knowledge, the sympathetic imagination ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock

... it has towards them all the feelings of a mother,—or of a stepmother, as the case may be. Where it says 'This can be no child of mine,' it is a stepmother indeed; but in all those whom I have presented to its arms, it has hitherto, I am proud to say, recognized desirable acquaintances, and to them the Hill has been a mother. And now, my dear Mr. Sloman, go to your rubber; Poyntz is impatient, though he don't show it. Miss Brabazon, love, we all long to see you seated at the piano,—you play so divinely! Something gay, ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Curran, Burroughs and Wallace, no people ever had; but still they were friends from without; men of another religion, or of no particular religion, advising and guiding an eminently religious people in their struggle for religious liberty. This could not always last; it was not natural, it was not desirable that it should last, though some years more were to pass away before Catholic Emancipation was to be accomplished by the union, the energy and the strategy ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee

... Nature at our own likeness. When we speak of a ludicrous occurrence, we cannot avoid thinking that the external events themselves contain something of that character. Thus, the ludicrous has come in our ideas and language to be separated from the sense in which alone it exists, and it is desirable that we should clearly understand that the distinction is only logical and ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange

... though nothing could be clearer than the atmosphere. Wandering there alone, I found the solitude desirable; my mind was stored with ideas, which this new scene associated with astonishing rapidity. But I shuddered at the thought of receiving existence, and remaining here, in the solitude of ignorance, till forced to leave a world of which I had seen so little, for the character of the ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft

... towards the Rhine. [517] In reply to overtures from London, Napoleon stated that the cause of Schleswig-Holstein to some extent represented the principle of nationality, to which France was friendly, and that of all wars in which France could engage a war with Germany would be the least desirable. England accordingly, if it took up arms for the Danes, would have been compelled to enter the war alone; and although at a later time, when the war was over and the victors were about to divide the spoil, the British and French fleets ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe

... plan of this treatise is far more comprehensive than those of ordinary grammars, the writer could not, without making his work unreasonably voluminous, treat some topics as extensively as was desirable. Its design is to embrace, not only all the most important principles of the science, but also exercises in parsing, false syntax, and punctuation, sufficiently extensive for all ordinary, practical purposes, and a key to the exercises, and, moreover, a series of illustrations so full and intelligible, ...
— English Grammar in Familiar Lectures • Samuel Kirkham

... success—just because it seemed forced upon him. The practical value of success depends not a little on the way you look at it. But Fate looks at nothing. It has no discretion. He no longer considered it eminently desirable all round to establish publicly the identity of the man who had blown himself up that morning with such horrible completeness. But he was not certain of the view his department would take. A department is to those it employs a complex personality with ideas and ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad

... strangeness and silence. The composure of the body was graceful and Jovelike. This being might have been a prophet come out of a country nearer to the sun. Perhaps a god who had lost his road and allowed himself to be taken prisoner by le gouvernement francais. At least a prince of a dark and desirable country, a king over a gold-skinned people who would return when he wished to his fountains and his houris. I learned upon inquiry that he travelled in various countries with a horse and cart and his wife and children, selling bright colours to the women and men of these countries. As it turned out, ...
— The Enormous Room • Edward Estlin Cummings

... time since I have seen you; how's your family? Quite well? Is it well with thee today? Rather lukewarm, eh? Sorry, sorry. Well, brother, can you do something for us financially, today? Our people think my pulpit is too common, and say a couple hundred will put it in good shape, and make it desirable and attractive. Can you contribute a few dollars to ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll

... current. At six however, we anchored in forty fathom, with very good ground, in a bay about two miles to the westward of that from which we sailed in the morning. A swell rolled in here all night, so that our situation was by no means desirable, and therefore, although the wind was still at W.S.W. we weighed and made sail about eight o'clock the next day: We had likewise incessant rain, so that the people were continually wet, which was a great aggravation of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr

... you write; for Lucilla is sure to ask to see your letter. Remember that she only supposes me to have returned to her after a brief absence from England, caused by a necessity for joining my brother on the Continent. It will be also desirable to say nothing on the subject of my unfortunate peculiarity of complexion. I have made it all right with Lucilla, and she is getting accustomed to me. Still, the subject is a sore one; and the less it ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins

... disgust should be felt by the fortunate for the unfortunate, or at any rate for those who have been discovered to have met with any of the more serious and less familiar misfortunes, is not only natural, but desirable for any society, whether of man or brute; what progress either of body or soul had been otherwise possible? The fact therefore that the Erewhonians attach none of that guilt to crime which they do to physical ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler

... have been so long disturbed; our citizens must be indemnified for losses so long since sustained, and for which indemnity has been so unjustly withheld from them. Accomplishing these great objects, we obtain all that is desirable. ...
— State of the Union Addresses of James Monroe • James Monroe

... King of Scotland without being fettered by any pledge on this subject, it might well be apprehended that he would hesitate about passing an Act which would be regarded with abhorrence by a large body of his subjects in the south of the island. It was therefore most desirable that the question should be settled while the throne was still vacant. In this opinion many politicians concurred, who had no dislike to rochets and mitres, but who wished that William might have a quiet and prosperous reign. The Scottish people,—so these men reasoned,—hated ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... promising positively to marry Lord Stanley, she, at my suggestion, led her father to believe she was ready to yield to his wishes. By this course she gained time and liberty, and kept peace with her father. Since you have seen the evils that war brought to Haddon, you well know how desirable peace was. In time of war all Haddon was a field of carnage and unrest. In time of peace the dear old Hall was an ideal home. I persuaded Sir George not to insist on a positive promise from Dorothy, and I advised him to allow her yielding mood to grow upon her. ...
— Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall • Charles Major

... upon soft beds, wear neat clothes, and can obtain every variety of food that we wish, think with pity of the men who lead a rough and lonely life among the mountains far from all comforts. Let us learn something more about the life and work of the prospectors, for we may find much that is desirable ...
— The Western United States - A Geographical Reader • Harold Wellman Fairbanks

... this story, my dear Sylvain and Jocosa,' added the Fairy, 'to prove to you that this little cottage and all that belongs to it is a gift more likely to bring you happiness and contentment than many things that would at first seem grander and more desirable. If you will faithfully promise me to till your fields and feed your flocks, and will keep your word better than you did before, I will see that you never lack anything that is ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various

... observed a tendency to roam in the young man's eye, he did not betray the fact—at least not so that any one could notice. Truxton departed, but returned immediately after luncheon, vaguely inclined to decide between two desirable rings. After a protracted period of indecision, in which Olga remained stubbornly out of sight, he announced that he could not make up his mind, and would return ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... Mr. William Murray Bradshaw, had made a half-playful bet with his fair relative, Mrs. Clymer Ketchum, that he would bag a girl within twelve months of date who should unite three desirable qualities, specified in the bet, in a higher degree than any one of the five who were on the matrimonial programme which she had laid out for him,—and Myrtle was the girl with whom he meant to ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... "and if so, isn't it a little queer that he and Mr. Harrington should live so near each other; both so eccentric; both so handsome and rich; both been disappointed; and both so desirable as husbands?" ...
— Darkness and Daylight • Mary J. Holmes

... am derelict if I do not manage a jaunt to the Cliff House. The most desirable method demands a span of horses for a spin out Point Lobos Avenue. We may, however, be obliged to take a McGinn bus that leaves the Plaza hourly. It will be all the same when we reach the Cliff and gaze on Ben Butler and his companion sea-lions as they ...
— A Backward Glance at Eighty • Charles A. Murdock

... from Cairo to the rival city with a good deal of favor. Such a change would considerably shorten the line to be built, and the connection southwest from Paducah to Memphis was in some respects a more desirable one than ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston

... he did not regret being alone. He began to doubt whether Graham would make a desirable traveling companion. Tom felt the need of economy, and he saw that his companion would make it difficult. If a fee must be paid, it was fair to divide it; but the porter's fee had come out of ...
— The Young Adventurer - or Tom's Trip Across the Plains • Horatio Alger

... that made him, perhaps, a better guardian for Norah than the benevolently disposed Tait. Puck had a nasty, inquiring mind—an unpleasant way of sniffing round the legs of tramps that generally induced those gentry to find the top rail of a fence a more calm and more desirable spot than the level of the ground. Indian hawkers feared him and hated him in equal measure. He could bite, and occasionally did bite, his victims being always selected with judgment and discretion, generally vagrants emboldened to insolence ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce

... watching with interest and amusement the maneuvers of the Turks to bring the American officials around to accepting this view of the matter. They "rushed" the rear admiral who was acting as American High Commissioner and his wife as the members of a college fraternity "rush" a desirable freshman. And, come to think of it, most of the American officials who were sent out to investigate and report on conditions in Turkey are freshmen when it comes to the complexities of Near Eastern affairs. This does not apply, of course, to such ...
— The New Frontiers of Freedom from the Alps to the AEgean • Edward Alexander Powell

... Goldencalf and me," steadily remarked the Doctor, who, in my soul, I believe had hoped that his condition would be rejected, having yielded to the importunities of a dying woman, rather than to his own sense of that which might be either very desirable ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper

... he justified his method of reporting conversations. 'It may be objected by some persons, as it has been by one of my friends, that he who has the power of thus exhibiting an exact transcript of conversations is not a desirable member of society. I repeat the answer which I made to that friend:—'Few, very few, need be afraid that their sayings will be recorded. Can it be imagined that I would take the trouble to gather what grows on every hedge, because I have ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask

... strengthen and fortify the body, we go on to spending many hours upon putting memory through its paces, and in developing the reason and the intelligence; we pass on from that to exercising and purifying the character and the will; we try to make vice detestable and virtue desirable. But meanwhile, what is the little mind doing? It submits to the drudgery imposed upon it, it accommodates itself more or less to the conditions of its life; it learns a certain conduct and demeanour for use in public. Yet all the time the thought of the boy is running ...
— Cambridge Essays on Education • Various

... could alone be secured by following the bay horse (whom, after the manner of young horses, she had adopted as a father) so closely, and at such a rate of speed, that a live torpedo attached to his tail could hardly have been a less desirable companion. ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross

... epitaph itself has a capital W affixed to it, as if it were also of his composition: but I do not find it inserted in Dr. Nott's edition of his poetical works, in 1816; nor does this MS. appear to have been consulted by Dr. Nott. And here I may take the liberty of remarking, how desirable it is that your correspondents, in sending any extracts from old English MSS. to the "NOTES AND QUERIES," should adhere strictly to the original orthography, or else modernise it altogether. A. B. ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 68, February 15, 1851 • Various

... effect upon my brother's imagination was of chief moment. All that was desirable was, that it should be regarded by him with indifference. The worst effect that could flow, was not indeed very formidable. Yet I could not bear to think that his senses should be the victims of such delusion. It argued ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown

... some time in getting ready. I sat, with growing impatience, listening to the sick man's soft breathing and the click of the housekeeper's knitting-needles. I wanted to get home, not only for my own sake; the patient's condition made it highly desirable that the remedies should be given as quickly as possible. But the minutes dragged on, and I was on the point of expostulating when a bell rang ...
— The Mystery of 31 New Inn • R. Austin Freeman

... you, Lord Minster, made a very admirable statement of how desirable it is for yourself that you should marry me, but it is not so clear what advantage I should ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard

... as it appears to me, is by no means so desirable a subject as to make one unwilling to drop it. It has its uses. It is perhaps right that we should be somewhat acquainted with this repulsive chapter in the annals of human nature. As the wise man says in the Bible, "It is good for us to resort to the house of ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin

... she wrote to her mother she was able to say that she liked being at the sea-side very much, but she always added: "We have not been on the sands yet." Now this was a thing she longed to do, for Sophia Jane had told her of so many delightful things to do and find there, that it seemed the most desirable place on earth; besides, she wanted very much to begin a collection of shells and sea-weed for Freddie. There was a card hanging in her bed-room, on which pink and green sea-weeds were arranged in a sort of bouquet, with some verses ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton

... come for revealing the truth. The hour has come when it is no longer necessary or desirable that the world should remain in ignorance that the Great Author of Shakespeare's Plays was himself alive when the Folio was published in 1623. The hour has come when all should know that this the greatest book produced by man was given to the world more carefully edited by its author as ...
— Bacon is Shake-Speare • Sir Edwin Durning-Lawrence

... allowed to return home. Whether or not these chiefs had entered into any conspiracy, as has been hinted, I do not know; but it is generally believed, that Damodar, so far as he was able, opposed the return of Rana Bahadur, which certainly was neither desirable for Nepal nor its neighbours. The natives in general believe, that he wrote a letter to a gentleman of rank at Banaras, requesting his influence to keep Rana Bahadur at that city; and that this letter, by the treachery ...
— An Account of The Kingdom of Nepal • Fancis Buchanan Hamilton

... played by the Amazonian prisoner. To the counterpart of that astounding belligerent—identical at least, in the way of experience—to one, by her own confession, thus far fallen, had he, not three hours since, been united in marriage. How desirable and natural it had seemed to him then, and how monstrous it seemed now! How the words of diamond thief number two yet burned in his ears: "If you ever get a girl, she'll have a picnic." What did that mean but that women instinctively ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry

... little celluloid sign, Howard Sommers, M. D., Physician and Surgeon, beneath his window. The proprietor of the Keystone thought it gave a desirable, professional air to the house. But Webber, the young man in the Baking Powder Trust, was sceptical of its commercial value to the doctor. Certainly the results from its appearance were not ascertainable. Sommers had no patients. The region ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... now over, for so soon as the casus belli was disproved by Squanto's appearance, the capture of Corbitant was no longer desirable, and Standish ordered his men to sheathe their swords and release their prisoners. Those who had been wounded by persisting in trying to escape were attended to by Surgeon Fuller, and by Standish's invitation returned to Plymouth with their friendly conquerors to ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin

... Gethryn, Marriott, a boy named Reece, who kept wicket for the School Eleven, and perhaps two others, Leicester's seniors were not a good lot. To the School in general, who gauged a fellow's character principally by his abilities in the cricket and football fields, it seemed a very desirable thing to be in Leicester's. They had been runners-up for the House football cup that year, and this term might easily see the cricket cup fall to them. Amongst the few, however, it was known that the House was passing through an unpleasant stage in its career. A House is ...
— A Prefect's Uncle • P. G. Wodehouse

... Lady Superior, telling her that if she considered Mary would be a desirable acquisition to their ranks she had no sort of objection to her ...
— The Making of Mary • Jean Forsyth

... one interest, and God another. When we wish what he does not wish, we are not more against him than against our real selves. We are traitors to the human when we think anything but the will of God desirable, when we fear our ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald

... since Man is so short-sighted a Creature, and the Accidents which may happen to him so various, I cannot but be of Dr. Tillotson's Opinion in another Case, that were there any Doubt of a Providence, yet it certainly would be very desirable there should be such a Being of infinite Wisdom and Goodness, on whose Direction we might rely in the Conduct of ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele

... Amply equipped with every desirable appointment, including daguerreotype apparatuses, mathematical instruments, and withal fifty repeating rifles, lest it should become necessary to resort to an armed expedition, these gentlemen sailed from ...
— Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central America • Pedro Velasquez

... desirable," smiled Joan, the little gleam of humor striking into her gloomy hour like a ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden

... invitation of an old friend, on the ridiculous plea that to-day of all days he had to leave Mantua. The woman's look of gloom convinced Olivo that this was the first she had heard of Casanova's intended departure, and the latter felt it desirable to explain that his mention of the journey had been a mere pretext, lest he should incommode his friend's household by an unexpected visit, and that he had, in fact, an important piece of writing to finish during the next ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler

... Don Filipo. "This morning I ran across old Tasio. He said to me: 'Your enemies are more opposed to your person than to your ideas. Is there something you don't want to have go through? Propose it yourself. If it's as desirable as a mitre, they will reject it. Then let the most modest young fellow among you present what you really want. To humiliate you, your enemies will help to carry it.' Hush! ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal

... of significance, viz. that the oscillations are much greater in the neighbourhood of water, and this appears to indicate that the junction lines of land and water form by far the most important portions of the globe in which to study both the phaenomena of storms and waves. It is also very desirable that our knowledge of these phaenomena should, with immediate reference to the surface of the ocean, be increased, and in this respect captains and masters of vessels may render essential service by observing and recording the state of the barometer, and direction ...
— The Hurricane Guide - Being An Attempt To Connect The Rotary Gale Or Revolving - Storm With Atmospheric Waves. • William Radcliff Birt

... the narrative of the hostilities which, so far as events of decisive interest are concerned, began in Natal, it is desirable to note one broad topographical feature distinguishing the region to which, in its eastern development, the war has been confined. From the capital, Pietermaritzburg, the railroad ascends rapidly, so that in twenty-five miles it has risen from 2,200 to 4,800 feet, after ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan

... actually dislike death, sickness, pain, poverty, disgrace, danger, separation from those to whom they are attached. He knew that religion, though it often regulates and moderates these feelings, seldom eradicates them; nor did he think it desirable for mankind that they should be eradicated. The plan of eradicating them by conceits like those of Seneca, or syllogisms like those of Chrysippus, was too preposterous to be for a moment entertained by a mind like his. He did not understand what wisdom there could be in changing ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... it was found that Linnaeus had left the University of Lund under a cloud. Linnaeus was confronted with the charge, and declined to answer it, thus practically pleading guilty. So, to get him out of Upsala seemed a desirable thing, both to friends and to foes. His friends secured the commission for the Lapland exploration, and his enemies made no objections, merely whispering, "Good riddance!" To be twenty-four, in good health, with hair like ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard

... with the family of Joergen Soerensen, the overseer at Frederiksborg castle, and later, with the Baroness Lena Rud of Vedby Manor, a position which to an impecunious but ambitious young man like Kingo must have appeared especially desirable. Lena Rud belonged to what at that time was one of the wealthiest and most influential families in the country. Many of her relatives occupied neighboring estates, a circumstance which enabled Kingo to become personally acquainted with a number of them; and with one of ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg

... allies, while their wives and children were tomahawked. They contributed in their humble way to secure the blessings of free government which the present inhabitants of Virginia enjoyed. They helped support schools, churches and charities and otherwise make the district desirable as a place of residence. Finally railways were built and stores opened, not to enrich these people, but to be enriched by them. These conveniences added to the value of the land, but were paid for at a good round price, as such things ever are by the users. The land is now worth about $30.00 ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... could not hold, and since he had felt—that evening at Brestalou—that his political convictions had placed an insuperable barrier between himself and Crystal de Cambray, he felt that no woman on earth could ever be quite so desirable. ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy

... they often cannot recover for many hundred yards. Everyone is expected in a boat race, and in a University race as much as anywhere, to row his best and hardest every stroke he takes, and never to slack off at all. If it is considered desirable to save up for a spurt at the finish, the "stroke" will do that by putting in a few less strokes to the minute till the time comes. Every man behind him is bound in honesty to the rest to shove every stroke through ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... order to enter into the service of the English East India Company, while others went to Goa to serve the Portuguese, and some even entered into the service of the Great Mogul, being so bare after so long a voyage, that any means of providing for themselves were desirable. Clipperton returned to England in 1706, and afterwards made another voyage round the world in the Success, of which an account will be ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr

... to the fort, Paul proceeded to hide the telephone as well as he could. Sooner or later the Germans were certain to come to the garage and it was desirable, for a good many reasons, that they should find no evidences of the use to which it had been put. For one thing, it was impossible to tell what was going to happen. It might well turn out that further use could be made of the telephone later. And when Paul had done, he felt that it was highly ...
— The Belgians to the Front • Colonel James Fiske

... This evening you will retire to your own rooms at eleven o'clock. Precisely at one-thirty a.m., you will come back here. You will be good enough to come in your slippers, because it is not desirable that any of the household should be disturbed by our proceedings. I have no further ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 4, April, 1891 • Various

... the brain. It quiets the nerves, makes a man look in charity upon the world, and to judge with a chastened lenity the shortcomings of his neighbors. It reconciles him to his lot, and sends him to his pillow, or about his labors, with a calm deliberate cheerfulness, very desirable to those who come under the law that requires people to earn their bread by the sweat of ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond

... pretty large kitchen. Two rooms for the servants, and a coal-cellar. The rooms must of course have inlaid floors, be newly laid, if possible, and require no repairs. But a little hotel or a separate part of a house in a court-yard looking into a garden would be most desirable. There must be tranquillity, quietness, no blacksmith in the neighbourhood. Respectable stairs. The windows exposed to the sun, absolutely to the south. Further, there must be no smoke, no bad odour, but a fine view, a garden, or at least a ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... explained how she came to wear a man's derby and possibly a man's overcoat. With her skirts covered by a bear-skin she would present a very fair figure of a man to any one who chanced to pass her. This was desirable in her case. A man and woman driving at a late hour through the city streets would attract little, if any, attention, while two women might. Having no wish to attract attention, they had resorted to subterfuge—or Carmel had; it was ...
— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green

... down in the distance, and the world which had once seemed so desirable seemed to her strangely trivial and easily denied. Already she could look back at the poor struggling ones, struggling for what to-morrow will be abandoned, forgotten, passing illusions; and she wondered how it was that she had not always thought as she thought ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore

... of earthly loveliness. It was heaven come to Aquitaine, to the Courts of Love, in shapes of vivid fragrant beauty, with delectable hair lying gold on white samite worked in borders of blue petals. It chose not abstractions for its faith, but the most desirable of all actual—yes, worldly—incentives: the sister, it might be, of Count Emmerick of Poictesme. And, approaching beatitude not so much through a symbol of agony as by the fragile grace of a woman, raising Melicent to the stars, it fused, more completely ...
— Domnei • James Branch Cabell et al

... abounding in flocks and herds, but generally small of growth. Nor even in their oxen is found the usual stateliness, no more than the natural ornaments and grandeur of head. In the number of their herds they rejoice; and these are their only, these their most desirable riches. Silver and gold the Gods have denied them, whether in mercy or in wrath, I am unable to determine. Yet I would not venture to aver that in Germany no vein of gold or silver is produced; for who has ever searched? For the use and possession, it is certain they care ...
— Tacitus on Germany • Tacitus

... disposition to melancholy,' said He; 'What can possibly have made you view in so desirable a light, Misanthropy, of ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis

... Points, it may at least be argued that President Wilson secured more than he lost. Open diplomacy in the sense of conducting international negotiations in an open forum was not the method of the Peace Conference; and it may not be possible or even desirable. The article in the Covenant, however, which insists upon the public registration of all treaties before their validity is recognized, goes far towards a fulfillment of the President's pledge of open covenants, particularly if his original meaning is liberally interpreted. ...
— Woodrow Wilson and the World War - A Chronicle of Our Own Times. • Charles Seymour

... directly connected with this desirable country property that he sought audience of his aunt immediately upon his return home. She was not to be found anywhere downstairs, and since his impatience did not welcome the idea of waiting for a fortuitous opportunity to chat with her in private, he took the stairs ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston

... bright heaven I had so recently gazed upon and the abyss now yawning at my feet! But so it is in the Court and the world! I felt then the nothingness of even the most desirable future, by an inward sentiment, which, nevertheless, indicates how we cling to it. Fear on account of the contents of the casket had scarcely any power over me. I was obliged to reflect in order to return to it from time to time. Regret ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... Achitophel' is more valuable, though not so talkative, than that of the modern men of banter; for what he says is like what he writes, much to the purpose, and full of mighty sense; and if the town were for anything desirable, it were for the conversation of him, and one or two more of the same character."—The Humours and Conversation of the Town exposed, in two Dialogues, ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott

... Department, the aid of the latest discoveries is wanted, it is better to rely upon those whose especial business it is to be acquainted with them. All departments and institutions are liable to become hardened, and to lose their elasticity. It is particularly desirable that this should be avoided in a Department for the Public Health; and, therefore, great care should be taken in the constitution of it, to ensure sufficient vitality, and admit sufficient variety of ...
— The Claims of Labour - an essay on the duties of the employers to the employed • Arthur Helps

... "It's desirable that you love your husband. Any sensible woman can learn to care for a man. Love, as you dream about it is merely a—a dream. If women waited for that ...
— The Day of the Beast • Zane Grey

... curious fact that the most desirable of bookish treasures are often found where one would be least likely to seek them. Montana is a great State, nevertheless one does not think of going to Montana for early editions of Shakespeare. Let the book-hunter inwardly digest the following ...
— The Bibliotaph - and Other People • Leon H. Vincent

... of rectifying our measures, and bringing us to a more modest opinion of ourselves: It tells us, how necessary the assistance of divine grace is unto us, when life itself becomes a burden, and death even desirable: But when the greatest oppression comes upon us, we must have recourse to patience, begging of God to give us that virtue; and the more composed, we are under any trouble, the more commendable is our wisdom, and the larger will be our ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe

... abolition of domestic labor for women, any more than of outdoor labor for men. Of course, most women will still continue to be mainly occupied with the indoor care of their families, and most men with their external support. All that is desirable for either sex is such an economy of labor, in this respect, as shall leave some spare time, to be appropriated in other directions. The argument against each new emancipation of woman is precisely that always made against the liberation of serfs and the enfranchisement ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various

... all means, the most desirable condition for you now," said I. Then addressing her mother, I added—"I think your daughter had better lie down. Let her room be shaded and kept quiet. She needs rest and sleep. Sleep is one ...
— The Allen House - or Twenty Years Ago and Now • T. S. Arthur

... rather rough and unrestrained, but I find in almost all of them both love and respect towards me; two things with which hitherto the Lord has everywhere graciously blessed my labors, and which in our calling, as your Reverence well knows and finds, are especially desirable, in order to ...
— Narrative of New Netherland • J. F. Jameson, Editor

... king might care to be known as the Duke of So-and-so; a Duke as Mr. ——, whatever his surname chanced to be. That would not be wicked and it would not be an alias. And sometimes people who are not nobles find it desirable to remain unrecognized for a time. Take it for granted that I was not, in reality, a governess at all; I mean that I was not forced by circumstances to take such a position, but that I for some reason chose to assume it. That I cared to come here and be with you because I had ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann

... why eloquence should not be taught by mail. One seems to be able to acquire every other desirable quality ...
— The Clicking of Cuthbert • P. G. Wodehouse

... saw a little glow kindle in his eyes. "I'm by no means sure that I possess any of those desirable qualities. Besides, there's a rather ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss

... list of desirable premiums for clubs which any popular adult or child can easily form. Your friends will thank you for showing them the magazine and offering to send their money. The work of getting subscribers among acquaintances ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photography [June, 1897] - A Monthly Serial designed to Promote Knowledge of Bird-Life • Various

... illustration. Hardly a chapter of European history or romance is more familiar to the world than the one which records the meteoric course of Charles the Bold. The propriety of his title was never doubtful. No prince was ever bolder, but it is certain that no quality could be less desirable, at that particular moment in the history of his house. It was not the quality to confirm a usurping family in its ill-gotten possessions. Renewed aggressions upon the rights of others justified retaliation and invited attack. Justice, prudence, firmness, wisdom of internal ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... mind belongs neither to memory nor to imagination. This particular case illustrates in a very clear form the nature of the first flights of the mind attempting to exercise its imaginative powers. Without enumerating other facts of this kind, it is more desirable to follow the imagination's development, limiting ourselves to two forms of the psychic life—perception and illusion. The necessary presence of the image in these two forms has been so often proven by contemporary ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot

... which, with due recognition of the law of self-preservation, comprehend the duty of man, it is necessary that the terms and conditions upon which others may acquire freehold estates in tropical Queensland—the most fruitful and the most desirable part of Australia—should be briefly detailed. As insurance against intrusion, a small area of the island had been secured from the Government under special lease for a term of thirty years, at the rental of 2 shillings 6 pence ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield

... "Only one to a customer!" announced Mrs. Brandeis. By the middle of the week the window itself was ravished of its show. By the end of the week there remained only a handful of the duller and less desirable pieces—the minor saints, so to speak. Saturday night Mrs. Brandeis did a little figuring on paper. The lot had cost her two hundred dollars. She had sold for six hundred. Two from six leaves four. ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber

... Bible we are exhorted again and again to trust in the Lord. We are warned against trusting in princes, in riches, or in ourselves; for all such trust is vain. Trusting in the Lord is represented as being safe, as blessed, and as producing very desirable results. In it is our hope, our strength, our safety, and ...
— Heart Talks • Charles Wesley Naylor

... case, even in certain portions of a main canal—where rendered desirable by the rocky nature of the ground—a smaller section might be adopted, which would only be large enough for single semi-barges, so that the duplex vessel would in these instances have to be taken apart in the same way as ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 829, November 21, 1891 • Various

... in these cases the knowledge of the language, as being a sine qua non, must be made imperative. This, however, as I think, is not a case for competition, but for a sufficient pass. There is a certain pitch of attainment that is desirable even at first entering the service; no one should fall below this, and to rise much above it cannot matter a great deal. At all events, I think the measure should be absolute and not relative. ...
— Practical Essays • Alexander Bain

... he leant on Mrs. Honeychurch's carriage. He had failed in his duties to the country-side, and the country-side was laughing at him as well. He had spent money, and yet Summer Street was spoilt as much as ever. All he could do now was to find a desirable tenant for ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster

... thermometers, are desirable; and the best instruments are ultimately the cheapest. But, unfortunately, barometers of every construction are very easily damaged or deranged. The accurate determination of heights, however, though very interesting to physical geography, is comparatively of little ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King

... affairs in Great Britain, that there ought to be an incorporating union of Scotland with the English Commonwealth. That proposal came before the Long Parliament in October 1651. It was agreed upon, by way of declaration, that it might be very desirable, and a committee of eight members of the Long Parliament was appointed to negotiate in the matter. They came to Scotland, and there was a kind of convention, a quasi Scottish Parliament, held at Dalkeith, where the matter was discussed. Of course, it was a very serious matter, giving rise to ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder

... —viz., the apparent transfer of an article from one hand to the other, though such article really remains in the hand which it has apparently just quitted. As the same movement frequently repeated would cause suspicion, and possibly detection, it is desirable to acquire different ways of effecting this object. It should be here mentioned that the term "palming" which we have so far used as meaning simply the act of holding any article, is also employed to signify the act of placing any article in the palm by one or the other of various passes. The ...
— Healthful Sports for Boys • Alfred Rochefort

... indulge the spleen and prejudice of his old acquaintance, "perhaps the wine is not so good as to make full measure desirable." ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott

... he observed. "I like this yer room. It's real homesome; and the view fr'm your front windows and the veranda's real elegant. Time you gets a collection o' choice flowers in your door-yard, you'll have 'bout the most desirable residence in the hull state of Wyoming. Ain't you ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton

... HEALTH AND EFFICIENCY... What is the moral importance of health? Can we attain to greater health and efficiency? Is continued idleness ever justifiable? Are competitive athletics desirable? Is ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake

... this sort of thing lies in the atmosphere, don't you think it would be a good thing for the whole Society to come down here next summer? A generous diffusion of masculine energy into the course might be a desirable change. For my part, I don't mean to leave this place till frost comes. I believe this thing is going to be an epidemic at the Branch, and when contagions rage I am sure to catch any disease that is going. I have had the measles twice, and two pretty severe tugs with the scarlet-fever. In ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens

... the enemy will occupy positions back from the city, out of range of the gunboats, so as to make it desirable to run past Grand Gulf and land at Rodney. In case this should prove the plan, a signal will be arranged and you duly informed, when the transports are to start with this view. Or, it may be expedient for the boats to run past, but not ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant

... alternative but to answer questions and smile fatuously upon the blond daughter, and wonder if I ought to warn the mother that "clothes do not make the man," and that I was a black sheep and not a desirable acquaintance. Before I had quite settled that point, they left the train. I am afraid I am not distinctly a chivalrous person; I hummed the Doxology after their retreating forms and retired into myself, with a feeling that my own society ...
— The Range Dwellers • B. M. Bower

... the Folsoms and Randalls came to the wedding, self-respecting, thrifty people who were, for the most part, as Alix summarized it, "buying little homes on the installment plan in desirable residential districts of Oakland and Berkeley." There were bright-faced school teachers, in dark plaid silk waists, and young matrons in carefully planned colour schemes of brown and gray; and they ...
— Sisters • Kathleen Norris

... argument, sentiment. He still bore himself as count, even while adopting, when desirable, an attitude of gallantry, and making pretty—nay, even tender—speeches. He exalted the service she would render them, spoke of their gratitude; then, suddenly, using the ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... with the increasing severity of the winter, made it desirable to occupy a line nearer the base of supplies at Harper's Ferry, and, accordingly, on the 30th of December, after living for six weeks in improvised huts or "shebangs," as they were called, roughly put together of rails, stones, and any other material to be found, the Nineteenth Corps broke ...
— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin

... presumable that the governor treated him as is sometimes done in our days, when it is deemed desirable to effectually conceal state secrets known to men of his kind and presumably unsafe in their keeping. Judas probably was simply hanged, by Pilate's order, to prevent the possibility of his some day revealing ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch

... like Lydia," said Anne. It was not jealousy in her voice, only yearning. It seemed very desirable to look like Lydia ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown

... rogation-week, a devouring flame consumed our church of Gysburn, with many theological books and nine costly chalices, as well as vestments and sumptuous images; and because past events are serviceable as a guide to future inquiries, I have thought it desirable, in the present little treatise, to give an account of the catastrophe, that accidents of a similar nature may be avoided through this calamity allotted to us. On the day above mentioned, which was very destructive ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home

... season, as you do, all your strict uprightness with charm of manner equally striking, and to be such an agreeable companion as well as such a man of weight, that is no less difficult than it is desirable. Yet you succeed in so doing with wonderful sweetness both in your conversation and above all, when you set pen to paper. For when you talk, all the honey of Homer's old man eloquent seems to flow from your tongue, and when you ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger

... herself would find a new and sacred duty in catering to the needs of this budding intelligence. So she reflected as she lay in bed, but the outlook was a little marred by the thought that the baby was the living image of its father—broad-featured and burly—not altogether desirable cast of countenance for a girl. What a pity, when it might just as well ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant

... Church, the public edifices were mean. All these have been swept away by the recent conflagration, a waste of property indefensible on any military principles. The buildings might have furnished winter-quarters for our troops, but in that climate they were not necessary for that purpose, perhaps not desirable, or, if required, could be easily replaced by temporary habitations constructed of lumber imported from the North by sea. But the Rebel chiefs had thrown themselves into heroic attitudes, and while playing the part of incendiaries, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 49, November, 1861 • Various

... other on sight; indeed, the dislike was anterior to sight, and may be said to have commenced when Harry first heard how thoroughly at home Julius had made himself at Seat-Sandal, and when Julius first saw what a desirable estate and fine old "seat" Harry's existence deprived him of. And in half an hour this general aversion began to particularize itself. The slim, suave youth, with his black eyes and soft speech, and small hands and feet, seemed to Harry Sandal in ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... one of the most humane, brave, and zealous commanders that ever walked a deck—one to whom every man looked up as a father, the late Admiral Sir Harry Burrard Neale. A better lesson cannot be given to a young officer to show that by kindness and firmness that desirable object may be attained which was so eminently proved during one of the most eventful periods of this country. The Saint Fiorenzo was at Spithead when the first mutiny broke out, and the red flag was hoisted on board the Queen Charlotte. The ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston

... to be regretted," writes Dr. Edwin James, "that our lamented friend (Mr. Johnston) had not lived to complete his autobiography. This deficiency constitutes no valid objection to the publication of the memoirs, though it appears to me highly desirable that you should complete the sketch, so as to include the history of the latter portion of his life. In perfect accordance with the plan of such a continuation, you would embody much valuable detail ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft









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