Free translatorFree translator
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Dearness   Listen
noun
Dearness  n.  
1.
The quality or state of being dear; costliness; excess of price. "The dearness of corn."
2.
Fondness; preciousness; love; tenderness. "The dearness of friendship."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Dearness" Quotes from Famous Books



... door watching the precious cake, turned to look at Mrs. Reynolds. A flame lit within her eyes; she had never forgotten the anguish engendered by her mother's refusal to cut away the goods from under the pink dress; then the expression softened. Was it not on that occasion, too, she had learned the dearness of that same mother? ...
— Suzanna Stirs the Fire • Emily Calvin Blake

... beautiful horses, Lady Merrenden, and the whole turn-out, except she herself, is as smart as can be. She really looks a little frumpish out-of-doors, and perhaps that is why papa went on to Mrs. Carruthers. Goodness and dearness like this do not suit male creatures as well as caprice, ...
— Red Hair • Elinor Glyn

... and still spake as if the words were somewhat hard to find: "I look upon thee, Elfhild, because I love thee, and because thou hast outgrown thy dearness of a year and a half agone and become a woman, and I see thee so fair and lovely, that I fear for thee and me, that I desire more than is my due, and that never shall we mend our sundering; and that even ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris

... of either would still be as useful as now. But if it were twice as easy to procure gold as it is, a sovereign would be twice as large; if only half as easy, it would be of the size of a half-sovereign, and this (besides the trifling circumstance of the cheapness or dearness of gold ornaments) would be all the difference. The analogy, therefore, fails in the ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill

... to bid. Now, what is a broker? A fellow who is to be paid a shilling in the pound for all articles purchased. What is his interest, then? To buy cheap? Clearly not. He is paid in proportion to the dearness of the article." ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade

... perceived; which is done by overpowering that scent by others of a stronger nature. In order to this the feet are to be covered with cloths rubbed over with assafoetida, or other strong smelling substances; and even oil of rhodium is sometimes used for this purpose, but sparingly, on account of its dearness, though it has a very alluring, as well as disguising effect. If this caution of avoiding the scent of the operator's feet, near the track, and in the place where the rats are proposed to be collected, be not properly observed, ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton

... guardians and his spiritual directors had alike found that while he was easy to lead, he was a difficulty and a danger to drive. He was stirred to the depths now. The strain of receiving Dick's onslaught in silence, the shock of his collapse, and now the fire that Christian's nearness and dearness had lit in him, all broke his self-control. He held her ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross

... certain that Ser Marco travelled to Tun, as Tabas falls to the west of the main route. Another point is that the district of Tabas only grows four months' supplies, and is, in consequence, generally avoided by caravans owing to its dearness. ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... rapture—which must obscure the old clearness of vision which had existed between them. She had been too well balanced of brain to allow herself to make a tragedy of it or softly to sentimentalise of loss. It was mere living nature that it should be so. He would be as always, a beloved wonder of dearness and beauty when his hour came and she would look on and watch and be so cleverly silent and delicately detached from his shy, aloof young moods, his funny, dear involuntary secrets and reserves. But ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... at last reached the open desert, Meg flung herself down and gazed up into the sky. It had never seemed so blue and beautiful before. The clear air rushed into her lungs. Oh, the sweetness and the dearness of the daylight and the real world! The joy it was to press her body close, close to the desert! She put her face down to it. Nothing in all her life had ever ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer

... inane, damsel who represented his ideal of feminine charm. One week ago! What magic did she possess, this little red-haired, white-faced girl, to make such short work of the scruples of a lifetime? What was this mysterious feminine charm which blinded his senses to everything but just herself, and the dearness of her, and the longing to have her for his own? The jarring element had not disappeared, the difference of thought still existed, but for the moment he was oblivious of their existence. For the first time in his three-and-thirty years he was in love, ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... containing silver. Within the circuit of a few miles, above eight hundred shafts have been made, but they have not been found sufficiently productive to encourage extensive mining works. The difficulties which impede mine-working in these parts are caused chiefly by the dearness of labor and the scarcity of fuel. There being a total want of wood, the only fuel that can be obtained consists of the dried dung of sheep, llamas, and huanacus. This fuel is called taquia. It produces a very brisk and intense flame, and most of the mine-owners prefer it to ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi

... looked and listened a sense of genuine devotion stole over her; the beauty and the worth of prayer grew clear to her through the earnest speech of that unlettered man, and for the first time she fully felt the nearness and the dearness of the Universal Father, whom she had been taught to fear, yet longed ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott

... traces of its influence. You learn more by talk in a cafe, or at a theatre, in one half hour, than you would learn in ten years in the provinces. Here, in truth, wherever you go, there is always something to see, something to learn, some comparison to make. Extreme cheapness and excessive dearness—there is Paris for you; there is honeycomb here for every bee, every nature finds its own nourishment. So, though life is hard for me just now, I repent of nothing. On the contrary, a fair future spreads out before me, and my heart rejoices though it is saddened for ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac

... therefore easy to understand that he did not provoke any display of tenderness toward himself, and that nearness and dearness with him were never accompanied by any ...
— Reminiscences of Tolstoy - By His Son • Ilya Tolstoy

... as many guests as it could hold, and the principal people in the town had come together in its kitchen—country inns had no parlours then—to debate all manner of subjects in which they were interested. The price of wool was an absorbing topic with many; the dearness of meat and general badness of trade were freely discussed by all. Amongst them bustled Mistress Final, the landlady of the inn, a widow, and a comely, rosy-faced, fat, kindly woman, assisted by her young son Ralph, her two daughters, Ursula and Susan, ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt

... still rang out on market mornings and mistresses were not above visiting the long, clean spaces, though there was much fault-finding about the dearness of things, and Mrs. Adams complained of the loneliness of Bush Hill, though she was afterward to be comforted by being the first lady of the land at ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... which the produce is generally, though with some variations, increasing both in quantity and value. Upon examining, however, the accounts which have been published of their annual produce, I have not been able to observe that its variations have had any sensible connection with the dearness or cheapness of the seasons. In 1740, a year of great scarcity, both manufactures, indeed, appear to have declined very considerably. But in 1756, another year or great scarcity, the Scotch manufactures made more than ordinary advances. The Yorkshire manufacture, indeed, declined, and its produce ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith

... he caught her. For a moment he supported her, and in that moment, under the sense of her nearness and dearness and helplessness, the hardness of the past hour disappeared. He did not understand her. Perhaps he would never understand her. But whatever she was, she was ...
— The Girl in the Mirror • Elizabeth Garver Jordan

... he was told that the dearness of wine was the cause of great distress among working people. He immediately gave orders that his own wine should be sold, but after a most curious and unusual fashion. He would not have any fixed price set upon it, but only desired that ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus

... about the Outer Hebrides, we find Andrew Lackaday in Paris confronted with the grim necessity of earning a livelihood. His pre-war savings had amounted to no fortune, and in spite of Elodie's economy and occasional earnings with her birds, they were well-nigh spent. The dearness of everything! Elodie wrung her hands. Where once you had change out of a franc, now you had none out of a five-franc note. He could still carry on comfortably for a year, but that would be ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke

... of hesitation; which she, interpreting to her advantage, repeated her request, and endeavoured to force a leer of invitation into her countenance. He took her arm, and they walked on to one of those obsequious taverns in the neighbourhood, where the dearness of the wine is a discharge in full for the character of the house. From what impulse he did this we do not mean to enquire; as it has ever been against our nature to search for motives where bad ones are to be found. They entered, and a waiter showed them a room, ...
— The Man of Feeling • Henry Mackenzie

... measure, perhaps, of three hundred thousand English gallons. IV. The anxiety of Augustus to provide the metropolis with sufficient plenty of corn, was not extended beyond that necessary article of human subsistence; and when the popular clamor accused the dearness and scarcity of wine, a proclamation was issued, by the grave reformer, to remind his subjects that no man could reasonably complain of thirst, since the aqueducts of Agrippa had introduced into the city so many copious streams of pure ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon

... one here to talk over old matters with. Scolding and quarrelling have something of familiarity and a community of interest; they imply acquaintance; they are of resentment, which is of the family of dearness. ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb

... called a tax upon the tradesmen; I think rather, it may be called a plague upon them: for there is, first, the dearness of every necessary thing to make living expensive; and secondly, an unconquerable aversion to any restraint; so that the poor will be like the rich, and the rich like the great, and the great like the greatest—and thus ...
— The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.) • Daniel Defoe

... traditions of the place, make the university. The original foundation had something eccentric in it; let Stanford not fear to be eccentric to the end, if need be. Let her not imitate; let her lead, not follow. Especially let her not be bound by vulgar traditions as to the cheapness or dearness of professorial service. The day is certainly about to dawn when some American university will break all precedents in the matter of instructors' salaries, and will thereby immediately take the lead, ...
— Memories and Studies • William James

... but they are dear to us for the wish of the Self, i.e. to the end that there may be accomplished the desire of the highest Self—which desire aims at the devotee obtaining what is dear to him. For the highest Self pleased with the works of his devotees imparts to different things such dearness, i.e. joy-giving quality as corresponds to those works, that 'dearness' being bound in each case to a definite place, time, nature and degree. This is in accordance with the scriptural text, 'For he alone bestows bliss' (Taitt. Up. II, 7). Things are not dear, ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut

... "Haec pro amicitia nostra non occultavi" [these things, from our friendship, I have not concealed from you]; and the whole Senate dedicated an altar to Friendship, as to a goddess, in respect of the great dearness of friendship between them two. The like, or more, was between Septimius Severus and Plautianus. For he forced his eldest son to marry the daughter of Plautianus; and would often maintain Plautianus in doing affronts to his son; and did write also, in a letter to ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various

... wheat at Athens[1]—not as it now is, from three to four times the cost of bread in London, although made out of the same flour shipped there from Minneapolis; and the two latest statutes expressly say that they fix the price by reason of the great dearness of such articles on account of the Black Death or plague, and the consequent scarcity of labor. Then the Statute of Laborers of 1349 provided that victuals should be sold only at reasonable prices, which apparently were to ...
— Popular Law-making • Frederic Jesup Stimson

... of late years) among the physicians and knowing men in France, Italy, Holland, and other parts of Christendom; and in ENGLAND it hath been sold in the leaf for six pounds, and sometimes for TEN pounds the pound weight, and in respect of its former scarceness and dearness, it hath been only used as a regalia in high treatments and entertainments, and presents made thereof to princes and grandees, till ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 286, December 8, 1827 • Various

... I love you not: let that appear hereafter, and aim better at me by that I now will manifest. For my brother, I think he holds you well, and in dearness of heart hath holp to effect your ensuing marriage; surely suit ill-spent and labour ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]

... England hath been sold in the leaf for six pounds, and sometimes for ten pounds the pound weight, and in respect of its former scarceness and dearness it has been only used as a regalia in high treatments and entertainments, and presents made thereof to princes and grandees till the year 1657. The said Garway did purchase a quantity thereof, and first publicly sold the said ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli

... ships that we have to fit out hence. Sir W. Pen told me, going with me this morning to White Hall, that for certain the Duke of Buckingham is brought into the Tower, and that he hath had an hour's private conference with the King before he was sent thither. Every body complains of the dearness of coals, being at 4l. per chaldron, the weather too being become most bitter cold, the King saying to-day that it was the coldest day he ever knew in England. Thence by coach to my Lord Crewe's, where very welcome. Here I find they are in doubt ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... as they pass by. Other Mussauls, ghorawallas, and passing ice coolies stop and perch beside him, and sometimes an ayah or two, with a perambulator and its weary little occupant, grace the gathering. I suppose the topics of the day are discussed, the chances of a Russian invasion, the dearness of rice, and the events which led to the dismissal of Mr. Smith's old Mussaul Canjee. Then the time for the lighting of lamps arrives, and Mukkun returns ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA

... the money had effectually pleaded their cause. "Gentlemen," said M. Dugas, "I have weighed your reasons in the balance of justice, and I find them light. I do not think that the people ought to suffer under a pretence of the dearness of corn, which I know to be unfounded; and as to the purse of money that you left with me, I am sure that I have made such a generous and noble use of it as you yourself intended. I have distributed it among the poor objects of charity in our two hospitals. As you are opulent ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various

... subject in the House, I am told that a leading member of great ability, little conversant in these matters, observed, that the general uniform dearness of butcher's meat, butter, and cheese could not be owing to a defective produce of wheat; and on this ground insinuated a suspicion of some unfair practice on the subject, that ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... them, there could be no doubt of it, had passed within the portals after which a change comes over the eyes, and those who enter see each other endowed with qualities raising the capacity for wonder to an ecstasy: so much engaging beauty, so much dearness, are not to be believed!... It can never be established whether the eyes only see truly when under this charm, or whether then more than at other times illusion makes of ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall

... 1628. He was a young man from Madagascar and was sold in Quebec for 50 half crowns.[2] Sixty years thereafter in 1688, Denonville, the Governor and DeChampigny, the Intendant of New France, wrote to the French Secretary of State, complaining of the dearness and scarcity of labor, agricultural and domestic, and suggesting that the best remedy would be to have Negro slaves. If His Majesty would agree to that course, some of the principal inhabitants would have some bought in the West Indies on the arrival of the Guinea ships. The minister replied ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920 • Various

... midst of these powers and nations, emulous or jealous, it is impossible for the citizens of our Republic, however superior their manufactures may be in quality and fineness, to resist a rivalry so universal; especially considering the dearness of labour, caused by that of the means of subsistence; which, in its turn, is a necessary consequence of the taxes and imposts which the inhabitants of this State pay in a greater number, and a higher rate, than in any other country, by reason of her natural ...
— A Collection of State-Papers, Relative to the First Acknowledgment of the Sovereignty of the United States of America • John Adams

... with you, that the dearness of the Rob of lemons, and of oranges, will hinder them from being furnished in large quantities; but I do not think this so necessary, for though they may assist other things, I have no great opinion of them alone. ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook

... renewal of hostilities, and that they themselves had been solicited to join therein. The Picentians received the thanks of the state; and a large share of the attention of the senate was turned from Etruria towards Samnium. The dearness of provisions also distressed the state very much, and they would have felt the extremity of want, according to the relation of those who make Fabius Maximus curule aedile that year, had not the vigilant activity of that man, such as he had on many occasions displayed in the field, been exerted ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius

... seriously; "and I suppose, too, that if any of the teachers or girls had seen me come away from the hall with you it might have given the impression that you had countenanced my going. But, Miss Minturn, I have wanted to get at the secret of— of your dearness, ever since you came here. But I promise you, though, I will not put you in jeopardy again by ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... profit and the expenses, of conveying the slaves from Ghat to Tripoli, feeding them as well here as there. What, where is my profit?" I echoed, "Where?" This is a fair specimen of the market. He complains of the dearness of the slaves, although an unusual number, more than a thousand, have been brought to the Souk or Mart. Haj Ibrahim and some other large purchasers have greatly and unexpectedly increased the demand. He says Haj Ibrahim purchases large quantities of goods on credit, ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... be of a physiological nature. The economics, which we shall see further on, take this upon themselves, as the most serious reproach which can be made against the use of animal dishes is doubtless their dearness, and the reason which militates most in favour of the predominance of a vegetable diet is to ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various

... long unknown to the Romans, although it was so rare, that it was even sold weight for weight with gold. The Emperor Aurelian, who died in 275, B.C. refused the Empress, his wife, a suit of silk which she solicited with much earnestness, merely on account of its dearness. Heliogabalus, the Emperor, who died half a century before Aurelian, was the first who wore a holosericum or garment ...
— A Catechism of Familiar Things; Their History, and the Events Which Led to Their Discovery • Benziger Brothers

... in Rotterdam, or in whatever town one's travels really begin, but a very short time without discovering that the Dutch unit—the florin—is a very unsatisfactory servant. The dearness of Holland strikes one continually, but it does so with peculiar force if one has crossed the frontier from Belgium, where the unit is a franc. It is too much to say that a sovereign in Holland is worth only twelve shillings: the case is not quite so ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas

... children in their cradles, the tender words of mothers, the footbeat of men on the pavements of ten thousand cities, the flags leaping in air from high buildings, ships putting out to sea with gunners at their sterns—in one aching synthesis the vastness and dearness and might of his land came to him. A mingled nation, indeed, of various and clashing breeds; but oh, with ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley

... and sullen; and he retired again to his tree, to inquire how dearness could be consistent with abundance, or how fraud should be practised by simplicity. He was not satisfied with his own speculations, and, returning home early in the evening, went a while from window to window, and found that he wanted ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson

... each has a little car or wagon on four little wheels to support and keep it from trailing on the ground. Would they caulk their ships, would they even litter their horses, with wool, if it were not both plenty and cheap? And what signifies the dearness of labor when an English shilling passes for five and twenty?" and so on. It is pleasant to think that then, as now, many a sober Britisher, with no idea that a satirical jest at his own expense was hidden away in this extravagance, ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.

... them; and this is sufficient to the argument; for what might lie in houses and holes, as in Moses and Aaron Alley, is nothing; for it is most certain they were buried as soon as they were found. As to the first article (namely, of provisions, the scarcity or dearness), though I have mentioned it before and shall speak of it again, yet I must ...
— A Journal of the Plague Year • Daniel Defoe

... and grateful shade, and all those visions of silver palaces built about the horizon, and voices of moaning winds and threatening thunders, and glories of coloured robe and cloven ray, are but to deepen in our hearts the acceptance and distinctness and dearness of the simple words, 'Our Father, Which ...
— The Glory of English Prose - Letters to My Grandson • Stephen Coleridge

... Chief of Police. Commendatore Angelelli was called to prove that the cause of the revolt was not the dearness of bread but the formation of subversive associations, of which the "Republic of Man" was undoubtedly the strongest and most virulent. The prisoner, however, was not one of the directing set, and the police knew him only as a sort of watch-dog ...
— The Eternal City • Hall Caine

... dragged at her hand, while she and her husband reckoned up the wages to be paid on the morrow, and spent the money in a score of different ways. Then came domestic details, lamentations over the excessive dearness of potatoes, or the length of the winter and the high price of block fuel, together with forcible representations of amounts owing to the baker, ending in an acrimonious dispute, in the course of which such couples reveal their characters in picturesque language. As I ...
— Facino Cane • Honore de Balzac

... and good about our ups and downs, and it makes me doubly regret that I cannot reward you by conveying a perfectly truthful impression of our life, etc. here to your mind, I trace in your very dearness and goodness about it, in your worrying more about discomfort for me in our moves than about your own hopes of our meeting at Home, how little able one is to do so by mere letters, I wish it did not lead you to the unwarrantable conclusion that it is because ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden

... will do little or nothing, the lower orders [end of page 249] are nearly all exempt, but that general dearness, that is the consequence of a general weight of taxes, is severely felt by them, and from that they cannot be exempted. They must get relief by assistance, and that assistance ought to be given in a manner that will not throw them altogether a ...
— An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations. • William Playfair

... stopped short. From all the strange scenes and interests which lately had whirled her along, her spirit leapt back with strong yearning recollection to her old home and her old ties; and such a rain of tears witnessed the dearness of what she had lost, and the tenderness of the memory that had let them slip for a moment, that Hugh was as much distressed as startled. With great tenderness and touching delicacy, he tried to soothe her, and at the same time, though guessing, to ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell

... towards Hindon, water riseth and makes a streame before a dearth of corne, that is to say, without raine; and is commonly look't upon by the neighbourhood as a certain presage of a dearth; as, for example, the dearness ...
— The Natural History of Wiltshire • John Aubrey

... pleads like that with glorious eyes, and her fragrance and her dearness are within arm's length, a man has but to catch her to him and silence her pleadings with a man's strength, and carry her off in triumph. It has been the way of man with woman since the world began, and Sypher knew it by his man's instinct. It was a temptation such ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke

... of Augustine was not less keen, it seems, than it had been at the death of his friend. But he could remember how "she related with great dearness of affection, how she never heard any harsh or unkind word to be darted out of my mouth against her." And to this consolation was added who knows what of confidence and tenderness of certain hope, or a kind of deadness, perhaps, that may lighten the pain ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang

... anyone saw that the increase in the precious metals was the fundamental cause, but several writers, among them Bodin, John Hales and Copernicus, saw that a debased currency was responsible for the acute dearness ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith

... of this year were very deficient, but corn of all sort sold at an extraordinary high price. I made of my tithes and living this year clear L1,200; from the dearness of labourers the outgoing expenses amounted ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs

... time to fall in love with you then. And I wanted you for a 'help-mate' in the literal sense of the word. It seems a pretty sordid sense, looking back from where we've got to now. But that was my scheme. A mean, cowardly scheme! And it's thanks to you and your blessed dearness I see it in its true light.... Do you begin to understand, Anita—knowing something of what my life has been, or ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; 't is dearness only that gives everything its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed, if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated. —Paine, in ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard

... could not afford. Mankind always has exhibited great irregularities. In every race some are born with an energy and ability to produce wealth, others not. Invention and discovery have replaced scarcity and dearness with abundance and cheapness. The law of competition seems ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton

... south-eastern edge of the great plateau and the sea; and that this land lies untouched is due partly to the presence of the Kafir tribes, who occupy more land than they cultivate, partly to the want or the dearness of labour, partly to the tendency, confirmed by long habit, of the whites to prefer stock-farming to tillage. The chief agricultural products are at present cereals, i.e., wheat, oats, maize, and Kafir corn ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce

... I persuade me That this was the true one; That Death stole intact her young dearness ...
— Wessex Poems and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy

... talent. He was employed in stretching the string of his bow, and sharpening his arrows to shoot birds. His trade of a shoemaker could not be very lucrative in a country where the greater part of the inhabitants go barefooted; and he only complained that, on account of the dearness of European gunpowder, a man of his quality was reduced to employ the same weapons as the Indians. He was the sage of the plain; he understood the formation of the salt by the influence of the sun and full moon, the symptoms of earthquakes, ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt

... had been no sin in clothing, Christ would not so soon have noted and spoken of the clothing of that rich man in the gospel. And Saint Gregory saith, that precious clothing is culpable for the dearth [dearness] of it, and for its softness, and for its strangeness and disguising, and for the superfluity or for the inordinate scantness of it; alas! may not a man see in our days the sinful costly array of clothing, and namely [specially] in too much superfluity, or else ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer

... carriages were made available for the public at a fixed rate of hire (the fiacres which have been used in Paris a little more than a century, and which took their name from Saint Fiacre because the first cab stood beneath his image); then, the dearness of fiacre-hire led to a further socialization by means of omnibuses and tramways. Another step forward and the socialization will be complete. Let the cab service, omnibus service, street railways, bicyclettes, etc., become a municipal service or ...
— Socialism and Modern Science (Darwin, Spencer, Marx) • Enrico Ferri

... remained motionless; then she raised on him eyes of such despairing dearness that he half-released her waist from his hold. But suddenly her look changed and deepened inscrutably. "I'm not sure if I DO understand," she said. "Is it—is it because you're not certain of continuing to ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton

... and the rueful glances he sometimes cast at the litter of wools and letters on the newspaper-table, and the gay garden hats and goloshes, hidden, but not concealed, under the drawing-room sofa. Conversation about the dearness of butchers' meat and the enormities of servants palled upon him, I think, after a time, but he had taken his wife's style of conversation for better for worse when he took her gayly dressed self under those ominous conditions, and he never showed impatience. He loved his wife, but I think it grieved ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley

... place, I won't have any kings; if it were only from an economical point of view, I don't want any; a king is a parasite. One does not have kings gratis. Listen to this: the dearness of kings. At the death of Francois I., the national debt of France amounted to an income of thirty thousand livres; at the death of Louis XIV. it was two milliards, six hundred millions, at twenty-eight livres the mark, which was equivalent in 1760, according to Desmarets, to four milliards, ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... unanimous voice of thirty-three centuries. If there be anything in which all peoples, nations, and languages, Jews, Greeks, Romans, Italians, Frenchmen, Englishmen, have agreed, it has been this, that the dearness of food is a great evil to the poor. Surely, the arguments which are to counterbalance such a mass of authority ought to be weighty. What then are those arguments? I know of only one. If any gentleman is acquainted with any other, I wish that ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... their portmanteaux, and, I suppose, consigned their manifestos to the flames, or adapted them to the needs of other principalities. De Mersch's affairs ceded their space in the public prints to the topic of the dearness of money. Somebody, somewhere, was said to be up to something. I used to try to read the articles, to master the details, because I disliked finding a whole field of thought of which I knew absolutely nothing. I used ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad

... object to work these mines upon a regular system, with proper machinery, and under competent inspection; but the attempt has in fact been made, and experience and calculation may have taught them that it is not a scheme likely to be attended with success, owing among other causes to the dearness of labour, and the necessity it would occasion for keeping up a force in distant parts of the country for the protection of the persons engaged and the property collected. Europeans cannot be employed upon such work in that climate, and the natives are unfit for (nor would ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden

... whether they know that, because of the small pay and the dearness of food, and because of their discomfort and their heavy toil in mounting guard and in sentinel duty, many fall sick daily and die; and that for this reason, the said hospital always contains more sick men than it ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume IX, 1593-1597 • E. H. Blair

... be rife and that half the sheep and goats will die, that grapes will be plentiful and honey scarce and cotton cheap.' (Q.) 'What if it fall on Tuesday?' (A.) 'That is Mars's day and portends death of great men and much destruction and outpouring of blood and dearness of grain, lack of rain and scarcity of fish, which will anon be in excess and anon fail [altogether]. In this year, lentils and honey will be cheap and linseed dear and only barley will thrive, to the exception of all other grain: great will be the fighting among kings and death ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous

... upon this subject in the reflections contained in my letter of June 28th, I endeavored to show the high improbability of our going into the business of mining, even to a degree to answer our own demands, for an age at least, much less for foreign markets. From the dearness of labor, when our mines if worked at all must be worked by freemen, and not as in Europe in general, by slaves, as we had no white slaves, and had prohibited the importation of blacks; that by this means, aided by the enemy, who in their progress through the southern States had stolen them ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various

... straw are now in the market. The pen moves so easily over any and all of them, that literary men should give them a trial. As there seems considerable likelihood of this manufacture being extensively introduced, on account of the dearness of rags, &c., it is to be hoped that it will not be improved into the resemblance of ordinary paper. Time was when ordinary paper could be written on in comfort, but that which adulterated Falstaff's sack spoiled it for the ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 212, November 19, 1853 • Various

... is a daughter," according to Menander or some old Greek poet, and to nobody was one ever more so than to Melbury, by reason of her very dearness to him. As for Grace, she began to feel troubled; she did not perhaps wish there and then to unambitiously devote her life to Giles Winterborne, but she was conscious of more and more uneasiness at the possibility of being the social hope of ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy

... having chosen a box in a very conpicuous place, we all went to supper. Much fault was found with every thing that was ordered, though not a morsel of any thing was left; and the dearness of the provisions, with conjectures upon what profit was made by them, supplied discourse during ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney

... throw them into the water along with the furniture of their clerks.—In Provence it is worse; for most unjustly, and through inconceivable imprudence, the taxes of the towns are all levied on flour. It is therefore to this impost that the dearness of bread is directly attributed. Hence the fiscal agent becomes a manifest enemy, and revolts on account of hunger are transformed into ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... clothes, gunpowder, iron, and many other things which they greatly need, and which the said islands lack. If they had to bring those articles from this kingdom, they might not have them on account of their dearness, and since they, without their trade, are so poor. Accordingly, it not only does not embarrass or hinder the settlement of the said islands; but rather they find it very difficult to support themselves and achieve success without the said trade and commerce. It will surely result ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume VI, 1583-1588 • Emma Helen Blair

... famine and starvation. The unpopularity, moreover, inherent in a tax on corn is all but fatal to a protective tariff when the class which protection enriches is comparatively small, whilst the class which would suffer keenly from dearness of bread and would obtain benefit from free trade is large, and, having already acquired much, is certain soon to acquire more political power. Add to all this that the Irish famine made the suspension of the corn laws a patent necessity. It is easy, then, ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... of another girl, some one he had met the day before. But yet it seemed as if there could be no doubt. There would not be two girls lost out in that desert. There could not—and her heart told her that he loved her. Could she trust her heart? Oh, the dearness of it if ...
— The Man of the Desert • Grace Livingston Hill

... than ten times the increase of the population, and more than thirty-eight times the increase in the domestic production. The iron-masters of this country have been compelled to struggle against a host of formidable difficulties,—adverse legislation, the ruinous competition of English iron, the dearness of labor, and the high rates of interest on borrowed capital. These have all been met and, let us hope, in good part overcome. Slowly, and with many hindrances and disasters, the iron-business is gaining strength, and achieving independence ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various

... 1873 the Burtons visited Vienna chiefly in order to see the great Exhibition. The beauty of the buildings excited their constant admiration, but the dearness of everything at the hotels made Burton use forcible language. On one occasion he demanded—he never asked for anything—a beefsteak, and a waiter hurried up with an absurdly small piece of meat on a plate. Picking it up with the fork he examined it critically, and then said, quite amiably ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright

... knowing men of France, Italy, Holland and in England it hath been sold in the leaf for six pounds (sterling) and sometimes for ten pounds the pound weight; and in respect of its former scarceness and dearness it hath been only used as a regalia in high treatments and entertainments, and presents made thereof to princes and grandees till the year 1657. The said Thomas Gaeway did purchase a quantity thereof, and first publicly sold the said tea in leaf and drink, made according to the directions ...
— Tea Leaves • Francis Leggett & Co.

... considerable addition to this was made by the private stocks of the officers, who were, however, under a necessity of circumscribing their original intentions on this head very much, from the excessive dearness of many of the articles. It will readily be believed, that few of the military found it convenient to purchase sheep, when hay to feed them costs sixteen ...
— A Narrative of the Expedition to Botany Bay • Watkin Tench

... year, because of the great danger of falling into the hands of the English. This was no small charge and hindrance to the fleet, as the ships that remain long at the Havannah consume themselves and in a manner eat up one another, from the great number of their people, and the great scarcity and dearness of every thing at that place; wherefore many of the ships adventured rather to hazard themselves singly for the voyage than to stay there; all of which fell into the hands of the English, and many of their men were ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr

... professions. Is this intellectualization beginning to show in the conversation of women when they are together, say in the hours of relaxation in the penetralia spoken of, or in general society? Is there less talk about the fashion of dress, and the dearness or cheapness of materials, and about servants, and the ways of the inchoate citizen called the baby, and the infinitely little details of the private life of other people? Is it true that if a group of men are talking, say about politics, or robust business, ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... or forethought is exercised in such matters, however. A few extensive plantations of trees have been made, notably by Captain Makee on Maui, who has set out a large number of Australian gum trees. The universal habit of letting cattle run abroad, and the dearness of lumber for fencing, discourages tree planting, which yet will be found some day one of the most profitable investments in the islands, I believe; and I was sorry to see in many places cocoa-nut groves ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff

... Smith having chosen a box in a very conspicuous place, we all went to supper. Much fault was found with everything that was ordered, though not a morsel of anything was left, and the dearness of the provisions, with conjectures upon what profit was made by them, supplied discourse during ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various

... different bazaars. The rest of the town, as it appeared to me as I rode round the walls the other day, is perfectly deserted. There are double walls to the town, entire all the way round, but I should think it could be easily taken. A great number of the inhabitants have left it on account of the dearness of provisions, occasioned by the hungry mouths of so large a force as ours, and also because, on his first arrival, the Shah wished to play some of his old arbitrary acts ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth

... shall protect you, when Siegmund lies overthrown, in the power of love!" "If your are Siegmund," cries the woman, "I am Sieglinde, who have so longed for you! Your own sister you have won at the same time as the sword!" Siegmund is given no pause by this revelation. At the realisation of this double dearness, the joy flares all the higher of the lawless pupil of Wotan. "Bride and sister are you to your brother. Let the blood of the Waelsungen flourish!" And with arms entertwined, forth they take their madly exulting hearts out into the ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall

... some pages of his prose that seem to me more eloquent than anything out of Jeremy Taylor, and I should think a selection of his works would answer to reprint. Their sale here is something wonderful, considering their dearness, in this age of cheap literature, and the want of attraction in the subject, although the illustrations of the "Stones of Venice," executed by himself from his own drawings, are almost as exquisite as the writings. By the way, he does not say what ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields

... token you are all sweetness and blue eyes and dearness and dimples," he punished her. Then the banter in his tones died ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various

... in honour of the event, but there were no bonfires at night "partly"—writes Pepys—"from the dearness of firing, but principally from the little content most people have in the peace." Yet the terms of the treaty were not wholly ruinous to the country. England, at least, gained New York, ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume II • Reginald R. Sharpe

... cause and effect, will begin to move in the direction of Free Trade. Similarly, in the United States of America, the campaign which has recently been waged against the huge Trusts, which are the offspring of Protection, as well as the rising complaints of the dearness of living, are so many indications that arguments, which must eventually lead to the consideration—and probably to the ultimate adoption—if not of Free Trade, at all events of Freer Trade than now prevails, are gradually gaining ground. Much the same may be said of Canada. A Canadian ...
— Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 • Evelyn Baring

... individuals who might almost be counted on the fingers, while the effective circulation depends upon middle-men through the engine of circulating libraries. These are not so much owners as distributers of books, and they mitigate the difficulty of dearness by subdividing the cost, and then selling such copies as are still in decent condition at a large reduction. It is this state of things, due, in my opinion, principally to the present form of the law of copyright, which perhaps may have helped to make way for the satirical (and sometimes untrue) ...
— On Books and the Housing of Them • William Ewart Gladstone

... being"; that they are immersed in an ocean of Divine love, and that Divine love permeates them all through and through; and that it is in that ocean of Divine love that they realize that they are one. They feel a blessed nearness and dearness and oneness to each other, though separated by oceans and continents, for they have realized through sweet experience that the same intelligent spiritual thought and love pulses through them all as if they were ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge

... schedule, note, Cere, wax over, embalm,; cerel, Certes, certainly, Chafe, heat, decompose,; chafed, heated, Chaflet, platform, scaffold, Champaign, open country, Chariot (Fr charette), cart, Cheer, countenance, entertainment, Chierte, dearness, Chrism, anointing oil, Clatter, talk confusedly, Cleight, clutched, Cleped, called, Clipping, embracing, Cog, small boat, Cognisance, badge, mark of distinction, Coif, head-piece, Comfort, strengthen, help, Cominal, common, Complished, complete, Con, know, be able, ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume II (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory

... fro of fruitful shower and grateful shade, and all those visions of silver palaces built about the horizon, and voices of moaning winds and threatening thunders, and glories of colored robe and cloven ray, are but to deepen in our hearts the acceptance, and distinctness, and dearness of the simple words, "Our Father which art ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin

... the moment dictated rather by discontent with the Home Government than by any settled feeling on the subject of foreign politics. Corn had been at a rather high price in Paris and its neighborhood throughout the winter; and the dearness was taken advantage of by the enemies of Turgot, and employed by them as an argument to prove the impolicy of his measures to introduce freedom of trade. They even organized[3] formidable riots at Paris and Versailles, which, however, Turgot, whose resolution ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge

... kitten, which slept peacefully on the counterpane. He wanted to talk, but to keep him quiet I told him a long trivial story, full of unexciting incidents. He lay musing, his head on his hand; then he seemed inclined to sleep, so I sate beside him, watching and wondering at the nearness and the dearness of the child to me, almost amazed at the revelation which this shadow of fear gives me of the place which he fills in my heart and life. He tossed about for some time, and when I asked him if he wanted anything, he only put his hand in mine; a gesture ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson

... appeared that she was one of the spring-flowers of the human family, so soon withdrawing thither whence they come, he found that she began to pull at his heart, not merely with the attraction betwixt childhood and age, in which there is more than the poets have yet sung, but with the dearness which the growing shadow of death gives to all upon whom it gathers. The eyes of the child seemed to nestle into his bosom. Every morning he paid her a visit, and every morning it was clear that little Molly's big heart ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald

... and selling it from door to door. In February, 1717, occurred the Great Snow, which destroyed great numbers of domestic and wild animals, and caused provisions for some weeks to be scarce and dear. The inhabitants laid the blame of the dearness to the rapacity of the hucksters, and the subject being brought up in town meeting, a committee reported that the true remedy was to build a market, to appoint market days, and establish rules. The farmers opposed the scheme, as did also many of the ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton



Words linked to "Dearness" :   preciousness, costliness, dear, expensiveness



Copyright © 2024 Free Translator.org