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adjective
earliest  adj.  Preceding all others in time.
Synonyms: premier, premiere.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Earliest" Quotes from Famous Books



... that night mainly because his body was too exhausted to let him lie awake and worry. Roused in the earliest dawn by McNeil, they both crawled down to the water's edge and struggled to bind stubbornly resisting saplings together with cords twisted from bark. They reinforced them at crucial points with some strings torn from ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton

... Agra. The great wonder and prize of Agra is, of course, the Taj Mahal. So we made our way to it before sunrise, and saw its exquisite columns and its white minarets in the rosy light of the earliest morning; then again, as the sun was setting, we saw its last rays fall upon the snow-white dome. As one looks upon the Taj from the noble gateway through which one enters the enclosing park, he sees also its reflection in the long lines of water that ...
— A Tour of the Missions - Observations and Conclusions • Augustus Hopkins Strong

... of another." But, after all, I will boldly and fearlessly rest my own character upon the following issue. If any one of those who have been railing against me, will come forward; if any person, male or female, will come forward and establish one act of seduction against me, even from the earliest period of my life, up to this hour; if they will produce one illegitimate offspring of mine, or prove that there ever has been such, even by common report; I hereby solemnly promise not to write, or have published, one more line as long as I remain in this prison. And further; if any one will ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt

... people as slow to adjust themselves to violent surprises as are the Japanese, there was an air of desperation about the whole business which greatly alarmed them, and made them determined at the earliest possible moment to throw every ounce of their weight in the direction which would best serve them by bringing matters back to their original starting-point. For this reason they were not only prepared in theory in 1911 to lend armed assistance to the Manchus but would have speedily ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale

... was notable for the great variety of corn, frejols, wheat, barley, etc. The famous cocoas known by the name of "Socomusco," and which since the earliest time have been recognized as among the best produced on the continent, were also represented in this section, as well as sugar, which is being produced in the country in respectable quantities. The attention of visitors was attracted by ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

... Fortunatus of Catania, the priest Venantius, the deacon Vitalis, and the notary Hilarius—with the most detailed instructions how to act. The intent was to test the emperor's sincerity—a foresight which after events completely justified. This instruction is said to be the earliest of the kind which has come down to us. Since nothing can so vividly represent the position of the Holy See as the words used by it on a great occasion at the very moment when it took place, I give a translation of it. In reading this it should be remembered ...
— The Formation of Christendom, Volume VI - The Holy See and the Wandering of the Nations, from St. Leo I to St. Gregory I • Thomas W. (Thomas William) Allies

... numerous. Generally oblong or circular in shape and almost as regular in outline as if drawn with a compass, they form vast archipelagoes like the famous group lying between Greece and Asia Minor, which mythology has made the scene of her earliest and most charming legends. As we gaze at them, the names of Naxos, Tenedos, Milo, and Carpathos rise up before our mind's eye, and we begin looking around for the Trojan fleet and Jason's Argo. This, at least, was Ardan's idea, and at first his eyes ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne

... at breakfast at nine, and for the twentieth time consulted his Bradshaw, to see at what earliest hour Dr Grantly could arrive from Barchester. As he examined the columns, he was nearly petrified by the reflection that perhaps the archdeacon might come up by the night-mail train! His heart sank within him at the horrid idea, and for a moment he felt himself dragged back to Barchester ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope

... sufferings he had been enduring, Prince Andrew enjoyed a blissful feeling such as he had not experienced for a long time. All the best and happiest moments of his life—especially his earliest childhood, when he used to be undressed and put to bed, and when leaning over him his nurse sang him to sleep and he, burying his head in the pillow, felt happy in the mere consciousness of ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... without any settled abode, concluding every day with schemes for defrauding the public of their subsistence for the next: where the children belonging to this numerous society are made use of to impose on the credulity of the benevolent, and where they are regularly trained, from their earliest infancy, in all those infamous practices, which are carried on systematically, and to such an alarming ...
— ESSAYS, Political, Economical and Philosophical. Volume 1. • Benjamin Rumford

... miracle. Through summer's withering heats and blighting droughts His own hands gave the thirsty roots to drink. In spring the first pale growth of tender green Thrilled him with scarcely less delight than mine At my babe's earliest glance of answering love. Daily he fed the tame free birds that went Singing among its boughs; he tended it, He watched, he cherished, yea he talked to it, As though it had a soul. God gave to him Two daughters, he was wont to say—one mute, And ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various

... to-morrow morning. Wheat—wheat—wheat, wheat—wheat—wheat! Instantly the jaded senses braced again, instantly the wearied mind sprang to its post. He turned out the lights, he locked the front door. Long since the great house was asleep. In the cold, dim silence of the earliest dawn Curtis Jadwin went to bed, only to lie awake, staring up into the darkness, planning, devising new measures, reviewing the day's doings, while the faint tides of blood behind the eardrums murmured ceaselessly to the overdriven ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris

... whom Briconnet had so cordially invited to assist him were compelled one by one to abandon Meaux. Among the earliest to leave was Farel.[170] His was no faint heart. If he gave up his activity in Brie, it was only to return to his native Dauphiny, where a young nobleman, Anemond de Coct, and a preacher, Pierre de Sebeville, ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird

... their own laws and magistrates, but others had Romans with their families settled in them, and were called colonies, while the Latin people themselves became Roman citizens in everything but the power of becoming magistrates or voting for them, being, in fact, very much what the earliest plebeians had been before they ...
— Young Folks' History of Rome • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... the plan. Stephen must pass the house on his way from the River Farm to the bridge, where he was to join the river-drivers on Monday morning. She would be out of bed by the earliest peep of dawn, put on Stephen's favorite pink calico, leave a note for her grandmother, run like a hare down her side of the river and up Stephen's, steal into the house, open blinds and windows, light the fire, and set the ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... heavy-faced gothic of his second font, are rubricated by the same hand, and though two of them are undated, were all evidently printed at about the same time. He was the first printer in Germany to make use of roman type, of which the earliest example seems to have been his "Calendarium pro anno 1472." He died in 1478, ten years after the appearance ...
— Catalogue of the William Loring Andrews Collection of Early Books in the Library of Yale University • Anonymous

... The earliest accounts of music which we possess are to be found in the Bible, in which the state of the world before the flood is noticed. Jubal is said to have been "the father of them that play upon the harp and organ;" ...
— A Catechism of Familiar Things; Their History, and the Events Which Led to Their Discovery • Benziger Brothers

... Mrs. Edward Chesterton did not approve of the rather arty-crafty atmosphere of Bedford Park—that earliest of Garden Cities, so conventionally unconventional—where Frances lived. She did not like her son's friendship with the Bloggs and she had chosen for him a girl who she felt would make him an ideal wife: "Very open air," Mr. Solomon said. ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward

... have also the same feeling; for it was prophesied to me, in my earliest youth, by a wise woman, that a stork would bring me great good luck; and perhaps I can tell in what manner we ...
— What the Animals Do and Say • Eliza Lee Follen

... expression of his genius—a fact which he could never understand, for it always seemed to him that prose was the natural expression of all mankind. His prose was, and always continued to be, masterly. Its earliest examples, outside of his critical papers in the North American Review and other periodicals (and outside of the Evening Post, of course), are two stories entitled "Medfield" and "The Skeleton's Cave," contributed by him to "Tales of the Glauber Spa" (1832)—a collection of original stories ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant

... I do not know it. It's ever thus. Doomed to disappointment from my earliest years. [Stup. endeavours ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan

... he proceeded. "I have deteriorated; but 'we always may be what we might have been'—and you have been sent to me again as a sign that it is not too late for me. You were my first love, my earliest ideal, and I have not changed, you see, I have been true to you; for, although I never suspected you were Beth, I recognised my rightful mate in you the moment we met. Yes, I was on the right road when we were boy and girl together, ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand

... administration in the Transvaal and Orange River Colony will at the earliest possible date be succeeded by Civil Government, and, as soon as circumstances permit, representative institutions, leading up to self-government, ...
— In the Shadow of Death • P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald

... stars to be unpropitious to Gustavus. This at once decided him. He resolved, however, to act on the defensive, and through the night employed the energies of his army in throwing up intrenchments. In the earliest dawn of the morning mass was celebrated throughout the whole camp, and Wallenstein on horseback rode along behind the redoubts, urging his troops, by every consideration, to fight valiantly for their ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott

... ancient civilisation of Babylon we find women in a position of honour, with privileges similar in many ways to those they enjoyed in Egypt. There are even indications that the earliest customs may have gone beyond those of the Egyptians in exalting women. All the available evidence points to the conclusion that at the opening of Babylonian history women had complete independence and equal rights with their husbands and brothers. ...
— The Position of Woman in Primitive Society - A Study of the Matriarchy • C. Gasquoine Hartley

... His earliest writings were historical in character, and consisted mainly of learned essays upon the classical ...
— Rudolph Eucken • Abel J. Jones

... to their destination an atmosphere of subdued excitement pervaded the Arabella, for even the sailors had caught the infection of the girls' eagerness and were anxious to get into action at the earliest moment. ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in the Red Cross • Edith Van Dyne

