"Descent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to presume, and it costs me nothing to do so, that he abundantly deserves the esteem and love of all who live with him. But as to public service, why, truly, it would not be more ridiculous for me to compare myself, in rank, in fortune, in splendid descent, in youth, strength, or figure, with the Duke of Bedford, than to make a parallel between his services and my attempts to be useful to my country. It would not be gross adulation, but uncivil irony, to say that he has any ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... hung along the walls. He lifted the paper-covered package, cut the string that bound it, and placed the ancient hour-glass on his table, watching the thin stream of sand which his action had set running. The constant, unceasing, steady downfall seemed to hypnotise him. Its descent was as silent as the footsteps of time itself. Suddenly it stopped, as it had done in the shop, and its abrupt ceasing jarred on his tingling nerves like an unexpected break in the stillness. He could almost imagine an unseen hand clasping the thin cylinder ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... his whip, and from the summit of the descent seen over the rolling tops of the trees in a park by the side of the road, appeared the level sea far below us, like the floor of an immense edifice inlaid with bands of dark ripple, with still trails of glitter, ending in a belt of glassy water at the foot of the sky. The light ...
— Amy Foster • Joseph Conrad
... form the bench of magistrates for the City, and in their more directly corporate capacity try the validity of ward elections, and claims to freedom; who admit and swear brokers, superintend prisons, order prosecutions, and perform a variety of other analogous duties; a descent, certainly, from the high position of the ancient "ealdormen," or superior Saxon nobility, from whom they derive their name and partly their functions. They were called "barons" down to the time of Henry I., if, as is probable, ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... likewise between France and England was not distinguished this year by any memorable event. Francis had equipped a fleet of above two hundred sail, besides galleys; and having embarked some land forces on board, he sent them to make a descent in England.[**] They sailed to the Isle of Wight, where they found the English fleet lying at anchor in St. Helen's. It consisted not of above a hundred sail; and the admiral thought it most advisable to remain in that road, in hopes of ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
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