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Scarcely   Listen
adverb
Scarcely, Scarce  adv.  
1.
With difficulty; hardly; scantly; barely; but just. "With a scarce well-lighted flame." "The eldest scarcely five year was of age." "Slowly she sails, and scarcely stems the tides." "He had scarcely finished, when the laborer arrived who had been sent for my ransom."
2.
Frugally; penuriously. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Scarcely" Quotes from Famous Books



... the matter shortly, whereas at Helles I had under my command no more than 88 to 95 guns and howitzers of all natures with scarcely any ammunition or aeroplanes to support four British Divisions; in Palestine at Gaza I had at least 230 guns and howitzers (one-third of which were of heavy calibre) with an abundance of ammunition and a sufficiency of aeroplanes to support the attack of one and a half Divisions, the ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton

... small valley we found a number of the mesaskatomina bushes, from which we obtained a supply of fruit which greatly refreshed us. I am afraid that it will be scarcely believed that we accomplished, according to our calculation, upwards of fifty miles before we stopped to camp at night. Though nothing on a highroad, it was good going over the prairie grass, with occasionally to have to make our way through ...
— Snow Shoes and Canoes - The Early Days of a Fur-Trader in the Hudson Bay Territory • William H. G. Kingston

... Maulear, who said to himself: "What mystery is this? why conceal it from me?" The coincidence of a veil being found by him, and of Aminta having lost one, made him keenly anxious: he was terrified, confounded, and so excited, that he could scarcely speak to Taddeo and Aminta as he crossed the park ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various

... came stealing from the ground; You scarcely saw its silvery gleam Among the herbs that hung around The borders of the winding stream, The pretty stream, the placid stream, The softly-gliding, ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant

... the Northwest was Detroit. Wayne, who saw it in 1796, described it as a crowded mass of one- and two-story buildings separated by streets so narrow that two wagons could scarcely pass. Around the town was a stockade of high pickets with bastions and cannon at proper distances, and within the stockade "a kind of citadel." The only entrances were through two gates defended by blockhouses at either end of a street along the river. ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster

... day or two the boy found himself quite unable to shake the spell of the old patriarch's presence off his mind, and the more he thought over it, the more he realized that scarcely any one thing in the whole of the United States loomed larger on its future than the main idea of Conservation. It had been merely a word before, but now it was a reality, and he determined to take ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Foresters • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... consequently the facts must be gathered from chance sources which are too often bad, poisoning mind and heart. Even the physiologies, with the exception of those large, and to the average reader inaccessible, volumes used in medical schools, scarcely ever touch upon the subject. Of course these larger books give only the physiological facts couched in scientific terms. How and where, then, can the youth learn what he needs ...
— The Renewal of Life; How and When to Tell the Story to the Young • Margaret Warner Morley

... Cherry Malotte; but now the facts were deeply, intimately colored with all the young man's natural enthusiasm and inmost personal feeling. To his listener it was like some wonderful, far-off romance, having to do with strange people whose motives she could scarcely grasp and pitched amid wild scenes that she ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach

... Celebes. Here the Pelican was a second time docked and scraped. The crew had a month's rest among the fireflies and vampires of the tropical forest. Leaving Celebes, they entered on the most perilous part of the whole voyage. They wound their way among coral reefs and low islands scarcely visible above the water-line. In their chart the only outlet marked into the Indian Ocean was by the Straits of Malacca. But Drake guessed rightly that there must be some nearer opening, and felt his way looking for it along the coast of Java. Spite of ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude

... entered the home of little Pierre, where there was a wounded French sergeant that the lad's mother had been nursing and whom the little boy loved very dearly. The sergeant's wounds were just beginning to heal, but so weak was he that he could scarcely stand without someone to lean upon. When the Germans burst in the wounded man was filled with rage, but he knew better than ...
— The Children of France • Ruth Royce

... except Custance there came in answer such a cry—half amazement, half exultation—as we in this nineteenth century can scarcely imagine for such an event. For the last eight years of the reign of Henry the Eighth, England had been in slavery—"fast bound in misery and iron." Every year it had grown heavier. Murmuring was treated as rebellion, and might have entailed death. To know that Henry was dead was to be free—to ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt

... sitting room, and had scarcely been there five minutes when we heard my three brothers coming in, in their usual way, by the back door. They tramped into the sitting room, noisy, dirty, wet with spray, and hungry, and demanded supper in a loud and collected voice. My mother looked at ...
— Amona; The Child; And The Beast; And Others - From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other - Stories" - 1902 • Louis Becke

... primitive legislation. They do not escape the almost inevitable consequence of making irreligion penal. If laws are based upon religion, the greatest offence against them must be irreligion. Hence the necessity for what in modern language, and according to a distinction which Plato would scarcely have understood, might be termed persecution. But the spirit of persecution in Plato, unlike that of modern religious bodies, arises out of the desire to enforce a true and simple form of religion, and is directed against the superstitions which tend to degrade mankind. ...
— Laws • Plato

... elevator-well. At the very crown of the building Dr. Frederick H. Lindsay and his numerous staff occupy almost the entire floor. In one corner, however, a small room embedded in the heavy cornice is rented by a dentist, Dr. Ephraim Leonard. The dentist's office is a snug little hole, scarcely large enough for a desk, a chair, a case of instruments, a "laboratory," and a network of electric appliances. From the one broad window the eye rests upon the blue shield of lake; nearer, almost at the foot of the building, run the ribboned tracks ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... absolute good sense: restless and wayward in action, but with deep peace at his heart; exulting that he has caught the true aspect of things past, and the depth of futurity which lies before him, wherein to create something so magnificent as the world has scarcely begun to dream of. There is the strongest hope of a nation that is capable of being ...
— The Frontier in American History • Frederick Jackson Turner

... to do nothing of the sort," she said. Her words were as firm as the old fir tree just outside the gates, which was so big that fifteen men could scarcely span it. ...
— Folk Tales Every Child Should Know • Various

... reached the dusty platform, in fact, just as the train came in. There were no other passengers from Amity except a woman whom she did not know, dragging a stout child by the arm. The child was enveloped in clothing to such an extent that it could scarcely walk. It stumbled over its voluminous white coat. Nobody could have told its sex. It cast a look of stupid discomfort at Maria, then its rasped little face opened for a wail. "Shet up!" said the mother, and she dragged more forcibly at the podgy little arm, and the child broke into a lop-sided ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... now washed and rinsed, which process was really quite necessary, and afterwards it looked clean and transparent, and felt young again in its old age; but the paper which it had carried so faithfully was destroyed in the washing. They filled the bottle with seeds, though it scarcely knew what had been placed in it. Then they corked it down tightly, and carefully wrapped it up. There not even the light of a torch or lantern could reach it, much less the brightness of the sun or moon. "And yet," thought the bottle, "men go on a journey that they may see as much as ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen

... LXXXIX. Scarcely any of those who were accessary to his murder, survived him more than three years, or died a natural death [102]. They were all condemned by the senate: some were taken off by one accident, some by another. Part of them perished at sea, others fell in battle; and some slew themselves ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... are of the same kind with those producing workers, has been repeatedly demonstrated. On examining the queen cells while they are in progress, one of the first things which excites our notice, is the very unusual amount of attention bestowed upon them by the workers. There is scarcely a second in which a bee is not peeping into them, and just as fast as one is satisfied, another pops its head in, to examine if not to report, progress. The importance of their inmates to the bee-community, might ...
— Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey-Bee - A Bee Keeper's Manual • L. L. Langstroth

... what if he had no child! The marriage amazing everybody scarcely promised fruit, it was thought. Countess Livia, much besought for her opinion, scouted the possibility. And Carinthia Jane was proclaimed by John Rose Mackrell (to his dying day the poor gentleman tried vainly to get the second syllable of ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... deck looked like the ward of an emergency hospital. Mrs. A. F. Morrison had fallen, breaking a bone in her wrist, Mrs. E. Dinkelspiel had her head injured, Louis Glass had a bandage over his cut face, and scarcely anyone escaped without black and ...
— The Log of the Empire State • Geneve L.A. Shaffer

... conduct; and to undertake a matter of such importance as was not only difficult for any man to have the ability to execute in an adequate manner, but hard even to think of in a way suited to its importance, appeared to me to be scarcely consistent with the character of a man who stood in awe of the reproof of wise and learned men. For what is there more important than, when the dissimilarity between good orators is so great, to decide which is the best sort and as it were the ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero

... him, and the two were alone in the room. No sound reached them from without, not even an echo of Hobart's footsteps in the hall. West looked across at the girl, who sat motionless, her eyes shaded by long lashes, and ringless fingers clasped in her lap. She appeared indifferent, uninterested, scarcely aware of his presence. He wondered if Hobart was listening at the door; what had become of Mike, and whether Sexton was alive or dead. For the moment he could scarcely make himself realize the true situation. His silence served to arouse her interest, for she suddenly lifted her ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish

... conjurer's trick. No one had seen or touched the parcel but himself. He had himself placed it in Mr Bickers's hands. Indeed, from the time he had taken the things from Herapath's cupboard till the moment of parting with them, he had scarcely had ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed

... last!" exclaimed Miss Prowley, when we returned to the drawing-room. She had been sitting in silence in an obscure corner, and I had scarcely realized her presence. "Over at last! and of all fatiguing and unprofitable employments that the folly of man ever devised, this trifling with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various

... discomfort or vexation would overcast her sky with conjugal clouds for the rest of the day. The least stone in his path was treated as a gigantic mountain; the narrowest brooklet as an unfathomable sea. And gradually—she scarcely knew how or when—the old weary discomfort crept back over Philippa's heart, the old unsatisfied longing for the love that no one gave. Her bower at Kilquyt was no more strewn with roses than her turret-chamber at Arundel. She found that ...
— The Well in the Desert - An Old Legend of the House of Arundel • Emily Sarah Holt

... at the first sound of the voice James had fallen back with a curse, and Flavia, grasping her bruised wrist with her other hand, reeled for support against the Tower wall. For a moment no one spoke. Then James, with scarcely a look at Payton—for he it was—bade her come away with him. "If you are not mad," he growled, "you'll have a care! You'll have a care, ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman

... without meaning. The man reading on, wrapt and unconscious, in his upper room, merely followed his bent. He read and reasoned, though in the great city round him the terror of the Revolution was at its height; though the rattle of the drum had scarcely ceased with nightfall, and the last tumbril was even now being ...
— In Kings' Byways • Stanley J. Weyman

... the subject I haven't quite made up my mind: But those guns went pop-popping all morning, alas! And young Rooks kept dropping among the long grass, Till good Mr. Blackbird, who watched the whole thing, For pity could scarcely a single note sing, And in the May sunset he hardly could bear To hear the returning ...
— The Adventures of A Brownie - As Told to My Child by Miss Mulock • Miss Mulock

... Ben had scarcely left the room when it occurred to him that he ought to send home for the remainder of his clothes. He did not like to do so, however, without first consulting ...
— The Young Explorer • Horatio Alger

