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Ruggedness

noun
1.
The property of being big and strong.  Synonyms: huskiness, toughness.
2.
The quality of being topologically uneven.
3.
The quality of being difficult to do.  Synonym: hardness.  "The ruggedness of his exams caused half the class to fail"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Ruggedness" Quotes from Famous Books



... expanse of hill and dale, the same beautiful channel stealing on, far away, the same lofty mountains which, like the troubles of life, viewed at a distance, and partially obscured by the bright mist of its morning, lose their ruggedness and asperity, and seem all ease and softness. Moved by the gentle beauty of the scene, the prince sank upon the green turf, and bathed his swollen feet ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens

... infuriated him. But instead of taking refuge, like many of his comrades, in disdainful silence, he did what he had always done, and turned bravely to the attack upon "a superior force." In May, 1916, he became editor of a small magazine, entitled "Les Humbles," but which somewhat belies its name by the ruggedness of its accents and by its refusal to allow its voice to be ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland

... there is a power in the consideration of fine art, which, when judiciously interpolated in the affairs of life, tends to soften the asperities, to round away, as it were, the ruggedness of human intercourse, and produce a tranquillity of mind which is ...
— Personal Reminiscences in Book Making - and Some Short Stories • R.M. Ballantyne

... world about him after the great storm, noting the marks of destruction and yet rejoicing in the ruggedness of the things which withstood it, if he is an American he breathes the clarified atmosphere with a strange mingling of regret and new hope. We have seen a world passion spend its fury, but we contemplate our Republic unshaken, and hold our civilization secure. ...
— U.S. Presidential Inaugural Addresses • Various

... right hand and Epictetus on the left. With a later thinker I reflected that if the Stoic knew more of the faith and hope of Christianity, the Epicurean came nearer to its charity. For it is true that Stoicism commands admiration rather than love. It was indeed too harsh a saying that "the ruggedness of the Stoic is only a silly affectation of being a god, to wind himself up by pulleys to an insensibility of suffering": that is the judgment of the bluff partisan, so shocked by the adversary's opinions that he feels absolved from ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith

... some think, roused the Laureate to emulative effort. "Jocoseria," published in 1883, reclaimed many of his earlier admirers, who had been estranged by what they regarded as the extravagance and whimsicality, not to speak of the obscurity and ruggedness, of so many of his later works. "Jocoseria," in fact, recalls "Men and Women" rather than the "Fifines," the "Hohenstiel-Schwangaus," and the "Red Cotton Nightcap Countries" of a later and less happily-inspired period. "Ferishtah's Fancies and ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne

... presentiments were his. And if at times these things bent the welded iron of his soul, much more did his far-away domestic memories of his young Cape wife and child, tend to bend him still more from the original ruggedness of his nature, and open him still further to those latent influences which, in some honest-hearted men, restrain the gush of dare-devil daring, so often evinced by others in the more perilous vicissitudes of the fishery. I will ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... War of 1879-80. Large quantities of supplies were transported from the main base of operations on the Indus, and distributed to the troops in the field over four or five distinct lines of communication, and over roads, and mountain paths of varied degrees of ruggedness. The country on both sides of the Indo-Afghan frontier was severely taxed to furnish the necessary animals. Part of the transport was hired—and as in the case of the Brahuis camels—with the services of the owners, ...
— Afghanistan and the Anglo-Russian Dispute • Theo. F. Rodenbough

... pretentious old gateway to see it clutched and stitched to the stony hillside by this rank embroidery of the wildest and bravest things that grow. Just at this moment nothing is prettier than the contrast between their dusky ruggedness and the tender, the yellow and pink and violet fringe of that mantle. All this you may observe from the viaduct at the Ariccia; but you must wander below to feel the full force of the eloquence of our imaginary papalino. The pillars and arches of pale grey peperino arise in huge tiers with ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James

... reduced to a degree of uniformity, that would have been deemed absolutely impracticable, even the most confused portion of that chaos of building, which is still known by the name of "the rocks;" and which, from the ruggedness of its surface, the difficulty of access to it, and the total absence of order in its houses, was for many years more like the abode of a horde of savages than the residence of a civilized community. The town upon the whole may be now pronounced to be tolerably regular; and, as in ...
— Statistical, Historical and Political Description of the Colony of New South Wales and its Dependent Settlements in Van Diemen's Land • William Charles Wentworth

... on our journey to Cumberland. It was tedious, for the roads were any thing but good, but the beauty of the scenery compensated for the ruggedness of the way. In six days we arrived at the Hall, where Mr. Campbell, who had called upon me on my arrival in London, had preceded me to make preparations for our reception, which was enthusiastic to the highest degree. We were called upon and ...
— The Privateer's-Man - One hundred Years Ago • Frederick Marryat

... of Love's sweets and bitter draught, * No difference kens 'twixt presence-bliss and absence-stress; And so, who hath declined from Love's true road, * No diference kens 'twixt smooth and ruggedness: I ceased not to oppose the votaries of love, * Till I had tried its sweets and bitters not the less: How many a night my pretty friend conversed with me * And sipped I from his lips honey of love ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton

... tear of years, and (what is worthy of notice) they are plainly more defective in some parts than in others. "Measure for Measure" is an example of this, and we are not satisfied with being told that its ruggedness of verse is intentional, or that its obscurity is due to the fact that Shakspeare grew more elliptical in his style as he grew older. Profounder in thought he doubtless became; though, in a mind like his, we believe ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various

... rejoice over the ruggedness of the way, which made it proper to take her hand so often, and at times even to lift her over ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe

... thought. In Paradise Lost, although there is little resemblance to Elisabethan work—such as one notices in Comus and the {161} Christmas hymn—yet the style is rich, especially in the earlier books. But in Paradise Regained it is severe to bareness, and in Samson, even to ruggedness. Like Michelangelo, with whose genius he had much in common, Milton became impatient of finish or of mere beauty. He blocked out his work in masses, left rough places and surfaces not filled in, ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers

... far away, and a number in the town, but because of the winding nature of the trail, and the ruggedness of the mountains, they could not be ...
— Jack of the Pony Express • Frank V. Webster

... friends up and down the river, Sewall's nephew, Will Dow, was possibly the one who had the rarest qualities of intellect and spirit. He had a poise and a winsome lovableness that was not often found in that wild bit of country combined with such ruggedness of character. He had a droll and altogether original sense of humor, and an imagination which struck Roosevelt as extraordinary in its scope and power and which disported itself in ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn

... would have been highly enjoyable, in that pure atmosphere, with the vault of heaven blazing overhead, and the stillness of the night broken only by our horses' hoofs, but for the weariness of the poor beasts after a long day's journey and the toilsome ascent of a mountain pass, and the ruggedness of the tracks along which we had to ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester

... summons to yield; and the reason why they thought this to be best was, because, that so far as could be perceived, the town of Mansoul now was more inclinable than heretofore. And if, said they, while some of them are in a way of inclination, we should by ruggedness give them distaste, we may set them further from closing with our summons, than we would be willing ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... went out at night without a lantern, for what with the ruggedness of the pavements and the vile state of the roads it was by no means safe to life or limb to go without some mode of illuminating ...
— Recollections of Old Liverpool • A Nonagenarian

... and the allurements of gain, while allowing to that universal firmness of his the respective names of temperance, fortitude, and justice, yet, in the life of the citizen and the statesman, could not but be offended at the severity and ruggedness of his deportment, and with his overbearing, haughty, ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch

... a supreme effort to face the situation as it affected herself and Laurence. Life without Laurence! The bare thought of it tested her heart and showed her how inalienably it belonged to him. But under all his lovingness and his boyishness, Laurence had a sternness, a ruggedness as adamantine as one of Cromwell's Iron-sides. With him to know would be to act. Well—he mustn't know. It terrified her to think of just what might ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler

... assembled their cavalry, and having raised a good body of infantry in the Val d'Arno Inferiore, and the country about Pisa, proceeded to Volterra. Although attacked by the Florentines and abandoned by his neighbors, Giusto did not yield to fear; but, trusting to the strength of the city and the ruggedness of the country around it, prepared ...
— History Of Florence And Of The Affairs Of Italy - From The Earliest Times To The Death Of Lorenzo The Magnificent • Niccolo Machiavelli

... looked, too. He was not the man I should have hit upon in any throng as the reaver of my father's estate; still less the man who might be Margery's father. He had the face of all the Stairs of Ballantrae without its simple Scottish ruggedness; a sort of weasel face it was, with pale-gray eyes that had a trick of shifty dodging, and deep-furrowed about the mouth and chin with lines that spoke of indecision. It was not of him that Margery got her firm round chin, or her steadfast eyes that ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... earnestness, its burning intensity, which seems to necessitate the broken lines and halting, interrupted rhythm. The following utterance of Caponsacchi, as he stands before his judges, will show the intensity and ruggedness of Browning's blank verse:— ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck

... gradually gave way to hills, which increased in size and ruggedness as we proceeded. We had found the river at its very beginning, and for a short way portages, as has been suggested, had to be made around shallow places, but after a little, as other streams augmented the volume of water, this became unnecessary, and as the ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace

... artillery on both sides kept up a constant fire, the royalist army descended from the mountain without keeping any regular order, and in all possible haste, the cavalry all on foot leading their horses, both on account of the ruggedness of the ground and the better to avoid the cannonade from the enemy, as they had no shelter from the balls. Immediately on getting down to the plain, the troops were drawn up in order of battle; the infantry in two battalions ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr

... appearance on this ground. What effect was this factor going to have on O'Hana's position in the household. He had been reassured on the physical point. Kibei was exceedingly ugly, a regular mask, and O'Hana was a woman to make much of physical beauty, as well as strength and ruggedness. He was a younger son of Inagaki Sho[u]gen, a hatamoto with a yashiki in Honjo[u] and an income of three thousand koku.[22] It was almost certain that Kwaiba would adopt Kibei. The negotiations had been long ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville

... forward on their survey of the island. The path was very uneven. They kept as near to the coast as they could, and frequently they could only make their way, on account of the ruggedness of the rocks, by turning inland. They had to clamber over fallen trunks or to cut a path with their axe through thick creepers. At other times they had to climb wild rocks and rugged hills, then to descend again, either into some valley running up from the shore or to the shore itself. ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston

... mere executive skill and simple craftsmanship in Luis de Leon's poems. He is, indeed, always sound and competent in these respects; but artistry is not his supreme virtue as a poet. He is ever prone to be a little rugged in his manner, and this ruggedness has proved something of a trap to the unwary. Luis de Leon has no real mannerisms, and is no more to be parodied than is Shakespeare. Yet it is sometimes difficult to distinguish him at his worst from ...
— Fray Luis de Leon - A Biographical Fragment • James Fitzmaurice-Kelly

... of the first mesa seem also to have imitated their eastern brethren in the free use of the adobe coating over their masonry, while at the villages of the middle mesa, and particularly at Oraibi, the practice has been comparatively rare, imparting an appearance of ruggedness and antiquity ...
— Eighth Annual Report • Various

... re-adjusted themselves; and were preparing to go out, burning as I was with rage and indignation, I jumped down from the chair, in order to raise the house upon them, but with such an unlucky impetuosity, that some nail or ruggedness in the floor caught my foot, and flung me on my face with such violence, that I fell senseless on the ground, and lay there some time before any one came to my relief: so that they, alarmed, I suppose, ...
— Memoirs Of Fanny Hill - A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) • John Cleland

... pupil of Stradivari, which is probable. The instruments of Balestrieri may be likened to those of Stradivari which were made during the last few years of his life, 1730-37. The form of both is similar, and the ruggedness observable in the latter instruments is found, but in a more marked degree, in those of Balestrieri. These remarks, however, must not be considered to suggest that comparison can fairly be made between these two makers ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart

... they had grown used to a wild ruggedness of nature and condition, a terrible, sublime uncertainty about life and things in general when the wind blew, missing which, in this earthly state, they would have pined most sadly. And I do not believe ...
— Cape Cod Folks • Sarah P. McLean Greene

... in his face had deepened under the influence of sun and wind; there was a new, almost unnatural ruggedness about the man Simmy had seen less than two months before. The cheeks had the appearance of being sunken and there was an even firmer look to the strong chin and jaws than in the so recent past. Simmy looked at this new, hardy face and wondered ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon

... that in most cases the names of places throughout the Saga have been turned into English, either in whole or in part, as "Lithend" for "Lfaethrendi," and "Bergthorsknoll" for "Bergthorshvol". The translator adopted this course to soften the ruggedness of the original names for the English reader, but in every case the Icelandic name, with its English rendering, will be found in the maps. The surnames and nicknames have also been turned into English—an attempt which has not a little increased the toil of translation. Great allowance ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous

... hair was gray, and a rather long white beard added to the effect of age, but detracted not an iota from the evidences of strength and vigor. He had the look of a Westerner,—of a man who had lived much of his life in the open. There was a ruggedness about him, a sturdy strength that told of many a day's toil along the trail, and many a night's sleep ...
— Craftsmanship in Teaching • William Chandler Bagley

... California, there were many griffins, on account of the great ruggedness of the country, and its infinite host of wild beasts, such as never were seen in any other part of the world. And when these griffins were yet small, the women went out with traps to take them. They covered ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864 • Various

... vii. 299), written in 1779, he speaks of an improvement. 'The general conduct of traders was much less liberal in those times than in our own; their views were narrower, and their manners grosser. To the mercantile ruggedness of that race the delicacy of the poet was ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill

... It has none of the sleekness of many horticultural forms, nor the fragility of peaches, sour cherries and plums. It stands boldly against the sky, with its elbows at all angles and its scaly bark holding the snow. Against evergreens it shows its ruggedness specially well. It presents forms to attract the artist. Even when gnarly and broken, it does not convey an impression of decrepitude and decay but rather of a hardy old character bearing his burdens. In every winter landscape I look instinctively ...
— The Apple-Tree - The Open Country Books—No. 1 • L. H. Bailey

... seemed to her the type of the perfect man, masterful, aggressive, accomplishing great projects with an energy and determination almost superhuman, one of the world's great men, whose name the world still shouted. She called to mind how the very ruggedness of his face; with its massive lines and harsh angles, had attracted her; how she had been proud of his giant's strength, the vast span of his shoulders, the bull-like depth of his chest, the sense of enormous physical power ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris

... in his horse and sat loosely in his saddle as his glance swept over the tangled masses of undergrowth, the tumbled boulders peeping here and there from amid the shadows, the precipitous sides of the pass, and the broken ruggedness of the ground beyond. But it was not an appreciation of the picturesque, nor a recognition of the poetry in landscape which held him. He saw in the place only such a spot as the men concerned in the robbery of the bank would select ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott

... evil, swayed by gusts of stormy passion, the love of freedom rooted in their very hearts' core. Their lives were harsh and narrow; they gained their bread by their blood and sweat, in the unending struggle with the wild ruggedness of nature. They suffered terrible injuries at the hands of the red men, and on their foes they waged a terrible warfare in return. They were relentless, revengeful, suspicious, knowing neither ruth nor pity; they were also upright, resolute, and fearless, loyal to their friends, ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt

... landscape alternately present their contrasted images to the eye. Such are the traits which the hand of Nature has impressed upon the scenery in this fortunate portion of the island; while that of man, busily engaged in adding to her charms, and in correcting her ruggedness, throws an appearance of life, comfort, and civilization over the picture. Convenient roads wind up the steep ascents, and frequent openings in the cliff, present vistas of fruitful fields, tastefully built mansions surrounded by parks and plantations, and snug farm-houses ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue

... bird, reptile, fly, sky, ocean, mountains, plain, rock, pebble. The warmth of life, the reality of creation is over all—the throb of human hands, glossiness of fur, lithe windings of long bodies, poignant buzzing of insects, the ruggedness of the steeps as I climb them, the liquid mobility and boom of waves upon the rocks. Strange to say, try as I may, I cannot force my touch to pervade this universe in all directions. The moment I try, the whole vanishes; ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller

... undulates the melody of call that rallies them all with a strong will together, until the steep bluff and the burden of the bulk by masculine labor are conquered, and a long row of powerful pinnaces displayed, as a mounted battery, against the fishful sea. With a view to this clambering ruggedness of life, all of these boats receive from their cradle a certain limber rake and accommodating curve, instead of a straight pertinacity of keel, so that they may ride over all the scandals of this ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... must lie the bosom of the lake. He had come to the little fringe of towns that clings to the borders of Champlain, here with the Adirondacks behind him, and there with the mountains of Vermont, but keeping close to the great, safe waterway, as though distrusting the ruggedness of both. ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King

... passable in its mouldy way, THE MISADVENTURES OF JOHN NICHOLSON. All my bardly exercises are in Scotch; I have struck my somewhat ponderous guitar in that tongue to no small extent: with what success, I know not, but I think it's better than my English verse; more marrow and fatness, and more ruggedness. ...
— Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 2 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... to his former state of ruggedness and obstreperousness. He continued, however, to cling to Silvia and to call her "mudder." To my amusement the other children followed suit and she was now "muddered" by all ...
— Our Next-Door Neighbors • Belle Kanaris Maniates

... the place were some bundles of furs flung down loosely on the ground, and a large, rudely-carved wooden chest, on which stood a polished human skull, hollowed into a sort of clumsy wine-cup. A thoroughly Gothic ruggedness of aspect, a stately Northern simplicity prevailed over the spacious tent, and was indicated not merely in its thick shadows, its calm lights, and its freedom from pomp and glitter, but even in the appearance and employment of ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins

... secure anchor I suppose, riding apparently like balloons in the hazy air. Sea and air and land here are all kin, I suspect, and have certain immaterial qualities in common. The contours of the shores and the outlines of the hills are as graceful as the mobile waves; and if there is anywhere ruggedness and sharpness, the atmosphere throws a friendly veil over it, and tones all that is inharmonious ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... whole length of nearly 3 miles the Dovedale scenery is the extraordinary mixture of ruggedness and soft beauty, which makes it unequalled, in its particular style, in ...
— What to See in England • Gordon Home

... discolours all the passions of men, and all the face of nature, and tinges with its own livid hue the flowers of Paradise and the glories of the eternal throne. All the portraits of him are singularly characteristic. No person can look on the features, noble even to ruggedness, the dark furrows of the cheek, the haggard and woeful stare of the eye, the sullen and contemptuous curve of the lip, and doubt that they belong to a man too proud and too sensitive to ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... and marriage, and I have no inclination that way. I am willing to be friends with everybody, and nothing more with anybody." The sentences came with the cruel detachment of bullets; but, "Not again, not twice," was his uppermost thought. Any bluntness, any ruggedness, rather than another month like that of ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller

... showed in much that he did. He was the only American writer of humorous verse of his day whom I always cared to read, or whose lines I could remember more than a few weeks. This was perhaps because his work was never merely humorous, but always had a big sweep of background to it, like the ruggedness of the Kentucky mountains from which he came. It was Colonel George Harvey, then editor of Harper's Weekly, who had started the boom to make Woodrow Wilson President. Wilson afterwards, at least seemingly, repudiated his sponsor, probably because of Harvey's identification ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various

... the leaf or surface of the Nettle, have very little considerable, but what is common to most of these kinds of Plants, as the ruggedness or indenting, and hairiness, and other roughnesses of the surface or out-side of the Plant, of which I may say more in another place. As I shall likewise of certain little pretty cleer Balls or Apples which I have observed to stick to the sides ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke

... of manners, idolatry, and polytheism, no people in the world ever went beyond them. They are clothed all in skins of beasts, and their houses are built of the same. You know not a man from a woman, neither by the ruggedness of their countenances, or their clothes; and in the winter, when the ground is covered with snow, they live under ground, in houses like vaults, which have cavities or caves going ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe

... extreme love of truth, prevailing over the sense of beauty, and causing it to take delight in portraiture of every kind, and to express the various characters of the human countenance and form, as it did the varieties of leaves and the ruggedness of branches. And this tendency is both increased and ennobled by the same Christian humility which we saw expressed in the first character of Gothic work, its rudeness. For as that resulted from a humility which ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin

... from heaven, leaves little room in a listener's soul for the jangling discords of earth. Into that movement the great deaf musician seems to have flung the essence of his impatient spirit;—that rare mingling of ruggedness and simplicity, of purity and passionate power, which went to make up the remarkable character of the man, and which sets Beethoven's music apart from the music of his compeers. Wagner, Chopin, Grieg,—these range the whole gamut ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver

... was hard to imagine there was anything in England finer than the country he had seen. The mountains had not the majestic grandeur of the British Columbian ranges, but they were wild enough, and pierced by dales steeped in sylvan beauty. The chasm in which he now rested had an impressive ruggedness. ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss

... thousand feet across their shadowed faces—these features gradually took shape in Carley's confused sight, until the colossal mountain front stood up before her in all its strange, wild, magnificent ruggedness ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey

... consisted wholly of this stone, without any intermediate soil to soften its asperity under the feet of our horses, and yet it was covered with a wood of eucalyptus and mimosa, growing there as on the open forest land between which and this stony region the chief difference consisted in the ruggedness of surface, this being broken as already stated into irregular terraces where loose stones lay in irregular heaps and hollows, most resembling old stone quarries. We travelled over three miles of this rough surface before we reached ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell

... of life in the open air, and the glow of the cheeks told of burning suns. Her form, her attitude, spoke not only of instinctive grace, but of a certain wildness in admirable harmony with the surrounding scene. Somehow, the ruggedness of the mountains and the desolate solitudes of the plains were reflected from ...
— Lahoma • John Breckenridge Ellis

... him; but rarely are Mountains seen in such combined majesty and grace as here. The rocks are of that sort called Primitive by the mineralogists, which always arrange themselves in masses of a rugged, gigantic character; which ruggedness, however, is here tempered by a singular airiness of form, and softness of environment: in a climate favourable to vegetation, the gray cliff, itself covered with lichens, shoots-up through a garment of foliage or verdure; and white, bright cottages, tree-shaded, cluster round the everlasting ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle

... where the robbers were assembled. He recollected that his light might betray him; and horrible as was the alternative, he was compelled to extinguish it. He now attempted to climb to the grate, through which he might obtain a view of what was passing without. This at length he effected, for the ruggedness of the wall afforded him a footing. He beheld in a ruinous court, which was partially illuminated by the glare of torches, a group of banditti surrounding two persons who were bound on horseback, and who ...
— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe

... distance in advance of his cousin. He stood some minutes listening for his signals, and then began walking toward the northern end of the hill that he might meet him as he came around. He observed as he advanced that they increased in rocky ruggedness, and could see that it was quite a ...
— Adrift in the Wilds - or, The Adventures of Two Shipwrecked Boys • Edward S. Ellis

... this trail afforded more commodious travelling, they immediately struck into it, and followed it for two days. It led them over rough hills, and through broken gullies, during which time they suffered great fatigue from the ruggedness of the country. The weather, too, which had recently been frosty, was now oppressively warm, and there was a great scarcity of water, insomuch that a valuable dog belonging to Mr. M'Kenzie died ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... or three cheap rings, catching at her shawl, swaying her body, nodding her head, on which the still black hair was piled in heavy masses. And her face was distorted by an emotion that seemed of sorrow and anger mingled. In her ears, pretty and almost delicate in contrast to the ruggedness of her face, were large gold rings, such as Sicilian women often wear. They swayed in response to her perpetual movements. Artois watched her lips as they opened and shut, were compressed or thrust forward, watched her white teeth gleaming. She lifted her two hands, doubled into ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens

... running through tunnels, and so tortuous as to form a hundred horseshoe loops. The road seemed almost a miracle of engineering. But the views were beautiful beyond description. It was Switzerland without its ruggedness. It was Italy on the southern side of the Alps, as "Philip van ...
— A Tour of the Missions - Observations and Conclusions • Augustus Hopkins Strong

... spiritual as well as material conquests out of nature. The greater part of this volume is composed of a series of narrative poems entitled "The Neighborhood." Their lack of literary sophistication is part of their charm, and the calculated ruggedness of the author's style is a faithful reflection of ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... island from Coffin's Point. At present I am by no means settled; it seems like jumping from the 19th century into the Middle Ages to return from the civilization and refinement which the ladies instituted at Coffin's to the ruggedness of bachelor existence. ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various

... the rolling up of a scroll, the squall passed, the sun returned, the sky burned back to blue, the ruggedness was smoothed from the ocean, and the warmth of the tropics closed around the "Bertha Millner," once more rolling easily on the swell ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris

... these resolutions is more than his diary will warrant us to say. He sometimes missed the mark, and came short of his aim. He suffered from a certain hastiness of temper, and ruggedness of disposition, which, to use his own words, 'cost him a vast deal of watching and praying. But the Lord,' he adds, 'has helped me in a wonderful manner, and I believe I shall reap if I faint not.' The following extracts from his ...
— The Hero of the Humber - or the History of the Late Mr. John Ellerthorpe • Henry Woodcock

... its strength. Faults it, of course, possesses. 'She would rhyme moon to table,' used to be said of her in jest; and certainly no more monstrous rhymes are to be found in all literature than some of those we come across in Mrs. Browning's poems. But her ruggedness was never the result of carelessness. It was deliberate, as her letters to Mr. Horne show very clearly. She refused to sandpaper her muse. She disliked facile smoothness and artificial polish. In her very rejection of art ...
— Miscellanies • Oscar Wilde

... until 11.30 a.m., rising again to the summit of the plateau some 50 ft. higher. There we had to describe a wide arc of a circle, as through the trees we perceived on our left an immense chasm, beyond which was a much disturbed landscape of striking ruggedness. We could see a huge circular crater with eroded lips, rising like the chipped edges of a gigantic cup, in the centre of the great volcanic basin. That depression with high vertical walls all round displayed a large gap to the W.N.W. and another ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... inn; who is not to be frightened by any amount of loneliness, or to be deterred by the roughest roads or the highest hills; such a traveller in the eastern part of Berkshire, Massachusetts, will find ample food for poetic reflection in the singular scenery of a country, which, owing to the ruggedness of the soil and its lying out of the track of all public conveyances, remains almost as unknown to the general tourist as ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville

... our summer, to the provinces which lie exposed to the south and west winds. On the northern and eastern coasts the heaviest downpours take place (in our winter months) during the north-eastern monsoons. The ruggedness of the country and its numerous mountains cause, in certain districts, many variations in these normal meteorological conditions. The dry season lasts in Manila from November till June (duration of the north-east monsoon); rain prevails during ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.

... sixth day they continued their march, part of them by land through the woods, and part by water in the canoes. Howbeit they were constrained to rest themselves very frequently by the way, both for the ruggedness thereof and the extreme weakness they were under. Unto this they endeavoured to occur, by eating some leaves of trees and green herbs, or grass, such as they could pick, for such was the miserable condition they were in. This day, at noon, they arrived at a ...
— The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century • Clarence Henry Haring

... prospect of worldly honors urges the ambitious man on in his career—as the oasis cheers the weary traveller on his journey through the desert, and makes him forget hunger and thirst—as the dreams of comfort and home warm the blood of a wayfarer amongst snow and ice—as hope smooths the ruggedness of poverty and softens the calamities of adversity, so the prospect of meeting again mitigates ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien

... though the pastoral valley had considerably changed its face, and had much of its ruggedness smoothed away in the course of years, this stretch of heather remained unreclaimed. It was still a thoroughfare, but a very safe one now, for its only dwelling ...
— Geordie's Tryst - A Tale of Scottish Life • Mrs. Milne Rae

... ye call the words of consecration, or else of making; and when they are said over the bread, ye say that there is left no bread, but it is the body of the Lord. So that in the bread there remaineth nothing but a heap of accidents, as witness ruggedness, roundness, savor, touching, and tasting, and such other accidents. Then, if thou sayest that the flesh and blood of Christ, that is to say, his manhood, is made more, or increased by so much as the ministration of bread and wine is, the which ye minister—if ye say it is so—then ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume I - Basil to Calvin • Various

... hundred Indians; ten leagues farther, that of Casiguran, with about five hundred Indians (a district resembling Ylocos, which lies on the opposite coast, although the two provinces have no communication, because of the ruggedness of the country); and, farther on, the province of Alanao River. This last is well peopled, and produces gold and cotton; its native Indians resemble those of Valete and Casiguran. Besides these three districts, no other settlement on this coast is encountered ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803, Volume V., 1582-1583 • Various

... soon felt the relief of decision and action. Clumps of small pines grew thickly in spots on the Rim, making it necessary for him to skirt them; at which times he lost sight of the purple basin. Every time he came back to an opening through which he could see the wild ruggedness and colors and distances, his appreciation of their nature grew on him. Arizona from Yuma to the Little Colorado had been to him an endless waste of wind-scoured, sun-blasted barrenness. This black-forested rock-rimmed land of untrodden ways was a world that in ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey

... Anne's ruggedness," said she. "She and Jimmie are inseparable. He has taught her all kinds of boys' accomplishments. And she's as happy as a bird if she's only allowed to trot around after him. It doesn't seem to make her in the ...
— New Faces • Myra Kelly

... had, for a time, laid aside their dignity, and were to expect only such regard, as liberality and courtesy could procure. And Imlac having, by many admonitions, prepared them to endure the tumults of a port, and the ruggedness of the commercial race, brought them down ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson

... instrument is worthy of first class repair, and everything conducive to the best results in up-to-date regulation has to be calculated and carried out in minute detail. Searching eyes will go over all the fresh parts, looking for any possible inaccuracy, any slip of the tool or ruggedness where a fine, even surface ought to be. In order that all may be conveniently attended to, the first proceeding will be that of sawing off the head and neck, this is done rather close to the body of the instrument. Under present circumstances, more care than usual with ...
— The Repairing & Restoration of Violins - 'The Strad' Library, No. XII. • Horace Petherick

... polished woods, busts, statues, unique bric-a-brac, gildings, glass and ruby velvet produced the perfection of old-time splendour. And now, as the gallant beaux led in fair maidens, it gave the picture life. The great north window disclosed the ice-bound trees in all their primitive ruggedness. The snow and sleet were vigorously driven by the wind that howled continuously. The light from the forked-tree cast through the window rays that resembled moonlight, as they mingled with the radiance within, while outside it twinkled with ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne

... moment, emphasized by the agitation of bright feminine plumes and the shifting of masculine backs into the corners of the pews. None got so far as to define to themselves why there should be an apparent incompatibility between ruggedness and orthodoxy—but there were some who hoped and more who feared. Luther had been orthodox once, Savonarola also: in appearance neither was more canonical than ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... instantly at her ease. She suddenly discovered that he was young in spite of his ruggedness, and she ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell

... prospect lightens with dawn, and the sun rises red. The spacious field of battle is now distinct, its ruggedness being bisected by the great road from Smolensk to Moscow, which runs centrally from beneath the spectator to the furthest horizon. The field is also crossed by the stream Kalotcha, flowing from the right-centre foreground ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy

... laudable tastes who did kind actions, and that here was a poor girl with a voice for singing music with. Then he is to have her taught. Then Arthur's father, who has all along been secretly pining in the ways of virtuous ruggedness for those accursed snares which are called the Arts, becomes acquainted with her. And so, a graceless orphan, training to be a singing girl, carries it, by that Frederick Dorrit's agency, against me, and I am humbled and deceived!—Not ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... Gilfil in those late years of his beneficent life "more of the knots and ruggedness of poor human nature than there lay any clear hint of it in the open-eyed, loving" young Maynard? Because "it is with men as with trees: if you lop off their finest branches into which they were pouring their young life-juice, the wounds will be healed over with some rough ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot

... longer and steeper hills I constantly walked, and was often an hour in advance of the stage. This mountain region is certainly a very fine one, and I do not think its grandeur has ever been done justice to in description. Its attributes are all gigantic: it has the picturesque ruggedness of the Appenines, without their barrenness; since the valleys lying between the ridges, wherever they have been cleared, give evidences of the richest soil. A view from any hill top, however, shows these clearings ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power

... sea-hare (APLYSIA), is a crudely wedge-shaped body but incomparable in its ruggedness to that or any other model, and the colour of mud and sand and of coral, dead and sea-stained. It reposes, with its back flush with the surface, beside a block of coral or stone defiantly indistinguishable from the ocean floor—a ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield

... have been a gay and imposing sight that greeted the spectators in the grim old border fortress, the gaunt ruins of which may yet be seen, but which had at that date already rubbed off some of its medieval ruggedness as a place of defence. Though necessarily less elaborate and costly than the performances in London, no pains were spared to make the spectacle worthy of the occasion, and it must have appeared all the more splendid in contrast to its surroundings, presented as ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg

... struck into a path which, compared with the ruggedness of that which we had lately trodden, was easy and smooth. This track led us to the skirt of the wilderness, and at no long time we reached an open field, when a dwelling appeared, at a small distance, which ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown

... contrast between these two leaders in the fields of chivalry, the one of whom paid no attention to any one's pleasure but his own, while the other seemed all good-humour and benevolence. It was in vain that Mr. Tyrrel endeavoured to restrain the ruggedness of his character. His motive was impatience, his thoughts were gloomy, and his courtship was like the pawings of an elephant. It appeared as if his temper had been more human while he indulged in its free bent, than now that ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin

... possibly make a good husband to a woman he was really attached to; but I have not the least spark of affection for him, though there is something very distinguished in his figure and bearing; even his ruggedness is perfectly free from vulgarity. Yes, he is a sort of man who might fascinate some women; but he is terribly wrong-headed. If he keeps hoping on until I marry, he has a long spell of celibacy before him. I dare ...
— A Crooked Path - A Novel • Mrs. Alexander

... practice. Thus Vitruvius writes of a wheel 4 feet in diameter and having 400 teeth being turned by a 1-toothed pinion on a cart axle, but it is very doubtful whether such small teeth, necessarily separated by about 3/8 inch, would have the requisite ruggedness. Again, Hero mentions a wheel of 30 teeth which, because of imperfections, might need only 20 turns of a single helix worm to turn it! Such statements behove caution and one must consider whether we have been misled by the 16th- and 17th-century editions ...
— On the Origin of Clockwork, Perpetual Motion Devices, and the Compass • Derek J. de Solla Price

... the ruggedness of the Devon land we feel in Herrick's poems. We feel rather the beauty of flowers, the warmth of sun, the softness of spring winds, and see the greening trees, the morning dews, the soft rains. It is as if he ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall

... History; but which Friedrich has been fated to make rather notable to the Moderns henceforth. Let me recommend it to the picturesque tourist, especially to the military one. Lovers of rocky precipices, quagmires, brawling torrents and the unadulterated ruggedness of Nature, will find scope there; and it was the scene of a distinguished passage of arms, with notable display of human dexterity and swift presence of mind. For the rest, one of the wildest, and perhaps ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... She wondered that he had allowed it, for they said that he was the only one who had ever been known to break the Judge's will. Virginia's eyes rested on Margaret Brice, who was seated at the head of the bed, smoothing the pillows The strength of Stephen's features were in hers, but not the ruggedness. Her features were large, indeed, yet stanch and softened. The widow, as if feeling Virginia's look upon her, glanced up from the Judge's face and smiled at her. The girl colored with pleasure, and again ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... the core at the news that Fort Sumpter had been fired upon. On one of the highest points stands a juniper on which a big blaze was cut by the early road-makers, so that there need be no doubt as to which way the road turned. Other nearby trees, in their wild ruggedness and sturdy growth, remind us of a woman whose skirts are blown about by a fierce wind. Their appearance speaks of storms braved, battles of wind and snow and ice and cold fought and won, for they have neither branch nor leaf on the ...
— The Lake of the Sky • George Wharton James

... character of the poets. Where the theme is the same, each writer will still pursue his own peculiar method. If that theme be the vengeance of God on the wicked, the style will naturally be rugged and abrupt. Yet the ruggedness and abruptness of David will not be that of Hosea or Nahum. But where both the theme and the character of the poet differ, there the diversity of style becomes very striking. To illustrate this, ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows

... many far less beautiful and permanent trees. With ordinary care, and in good soil, the pin-oak grows rapidly, and the characteristic spreading habit and the slightly down-drooping branches are always attractive. In its age it has not the ruggedness of its kin, though it assumes a stately and somewhat formal habit, and, I must confess, accumulates some ragged dead ...
— Getting Acquainted with the Trees • J. Horace McFarland

... circumstance which may have rendered it famous. In the interval between the Dwapara and the Kali Yugas there happened at Samanta-panchaka the encounter between the armies of the Kauravas and the Pandavas. In that holy region, without ruggedness of any kind, were assembled eighteen Akshauhinis of soldiers eager for battle. And, O Brahmanas, having come thereto, they were all slain on the spot. Thus the name of that region, O Brahmanas, hath ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)

... the Queen gained over the King's mind, the charms of a society in which Monsieur displayed his wit, and to which the Comte d'Artois—[Afterwards Charles X.]—gave life by the vivacity of youth, gradually softened that ruggedness of manner in Louis XVI. which a better-conducted education might have prevented. Still, this defect often showed itself, and, in spite of his extreme simplicity, the King inspired those who had occasion to speak to him with diffidence. ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... with the ballad form most of his songs take. The chief fault with his work is the prevailing dun-ness of his harmonies. They have not felt the impressionistic revolt from the old bituminous school. But in partial compensation for this bleakness is a fine ruggedness. ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes

... silent, and solemn, and frowning. Here and there, stunted trees, the cedar and pinon, hang horizontally out, clinging along the cliffs. The unsightly limbs of the cactus, and the gloomy foliage of the creosote bush, grow together in seams of the rocks, heightening their character of ruggedness and gloom. Such is the southern barrier of ...
— The Scalp Hunters • Mayne Reid

... And then what? What of sickness, and the other contingencies which still lay ahead of her? How old her father seemed, these days! In his heavy shock of hair the flecks of white had doubled in size, were merging one into the other, and his tall, stooping, massive frame had lost its look of ruggedness. Suppose, suppose.... Her breath came fast. Was his ...
— His Family • Ernest Poole

... lion and the coyote are two animals that the authorities of the park feel justified in killing in order to preserve the other game, but the wild ruggedness of the territory, which affords these pests ample opportunity to multiply ...
— Wealth of the World's Waste Places and Oceania • Jewett Castello Gilson

... was in romance and adventure, is not to be compared, in any valuable characteristic, to the noiseless self-devotion of the men who first explored the Western country. The courage of the knight was a part of his savage nature; his confidence was in the strength of his own right arm; and if his ruggedness was ever softened down by gentler thoughts, it was only when he asked forgiveness for his crimes, or melted in ...
— Western Characters - or Types of Border Life in the Western States • J. L. McConnel

... pack-horses; and, after a delay of half a day, time lost in making these arrangements, we proceeded. The wagons were to follow, but at a slow pace, the ladies being compelled to abandon them on account of the ruggedness of the ways, which would have rendered their motion not easy to be borne. Our cavalcade and train of footmen made a respectable display along the uneven road, which soon became very little more than a line cut through the forest, with an occasional wheel-track, but without the least attempt to level ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper

... remarkable, as we have already seen, for a certain savage ruggedness of character, and for a stern and indomitable recklessness of will, so great that it seemed impossible that any thing human should be able to tame him. He was under the control, too, of an ambition so lofty and aspiring that it appeared to know no bounds; and ...
— Cleopatra • Jacob Abbott

... of labor division that enables not Professor Haeckel only, but a host of other German brain-workers to accomplish enormous labors, yet to thrive on the accomplishment and to carry the ruggedness and health of youth far into the decades that are too often with our own workers given over to decrepitude. Haeckel at sixty-five looks as if he were good for at least a score of years of further effort. And should he fulfil the promise of his present rugged-ness, he will do ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams

... the mountain. A natural gateway opens in the face of a cliff, through which they pass, and are lost to sight for a space. Then they are seen ascending a sloping passage, and little by little the rocks lose their ruggedness and begin to take on rude architectural contours. They are walking to music which, while merely suggesting their progress and the changing natural scene in the main, ever and anon breaks into an expression of the most poignant and ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel



Words linked to "Ruggedness" :   difficulty, difficultness, rugged, hilliness, variability, unevenness, hardness, strength



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