... know, dear Jan, that you will not mind financing Fay to this extent at present; as, owing to these wholly unexpected departmental complications, I am uncommonly hard up. I will, of course, repay you at the earliest ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker

... or Spaniard, to oppose us, and before long the land had been roughly surveyed and portioned out, my father, as an officer of good standing, being one of the earliest to choose; and in a very short time we were preparing to go out on the beautiful little estate that had become his, for the most part forest-land, with a patch or two of rich, easily-drained marsh on both sides of a little stream which ran, not far away, into the great river up which ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn

... most marvelous of the "coal-sacks'' are those that have been found by photography in Sagittarius. One of Barnard's earliest and most excellent photographs includes two of them, both in the star-cluster M8. The larger, which is roughly rectangular in outline, contains one little star, and its smaller neighbor is lune-shaped — surely a most singular form for such an object. Both are associated ...
— Curiosities of the Sky • Garrett Serviss

... manpower "within proportions corresponding to those in the civilian population." This policy, it added, must "be implemented promptly ... must be objective by nature ... must (p. 156) eliminate, at the earliest practicable moment, any special consideration based on race ... and should point towards the immediate objective of an evaluation of the Negro on the basis of individual merit ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.

... the A——'s, we sat down to supper, and never was there a sadder meal than this, when for the last time we sat at the hospitable board of these our earliest and latest Mexican friends. We were thankful when it was all over and we had taken leave, and when, accompanied to the inn by Seor A—-d and other gentlemen, we found ourselves fairly lodged in the diligence, on a dark and rather cold morning, sad, ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca

... fine large creek, containing a chain of large water-holes went to the north-east, and disembogued probably into Bremer's Bay. We followed it for three or four miles towards its head; and, when crossing it, we had a very heavy thunder-storm; at the earliest hour we had ever witnessed one. The Seaforthia palm because very abundant, and at last the forest was formed entirely of it, with trees of every size. Our guide showed us how we could easily obtain the young shoots, by splitting ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt

... entirely composed of iron. Nowadays, of course, there would be nothing remarkable in the use of such a material for such a purpose; but Telford was the first engineer to see the value of iron in this respect, and the Pont Cysylltau aqueduct was one of the earliest works in which he applied the new material to these unwonted uses. Such a step is all the more remarkable, because Telford's own education had lain entirely in what may fairly be called the "stone age" of English engineering; while his natural predilections as a stonemason ...
— Biographies of Working Men • Grant Allen

... upon the contending forces, and the assailants ceased firing and encamped for the night on the bank of the river. They were on the qui vive through the still hours, and so eager for the attack that with the earliest streakings of light in the east, they plunged into the stream and made for the barricades. It was not to be supposed that the Blackfeet would be taken off their guard, and the trappers expected to reach the defences through a hot fusillade from ...
— The Life of Kit Carson • Edward S. Ellis

... "The loveliest fade earliest, we all know," and the tears were in his honest, frivolous eyes, dashed away in the next moment as he exclaimed, eagerly, "Why, there goes the Lamarque equipage, as I live! I had forgotten all about it. The pleasantest woman in Savannah, young ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield

... of the Psalter for the laity, giving a few psalms for each day, and Alcuin had rendered a similar service by including a prayer for each day and some other prayers, but no lessons or homilies. The Breviary rightly so called, however, only dates from the 11th century; the earliest MS. containing the whole canonical office is of the year 1099 and is in the Mazarin library. Gregory VII. (pope 1073-1085), too, simplified the liturgy as performed at the Roman court, and gave his abridgment the name of Breviary, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various

... the first recorded exercise of the faculty of speech in Gen. ii. 19. Adam first used it to give names to all the living creatures as they passed in review before him. In accordance with this statement it appears, from the researches of philologists, that language in its earliest state was entirely, or almost entirely limited to words denoting sensible objects and actions. It seems probable that these names were derived from radicals expressing general ideas [Footnote: Max Muller's Lectures on the Science of Language, First Series ...
— The Story of Creation as told by Theology and by Science • T. S. Ackland

... bring to mind its primitive beauty; by which it may be said to be a type of the mystical body of Jesus Christ, which notwithstanding the decay of ages, does not cease to have vigorous and healthy members who are as fervent as those of the earliest periods. ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe

... superstitious population of agriculturists; the birth-rate is very high, and there is practically no public provision for the safeguarding of infant life. But its backward ignorant mothers tend and feed their babies after the manner of the earliest ages. ...
— Women's Wild Oats - Essays on the Re-fixing of Moral Standards • C. Gasquoine Hartley