... to pull a bell, but remembered that the servants would scarcely be up as yet. He went to the front door himself. There were the Press and the Public Ledger lying damp from the presses. He picked them up and glanced at the front pages. His countenance fell. On one, the Press, was spread a great black map of Chicago, a ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser

... doubly tender of thwarting him; hence, she did not set her face as firmly as she might otherwise have done, against a wild plan he now formed of again altering, or indeed rebuilding the house; although she could scarcely think of it with patience. She liked her house so well as it stood; and it was amply big enough: there was only the pair of them... and John's child. It had the name, she knew, of being one of the most comfortable and best-kept in Ballarat. ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson

... the breast to gold, emerald green and rich crimson. The general color of the upper parts is grayish blue, the under parts white. The extreme length of the bird is about seventeen inches; the finely modeled slender tail about eight inches, and extent of wings twenty-four inches. The females are scarcely less beautiful. "Oh, what bonnie, bonnie birds!" we exclaimed over the first that fell into our hands. "Oh, what colors! Look at their breasts, bonnie as roses, and at their necks aglow wi' every color juist like the wonderfu' ...
— The Story of My Boyhood and Youth • John Muir

... of the descent of the crown to a female was the separation from it of Hanover, after an union which had lasted for nearly a century and a quarter. This abscission of territory, however, was scarcely noticed; it hardly called forth an observation in the newspapers, much less an expression of regret—a proof of the little value attached in this country to foreign dominion as a source of wealth ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... infirmities of old age creeping on, he could not determine, but since the year 1664, there was such a continual pain contracted in his bladder, that he could not walk abroad, and a shaking of his hands, that he could scarcely write any; otherwise, he blessed the Lord that hitherto he had found no great defection ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie

... disgust for those propensions that are started in us without the mediation and direction of the judgment, as, upon the subject I am speaking of, I cannot entertain that passion of dandling and caressing infants scarcely born, having as yet neither motion of soul nor shape of body distinguishable, by which they can render themselves amiable, and have not willingly suffered them to be nursed near me. A true and regular affection ought to spring and increase with the knowledge they give us of themselves, and ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... left Paris. I was in such a state of depression, that I scarcely felt the pain of parting. The thought of being loved by such a woman filled me with extreme pride, and, no doubt, saved me from many an excess. Ambition was rising within me whenever I thought of her. I ...
— Within an Inch of His Life • Emile Gaboriau

... precision now in a right line, not stopping at any obstruction, in the way of fences, hedges, or ditches, so that it took Charles some exertion, to which, just then, he was scarcely equal, ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest

... mane, stretch over the blue vault. These purple streaks grow browner; the patches of blue assume the paleness of mother-of-pearl. The bushes, the pebbles, the earth, now wear the hard colour of bronze, and through space floats a golden dust so fine that it is scarcely distinguishable from ...
— The Temptation of St. Antony - or A Revelation of the Soul • Gustave Flaubert

... we ask it, scarcely knowing What this wondrous gift may be; But fulfil to overflowing, Thy ...
— The Prayers of St. Paul • W. H. Griffith Thomas

... below, whence, the windows being small and high, there was literally nothing to be seen. They employed themselves in reading, writing, or working; the French ladies in particular being most industrious in plying the needle. We noticed one family especially, who scarcely shewed themselves upon deck. It consisted of the mother, an elderly lady, of a very prepossessing appearance, with her son and daughter; the former about thirty years old, the latter considerably younger. The dress of the ladies, which was perfectly neat, consisting of printed muslin ...
— Notes of an Overland Journey Through France and Egypt to Bombay • Miss Emma Roberts

... housekeeper, "I scarcely understood before; I perfectly understand now. You are mistaken, ma'am, in supposing that I am of any importance, or that I exercise any influence in this painful matter. I am the mouth-piece of Mr. ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins

... ornamented with curious inlay-work of gold. He dared not ask about it even if he could have made his question understood. The knight spoke only Norman and a little mixed French and English, and Dickon knew scarcely a word of any language but Saxon. When his father had come home and the knight had gone on his way, Dickon ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey

... when he entered, talking to a poor applicant who was waiting to see the Rector. Lord Hartledon lifted his hat to her, but did not offer to shake hands. He had never presumed to touch her hand since the reconciliation; in fact, he scarcely ever ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood

... caused in me bad feeling toward the English nation. I was too young to know anything about the Revolution; but I looked upon this as an insult to be paid in kind, and was anxious to discharge the debt with interest." It is scarcely necessary to say how keenly this feeling was shared by his seniors in the service, to whom the Vixen incident was but one among many bitter wrongs which the policy of their Government had forced ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan

... being entertained by popular penny-books that treated of all kinds of subjects, from the History of Joseph and his Brother to The Old Egyptian Fortune Teller's Last Legacy. These books were of a size scarcely larger than that of the letter-paper made for little folks, and they contained usually from sixteen to twenty-four pages. Illustrations that looked a good deal like the pictures made by a small boy in his schoolbooks adorned the rough ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester

... an underworld of the dead exist in Breton folk-belief. The dead must travel across a subterranean ocean, and though there is scarcely any tradition regarding what happens on landing, M. Sebillot thinks that formerly "there existed in the subterranean world a sort of centralisation of the different states of the dead." If so, this must have been founded on pagan belief. The interior of the earth is ...
— The Religion of the Ancient Celts • J. A. MacCulloch

