Sentence Examples:
He forgot that the didactic element in a poem should be, to employ a homely illustration, what garlic should be in a salad, "scarce suspected, animate the whole," that the poet teaches not as the moralist and the preacher teach, but as nature and life teach us.
Stuart, however, was so exhausted by the agitation of the past scene, acting upon his emaciated frame, that he could scarce crawl to his miserable couch; where, notwithstanding his fatigues, he passed a sleepless night, revolving upon their dreary situation, and the desperate prospect before them.
They laid their plans for further interviews, all the while unconscious that eyes, glistening with fury, were peering through the brushwood, and mad hate was rankling in the breast of an unseen foe, who scarce could forbear to rush in and execute vengeance on the spot.
Some tried fishing, but with little success, "nets, lines, and hooks being wanting," and gunpowder so scarce, that he preferred suffering rather than use for hunting the little he had left, which was not more than thirty or forty pounds, and that very bad.
These throbs scarce expressed, however, the impatience of desire, any more than they stood for sharp disappointment: the series together resembled perhaps more than anything else those fine waves of clearness through which, for a watcher of the east, dawn at last trembles into rosy day.
By this means he insensibly fell into the society of about ten young gentlemen, pretty near his own age, with whom he spent his time in continual feasting and entertainments; and scarce a day came over his head, but he made every one of them some considerable present.
The progress that he made was scarce perceptible, and he could hardly have gained the boat by his own efforts; but, fortunately, the river current favored him, for the boat reached a place where it was whirled round so that its stern came close to him.
In a cavernous fissure called the Raven's Cliff, teeth of several individuals of Hippopotamus major, both young and old, were found; and this in a district where there is now scarce a rill of running water, much less a river in which such quadrupeds could swim.
It was a miserable body of men who crawled up in answer to the summons, utterly worn out and exhausted with the seasickness, the closeness of the air, and the tossing and buffeting of the last eighteen hours; many had scarce strength to climb the ladder.
Small wonder the general raved and swore at provincial perfidy and turpitude, the more so when it was discovered that a great part of the provision furnished for the army was utterly worthless, and the two hundred horses scarce able to stand upon their feet.
Of course the hardness of the task was to represent the heroine as doing what were scarce pardonable in another; yet as acting on such grounds, from such motives, and to such issues, that the undertaking not only is, but is felt to be, commendable in her.
He had believed when he left college that Sumner's teaching and example would be a buckler and shield to him all the days of his life; and here he was, faltering before a man to whom the great teacher would have given scarce a moment's contemptuous thought.
In those provinces which were fully exposed to the ravages of horse, scarce a vestige remained either of population or agriculture: such of the miserable inhabitants as escaped the fury of the sword were either carried into the Mysore country or left to struggle under the horrors of famine.
The wind being light, with a heavy swell, and the fleet lying with their main topsails to the mast, it was impossible for the ships to preserve their exact station in the line; consequently scarce any ship was immediately ahead or astern of her second.
On the other side of the Channel, scarce out of sight and hail of a man standing on our English shore, the French army of a hundred and sixty thousand men and fifteen thousand horses had been brought together from all parts, and were drilling every day.
With such persistent and continued onslaught on our part, at the end of the first year their numbers were very noticeably decreased, and at the close of the following summer they were positively scarce, and a very welcome number of whitefish stocked our lake in their place.
Again, as the pestilence raised the price of clerical as well as of all other labor, parliament in 1362 represented that chaplains had become scarce and dear, and prayed that they might be compelled to work for lower pay than they were in the habit of receiving.
Moreover, on these journeys I never kept the same road, as I always guided myself by the compass, and altered my course according to the seasons, as I had to pass spots which were inundated at certain periods, and others where water at times was very scarce.
Only a few eminent men, who have felt this reproach and defect, are now exerting themselves to rescue from oblivion the neglected materials, scarce as they now are, after it has become next to impossible to collect anything complete respecting the history of many exterminated Indian tribes.
In goodness of heart, and in principles of piety, this exemplary couple was bound to each other by the most perfect unison of character, though in their tempers there was a contrast which had scarce the gradation of a single shade to smooth off its abrupt dissimilitude.
In the winter they are troublesome to the hunters, especially when the ground is thickly covered with snow, and food consequently scarce, for, at such a time, they never meet with a Deer or a Moose hung on a tree, without mutilating it as much as in their power.
On the other side of the Channel, scarce out of sight and hail of a man standing on our English shore, the French army of a hundred and sixty thousand men and fifteen thousand horses had been brought together from all parts, and were drilling every day.
They carried on a considerable trade in it with the neighboring islands; and from the consumption thus occasioned, and the quantity of obsidian which must have been broken in the course of manufacture, we may presume that this mineral has become scarce from the lapse of ages.
The Zealots were in an uproar and could scarce refrain from drawing their swords, although anxious to play out their part in the farce of a trial to the close, and desirous, moreover, to test whether the judges would put considerations of justice above their own peril.
Jeanie Deans, though so much accustomed to the Laird's staring that she was sometimes scarce conscious of his presence, had nevertheless some occasional fears lest he should call in the organ of speech to back those expressions of admiration which he bestowed on her through his eyes.
"Here are to be seen in wonderful abundance the precious stones, the pearls, the silks, and the diverse perfumes of the East; scarce a day passes that there does not arrive nearly a thousand cars laden with silk, of which they make admirable stuffs in this city."
Passing through a door, of height scarce sufficient to admit a person of ordinary stature, I reached a vestibule, from which by a descent of a few steps I entered a large circular apartment, low but not inelegant, with a vaulted ceiling supported by chaste Ionic columns.
This party, having remained for seven days on our beach, and not hearing anything more of our intended invaders, their provisions also becoming rather scarce, took leave in order to return to their own district, placing scouts to give them quick intelligence of the movements of the enemy.
A beautiful, sturdy boy hung upon her hand, keeping pace gallantly even with her flying steps, and the joy of motherhood had given something of added luster to the soft beauty of her dark eyes; otherwise she was scarce changed from the Gertrude of past days.
The men were armed as fast as they were enrolled, and scarce a field or quiet avenue in the district but resounded to the tramp of feet, the rattle of weapons, and the sharp orders of the officers who, by drilling, were converting this raw material into soldiers.
"He writes a fair hand;" and then, as the thought, which at first was scarce a thought, kept growing in her mind, she turned it over, and found that, owing to some defect, it had become unsealed and the lid of the envelope lay temptingly open before her.
Long and toilsome was this ascent; for though the main road was still beneath our feet, so perfectly had its fabricators set the rules of their art at defiance, that it ran sheer and abrupt, with scarce a trifling deflection, from the base to the summit.
I could scarce realize it all as I read the note again and again, and handled the sparkling, glittering baubles, which made my bunk a cave of dazzling light; or wrapped them once more in the linen, using it as a bag, and tying it round my neck for safety.
Lora Lovelace would scarce condescend to exchange a word with him; and when by chance he had twice or thrice been thrown into her company, it was only to find himself the subject of a slight or a satire, and the next moment to receive the cold shoulder.
We soon found sheep again, but they fled on our approach to the most inaccessible rocks, where they leaped with wondrous strength and certainty from one pinnacle to another, and sometimes after a desperate leap reached a peak on which they had scarce room for their four feet.
In countries and localities where stone is scarce and shell abundant, cutting implements were, in prehistoric times, made of shell; and chisels or hatchets of shell, corresponding to the polished stone hatchet, were prevalent wherever the conditions were favorable, yet nobody ever called it an age of shell.
Great numbers of the men could scarce drag themselves along owing to the state of their feet; their shoes and sandals, well enough adapted for sandy plains, were wholly unfitted for traversing rocky precipices, and the greater part of the army was almost barefoot.
The Governor's message had not been so prompt as to forestall them, and I am occupied scarce the time in the writing of this that it took our brave members to adopt the petition to his Majesty and to pass resolutions of support to our sister colony of the North.
Scarce were we come within the gates when we perceived a great concourse of the people near to the market; and running thither we entered with the rest into a courtyard and there found a great multitude assembled, and the travelers, in the gallery above, discoursing to them.
The stirring activity of camp life and warfare, the indolent, intriguing nature of domestic society in India, where ladies are scarce and gentlemen officers are in excess, these and many other causes peculiar to his isolation from all his English ties, kept this emotion deep beneath the surface.
The southern night came on quickly, and the last ray of the sun had scarce disappeared when the stars were twinkling in the dark blue sky, and around us, more and more solidly, were gathering the dark shadows, and a smooth blankness engulfed the whole steppe.
To talk of hunting with the sweepings of a few second-rate kennels, dignified with the name of a pack, when the huntsman was a local genius, and foxes were said to be so scarce or so little enterprising that it was often necessary to have recourse to a red herring!
Just then finding that they too were consumptive, and limping with pain in every joint, I consented to take my chances; and after preparing for the occasion like any person would in such circumstances, where clothes were scarce and no one near, I waded into the doughy sea.
In a niche opposite the cabinet gleamed a complete suit of sixteenth century armor; and so dry was the atmosphere of the apartment, that scarce a spot of rust appeared upon the polished surface, which, however, like every other object in the room, was overlaid with fine dust.
I thought I had never beheld a scene more disagreeable; and when I considered that the whole traffic was illusory, and all the money then upon the market would scarce have sufficed to buy a pair of skates, I was at first astonished, although not for long.
The little fellow remembered that Marten had forbidden him to leave the tree or to speak, but he could not keep his small feet from moving up and down restlessly, nor could he scarce command himself not to call out and tell his brother of Edward's arrival.
Scarce a fortnight had passed over my head, but impatient for their return, I laid me down to sleep one morning, when a strange accident happened, which was ushered in by Friday's coming running to me, and calling aloud, Master, Master, they are come, they are come.
Socrates the most sober and most chaste of all men, who cheerfully supported both cold and heat; whom no inconvenience, no hardships, no labors could startle, and who had learned to wish for so little, that though he had scarce anything, he had always enough.
In those parts of South America which I had previously visited, these gigantic grasses were comparatively scarce; and where found but little used, their place being taken as to one class of uses by the great variety of Palms, and as to another by calabashes and gourds.
I thought I had never beheld a scene more disagreeable; and when I considered that the whole traffic was illusory, and all the money then upon the market would scarce have sufficed to buy a pair of skates, I was at first astonished, although not for long.
For in the religious orders there is scarce one in many thousands, who is not more concerned about works than about faith, and on the basis of this madness they have even made distinctions among themselves, such as "the more strict" and "the more lax," as they call them.
The sun makes the system called by its name a unity, though some planets be of giant bulk and swing through a mighty orbit, waited on by obedient satellites, and some be but specks and move through a narrow circle, and some have scarce been seen by human eye.
The things composing capital are concrete things, scarce forms of wealth, some of which are yielding gratification at the present moment, or are destined to do so at some future moment; others of which are not themselves giving direct gratification, but are indirect agents for the gratifying of wants.
I could scarce believe her information, when she recounted her expressions in my favor, so much more warm and passionate were they than my most sanguine hopes had presaged; and was particularly pleased to hear that she approved of my behavior to her brother after she withdrew.
I remember to this day with a curious dizziness of recollection, the straining of those two stout wrestlers over the field, each forcing the other with all his might, and each scarce yielding a foot, and finally ending the strife in the same spot as where begun.
Bears not, at present, being indigenous to Britain, were naturally scarce, so the homely and offensive Bull had to afford rough sport to the multitude, and several towns now bear testimony to the popularity of the sport of bull baiting in their "Bull rings" (Birmingham, to wit).
All that the husband, who was scarce able to read or write, appreciated in his wife, who was still more ignorant than himself, was her powers of endurance, which, similar to those of a beast of burden, enabled her to toil from morn till night without complaining.
Bernard, whom he betrays and laughs at, is the commonplace, scarce presentable husband, married by a refined and poetical creature for his money, and blushed for by her at every moment while she is solacing herself with the elegant improprieties of her friend's husband, Richard.
All the autumn day had been sultry, and the wind seemed to have fallen asleep in some remote corner of the sky, for there had scarce been air enough to stir the feathery tassels of the pasture grasses, and the stillness of drought and heat had been everywhere unbroken.
The few minutes so occupied had brought the fire within a few hundred yards, and, as I crushed myself within the reeking carcass, and covered my exposed limbs with masses of the disgusting offal, I could scarce turn my fascinated sight from the appalling scene.
One hundred and three strong, gay in bright new uniforms, with unstained banner kissing the breeze above our proud young heads, we rode hopefully forth from Charlottesville scarce three years before, untried, undisciplined, unknown, to place our lives willingly upon the sacred altar of our native State.
"If you have anything to propose to me," said Roland, smothering his wrath as well as he could, though scarce hoping assistance or comfort of any kind from the man who had done him so much injury, "propose it, and be brief, and trouble me with no questions."
We stayed a moment till a great troop was round us, every moment swelling as the laggards came up, thirsting to have a lot in so great a matter, and then with a mighty charge, that our foes scarce essayed to meet, we drove them before us into the sea.
That there is not the least probability of his having poisoned his wife, who died of a languishing distemper: that no proof was ever pretended to be given of it; that a bare supposition of such a crime, without proofs or very strong presumptions, is scarce ever to be credited.
A party like ours would be noticed at once, but two or three persons each with a camel carrying their belongings would be scarce observed; and the Mahdi's horsemen, asking if a caravan of ten camels had passed, would be told that no such party had been seen.
Self-sufficient, assured, with scarce shyness enough for modesty, handsome and hard, she was essentially a self-glorious Philistine; nor would she be anything better till something was sent to humble her, though what spiritual engine might be equal to the task was not for man to imagine.
In those days, only a year ago, and yet already such ancient history that the earlier pages are forgotten and scarce credible if recalled, it took courage to walk past the knots of facetious loafers, and the unblushing Suffragette poster, into the hall where the meetings were held.
Luke, but I can print nothing but at my own cost: thereupon I wholly give myself to reading, scarce thinking of writing more; for booksellers and printers have dulled my edge, who will print no book, especially Latin, unless they have an assured and considerable gain.
His Catalog of English Plants having become scarce, he was solicited by some friends to improve it for a third edition, which he accordingly did; but a difference arising between him and the booksellers, to whom the copyright belonged, he forthwith resolved to publish it in another form.
Scarce five minutes had transpired from the hanging out of the handkerchief, when a canoe was seen shooting out from under the moss-garnished trees that fringed the upper edge of the lagoon, and making for the bottom of the cliff beneath the spot where she stood.
Thus taking leave of the wily woman, these two old simple-minded retainers rode back again; their obtuse minds probably scarce comprehending the nature of the loss Lady Lester had met with, the exchanged fortunes of their late young master, nor the important object of their mission.
Yet, as there is scarce any vice, even to be imagined, but there may be found men who have been guilty of it, perhaps there have been as many criminals in the case before us, as in any one particular besides, notwithstanding the aggravation and extraordinary degree of its baseness.
It was one of those faces that one scarce knows whether to think finer in profile or in full view; the features were small, the hair glistened with a tint of that burnish the moon sometimes wears on summer nights, and the figure was a mere fillip to the imagination.
It is a mistake to suppose that when the stars appear to be the brightest to the unaided eye, definition will be at its best, though this may happen; when it does so, the astronomer should make the most possible use of the opportunity, as such nights are very scarce.
Every village possesses a herd of cows, which you may watch in the early morning hours straggling off to the pastures, driven along by two or three old men or urchins, and although you can always get excellent milk, butter is very scarce, and cheese unknown.
The eaves of my bedchamber were scarce on speaking terms with the walls, and through a score of crannies at least the wind poured and whistled, so that after shifting my truss of straw a dozen times I found myself still the center of a whirl of draft.
With bated breath she groped beneath the little mound, scarce daring to hope that the treasure remained where she had left it; but, to her infinite relief and joy, her hand came at once upon the barrel of the heavy weapon and then upon the bandoleer of cartridges.
His reflections open to all the recesses of the human heart; and, in a word, a more just or pleasant, a more engaging or a more improving treatise, on all the excellencies and defects of human nature, is scarce to be found in our own, or, perhaps, any other language.'
This Edmund Neal senior had by this method climbed (by a little skill he had in horses) from paring off their hoofs, to directing of their riders, until in short there was scarce a sporting squire in the neighborhood but old Edmund was of his privy council.
Of these it is scarce necessary to quote instances; but the following may be told as a tale recounted by a foreign nobleman known to me nearly thirty years ago, whose life, lost in the service of his sovereign, proved too short for his friends and his native land.
When I came to the precipice whence we were to descend into the cove I was seized with such a dizziness in my head that I thought it scarce possible to effect it: however by the assistance of Nelson and others they at last got me down, in a weak condition.
The prisoners, on being questioned by Cyrus, said they belonged to the camp and had gone out to forage or cut wood and so had passed beyond their own pickets, for, owing to the size of their army, everything was scarce. "How far is your army from here?"
Apparently I was in the hollow cup of an extinct crater, for on all sides towered perpendicular cliffs of dark granite-like rock, so smooth and unbroken for the most part that a baboon would scarce have found foothold upon them indeed, in many places they actually overhung.
At Pat's end of the table plates were scarce, and the boys round him took the huge lumps of blood-red mutton in their fists, and seemed perfectly independent of such conventional wants as knives and forks, in the ease and enjoyment with which they dispatched their repast.
Setters do not, to the same degree, alarm birds; and there is, also, this advantage, that they can be employed on all occasions, excepting in low gorse or the closest thickets, whereas spaniels, from their contracted "beat," are nearly useless in the open when game is scarce.
I lean against the walls in a very old armchair there is on the premises, and scarce ever fail to worry such a hole in the plastering as would set me down for a round charge for damages in town, or make a prim housewife fret herself into a raging fever.
The weather was, unfortunately, so severe that the cold nearly broke his army up into shivers; while provisions were so scarce that at one time there seemed to be no chance of anything to eat but ice, and though the air was thoroughly gelid, it was impossible to live on it.
Without regarding the danger, however, young volunteers never enlist so readily as at the beginning of a new war; and though they have scarce any chance of preferment, they figure to themselves, in their youthful fancies, a thousand occasions of acquiring honor and distinction which never occur.
I don't mention it because my love scrapes were so scarce, but because it was with a Mexican girl, and under curious circumstances, that is, the circumstances were curious from the fact that we became personally acquainted and never spoke to one another, except by signs, and through letters.
There seemed scarce foothold for a goat on those pillared cliffs which sank sheer into the dark water, and the streak or two of snow lingering still in a northern recess marked, she felt sure, some deep crevasse hidden from sight by the innocent-looking mantle of white.
This point, though scarce deserving the name of a cataract, is so marked by the occurrence of a peculiar bed of rocks crossing the river, and by the rapid descent of the current, that it may be readily recognized by any who shall pass that way hereafter.
There was an old creature bent double, she could scarce bobble, and two young women with babies to their breasts, and there was a growing girl or two I'm bound to confess that none of them looked wicked enough to have been the one that set on you, sir.
Before long, however, the Spanish king will refuse to pay him the price agreed upon, and will send him on wild-goose errands, until he sees his men fall around him stricken by pestilence, and scarce one in five of them will return with him across the Pyrenees.
It became necessary to provide for the thousands to whom a sweeping measure of emancipation had given their freedom and nothing more, in many cases casting them adrift upon the world without any resource, for at the end of the war trade was bad and employment scarce.
The savage has all the privacy he needs within the compass of his skull; like dogs and timid women, he prefers ill-treatment to desertion, and it is only a scarce and complex modern type that finds comfort and refreshment in quite lonely places and quite solitary occupations.
It is scarce necessary, therefore, to add, that the churchmen of various descriptions had no small influence over this easy tempered prince, though, indeed, theirs was, at that period, an influence from which few or none escaped, however resolute and firm of purpose in affairs of a temporal character.
Their inhabitants were still of the usual backwoods type, living by tilling their clearings and hunting; the elk and buffalo had become very scarce, but there were plenty of deer and bear, and in winter countless wild swans settled down on the small lakes and ponds.
A bag of small shot was missing, and we afterwards discovered that the Canadians had secreted and distributed it among themselves in order that when provision should become scarce they might privately procure ducks and geese and avoid the necessity of sharing them with the officers.
She had tremendous force of character for one scarce twenty years of age; indeed, she lived a superlative life, and the man, woman, child, or dog that came within radius of her existence presently formed a definite part of it, and was loved or detested according to circumstances.
The Duke, who on the one hand loved his wife and felt himself grievously affronted, and on the other loved his servant, whose faithfulness he had so fully tried that he could scarce believe this falsehood against him, was in great distress and filled with anger.