... a word to me, sir," said he, not without blushing, do not say a word; I have given my orders, they will have to be executed." Bossuet held his tongue. "He had tried every thrust; had acted like a pontiff of the earliest times, with a freedom worthy of the earliest ages and the earliest bishops of the Church," says St. Simon. He saw the inutility of his efforts; henceforth, prudence and courtly behavior put a seal upon his lips. It was the time of the great king's omnipotence ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... outcome of the roving life of his early years. Before he was many months old, his parents, obedient to the dictates of military command, had moved from Dereham to Canterbury. The year 1809, however, saw them back again in the little Norfolk town with which Borrow's earliest recollections ...
— George Borrow in East Anglia • William A. Dutt

... interminable hours for those who were not engaged in the active preparations for the landing of people and stores. Captain Trigger was making ready to transfer the passengers from the ship at the earliest possible moment. He was far from certain that the Doraine would maintain its rather precarious balance on the rocks. With safety not much more than a stone's throw away, he was determined ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon

... Therefore God must have come into being some time between the issue of the creative fiat and the appearance of man on the planet. This is a pretty wide margin, but it is something to go upon. He may have been contemporary with the amoeba, or with the ichthyosaurus, or haply with the earliest quadrumana. At the very latest (if "always" is accurate) he must have made his appearance exactly at the same time as man; and if I were to give my opinion, I should say that was extremely probable. At all events, even if he preceded man by a few thousand or million ...
— God and Mr. Wells - A Critical Examination of 'God the Invisible King' • William Archer

... G. G. Glyn (the present Lord Wolverton), Captain Glyn (the late Admiral Henry Glyn), and Messrs. Newmarch, Benson, Blake, and myself. Mr. Berens, an old man and obstinate, bearing a name to be found in the earliest lists of Hudson's Bay shareholders, was somewhat insulting in his manner. We took it patiently. He seemed to be astounded at our assurance. "What! interfere with his Fertile belt, tap root, &c.!" Subsiding, we had a reasonable discussion, and were finally informed that ...
— Canada and the States • Edward William Watkin

... Jeanie Morrison, Gin I hae been to thee As closely twined wi' earliest thochts As ye hae been to me? Oh! tell me gin their music fills Thine ear as it does mine; Oh! say gin e'er your heart grows great Wi' dreamings ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various

... Provident Institution for Savings and the Primary Schools; the former giving to the laborer the means of sustaining himself in times of pressure, and the latter placing almost at his door the means of instruction for his children from the earliest age. The union of the Primary Schools with the Grammar Schools and the High Schools in this place constitutes a system of public education unparalleled, it is believed, in any country. It would not be easy to name an ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various

... wanderers, peculiar by reason of the very characteristic that would have resulted from the Hussite oath, made their first appearance in Europe at this very period,—between 1418 and 1427,—and in those very countries in which the Orphans ought first to have been seen. But the earliest circumstantial notice of a company of Gypsies relates to the one that visited Paris in 1427. Pasquier gave a particular account of them, and remarks, that, though they had a very bad name, and though he was with them a great deal, he "never lost ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various

... for any quantity of gold part with the wonderful tales which he has retained from his earliest childhood, or met with in ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 215, December 10, 1853 • Various

... children on a new farm, the frequent change of teachers, the endless variety of text-books, the vexing elements of national prejudice and religious differences, had told on its efficiency and success. Yet it had been a power for good in Gershom and in all the country round. From the earliest settlement of the place the leading men had taken pains to encourage and support it. Its teachers had generally been college students from the neighbouring States, who taught one year to get money to carry them through the next, or graduates ...
— David Fleming's Forgiveness • Margaret Murray Robertson

... and it is a comfort to me in my old age to know that I am not far away from a fort, that I can almost see the beautiful flag, as it sways in the breeze, can almost hear the drum and fife, the music of my childhood, and can feel that they are near me, in dear old Fort Snelling, my earliest home. ...
— 'Three Score Years and Ten' - Life-Long Memories of Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and Other - Parts of the West • Charlotte Ouisconsin Van Cleve

... make me believe," he said, "that this gang, or one like it, has been doin' this gas business all along. In the first place the earliest, mysterious death on Dot and Dash took place many years ago, before poison gas in war was thought of. I won't deny that this bunch back there," and he nodded in the direction of Smugglers' Glen, "I won't deny but what they may be usin' war gas. ...
— The Boy Ranchers in Death Valley - or Diamond X and the Poison Mystery • Willard F. Baker

... lacking in mercy, that vigour was always exercised within the law. He never transgressed the rules of war, but his headlong energy sometimes landed him close to the dead line. He had already breakfasted, when the earliest risers entered the morning room to saunter about the sideboards and investigate the simmering contents of silver-covered ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers

... this newfound romantic love went a completely practical attitude toward those Americans still existing in the flesh. The earliest expatriates, being generally men of substance, were well received. The thousands who had crossed by small boats from Canada to Greenland and from Greenland to Iceland to Europe were by definition in a different category and found the quota system their fathers and grandfathers had devised ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore

... the Sturtevants had lived during many generations was a house even older than The Maples. It was far more quaintly ancient in style, and had been one of the many "Headquarters" of our Revolutionary generals. The earliest built house in the county, the part first erected still stood strong and intact, though little used now. On this portion of the Mansion the roof ended sharp at the eaves on one side, and but a few feet above the ground; the opposite ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond

... buildings we also observed several towers or fire signals—high buildings, from which with rods of iron in various directions are given the earliest intimation of fire, which is communicated by a flag in the day or lamps in the night. These towers were formerly more necessary when a large part of the city was built ...
— A Journey in Russia in 1858 • Robert Heywood

... 18 years of age for compulsory military service; 16 years of age for voluntary service; from 2007, at the earliest, compulsory military service obligation will be reduced from 8 months ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... its earliest days, "I cal'late," a certain somebody began to say to General Byington, "th' never was a happier weddin' so quiet, nor a qui—" But he caught the sheen of his daughter's spectacles ...
— Bylow Hill • George Washington Cable

... all maps, from the earliest published to the latest issued by the local railroads, a town with the name of Taos, which never had an existence. Fernandez de Taos is the chief city, which has been known so long by the title of the valley that perhaps the misnomer is excusable ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman

... on their future course; and, after joining his client in the hall, at once pointed out the utterly absurd conclusion at which the jury had arrived; declared that there must be friends of the plaintiff among them, and that Mr. Ricochet would take the earliest opportunity of moving for a new trial; a piece of information which quite lit up the coarse features of his client, as a breath of air will bring a passing glow to the mouldering embers of an ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris

... and lively relish for literature, for social conversation, for whatever was interesting in the occurrences of the time, and even in political affairs. She had been, during the war of our Revolution, an ardent patriot, and the earliest lesson of unbounded devotion to the cause of their country that her children received was from her. She had the most delicate sense of propriety of conduct, but nothing uncharitable, nothing bitter. Her price ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various

... time came for breaking up, Melbury and his family being the earliest to leave, the two card-players still pursuing their game doggedly in the corner, where they had completely covered Giles's mahogany table with chalk scratches. The three walked home, the distance being short ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy

... [afterwards "general"] Daniel Boone, in the United States' service, was one of the earliest settlers in Kentucky, where he signalized himself by many daring exploits ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.

... left this to the second day. Very probably I lost no time in going to the office of the Saturday Press, as soon as I had my breakfast after arriving, and I have a dim impression of anticipating the earliest of the Bohemians, whose gay theory of life obliged them to a good many hardships in lying down early in the morning, and rising up late in the day. If it was the office-boy who bore me company during the first hour of my visit, by-and-by the editors and contributors actually began ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... is counteracted by them; but its operation is incessant, and it has never yet failed in producing its effect, for the triumph of poverty over wealth on the great scale as on the small, though very irregular in its pace, has continued without interruption from the earliest records to the ...
— An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations. • William Playfair

... parson lifted from the shelf the huge tome, "made to view his life and actions in." He drew his chair to the fire and began to turn over the earliest leaves. Greta had thrown on her cloak ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine

... commanded the wonder of the world, then faded out and disappeared; and not one of them except the latest ever invented any sweeping and adequate way to kill people. They all did their best—to kill being the chiefest ambition of the human race and the earliest incident in its history—but only the Christian civilization has scored a triumph to be proud of. Two or three centuries from now it will be recognized that all the competent killers are Christians; then the pagan world will go to school ...
— The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories • Mark Twain

... followed by curses and a shower of stones; but to these he gave no heed, caring only to reach freer spaces at the earliest. Still he advanced with the greatest effort. People who had encamped would not move, and heaped loud curses on Caesar and the praetorians. The throng assumed in places a threatening aspect. Thousands of voices accused Nero ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03 • Various

... has been written on the widespread belief that a dead person's wounds would bleed afresh in the presence of his murderer. The passage in our text is interesting as being the earliest literary reference to the belief. Other instances will be found in Shakespear ("King Richard III., Act. I., Sc. 2), Cervantes ("Don Quixote"), Scott ("Ballads"), and Schiller ("Braut von Messina"). In the 15th and 16th ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes

... of the way to the toll-gate seemed very short to Dick, but he had time enough to make up his mind that he would see the captain at the earliest possible moment; that he would deliver his message and the letter of Lieutenant Asher; that he would immediately bring up the matter of Maria Port and let the captain know the mischief that woman had done. Then, ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton

... there have been attempts to encumber its scutcheon with the quarterings of a fabulous antiquity. Gram, we are told, was in some primeval time the generic name for all independent leaders of men, and was borne by one of the earliest kings of Denmark. Another has surmised that if Graham be the proper spelling of the name, it may be compounded of Gray and Ham, the dwelling, or home, of Gray; but if Grame, or Graeme, be the correct form, then we must regard it as a genuine Saxon word, signifying fierce, or grim. ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris

... earliest record to give the names of all those who took part in the ceremonies. Two of the poorer women were burned; Dame Alice Kyteler returned to England; William Outlaw, her son, was imprisoned for a time. Nothing is known of the fate ...
— The Witch-cult in Western Europe - A Study in Anthropology • Margaret Alice Murray

... side are the poorer—by how much we can never know. What strengthens the conviction that he might yet have surpassed himself and dwarfed his own best work is, certainly no immaturity, for the flavour of wisdom and old experience hangs about his earliest writings, but a vague sense awakened by that brilliant series of books, so diverse in theme, so slight often in structure and occasions so gaily executed, that here was a finished literary craftsman, who had served his period of apprenticeship and was playing with his tools. ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Walter Raleigh

... beauty only hold their revels In life's familiar, penetrable levels: What of its ocean-floor? I dwell there evermore. From almost earliest youth I raised the lids o' the truth, And forced her bend on me her shrinking sight; Ever I knew me Beauty's eremite, In antre of this lowly body set. Girt with a thirsty solitude of soul. Nathless I not forget How I ...
— Sister Songs • Francis Thompson

... good that Bob acted upon it at his earliest opportunity. He found Welton riding his old brindle mule in from the bull donkey where he had been inspecting the work. The lumberman's red, jolly face lit up with a smile of real affection as he recognized Bob, an expression ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White

... want all boys taught from their earliest years is, roughly speaking, that boys came into the world to take care of girls. Whatever modification may take place in our view of the relation of the sexes, Nature's great fact will remain, that the man is the stronger—a difference which civilization ...
— The Power of Womanhood, or Mothers and Sons - A Book For Parents, And Those In Loco Parentis • Ellice Hopkins

... it is due to some inborn fatality of imagination, or to having heard some story or other of the kind with which children are so rashly allowed to be frightened, but the fact is, that since my earliest years nothing has caused me so much horror and alarm as a woman alone, in the street, at a late hour of the night. The effect is the same whether I actually encounter her, or simply have an image ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Spanish • Various

... in a dim room near, until it was almost midnight, quiet and sad together. At times his grief would seek relief in a burst like that in which it had found its earliest expression; but, besides that his little strength would soon have been unequal to such strains, he never failed to recall her words, and to reproach himself and calm himself. The only utterance with which he indulged his sorrow, was the frequent exclamation that his brother was gone, alone; ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... each impression of the beauty and novelty. It quickened associations of his earliest days, and of the winter among his native hills. He felt that life could be very pleasant in this latitude; he relinquished the notion he had cherished at times of going to South America with his family in case he should finally fail to arrange with the company for his safe ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells

... Graeme, and down the hill we tore and rocked and swayed to the amazement of the steady team, whose education from the earliest years had impressed upon their minds the criminality of attempting to do anything but walk carefully down a hill, at least for two-thirds of the way. Through the village, in a cloud of dust, we swept, catching a glimpse ...
— Black Rock • Ralph Connor

... a ruined house that stood on the road side. "Oh, heavens!" he cried, "what do I see: silent, unroofed, and desolate! Are all thy gay tenants gone? do I hear their hum no more Edwards, look there, look there? the scene of my infant joys, my earliest friendships, laid waste and ruinous! That was the very school where I was boarded when you were at South-hill; 'tis but a twelve-month since I saw it standing, and its benches filled with cherubs: that opposite side of the road was the green on which ...
— The Man of Feeling • Henry Mackenzie

... Entertainment, and he was feeling none too well at ease. It had occurred to him that his drastic action might have more disastrous effects than merely nipping Denis's passion in the bud, and he wished to rejoin the company at Brineweald at the earliest possible moment. ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici

... father and I, we had long been estranged. Not even in my earliest childhood have I the memory of a gentle word, a fatherly pressure of the hand. So I grew to young manhood with no knowledge of a mother's or father's love—for my mother," here his voice lowered, reverently, "died ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield

... indignation were upon all their faces at the sight of the devastated house, and their feelings were redoubled when they found that the whole of the family, who were so justly liked and esteemed, were dead. The Edwards and the Jamiesons were among the earliest arrivals, bringing the Gaucho Martinez with them. Perez, too, shortly after arrived from Canterbury, he having been out on the ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty

... In the earliest weeks of Punch's existence Kenny Meadows had been the Nestor of the least; but when Jerrold joined the Staff three months later, he took by force of character and wit, and power of lung, a leading position on the paper and at the Table—a position which he never resigned. Notwithstanding ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann

... ran into Simon's Bay, and captain Tomkinson set off immediately for Cape Town with his despatches to vice-admiral Bertie and His Excellency the earl of Caledon; he took also a letter from me to the admiral, making application, conformably to my instructions, for the earliest passage to England; and requesting, if any circumstance should place general De Caen within his power, that he would be pleased to demand my journal from him, and cause it to be transmitted to the Admiralty. I went on shore next morning and waited upon ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders

... worthy captain in the English Navy, had associated his son with him, from the young man's earliest years, in the perils and adventures of his profession. The fine little fellow, who seemed to have never known the meaning of fear, early revealed a keen and active mind, an investigating intelligence, and a remarkable ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne

... Porky; "but you can bet we are slated to get right out of the immediate vicinity of here at our earliest convenience!" ...
— The Boy Scouts on a Submarine • Captain John Blaine

... lay in surmounting the prejudices of the young duchess herself. That princess had imbibed a strong prepossession against the French nation, particularly against Charles, the author of all the calamities which, from her earliest infancy, had befallen her family. She had also fixed her affections on Maximilian; and as she now deemed him her husband, she could not, she thought, without incurring the greatest guilt, and violating the most ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume

... never have been mistaken for any other than a good Norman. He was endowed with the gift of oratory peculiar to the country; and his profanity was enriched with all the flavor of the provincial's elation in the committing of sin. From the earliest moment of our starting, the stream of his talk had been unending. His vocabulary was such as to have excited the envy and despair of a French realist, impassioned in the pursuit ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd

... legislative authority as well. He is thoroughly versed in the history of 'the struggle between liberty and authority,' which he says 'is the most conspicuous feature in the portions of history with which we are earliest familiar, particularly in that of Greece, Rome, and England. But in old times this contest was between subjects, or some classes of subjects, and the government. By liberty was meant protection against the tyranny of political rulers.' This struggle ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... him than it could have had, for instance, with an Italian. Reanda entirely agreed with him on this point, and when Gloria spoke of it, he never failed to draw a lively picture of the drawbacks attending stage life. The artist spoke very strongly, for one of Gloria's earliest and chiefest attractions in his eyes had been the certainty he felt that she belonged to Francesca's class. For that reason her flattering admiration had brought with it a peculiar savour, especially delightful to the taste of a man of humble origin. Dalrymple did not understand that, but ...
— Casa Braccio, Volumes 1 and 2 (of 2) • F. Marion Crawford

... know, for instance, that an Egyptian king some 2000 years before Christ possessed a fleet of 400 fighting ships. But it appears now that long before this time the island of Crete was a great naval and commercial power, that in the earliest dynasties of Egypt Cretan fleets were carrying on a commerce with the Nile valley. Indeed, the Cretans may have taught the Egyptians something of the art of building sea-going ships for trade and war.[1] ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott

... having resumed the ancient classical tradition there, with no break or obstruction, as it had happened, in any very considerable work of the middle age. Immediately before him, on the square, steep height, where the earliest little old Rome had huddled itself together, arose the palace of the Caesars. Half-veiling the vast substruction of rough, brown stone—line upon line of successive ages of builders—the trim, old-fashioned garden walks, under their closely-woven walls of dark glossy foliage, test of long ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater

... I,' he said to himself, 'like other men of honour, take the earliest opportunity to welcome to Britain the descendant of her ancient kings, and lineal heir of her throne? Why did ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott

... obsessed with the spirit of militarism and almost everything else had been sacrificed to this idol. The very first appearance of Germans in history is as a warlike people. The earliest German literature is of folk-tales about war heroes, and these stories tell of the ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller

... was mainly owing to the liberal expenditure of the governor, Colonel Gawler, who saw the policy at the earliest possible opportunity of making adequate preparation for the stream of population that was so rapidly flowing in. Every public building was erected on a scale to suit the anticipated splendour of the ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes

... that if their reasons be well considered they will be found to be so simple and so conformed, to common sense as to appear less extraordinary and less paradoxical than any others which can be held on the same subjects; nor do I even boast of being the earliest discoverer of any of them, but only of having adopted them, neither because they had nor because they had not been held by others, but solely because reason has convinced ...
— A Discourse on Method • Rene Descartes

... true view to others, and that is what I was trying to do to-day; though it is only lately that I have preached hereabout. The first months of my ministry have been spent in the North of England among strangers, where I preferred to make my earliest clumsy attempts, so as to acquire courage before undergoing that severest of all tests of one's sincerity, addressing those who have known one, and have been one's companions in the days of darkness. If you could only know, ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy

... celebrity that Edith had first met him; she had known him intimately all her life. From her earliest childhood she had, so to speak, been brought up on Landi; on Landi's music and Landi's views of life. He had been her mother's music teacher soon after he first made a name in London; and long before he was the star whose ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson

... destined to remain in Ireland. From his earliest years he had looked forward to the time when he might devote himself to missionary efforts for the benefit of those who knew not the Christian faith. In the forty-second year of his age he exiled himself voluntarily from his beloved country to preach ...
— A Calendar of Scottish Saints • Michael Barrett

... possessor of a large portrait by Cezanne, done in his earliest manner. This he had to sell on account of pressing need. Dark days followed. He moved across the street into smaller quarters. The old crowd began to drift away; some died, some had become famous, and ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker

... our language of the Petrarchan sonnet, and with it of a tenderness and refinement of sentiment unknown to the barbarism of our preceding versifiers; but what is much more, that of heroic blank verse; a noble measure, of which the earliest example exists in Surry's spirited and faithful version of ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin

... was so handsome. He was tall and slim, with brown hair and big open eyes; his complexion was clear and smooth, and his teeth shone when he laughed. He was quite conscious of his beauty, but, as everybody had petted him from his earliest days, his vanity was of a cheerful, good-natured sort, which, after all, was not so offensive. He was exceedingly fond of his friend. He amused himself and sometimes others by teasing him and making fun of him; but he knew Charles's face so thoroughly that he saw at once when ...
— Tales of Two Countries • Alexander Kielland

... nothing of the presence of opposite feelings, is of itself sufficient to prevent effective learning, whether of knowledge or of skill. And when the opposite feelings are present, the acquired act or idea tends to be pushed out of the system at the earliest opportunity. It is in some such way as this that many specialists in the workings of the human mind would explain so much of our "forgetting." They say that we forget either because we really wish to forget—the facts are unpleasant— or because we do not sufficiently care to remember—the ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg

... From their earliest infancy the female children are engaged or betrothed to a future husband, and in case of his death, they belong to his heir. But this arrangement is frequently prevented by the horrid practice, common among these barbarians, of stealing their wives, and taking them away by main force. Indeed, it ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden

... earliest days of the occupation Pretoria was always full of spies, and the English were aware of it, but, do what they would, they ...
— The Petticoat Commando - Boer Women in Secret Service • Johanna Brandt

... have the same method of procuring your livelihood as we have; our Saviour has given you teachers, as he has given us: be thankful to him that they make known to you his precious words, and all his deeds, which are full of life and happiness. I have, from my earliest infancy, been instructed in this blessed doctrine, for I have grown up in the congregation. When you read this, you may very likely think that I have always lived to the joy of our Saviour; but, alas, I have been, particularly in my youth, very often ungrateful towards him who died for me. ...
— The Moravians in Labrador • Anonymous

... by tracing the differences of sex function to their earliest appearances in life on the globe; not only as when in the animal world, two amoeboid globules coalesce, and the process of sexual generation almost unconsciously begins; but to its yet more primitive manifestations in plant life. In the first three chapters I traced, as far ...
— Woman and Labour • Olive Schreiner

... built, after a short time, a chapel or tabernacle of wood, in their garden, and gave to the Baptists "for ever" the "piece of land adjoining the chapel-field," as a burying-place; and in this little cemetery have all the earliest leading members of this influential body been interred. It has been quite full for some years, and in consequence the Necropolis Cemetery sprung as it were from it, where dissenters of all denominations could be buried. The Baptists, increasing in ...
— Recollections of Old Liverpool • A Nonagenarian

... house, is as essential an element of a morning call as the making a bow or shaking hands, and to refuse to take off your glass would be as great an incivility as to decline taking off your hat. From earliest times, as the grand old ballad of the King of Thule tells us, a beaker was considered the fittest token a lady could ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)

... Imaginative Inspiration; 3. Truth and Beauty (one figure); 4. Religion; 5. Wealth; and 6. Family joys (a woman with babes). In this panel the background contains suggestions of Asiatic and American cities. In the other panel the background shows a group of ships, ranging from those of the earliest times to the ...
— An Art-Lovers guide to the Exposition • Shelden Cheney



Words linked to "Earliest" :   soonest, earlier, comparative degree



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