"Proficient" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... long cavalcade winds slowly over the mountain trail. Just ahead is a mother with two children, a little girl astride behind her and a two-year-old boy standing in her lap. The mourning dove sounds its melancholy note from the forest, and the children take up the call. The little boy is not very proficient in the imitation, and sister corrects him time after time. Truly, in Indian-land, nature study begins early ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... there was, for some time, more than coldness between him and his employer. He always spoke of Pope as too much a lover of money; and Pope pursued him with avowed hostility; for he not only named him disrespectfully in the Dunciad, but quoted him more than once in the Bathos, as a proficient in the Art of Sinking; and in his enumeration of the different kinds of poets distinguished for the profound, he reckons Broome among "the parrots who repeat another's words in such a hoarse odd tone as makes them seem their own." I have been told that they were afterwards ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... time I had learnt music, my mother and even my father having secretly given me money for the same; my father likewise paid for my instruction in dialectics. I became so proficient in this art that I taught it to certain other youths before I went to the University. Thus he sent me there endowed with the means of winning an honest living; but he never once spake a word to me concerning this matter, ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... she had no cronies. Not in millinery and dressmaking, for there were no admiring eyes to reward such labors. Not in gadding, for she might not pass the imprisoning wall. Not even in reading, perhaps because she was not much of a proficient in that art. ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... the eye remains to me, and I am a proficient in that, ma'am,' said Mat, roused by these efforts to deny her the right ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... old of good character, who can read and write and pass the physical examination, may enlist for the term of their minority. They enlist as third- class apprentices, and are given six months' instruction at a training station, and thence go to sea in apprentice training vessels. When proficient they are transferred to regular cruising vessels as second class, and when further qualified are rated first class. All other enlistments are for four years. Recruits must speak English. Landsmen are usually sent to sea on special training-ships until proficient, and are then sent into general ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... after her morning's duties were over, for a tramp along the Panipara Jhil for snipe, the sport Honor most enjoyed and at which she was gradually becoming proficient. She would be all alone, that bright January day, as Tommy, her faithful and devoted lover, was prevented by his duties from ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... the different natures, And weigh the power of other creatures 40 Who by the partial work hath shown He knows so little of his own? How falsely is the spaniel drawn! Did man from him first learn to fawn? A dog proficient in the trade! He the chief flatterer nature made! Go, man, the ways of courts discern, You'll find a spaniel still might learn. How can the fox's theft and plunder Provoke his censure or his wonder; 50 From ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... of sacrifice was called the "peace-offering," which was offered to God, either in thanksgiving, or for the welfare and prosperity of the offerers, in acknowledgment of benefits already received or yet to be received: and this typifies the state of those who are proficient in the observance of the commandments. These sacrifices were divided into three parts: for one part was burnt in honor of God; another part was allotted to the use of the priests; and the third part to the use ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... scene Mr. Sneed had to pose as a wood chopper, and, to make it more realistic he was to fell a small tree. This action on his part had cost him no little time and trouble, for he was not proficient in the use of the axe. For several days the actor had had Sandy "coaching" him until ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Oak Farm - or, Queer Happenings While Taking Rural Plays • Laura Lee Hope
... a somewhat threadbare suit of Lincoln green, with a high-crowned Tyrolese hat; a knapsack was slung behind his shoulders, and he was attended by a white Pomeranian dog, evidently foot-sore, but doing his best to appear proficient in the chase by limping some yards in advance of his master, and sniffing into the hedges for rats and mice, ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the lad a proficient in magic?" asked Hadrian. "It seems to me simply impossible that he should have completed this statue and a woman's bust in these ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the Jongleurs gradually undermined that of the Troubadours, as the former grew more and more proficient. In the thirteenth century we find Guirant Riquier, often called the last of the Troubadours, requesting King Alfonso X. of Castile to make a definite classification of Jongleurs, and title the best, ...
— Woman's Work in Music • Arthur Elson
... this boyish age, to have been so far a proficient in gallantry as to know the use that may be made of the trophies of former triumphs in achieving new ones; for he used to boast, with much pride, to Miss Chaworth, of a locket which some fair favourite had given him, and which probably may have been a present from that pretty cousin, of whom he ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... contemporaries in Great Britain, was filled with disgust at the blind carnage of the Revolution. He returned to Scotland and began a series of tours in the Highlands, studying the conditions of life among his Celtic countrymen and becoming proficient in the use of the Gaelic tongue. Not France but Scotland was to be the scene ...
