"Dubious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the first time it became a practical question. Erastus Wiman, a Canadian who had found fortune in the United States, began in 1887 a vigorous campaign in its favor both in Congress and among the Canadian public. Goldwin Smith lent his dubious aid, leading Toronto and Montreal newspapers joined the movement, and Ontario farmers' organizations swung to its support. But the agitation proved abortive owing to the triumph of high protection in the presidential election of 1888; and in ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton
... scoffing at the folly of another, who did nothing but torment everybody with the catalogue of his genealogy and alliances, above half of them false (for they are most apt to fall into such ridiculous discourses, whose qualities are most dubious and least sure), and yet, would he have looked into himself, he would have discerned himself to be no less intemperate and wearisome in extolling his wife's pedigree. O importunate presumption, with which the wife sees herself ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... undressed, and laid in a warm bed, a surgeon examined his body, and found a wound in his neck by a sword, and another in his right side, occasioned by a pistol-shot; so that his prognostic was very dubious. Meanwhile, he applied proper dressings to both; and, in half an hour after this administration, the gentleman gave some tokens of perception. He looked around him with a wildness of fury in his aspect, as if he had thought himself in ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... situated, when the news of Wallace's decisive victory, distancing all their means to raise him who was now at the pinnacle of power, determined the dubious to become at once his mortal enemies. Lord Badenoch had listened with a different temper to the first breathings of Lady Mar on her favorite subject. He told her, if the nation chose to make their benefactor king, he should not oppose it; because he thought that ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... is not, never could you know: there is no way of getting at that; nor could you explain it to another; for Thought and Being are identical."—Famous utterance, yet of so dubious omen!—To gar auto voein estin te kai einai —-idem est enim cogitare et esse. "It is one to me," he proceeds, "at what point I begin; for thither I shall come back over again: ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... ballad, there had walked, or rather reeled, into the room, a gentleman in a military frock-coat and duck trousers of dubious hue, with whose name and person some of my readers are perhaps already acquainted. In fact it was my friend Captain Costigan, in his usual condition at this hour of ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... eyes sparkling. He had his arms akimbo, and his feet planted wide apart. His grey bowler rested on the back of his head, to display a sleek coating of hair plastered down over his brow. In his white satin tie shone a dubious but large diamond, and there was the counter-attraction of geraniums and maidenhair fern in his button-hole. So fresh was the nosegay that he must have kept it in water during the passage! Or perhaps these vegetables had absorbed by mere contact with ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... accumulation of traits, and not by a concentration. The vernacular Irish literature is there to prove that Irish fancy gives too much rather than too little. One may observe, again, that a nation laughs habitually over its besetting weakness; and if the French find their mirth by preference in dubious adventures, it cannot be denied that much Irish humour has a pronounced alcoholic flavour. But it is better neither to define nor to describe; there is more harmful misunderstanding caused by setting ...
— Irish Books and Irish People • Stephen Gwynn
... said the doctor with a carelessness which was somewhat dubious in its character. "It is very well for those who find the subject pleasant. I confess I have ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... conducted by means of arguments. But an argument is a reason in settlement of a dubious matter: whereas things that are of faith, being most certain, ought not to be a matter of doubt. Therefore one ought not to dispute in public about ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... too bloody and dangerous to afford their sex much pleasure. The lower and interior space was soon filled by substantial yeomen and burghers, and such of the lesser gentry, as, from modesty, poverty, or dubious title, durst not assume any higher place. It was of course amongst these that the most frequent disputes ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... can he expect it? He knows I am blind, and he sends me groping about for a thing so hard to detect, and so nearly extinct this long time, that a Lynceus would have his work cut out spying for its dubious remains. So you see, as the good are few, and cities are crowded with multitudes of the bad, I am much more likely to come upon the latter in my rambles, and they keep me ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... state: President Laurent GBAGBO (since 26 October 2000); note - took power following a popular overthrow of the interim leader Gen. Robert GUEI who had claimed a dubious victory in presidential elections; Gen. GUEI himself had assumed power on 25 December 1999, following a military coup against the government of former President Henri Konan BEDIE head of government: Prime Minister Seydou DIARRA (since 25 January 2003); note - appointed ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... notebook, wondering mildly why she should be called upon to shoulder a part of Nelly Morrison's work, and a trifle dubious at the prospect of facing the rapid-fire dictation Mr. Bush was said to inflict upon his stenographer now and then. She had the confidence of long practice, however, and knew that she was equal to anything in reason ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... meantime her whole attention was engrossed with Winnie's party. Miss Latimer had bought her a soft white muslin for the occasion, and Miss Deborah was busy converting it into the prettiest party-dress imaginable. The young girl had been at first slightly dubious about Aunt Debby's dress-making capabilities; but her doubts were fast disappearing as she watched the gradual progress made under that lady's skilful fingers, and noted how beautifully and tastefully the work ...
— Aunt Judith - The Story of a Loving Life • Grace Beaumont
... The physician was still dubious. "Well, perhaps. Still, I doubt if many ministers would agree that merely because a man may believe in a superhuman creative power, he is religious, if, at the same time he says—as I must—that he doesn't and can't subscribe to many of the things which we were taught as children ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... is bothered by a sort of quiet annoyance that the poet should so confidently take a dubious idea for a certain one. He might easily argue against the poet that on the contrary it seemed to him that a man who commits a crime for his master is more at fault than one who commits it for himself, and he could support his position with rational arguments. ...
— An Essay on True and Apparent Beauty in which from Settled Principles is Rendered the Grounds for Choosing and Rejecting Epigrams • Pierre Nicole
... compensation: the gypsy episode, for example, is full of raciness and relish. And what a gallery of women we get in the story: Mrs. Honour the maid, and Miss Western (who in some sort suggests Mrs. Nickleby), Mrs. Miller, Lady Bellaston, Mrs. Waters and other light-of-loves and dames of folly, whose dubious doings are carried off with such high good humor that we are inclined to overlook their misdeeds. There is a Chaucerian freshness about it all: at times comes the wish that such talent were used in a better cause. A suitable ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton
... then, can it be extolled by me. And I am bound to say that even as an honour it seems to me more than dubious. Commissioned and designed and chiselled and set up in all reverence, it yet serves very well the purpose of a guy. This does not surprise you. You are familiar with a host of statues that are open to precisely that objection. Westminster Abbey abounds in them. They confront ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... from sence of injur'd merit, That with the mightiest rais'd me to contend, And to the fierce contention brought along 100 Innumerable force of Spirits arm'd That durst dislike his reign, and me preferring, His utmost power with adverse power oppos'd In dubious Battel on the Plains of Heav'n, And shook his throne. What though the field be lost? All is not lost; the unconquerable Will, And study of revenge, immortal hate, And courage never to submit or yield: And what is else not to be overcome? That Glory ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... the poor Souls to confess their Crimes, in order to be sav'd, or the like; no, faith, but quite contrary, for he was rather hardning them, and infusing a strong Portion of his own obstinacy, to fortifie 'em for their dubious Journey; and in few minutes after, possess'd with a stronger Spirit of Priesthood than e'er, for some past Ages there has been Example for, pronounc'd the Absolution, the extremest and most mysterious Grace the Church can possibly ...
— Essays on the Stage • Thomas D'Urfey and Bossuet
... ago, Dr. Priestley having caught cold by attending a meeting of the Philosophical Society on a wet evening, was taken ill of a violent inflammatory complaint which rendered his recovery for a long time dubious. We announce with sincere pleasure the returning health of a man, whose life hath hitherto been sedulously and successfully devoted to the ...
— Priestley in America - 1794-1804 • Edgar F. Smith
... ear and looked dubious. "That sounds pretty sensational. But maybe the second lad just plain happened to fall in love with the girl ...
— Ten From Infinity • Paul W. Fairman
... were put on board with all expedition, and the fleet got under sail on the eighth day of September, attended with the prayers of every man warmed with the love of his country, and solicitous for her honour. The public, big with expectation, dubious where the stroke would fall, but confident of its success, were impatient for tidings from the fleet; but it was not till the fourteenth, that even the troops on board began to conjecture that a descent was meditated on the coast of France, near ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... lent Miss Townshead a hat when they reached the ranch, and made no comment when Seaforth rode home with her. It was late that night when the latter found Alton smoking in a somewhat dubious ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... dubious of the prize: Elate she mark'd his wild and rolling eye, Mark'd his lip quiver, and his bosom rise, And his warm ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... our night's quarters. Agnello himself was cook, and proved a very tolerable one. This is essential; for Spanish custom prevails in the inns, whose host considers his duty accomplished when he has provided ample stabling for the mules and dubious bedding for his ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various
... said I, with a dubious accent, thinking of the heather above the myrtle and MacCailein's head on a post "Did you hear of the ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... to a European group, by the Lansing-Ishii agreement, and finally by the part played by President Wilson in the Versailles decision regarding Shantung. Those disturbances in the main, however, have made them dubious as to our skill, energy and intelligence rather than as to our good-will. Americans, taken individually and collectively, are to the Chinese—at least such was my impression—a rather simple folk, taking the word in its good and its deprecatory ...
— China, Japan and the U.S.A. - Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing - on the Washington Conference • John Dewey
... will doom this act to public execration. No necessity demanded, no policy justified it. Ulloa's conduct had provoked the measures to which the inhabitants had resorted. During nearly two years, he had haunted the province as a phantom of dubious authority. The efforts of the colonists, to prevent the transfer of their natal soil to a foreign prince, originated in their attachment to their own, and the Catholic king ought to have beheld in their conduct a pledge of their future devotion to himself. They had but lately seen their country ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... a puritanical fervor which withstood the lure of expediency. He entered the courts not to juggle with words, fence for loopholes out of which to drag dubious acquittals for his clients. His profession was a part of his nature. He saw it as a battle ground on which, under the babbling and droning, good and evil stood at unending grips. Good always triumphing. Evil always going to jail despite habeas corpuses, ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... continues, walking up and down the stage in King Hal's mantle, inquiring narrowly into its virtues and taking advantage of that occasion to ascertain the limits of the prerogative—that very dubious question then,— ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... the 'asbestos cork award'. (Any reader in doubt as to the intended application of the cork should consult the etymology under {flame}.) Since then, it is agreed that only a select few have risen to the heights of bombast required to earn this dubious dignity — but there is no agreement ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... of magnanimous Ajax and Menelaus, when he for the present gave the dubious victory to the Trojans; but to them the mighty Ajax, son ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... shows a tendency to croup and to the development of tuberculosis, and finally degenerates in whooping-cough, so that epidemic measles and whooping-cough often go hand in hand. After Apis, the cough speedily begins to become looser and milder, to loose its dubious character, and to gradually disappear without leaving a trace behind. If these results should be confirmed by further experience, we would have attained additional means of preventing the supervention of whooping-cough in measles; a triumph of art and ...
— Apis Mellifica - or, The Poison of the Honey-Bee, Considered as a Therapeutic Agent • C. W. Wolf
... because she was anxious to see that Russia should be pushed into Asiatic commitments and drawn away from the problems of the Near East. England on her part very prudently declined to be associated with a transaction which, while not opposed to her interests, was filled with many dubious elements. ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale
... M. Longnon has a theory that this unhappy accident with Sermaise was the cause of Villon's subsequent irregularities; and that up to that moment he had been the pink of good behaviour. But the matter has to my eyes a more dubious air. A pardon necessary for Des Loges and another for Montcorbier? and these two the same person? and one or both of them known by the ALIAS OF Villon, however honestly come by? and lastly, in the heat of the moment, a fourth name thrown out with an assured countenance? ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Mordaunt, for it was indeed he, "I have struggled long with my feelings, but in vain; and for both our sakes, I rejoice at the conquest they obtained. I listened only to a deceitful delusion when I imagined I was obeying the dictates of reason. Ah, dearest, why should we part for the sake of dubious and distant evils, when the misery of absence is the most certain, the most unceasing ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... at his own gate; and Mrs. Grizzle was so much affected with his escape, that her sister, in pure compassion, desired she would not afflict herself, protesting that her own wish was already gratified, for she had plucked three hairs at once, having from the beginning been dubious of the commodore's patience. ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... familiar touch, and, by way of answer, poised the cylinder in a tiny holder and deliberately lighted it, to the amazement of his questioner. Cigarettes were then unknown in that part of the state and the owner of the coach enjoyed the dubious distinction of being the first to introduce them there. "Since which time," says Chronicler Barnes in his memoirs, "their use and ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... inherited the ancestral 'vices.' 'What he appeared generally to be was seldome what he really was.' His portrait, {149a} in Highland dress, displays a handsome, fair, athletic young chief, with a haughty expression. Behind him stands a dark, dubious-looking retainer, like ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... suggest a sacrifice. Since her sister's departure she had taken sole charge of her father's domestic affairs and the few rude servants he employed, with a certain inherited following of his own moods and methods. To the neighbors she was known as "Miss Hays,"—a dubious respect that, in a community of familiar "Sallies," "Mamies," "Pussies," was grimly prophetic. Yet she rejoiced in the Oriental appellation of "Zuleika." To this it is needless to add that it was impossible to conceive any one who looked more ...
— Colonel Starbottle's Client and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... time, or in any other country. When one of the old monarchies commenced war, the operation, however large and formidable, was simple. A monarch resolved, a council sat, less to guide than to echo his resolution; an army marched, invaded the enemy's territory, fought a battle—perhaps a dubious one—rested on its arms; and while Te Deum was sung in both capitals alike for the "victory" of neither, the ministers of both were constructing an armistice, a negotiation, and a peace—each and all to be null and void ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... not seem possible that anything other than a bird could make the ascent. It looked a sheer wall from where the girls stood, the projections and jutting crags appearing perfectly flat to them. Even Harriet Burrell and Miss Elting were a little dubious. ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls in the Hills - The Missing Pilot of the White Mountains • Janet Aldridge
... Emma watched with deep interest the rapid flight, the burning of the bridge, and the headlong pursuit of the Confederate troop. Seeing Forrest looking with a dubious countenance at the dark stream, she ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... that message through in the shortest time possible. The climb was not necessary—and I for one had a sneaking hunch that we were making a mistake. But I had voted yes, and so had we all. If anybody had felt dubious, he ought to have ...
— Pluck on the Long Trail - Boy Scouts in the Rockies • Edwin L. Sabin
... this castle where the Governor was continued very furious on both sides, from break of day until noon. Yea, about this time of the day the case was very dubious which party should conquer or be conquered. At last the Pirates, perceiving they had lost many men and as yet advanced but little towards the gaining either this or the other castles remaining, thought to make use of fireballs, which they threw with their hands, designing, if possible, ...
— The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century • Clarence Henry Haring
... have supposed possible, and to the joy and wonder of the garrison, the best division of the Turkish army, with its best general at the head, marched into the city. From that hour the contest was no longer dubious. The Russians saw that the prize was carried from their grasp. They at last raised the siege, to be pursued by Cannon and other British officers, at the head of their gallant Turks, from victory to victory, until the baffled and beaten Muscovite fled through the Principalities he ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... (including a wealthy, witty, and learned divine, a doctor of laws, personally known to the Monk), and whether these people would ever be delivered from Purgatory was a matter of doubt; of the salvation of no other sinners does the Monk of Evesham seem so dubious. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... the corrupt Pennsylvania political machine, and a railroad manipulator, [Footnote: He had been involved in at least one scandal investigated by a Pennsylvania Legislative Committee, and also in several dubious railroad transactions in Maryland.] was at that time Secretary of War. Whom did he appoint as the supreme official in charge of railroad transportation? None other than Thomas A. Scott, the vice-president of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Scott, it may be said, was another capitalist ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... pink sprigged chintz that she had made a year ago and laid it near the other things, with a bit of black velvet and the quaint old brooch. She felt a little dubious about appearing on such a great occasion, almost in Albany, in a chintz dress and with no wrap. Stay! There was the white crepe shawl, all her own, that David had brought her. She had not felt like wearing ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... Text in Greek, and adds a new Translation of it, he leaves out indeed the Cranes fighting with the Pygmies, yet makes them Men, which Aristotle do's not; and by anti-placing, ut aiunt, he renders Aristotle's Assertion more dubious; Neque enim (saith he in the Translation) id est fabula, sed revera, ut aiunt, Genus ibi parvum est tam Hominum quam Equorum. Julius Caesar Scaliger in translating this Text of Aristotle, omits both ...
— A Philological Essay Concerning the Pygmies of the Ancients • Edward Tyson
... The dubious antecedents of the third Napoleon exposed him to even more than the usual hatreds and perils of crowned heads, and the number of plots against his life rivalled even those of the attempted assassinations ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton
... near, a man, whom the careless glance of Helen's cousin took for a casual tourist about to view the ruins. Helen herself, and in the same moment, Irene, recognised Piers Otway. It seemed as though Mrs. Borisoff would not rise to welcome him; her smile was dubious, half surprised. She cast a glance at Irene, whose face was set in the austerest self-control, and thereupon not only stood up, but ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... which were becoming such an occasion. When the funeral was over, indeed, he permitted himself to say piously that, though such an end was very shocking, it was an intervention of Providence for the property, which could not have stood another year of Lord Markland's going-on. He was a little dubious of Lady Markland's wisdom in taking the burden of the business upon her own shoulders; but on the whole he respected her and her motives, and gave her all the help in his power. And Lady Markland let no grass grow under her feet. She began ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... high. She's got an easel for it. She al'ays cal'ated to have me done, and she'd got as fur as the easel." His eye returned almost wistfully to the canvas. "Willum says it's a good likeness." He spoke with a kind of dubious pride. ...
— Uncle William - The Man Who Was Shif'less • Jennette Lee
... permission To intimate to 'John' The dubious condition Of the ground he's standing on"; And, dropping the suggestion To "mind what he's about," It stuns him with the question: "Does ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... stood by, looking on. She had made no comment. Her expression was not cheerful. Turning suddenly about, Elizabeth saw the dubious look. ...
— Elizabeth Hobart at Exeter Hall • Jean K. Baird
... down-stairs to superintend Mary Anne in the tea-making, and left her guest alone, that young person glanced about her with a rather dubious expression. ...
— A Fair Barbarian • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... flat as a pancake, wherein rhyme did duty for reason. M. du Chatelet had besides a very pretty talent for filling in the ground of the Princess' worsted work after the flowers had been begun; he held her skeins of silk with infinite grace, entertained her with dubious nothings more or less transparently veiled. He was ignorant of painting, but he could copy a landscape, sketch a head in profile, or design a costume and color it. He had, in short, all the little talents ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... a coldness in our national character, have caught the inspiration and enthusiasm for the works and the celebrity of genius; the symptoms indeed were long dubious. REYNOLDS wished to have one of his own pictures, "Contemplation in the figure of an Angel," carried at his funeral; a custom not unusual with foreign painters; but it was not deemed prudent to comply with this last wish of the great artist, ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... said the doctor in a dubious voice. "I am slow in making friends myself. It is the old-fashioned way ...
— A Girl in Ten Thousand • L. T. Meade
... give his band a taste of blood, and so raise their spirits, and he might reasonably conclude that naught would be known about it for days, perhaps weeks to come. Then, again, the attack might have been made by some straggling party without orders. It's a dubious question. You've got four hands here, I think, and yourself. I have seen your wife shoot pretty straight with a rifle, so she can count as one, and as this young un, here, has a good idea, too, with his shooting-iron, that makes six guns. Your place is a strong one, and you could beat ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... the birds?" inquired Allee, still a trifle dubious about entering into Peace's plan, in ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown
... situated on the corner of Catherine street, opposite the Catherine Market—a region remarkable for a very 'ancient and fish-like smell.' This Market was a large, rotten old shanty, devoted to the sale of stale fish, bad beef, dubious sausages, suspicious oysters, and dog's meat. Beneath its stalls at night, many a 'lodger' often slumbered; and every Sunday morning it was the theatre of a lively and amusing scene, wherein was performed the renowned pastime of 'niggers ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... dubious. 'She's gey saft on them hersel', an' she micht be offendit if we refused them. Of course they dinna scoot up the sleeve ...
— Wee Macgreegor Enlists • J. J. Bell
... House.—Monk and the Council of State left in charge: Annesley the Managing Colleague of Monk: New Militia Act carried out: Discontents among Monk's Officers and Soldiers: The Restoration of Charles still very dubious: Other Hopes and Proposals for the moment: The Kingship privately offered to Monk by the Republicans: Offer declined: Bursting of the Popular Torrent of Royalism at last, and Enthusiastic Demands for the Recall of Charles: Elections to the Convention Parliament going on meanwhile: ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... with Catiline's in the street rumours of the time; and the other and more direct piece of evidence is, that Catiline was tried in the year 64 for murders committed at this time, and was acquitted. It is a curious thing that the obloquy which has clung to Catiline's name on such dubious reports has never attached in the same measure to the undoubted horrors and abominations of ...
— The Gracchi Marius and Sulla - Epochs Of Ancient History • A.H. Beesley
... the dubious Mr. Richard-resting on his gun and throwing one leg negligently over the other—"I do think they're plovers, or larks, or summat of ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... gloom and melancholy that had overshadowed the land had given birth to a thousand superstitious fancies; the woes and terrors of the past were clothed with supernatural miracles and portents, and the actors in the fearful drama had already assumed the dubious characteristics of romance. Or if a writer from among the conquerors undertook to touch upon the theme, it was embellished with all the wild extravagances of an oriental imagination, which afterward stole into the graver works of the monkish historians. Hence the chronicles ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various
... himself, as was by far most probable, had willingly delivered to his son this paper of notes, to be communicated to Pym, this implied such a breach of oaths and of trust as rendered him totally unworthy of all credit: that the secretary's deposition was at first exceedingly dubious: upon two examinations, he could not remember any such words: even the third time, his testimony was not positive, but imported only, that Strafford had spoken such or suchlike words; and words may be very like in sound, and differ ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... Delightful to his feet. So fables tell, The adventurous hero, bound on hard exploits, Beholds with glad surprise, by secret spells Of some kind sage, the patron of his toils, 510 A visionary paradise disclosed Amid the dubious wild; with streams, and shades, And airy songs, the enchanted landscape smiles, Cheers his long labours ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... elegant; he talked in that attractive manner of the young nobles of the French and English courts that Mary no longer heard since her exile in Scotland; she let herself be deceived by these appearances, and did not see that under this brilliant exterior Darnley hid utter insignificance, dubious courage, and a fickle and churlish character. It is true that he came to her under the auspices of a man whose influence was as striking as the risen fortune which gave him the opportunity to exert it. We refer ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... rumours, somehow, within the gates of Silversmiths' College, of all places!—rumours that had nothing to do with the island, but suggested that, after all (there being no smoke without fire), there had been dubious and uncleanly experiments in the laboratory during my professorship. I believe that this, when I came to think it over, started my recovery: yes, my recovery. For it showed me that Farrell was deteriorating, ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... look in the old man's eyes as he spoke, and ages of dubious reasoning and purpose showed in their ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... admiring Harry; and until his thoughts had been turned into their present channel by Mrs. Cathcart's remarks, he had felt that that lady was unjust to the doctor. But to think that his line, for he had no son, should merge into that of the Armstrongs, who were of somewhat dubious descent in his eyes, and Scotch, too—though, by the way, his own line was Scotch, a few hundred years back—was sufficient to cause him very considerable uneasiness—pain would be the ...
— Adela Cathcart - Volume II • George MacDonald
... what is this? A dubious compromise; Twilight of cloudy zones, whereon the blaze Of sunshine breaks but seldom with its rays Of heavenly hope, towards which the spirit sighs Its aspirations, and is lost again 'Mid doubts: to grasp the wisdom of the skies Too feeble, tho' convinced earth's bonds are ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various
... overstepped the bounds of its habitual forbearance, for it fastened upon his finger with such determination that it had to be pried off. The man soon became unconscious, but rallied, and, after three days of dubious condition, recovered. Every year since, at about the anniversary of the bite, an ulcer forms upon the finger and the nail sloughs off. I have heard of similar recurrent effects from crotaline poisoning, but none scientifically attested, as ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... Daniel looked dubious. "I guess not, Labe," he said. "Zuba—well, the fact is, Zuba doesn't like people to smoke in ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... freaks, can hardly understand how one can idly walk through the country with no higher ambition than the taking of a picture here and there, and many are the questions to be answered as to the whyness of the whichness, the old farmer generally going on with a dubious shake of the head, convinced that there is a screw ...
— The New York and Albany Post Road • Charles Gilbert Hine
... loose trousers, which he donned only once for the amusement of his staff.[110] That he endeavoured to pose as a Moslem is beyond doubt. Witness his endeavour to convince the imams at Cairo of his desire to conform to their faith. If we may believe that dubious compilation, "A Voice from St. Helena," he bade them consult together as to the possibility of admission of men, who were not circumcised and did not abstain from wine, into the true fold. As to the latter ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... this agent between The Hague and Brussels, before he could succeed in obtaining a perfect understanding as to the specific views of the archdukes. The suspicions of the states-general seem fully justified by the dubious tone of the various communications, which avoided the direct admission of the required preliminary as to the independence of the United Provinces. It was at length concluded in explicit terms; and a suspension of arms for eight months was the ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... confessions of apostates and weaklings, was gathered together, and in 1311 laid before provincial councils, but neither province came to any fixed decision. "Inasmuch," says Hemingburgh, "as the Templars were not found altogether guilty or altogether innocent, they referred the dubious matter to the pope." They sent the evidence they had collected to swell the mass of testimony from all Christendom, which was laid before the council of Vienne. When the pope suppressed the order in April, 1312, and transferred ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... conducted by George W. Macauley with the laudable object of waking up a sleeping amateurdom. The editor very justly takes the press associations to task for their manifold sins, particularly the dubious circumstances surrounding a recent convention, in which it is needless to say the United had no part. Mr. Macauley's literary attainments are very considerable, but as yet unperfected. Possessed of rare charm in ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... elated at having carried his point; and I, after sundry dubious misgivings anent the rash promise I had made, ended by casting all compunctious visitings to the winds, and doughtily resolved, as I was in for the business, to "screw my courage to the sticking-place,' and go through with it as boldly as ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... he merely looked dubious, it's the most I can say; so did the others. I waited—to let the thing work. Dowley spoke at last—and betrayed the fact that he actually hadn't gotten away from his rooted and grounded superstitions yet. He said, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... me. And further, by the light of the moon between the trees, I can see them. We have now reached the same path that we took in the morning for gathering fruits. Do thou, O auspicious one, proceed by the way that we had come: thou needst not any longer feel dubious about our path. Near that tract overgrown with Palasa tree, the way diverges into two. Do thou proceed along the path that lies to the north of it. I am now well and have got back my strength. I long to see my ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... great moulding tradition of freedom there was one dubious and narrowing element. Accustomed to regard herself as having achieved liberty by shaking off her connection with the Old World, America was tempted to think of this liberty as something peculiar to herself, something which the 'effete monarchies' of the Old World did not, and could not, fully ...
— The Expansion of Europe - The Culmination of Modern History • Ramsay Muir
... know." They had paused at a crossing, and young Draper, with a dubious air, stood striking his agate-headed stick against the curb-stone. "I believe in a purpose, don't you?" he asked, lifting his blue eyes suddenly to ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton
... this a while, becomes manifestly very dubious as to how far I am an honest man or ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... with the Noctilucae, the Flagellata, the Rhizopoda, the Protoplasta, and the Monera, which are most generally included within the animal world. A like attempt has been made, by other writers, to escape the inconvenience of calling these dubious organisms by the name of plant or animal; but I confess, it appears to me, that the inconvenience which is eluded in one direction, by this step, is met in two others. Professor Haeckel himself doubts whether the Fungi ought not to be removed ...
— Critiques and Addresses • Thomas Henry Huxley
... on and on, square after square, with Peter listening gravely, his head bent. And square after square it was borne in on him what a precarious future stretched before this girl beside him, how very slender her resources, how more than dubious the outcome. ...
— The Street of Seven Stars • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... folk in the village," said, warmly, the blacksmith, Shaking his head, as in doubt; then, heaving a sigh, he continued:— "Louisburg is not forgotten, nor Beau Sejour, nor Port Royal. Many already have fled to the forest, and lurk on its outskirts, Waiting with anxious hearts the dubious fate of to-morrow. Arms have been taken from us, and warlike weapons of all kinds; Nothing is left but the blacksmith's sledge and the scythe of the mower." Then with a pleasant smile made answer the jovial farmer:— "Safer are we unarmed, in the midst of our flocks and our cornfields, Safer ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... took up with a dubious frown which swiftly lightened, yielding, as he pursued his examination into the papers and began to recognize their surpassing value to the Allied cause, to a subdued ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... still dubious, but she wrote the letter and gave it to him, her face proud and scornful. But she was not easy, for all that, and she watched from her balcony to see if any messenger left the castle and descended the mountain road. She was rewarded, an hour later, ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... infancy, and the four-months-old baby had been started on the same path. I explained to the mother the mechanism of elimination, told her to give up cathartics, and to set a regular time for herself and the baby, but was a little dubious about the mentally deficient four-year-old. However she soon reported that they had all three promptly acquired the new habit. Four years later she told me that they had ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury
... towards him as he hesitated with his hand dubious between his side and his bonnet, a pleasant, even an eager smile upon ...
— Gilian The Dreamer - His Fancy, His Love and Adventure • Neil Munro
... apartment—they left the house—an unauthenticated and dubious, but appalling, sensation of terror had already spread itself among the inferior retainers, who had so short time before strutted, and bustled, and thronged the doorway and the passages. A report had arisen, of which the origin could not be traced, of troops advancing towards the ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... Dubious, facing three ways, welcoming wayfarers, he whom the sea-orchard shelters from the west, from the east weathers ...
— Sea Garden • Hilda Doolittle
... had kept his diary for fourteen years, it seemed to a pardonable vanity so amusing, that he persuaded himself to give part of it to the world. The experiment, no doubt, was a very dubious one. After much hesitation, and in an evil hour, perhaps, he wrote: "I am induced to submit to the indulgence of the public the idlest work, probably, that ever was composed; but, I could wish to hope, not absolutely the most unentertaining or unprofitable." The welcome his volume ...
— Gossip in a Library • Edmund Gosse
... for granted by Biblical scholars that there were no codices extant in the world but these five, which contained data of a nature to enable us to reconstruct the text of the Septuagint. And the assistance given by these manuscripts was dubious at best, for they included the misleading additions incorporated in the text by Origen, merely marking them with asterisks, which were not only insufficient in number, but oftentimes wrongly distributed. No one ventured ...
— The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur • Emile Joseph Dillon
... since Yeager's second arrival at Noche Buena he had been gone. What did his appearance now mean? Who was the American woman he had brought back with him? Steve was inclined to think she was probably some one of the man's dubious acquaintances from Arixico. But of this he intended to ...
— Steve Yeager • William MacLeod Raine
... the tower they fell, And, grasping each the other's throat, Lay for an instant in the moat. They rose, and each in fiercer mood The sanguinary strife renewed. Well matched in size and strength and skill They fought the dubious battle still. While sweat and blood their limbs bedewed They met, retreated, and pursued: Each stratagem and art they tried, Stood front to front and swerved aside. His hand a while the giant stayed And called his magic to his aid. But brave Sugriva, swift to know ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... coach; the road gets very monotonously barren; the lounge in the corner—how suitable then to this solitary languor! Lulled here, the traveller for awhile admires the leathern trappings of the coach, hums a tune perhaps, and affects a dubious whistle. Meantime the operations of doziness have been gently applying themselves. His eye is sated with the road and the coach; his hands become stationary on his lap; his feet supinely rested on the opposite seat; his head instinctively ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 266, July 28, 1827 • Various
... I was dubious before about my chances of success, but as an ape of a new species I have a far better chance, and my inevitable human ...
— The Mind Master • Arthur J. Burks
... moment Diamond was singing like a lark in the clouds. He had the new baby in his arms, while his mother was dressing herself. Joseph was sitting at his breakfast—a little weak tea, dry bread, and very dubious butter—which Nanny had set for him, and which he was enjoying because he was hungry. He had groomed both horses, and had got old Diamond harnessed ...
— At the Back of the North Wind • George MacDonald
... been permitted to see, unscrupulous, pleasure seeking, energetic, subtle, a world too of dire economic struggle; there were allusions he did not understand, incidents that conveyed strange suggestions of altered moral ideals, flashes of dubious enlightenment. The blue canvas that bulked so largely in his first impression of the city ways appeared again and again as the costume of the common people. He had no doubt the story was contemporary, and its intense realism ...
— The Sleeper Awakes - A Revised Edition of When the Sleeper Wakes • H.G. Wells
... who have heard of the matter should know that it is not painful. I think that throughout I behaved like a gentleman.' Mr Longestaffe, in an agony, first shook his head twice, and then bowed it three times, leaving the Jew to take what answer he could from so dubious an oracle. 'I am sure.' continued Brehgert, 'that I behaved like an honest man; and I didn't quite like that the matter should be passed over as if I was in any way ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... thoughtfully polite. Richard would have preferred the main floor, with whatever delay and formal clatter such entrance made imperative. The more delay and the more clatter, the more chance of seeing Dorothy. It struck him with a dubious chill when Senator Hanway suddenly distinguished him with the freedom of that veranda door—a franchise upon which your statesman laid flattering emphasis, saying that not ten ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... the college permits are usually listed. "Prose fiction" seems to be the favorite description, a label designed to recall the existence of an undeniably respectable fiction in verse that may justify a study of the baser prose. By such means is so dubious a term as novel or short story kept out of the ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby |
