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Scrutiny   /skrˈutəni/   Listen
Scrutiny

noun
1.
The act of examining something closely (as for mistakes).  Synonym: examination.
2.
A prolonged intense look.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Scrutiny" Quotes from Famous Books



... essayist, pamphleteer, book-lover, and book-collector, who was equally at home in the world of society and the world of literature. Nothing that was good in books, whether ancient or modern, escaped his curious scrutiny, and at his hospitable table, which might truly be called a "Festive Board," authors great and small rubbed shoulders with dandies and diplomats and statesmen. On the 16th of June, 1863, Matthew Arnold wrote—"On Sunday I dined with Monckton Milnes,[51] and met all the advanced Liberals in religion ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell

... centered. Peter had known fear many times, for fear was in the air for weeks along the Russian front, the fear of German shells, of poison gas, and of that worst poison of all—Russian treachery. But that fear was not like this fear, which was intimate, personal but intangible. He marked it in the scrutiny of the man who opened the door and of the aged woman who suddenly appeared beside him in the dim hallway and led him noiselessly up the stair to a lighted room upon the second floor. At the ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs

... illegitimate influences or the incurrence of personal obligation. To no one in particular did Cleveland owe his nomination. Besides, his success as a politician, his character as a public official, and his enthusiastic devotion to the clients whose causes he championed, challenged the most careful scrutiny. He was then unmarried, forty-four years old, tall, stoutly-built, with a large head, dark brown hair, clear keen eyes, and a generous and kindly nature concealed under a slightly brusque manner. His sturdy old-fashioned rectitude, and the ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander

... preservation of its qualities. The colour of its skin, in a perfect state of health, is scarcely discernible from the trees and grass, in which it delights to conceal itself, and is not to be discovered at all without a very minute scrutiny. It remains immoveable for a length of time, and its motions are all cautious and slow, continuing to loll out its tongue, which is long and glutinous, in order to secure the little insects that are necessary to its nourishment; and I doubt not but it ...
— Observations Upon The Windward Coast Of Africa • Joseph Corry

... brother, hastened to her chamber and subjected her heart to a scrutiny it had never experienced. She was startled upon an examination her brother's language had suggested, to find the interest Pownal had awakened in her bosom. She had been pleased to be in his company, and to receive ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams

... requested to take off my cloak to display the pattern of my dress, and the performance of a very inefficient country modiste passed off as the latest Parisian fashion. My bonnet and cloak were subjected to a like scrutiny, and the pattern of the dress was taken, after which I was allowed to ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird

... instant, there came into her own a look of eager search; no softly inquiring gaze, such as would be natural to most women on a casual meeting of this sort, but a full, energetic, self-reliant scrutiny. I don't think the compression about her lips was softened by her surprise at seeing me; but that keen level look from her eyes brought a wonderful change over her face, so that from being interesting it became attractive, and I was fired by a kind of enthusiasm in beholding it. Involuntarily ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various

... A temper of scrutiny and dissent broke out in every direction. In almost every relation men and women asked themselves by what right Conformity levied its tax, and whether they were not false to their own consciences in paying it. 'What a fertility ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. 1, Essay 5, Emerson • John Morley

... to find it out, it was not probable that any one else would detect it. Indeed, no one but himself and Mr. Millard had any thing to do with the general cash account of the establishment, and he knew very well that the latter did not examine it with a very close scrutiny. Finally, pressing demands for money determined him to put the surplus into his pocket, at least for the present. He did so, and in that act let into his mind a flood of evil counsellors, whose arguments, enforced by his own cupidities, could at any ...
— Home Lights and Shadows • T. S. Arthur

... the business of Governments—the preservation of the prosperity and power of the state. With the unexpected prolongation of the war and the British recognition of the Northern "will to conquer" there came, as is evident from a scrutiny of Russell's diplomatic tone and acts, a growing belief that the North might after all succeed in its purpose, at least of subjugating the South. This would mean the possibility of continuing that policy of friendship for a united America which had been determined upon ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams

... the United States and Germany had not yet been officially established, and it was believed that only correspondence from and to suspected persons and firms was being opened, and the writer had no reason to expect that this particular letter would come under the scrutiny of the censor. ...
— Right Above Race • Otto Hermann Kahn

... of the poplars stretched across the road, a man carrying a small kettle stopped and gazed, first at the bill and then at the house. When he had reached the corner of the fence, he again stopped and looked cautiously up and down the road. Apparently satisfied with the result of his scrutiny, he deliberately sat himself down in the dark shadow of the fence, and at once busied himself in some employment, so well concealed as to be invisible to the gaze of passers-by. At the end of an ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte

... that Dr. Hitchens is rather new to this line of advocacy. In the course of time he will learn—if indeed he has not already learnt, and is concealing the fact—that the "converted infidels" will not stand a minute's scrutiny. The only safe method is to drop questionable cases and resort to sheer invention. Even that method, however, is not devoid of peril, as one of its practitioners has recently discovered. The Rev. Hugh Price Hughes ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (Second Series) • George W. Foote

... of Bob Brownley. No one else in Wall Street had the power, the nerve, and the devilish cruelty to rip things as they had been ripped during the last twenty minutes. The night before I had passed Bob in the theatre lobby. I gave him close scrutiny and saw the look of which I of all men best knew the meaning. The big brown eyes were set on space; the outer corners of the handsome mouth were drawn hard and tense as though weighted. As I had my wife with me it was impossible to follow him, but when I got home ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson

... old cautious scrutiny that I knew so well; the very familiarity of it, after all these months, set me smiling in a way that might have reassured him; for dimly already ...
— The Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung

... universe, in the midst of giant forces of which, after science has made its most searching investigation and said its last word, we know comparatively little and that little imperfectly. No set of men is more ready to admit this state of affairs than that which has made the closest scrutiny of the phenomena of nature. There is a host of questions to which the most painstaking investigation on the part of the philosophers can afford ...
— Studies in the Life of the Christian • Henry T. Sell

... duty was concerned he became a different being. The gentle tones grew curt and peremptory, and the absent demeanour gave place to a most purposeful energy. His vigilance was marvellous: his eye was everywhere; he let nothing pass without his personal scrutiny. The unfortunate officer accused of indolence or neglect found the shy and quiet professor transformed into the most implacable of masters. No matter how high the rank of the offender, the crime met with the punishment it deserved. The scouts compared him with Lee. The latter was so genial ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... religious man himself holds it as a veritable portent that he outlived such a terrible trial; but even this did not satisfy them as subsequently the Secretary again called Father Ceferino to subject him to a further scrutiny, as ridiculous as it was malicious, though it did not go beyond words ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester

... are many examples is shown in plan in figure 9. These ruins occur on the flat, next the cliff, which is seldom bayed and overhangs but slightly. They are usually so much obliterated that only careful scrutiny reveals the presence of wall lines, and walls standing to a height of 6 inches above the ground are rare. In the example illustrated no traces of a kiva can be found, but the almost complete destruction of the ...
— The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona • Cosmos Mindeleff

... had as yet escaped destruction. Hurrying in, I stumbled over the corpse of a man. His rifle lay on the ground, while his hand grasped an axe, the blade covered with gore. I gazed on his face, and recognised, after a moment's scrutiny, my own brother-in-law. He had fallen while defending his hearth and home. Close to him lay a young boy, who, I guessed, was his eldest child, ...
— Afar in the Forest • W.H.G. Kingston

... cases, playing solitaire, and talking freely to Molly of various internes and patients who admired her. She marked herself at once as unused to children by calling Timothy "little man," and, except for a vague, friendly scrutiny of his tray three times a day, did nothing at all—even leaving the care of ...
— Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories • Kathleen Norris

... appear at Mr. Barnard's in time for breakfast—which, luckily, was somewhat late, owing to the party over night. I suppose all at the table were too much fatigued themselves to notice our jaded appearance—of course, it would not have borne a very rigid scrutiny. Schoolboys, however, can accomplish wonders in the way of deception, and I verily believe not one of our friends in Nantucket had the slightest suspicion that the terrible story told by some sailors in town of their having run down a vessel at sea and drowned ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... the pressure of their legislative duties. Was this the time, therefore, for passing a measure of such a far-reaching character, and where every clause demanded the most careful consideration and scrutiny? Was it the right thing because he had a majority at his back for the Minister to say that they must get this Bill through this session? He held that this was not right. It was not fair to those who had the solution of the question at ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje

... to her feet, feeling herself giddy, and knowing that she was white with agitation. Her one idea was to get away—to escape the scrutiny of the intense gaze which was ...
— A Manifest Destiny • Julia Magruder

... closely observed these indications of departure in the ship so often named, to turn his eyes on the vessel which lay without the fort, in order to witness the effect so manifest a signal had produced in her, also. But the closest and the keenest scrutiny could have detected no sign of any bond of interest between the two. While the firmer was making the movements just described, the latter lay at her anchors without the smallest proof that man existed within ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper

... donkey; Burade, one of the Burud or Basor caste; Naktode, one with a broken nose, and so on. Each subcaste has a number of septs, a total of 66 being recorded for the Tiroles alone. The names of the septs confirm the hypothesis arrived at from a scrutiny of the subcastes that the Kunbis are largely recruited from the pre-Aryan or aboriginal tribes. Conclusions as to the origin of the caste can better be made in its home in Bombay, but it may be noted that in Canara, according to the accomplished author of A ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell

... for that of Continental India, embracing, as the former does, much that is common to both, as well as possessing within itself a fauna peculiar to the island, that will amply repay more extended scrutiny. ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... shrinks from impartial observation and repels unfavorable criticism as hostility. We freely proffer our farms, our factories, our warehouses, common-schools, alms-houses, inns, and whatever else may be deemed peculiar among us, to our visitors' scrutiny and comment: we know they are not perfect, and welcome any hint that may conduce to their improvement. So in the broad, free West. The South alone resents any criticism on her peculiarities, and repels as enmity any attempt to convince her that her ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... that the singularly ugly and deformed man at the next table was gazing at him with an intense, almost excited scrutiny. But, more disturbing than this, was the scowl of hate on the face of another man, as handsome as this other was hideous, who sat in a far corner hidden behind a broad column, with rude elbows on the table, gawking first at Northwood ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science February 1930 • Various

... back to a pine, and, laying the sombrero by his side, he looked full at her, conscious of a singular eagerness, as if he wanted to verify by close scrutiny a first hasty impression. If there had been an instinct in his meeting with Colter, there was more in this. The girl half sat, half leaned against a log, with the shiny little carbine across her knees. She had a level, curious gaze upon ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey

... son, Sommers had not seen until his coming to Chicago. At a first glance, then, he could feel that in the son the family had taken a further leap from the simplicity of the older generation. Incidentally the young man's cool scrutiny had instructed him that the family had not committed Parker Hitchcock to him. Young Hitchcock had returned recently to the family lumber yards on the West Side and the family residence on Michigan Avenue, with about ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... propriety of the measures themselves. They will consider the conformity of the thing proposed or required to their immediate interests or aims; the momentary conveniences or inconveniences that would attend its adoption. All this will be done; and in a spirit of interested and suspicious scrutiny, without that knowledge of national circumstances and reasons of state, which is essential to a right judgment, and with that strong predilection in favor of local objects, which can hardly fail to mislead the decision. The same process must be repeated in every member of which ...
— The Federalist Papers

... visible emotion whilst he conducted his sad scrutiny. When he was assured that this silent company was beyond mortal help he at once strode away towards the nearest belt of trees. He could not tell how long the search for water might be protracted, and there was pressing ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy

... looked down; Lawrence held his eyes on him until Westby looked up and then, in even greater embarrassment under this prolonged scrutiny, down again. Then Lawrence ...
— The Jester of St. Timothy's • Arthur Stanwood Pier

... smiling star appeared. It was Venus watching lovers, as men of the crumbled centuries had besought her to do, when they named her so long ago, kneeling upon their hills with bended heads, and arms stretched out to her sweet eternal scrutiny. Beneath her wandering rays as they danced down to bless them Rodriguez and Serafina talked low in the sight of the goddess, and their voices swayed through the flowers with whispers and winds, not troubling ...
— Don Rodriguez - Chronicles of Shadow Valley • Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, Baron, Dunsany

... type, as compared in statues with the familiar Greek, the head of the "White Captive" is large; but that it is too large, or in excess of the least of a thousand female heads that have been gathered around it since it was first exposed to the public scrutiny, we have failed to discover in repeated and careful examinations; and we are constrained to commend such as may be exercised on that point to the critical flippancies of the jaunty gentlemen who find the hips at once too broad and too narrow, the bosom too full and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27, January, 1860 • Various

... matter over and over when Brother Tom returned. She scanned his face with a keen scrutiny, eager to get at what he had learned, yet not ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various

... exuberant. The balance is preserved by a corresponding number of Arachnida. On May 25 and 26 the east wall of the vicarage of Burgh-by-sands was coated with a tissue of web so delicate that it required a very close scrutiny to detect it. I could find none of the spinners. Every square inch of the building appeared coated with filmy lines, crossing in places, but mostly horizontal, from north ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1082, September 26, 1896 • Various

... to the opening in the cabin-hood, and, for a single moment before he spoke, once more examined the countenance of his prisoner, with a keen eye. Dillon had removed his hands from before his sallow features; and, as if conscious of the scrutiny his looks were to undergo, had concentrated the whole expression of his forbidding aspect in a settled gaze of hopeless submission to his fate. At least, so thought his captor, and the idea touched some ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper

... the beard and pondered, I began to see that if anything was to be done, it must be by searching in the coffin itself, and the clearer this became to me, the greater was my dislike to set about such a task. So I put off the evil hour, by feigning to myself that it was necessary to make a careful scrutiny of the beard, and thus wasted at least ten minutes. But at length, seeing that the candle was burning low, and could certainly last little more than half an hour, and considering that it must now be getting near dawn, I buckled to the distasteful work of rummaging ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner

... specially devoted to the work of education. In all this period of time, the Legislature has never been called upon to provide money for the expenses which have thus been incurred; and, though a rigid scrutiny has been exercised over the expenditures of the educational department, measures for the promotion of the common schools have never been considered in relation to the general finances of the commonwealth. While some states have hesitated, and others have vacillated, ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell

... scrutiny was not without effect. Suddenly he raised his dark eyes, and she felt them pierce the obscurity of her kitchen with a quick, suspicious, impatient penetration, which as they met hers gave way, however, to a look that she thought was gently reproachful. Then he rose, ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... knee as he uttered this meditative monosyllable, and continued to regard his niece with keener scrutiny, if that were possible, than before. 'It is John's temper—a very firebrand. My dear, you are very young, and you should not be above taking advice. Let me advise you to control that fiery passion. Temper doesn't pay—it is one of the ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan

... services of Lincoln to the cause of union defy description. A judicial scrutiny of the war reveals his thought and planning in every part of the varied activity that finally crowned Northern arms with victory. Is it in the field of diplomacy? Does Seward, the Secretary of State, propose harsh and caustic measures likely to draw England's sword into the scale? Lincoln ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard

... creeds cannot, strictly speaking, invalidate, still less refute, the creeds themselves, though it may, and doubtless often does weaken the confidence with which they are held. This weakening of religious faith as a consequence of a closer scrutiny of religious origins is unquestionably a matter of great importance to the community; for society has been built and cemented to a great extent on a foundation of religion, and it is impossible to loosen the cement and shake the foundation without endangering ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer

... girl, Mr. Carleton," said Mrs. Evelyn with an indescribable look—outwardly benign, but beneath that most keen in its scrutiny. ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner

... looked up at her rather earnestly, though his finger was in his mouth the while; and then having ended his scrutiny gave a grave little nod of assent, and moved round and ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner

... whenever I take any step or come to any decision—though I may have given the matter mature consideration—it afterwards attacks what I have done, without, however, being each time necessarily in the right. This is, I suppose, only a form of rectification on the part of the spirit of scrutiny; but it often reproaches me when I do not deserve it. The same thing, no doubt, happens to many others as well; for where is the man who can help thinking that, after all, it were better not to have done something that he did with ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Studies in Pessimism • Arthur Schopenhauer

... say!" The cook surveyed Parker from head to foot with critical inspection. This scrutiny annoyed the young man ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day

... of companionship in Nature is not wholly fanciful. Is not the fundamental law of the universe the attraction which one mass of matter has for another? Even the awful distances in interstellar space form no exception to this rule; for telescopic scrutiny reveals the fact that planets, suns, and systems move in harmony, on paths which indicate that they are all associated in the stupendous drama of the skies. The human interest connected with the mountains ...
— John L. Stoddard's Lectures, Vol. 10 (of 10) - Southern California; Grand Canon of the Colorado River; Yellowstone National Park • John L. Stoddard

... the Black Phalanx invites the scrutiny of all who have been disposed to taunt you for associating with "armed barbarians." No massacre of vanquished foe stains the banners of those who followed you, giving quarter but receiving none. It was your teaching that served as a complete restraint ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson

... Bow Street Runners still lounged, smoking their pipes and talking together in their rumbling tones. As he drew nearer he became aware that they had ceased their talk and guessed rather than saw that he was the object of their scrutiny; nor was he mistaken, for as he came abreast of where they stood, one ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al

... Mazzuchelli; but none of these could help him. He turned the pages of Crescimbeni, Quadrio, Gamba, Corniani, Tiraboschi, weighty with enormous erudition—and only those who make a special study of Italian know how little has escaped their scrutiny—but found no mention of Campanella as a poet. At last, after the lapse of a quarter of a century, he received the long-coveted little quarto volume from Wolfenbuttel in the north of Germany. The new edition which Orelli gave to the press at Lugano has this title:—'Poesie ...
— Sonnets • Michael Angelo Buonarroti & Tommaso Campanella

... all for his sake, and to follow him through peril and sacrifice, even to death? Is it his wonderful teaching? "No man ever spake like this man." Is it his power as revealed in his miracles? Is it his sinlessness? The most malignant scrutiny could find no fault in him. Is it the perfect beauty of his character? Not one nor all of these will account for the wonderful attraction of Jesus. Love is the secret. He came into the world to reveal the love of God—he was the love of God in human flesh. His life ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller

... He was methodically spreading out the not unbeautiful instruments. And as he picked them up one by one, handling them with his strong and expert fingers and testing each with a hawk-eyed scrutiny, a most curious and subtle change stole over the ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler

... rationalists, materialists, and definitely sceptical. It dawned on his mind for the first time that, while all other sciences were of a deductive kind, endeavouring to approach principles from the observation and classification of phenomena, from the scrutiny of evidence, that theology was a science based on intuitions, and dependent on assumptions which it was impossible to test scientifically. The first effect of this was to develop a great loyalty to his traditions, and almost the first hard thinking he had ever done was in the direction ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson

... looked him in the face with keen enquiring eyes; then apparently satisfied with her scrutiny, smiled, ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... at the coolness of her request, subjected his accoster to a closer scrutiny. As he did so, his irritation diminished. He ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... spent in the Society fifty-five years, in the same uniform crucified life, and in the constant round of the same uninterrupted labors, which perhaps requires a courage more heroic than martyrdom. In the process for his canonization, the scrutiny relating to his life and virtues is happily finished; and Benedict XIV. confirmed the decree of the Congregation of Rites, in 1747, by which it is declared, that the proofs of the heroic degree of the Christian virtues which he practised, are competent and sufficient. ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... investigation, every proposition which relates to the interest and happiness of man, every statement and appeal involving a valuable consideration, must be submitted to the scrutiny and judgment of individual reason; for every person has the right to form his own conclusions, and justify them by experience. Those claims which are only supported by empty assertion are very doubtful. Misty theories vanish before the sun of truth. ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... sure," exclaimed Barney Job, after a long scrutiny. "Leastways I ken make out two. The durned fog's that thick you couldn't get a glimpse o' Peddick's flamin' hair ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum

... be fond of recounting his first experience of this phenomenon. He was going down early one morning to the fields, when on the shady side of the quadrangle he encountered a boy, whom he recognised after a little scrutiny to be Sir Digby Oakshott, Baronet. The reason why he did not immediately grasp the identity of so familiar a personage was because Sir Digby's body was thrown back, his arms were behind his back, ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed

... prescribing to ourselves a {242} practical application of the same rule in various points of faith and discipline, I would with all delicacy and respect invite Roman Catholics to do likewise. Especially would I entreat them to reflect with more than ordinary scrutiny and solicitude on the vast evils into which the practice of praying to saints and angels, and of pleading their merits at the throne of grace, has a tendency to betray those who are unenlightened ...
— Primitive Christian Worship • James Endell Tyler

... at Merton College, Oxford, according to Pointer (Oxoniensis Academia, ed. 1749, p. 24), on the last night in the year, called Scrutiny Night, for the College servants, all in a body, to make their appearance in the Hall, before the Warden and Fellows (after supper), and there to deliver up their keys, so that if they have committed ...
— A Righte Merrie Christmasse - The Story of Christ-Tide • John Ashton

... was delivered with a sincerity which it was impossible to doubt. In palpable disappointment Barrant turned to a renewed scrutiny of the letter, which he held open ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees

... walking in bridle-paths and wood-roads branching off from the thoroughfare every few rods. I think the madcap chose the rutty and mud-holey route because there was, at least, a chance that we might have to plunge into the bushes to hide, or to brave the scrutiny of strangers and acquaintances. The sauce of danger made ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland

... lay between them; the last vases of wine stood at their sides. Not a word escaped the lips of either, to break the deep stillness prevailing over the palace. Each fixed his eyes on the other, in stern and searching scrutiny, and cup for cup, drank in slow and regular alternation. The debauch, which had hitherto presented a spectacle of brutal degradation and violence, now that it was restricted to two men only—each equally unimpressed by the scenes of horror he had beheld, each vying ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins

... the hours of one who, deprived of other means of information, is left to form his conjectures by some passing object or some chance murmur. The things which, in the ordinary course of life, are passed by unnoticed and unregarded, are now matters of moment,—with what scrutiny he examines the features of those whom he dare not question; with what patient ear he listens to each passing word. Thus to me, a prisoner, the hours went by tardily yet anxiously; no sabre clanked; no war-horse neighed; ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... In that brief scrutiny permitted himself by a well-bred man, Hayden decided that she was a Gipsy. Her rather short face, with the full, square chin, was of a clear brown; her intense and vivid eyes were green, a beautiful and rare shade of olive. Her mouth was large, merry and inscrutable, ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow

... She felt that she was under scrutiny, and her eyes felt hot and restless. She wished to run away and cry, but she dared not. She stayed, while Will began to tell her of his life and to ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland

... of Harrington). Laying it aside, I pulled out from the pile several others belonging to the same class. Being too eager to learn of what the real merits of this huge pile of Fiddles consisted, I rapidly passed from one to the other without close scrutiny, leaving that for an after pleasure. So entirely fresh were these instruments to me, that the delight I experienced in thus digging them out may well be understood by the connoisseur. After thus wading through those resting on the table, I discovered some shelves, upon which ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart

... The Custom-House stood on the other side of the street, and word came that we were wanted there also, though our slender carpet-bags had been regularly searched and sealed by the Roman functionaries at Civita Vecchia expressly to obviate any pretext for scrutiny or delay here. No use—money. By this time, change and patience were getting scarce in our company. We tried to get off cheap; but it wouldn't do. Finally, rather than stay out till midnight in the malaria, I put down a five-franc-piece, which was accepted and we were let ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley

... trees she had gone away, and the night was much older when I marked her again, coming out of the firelit distance back to the fire and her dusky mates. It was soon after this that I became aware that she must have some reason for her anxious scrutiny, some message to deliver or warning to give. Once when I made a slight motion as if to go to her, she shook her head and laid her finger ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston

... brought into the conversation, Mr. Turner, for the first time, bent his gaze fully upon her, giving her the same swift scrutiny and appraisement that he had the father. He was evidently highly satisfied with what he saw, for he kept looking at it as much as he dared. He became aware after a moment or so that Mr. Stevens was ...
— The Early Bird - A Business Man's Love Story • George Randolph Chester

... preceding these eight that we find a time when the reverse happened, the spots being most numerous when Jupiter was nearest to the sun. So with various other periods which the ingenuity of Messrs. De la Rue and Balfour Stewart has detected, and which, under the closest scrutiny, exhibit almost exact agreement for many successive periods, preceded and followed by almost exact disagreement. Here, again, the captious may argue that such alternate agreements and disagreements may be noted in every case where two periods are not very unequal, whether there ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor

... he, suddenly resuming his gay tone, "all I want is that different things be kept in different boxes. The whole frame-work of society, both in Europe and America, is made up of various things which will not stand the scrutiny of any very ideal standard of morality. It's pretty generally understood that men don't aspire after the absolute right, but only to do about as well as the rest of the world. Now, when any one speaks up, like a man, and says ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... very well, seeing what a short time he had been here. Jean, with all the eager romance of fifteen, straightway began the building of an air-castle, which seemed to her a fine structure indeed. Meantime, Hugh and Margaret, all unconscious of her scrutiny, ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards

... of meeting each other's friends, after the engagement is announced, is one which should be most interesting and enjoyable, and should have nothing of that embarrassment which comes from the sense of critical scrutiny. The great ordeal of winning each other is decided, and the die cast. The smaller matter of establishing friendships on a mutual basis should be a pleasure and not an object of dread. Real affection and deep sincerity will make all ...
— The Etiquette of To-day • Edith B. Ordway

... for the carbine he had taken from the boot on the saddle of the captured bay. Army issue ... Spencer. He appraised it with the sharp, quick scrutiny of a man who had had to depend on enemy weapons before. Just how had this fallen into outlaw hands? The arm was well ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton

... while men plucked up the tares 'they should root up also the wheat with them.' This darnel is easily distinguishable from the wheat and barley when headed out, but when both are less developed, 'the closest scrutiny will often fail to detect it. Even the farmers, who in this country generally weed their fields, do not attempt to separate the one from the other ... The taste is bitter, and, when eaten separately, or even when diffused in ordinary bread, it causes dizziness, and often acts as a violent ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... must occupy at any given period. In September last we find Leverrier communicating these results to his friends in Berlin. They are provided with charts, on which every observed star is mapped down; and if any new object presents itself in the heavens, it is immediately subjected to a rigid scrutiny. On the very night on which Leverrier's letter had been received, we find the telescope directed to the designated point in the heavens. A stranger appears, but has only the aspect of a fixed star. Long did the eye watch that ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies

... the dickens are you staring at?" Devey indignantly demanded, when he thought that he had borne this scrutiny with ...
— The Hero of Garside School • J. Harwood Panting

... will," said Fairway, taking the candle and moving it over the surface of the Grandfer's countenance, the subject of his scrutiny irradiating himself with light and pleasant smiles, and giving himself ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy

... acquaintance with them can hardly justify him in regarding his studies as founded upon observation. To see people in the stalls and meet them at public "functions," or the large entertainments of a semi-private character which it is easy to penetrate, gives poor opportunity for close scrutiny. Is there amongst the dramatists—and novelists too—something akin to the system of the islanders who earned a living by taking in one another's washing? Is there a vicious circle, in which each and all accept as true what others have written? Do they merely help ...
— Our Stage and Its Critics • "E.F.S." of "The Westminster Gazette"

... up haughtily. His use of her Christian name in that familiar tone annoyed her exceedingly. Her eyes flashed indignantly, but the whole of it was lost unless Bud saw it, for Gardley had faced his would-be adversary with a keen, surprised scrutiny, and was looking him over coolly. There was that in the young man's eye that made the eye of Frederick West quail before him. It was only an instant the two stood challenging each other, but in that ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill

... from thoughts that, if left in the gloom of semi-oblivion, will grow until they overshadow a whole life. It is better to follow the example of England's pure Queen, visiting on certain anniversaries our secret places and holding communion with the past, for it is by such scrutiny only ...
— Worldly Ways and Byways • Eliot Gregory

... avouch (as is said) that surely these are a numerous people by themselves, having their own politics, which diversities of judgment may occasion several inconsonancies in this rehearsal, after the narrowest scrutiny ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous

... speech or in the affections, will often keep a little locked volume in which self can be safely revealed. Her diary occupied just such a place in her own inner life, and for that reason one hesitates to submit its pages even to the most loving and sympathetic scrutiny. ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan

... commanded Than Kosis. "He also is a stranger and likely as not they both hail from Helium, and where one is we shall sooner or later find the other. Quadruple the air patrol, and let every man who leaves the city by air or ground be subjected to the closest scrutiny." ...
— A Princess of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... employed, after a long interval, in an enlightened age, and at an important conjuncture, to an extent never before known, and for a purpose generally abhorred. It was instantly subjected to a severe scrutiny. Men did not, indeed, at first, venture to pronounce it altogether unconstitutional. But they began to perceive that it was at direct variance with the spirit of the constitution, and would, if left unchecked, turn the English ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... the conditions prevailing throughout the world. It means daring and imagination combined with care and foresight and integrity, and hard, wearing work—much of it not compensated, because of every ten propositions submitted to the scrutiny or evolved by the brain of the financier who is duly careful of his reputation and conscious of his responsibility to the public, it is safe to say that not more than ...
— High Finance • Otto H. Kahn

... condition nothing more seemed to me worth a desire, nothing worth a wish. An infinite yearning, indeed, seized me at times to know how it had gone with my poor friends and my beloved, what had been the result of a stricter scrutiny, how far they were implicated in those crimes, or had been found guiltless. This also I circumstantially painted to myself in the most various ways, and did not fail to hold them as innocent and truly unfortunate. Sometimes I longed to see myself freed from this uncertainty, and wrote vehemently ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

... its defects, the classification of Linnaeus was the first attempt at grouping animals together according to certain common structural characters. His followers and pupils engaged at once in a scrutiny of the differences and similarities among animals, which soon led to a great increase in the number of classes: instead of six, there were presently nine, twelve, and more. But till Cuvier's time there was no great ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various

... upon him with a peculiarly keen scrutiny, and Harvey, resenting the embarrassment due to his own tactics, ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing

... those whose days were of "a mingled yarn" with ours, whose hearts blended in the warmest reciprocities of friendship, whose joys, whose cares, almost whose wishes were in common, how little do we know? how little will even the severest scrutiny enable us to discover? Yet, at one time, we were inseparable "like Juno's swans;" we were as brothers, nor dreamt we of ought else, in the susceptibility of our youthful imagination, than that we were to pass through all the future scenes of life, side by side; and, mutually supporting and supported, ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir

... of the passions, and we shall surely find it; we have but to fold our hands, and it will come to us. With the kingdom of eternal life it is not so. That is a prize not easily won. Faithful, untiring effort, looking ever toward eternal ends; a constant scrutiny of motives, that they may be pure and true; an earnest, heartfelt, determined devotion to the heavenly Master, to whose service we have bound ourselves by deliberate choice, can alone make sure for us what we seek. For ...
— The Elements of Character • Mary G. Chandler

... South Carolina has admonished us to be mindful of the opinions of those who shall come after us. We must take our chance, Sir, as to the light in which posterity will regard us. I do not decline its judgment, nor withhold myself from its scrutiny. Feeling that I am performing my public duty with singleness of heart and to the best of my ability, I fearlessly trust myself to the country, now and hereafter, and leave both my motives and my character to ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster

... questions, in which the angry spirit of the late conflict still survived, were the Westminster Scrutiny and Mr. Pitt's East India Bill. The conduct of the minister in the former transaction showed that his victory had not brought with it those generous feelings towards the vanquished, which, in the higher order of minds, ...
— Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan V1 • Thomas Moore

... counted the three hundred pieces of gold with as much expedition as was compatible with the frequent interruptions necessitated by the crone's depositing each successive handful in a leather pouch; and the scrutiny, divided between jealousy and affection, which she bestowed on ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett

... Satisfied at his scrutiny, the Jew named a very low price, one which his customer had some hesitation in accepting; but at last, seeing Phenee was obdurate, he took the offered money, and glided off like ...
— Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective - Or, The Crime of the Midnight Express • Frank Pinkerton

... remarked the father, sarcastically, with a severe scrutiny of my retreating person. "A civil-tongued young man to know your name so readily, Frances! Pray, ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut

... to take a leisurely stroll through the peaceful herd, carefully inspecting each horse as he passed. As a result of his scrutiny, he found that, while most of the horses were already encumbered with their annoying hobble, in "A" Troop alone there were at least a dozen still unfettered, notably the mounts of the non-commissioned officers and the older soldiers. ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... meanness and isolation! We joyously accepted the imputation, and even the coldness with which our holiday friends accompanied it; it was a veil with which society thought proper to cover us, and beneath its folds our poverty was safe from scrutiny. ...
— The Poor Gentleman • Hendrik Conscience

... well as in heaven; and as an experienced general, it became her to reconnoitre, when one of the enemy approached her camp. Slightly altering her position, she darted an all-comprehensive glance at the invader, who seemed entirely absorbed, for not an eyelash stirred during the scrutiny. It lasted but an instant, yet in that instant he was weighed and found wanting; for that experienced eye detected that his cravat was two inches wider than fashion ordained, that his coat was not ...
— A Modern Cinderella - or The Little Old Show and Other Stories • Louisa May Alcott

... compressed, watched them from the door. The girl, limping slightly, walked along with the utmost composure, but the bearing of her escort betokened a mind fully conscious of the scrutiny of ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs

... official judgment or publicity of facts which, if made available, would supply evidence of infidelity. In the operation of this machinery, there has not been the means provided for effective official scrutiny and the public conscience could ...
— American Indian stories • Zitkala-Sa

... This scrutiny on both sides went on for some time in a silence which was at last broken by the Kaffir uttering a dismal groan which went right ...
— Diamond Dyke - The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure • George Manville Fenn

... lost in thought, was oblivious of this scrutiny, and it was as one speaking from revery that he ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck

... chair, but Maezli pulled her forward. The gentleman now threw a penetrating glance at the delicate looking little girl, who hardly dared to raise her large, dark eyes to his. Leonore, who had blushed violently under his scrutiny, said in a barely audible voice, "Perhaps we should not have come; but Maezli thought we might be allowed to see you. Can we do something for you? Perhaps Maezli should not have brought me. Oh, I am so sorry if ...
— Maezli - A Story of the Swiss Valleys • Johanna Spyri

... left of which the lid drooped appreciably. He was smoking a long black stogie, and scattered upon his vest and in a semicircle surrounding his chair was a sprinkling of white ash from vanished predecessors. Though he looked up when the other entered, and Landor returned the scrutiny, there was no salutation, not even when, without form of invitation, the rancher dropped into the vacant seat opposite and tossed his broad felt hat familiarly amid the litter of the desk. A moment they sat so, while ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge

... her eyes full of happy tears, towards Lady Scrope, who stood only a few paces off watching everything with her accustomed intense scrutiny, and held out both her hands in a sweet and simple gesture expressive of so much feeling that the old dame felt an unwonted mist rising ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green

... presenting an ailing appearance, she looked radiantly well and very lovely in her diaphanous sleeping toilet, with golden ringlets in distracting disarray Nor was she alone. By her pillow sat one who, if at first to be presumed her physician, proved upon scrutiny to be ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini

... and when you have finished your scrutiny, you have next to consider, how you would like the present which I offer you. Paris, give me the prize of beauty, and you shall be ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata

... opinion and debate there was a keener scrutiny of institutions and domestic life than any we had known; there was sincere protesting against existing evils, and there were changes of employment dictated by conscience. No doubt there was plentiful vaporing, and cases ...
— Essays, Second Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... on hyperbolical accusations and pointed sentences, which even he that utters them desires to be applauded, rather than credited. Addison can hardly be supposed to have meant all that he said. Few characters can bear the microscopic scrutiny of WIT quickened by ANGER." I could heap up facts to demonstrate this severe truth. Even of Pope's best friends, some of their severities, if they ever reached him, must have given the pain he often inflicted. His friend Atterbury, ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli

... of organized labor in general as well as to local labor conditions in every trade. Indeed, vigilance seems to be the watchword of the Central. Organization, wages, trade agreements, and the attitude of public officials and city councils which even remotely might affect labor rarely escape their scrutiny. This oldest of all the groups of labor organizations remains the most vital part of the Federation. The success of the American Federation of Labor is due in large measure to the crafty generalship of its President, Samuel Gompers, one of the most astute labor leaders ...
— The Armies of Labor - Volume 40 in The Chronicles Of America Series • Samuel P. Orth

... this just Description, as it is by all the usual Notions that we are taught to entertain of them, by (the old Women) our Instructors; for every Man may, by taking but a common View of himself, and making a just Scrutiny into his own Passions, on some of their particular Excursions, see a Hell within himself, and himself a meer Devil as long as the Inflammation lasts; and that as really, and to all Intents and Purposes, as if he had the Angel (Satan) ...
— The History of the Devil - As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts • Daniel Defoe

... to the action of the wind; in the first instance, directly, in the latter, through the water. "The wind-ripples on the surface of the dunes precisely resemble the water-ripples of sand flats occasionally overflowed by the sea; and with the closest scrutiny, I have never been able to detect the slightest difference between them. This is easily explained by the fact, that the water-ripples are produced by the action of light wind on the water which only transmits the air-waves to the sand."—Leonhard und Bronn, 1841, pp. ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh

... their beauty, envied their happiness; for, short as her wedded life had been, the thorns already pierced her through the roses, and with each airy revolution of those figures, dark and bright, her discontent increased, her wonder deepened, her scrutiny grew keener, for she knew no common interest held her husband there, fascinated, flushed, and excited as if his heart beat responsive to the rhythmic rise and fall of that booted foot and satin slipper. The music ended with a crash, ...
— Pauline's Passion and Punishment • Louisa May Alcott

... distortion or favor. He carried his powerful execution into minute details, to a hair point, finishes an eyelash or a dimple as firmly as he draws a mountain; and yet these, like nature's, will bear the scrutiny of the solar microscope. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord

... location of the firm. During breakfast Mac went carefully through his pockets, taking out every scrap of paper and turning everything over to me; then taking out from among the others in our bag the letters of credit and introduction we made our last scrutiny of them. We had not settled upon the amount he should ask for, but agreed that it should not in any case be less than 25,000 gulden ($10,000). If everything seemed favorable then Mac was to use his own judgment and demand any sum under 100,000 gulden ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell

... realized that daughters are guarded by the vigilance of parents almost to the verge of absurdity. A young girl is never allowed to go out alone, and no man is permitted to enter the household until his character has undergone the closest scrutiny. Marriage is a unique contract, and all the various wrongs caused by hasty marriages, all the troubles before the courts, all the divorces, are multiplied by the carelessness of American parents, who, believing, and truly believing, ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood

... never seen him since his boyhood might have looked at him with slow recognition, due perhaps to the peculiarity of the gaze which Gwendolen chose to call "dreadful," though it had really a very mild sort of scrutiny. The voice, sometimes audible in subdued snatches of song, had turned out merely a high baritone; indeed, only to look at his lithe, powerful frame and the firm gravity of his face would have been enough for an experienced guess that he had no rare and ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot

... dismissed. To our amusement, the simple folk formed a double line outside the door to inspect us as we emerged. It was easy to imagine their interest in an apparition so unusual as foreign visitors, and we submitted to their curious but entirely respectful scrutiny, wishing that our aspect might give them half the satisfaction we had in watching their eager faces and noting their droll costumes. Ludicrously high stocks and "swallow-tail" coats of brown homespun made the dress of the men different from that of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XVII, No. 102. June, 1876. • Various

... Flechter's fear of a conviction led him to invite testimony in his behalf which would not bear the test of careful scrutiny. Many an innocent man has paid the penalty for uncommitted crime because he has sought to bolster up his defense with doubtful evidence without the incubus of which he would ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train

... captain spoke, with his strange, humorous, arrogant abruptness, I observed Jim to be sizing him up, like a thing at once quaint and familiar, and with a scrutiny that was both ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... was a greasy piece of string, a crust of bread, a halfpenny, a few brass buttons, and a very greasy and very crumpled and very filthy copy of a "penny awful" paper. I need hardly say that this scrutiny did not afford me absolute pleasure. In the first place, my temporary lodging was most unsavoury and unclean; and in the second place, there was not one among my many fellow-lodgers who could be said to be in my position in life, or to whom I felt in any way ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed

... that they welcome them here, and desire to receive them with warmth and with cordiality. But I cannot conceive any process better calculated to manufacture an anti-Colonial party, than this process of subjecting to the scrutiny of the House of Commons year by year, through the agency of taxation, the profit and loss account, in its narrow, financial aspect, of the relations of Great Britain and her Dominions ...
— Liberalism and the Social Problem • Winston Spencer Churchill

... which is which. The firmament seems to be like the solid base of a vessel. The fire-fly seems to be like the actual spark of fire. In reality, however, the sky has no base and there is no fire in the fire-fly. You see, there is necessity, therefore, for scrutiny in respect of even such things as are addressed to the eye. If a person ascertains everything after scrutiny, he is never called upon to indulge in any kind of regret afterwards. It is not at all difficult, O son, for ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... the girl's, wet and pleading, miserable, but full of love. Luella, with narrowed lids, bored into those clear young eyes: no shadow of deceit, no hint of shuffling or double-dealing could withstand that relentless scrutiny. ...
— While Caroline Was Growing • Josephine Daskam Bacon

... not abate that look of quizzical appraisal. And again Gavin Brice began to feel uncomfortable under her scrutiny. ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune

... expanded by heat and contracted by cold. If the heat be applied with perfect uniformity, no local strains or pressures come into play; but, if one portion of a solid be heated and another portion not, the expansion of the heated portion introduces strains and pressures which reveal themselves under the scrutiny of polarized light. When a square of common window-glass is placed between the Nicols, you see its dim outline, but it exerts no action on the polarized light. Held for a moment over the flame of a spirit-lamp, on reintroducing it between the Nicols, light flashes out upon the screen. Here, as in ...
— Six Lectures on Light - Delivered In The United States In 1872-1873 • John Tyndall

... correspondingly growing recognition of this public interest, with provision for its security, will be found necessary. So far as the natural changes of industrial structure in the private business fail to provide the requisite publicity, the exercise of direct public scrutiny must come to be enforced. The reluctance shown alike by bodies of employers and of workers to divulge material facts is in large measure due to the false ideas they have conceived as to the nature of industrial activity, which education ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson

... by the earnest scrutiny of both Daffingdon and Virgilia. She saw that she had tied her boa into a double knot, and surmised that she had been doing the same with ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller

... keen eyes, which once met the glance of his, rose above its folds. Her look rested on him a moment and held him with a kind of secret power, then her eyes passed on; but it seemed to him that under a show of indifference she was examining everything with minute scrutiny. ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler

... on all-fours, his face screwed up for scrutiny and the back of his neck hotly ridden with crimson, ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst

... instinct warned her that the man had not yet stated his real reason for coming, and she wondered a little what it could be. He seemed to be watching her covertly, yet she failed to catch any telltale admiration for her in his scrutiny. She decided that his forehead was too narrow to please her, and that his eyes were too close together, and that the lines around his mouth were cruel lines and gave the lie to his smile, which was pleasant enough if you just looked at the ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower

... a busy morning in a terrible uncertainty. When Sally had come by the bank to tell him of her proposed ride with Steering, he had watched her with painful, anxious scrutiny. But the girl's control had become perfect by that hour, and Madeira had to go back into the bank with the uncertainty still thickly upon him. Pausing there in the bank at the plate-glass window for a reflectful moment, he came to a swift resolve. He saw that he could not afford to ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young

... his own motives with a severer judgment than that of the world, as his scrutiny is more close, and his self-knowledge more minute. He knows the secret sin, the mental act, the spiritual aberration. He knows the distance between his highest effort and that lofty standard of perfection to ...
— The Crown of Thorns - A Token for the Sorrowing • E. H. Chapin

... I encounter this morning, that forms quite a striking contrast to the almost childlike harmlessness and universal respect toward me observed in the disposition of the villagers. It requires no penetrating scrutiny of these fellows' countenances to ascertain that nothing could be more uncongenial to them than the state of affairs that prevents them stopping ine and looting me of everything I possess; a couple of them order me quite imperatively to make a detour ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens

... was one of searching, eager, yet most cautious and wary examination. On the whole, this woman excited some surprise in Edith; and while she was gratified at finding in her one who was not out of the reach of respect, she yet was perplexed at the calm and searching scrutiny of which she was the object. But she did not now take any time to think about this. A vague idea occurred to her that Mrs. Dunbar, like many other housekeepers, was one of that numerous class who "have seen better days;" so, after ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille

... effects, and, the latter comprising those who could give no proofs that the transactions they had entered into were real and bona fide. The securities of the latter were ordered to be destroyed, while those of the first four classes were subjected to a most rigid and jealous scrutiny. The result of the labours of the visa, was a report, in which they counselled the reduction of the interest upon these securities to fifty-six millions of livres. They justified, this, advice by a statement of the various acts of peculation and ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay

... glorious manuscript, he, no doubt, did us good service; for how easily might my intercourse with him, while the book was being printed, have led to our discovery? Your father has not yet, be assured, relinquished his pursuit of us—my passport would have been examined again with severer scrutiny—something, no doubt, would have led to the suspicion that the name I bear is assumed. We should have been separated. So, angel mine, we are happy as we ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various

... invitation of the latter, was paying his first visit to the great western metropolis. Between the two cousins there were few points of resemblance. Both had the same cold, calculating gaze, which made one, subjected to its scrutiny, feel that he was being mentally weighed and measured and would, in all probability, be found lacking; but the Londoner possessed a more phlegmatic temperament. A year or two his cousin's junior, he looked ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour

... self-scrutiny he had often wondered if he ought not to openly proclaim his kinship with the despised race, but he was always deterred by the thought of his sister and her husband, as well as by the persistent doubt whether his advocacy of Indian rights ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte

... was now occupied in preparing his pipe, without minding the question. Therefore Atlee set himself to study the features before him. It was evident enough, from the intensity of his gaze and a certain trembling of his upper lip, that the scrutiny cost him no common effort. It was, in fact, the effort to divine what, if he mistook to read aright, would be ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... Makebelieve returned again to her labor. She intended finishing her week's work with Mrs. O'Connor (it might not last for a week). She wished to observe that lady with the exact particularity, the singleness of eye, the true, candid, critical scrutiny which had hitherto been impossible to her. It was, she said to Mary, just possible that Mrs. O'Connor might make some remarks about soap. It was possible that the lady might advance theories as to how this or that particular ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens

... not of the Scribes and Pharisees, the pillars of the Temple, the wise and rich and proud who had been the first to follow Dylks, but the poorer and lowlier sort who wavered before the example of their betters, and were willing to submit it to the searching of the old Sadducee's scrutiny. ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells

... long, low dining-room. Mr. Blithers resented the scrutiny: It was lofty and yet stooping. She seemed to be looking down upon him at right angles, due no doubt to her superior height and to the fact that she ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... smaller, they found an excellent meal awaiting them. They ate under a leafy grape arbor on the shady side of the house, half a dozen of Bruce's men sitting at table with them. Kendric regarded the men with interest, feeling that their scrutiny of him was no less painstaking. They were swarthy Indians and half-breeds and little else did he make of them. Their eyes met his, steady and unwinking, but gave no clue to what thoughts might lie ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory

... opinions," he says, "in the privacy of my own household, and to occasional American visitors, I have not concealed. The great question now presenting itself for solution demands the conscientious scrutiny of every American who loves his country and believes in the human progress of which that country is one of the foremost representatives. I have never thought, during my residence at Vienna, that because I have the honor of being a public servant of the American people I am deprived of the ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... all inscriptions throughout this kingdom were impartially examined, in order to tax those which should appear demonstrably false or flattering, I am convinced that not one-fifth part of the number would, after such a scrutiny, escape exempted. ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift

... of the calculating observer, it would be noted that his volume (or mass) was not what his bony structure implied. Spiritually, in deed, this interesting individual conveyed to the world a sensation of stoutness, of bulk and solidity, which (upon scrutiny) was not (or would not be) verified by measurement. Evidently, you will conclude, a stout man grown thin; or, at any rate, grown less stout. His molded depth, one might assess at 20 inches between the eaves; his ...
— Mince Pie • Christopher Darlington Morley

... your caution, Herr Captain," observed the older man. "Will you smoke?" producing his cigarette case, and as the other smilingly helped himself and accepted a lighted match, he surveyed him critically. Paying no attention to his chief's scrutiny, the Secret Service agent contemplated the luxurious appointments of the limousine with satisfaction and puffed contentedly at his cigarette. His air of breeding was unmistakable, but the devil-may-care sparkle in his gray-blue eyes redeemed an otherwise expressionless face from being considered ...
— I Spy • Natalie Sumner Lincoln

... in front of the mirror and regarded himself—not with the forbearance of a friend but the keen scrutiny of a critic. ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann

... others. "Why," said he, "I have seen her often, and it is to his lodge I go almost every night to court her." All the others laughed and continued their games. The young man did not know he was telling a lie to the woman's advantage, who by that means escaped scrutiny. ...
— The Myth of Hiawatha, and Other Oral Legends, Mythologic and Allegoric, of the North American Indians • Henry R. Schoolcraft

... sought to obtain the majority by terror, determined, if it did not succeed, none the less to sacrifice Louis XVI. Finally, after four hours of nominal appeal, the president, Vergniaud, said: "Citizens, I am about to proclaim the result of the scrutiny. When justice has spoken, humanity should have its turn." There were seven hundred and twenty-one voters. The actual majority was three hundred and sixty-one. The death of the king was decided by a majority of twenty-six votes. Opinions were very various: ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet

... doctor's gaze lowered to the vellum-bound books on the carven table, then to the gorgeous pattern of the Kermansha at his feet. Once more he studied the face of his companion, with the keen, soul-gripping scrutiny of the skilled physician. As last he arrived at a definite conclusion. He cleared his throat, and fumbled in his waistcoat pocket for a cigar. A swiftly struck match in Monty's hand was held up so promptly to the end of the cigar, that the doctor's lips had not closed about it. This ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball

... the Secretaries at the office, who in turn submit the entire work to the churches, is thus continually made better prepared to direct the sacrifices of the benevolent in ways that shall not be irresponsible or unwise, than those which are subject to no such scrutiny or supervision, and are held to no responsibility. Much less money would be diverted from this authorized and recognized servant of the Congregational Churches, and far greater efficiency would be secured, if our friends ...
— American Missionary, Volume XLII. No. 11. November 1888 • Various

... perfect story in the world. It will bear the deepest scrutiny of mind or matter or soul. Physically it is exact; mentally it balances; spiritually it is the ultimate lesson. You will find in it all that you need to know about Christianity, for it is the soul of that; the one thing ...
— Red Fleece • Will Levington Comfort



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