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Converse   Listen
noun
Converse  n.  
1.
(Logic) A proposition which arises from interchanging the terms of another, as by putting the predicate for the subject, and the subject for the predicate; as, no virtue is vice, no vice is virtue. Note: It should not (as is often done) be confounded with the contrary or opposite of a proposition, which is formed by introducing the negative not or no.
2.
(Math.) A proposition in which, after a conclusion from something supposed has been drawn, the order is inverted, making the conclusion the supposition or premises, what was first supposed becoming now the conclusion or inference. Thus, if two sides of a sides of a triangle are equal, the angles opposite the sides are equal; and the converse is true, i.e., if these angles are equal, the two sides are equal.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Converse" Quotes from Famous Books



... Reggie, and Noel. He naturally fled for his life, but was overtaken by the latter and held down while the two accomplices rifled his pockets. By the rules of the game all coppers found therein were confiscated, and this regulation having been duly observed, the prisoner was allowed to sit up and converse with his principal captor while the rest of ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell

... the best help a woman can get is from a right man—equally true with its converse; but let the man who ventures take heed. Unless he is able to counsel a woman to the hardest thing that bears the name of duty, let him not dare give advice even to ...
— Thomas Wingfold, Curate • George MacDonald

... the coast which mosquitoes have in most melancholy manner marked as their own. Perhaps it is the noise of the city that scares them. The people live in the street as much as possible, and therein conduct their converse in highly-pitched notes. I have a strong suspicion that, like the habitation jointly rented by Messrs. Box and Cox, Genoa is tenanted by two distinct populations. One fills the place by day and throughout the evening up to about ten ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy

... mind appear in simulation, And, for the most, such quality offends; 'Tis plain that this in many a situation Is found to further beneficial ends, And save from blame, and danger, and vexation; Since we converse not always with our friends, In this, less clear than clouded, mortal life, Beset with snares, and ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto

... of an enthusiastic archaeologian that he blessed the day of the Commonwealth because, he said, if Cromwell and all his destructive followers had never lived, there would have been no ruins in the country to repay the antiquary's researches. And the converse of this is true of a race of men who before long will be "improved" off the face of the earth, if the restoration of our parish churches is to go on at the present rate. I allude to the old parish clerks of our boy-hood ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield

... rest, M. de Treville had good reason to mistrust the cardinal and to think that all was not over, for scarcely had the captain of the Musketeers closed the door after him, than his Eminence said to the king, "Now that we are at length by ourselves, we will, if your Majesty pleases, converse seriously. Sire, Buckingham has been in Paris five days, ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... Ralph," said the stranger, stepping forward and taking his hand. "However, we will say no more on the subject at present. Your son and General Sampson know me as Mr Hastings; let me retain that name till we can converse in private. In the meantime, continue your preparations to receive the ruffians, who are close at hand. Thanks to the speed at which we were driving, the volley they fired ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston

... greatly refreshed after their hearty repast but they were still very tired and sleepy. They strove to converse together and keep awake but the fatigue of the day, the heavy meal, and the warmth of the fire proved too much for them and every now and then one would catch ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely

... sort are these maxims, "That God is to be worshiped, that parents are to be honored, that a man's word is to be kept," and the like; which, being of universal influence, as to the regulation of the behavior and converse of mankind, are the ground of all virtue and civility, and the foundation ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Vol. 2 (of 10) • Grenville Kleiser

... obstacles which had arrested M. de Lafayette at the commencement of the projected northern campaign, he had embraced with ardour the idea of a diversion which was to be operated in Canada, with the combined forces of France and America; and it was partly to converse on this plan with Washington, and later with the cabinet of Versailles, that he insisted upon having a conference with the general- in-chief, and returning to France before the winter. He was even ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette

... world of comprehension in his fiery eyes. Whoever thinks this puerile must remember that my hero was a Frenchman, and a young Frenchman, with a prescriptive right to chatter for chattering's sake, and also that he had not a very highly cultivated mind of his own to converse with, even if the most highly cultivated intellect is ever a reliable resource against ...
— Frances Kane's Fortune • L. T. Meade

... dreadfully frightened at seeing a strange man come into the room through the window; but the King's son looked at her with such friendly eyes, and began to converse with her so kindly, that she soon ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... Queen Blanche would not suffer, so far as her power went, that her son should keep his wife's company. Where it was most pleasing to the king and the queen to live was at Pontoise, because the king's chamber was above and the queen's below. And they had so well arranged matters that they held their converse on a spiral staircase which led down from the one chamber to the other. When the ushers saw the queen-mother coming into the chamber of the king her son, they knocked upon the door with their staves, and the king came running ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... and pursue; and if thou wilt not be open-eyed to the follies of my youth, [a transitory state;] every excursion shall serve but the more to endear thee to me, till in time, and in a very little time too, I shall get above sense; and then, charmed by thy soul-attracting converse; and brought to despise my former courses; what I now, at distance, consider as a painful duty, will be my joyful choice, and all my delight will centre ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson

... enjoyment has deepened. As you meet friendly faces and feel the grip of friendly hands, so you also exchange salutations with Nature, as if she, too, were an old Heligoland friend. You know the view from this point and from that; but, like the converse of a friend, it is always changing, for there is no monotony in the sea. The waves lap the shore gently, or roar tumultuously in the red caverns, and it is all familiar, but none the less welcome and soothing because of that familiarity. ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume V (of X) • Various

... at it who will, to hearken to the footsteps that came and went. They were to us meaningless as the lapse of the waves on the shore, pattering an accompaniment above the soft sibilance of our whispered talk, making our converse sweeter. ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett

... world loves a lover, and a true lover loves all the world,—especially that portion of it similarly blessed. So, when I heard a girl's voice alternating in intimate converse with that of a man, my sympathies went out to them, and I turned silently to look. They must have come in during my reverie; for I had passed the place where they were sitting and had not seen them. There was a piece of grillwork between my station and theirs, through which I could see them plainly. ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick

... Indeed, M. Du Bois was the only man of the party to whom, voluntarily, I ever addressed myself. He is civil and respectful, and I have found nobody else so since I left Howard Grove. His English is very bad; but I prefer it to speaking French myself, which I dare not venture to do. I converse with him frequently, both to disengage myself from others and to oblige Madame Duval, who is always pleased ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various

... that some things stated here grate harshly upon the ears of gentlemen from the South. The converse of this is equally true. I can take a rebuke, I trust, in a good temper, but I do not like to be stabbed in the house of my friends. I do not like to have doctrines and opinions imputed to me and ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden

... of the SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN I notice an ingenious method of teaching deaf and dumb persons to converse in the dark, which is also applicable to blind mutes, and it brings to my recollection a method which was in use among the "telegraph boys" some years ago when I was one of them. Sometimes when we were visiting and asked to communicate to a "brother chip," anything that it was not advisable ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various

... airing, to walk upstairs to her step-sister's room and seat herself by the bedside before grandmother had time to turn to the wall. There she sat, pulling off her gloves and talking casually as if they had been in the habit of daily converse, while grandmother lay and pierced her with unyielding eyes. There was not emotion in the glance, no aversion or remonstrance. It was the glance she had for Esther, for Rhoda Knox. "Here I am," it said, "flat, but not at your mercy. You can't make me do anything I don't want ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown

... this ferocious jest, Don Estevan signed to Diaz to accompany him to a place where they might converse without being overheard. When the new-comers had lain down and silence reigned ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid

... converse together all the time that the cups were going round, and when the Earl retired to rest, as he did betimes, Harald would sit long talking with the wife to the Earl, and so fared things for a long ...
— The Sagas of Olaf Tryggvason and of Harald The Tyrant (Harald Haardraade) • Snorri Sturluson

... go out to this sick passenger. I long to speak and act kindly. Forgetting personal stress, I am touched at thought of fellow-helplessness. Yet there must be no sentimental indiscretions. To converse with either would invite questioning. Direct answers might be unsafe. Evasive replies would ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee

... thought it necessary to establish between the two houses, she was not likely to see Roger again before his departure for Africa. Oh! if she had but made more of the uncared-for days that she had passed with him at the Hall! Worse than uncared for; days on which she had avoided him; refused to converse freely with him; given him pain by her change of manner; for she had read in his eyes, heard in his voice, that he had been perplexed and pained, and now her imagination dwelt on and exaggerated the expression of his tones ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... was now unnaturally silent for five minutes, munching chestnuts; this enabled his guests to converse; but as soon as he had cleared his plate, he cut right across the conversation, with that savage contempt for all topics but his own which characterizes gentlemen of his age, and says he to Rolfe, "You know everything? Then what's a ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade

... powers, is specific, abundant, decided, emphatic. It is founded in human nature; it is essential to the peace of society a departure from it would be ruinous to social comfort. If therefore it is proper to introduce any rule on this point into a mutual church covenant, it seems to me that the converse of that which is usually found in that place ought to be substituted. Even the apostles, as we have seen, found it necessary to rebuke the disposition prevalent in their time to meddle with the affairs, and to make inquisition into the conduct of others. But it should be recollected, that ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... the long, pathless trail approached, arose a question of which McKay had previously thought but had not spoken—how he was to converse with the Red Bone chief. Lourenco asked Tucu whether the Red Bones spoke the Mayoruna tongue. Tucu replied that they did not. He added, however, that the languages were not so dissimilar as to prevent some sort of understanding being reached between members of the ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel

... near her house, Linked with sweet converse, sit two shadowed forms. The new sword moon against the violet sky Is held aloft, by one white arm of cloud Raised from the sombre shoulder of a hill. My Grace and I are sitting in the bower, And down upon my breast and girdling arm Is strewn pure gold—no alloy mixes it— ...
— Stories in Verse • Henry Abbey

... aboard. The crowd called him Dashalong. Upon inquiry, Leonard found it to be Deschaillon. The young man who read the articles was named Farnol Greer. However, he proved a silent, taciturn youth, who seemed to converse with no one and ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling

... speedily she went, and met but three men on the way; and when these saw her, and that she was making for Evilshaw, they turned their heads away, each one, and blessed themselves, and went past swiftly. Not one sought to stay her, or held any converse with her, and no foot she heard following after her. So in scarce more than the saying of a low mass she was in amongst the trees, with her ass and ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris

... number of dialects of the same language, and these differ so widely that Kenyahs of widely separated districts cannot converse freely with one another; but, as with all the peoples, except the Sea Dayaks, nearly every man has the command of several dialects as well as of ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall

... to be a very intelligent, well-read man. I could speak the Danish language pretty fluently, and was therefore able to converse with him on various subjects. On hearing that I had already been in Palestine, he put a number of questions to me, from which I could plainly see that he was alike well acquainted with geography, history, natural science, &c. He accompanied ...
— Visit to Iceland - and the Scandinavian North • Ida Pfeiffer

... the real sting of waiting to fond-hearted woman. The remark awoke in Stephen the converse fear. 'You, too, may be persuaded to give me up, when time has made me fainter in your memory. For, remember, your love for me must be nourished in secret; there will be no long visits from me to support you. Circumstances will always tend ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy

... then put to her. Had the saints long hair? She did not know. And what language did they converse ...
— Joan of Arc • Ronald Sutherland Gower

... a good critique on a poem may be written by one who is no poet himself. This, according to your idea and mine of poetry, I feel to be false—the less poetical the critic, the less just the critique, and the converse. On this account, and because there are but few B——s in the world, I would be as much ashamed of the world's good opinion as proud of your own. Another than yourself might here observe, 'Shakespeare is in possession of the world's ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe

... worthy of divine honors in all the cities. A certain Livius Geminus, a senator, stated on oath, invoking destruction upon himself and his children if he spoke falsely, that he had seen her ascending into heaven and holding converse with the gods; and he called all the other gods and Panthea herself to witness. For his declaration he received twenty-five myriads. Besides all this Gaius showed her honor in not having the festivals ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio

... voyage." Sometimes the conversation, begun as between equals, would gradually get the word "Sir" sprinkled over it; and once or twice—and this not in France—it came down at last to that "glass of beer," sheepishly enough asked for, which of course instantly drowns the converse that has been free on one side and independent on ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor

... help shifting at the great objects of our letters. We never converse on a less topic than a kingdom. We are a kind of citizens of the world, and battles and revolutions are the common incidents of our neighbourhood. But that is and must be the case of distant correspondences: Kings and Empresses that we never saw are the only ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole

... cannot. Canny, careful, shrewd. Cantie, cheerful. Carline, old woman. Cauld, cold. Chalmer, chamber. Claes, clothes. Clamjamfry, crowd. Clavers, idle talk. Cock-laird. See Bonnet-laird. Collieshangie, turmoil. Crack, to converse. Cuist, cast. Cuddy, donkey. Cutty, jade, also ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson

... not a fairy, or spiritual being, but an animal. In this class of story the husband is usually forbidden to perform some act which will recall to the bride the associations of her old animal existence. The converse of the tale is the well-known legend of the Forsaken Merman. The king of the sea permits his human wife to go to church. The ancient sacred associations are revived, and the woman returns ...
— Custom and Myth • Andrew Lang

... when you had such company? Pelle was no longer able to comprehend his own fear of it. As a child he had been a creature in the widest sense, and found companionship in everything; he could converse with trees, animals, and stones. Those fibers had withered, and no longer conveyed nourishment; but then he became one with the masses, and thought and felt exactly as they did. That was crumbling away too now; he was being isolated distinctly, bit by ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... become rather painful, and I availed myself of the cup of sake, feeling I needed some stimulant. This was the only refreshment I tried, but some of the party had the courage to experiment further. After some deliberation and a little more converse, we arose from our repast and proceeded to the hotel dining-room, where a substantial dinner was served us at nine o'clock. This was altogether the most unique affair of the week and greatly enjoyed by all. The eight days in Kyoto had flown and we would gladly have remained ...
— Travels in the Far East • Ellen Mary Hayes Peck

... autumn, I sat at the large bow window of the D——- Coffee-House in London. For some months I had been ill in health, but was now convalescent, and, with returning strength, found myself in one of those happy moods which are so precisely the converse of ennui—moods of the keenest appetency, when the film from the mental vision departs—the [Greek phrase]—and the intellect, electrified, surpasses as greatly its every-day condition, as does the vivid yet candid reason of Leibnitz, the mad and flimsy rhetoric of Gorgias. Merely to breathe ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... French Embassy. Accordingly he welcomed Maret cordially. No tactical skirmish about chairs took place, and Maret afterwards declared that the great Minister behaved affably throughout, brightening his converse at times by a smile. As the personality of the two statesmen and the gravity of the crisis invest this interview with unique interest, Pitt's account of it, which is in the Pretyman MSS., must ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... men, however, received us without any apprehension, and gave us a plentiful supply of provisions. The plains were now crowded with Indians, who came to see the persons of the whites and the strange things they brought with them: but as our guide was perfectly a stranger to their language we could converse by signs only. Our inquiries were chiefly directed to the situation of the country, the courses of the rivers, and the Indian villages, of all which we received information from several of the Indians, and as their accounts varied but little from ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark

... himself. These are his words: 'Like him (Shakspeare) she shows as admirable a discrimination in the character of fools as of people of sense; a merit which is far from common. To invent indeed a conversation full of wisdom or of wit requires that the writer should himself possess ability; but the converse does not hold good, it is no fool that can describe fools well; and many who have succeeded pretty well in painting superior characters have failed in giving individuality to those weaker ones which it is necessary to introduce in order to give a faithful representation ...
— Memoir of Jane Austen • James Edward Austen-Leigh

... mocked and the World called me mad— That a whole family of twice ten souls Should move house for the sake of a few pines! Now that I have come to them, what have they given me? They have only loosened the buckles of my care. Yet even so, they are "profitable friends,"[1] And fill my need of "converse with wise men." Yet when I consider how, still a man of the world, In belt and cap I scurry through dirt and dust, From time to time my heart twinges with shame That I am not fit to be master ...
— More Translations from the Chinese • Various

... same mind in converse with a like abstraction. "The Night-Wind," breathing through an open window, has visited an ear which discerned ...
— Poems • (AKA Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte) Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell

... desire our happiness, and know our actions, either in God whom they behold, and in whom they discover all truth which it concerns them to know; or by the angels, the messengers of God on earth: but that the damned do not ordinarily know what passes on earth, because they neither see God nor converse with our angels. He says that prayers for the dead are thanksgivings for the good, a propitiation for the souls in purgatory, but {549} no relief to the damned. He was raised to the see of Toledo in 680, and died in 690. See Ildefonse of ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... keep to the left, and you'll come right on it," said the peasant, unmistakably loth to let the travelers go, and eager to converse. ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy

... liberty, was nevertheless pleased that he had the freedom to converse with his books, and that made him look on his imprisonment with indifference. In the evening he bathed and said his prayers; and after having read some chapters in the Koran, with the same tranquility of mind as if he ...
— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon

... which was first and chiefest, they gave letters of exchange for another life, by which the dead became rich in heaven; that, in fine, the Bonzas were the familiar friends of the stars, and the confidents of the saints; that they were privileged to converse with them by night, to cause them to descend from heaven, to embrace them in their arms, and enjoy them as long as they desired." These extravagancies set all the company in a laughter; at which the Bonza was so enraged, that he flew out into greater ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume XVI. (of 18) - The Life of St. Francis Xavier • John Dryden

... to the fore; both my immediate neighbours English, but neither shows any inclination to converse. Rather glad of it; afternoon of Museums and Galleries instructive—but exhausting. Usual Chatty Clergyman at end of table, talking Guide-book intelligently; wife next him, ruminating in silence and dismally ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 11, 1892 • Various

... characters, customs, and manners of the company? No. He may be in the best companies of his lifetime (if they will admit him, which, if I were they, I would not), and never be one jot the wiser. I never will converse with an absent man; one may as well talk with a deaf one. It is, in truth, a practical blunder, to address ourselves to a man, who we see plainly neither hears, minds, nor understands us. Moreover, I aver that no man is, in any degree, fit for either business or conversation, who cannot, ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury

... those of the capital. Throughout the whole of these countries there is one general characteristic, in which they resemble the Indians of America, namely, courage and self-respect. The chiefs, after coming to salute the Pasha, would make no scruple of sitting down facing him, and converse with him without embarrassment, in the same manner as they are accustomed to do with their own Maleks, with whom they are very familiar. With the greatest apparent simplicity they would frequently propose troublesome questions to the Pasha, such as, "O ...
— A Narrative of the Expedition to Dongola and Sennaar • George Bethune English

... neck, by which I contrived to pull off his bands altogether, I said, 'I am indeed that Cervantes, senor, but not the favorite of the Muses, nor the other fine things which you have said of me. Pray mount your ass again, and let us converse together for the small remainder of our journey.' The good student did as I desired. We then drew bit and proceeded at a more moderate pace. As we rode on, we talked of my illness, but the student gave me little ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne

... Persians and the Peruvian Incas, who thus kept pure the solar and lunar blood. If this "breeding-in" ever existed, no trace of it now remains; on the contrary, every care is taken to avoid marriages of consanguinity. Bowdich, indeed, assures us that a man may not look at nor converse with his mother-in-law, on pain of a heavy, perhaps a ruinous fine; "this singular law is founded on ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... Duchesses, explain the heart-throbs of peers of the realm? Some of my friends who, being Conservative, attend Primrose "tourneys" (or is it "Courts of love"? I speak as an outsider. Something mediaeval, I know it is) do, it is true, occasionally converse with titled ladies. But the period for conversation is always limited owing to the impatience of the man behind; and I doubt if the interview is ever of much practical use to them, as conveying knowledge of the workings of the aristocratic mind. Those of us who are not Primrose Knights ...
— The Angel and the Author - and Others • Jerome K. Jerome

... especially to Baron Sonnino's opposition, these inchoate sentiments of neighborliness quickly lost their warmth and finally vanished. No trace of them remained at the Paris Conference, where the delegates of the two states did not converse together nor even ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon

... to keep him close tied to my apron-string; he will tell you nothing of the kind; but that, on the contrary, I always allows him an agreeable latitude, permitting him to go where he pleases, and to converse with any one to whose manner of speaking he may take a fancy. But I have had the advantage of ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow

... when they arrived; the two older ladies awaited them in the parlor, and some time was spent in pleasant converse before retiring for ...
— Grandmother Elsie • Martha Finley

... assaults of ice and snow. Let him howl about your windows and scrawl his wonderful landscapes on your panes and pile his fantastic wreaths outside, while you draw round the blazing hearth and enjoy the artificial heat and warm in the social converse that he provokes. Your punch is all the better for his threats; by contrast you enjoy the more. Or brave him outside in a flying sledge, careering with jangling bells over white wastes of snow, while the stars, as you go, fly through the naked trees ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various

... of the world. His favorite places of resort were the saloons of Andrea Morosini, and the shop of the Secchini at the sign of the Nave d'Oro. Here, after days spent in religious exercises, sacerdotal duties, and prolonged studies, he relaxed his mind in converse with the miscellaneous crowd of eminent persons who visited Venice for business or pleasure. A certain subacid humor, combining irony without bitterness, and proverbial pungency without sententiousness, added piquancy to his discourse. We have, unfortunately, no record of the wit-encounters which ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... Academy degli Intronati. I had taken an instant liking for the Cordelier in question, a man who, grown grey in study, still preserved the cheerful, facile humour of a simple, unlettered countryman. He was very willing to converse; and I greatly relished his bland speech, his cultivated yet artless way of thought, his look of old Silenus purged at the baptismal font, the play of his passions at once keen and refined, the strange, alluring ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France

... it is extremely convenient and to a certain extent justifiable on physical and psychological grounds; and it may be said roughly that while the linguistic uniformity of the Bantu is accompanied by great variation of physical type, the converse is in the main true of the Negro proper, especially where least affected by Libyan and Hamitic admixture, e.g. on the Guinea coast. The variation of type among the Bantu is due probably to a varying admixture of alien blood, which is more apparent as the east ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... sort of compromise," the knight said. "One which pleased me not, but which at any rate will save the king from insult. He will send a messenger to-day to them saying that he will proceed to-morrow in his barge to Rotherhithe, and will there hold converse with them. He intends not to disembark, but to parley with them from the boat, and he will, at least in that way, be safe from assault. I hear that another great body of the Essex, Herts, Norfolk, and Suffolk rebels have arrived ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty

... converse with unrespective boys And iron witted fools. None are for me that look into ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott

... long looked-for company." If he had been fairly caged and found himself in congenial company, he let time pass unheeded, sitting up all night to talk, and chaining his audience by the spell of his unrivalled eloquence; for wonderful as was his poetry, those who enjoyed the privilege of converse with him, judged it even more attractive. "He was commonly most communicative, unreserved, and eloquent, and enthusiastic, when those around him were inclining to yield to the influence of sleep, or rather at the hour when they would ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds

... do. She is somewhat absolute, though quite unconsciously so; but she is likewise kind, with an affection at once abrupt and constant, whose sincerity you cannot doubt. It was delightful to sit near her in the evenings and hear her converse, myself mute. She speaks with what seems to me a wonderful fluency and eloquence. Her animal spirits are as unflagging as her intellectual powers. I was glad to find her health excellent. I believe neither solitude nor loss of friends ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter

... a bale of hay, they smoked many pipes together in earnest converse, until such time ...
— The Money Moon - A Romance • Jeffery Farnol

... bonds, and Xantippe (you know her), holding his little boy and sitting by him. As soon as Xantippe saw us, she wept aloud and said such things as women usually do on such occasions, as, "Socrates, your friends will now converse with you for the last time, and you with them." But Socrates, looking toward Crito, said, "Crito, let some one take her home." Upon which some of Crito's attendants led her away, wailing ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various

... most celestial region! Babylon The mighty, the magnificent, to thee, With all the trappings of her bravery on, Seems but a river to the engulfing sea. What are its oracles but lies? 'Tis given Thy prophets only to converse with Heaven— The hidden to reveal, the dark to scan, And be the interpreters of God to man. The idols dumb that erring men invoke, Themselves are vanities, their power is smoke: But, while the heathen's pomp is insecure, Is transient, thine, O Sion! ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various

... return at the hour when the muezzin calls from the minaret to evening prayer in the mosque, and if left undisturbed until then, I promise you this same Frankish soldier shall be able, without prejudice to his health, to hold some brief converse with you on any matters on which either, and especially his master, may have ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott

... rifle that it was agony to move them. I collapsed for a minute or two. Gobo and another man, wrapped up like a couple of monks in their blankets, thinking that I was still asleep, were crouched over a little fire they had made, for the morning was damp and chilly, and holding sweet converse. ...
— Maiwa's Revenge - The War of the Little Hand • H. Rider Haggard

... arrival in Capetown of the two celebrated soldiers, Lords Roberts and Kitchener, I made it my business to converse with as many Boers as possible in regard to the two Generals, and was astonished to find how much they knew concerning them. How, and from whom, they get information passes my comprehension, but the fact remains that they knew all over the country as soon, if not sooner, than ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales

... joy of earth or sky, No commune with the things I see, But dreary converse of the eye With worlds too grand to look at ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore

... said snappily, looking at me as much as to say: "You aren't asked to converse. This isn't a conversazione"; but, when he caught my gaze, he seemed, to repent of ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond

... grassy walk. Hark the laburnum from his opening flower, This cherry creeper greets in whisper light, While the grim fir, rejoicing in the night, Hoarse mutters to the murmuring sycamore,[39] What shall I deem their converse? would they hail The wild gray light that fronts yon massive cloud, Or the half bow, rising like pillar'd fire? Or are they fighting faintly for desire That with May dawn their leaves may be o'erflowed, And dews about their feet ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown

... Boabdil, when alone with the prince, and fixing his large and thoughtful eyes upon the dark orbs of his companion,—"when, in our younger days, we conversed together, do you remember how often that converse turned upon those solemn and mysterious themes to which the sages of our ancestral land directed their deepest lore; the enigmas of the stars—the science of fate—the wild searches into the clouded future, which hides the destines of nations and ...
— Leila, Complete - The Siege of Granada • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... whether I am suspicious of him, and whether I seeks to keep him close tied to my apron-string; he will tell you nothing of the kind; but that, on the contrary, I always allows him an agreeable latitude, permitting him to go where he pleases, and to converse with anyone to whose manner of speaking he may take a fancy. But I have had the advantage of keeping good company, ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... face. You are very like her in appearance. And you must try. You must try to improve yourself. Your uncle is always trying to improve himself. He reads 'Doctor Syntax' aloud to us. In the evening it is our custom to read aloud and converse." ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand

... wanting to avenge the craven blow, If he himself at such an age to fight should think to go. Sleepless he passed the weary nights, his food untasted lay, Ne'er raised his eyes from off the ground, nor ventured forth to stray, Refused all converse with his friends, impelled by mortal fear, Lest fame of outrage unatoned should aggravate his care. While pondering thus his honor's claims in search of just redress, He thought of an expedient his failing house to test; So summoning to his side his sons, ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock

... sacred converse have long ago fled. Its honoured family have slumbered for ages in their tomb. Bethany's Lord has been for centuries enthroned amid the glories of a brighter home. But though its Memories are all that remain, the place is still fragrant ...
— Memories of Bethany • John Ross Macduff

... confidently a few steps in advance; she was the most at home out here and led the way. Pelle and Hanne walked close together, in order to converse. Hanne was silent and absent; Pelle took her hand in order to make her run up a hillock, but she did not at first notice that he was touching her, and the hand was limp and clammy. She walked on as in a sleep, her whole ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... maidens, and even if he had wished to flirt with Zuleika he would hardly have known how to do it. But he did not wish to flirt with her. That she had bewitched him did but make it the more needful that he should shun all converse with her. It was imperative that he should banish her from his mind, quickly. He must not dilute his own soul's essence. He must not surrender to any passion his dandihood. The dandy must be celibate, cloistral; is, indeed, but a monk with a mirror for beads and breviary—an anchorite, ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm

... Life's joys unmix'd were given To thee some favourite of Heaven: Within, without, tho' all were health— Yet what e'en thus are Fame, Power, Wealth, But sounds that variously express, 70 What's thine already—Happiness! 'Tis thine the converse deep to hold With all the famous sons of old; And thine the happy waking dream While Hope pursues some favourite theme, 75 As oft when Night o'er Heaven is spread, Round this maternal seat you tread, Where far from splendour, far from riot, In silence wrapt sleeps careless Quiet. ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... hours; yet so miserably did time seem to linger, that I thought a thousand accidents had happened, and feared she would never return. I passed the whole time in my own room, for I was too much agitated even to converse with ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney

... surpassed; and, moreover, her manner of speech and her seriousness were to match, so that there was none but feared to accost her excepting the King, who loved her exceedingly. That he might have still more intimate converse with her, he gave some mission to the Count, her husband, which kept him away for a long time, and meanwhile the King made right ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. IV. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre

... little state: another near Grew by like means, and joined, through love or fear. Did here the trees with ruddier burdens bend, And there the streams in purer rills descend? What war could ravish, commerce could bestow, And he returned a friend, who came a foe. Converse and love mankind might strongly draw, When love was liberty, and Nature law. Thus States were formed; the name of king unknown, 'Till common interest placed the sway in one. 'Twas virtue only (or in arts or arms, Diffusing blessings, ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope

... strong; or she varied that with a sewing-school, having classes of girls to learn the art; this, too, was equally well relished. During the day every operation must be superintended, and both husband and wife must labor till the sun declines. After sunset the husband went into the town to converse with any one willing to do so, sometimes on general subjects, at other times on religion. On three nights of the week, as soon as the milking of the cows was over and it had become dark, we had a public religious service, and one of instruction on secular subjects, aided by ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone

... served to give a diversion to their thoughts, turning them into a new channel, and relieving them from that intense excitement of feeling by which they had been overcome. It also gave them a subject of common interest apart from themselves; and thus they were once more able to converse with one another, without having that sense of violent self-restraint which had thus far afflicted them. Brooke was able to be lively, without any affectation of too extravagant gayety, and Talbot was ...
— A Castle in Spain - A Novel • James De Mille

... Martie said wistfully. And suddenly reminded, she thought that she would take Teddy and go to see the old Doctor and Mrs. Converse. ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris

... victim's family, however, there is the difficulty of pleasing the victim. According to Mr. Collier, and he is, of course, a high authority on the matter, portrait painters bore their sitters very much. The true artist consequently should encourage his sitter to converse, or get some one to read to him; for if the sitter is bored the portrait will look sad. Still, if the sitter has not got an amiable expression naturally the artist is not bound to give him one, nor 'if he is essentially ungraceful' ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde

... Mrs. Munsell, chairman of the American Citizenship Committee, reported a ten-day course of citizenship at Winthrop Summer School; a summer class at the University of South Carolina; one at Coker College, Hartsville, conducted by Mrs. J. L. Coker, and a course at Converse College, Spartanburg. Mrs. Cathcart, chairman of the Resolutions Committee, read the following: "The State Equal Suffrage League tenders appreciation and thanks to the members of the General Assembly of South Carolina, who have fostered the cause ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various

... the Prince seemed to be one of benevolence to his "Fellow-Germans" and personal interest in them. Wherever the Prince discovered a German wearing the Iron Cross in the crowd, he would ask an aide to bring the man up to him so that he could shake hands and converse with him. ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard

... of it as he could be, but that I could not help it; that I deserved all the punishment I met with, and threw myself entirely on his mercy. He used frequently to call me over to the weather side of the deck, when he would converse with me on any topic which he thought might interest or amuse me. Finding I was tolerably well read in history, he asked my opinion, and gave me his own with great good sense and judgment; but such was the irresistible weight of my eyelids, that I used, when he was in the ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat

... sister's amiable anxiety to oblige me; I find an unspeakable softness in seeing my lovely Emily every moment, in seeing her adored by my family, in seeing her without restraint, in being in the same house, in living in that easy converse which is born from friendship alone: yet I ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke

... before the fire, and the three leaders and Braxton Wyatt sat upon them. All others kept at a respectful distance. The four began to talk and, although only an occasional word reached the watching three, they knew too well their subject of converse. It was the great conspiracy to draw the Spanish from Louisiana into an attack upon the infant settlements, upon the ground that they were or would be interlopers. It was cannon that the assailants needed to smash the block houses, and cannon in abundance could be brought ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler

... confinement. Baron Trenck, who managed to escape from the fortress of Clatz, can't for the life of him get out of our sittingroom closet. Even the Rivermouth Barnacle is suppressed until Monday. Genial converse, harmless books, smiles, lightsome hearts, all are banished. If I want to read anything, I can read Baxter's Saints' Rest. I would die first. So I sit there kicking my heels, thinking about New Orleans, and watching a morbid blue-bottle fly that attempts ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... assistant cobbler at Bruceton. He had silenced, if not conquered, all the other religious controversialists of the town, and found the weak spots in the armor of many good people not given to controversy, whom he had beguiled into talking on religious themes. Why he should want to converse at all upon such subjects puzzled the people of the town, all of whom had known him from boyhood as a member of a family so entirely satisfied with itself that it never desired any aid from other people, to say nothing of higher powers. Sometimes the Bartrams went to church for social purposes, ...
— All He Knew - A Story • John Habberton

... body, from the managing our domestic estate, which is a sort of handmaid and servant of the body, or from duties of a public nature, or from all other serious business whatever? What else is it, I say, that we do, but invite the soul to reflect on itself? oblige it to converse with itself, and, as far as possible, break off its acquaintance with the body? Now, to separate the soul from the body, is to learn to die, and nothing else whatever. Wherefore take my advice; and let us meditate on ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... He continued his converse with the Pendletons while Jinny went for the things; she returned with a small bag containing coat and hat and veil, and the announcement that she would go right ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley

... niece, with a pure love, but not without gratification of the senses. On the day following that on which he had learned of Robin's bankruptcy, he went to see Mirande in order to hold pious converse with her, as was his duty, for he stood in the place of a father to her, and had taken charge ...
— The Miracle Of The Great St. Nicolas - 1920 • Anatole France

... among the dead are passed; Around me I behold, Where'er these casual eyes are cast, The mighty minds of old: My never-failing friends are they, With whom I converse day by day. ...
— How to Form a Library, 2nd ed • H. B. Wheatley

... studies on the site of the ancient maritime empire of Carthage. He mentions particularly the subjects of mathematics, English literature, French, and Italian. For languages he had great natural aptitude, and in later life was able to converse in several. The monotony of study was varied by the society of the few but agreeable foreign families residing in Tunis, and by occasional excursions in the neighborhood; when the interest of the present was happily ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan

... Little Russians of the southern steppes, who were so long exposed to Tartar influences. Most other languages of Europe, though confined to much smaller areas, show far greater diversity.[1042] While the Russian of Kazan or Archangel can converse readily with the citizen of Riga or St. Petersburg, Germans from highland Bavaria and Swabia are scarcely intelligible to Prussian and Mecklenberger. And whereas Germany a few decades ago could count over a hundred different ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple

... the ivy adopts the converse attitude towards its visitors to that forced upon the alpine flower. The ivy bloom is small and inconspicuous, but then it has the season to itself, and its inconspicuousness is no disadvantage, i.e. if one plant was more conspicuous than its neighbours, it would not have any ...
— The Birth-Time of the World and Other Scientific Essays • J. (John) Joly

... forth together, enjoying charming converse upon the road. Slow-toes perceived Light o' Leap a long way off, and hastened to do him the guest-rites, extending them to the Mouse upon Light ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson

... up, sipped our coffee, and when we had finished, fled outside into the cold which, after all, was warmer than these people's welcome. Outside we met a young man who spoke German, and as he wanted to show off, he stopped to converse. We were joined by an older man who claimed to be his father. The father was really a jolly old boy. He said his son was a puny weakling, but as for himself he never had had a doctor in his life. So Jan tried his mettle with a cigar. An officer, ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon

... to converse with the swains, But go where fine folk resort: One can live without money on plains. But never without ...
— Life And Letters Of John Gay (1685-1732) • Lewis Melville

... graciously, and ordered a stool to be placed near to the divan so that I might sit and converse with him upon the matter in hand. When I showed him some of my rubies he at once said, "These come from the South Land," and upon my asking him how he had arrived at this conclusion, he answered that some of his people ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes

... set in, as the two sisters, to secure more privacy for their talks—they laughed so incessantly that they could be heard a long way off— usually shut themselves away from us in their bedrooms, and almost my only resource was to converse in French with my political friend. I succeeded in gaining admission to the sisters once or twice, to announce to them amongst other things my intention of adopting them, as their father took no more notice of them—a proposition received with more mirth than confidence. I once deplored ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner

... up and waved their handkerchiefs. There was no response; the gentlemen's faces were towards each other and they seemed to be engaged in earnest converse. ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley

... You are more dressed than you were at dinner. That's awfully rude, isn't it? But then, you see, you're not my hostess now—you're a spirit, walking in the night. One can't be polite to spirits. Sit down, oh shade, and let us converse. ...
— Five Little Plays • Alfred Sutro

... M. Beauchamp of whom I have spoken to you, the very pick of his country, fresh, lively, original; and he can converse. You will like him.' ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... of alarm, the wood offered a secure retreat. The young man had had enough experience in gallant strategies to seize the advantage of this position, and wended his steps in that direction while continuing to converse. It may be that instinct which, in a critical situation, makes us follow mechanically an unknown impulse; it may be that the same idea of prudence had also struck her, for Madame de ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... beginning to show symptoms of fight, and in the future it may be hoped that doctors, like lawyers, will not be required to give their services free to the community. It may be true that if a man will not work neither shall he eat, but the converse should also be true, that if a man works he should eat, and at present it is not by any means ...
— Women Workers in Seven Professions • Edith J. Morley

... the tale—an hour later we took boat with our belongings, under Mr. Strangways' escort, and were pulled on a swift tide down to the ship. It so happened that the first and second lieutenants were standing together in converse on the break of the poop when we climbed on board and were led aft to report ourselves. The second lieutenant, Mr. Fraser (in whom we recognised our friend of the night before) stepped to the gangway and shook hands with a jolly smile. His superior offered us no such cheerful welcome, but stuck ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... Then will come the new literature, the literature of good! And it will make people think, rather than relieve them from the ennui of solid thought, as our present novels do. The intellectual palate then will find only insipidity in such books as pour from our presses now. The ability to converse glibly about authors who wallow in human unrealities will then no longer be considered the hall-mark of culture. Culture in that day will be conformity ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... unable to converse with you in English, as I speak no language but my own," began M. Pugno, with a courteous wave of the hand for us ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower

... students in finding out the honey that couches in the carcass of the slain Lion of the tribe of Judah.' There is no fear of Bunyan's indulging his readers with the vagaries of the Jewish rabbis or Christian fathers—his converse was limited to the prophets and apostles. His object is to make us familiar with those types exhibited in the temple and alluded to by the inspired writers of the New Testament; to use a Puritan expression, he ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... must have come over me, for while I hold converse with you the old hatred seems melting away. If I had met you eight or ten years ago, I verily believe that I would have killed you all in ...
— The Crew of the Water Wagtail • R.M. Ballantyne

... against their guardian, either to disobey him or to refuse him the absolute control of their produce. On the contrary, they are more apt to show hostility against other animals than against the owner who derives advantage from them. But with man the rule is converse; men unite against none so readily as against those whom they see attempting to rule over them. [3] As long, therefore, as we followed these reflexions, we could not but conclude that man is by nature fitted to govern all creatures, except his fellow-man. But ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon



Words linked to "Converse" :   proposition, confab, reversed, chitchat, conversation, gossip, speak, chat, antonymous, discourse, fence, chit-chat, question, natter, chew the fat, chatter, transposed, visit, shoot the breeze, talk, contend, jaw, confabulate, claver, interview, backward, argue, debate



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