... into the depths of the Revolving Beryl, which represented the earth. It was fifty feet in diameter, and in its curved surface and entrancing depths was mirrored, in this latest development of teleview, all the earth and the doings of its people. But Jaska scarcely saw the fleeting images, the men locked in conflict for the right to live, the screaming, terror-stricken women. This was now a century-old story, and the civilization of Earth had ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science July 1930 • Various

... driver returned at this moment and attracted the woman's attention. The overseer had brought with him all of the women slaves from Pingaree, who had been loaded down with chains and were so weak and ill they could scarcely walk, much ...
— Rinkitink in Oz • L. Frank Baum

... supreme command, with Onesikritus as chief pilot. He, himself, marched through the country of the Oreitae, where he endured terrible sufferings from scarcity of provisions, and lost so many men that he scarcely brought back home from India the fourth part of his army, which originally amounted to a hundred and twenty thousand foot, and fifteen thousand horse. Most of the men perished from sickness, bad food, and the excessive ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch

... Sophocles is scarcely less than that of Aeschylus. He was twenty-seven years of age when he appeared as a rival. He was born in Colonus, in the suburbs of Athens, 495 B.C., and was the contemporary of Herodotus, of Pericles, of Pindar, of Pheidias, of Socrates, of Cimon, of Euripides—the era of great men; the ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord

... very few prepare for their work. Of thousands of young women trying to get a living at typewriting, many are so ignorant, so deficient in the common rudiments even, that they spell badly, use bad grammar, and know scarcely anything of punctuation. In fact, they murder the English language. They can copy, "parrot like," ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden

... silly old fool, but my heart beat fast when I took it out and looked at it. On the lid was written "For a good girl," and inside lay the red puffs from Mrs. Yost's window down in Finleyville. Just under them was an envelope. I could scarcely see to ...
— Where There's A Will • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... closely shut. Mrs McNab was too capable a housewife to allow the noise and odour of culinary preparations to invade the rest of the house; but by this time Margot was sure of her welcome, for scarcely a day had passed by that she had not offered her services, and been condescendingly permitted to shell peas, stone fruit, or whip up snowy masses of cream. Mrs McNab always accorded permission with the air of an empress conferring an order upon some humble suppliant, but ...
— Big Game - A Story for Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... in the books. Indeed, I am acquainted with scarcely any writer on ornithology whose head is not muddled on the subject of our three prevailing song-thrushes, confounding either their figures or their songs. A writer in the "Atlantic" [Footnote: For ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs

... theme of justifying God's management of human and divine affairs. His maturity brought him his great familiarity both in matter and in style with nearly all that was best in European literature, and his peculiar subject, with only gods and angels (Adam and Eve are scarcely human, even after the fall) for characters and selected portions of eternity and infinity for time and place, gave him the tendency to artificiality and strain to the outmost verges of sublimity, and to extraordinary involution of phrase and idea—for all of which he must have ...
— The Principles of English Versification • Paull Franklin Baum

... hardly know the House of Commons without Sir Robert Peel. On the first evening on which I took my seat in that House, more than two and twenty years ago, he held the highest position among the Ministers of the Crown who sate there. During all the subsequent years of my parliamentary service I scarcely remember one important discussion in which he did not bear a part with conspicuous ability. His figure is now before me: all the tones of his voice are in my ears; and the pain with which I think that I shall never hear them again would be embittered by the ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... novelist there comes, at the inception of a book, a period in which the things and people around him recede into the background before the people and things he seeks to create; and it is scarcely to be wondered at if at these times the writer's vision, which is turned, so to speak, inward, fails to realize the significance of the scenes being enacted beneath ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes

... or evening, without a cap; I believe that she and her sister were generally thought to have taken to the garb of middle age earlier than their years or their looks required; and that, though remarkably neat in their dress as in all their ways, they were scarcely sufficiently regardful of the ...
— Memoir of Jane Austen • James Edward Austen-Leigh

... letter is to me a point of great delicacy indeed—insomuch that I can scarcely without some impropriety touch upon it. In the first place, the event to which you allude may never happen; among other reasons, because, if the partiality of my fellow- citizens conceive it to be a means by which the sinews of the new government would be strengthened, it will of consequence ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing

... of his coal-black locks, His hands so long and lean They scarcely seemed to grasp at all The keys that hung between: Both were of gold, but one was small, And with this last did he Wag in the air, as if to say, "Come hither, child, ...
— Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes - Volume I. • Walter de la Mare

... the traditional Chinese social system four classes are distinguished: the literary, the agricultural, the artisan and the trading class. Hereditary nobility, in the European sense, scarcely exists, and the possession of an hereditary title gives in itself no special privileges. Official position is more highly esteemed than birth and the bureaucracy takes the place of the aristocracy in the west. There are, nevertheless, besides ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various

... betrayed his reflections. At sight of the page, however, carrying the dead cat, he turned briskly, and we both examined the beast which, already rigid, with staring eyes and uncovered teeth, was not a sight to cheer anyone, much less the stricken man. La Trape, however, seemed to be scarcely aware of its presence. He had sunk upon a chest which stood against the wall, and, with his body strangely twisted, was muttering prayers, while he rocked himself to ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman

... bewildered Gladys from his embrace, and almost placed her in the arms of his wife, who, scarcely comprehending what was ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale

... of Cambyses into Egypt had been flanked by a fleet, so also was that of Xerxes into Greece. By the good fortune sometimes vouch-safed to a people which, owing to its obstinate opposition to, or neglect of, a wise policy, scarcely deserves it, there appeared at Athens an influential citizen who understood all that was meant by the term sea-power. Themistocles saw more clearly than any of his contemporaries that, to enable Athens to play a leading part in the Hellenic ...
— Sea-Power and Other Studies • Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge

... as it would completely bury the more fertile and better cultivated soil, and bring to the top one which contains no organic matter, and has never been subject to atmospheric influences. This would, perhaps, be so little fitted for vegetation that it would scarcely sustain plants until their roots could reach the more fertile parts below. Such treatment of the soil (turning it upside down) is excellent in garden culture, where the great amount of manures applied is sufficient to overcome the temporary ...
— The Elements of Agriculture - A Book for Young Farmers, with Questions Prepared for the Use of Schools • George E. Waring

... the young monarch found life very bright around him. His courtiers called him "the rising sun," and his ambition was to justify the title, to be what with his enormous wealth and authority was scarcely difficult, the Grand Monarch. He rushed into causeless war and snatched provinces from his feeble neighbors, exhausted Germany and decaying Spain. He built huge fortresses along his frontiers, and military roads from end to end of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson

... most tragical meeting broke up, and we are told that every man in that room, except Captain Asgill himself, was in tears. The truly unfortunate man who had been chosen by this most doleful chance was a handsome young gentleman, scarcely more than a boy. He was beloved by every one who knew him, and he would have been the last man to have consented to any such deed as that for which he was to pay the penalty. When it became known that he had been selected by fate ...
— Stories of New Jersey • Frank Richard Stockton

... which it will be requisite to return and follow his own footsteps from the house of the twin brothers. Therefore, we leave Nicholas somewhat reassured by the restored kindness of their manner towards him, and yet sensible that it was different from what it had been (though he scarcely knew in what respect): so he was full ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens

... whose sole experience of mankind had been the scarcely remembered father, the too well remembered brother, and the anxiously watched nephew, thanked God that there seemed to be one man in the world whom a woman could lean her heart upon, and not feel the support break like a reed beneath her—one man whom she could entirely believe ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)

... which reached a crisis a few days before Mr. Wilson came into office, at once demanded his attention and led to the enunciation of a general Latin-American policy. He had scarcely been in office a week when he issued a statement which was forwarded by the secretary of state to all American diplomatic officers in Latin ...
— From Isolation to Leadership, Revised - A Review of American Foreign Policy • John Holladay Latane

... to be imposed upon by imaginary wonders and prodigies. The circumstance which we should regard as most unequivocally marking a total eclipse is the visibility of the stars during the darkness. But even this can scarcely be regarded as conclusive, because Venus may be seen when there is no eclipse, and may be quite conspicuous in an annular or a considerable partial eclipse. The exaggeration of a single object into ...
— The Story of Eclipses • George Chambers

... autumn of 1829 a physician was present at the examination of a case of puerperal fever, dissected out the organs, and assisted in sewing up the body. He had scarcely reached home when he was summoned to attend a young lady in labor. In sixteen hours she was attacked with the symptoms of puerperal fever, and narrowly escaped with ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... from the police, welfare officers, a headmaster, and social workers in Auckland, the Committee learned of an accumulation of sordid happenings occurring within a short space of time which people who regard themselves as men of the world could scarcely believe possible ...
— Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents - The Mazengarb Report (1954) • Oswald Chettle Mazengarb et al.

... the substance of the earliest life of Homer we possess, and so broad are the evidences of its historical worthlessness, that it is scarcely necessary to point them out in detail. Let us now consider some of the opinions to which a persevering, patient, and learned—but by no means consistent—series of investigations has led. In doing so, I profess to bring forward ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer

... that the German started as Tom asked this question, but if he did the young inventor scarcely noticed it. In an instant, however, von Brunderger ...
— Tom Swift and his Giant Cannon - or, The Longest Shots on Record • Victor Appleton

... The real Lady MacNairne does not dress as smartly, or have such an air of Parisian elegance as this mysterious little upstart has put on since assuming her part. Save for the gray hair and the hideous glasses, there could scarcely be a daintier figure than that of ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson

... scarcely finished the sentence, when Gracious Meanwell, having first knocked, and received permission to enter, advanced with a small and peculiar-looking packet in his hand; it was composed of slips of parchment, and the direction was ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall

... found him curiously companionable. Where once he had shunned him, he now went freely to the study with his lessons or his storybook, or for talk of any little matter. His grandfather, it seemed, could understand many things which so old a man could scarcely have been expected to understand. In token of this there would sometimes creep over his brown old face a soft light that made it seem as if there must still be within him somewhere the child he had once ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson

... distributing types. It was invented by Mr. Charles W. Felt, of Salem, Massachusetts, a man of superior genius, whose energy in overcoming obstacles and working out the practical success of his idea is scarcely less remarkable than the idea itself. I shall dwell briefly upon his career, since it teaches the old, but never tiresome lesson of patient perseverance. He began the business of life in his native town, though not in mechanical pursuits. His mind, however, tended naturally ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various

... scarcely any question, the sudden explosion of which out of a clear sky, excites more charming perturbation in the mind of a man—professionally, as they say, "of letters"—than the question, so often tossed disdainfully off from young and ardent lips, ...
— One Hundred Best Books • John Cowper Powys

... you make such statements?" replied Grace, looking at the young man in mock disapproval. "You know perfectly well that you've been shut up in your old laboratory all fall. We have scarcely seen you since the walking party. You have even given football the go by, and I'm so sorry, for you were a ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower

... unnerved him. He wondered had he been in her thoughts as she had been in his. Then in the dark and unseen by the other two he rested the tips of the fingers of one hand upon the palm of the other hand, scarcely touching it lightly. But the pressure of her fingers had been lighter and steadier: and suddenly the memory of their touch traversed his brain and body like an ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce

... precluded, and there is induced in the mind—even of those with whom the study of precious stones has no part commercially—an intelligent interest in the sight or association of what might otherwise excite no more than a mere glance of admiration or curiosity. There is scarcely any form of matter, be it liquid, solid, or gaseous, but has yielded or is now yielding up its secrets with more or less freedom to the scientist. By his method of synthesis (which is the scientific name for putting ...
— The Chemistry, Properties and Tests of Precious Stones • John Mastin

... continent to refine and beautify; we had climates to change and seasons to modify, a whole system of meteorology to readjust, and the public works gave employment to the multitudes emancipated from the soul-destroying service of shams. I can scarcely give you a notion of the vastness of the improvements undertaken and carried through, or still in process of accomplishment. But a single one will, perhaps, afford a sufficient illustration. Our southeast coast, from its vicinity to the pole, had always suffered from a winter of antarctic ...
— A Traveler from Altruria: Romance • W. D. Howells

... liveried retinues are probably not entirely un-English, notwithstanding he wields so sharp a pen against England's snobs; and he may naturally have looked for more display of greatness at the residence of an ex-ambassador. But he could scarcely appreciate that simple dignity and solid comfort, that unobtrusive fitness, which belonged to Mr. Irving's home-arrangements. There were no flunkies in gold and scarlet; but there were four or five good horses in the stable, and as many suitable carriages. Everything ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various

... YOUNG WOMEN.—In cities public balls are given every night, and many thoughtless young women, mostly the daughters of small tradesmen and mechanics, or clerks or laborers, are induced to attend "just for fun." Scarcely one in a hundred of the girls attending these balls preserve their purity. They meet the most desperate characters, professional gamblers, criminals and the lowest debauchees. Such an assembly and such influence cannot mean anything but ruin ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols

... Americanistas, which meets every year, brings forward many curious studies on the history of the continent, but it can scarcely be said to have done much to advance our knowledge of the ...
— The Life of Christopher Columbus from his own Letters and Journals • Edward Everett Hale

... more of the 'warm champagne' atmosphere which was giving fresh life and health to us both. And up the islands we went, wiser, but not sadder, than when we went down them; casting wistful eyes, though, to windward, for there away—and scarcely out of sight—lay Tobago, to which we had a most kind invitation; and gladly would we have looked at that beautiful and fertile little spot, and have pictured to ourselves Robinson Crusoe and Man Friday pacing along the coral beach ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley

... of the afternoon to attend to them as well as he could. Arriving thus in a great hurry on account of the lateness of the hour, he still retained the wild, amphibious appearance which had marked him when he came up from the meadows to her side—an exceptional condition of things which had scarcely ever before occurred. When she crossed the pavement from the shop door, the shopman bowing and escorting her to the carriage, Nicholas chanced to be standing at the road-waggon office, talking to the master of the waggons. There were a good many people about, and those near paused and looked ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy

... him to rush it; and the staging had not been constructed with an eye to such a possibility. If one of the rather flimsy poles should break, or if the lion could spring the twelve feet which separated me from the ground ... the thought was scarcely a pleasant one. I began to feel distinctly "creepy," and heartily repented my folly in having placed myself in such a dangerous position. I kept perfectly still, however, hardly daring even to blink my eyes: but the long-continued strain was telling on my nerves, and my feelings ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson

... when they come to face the guns of the enemy?" he concluded, whispering in the ear of one of the officers. Having stepped aside to wipe the razor, as he said, they were all surprised and astonished to find that Neptune had disappeared amidst the plunging of waters and blowing of sea-conchs. Scarcely had he gone when an immense current of water came down upon the head of the suffering Tickler, and which he was assured was nothing more than the tail-end of a water-spout, though in truth it was poured from buckets in the hands of a cunning ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"

... to talk to Mr. Shimerda, scarcely above a whisper. He was telling a long story, and as he went on, Antonia took my hand under the table and held it tight. She leaned forward and strained her ears to hear him. He grew more and more excited, ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather

... He was scarcely ready, however, for the prodigious silence following the announcement read by the lawyer. He felt as though life was suspended for many minutes, when it was proclaimed that he, Luke Tarboe, would inherit the property. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... the mind of my dear wife, but the earnest remonstrances of my little party, who represented it as certain death to all of us to cross the plains, which were infested with lions and other savage beasts who were prowling in every direction, at length induced me to wait till the next day. But scarcely had day begun to dawn when I sallied forth, without either arms or guide, except a pocket compass, leaving my fellow-travellers to bring on the waggon as soon as they should arouse from their slumbers. This impatience had, however, well-nigh cost me my life; for having to wade through many ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat

... the Spaniards owned a very much greater portion of the transatlantic continent than you now do, and their navy composed a part of the hostile fleets which were destroyed by Lord Nelson. At that time, also, you had no navy, or at all events, so few ships, as scarcely to deserve the name of one; nor had you won for yourselves that high character, which you now so justly enjoy, for skill and gallantry. I agree with you, however, in thinking the monument is in bad taste. The name of Lord Nelson is its own ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... now: how, ever since Burr major had that watch, Mercer had been envious, and longed for it. Scarcely a day had passed that he had not said something about his longings; and now here it was plainly enough before me: he had gone on coveting that wretched toy till the desire had been too strong for him, and it had ended in my ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn

... That scarcely any notices of this worship should appear in modern works, except in the erudite pages of a few antiquarians may be accounted for by considering the difference of opinion between the ancients and the moderns as to what constitutes—modesty; ...
— Aphrodisiacs and Anti-aphrodisiacs: Three Essays on the Powers of Reproduction • John Davenport

... Pray, you shall need Him. You shall eat dock and grass, and dandelion, Till that low threshold there becomes a wall, And when your hands can scarcely drag your body ...
— The Countess Cathleen • William Butler Yeats

... Tom had scarcely spoken when the shock came, and beams, boards, and shingles flew in all directions. It was a terrifying occurrence and not knowing what else to do the five boys dug into the loose hay and threw themselves flat. Each felt as if the end ...
— The Rover Boys out West • Arthur M. Winfield

... Miss Travers; and she bade me come to you. Otherwise, as you did not send for me, it was scarcely my place ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... vessel by reversing, when running at full speed, thus confirming the very favorable reports previously received by the owners from their captains since the Dickinson propeller was fitted to the Herongate. Those who were on board her state that the vibration was scarcely noticeable. From a statement submitted to us it is clear that the Herongate had the turn of the scale against her in dead weight and draught, vacuum, and diagrams taken, but notwithstanding (making allowance for one faulty run due to the variations in tide) she appears to have more than held ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 647, May 26, 1888 • Various

... all his power to forcing the passage of this bill. At the same time the Socialist press was handicapped by every sort of persecution. I was at that time in intimate touch with the "Appeal to Reason", and I know that scarcely a month passed that the Post Office Department did not invent some new "regulation" especially designed to limit its circulation. I recall one occasion when I met the editor on his way to Washington with a trunkful of ...
— The Profits of Religion, Fifth Edition • Upton Sinclair

... possesses a good mentality, it scarcely occurs to us that this is just as surely heredity as is the transmission of the ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen

... limited in its extent, information of all kinds is so generally diffused, and there is such a flood of newspapers that the characters of all the candidates for office may be thoroughly known by all who will bestow any attention to the subject. This State is scarcely more extensive than a single county in many other States, and the intercourse of the inhabitants of the various parts with each other is such that no evil can exist in our present mode of elections—But there are serious and weighty ...
— Count The Cost • Jonathan Steadfast

... "breaking the last link." As used to enforce a primitive ideal, the modern art of photography seems, if I may say so, a little out of this picture; but, anyhow, into the forest Mr. KNOWLES went with "nodings on," and there he stuck out his time, speaking to no one, scarcely seeing a human being, and proving—well, I don't honestly think that he proved much. But at least he was not what he calls a quitter, and as more than once he had an intense desire to return to civilisation, he deserves much credit for carrying out his resolution. But, difficult as he found it to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 18, 1914 • Various

... is, we need scarcely say, full of delicate criticism and suggestion. He treats his subject with great cleverness, and on many points carries the reader along with him. Especially good is all that he says about the "grand ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various

... the part of the landlord to solicit custom. It need hardly be stated that the information given on this signboard was incorrect. Before the Reformation there were few inns, and the old Vineyard Inn can scarcely claim such a ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield

... and just this gained the chief admiration. These works, these services, they thought, merited grace more than the use of wine and flesh, and than marriage, which seemed to be a profane and unclean matter, and which scarcely could please God, even though it were not ...
— The Apology of the Augsburg Confession • Philip Melanchthon

... There were over six thousand planets in the Brotherhood of Man. At two months per planet, not figuring transit time, it would take more than a thousand Galactic Standard years to visit them all, and a man could look forward to scarcely more than five hundred at best. The habitat of Man had become too large. There wasn't time to ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone

... must consider the form and the origin. A narrative which has taken a definite shape, either as a formula or a poem, can scarcely be called a tradition. It is a specimen of composition handed down by tradition, but not a tradition itself. It is an unwritten record—as much a record in form and nature as a written document, but differing from a written document in the manner of its transmission to posterity. ...
— The Ethnology of the British Islands • Robert Gordon Latham

... inexhaustible stores, what might be best adapted to the taste of his present hearers. As to their capacity he gave himself no trouble; and, indeed, such was his singular talent for making all things plain, clear, and intelligible, that scarcely any one could be aware of such a deficiency in his presence. His talk, too, though overflowing with information, had no resemblance to lecturing or solemn discoursing, but, on the contrary, was full of colloquial spirit and pleasantry. He had a certain quiet and grave humour, which ran through most ...
— James Watt • Andrew Carnegie

... their schoolmasters never could tell them apart; at dancing parties they constantly changed partners without discovery; their close resemblance is scarcely diminished by age." ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton

... was by his memory of the steam-organ, I will say that much for him. He took the trouble to go all the way up to Salisbury, and to beg him to have him excused. And he was successful. I don't quite know what excuse he gave. It was scarcely likely to be so crude as the excuse I guessed at, 'I want to marry a wife, and therefore I cannot go.' He unbosomed himself to me engagingly when he came back from Salisbury. He appealed ...
— Cinderella in the South - Twenty-Five South African Tales • Arthur Shearly Cripps

... of her small mob, and, though she fought with the fury of ten males of her species (bitterly conscious of the young thing glued to the teat in her pouch), she was left a torn and trampled mass of scarcely recognizable fur and flesh, crushed among scrub-roots. Lesser creatures succumbed under the blinding stabs of Finn's feet; and once he leaped, like a cat, clear into the lower branches of a bastard oak tree, ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson

... And, scarcely able to believe my eyes, I saw standing there against the night two white-robed figures, with arms extended and faces raised; and then they ...
— The Gloved Hand • Burton E. Stevenson

... is of opinion that even in England L100,000 employed in trade in land can scarcely effect exchanges to the amount of L1,000,000 in a year. The same sum employed for the same purpose in London, in stocks and in the trade in commodities, will effect exchanges to the amount ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher

... says of it, in the words above quoted, "One of the works which most contributed to form the taste of the (French) nation, and to give it a spirit of justness and precision, was the collection of the maxims of Francois Duc de la Rochefoucauld, though there is scarcely more than one truth running through the book—that 'self-love is the motive of everything'—yet this thought is presented under so many varied aspects that it is nearly always striking. It is not ...
— Reflections - Or, Sentences and Moral Maxims • Francois Duc De La Rochefoucauld

... about half a yard made, whilst Michel prepared to hurl his dog into space. The window, worked by a powerful lever, which conquered the pressure of air in the interior upon the sides of the projectile, moved upon its hinges, and Satellite was thrown out. Scarcely a particle of air escaped, and the operation succeeded so well that later on Barbicane did not fear to get rid of all the useless rubbish that encumbered the vehicle in ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne

... French of the seventeenth century, like Saint-Evremond, who reproached him for his ESPRIT VASTE, and even Voltaire, the last echo of the century) cannot and could not so easily appropriate—whom they scarcely permitted themselves to enjoy. The very decided Yea and Nay of their palate, their promptly ready disgust, their hesitating reluctance with regard to everything strange, their horror of the bad taste even of lively curiosity, and in general the averseness of every ...
— Beyond Good and Evil • Friedrich Nietzsche

... chains and rattling bones; but there are certain points on which I do take a firm stand, and this matter of initials is one of them. Not one of these stories is convincing. Mr. O'DONNELL taps you on the chest and whispers hoarsely, "As I stood there my blood congealed, I could scarcely breathe. My scalp bristled;" and you, if you are like me, hide a yawn and say, "No, really?" There is a breezy carelessness, too, about his methods which kills a story. He distinctly states, for instance, that the story of the "Headless Cat of No. ——, Lower Seedley Street, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 21, 1914 • Various

... pleasure. I have not written before to congratulate you on the capture of Atlanta, the objective point of your brilliant campaign, for the reason that I have been suffering from my annual attack of "coryza," or hay-cold. It affects my eyes so much that I can scarcely see to write. As you suppose, I have watched your movements most attentively and critically, and I do not hesitate to say that your campaign has been the most brilliant of the war. Its results are less striking and less complete than those of General Grant ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... the largest and more prosperous Crimean towns, such as Simferopol and Sebastopol, Yalta, Yevpatoria, and Theodosia, where the deported Jews could easily find employment, are closed to the newcomers. Only the smaller and poorer towns and townlets where even the local Jews can scarcely get employment, are put at the disposal of the newcomers as their places of residence. There was even a project to settle a portion of these people in the city of Perekop. This town counts only one Jewish family ...
— The Shield • Various

... had been found out. She replied in a tone of sad resignation: "I could scarcely have expected to deceive you, mother. I've had so little experience in doing so. You know I've always been obedient—always before. Deceit isn't easy. I had only changed my dress, after all, while you had put on a gracious manner—and yet ...
— Everychild - A Story Which The Old May Interpret to the Young and Which the Young May Interpret to the Old • Louis Dodge

... chamber of the House of Representatives, was a multitude as great as the space could contain, and I believe scarcely a dry eye but Washington's. The sight of the sun setting full orbed, and another rising, though less splendid, was a novelty. Chief Justice Ellsworth administered the oath, and with great energy. Judges Cushing, Wilson, and Iredell, ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward

... about 10 miles from the Riff coast by twenty Moors armed with rifles and daggers. As usual, the pirates ransacked the vessel, destroyed the ensign and ship's papers, brutally assaulted the men on board, and then made off in their boat. Scarcely had the foregoing notice been generally circulated than another case of a similar character happened in connection with the Italian schooner Scatuola. Again, there is the Spanish cutter Jacob. She was running along the Moorish ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various

... this forest, scarcely off a mile, In goodly form comes on the enemy; And, by the ground they hide, I judge their number Upon or near ...
— King Henry IV, Second Part • William Shakespeare [Chiswick edition]

... informs us that the Swiss naturalists who met last year at Samaden visited the end of the Morteratsch glacier, and there convinced themselves that a glacier had no tendency whatever to imbed itself in the soil. I scarcely think that the question of glacier erosion, as applied either to lakes or valleys, is to be disposed of so easily. Let me record here my ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall

... he was scarcely above the middle height, of an almost frail but very graceful slenderness, and very graceful, too, in all his movements. In dress he was supremely elegant, with the elegance of France, that in England would be accounted foppishness. He wore a suit of dark blue cloth, with white satin linings ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini

... Scarcely had they done this when Jack threw open another door, and this time it led to a hall filled with silver. In an instant his brothers had turned their bags upside down, so that the copper money tumbled out on to the floor, ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various

... And scarcely one man in a century appears so highly gifted with that wonderful quality for which we have no better name than Humor. His humor is the conciliation that takes place between love and knowledge. The two tendencies ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... through her part, she was too weak for it. But he told her shortly to mind her own business; so little Rosalie could do nothing more—nothing, except watch her mother very carefully and gently all that long, dreary Sunday, scarcely allowing her to rise from her seat, but fetching her everything she wanted, and looking forward, sick at heart, to ...
— A Peep Behind the Scenes • Mrs. O. F. Walton



Words linked to "Scarcely" :   just, hardly



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