— The Red River Colony - A Chronicle of the Beginnings of Manitoba • Louis Aubrey Wood
... of the creeper's music which liken it to a wren's. I am sorry that I have myself heard it only on one occasion: then, however, so far was it from being wren-like that it might rather have been the work of one of the less proficient warblers,—a somewhat long opening note followed by a hurried series of shorter ones, the whole given in a sharp, thin voice, and having nothing to recommend it to notice, considered simply as music. All the while the bird kept on industriously with ...
— Birds in the Bush • Bradford Torrey
... planned and put in operation for the training of the soldiers, for few men unacquainted with military life are able to handle modern high-powered military rifles with any degree of success, although the average man, under capable instructors, rapidly becomes proficient. Artillery ranges in the Laurentian Hills were established for the training of the field artillery. Here the big sixty-pounders, which throw a shell for nearly five miles, ...
— A History of The Nations and Empires Involved and a Study - of the Events Culminating in The Great Conflict • Logan Marshall
... had not a particle of that knowledge in which Young America is so great a proficient, namely, the "knowing how to get out of a scrape." She was, besides, alarmed at the effect of her words on Ivy, supposing nothing less than that the girl was in the last stages of a swift consumption; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... easily augment at any time to two, three, or even four times as many; for he very rarely finds a boy that has not a taste for some musical instrument. The greatest trouble he has yet encountered in the formation of his bands is the fact, that, as soon as his pupils become really proficient, they are ready for a discharge for good conduct, the music possessing such an influence for good over them as to completely reform dispositions that would otherwise be incorrigibly bad. Since he has held the position of ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter
... try it in any other way for some time to come," he said, stroking her hair; "you must become a good deal more proficient in the use of skates before I can again trust you to go alone; especially where there are so many other ...
— Christmas with Grandma Elsie • Martha Finley
... which, I may here say, all secrets of the French kitchen are laid bare; no effort is spared to make everything plain, from the humble pot-au-feu to the most gorgeous monumental plat. And I would refer any one who wants to become proficient in any French dish, to that book, feeling sure that, in following strictly the directions, there will be no failure. It is the one book I have met with on the subject in which no margin is left for your own knowledge, if you have it, to fill ...
— Culture and Cooking - Art in the Kitchen • Catherine Owen
... boy, John slaved at "footer," and displayed a curious inaptitude for squash racquets. At all games Caesar and Scaife were precociously proficient. John's clumsiness annoyed them. Often the Caterpillar joined him and Fluff, giving them to understand that this must be regarded as an act of grace and condescension which might be suitably acknowledged ...
— The Hill - A Romance of Friendship • Horace Annesley Vachell
... decide who would go to the new English Convoy, and two or three left for England to become proficient ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp
... Now in every human effort we can distinguish a beginning, a middle, and a term; and consequently the state of spiritual servitude and freedom is differentiated according to these things, namely, the beginning—to which pertains the state of beginners—the middle, to which pertains the state of the proficient—and the term, to which belongs the state ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... of mine,' said the Emperor, 'is a proficient Queen in the art of man training. My other sister, the Duchess of Parma, is equally scientific in breaking-in horses; for she is constantly in the stables with her grooms, by which she 'grooms' a pretty sum yearly in buying, selling, and breaking-in; while the simpleton, her ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... to mollify his master and long habit had made him proficient. Bostil's eyes flashed. He was proud of Lucy's power over a horse. The story Bostil first told to any stranger happening by the Ford was how Lucy had been born during a wild ride—almost, as it were, on the back of a horse. That, at least, was her fame, and the riders swore she was a worthy daughter ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... persuade him to talk about that awful fight in a dark room with so many against him. One result of his intimacy with Jack was that he became dissatisfied with his own progress in the manly art of self-defence. It was all very well to make himself proficient with the foils and as a boxer, and to be a good shot, but he was living among people who had the knife for sole weapon, and if by chance he were attacked by a man with a knife, and had no pistol or other weapon, he would find himself in an exceedingly awkward position. There was then ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... foundation of his education was laid in the grammar school of his native town, where most probably his father (being a clergyman) would officiate as tutor. At the age of fifteen he was sent to Oxford. Five years of assiduous study made him proficient as a tutor; this, combined with his amiability and profound views of society, gained him the respect of the Earl of Devonshire, and he was appointed tutor to the Earl's son, Lord Cavendish. From 1610 to 1628, he was constantly ...
— Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers - Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With - The Freethinkers." • Charles Bradlaugh, A. Collins, and J. Watts
... amusing but not spiteful," said the ambassador's wife, a great proficient in the art of that elegant conversation called by the English, small talk. She addressed the attache, who was at a loss now what to ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... unseasonably spoken, it being fit that we should know such and avoid them;—as that to Pompey the Great, to whom, upon his return from a dangerous war, the schoolmaster brought his little daughter, and, to show him what a proficient she was, called for a book, and bade her begin at ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... mind in a sound body was her noble heritage. She was always extremely temperate in food and drink, fastidious in all her tastes and personal habits, indulgent never beyond the dictates of perfect simplicity and sobriety. Proficient in all branches of housekeeping, her apparel was mostly of her own making. Good literature was a passion with her, and while never an omnivorous reader, she had a natural instinct for the best in language. A spirit of indomitable independence, courage and persistence in purpose characterized ...
— Memories of Jane Cunningham Croly, "Jenny June" • Various
... boys and girls have passed all the standards of the elementary schools, they enter trade schools, where they remain until they are proficient in some craft which will enable them to earn a living. Those who show decided intellectual or business aptitudes are sent to colleges or ...
— Criminal Man - According to the Classification of Cesare Lombroso • Gina Lombroso-Ferrero
... surnamed of Antioch, was born at Samosata, in Syria. He lost his parents while very young; and being come to the possession of his estate, which was very considerable, he distributed all among the poor. He became a great proficient in rhetoric and philosophy, and applied himself to the study of the holy scriptures under one Macarius at Edessa. Convinced of the obligation annexed to the character of priesthood, which was that of devoting himself entirely to the service of God and the ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... equally youthful Kirtley—may it be repeated—had not begun real life and, according to the American plan, could do nothing very well. Those two room-mates and cronies were leading the typical Teuton existence of youths who combined proficient work with a frank sensuality accompanied, of course, by much imbibing in the German way. And it may be preliminarily noted that what explorations Gard afterward made in this great and seamy side of Teuton nature, likewise ...
— Villa Elsa - A Story of German Family Life • Stuart Henry
... of men is attained through repetition of operations, the management must subdivide the work into classes in which each man can become highly proficient. ...
— Industrial Progress and Human Economics • James Hartness
... that disease." Accordingly, Parr having in vain tried to reconcile himself to the "uttering of mortal drugs" for three years, was at length suffered to follow his own devices, and in 1765, was admitted of Emmanuel College, Cambridge. Dr. Farmer was at that time tutor. Of this proficient in black letter (he was one of the earliest, and perhaps the cleverest, of his tribe) we are told by Archdeacon Butler, in a note, that he was a man of such singular indolence, as to neglect sending ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume XIII, No. 370, Saturday, May 16, 1829. • Various
... English is almost exclusively used. The Boers, and especially the younger generation, have a much greater aptitude and penchant for learning English than for High Dutch; and generally it has been held more important by the parents that their children should become proficient in English, that language being more easily acquired and of vastly greater use than Dutch. The latter, it was truly averred, would be learnt as they grew up quite ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... to effect this was ellipsis, but an accurate understanding of the intelligence of the hearer was requisite in order to become proficient. The alphabet was not disturbed or abbreviated. The radical change was in the dismemberment of sentences. And here it was obvious that a greater number of words could be omitted without destroying the sense with a clever listener than with ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... for old Violins, thus awakened, caused him to relinquish his former employment entirely, and to devote the whole of his attention to the art which he so loved. He soon became aware of the growing demand for Italian works, and felt that, possessed with a varied and proficient knowledge of the different styles of workmanship belonging to the Italian schools of Violin-making, he could turn his present acquirements to a profitable as well as pleasurable use. He resolved to journey in search of hidden Cremonas. His means were, indeed, very limited. His stock-in-trade ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart
... inquire into the results of the liberal policy heretofore pursued. Commander (since Rear-Admiral) William T. Sampson was ordered to the observatory, not as its head, but as assistant to the superintendent. He was one of the most proficient men in practical physics that the navy has ever produced. I believe that one reason for choosing so able and energetic an officer for the place was to see if any improvement could be made on the system. As I was absent at the ...
— The Reminiscences of an Astronomer • Simon Newcomb
... being unable to continue this sort of Mayfly-shooting dialogue, but her first charming readiness had affected the proficient social gentleman very pleasantly, and with fascinated eyes he hummed and buzzed about her like a moth at a lamp. Suddenly his head dived: 'Nothing, nothing, signorina,' he said, brushing delicately at her dress; 'I ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... celebrity, worthy, lion, rara avis[Lat], notability, somebody; classman[obs3]; man of rank &c. (nobleman) 875; pillar of the state, pillar of the church, pillar of the community. chief &c. (master) 745; first fiddle &c. (proficient) 700; cynosure, mirror; flower, pink, pearl; paragon &c. (perfection) 650; choice and master spirits of the age; elite; star,.sun, constellation, galaxy. ornament, honor, feather in one's cap, halo, aureole, nimbus; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... I, Miss Garden, be allowed to introduce him to you?" he continued. "Although a Greek, he speaks Italian like a native, in which language I know that you, also, are a proficient." ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... Jay. He was a proficient in his art; and though he might not have been able to jump as high or to spin round on one leg as long as an opera-dancer, he was able to teach us to dance like gentlemen. He was also a professor of fencing and gymnastics, and a very ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... compositions; for it must be owned, he was a better statesman than a poet, and fitter to act upon the wide theatre of life, than to write representations for the circumscribed theatre of the stage. In the light of an author he is less eminent, and lived a life of too much hurry to become proficient in poetry, a grace which not only demands the most extensive abilities, but much leisure and contemplation. But if he was not extremely eminent as a poet, he was far removed above contempt, and deserves to have full mention made of all his writings; and we can easily forgive want of elegance ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber
... become quite proficient at walking the tight rope, stretched between two poles in the yard about ten feet apart and two feet from the ground, if she remembered to keep one end of her balancing pole touching the ground all the time. Mrs. Mullarkey had decided that Celia Jane didn't ...
— The Circus Comes to Town • Lebbeus Mitchell
... towards drawing as a child, he was taught to play the violin as a matter of discipline,) he prefers to make his own maps and sketches because he knows exactly what he wants to say and cannot possibly explain this meaning to his more proficient brethren in the field of art. Besides, the pictures were all drawn for children and their ideas of art are very different from those ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... purpose of self-enjoyment, and live a life of luxurious abandonment. And he need not be altogether idle, he reflected within himself afterwards, as he was riding home: he felt that he was possessed of sufficient energy and talent to make himself perfectly master of a pack of cards, to be a proficient over a billiard-table, and even to get the upper hand of a box of dice. With such pursuits left to him, he might yet live to be talked of, feared, and wealthy; and Barry's utmost ambition would have carried ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope
... conservative side was now Annius Milo, one of the new tribunes, a man as disreputable as Clodius himself; deep in debt and looking for a province to indemnify himself—famous hitherto in the schools of gladiators, in whose arts he was a proficient, and whose services were at his ...
— Caesar: A Sketch • James Anthony Froude
... considered to be proficient. In the census of 1901 nearly a quarter of the whole caste were shown as malguzars or village proprietors and lessees. They wear a coarse cloth of homespun yarn which they get woven for them by ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell
... to the Grand Lama, at Thibet, who responded more efficiently and successfully than Gregory X., so that Buddhism seized the chance which Catholicism failed to grasp. The Venetians, however, lost nothing in the good Khan's esteem. Young Marco began to make himself proficient in speaking and writing several Asiatic languages, and was presently taken into the Khan's service. His name is mentioned in the Chinese Annals of 1277 as a newly-appointed commissioner of the privy council.[330] He remained in Kublai's service until 1292, ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... the kindest thing you can think of?" asked Sally. "I do mean it. I've written to London and I've got the prospectus here of one of the schools for teaching shorthand and typewriting. For eight pounds they guarantee to make any one proficient in both—suitable to take a secretaryship. Doesn't matter how long you'll stay; they agree for that sum to make you proficient, and they also half promise to get you ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... with the Indians, his bateaux voyaging as far northward as the falls of the Ohio, while his influence among the tribesmen extended to the eastern mountains. My mother was of Spanish blood, a native of Saint Augustine, so I grew up fairly proficient in three languages, and to them I later added an odd medley of tribal tongues which often stood me in excellent stead amid the vicissitudes of the frontier. The early death of my mother compelled me to become companion to my father in ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... century of political lore, and the high-born, brilliant, and scientific soldier, with the laurels of Turnhout and Nieuwpoort and of a hundred famous sieges upon his helmet, reformer of military science, and no mean proficient in the art of politics and government, were the representatives and leaders of the two great parties into which the Commonwealth had now unhappily divided itself. But all history shows that the brilliant soldier of a republic is apt to have the advantage, in a struggle for popular affection and ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... Street, still in possession of its fine Hall and Chapel, and the great school founded by William of Wykeham in 1382, "for seventy poor and needy scholars and clerks living college-wise in the same, studying and becoming proficient in grammaticals or the art and science of grammar." It remains without compare, the oldest and the greatest school in England, whose daughter is Eton and whose late ...
— England of My Heart—Spring • Edward Hutton
... departure, to any serious extent, from normal practice tends to induce resumption of consciousness even in the case of such old habits as breathing, seeing, and hearing, digestion and the circulation of the blood. So it is with habitual actions in general. Let a player be never so proficient on any instrument, he will be put out if the normal conditions under which he plays are too widely departed from, and will then do consciously, if indeed he can do it at all, what he had hitherto been doing unconsciously. It is an axiom as regards ...
— Essays on Life, Art and Science • Samuel Butler
... one, although they tried to enliven it with a game of bridge, in which Uncle John and Louise were quite proficient and the others dreadfully incompetent. Once in a while the volcano thundered a deep detonation that caused the windows to shiver, but the Americans were getting used to the sound and ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Abroad • Edith Van Dyne
... that which learn he can; Who knows the moment to embrace, He is your proper man. In person you are tolerably made, Nor in assurance will you be deficient: Self-confidence acquire, be not afraid, Others will then esteem you a proficient. Learn chiefly with the sex to deal! Their thousands ahs and ohs, These the sage doctor knows, He only from one point can heal. Assume a decent tone of courteous ease, You have them then to humour as you please. First a diploma must belief infuse, That you ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... till he was full seven years old, when his father gave him in charge to a divine of his own folk and faith. The priest taught him the laws and tenets of their Misbelief and instructed him in philosophy and all manner of other knowledge, and it needed but three full told years ere he was proficient therein and his spirit waxed resolute and his judgment mature; and he became learned, eloquent and philosophic[FN315]; consorting with the wise and disputing with the doctors of the law. When his father saw this of him, it pleased him and he taught him to back the steed and stab with ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... acquainted. I cannot express to you the delight of my fair countrywoman at finding that a person who spoke English had arrived at the 'pension'—a feeling I myself somewhat participated in; for to say truth, I was not at that time a very great proficient in French. We soon became intimate, in less time probably than it could otherwise have happened, for from the ignorance of all the others of one word of English, I was enabled during dinner to say many soft and tender things, which one does not ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... Pramati had a son named Ruru by Ghritachi (the celestial dancer). And to Ruru also by his wife Pramadvara, was born a son, whose name was Sunaka. He was, O Saunaka, thy great ancestor exceedingly virtuous in his ways. He was devoted to asceticism, of great reputation, proficient in law, and eminent among those having a knowledge of the Vedas. He was virtuous, truthful, and of ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... small pond attached to the Briarwood property and Ruth tried Helen's skates there. She had been on the ice before, but not much; however, she found that the art came easily to her—as easily as tennis, in which, by this time, she was very proficient. ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson
... was target practice with the rifle. The old Indian had chosen wisely when he purchased the rifle, and the boy became very proficient in marksmanship. One day when he had made a fine shot he turned and found his mother and ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... measures. But in the grave music of the various elaborate stanzas in which the Elizabethan poets delighted, and of which the Spenserian, though the crown and flower, is only the most perfect, he was a great proficient, and his couplets and blank verse are not inferior. Some of his single lines have already been quoted, and many more might be excerpted from his work of the best Elizabethan brand in the quieter kind. Quiet, indeed, is the overmastering ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... harmonious; at savants for gazing at the heavenly bodies while sublimely incognizant of earthly ones; at orators who studied how to enforce truth, but not how to practice it. * * * When asked what business he was proficient in, ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, July 1887 - Volume 1, Number 6 • Various
... has many merits not possessed by the other. It will be better to constantly practise both these guarding positions and then come to a decision as to which you can do best in. Two things are certain, viz., you can, if proficient at both, puzzle an opponent who is at home only in one, and the change of position is a great rest in a long succession ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn
... long winter. He ground away at the bookkeeping—he was more proficient at it, but he hated it as heartily as ever—and wrote a good deal of verse and some prose. For the first time he sold a prose article, a short story, to a minor magazine. He wrote long letters to Helen ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... recruited from this source of supply. But brains without knowledge will no more make a superior staff officer who can be trusted, nor a commander of troops of all arms who will be able to make the most of them in face of the enemy, than will they make a successful physician or a proficient electrical engineer. It was also completely overlooked by the propagandists of this particular stunt that the experience which on every front, other than the Mesopotamian, temporary officers had been gaining was for practical purposes ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... whose delicate mode of walking we witness with ever-recurring surprise. If the shoulders slope downwards, with the spine bending inwards, the individual 'cannot throw a stone, or handle firearms with dexterity.' When inclined forwards, and well relieved from the body, he may be a proficient in these exercises. A peculiarity in walking is given by the size of the head and neck being out of proportion; and an instance is mentioned of a man being discharged from the army, on account of his conformation rendering it impossible ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 442 - Volume 17, New Series, June 19, 1852 • Various
... month, because here the students get all sorts of primary acrobatic tricks and gain in strength and flexibility. All dancing is easier to those who take this work. And besides, if you go out and accept an engagement you will be proficient in cartwheels, splits, and many other neat tricks that will be of great service to you. These are stunts that you cannot learn in a theatre; no one has time to teach them to you, nor the necessary equipment or facilities, and you ...
— The Art of Stage Dancing - The Story of a Beautiful and Profitable Profession • Ned Wayburn
... wooden building, above the door of which was a board inscribed "GYMNASIUM AND SCHOOL OF ARMS." In the long, narrow entry hung a framed manuscript which set forth that Ned Skene, ex-champion of England and the colonies, was to be heard of within daily by gentlemen desirous of becoming proficient in the art of self-defence. Also the terms on which Mrs. Skene, assisted by a competent staff of professors, would give lessons ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... gentry and the towns-folk of La Chatre. They had heard of her studies, too, and disapproved of them as unlady-like in character. Philosophy was bad enough, but anatomy, which she had been encouraged to take up by Deschartres, himself a proficient in medical science, was worse—sacrilegious, for a person understood to be professedly of a devotional turn of mind. She went game-shooting with the old tutor; he had a mania for the sport, which ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas
... green pelisse yonder, on the pave, is the celebrated courtezan, Mrs. St*pf**d, of Curzon-street, May-fair. How she acquired her present cognomen I know not, unless it was for her stopping accomplishment in the polite science of pugilism and modern patter, in both of which she is a finished proficient, as poor John D———, a dashing savoury chemist, ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... according to his own invitation and message from him, I found him sitting in his study,[80] and in a discourse with C. Velleius, the senator, who was then reputed by the Epicureans the ablest of our countrymen. Q. Lucilius Balbus was likewise there, a great proficient in the doctrine of the Stoics, and esteemed equal to the most eminent of the Greeks in that part of knowledge. As soon as Cotta saw me, You are come, says he, very seasonably; for I am having a dispute with Velleius on an important subject, ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... but there was really no choice for her, and they came in silver. She knew not only her own place, but the places of her two ladies, and she presently had them in such training that they were as proficient in what they might and might not do for themselves and for each other, as if making these distinctions were the custom ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... youth who was with Laodamas, Euryalus, who had won in the wrestling bout, said insolently, 'Laodamas is surely mistaken in thinking that thou shouldst be proficient in sports. As I look at thee I think that thou art one who makes voyages for gain—a trader whose only thought is for his cargo and ...
— The Adventures of Odysseus and The Tales of Troy • Padriac Colum
... instruments, with some favourite birds and plants. Here she usually exercised herself in elegant arts, cultivated only because they were congenial to her taste, and in which native genius, assisted by the instructions of Monsieur and Madame St. Aubert, made her an early proficient. The windows of this room were particularly pleasant; they descended to the floor, and, opening upon the little lawn that surrounded the house, the eye was led between groves of almond, palm-trees, flowering-ash, and ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... sometimes made a hasty sketch with her pencil the means of conveying her ideas, either by direct or emblematical representation. Above all, in the art of ornamental writing, much studied at that period, Fenella was so great a proficient, as to rival the fame of Messrs. Snow, Shelley, and other masters of the pen, whose copybooks, preserved in the libraries of the curious, still show the artists smiling on the frontispiece in all the honours of flowing ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... allusions to well-known peculiarities in the various people and their occupation in the other life caused much amusement. For instance, Ingres the painter was seated by the roadside playing Rossini's music on the violin, on which instrument he was a great proficient. But he was known to detest the Italian's music before he started heavenward: his taste must then have grown en route. (Critics might object to this supposition.) However, Jacques was anxious ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... the only way to learn music properly so as to be able to give pleasure to others, were pieces which Miss Letitia herself had practised with painstaking care for expression over fifty years ago. Both musicians were quite proficient in mazurkas and polkas and old-fashioned reels and ballads, and let us not forget to mention variations of every conceivable variety, for Miss Letitia possessed a whole book of variations, and it was quite a ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... unrivaled grace of style which led the ancients to say that if Jove should speak Greek he would speak like Plato. He was a remarkable example of that universal culture of body and mind which characterized the last period of ancient Greece. He was proficient in every branch of art and learning and was such a brilliant athlete that he contended in the Isthmian ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... in shops, so long in coming. The first day they only got round the Lizard to Cadgwith, where they dived from steep rocks into deep blue water. Nan dived from a high rock with a swoop like a sea bird's, a pretty thing to watch. Barry was nearly as good; he too was physically proficient. The Bendishes were less competent; they were so much younger, as Barry said. But they too reached the water head first, which is, after all, the main thing in diving. And as often as Nan dived, with her arrowy swoop, ...
— Dangerous Ages • Rose Macaulay
... produkto. Productive fruktoporta. Proem antauxdramo, antauxdiro. Profanation malpiegajxo. Profane malpia. Profanity malpieco. Profess anonci, profesi. Profession (occupation) profesio. Professor profesoro. Proffer proponi, prezenti. Proficient kompetenta. Profile profilo. Profit profito, gajno. Profitable profita. Profligate dibocxulo. Profound (deep) profunda. Profound (learned) lernega, klerega. Profundity profundeco. Profuse suficxega, supermezura. Progeny ido, idaro. Prognostic ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... she was also finely inexperienced, malleable, open to influence as yet. Let Henrietta then see to it, and that without delay or hesitation, bringing to bear every ingenious social art, and—if necessary—artifice, in which long practice had made her proficient. ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... had been called in. During the latter part of her aunt's sickness Desire Edwards had made a practice of running into her Uncle Jahleel's many times a day to give a sort of oversight to the housekeeping, a department in which she was decidedly more proficient than damsels of this day, of much less aristocratic pretensions, find it consistent with their dignity to be. The doctor and Desire were at this moment in the living-room, inspecting through the closed shutters the preparations on the ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... last centuries. He possessed complete sets of the Idler, the Spectator, the Tatler, the Guardian, and the Rambler, and would discourse by hours together on the superiority of such publications to anything which has since been produced in our Edinburghs and Quarterlies. He was proficient in all questions of genealogy, and knew enough of almost every gentleman's family in England to say of what blood and lineage were descended all those who had any claim to be considered as possessors of any such luxuries. For blood and ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... easily understand that my mysterious Guest was speaking the language of truth and even of simplicity. But to me, proficient though I was in Flatland Mathematics, it was by no means a simple matter. The rough diagram given above will make it clear to any Spaceland child that the Sphere, ascending in the three positions indicated there, must needs have manifested himself to me, or to any Flatlander, as a Circle, ...
— Flatland • Edwin A. Abbott
... all the rest of the party busy, begged that she also might have something to do. "I will gladly act as cook for you, though, unfortunately, I am very little acquainted with the art; but with some hints from Sambo, I may in time become proficient." ...
— The Wanderers - Adventures in the Wilds of Trinidad and Orinoco • W.H.G. Kingston
... reserve. In preparation for this duty, every man is enrolled, and required to drill for a period of from four to six months, according to the arm of the service in which he is placed; and those who do not become proficient in this time are required to drill for another and longer period. The kingdom is divided into military districts, and all the soldiers are required to drill from thirty to forty-five days every year. The navy of ...
— Up The Baltic - Young America in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark • Oliver Optic
... baffle his creditors before a jury. The young man, after much demur and the ludicrous failure of his father, who at first matriculates in his stead, consents. He listens to the pleas of the just and unjust argument in behalf of the old and new education, and becomes himself such a proficient that he demonstrates, in flawless reasoning, that Euripides is a better poet than Aeschylus, and that a boy is justified in beating his father for affirming the contrary. Strepsiades thereupon, cured of his folly, undertakes a subtle investigation into the timbers ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... the uneasy smile of a man who knew that his interlocutor's playfulness occasionally extended to the use of a derringer, in which he was singularly prompt and proficient, and Mr. Hamlin, equally conscious of that knowledge on the part of his companion, descended the ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... blacks pass with Fraulein Bertha Kircher in their midst, or at least until the last straggling warrior suggested to his mind the pleasures of black-baiting—an amusement and a sport in which he had grown ever more proficient since that long-gone day when Kulonga, the son of Mbonga, the chief, had cast his unfortunate spear at Kala, ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... England to America, Mr. Fearon says, that the capitalist may obtain, for his money, seven per cent. with good security. The lawyer and the doctor will not succeed. An orthodox minister would do so. The proficient in the fine arts will find little encouragement. The literary man must starve. The tutor's posts are all occupied. The shopkeeper may do as well, but not better than in London, unless he be a man of superior talent, and have a large capital: for such requisites there is a fine opening. ...
— Travels in North America, From Modern Writers • William Bingley
... Louise, cousin of Francis' former queen, Claude, had been reared with rigid strictness, although provided with various preceptors who had made her more or less proficient in the profane letters, as they were then called, Latin, Greek, theology and philosophy. The fame of her beauty had gone abroad; her hand had been often sought, but the obdurate king had steadfastly refused to ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham
... a writer to any other person. Writers are self-made. But it is a reasonable speculation that history might never have heard of the greater number of these men had they not worked sedulously to become proficient with the pen as well as with the sword. Granting that they had other sound military qualities in the beginning, an acquired ability to express themselves lucidly and with force became a touchstone to preferment. ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... sister, who was often with them, shewing a great desire to learn, the intendant, pleased with her quickness, employed the same master to teach her also. Her emulation, vivacity, and piercing wit, made her in a little time as great a proficient as her brothers. ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... invitation to give herself to the service of the poor), and Lucretia Helena Gomaro Piscopia, who taught philosophy and theology! and Laura Bassi who lectured in physics, and Clara von Schur-man who became proficient in Greek, Hebrew, Syriac, and Chaldaic in order to study Scripture "with greater independence and judgment," and the Pirk-heimer family of Nuremberg, Caritas and Clara and others, whose attainments were conspicuous in ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart
... the author has had in mind the needs of young men having no technical instruction who are anxious to become proficient in the art of Plumbing. As a consequence each exercise is minutely described and illustrated; so much so, perhaps, that an experienced mechanic may find it too simple for skilled hands and a mature mind. But the beginner will not find the exercises too elaborately described and ...
— Elements of Plumbing • Samuel Dibble
... the results they anticipated immediately, they want to know "what's wrong?" My answer is usually that "nothing is wrong" and that they need only keep steadily applying the instructions. Certainly, one doesn't become a proficient typist, musician, actor or sportsman because he has mastered the basic techniques. It ...
— A Practical Guide to Self-Hypnosis • Melvin Powers
... can do exceptionally well, or for something that few people can do at all. As long as the vast majority of women can bear children, the only women who could get well paid for it would be those exceptionally qualified, or exceptionally proficient. This is economics, now we're talking. Other considerations are left out. No, I tell you. Economic independence, if she really got it—the kind of woman I've been talking about—would make her ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... hypocritical to attempt to conceal the truth; and the difficulty is increased by the fact that, while parents and boys alike feel as they do about the essential importance of games, head-masters are more or less bound to select men for masterships who are proficient in them; because whatever else has to be attended to at school, games have to be attended to; and, moreover, a man whom the boys respect as an athlete is likely to be more effective both as a disciplinarian and a teacher. If a man is a first-rate slow bowler, ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... with credit, his tastes were not primarily in this direction. The study of Roman antiquities, Christian and Pagan, was congenial to him, as was also the study of Italian art—in which he ultimately became proficient—and of music: and he early devoted himself to the Syriac and Arabic languages. In all these pursuits the enthusiasm and eminence of men living in Rome itself at this era of renaissance was a potent stimulus to ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... the poorest of all tests as to relative values. Oliver was the product of the most teeming hot-beds of art and literature, and even of compulsory addiction to the art of painting, in which nevertheless he was rapidly becoming as much a proficient as in literature. What he would have been if, like the ardent and heroic Chatterton, he had had to fight a single-handed battle for art and bread together against merciless mediocrity in high places,—what he would then have become, I cannot in the least calculate; ...
— Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti - 1883 • T. Hall Caine
... Karl and I were perpetually changing identities and confusing our playmates, as well as our parents. To that end I was a willing German scholar, and Karl also became proficient in his ...
— I Spy • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... going to send him to Jena for three months to pick up your noble vernacular; and in the meanwhile to continue his Greek and Mathematics, in which the young gentleman is fairly proficient. If you can recommend any Professor under whom he can carry on his studies, it ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2 • Leonard Huxley
... remarkably well, for an invalid. He won golden praise from August at the rifle practice, and he began to take lessons in the quick drawing and rapid firing of a Colt revolver. Naab was wonderfully proficient in the use of both firearms; and his skill in drawing the smaller weapon, in which his movement was quicker than the eye, astonished Hare. "My lad," said August, "it doesn't follow because I'm a Christian ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... in Persia to the great Khan Kublai, who ruled in far-off China, and to whom all the Tartar rulers owed allegiance. The chief ambassador was struck with the talents and charm of the brothers, who had now become proficient in the Tartar language, and persuaded them to accompany him on his journey to the presence of the Great Khan, who had never yet set eyes on a man of the West, and would, he assured them, receive them honourably. They would not have been Venetians had they refused such an opportunity, and, ...
— Medieval People • Eileen Edna Power
... asked if he were prepared to learn Manchu sufficiently well to edit, or translate, into that language such portions of the Scriptures as the Society might decide to issue, provided means of acquiring the language were put within his reach, and employment should follow as soon as he showed himself proficient. To this Borrow had willingly agreed. At this period, the idea appears to have been to execute the ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins |
