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Improving   Listen
adjective
Improving  adj.  Tending to improve, beneficial; growing better.
Improving lease (Scots Law), an extended lease to induce the tenant to make improvements on the premises.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Improving" Quotes from Famous Books



... the councils of Rimini and Seleucia, [143] forces us to believe that he was secretly present at the time and place of their convocation. The advantage of personally negotiating with his friends, and of observing and improving the divisions of his enemies, might justify, in a prudent statesman, so bold and dangerous an enterprise: and Alexandria was connected by trade and navigation with every seaport of the Mediterranean. From the depth of his inaccessible retreat the intrepid primate ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon

... the King one evening at supper, "Your Majesty does me the favour to treat me with great kindness: I should be inconsolable if I had the misfortune to fall under your displeasure. If such a calamity were to befall me, I should endeavour to divert my grief by improving some beautiful estates of mine in such and such a province;" and he thereupon gave a description of three or four fine seats. About a month after, talking of the disgrace of a Minister, he said, ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... As we glance at the record of its events, and contemplate its changes, we can but feel a realizing sense of the shortness of time, and the necessity of improving the present to the best possible advantage. One after another has dropped from our little circle, till we are left but few in number; but enough to claim the precious promise of the blessed Saviour, that he will be with us if we meet ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna

... not without his desires of improving (as he called it) our state; and I cannot resist relating a circumstance which took place between him and the grand vizier. He announced it as his intention to make a present to us of a certain produce of the earth, unknown in most parts of Asia, but much cultivated in Europe, ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier

... wheeling, but nothing compared with the road between Zendjan and Kasveen; it is more of an artificial highway; the Persian government has been tinkering with it, improving it considerably in some respects, but leaving it somewhat lumpy and unfinished generally, and in places it is unridable from sand and loose material on the surface; it has the appreciable merit of levelness, however, and, for Persia, is a very creditable highway ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens

... carbonate of lime in the various forms of chalk, shell marl,[6] old mortar, leached ashes and peat ashes, (for in all these it is the chief and most "alkaline" ingredient,) is recommended to compost with peat. Let us inquire whether carbonate of lime can really exert any noticeable influence in improving the ...
— Peat and its Uses as Fertilizer and Fuel • Samuel William Johnson

... agricultural writer and traveller, together with his extended opportunities of witnessing the application and effect of guano upon the various soils and climates of this country, will give this work such a character, as to induce every improving farmer, gardener, or horticulturist, in America to give it a careful perusal. The author believes it will be found to contain all and much more than its title imports, and be of great value to every person using or dealing ...
— Guano - A Treatise of Practical Information for Farmers • Solon Robinson

... the sons of the rich,—the more eminent of them being Protagoras, Gorgias, Hippias, and Prodicus; men who travelled from city to city, exciting great admiration for their rhetorical skill, and really improving the public speaking of popular orators. They also taught science to a limited extent, and it was through them that Athenian youth mainly acquired what little knowledge they had of arithmetic and geometry. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord

... bed reading one of Mrs Behn's novels; for he had been instructed by a friend that he would find no more effectual method of recommending himself to the ladies than the improving his understanding, and filling his mind with good literature. He no sooner, therefore, heard the violent uproar in the next room, than he leapt from his bolster, and, taking his sword in one hand, and ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding

... this domestic stock, and the importations still extensively made of selections from the short horns, and others of the finest European breeds, the cattle, not only of New England, but of other sections, are rapidly improving, especially in the ...
— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings

... trembling I presented myself, and confronted not Miss Steele but Miss Bousfield, who addressed me in terse and forcible language, and gave me to understand that I was a person of extremely second-rate character and attainments. I acknowledged it, but hoped for an opportunity of improving her impressions. ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed

... hard worker. I have heard him say that he used to sit up late of nights during his apprenticeship, studying and improving himself." ...
— Risen from the Ranks - Harry Walton's Success • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... congratulate herself on the favour of the ruling power; and the Philhellenes of Rome might well be of opinion that the calamitous effects of the war with Perseus were disappearing, and that the state of things in general was improving there. The bitterest abettors of the now dominant party, Lyciscus the Aetolian, Mnasippus the Boeotian, Chrematas the Acarnanian, the infamous Epirot Charops whom honourable Romans forbade even to enter their houses, descended ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... rugged country, its northern part serried by great fiords, its mountains steep and often desolate, its forests thick and many. The young surveyor was in his element roughing it through the wild country, with an eye to improving it for cultivation and for defense, making elaborate maps of its hills and valleys, and charts of its fiords and bays. He had a genius for such work, and the drawings he sent back to Stockholm were invaluable for the development of Sweden. The surveyors were ...
— Historic Boyhoods • Rupert Sargent Holland

... name usually given to the process of cooking an article by placing it for a few minutes in boiling water. Marinating or pickling is a process with a formidable name with a simple meaning. To marinate simply is to soak meat in a mixture for some hours, or even days, with the idea of improving its flavor of softening its fibres and making it tender. Vinegar, oil, pepper and salt are mixed together and the meat packed in the mixture; sometimes a sliced onion and herbs are added. The meat, of course, should be wiped first, but ...
— The Story of Crisco • Marion Harris Neil

... in social development and in culture the recent evolution of civilized peoples has been nearly identical. This fundamental unity of the nations has grown stronger with the centuries on account of improving methods of transport and communication. Formally it might seem that in the Middle Ages the white nations were more closely bound together than they are now. They had one church, a nearly identical jurisprudence, ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith

... worthless for determined work of the kind that the white men had to do. Even while lying in the woods at a distance, waiting for the gun-boats to come up, the Indians became utterly demoralized under the fire of Garcon's 32-pounder. There was nothing to be done, however, by way of improving the prospect, which was certainly hopeless enough. One hundred and sixteen white men had the Negro Fort to storm, notwithstanding its strength and the overwhelming force that defended it. But those one hundred and sixteen men ...
— Strange Stories from History for Young People • George Cary Eggleston

... here at a good salary and let you keep on with this March Hare job? Not, of course, in precisely its present form but along the same general lines. We could make a paying proposition out of that paper, I am sure of it. It would need a good deal of improving," continued the great man in a pompous, patronizing tone, "but there is an idea there that could be developed into something worth while, unless I am very ...
— Paul and the Printing Press • Sara Ware Bassett

... from that time he had been a devoted follower of Thespis. He had roughed it patiently in the provinces for years, his only consolation during a long season of poverty and neglect arising from the conviction that he was slowly but surely improving himself in the difficult art he had chosen as his mode of earning his daily bread. When the manager of the Royal Tabard, then on a provincial tour, picked him out from all his brother actors, and offered him a Metropolitan ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various

... but resolved not to let her go before he had tried to learn the cause of it, he walked along by her side. In this part of the gardens there were only a few nursemaids and children; it would have been a capital place and time for improving his intimacy with the remarkable woman. But possibly she was determined to be rid of him. A contest between his will and hers would be an ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing

... account of his wars, however, but his reforms, that the name of Peter the Great is so well known to-day. He was constantly changing and improving the order of things in his country. He went so far as to require that the Russian civilians abandon the Asiatic dress of their forefathers and cut their beards, and he, more than any other man, transformed Russia from an eastern into ...
— A Treasury of Heroes and Heroines - A Record of High Endeavour and Strange Adventure from 500 B.C. to 1920 A.D. • Clayton Edwards

... be in light, cleanliness, dryness, warmth, and consequently economy. The play of a fire-engine would then effectually wash the outside of a house. This kind of walling would stand next to paving in improving ...
— Notes on Nursing - What It Is, and What It Is Not • Florence Nightingale

... and department foremen and took them into his confidence regarding his plans for improving and enlarging the plant. They came, if not with an air of hostility, at least with reserve, for they were nearer to the men than they were to Bonbright. They shared the prejudices of the men. Some of them went away from the ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland

... if once proper communication was established, would not be difficult to govern. The only mode of improving the access to the Sudan, seeing the impoverished state of Egyptian finances, and the mode to do so without an outlay of more than L10,000, is by the Nile."—Gordon's ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose

... towel. He drew some water from the pipes of the evaporator, put in the soap, and carried it to the work room. There he carefully washed and wiped all the pieces, save two cups and one saucer. He did not know how long it would require to bake the grease from that, but he was sure it was improving. He thought he could clean the paint cup, but he imagined the harness oil one ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter

... faults, too," said Mr. Wilson. "Never was such a fellow for photography. Snapping away with a camera when he ought to be improving his mind, and then diving down into the cellar like a rabbit into its hole to develop his pictures. That is his main fault; but, on the whole, he's a good worker. ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various

... using every endeavour to preserve those pictures that remain to us; but probably a far greater number have perished from damp or neglect, and a strange combination of mischief and ignorance. Let us hope that in this respect the times are improving. For one, I cannot consent to the wanton destruction of a single portrait, though Horace ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 74, March 29, 1851 • Various

... Geof called, gathering himself together, as they came up; "but we must know what you are improving ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller

... they don't all live up to the usually accepted standard. Some of them seem rather to glory in behaving like bounders and treating the native unjustly. It is bad for the country, but things are improving. Almost all new appointments now are made among public-school ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page

... the engineers were incessantly extending and improving Kantara. In time substantial churches were built alongside Dueidar Road; playing areas were laid out and cinemas erected for the troops; and the Y.M.C.A. built lounges, concert-halls, and tea-rooms. Of these it ...
— With Our Army in Palestine • Antony Bluett

... gave her children Aesop's fables to read, in the hope of educating and improving their minds; but they very soon brought the book back, and the eldest, wise beyond his years, delivered himself as follows: This is no book for us; it's much too childish and stupid. You can't make us believe that foxes and wolves and ravens are able to talk; we've ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Studies in Pessimism • Arthur Schopenhauer

... spared nothing to make her niece an example to her sex. No pugilist ever believed more fully in training than did Miss Willmanson: she looked upon institutions of learning as forcing-houses, where nipping, budding and improving the natural growth was the constant occupation, and where the various branches of knowledge were cultivated, like cabbages, at so much a head. When Eleanor became, so to speak, her property, she seized with avidity the opportunity of submitting her principles to the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various

... in SNELL'S improving hand The pen at once joins freedom with command! With softness strong, with ornaments not vain, Loose with proportion, and with neatness plain; Not swell'd, not full, complete in every part, And artful most, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... various countries have found that testicular extracts, and more especially the spermin as studied by Poehl,[140] and by him regarded as a positive katalysator or accelerator of metabolic processes, exert a real influence in giving tone to the heart and other muscles, and in improving the metabolism of the tissues even when all influences of ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... to "improve" the roads and ponds on my property on the principle on which France has been "improving" her railway systems and her ports, I should bring up in bankruptcy. Where else can the country bring up? Nothing, so far, has saved us but the woollen stocking of the peasants. Come to my place in Picardy, and I will show you a dozen old fellows who go about ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert

... Wackerbath, with elaborate irony, "I presume it is you whom I have to thank for improving my land by erecting this precious ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey

... war footing. For the sake of strength we are obliged to hold together so firmly that for the time we can only think of maintaining old traditions without dreaming of progress or spending time in experiments. When we have weathered the storm we shall have leisure for improving much that needs improvement. Do not think that if I am alive twenty years hence I shall advise what I advise now. We are fighting now, and we have no time to think of the arts of peace. We shall have peace some day. We shall lose an ornament or two ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford

... imperfection or by the addition of some perfection. Now Brahman cannot be freed from any imperfection, for it is eternally faultless; nor can a perfection be added to it, for it is absolutely perfect. Nor can it be improved in the sense in which we speak of improving a mirror, viz. by polishing it; for as it is absolutely changeless it cannot become the object of any action, either of its own or of an outside agent. And, again, actions affecting the body, such as bathing, do not 'purify' the Self (as might possibly be maintained) ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut

... "I've no ill feeling for him, heaven knows, but I can't say I think his society likely to have a very improving effect upon anyone." ...
— Charles Rex • Ethel M. Dell

... thus afforded for the main features involved in his idea, the inventor can proceed more deliberately in perfecting and improving his invention, and can then file an additional application if necessary, to secure special protection on particular improvements or the improved invention as a whole. The early filing of an application ...
— Practical Pointers for Patentees • Franklin Cresee

... the last forty minutes, and much of the time sleeping sweetly. He came out walking easily without assistance, and in the cool anteroom fell asleep again upon the lounge, not to wake for an hour longer. This one bath entirely broke up the attack. He kept on improving, and with the aid of beef-tea was well enough to go to business in a week. The value of the bath in treating Mr. Edgerton at present will he greatest when he suffers most severely from acute neuralgic pains in the legs and back, especially ...
— The Opium Habit • Horace B. Day

... genius, relinquishing their habits, could do this violence to their nature, should we not lose the original for a factitious genius, and spoil one race without improving the other? If nature and habit, that second nature which prevails even over the first, have created two beings distinctly different, what mode of existence shall ever assimilate them? Antipathies and ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli

... young woman cheerfully. "I've made almost $4. I'm improving, Mr. Kenwitz. I hardly know what to do with so much money." Her eyes turned, brightly soft, in the direction of Dan. A little pink spot came out on her ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry

... order to increase his own power and grandeur as the monarch of it, just as a private citizen might wish to improve his estate in order to increase his wealth and importance as the owner of it. He sent the embassador above referred to to China in order to make arrangements for increasing and improving the trade between the two countries. This mission was arranged in a very imposing manner. The embassador was attended with a train of twenty-one persons, who went with him in the capacity of secretaries, interpreters, legal councilors, and the like, besides a large number of servants and followers ...
— Peter the Great • Jacob Abbott

... of course lose the opportunity to impress upon so influential a person as the Senator the desirability of improving the navigation of Columbus river. He and Mr. Brierly took the Senator over to Napoleon and opened to him their plan. It was a plan that the Senator could understand without a great deal of explanation, for he seemed ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... against the house of Austria had an artillery train of fifty pieces. Great improvements were also made about this period in the manufacture of powder, and all kinds of fire-arms. Sully gave greater development to this arm of service, improving its materials, and increasing its efficiency. Then, as at most other periods, the French were in advance of most other ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck

... average of quality of work is steadily improving. Better standards have been established. The workers are "finding" themselves. Enthusiasm is being beneficently tempered by increased technical skill, and more particularly by the intellectual development of the art ...
— Pictorial Photography in America 1920 • Pictorial Photographers of America

... Sir Archibald Grant, of Monymusk, is deservedly distinguished for the interest he took in road-making about the time of the Hanoverian accession. Some years later statute labor did a little—a very little—towards improving the public roads, but it was not until after the rebellion of 1745, when the Government took the matter in hand, that anything really efficient was done. A number of good roads were then made, chiefly by military labor, and received in popular language the special ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy

... the confirmation of evil habits and principles, or to the excitement of them. Such persons, therefore, as are connected with the people of God, who have pious parents or friends, or who are servants in religious families, cannot be too grateful to Providence, or too solicitous of improving their advantages. Let them be attentive to the instructions they receive, and anxious to understand and join in the devotions which are offered ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox

... flag-ship. It was warm work, for already two men had been killed and several wounded, not including Billy, who, however, appeared on deck with a large black patch on his cheek and a handkerchief tied round his head, not certainly improving his beauty. ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston

... Protestants on the Continent who were persecuted for their faith's sake. England compassionated these persons, having learned by experience what persecution is; and did not offer any objection to a scheme for improving the lot of debtors in her own land, if any feasible ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne

... will take a few cases. We will begin with the cat. The cat, as a genera of a species of animals, we trace in his order of creation through various grades—cougar, panther, leopard, tiger, up to the lion, improving in each gradation from the small cat up to the lion, a noble beast. Again, we take the ass, and we trace through the intervening animals of the same species up to the horse, another noble animal. Again, we take up the monkey, and ...
— The Negro: what is His Ethnological Status? 2nd Ed. • Buckner H. 'Ariel' Payne

... perfect," said Celia, an hour later, when Charlotte had brought up her supper. "You are improving every day. But it frets me not to have you come to me for help. I could plan things for you, and teach you all the little I know. I'm doing so well now, the doctor says I may get down-stairs on the couch by next week. Then you certainly must ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond

... EMPIRE. Caesar's successor was his grandnephew Octavius, usually called Augustus, which was one of his titles. Augustus carried out many of Caesar's plans for improving the government in Rome and in the provinces. The people in the provinces were no longer robbed by Roman officers. Many of them became Roman citizens. After a time all children born within the empire were considered Romans, just as if they had ...
— Introductory American History • Henry Eldridge Bourne and Elbert Jay Benton

... luxuriance of uncultivated nature, and where science might accomplish new and unthought-of discoveries; while intelligent man would find a region teeming with useful vegetation, abounding with rivers, hills, and valleys, and waiting only for his enterprising spirit and improving hand to turn to account the native ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 1 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell

... in the representation of religious plays to instruct them in the theology which they thought all-important; in the performance of Aristophanes and Lucian, Plautus and Terence, mainly in the hope of improving them in Greek and Latin: and when the plays were in the vernacular, it was often to train their taste, manners, and elocution. Erasmus and the Oxford and Cambridge authorities certainly had the same ideas as the Continental scholars. So the English schoolmasters in ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer

... has a railroad running by it, but it has a canal upon which a large amount of traffic is done. There has been a good deal of agitation lately concerning the possibility of improving locomotion upon the canal, and the company offered a reward for the best device that could be suggested in that direction. A committee was appointed to examine and report upon the merits of the various plans submitted. While ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)

... him; all the heavy baggage had been sent by boat to Kourata. On the 9th, his Majesty encamped on a low promontory south of Kourata. Cholera had by this time broken out in the camp, and hundreds were dying daily. In the hope of improving the sanitary condition of the army, the Emperor moved his camp to some high ground a mile or so north of the town; but the epidemic continued to rage with great virulence both in the camp and in the town. The church was so completely choked up with dead bodies that ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc

... period among their rulers the people of Albemarle were giving their principal attention to growing corn and other farm products. They were improving their settlements and reaping the full reward of industry and perseverance. In 1704 the manufacture of tar began, and it was soon discovered that this native article was destined to become a very valuable commodity, both at home and ...
— School History of North Carolina • John W. Moore

... watched the curtsying narrowly, with the view at first of improving our own obeisances for Buckingham Palace; but truth to say we got no added light, and plainly most of the people had not worn threadbare the carpets in front ...
— Penelope's Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... sulphur, and that the red clover seed had its colour improved by shaking it in a sack with a small quantity of indigo; but this being detected after a time, the doctors then used a preparation of logwood, fined by a little copperas, and sometimes by verdigris; thus at once improving the appearance of the old seed, and diminishing, if not destroying, its vegetative power already enfeebled by age. Supposing no injury had resulted to good seed so prepared, it was proved that from the improved appearance, ...
— On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures • Charles Babbage

... essential to its full development, and that we owe much to James's presentation of his theory even admitting its "slap dash"[9] character to use his own phrase. It was to be expected that the artificially raised blood pressure would have had some effect in improving the patient's mental condition, and in the case of adrenalin, at any rate, some such effect should have occurred if we are to accept the recently published conclusions of Crilel[10] to the effect that "adrenalin causes increased brain action," "that brain and adrenalin action ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10

... tested. That will require to be itself treated with repeated rubbings of finely wrought lather over the stomach and bowels. Until you have in some measure subdued this fever, you will not do much in the way of improving the muscles of the back. In many cases you will be able to bring the fever down completely, and then you will be free to exercise the muscles, and so to strengthen them that they will bring the spine to something like its proper ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk

... of individual consciousness drawn from the universal sea by a sun burst of the Spirit. He is a self ruling intelligence, using a dependent organism for his own ends, comprehending his own destiny, successively developing its conditions and acquiring the materials for occupying and improving them, with a prevision of eternity. A flower may just as well perish as live, a musical sound cease as continue, a lamp be put out as burn on: they know not the difference. Not so with the soul of man. We here overpass a discrete degree ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... was his, and he had the money to throw away. Some men get their fun making over the earth. When one place is finished, they lose interest and go looking for a chance to put their time and dollars into improving somewhere else. Besides,"—and she took this other woman into her abrupt and rare embrace—"I happen to know he had an offer for his option and refused a good price. Now, come, Marcia and Frederic have gone down to the dining-room, you know. They ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson

... thousand other things, by having nothing to do with the militia, unless in cases of extraordinary exigency, and such as could not be expected in the common course of events, would amply support a large army, which, well officered, would be daily improving, instead of continuing a destructive, expensive, and disorderly mob. In my opinion, if any dependence is placed on the militia another year, Congress will be deceived. When danger is a little removed from them they will not turn out at all. When it comes home to them, the well-affected, ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck

... put in Phillis. "I hope Mrs. Squails will take her creased gown! Dulce, the sewing-machine is right on the top of it,—a most improving ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey

... charming cover for the monthly part of the new book. At the very earnest representations of Millais (and after having seen a great number of his drawings) I am going to engage with a new man; retaining, of course, C.C.'s cover aforesaid. K—— has made some more capital portraits, and is always improving. ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields

... who will commit unto you that which is your own? That is a remarkable place to this purpose in the Revelation—'Behold,' saith he, 'I have set before thee an open door,' that thou mayest have what thou wilt, as was also said to the improving woman of Canaan, 'and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name.' (Rev. 3:8; ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... days of their first acquaintance they were bound together as friends and partners. Altotas, in the course of a long life devoted to alchymy, had stumbled upon some valuable discoveries in chemistry, one of which was an ingredient for improving the manufacture of flax, and imparting to goods of that material a gloss and softness almost equal to silk. Balsamo gave him the good advice to leave the philosopher's stone for the present undiscovered, and make gold out of their flax. The advice was taken, and ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... of one another in its various modifications is a kind of culture varying with the degree of directness with which it is carried out, but we should be careful not to ascribe to such culture any improving qualities upon those on whom it is brought to bear. The water-ousel plucks moss from the riverbank to build its nest, but is does not improve the moss by plucking it. We pluck feathers from birds, and less directly wool from wild sheep, for the manufacture of clothing and cradle-nests, ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir

... sloped easily down into the open valley, whence they might emerge at the lower level of the prairie round about. He led the team for a distance down this floor of the coulee, until he could see the better going in the improving light which greeted them as they came out from the gully-like defile. Cursing his ill fortune, and wretched at the thought of the danger and discomfort he had brought upon the very one whom he would most gladly have shielded, Franklin said not a word from the beginning of the mad dash down ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough

... necessary information; that she would have to give her whole time to it, and neglect the chevalier, who is growing old and can no longer read anything without his daughter's eyes and head. The abbe was too fond of improving his mind from the writings of the wise to have time ...
— Mauprat • George Sand

... indicated that we were leaving to continue negotiations under conditions which were seemingly improving for us and becoming worse for our enemies. We observed the movement in Austria-Hungary, and there were signs indicating (this was made the basis for statements by representatives of the German Social Democracy in the Reichstag) that Germany was on the eve of similar events. ...
— From October to Brest-Litovsk • Leon Trotzky

... of social subjects are treated in a way at once wise and witty, and in a manner as delightful to read as they are pleasantly 'improving.'"—Daily Telegraph. ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes

... pass through the parlor; he had ordered a rickety stairway on the outside wall to be repaired, and we could hear him going up and down its icy steps as we sat by the hearth-fire. One day I said to him, 'My protegee is improving wonderfully. If she could have a complete education, she might take her place with ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson

... often and took Patty and Kate on long motor trips. Mattie was doing nicely. She was employed in a Woman's Exchange where she received twelve dollars a week and taught cooking and sewing. Mollie was improving daily. Mr. Hastings had a fine position with Judge Sands. Honora was away, but the rest of the girls were as usual. The Camp Fires met weekly and everyone missed Ethel, but no one missed her as did Aunt Susan. "Why," wrote Kate, "she says the light has gone out of her life, and Tom roams ...
— Ethel Hollister's Second Summer as a Campfire Girl • Irene Elliott Benson

... European theater launched the most ambitious project by far for improving the status of black troops, and before it was over thousands of black soldiers had been examined, counseled, and trained. The project was conceived and executed by the deputy and later theater commander, ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.

... of The Art of Improving Health, has also a passage in point: "An animal diet, especially in temperate climates, is more wasting than a vegetable; because it excites by its stimulating qualities a fever after every meal, by which the springs of life are urged into constant and weakening exertions: on the contrary, a ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 20, Issue 558, July 21, 1832 • Various

... South American cocaine destined for Western Europe; limited producer of precursor chemicals, particularly for amphetamine and methamphetamine; efforts to counter money laundering, related to organized crime and drug trafficking, are improving, but remain vulnerable; ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... Rothschild coming out of Herries' room, with his nephew from Paris. He looked pretty lively for a man who has lost some millions, but the funds were all up yesterday; he asked me the news, and said Lafitte was the best Minister France could have, and that everything was rapidly improving there. ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville

... fictions may mean, AEsculapius being removed from the mount on which he was exposed, was nursed by Trigo or Trigone, who was probably the wife of the goat-herd that found him; and when he was capable of improving by Chiron, Phlegyas (to whom he had doubtless been returned) put ...
— Roman Antiquities, and Ancient Mythology - For Classical Schools (2nd ed) • Charles K. Dillaway

... the patient's pulse; asked two or three questions; pronounced the baronet to be steadily improving; exchanged a few commonplace remarks with Alicia and Lady Audley, and prepared to leave the room. Robert rose and ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon

... she actually taught: and again, if her disputants had been unfair to us, or her rulers tyrannical, we bore in mind that on our side too there had been rancour and slander in our controversial attacks upon her, and violence in our political measures. As to ourselves being direct instruments in improving her belief or practice, I used to say, "Look at home; let us first, (or at least let us the while,) supply our own shortcomings, before we attempt to be physicians to any one else." This is very much the spirit ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... liberal education, and being desirous of farther improving himself in useful knowledge, he left Scotland, and went to the university of Wirtemberg, in Germany, in order ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... spend much less on clothes and furniture, and the outward show of things, than English people of the same condition do, and they do not stint themselves in meat and drink as the French peasants do. In fact, under the operation of existing circumstances, they are getting into the way of improving their condition, not so much by sacrifices and savings, as by an insistence on rent being fixed low enough to leave full margin ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (2 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert

... figure is improving every day; she will be a very good-looking girl by and by—what is more, a stylish one," ...
— A Bunch of Cherries - A Story of Cherry Court School • L. T. Meade

... both hard and short. Born of farmer folk in Oxford County, Maine, his early life had been spent on the soil in and about Lock's Mills with small chance of schooling. Later, as a teamster, and finally as shipping clerk for Amos Lawrence, he had enjoyed three mightily improving years in Boston. He loved to tell of his life there, and it is indicative of his character to say that he dwelt with special joy and pride on the actors and orators he had heard. He could describe some of the great scenes and repeat a few ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland

... the town are painfully dull. They are taken up by small domestic matters: the regulations for cattle; running boundary lines, locating highways, improving the town common, fixing fines for roving swine or agreeing to the division of a whale found on the shore. There was more or less bickering over the salary of the town clerk, who was to receive thirty-three pounds and fourteen shillings yearly to keep "A free school and teach ...
— The Old Coast Road - From Boston to Plymouth • Agnes Rothery

... different standards and procedures in collecting and adjusting the data. Surveys based on income will normally show a more unequal distribution than surveys based on consumption. The quality of surveys is improving with time, yet caution is still necessary ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States

... prove themselves of value to their comrades; and, as we have said, it set them digging with such furious energy that those about them marvelled, and then, taking an example from them, well knowing that the time available for improving their shelter was limited, they too redoubled their efforts, till the perspiration was pouring ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton

... power. Their own intense personal experience was valid not only for themselves. They belonged to that class of natural, leaders who are capable,—of infecting the herd with their own ideals; leading it to new feeding grounds, improving the common level It is indeed the main social function of the man or woman of the Spirit to be such a crowd-compeller In the highest sense; and, as the artist reveals new beauty to his fellow-men, to stimulate in their neighbours ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill

... last great trial. I will not now discuss it further with one who is yet on the other side of the veil. But if you will cast in your lot with us as a brother, come with me to the council, who are still sitting, to arrange the future march of the army, and the means of improving ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... plain enough that I was to be endowed: to what extent and upon what conditions I was now left for an hour to meditate in the wide and solitary thoroughfares of the new town, taking counsel with street-corner statues of George IV. and William Pitt, improving my mind with the pictures in the window of a music-shop, and renewing my acquaintance with Edinburgh east wind. By the end of the hour I made my way to Mr. Gregg's office, where I was placed, with a few appropriate words, in possession of a cheque for two thousand ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... time at work in some way, improving our little place. "Some day we will buy it," said Euphemia. We intended to have some wheat put in in the fall and next year we would make the place fairly crack with luxuriance. We would divide the duties of the farm, and, among other things, Euphemia would take charge of the chickens. ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton

... department was the most interesting. I think I liked the horses and the flowers and the fancywork best. Josie Pye took first prize for knitted lace. I was real glad she did. And I was glad that I felt glad, for it shows I'm improving, don't you think, Marilla, when I can rejoice in Josie's success? Mr. Harmon Andrews took second prize for Gravenstein apples and Mr. Bell took first prize for a pig. Diana said she thought it was ridiculous for a Sunday-school superintendent to take a prize in pigs, but I ...
— Anne Of Green Gables • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... Voices, excellent Actors on the Stage, and famous Dancers; whose Province is only to amuse and recreate; and is therefore far below theirs, who are either busied in governing the State, defending their Country, improving the Minds, or relieving the Bodies ...
— Essay upon Wit • Sir Richard Blackmore

... some of the most beautiful passages of the work owe their existence. On comparing, indeed, his rough draft of the two Cantos with the finished form in which they exist at present, we are made sensible of the power which the man of genius possesses, not only of surpassing others, but of improving on himself. Originally, the "little Page" and "Yeoman" of the Childe were introduced to the reader's notice in the following tame stanzas, by expanding the substance of which into their present light, lyric shape, it is almost needless to remark how much the ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... while having regard also to the material welfare of his country, adorning it with buildings, enriching it with the products of other lands, both animal and vegetable, fertilizing it by means of works of irrigation, and in every way "improving the condition of the people, and obtaining for ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson

... who would be most helped by such improved health facilities and whose practice would be benefited by them, are often their chief opponents. The leaders in the medical world, who are keen for all practicable means of improving the public health, heartily support the ...
— The Farmer and His Community • Dwight Sanderson

... from my father, who, now it was too late, saw the necessity of my improving myself. The amount of studying I did that first year was amazing, but it was nothing to what I went through the second, for my husband's letters had begun to fail me, and I was forced to work in order to drown grief and keep myself from despair. Finally ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green

... frequently stated that the peasants of Styria are in the habit of taking from two to five grains of arsenious acid daily for the purpose of improving the health, avoiding infection, and raising the whole tone of the body. It is a well-substantiated fact that the quantities taken habitually are quite sufficient to produce immediate death ordinarily. But the same might be easily said of those addicted to opium and chloral, ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... "She is improving rapidly. Soon she will be able to appear before the jury already chosen to inquire into the cause and manner of ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green

... principles, keeping carefully aloof from all such damaging connection as the Credit Mobilier, and having its books always thrown open for public inspection, its reputation even to-day is excellent and continually improving in the popular estimation. Holding out no utopian inducements to catch the unwary, and making no wheedling promises to blind the guileless, it states its great objects with all their great advantages, without at the same time suppressing its enormous and perhaps ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne

... slaves in 1818 and 1819, than in the four preceding years. The result has been, that that island has produced, in 1819, more than double the produce of the former year; their waste lands, accordingly, are in progressive cultivation, and, if they go on thus improving, that island, in a few years hence, will produce coffee and sugar sufficient for the supply of all the markets ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny

... weak mental calibre, or to presage small mental capacity in the Indian, from his present deplorable state of inertness, a condition which has been sadly impressed and confirmed by repressive legislation, and of which that legislation, by practically denying him occupation of improving fields of thought, and, indeed, scope for any enlarged mental activity, seeks to decree ...
— A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians • James Bovell Mackenzie

... were as savage as those we had last visited. The whole had now become Christians, and partly civilised. Anxious as he was to instruct them in the truths of Christianity, he was also desirous of improving their social condition. All the women were dressed in cotton gowns, the men as I have described; while their huts were of a superior construction to those on any of the neighbouring islands. The missionary assured us also that ...
— The Cruise of the Dainty - Rovings in the Pacific • William H. G. Kingston

... It is true that he secretly regretted Louise was not more genuine, that Beth was so cynical and frank, and that Patsy was not more diplomatic. But he reflected that he had had no hand in molding their characters, although he might be instrumental in improving them; so he accepted the girls as they were, thankful that their faults were not glaring, and happy to have found three such interesting nieces to cheer ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Abroad • Edith Van Dyne

... Constitution ought to precede appropriations for public works; but he said this very briefly and without emphasis, while he stated at some length, and with force, the desirableness of expending the surplus revenue in improving the country. As time wore on, less and less was said about the amendment, more and more about the importance of internal improvements; until, at last, the Republican party, under Clay, Adams, Calhoun, and ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton

... improving, and developing of agriculture, horticulture, forestry, dairying, the breeding of horses, cattle, and other live stock and poultry, home and cottage industries, the preparation and cultivation of flax, ...
— Against Home Rule (1912) - The Case for the Union • Various

... saw at once that its friend was full of improving conversation, and it let him begin without the least attempt to stay him; anything of the kind, in fact, would have been a provocation to greater circumstance in ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells

... as absolute individual ownership in land and ground values is allowed, seems to me very doubtful. We cannot hope to see great social improvements without great economic changes, but every effort in the direction of improving the beauty of our cities is welcome to all who have the well-being of the community at heart; and such work as Prof. Geddes is doing should arouse the keenest interest and the earnest attention of all who realise its ...
— Civics: as Applied Sociology • Patrick Geddes

... amused herself with improving the gardens, without allowing any addition to the building, or any change in the furniture, which was very shabby, and remained, in 1789, in the same state as during the reign of Louis XV. Everything there, without exception, was preserved; and the Queen slept in a faded bed, which ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... Magazine, in 1813 chronicling the clearance away of some hovels encroaching upon the building, says: "It will not be surprising if certain amateurs, busy in improving the architectural concerns of the City, should at length request of their brethren to allow the Bar or grand gate of entrance into the City of London to stand, after they have so repeatedly sought to obtain its destruction." In 1852 a proposal ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... "conceiving a better arrangement" of the celestial orbs, and improving the system of the universe generally, we shall leave to those who imagine themselves possessed of that omniscience which comprehends all the facts and relations of the actual universe, and foreknows all the details and relations of all possible ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker

... me at intervals (she wrote) all through the rest of the day; and, kindly as I had received her, she was conscious of being the object of doubts on my part which her visit had failed to remove. Might she ask leave to call on me, in the hope of improving her position in my estimation? An appointment ...
— The Legacy of Cain • Wilkie Collins

... introspection. I do not mean that in matters of feeling "authority" is to override "private judgment." Our last resort with respect to things of the mind is, as I have said, that of careful self-inspection. And the progress of psychology and the correction of illusion proceed by means of an ever-improving exercise of the introspective faculty. Yet such individual inspection can at least be guided by the results of others' similar inspection, and should be so guided as soon as a general consensus ...
— Illusions - A Psychological Study • James Sully

... to celebrity in it, who may chance upon these pages, will profit therefrom. We regret to be obliged to state that there are some so utterly out of sympathy with the cause of art, as to assert that the greater portion of Bill's utensils are useless; and that by much puttering he loses time without improving his work. These persons we are inclined to class among those zealous but unthinking lovers of simplicity, whose misdirected reformatory efforts in other departments of life are so well known. As might be expected, Bill treats ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park

... for the affections," added Maria, with a sigh, "how gross, and even tormenting do they become, unless regulated by an improving mind! The culture of the heart ever, I believe, keeps pace with that of the mind. But pray go on," addressing Jemima, "though your narrative gives rise to the most painful reflections on ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft

... improvements &c. n.; doctor &c. (remedy) 662; purify,&c. 652. relieve, refresh, infuse new blood into, recruit. reform, remodel, reorganize; new model. view in a new light, think better of, appeal from Philip drunk to Philip sober. palliate, mitigate; lessen an evil &c. 36 . Adj. improving &c. v.; progressive, improved &c. v.; better, better off, better for; all the better for; better advised. reformatory, emendatory[obs3]; reparatory &c. (restorative) 660[obs3]; remedial &c. 662. corrigible, improvable; accultural[obs3]. adv. on ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... the trench villa, the soldiers' home, and is considered to be proof against shrapnel bullets and rifle fire. Personally, I do not think much of our dug-outs, they are jerry-built things, loose in construction, and fashioned in haste. We have kept on improving them, remedying old defects, when we should have taken the whole thing to pieces and started afresh. The French excel us in fashioning dug-outs; they dig out, we build. They begin to burrow from the trench downwards, and the roof of their shelter is on a line with the floor ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill

... to some in America by engravings in the "People's Journal" from her pictures; but, if I remember right, these are coarse things, and give no just notion of her pictures, which are distinguished for elegance and refinement; a little mannerized, but she is improving ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... this paper has visited one or more observatories, and of course knows all about them. But as it may hereafter be translated into some foreign tongue and circulated among barbarous, but rapidly improving people, people who have as yet no astronomers among them, it may be well to give a little notion of what kind ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... means (i.e. the wholesale destruction of the less fit); not when we extend our view to what, even within the limits of human observation, is unquestionably the end (i.e. the causal result in an ever improving world of types). A candidate who is plucked in a Civil Service examination because he happens to be one of the less fitted to pass, is no doubt an instance of failure so far as his own career is concerned; but it does not therefore follow that the system ...
— Thoughts on Religion • George John Romanes

... struck with the necessity of improving the quality of his craft, by giving it increase both in size and strength. With this intention—after having possessed himself of an oar, out of several that were adrift—he commenced paddling about among the floating fragments, here and there picking up such pieces as appeared ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid

... amount only such bonds as should be necessarily issued by the companies for the construction of their roads at fair prices, agreed upon in an honest way between real and substantial parties. For the purpose of saving or improving the security afforded by its junior lien the Government should have the right now to purge this paramount lien of all that is fraudulent, fictitious, or unconscionable. If the transfer to innocent hands of bonds of this character secured by such ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland

... the difference between rich and poor. Solon had endeavoured to check the increase of estates; and Pericles had not only strengthened the public resources by bringing the rich under the control of an assembly in which they were not supreme, but he had employed those resources in improving the condition and the capacity of the masses. The grievance of those who were taxed for the benefit of others was easily borne so long as the tribute of the confederates filled the treasury. But the Peloponnesian ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton

... the other multifarious tasks of devising new weapons for the war, improving the various types of aircraft, building larger submarines and guns of greater calibre went forward with unimpaired speed. Nothing was too vast or too complicated to be undertaken, no detail was too trivial ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon

... believe Congress had it in contemplation to give him the grade of Admiral from the date of his taking the Serapis. Such a measure now would greatly gratify him, second the efforts of fortune in his favour and better the opportunities of improving him for our service, whenever the moment shall come in which we ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat

... came pretty regularly to see Madame Graslin, and make her a sort of report about her poor and discuss the best means of succoring and improving them. But Monsieur Graslin had now begun to tighten his purse-strings, having made the discovery, in spite of the innocent deceptions of his wife and her maid, that the money he paid did not go solely for household expenses and for dress. He was angry when he ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac

... anywhere to be seen, and the most substantial landholders live in wretched mud-hovels with invisible covers. I asked the people why, and was told that they were always too insecure to lay out anything in improving their dwelling-houses; and, besides, did not like to have such local ties, where they were so liable to be driven away by the Government officers or by the landholders in arms against them, and their reckless followers. The ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman

... commiserating her utter helplessness or her complete isolation, he went farther to relieve her than to many, if not all, the other poor. She frequently was in the habit of pleading her poverty as a reason for not appearing in church among her neighbours; and he gladly seized an opportunity of so improving her condition, that on this score at least no impediment existed. When all his little plans for her comfort had been carried into execution, he took the opportunity one day of dropping in, as if accidentally, to speak to her. By degrees ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)

... bigotry; they too have their antiphilosophists who find an interest in keeping things in their present state, who dread reformation, and exert all their faculties to maintain the ascendancy of habit over the duty of improving our ...
— U.S. Presidential Inaugural Addresses • Various

... altogether different. Besides you are improving, are you not?" She asked it a trifle anxiously, but the question ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... excuse for slothfulness; Anna was not always well—had heavy colds, and was feverish; but well or ill was always employed. Even with painful local afflictions such as a "whitloe," she still was industrious, "improving it to perfect myself in learning to spin flax." She read much—the Bible constantly—and also found amusement in reading "a variety ...
— Diary of Anna Green Winslow - A Boston School Girl of 1771 • Anna Green Winslow

... question of the fundamental relation between nationality and democracy is raised by their attitude, because the reasons they advance against increasingly centralized authority would, if they should continue to prevail, definitely and absolutely forbid a gradually improving cooerdination between American political organization and American national economic needs or moral and intellectual ideals. The conception of democracy out of which the supposed contradiction between the democratic and national ideals issues is the great enemy of the American ...
— The Promise Of American Life • Herbert David Croly

... improving, though. If he just let it alone, most of it would come back, and he could orient himself. Meanwhile, he might as well explore his surroundings a little more. He resolved to keep his hands off anything ...
— Viewpoint • Gordon Randall Garrett

... this untoward incident, Douglas made a formidable showing.[387] He was himself well pleased at the outlook. He wrote to a friend, "Prospects look well and are improving every day. If two or three western States will speak out in my favor the battle is over. Can anything be done in Iowa and Missouri? That is very important. If some one could go to Iowa, I think the convention in that State would instruct for me. In regard ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson

... dark at the end of afternoon service that we could not have the practice, so it has been settled to have service at two o'clock, an hour which seems to suit the people better. The singing is improving. We managed the "Venite" very well, and now mean to try the "Te Deum." I intend to teach them a chant with three changes in it. In the end perhaps we shall sing the Psalms. Yesterday the children sang with much vigour "There's ...
— Three Years in Tristan da Cunha • K. M. Barrow

... thought of improving the feminine strain of the race also," he told her, but almost as though he spoke to himself, "but I realized that it mattered little the stature of the mothers of the race as long as the fathers were made virile. But if all ...
— The Mind Master • Arthur J. Burks

... over her disappointment. Prudence had told her the contents of the letter, and also her mother's wishes on the subject. Alice was naturally too cheerful to think much of the matter; besides, she was glad that Robb's business was improving. ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum

... into Spain, where he spent a month or so inspecting the historical beauties of that fallen country. Thence he penetrated across the Pyrenees into Southern France, which was pleasant in the spring months. Here he remained another month, meeting with no adventures worthy of any note, and improving his knowledge of the French language. Tiring at last of this, he travelled to Paris, and went to the theatres, but found his own thoughts too absorbing to allow of his taking any keen interest in their sensationalisms; so, after a brief stay, he made his way up to Brittany and ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard

... Fabien into one of those nests, where he will be protected against idleness by the little he will do, and against revolutions by the little he will be. It's a charming profession; the very smell of books is improving; merely by breathing it ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... stand out prominently from the throng of busy pleasure-seekers, who are devoting their lives to improving the surroundings of those less fortunate fellow-creatures who have fallen upon the thorny path, and whose portion is often the cup of bitterness. Indeed, I have ever found the Argentine desirous of helping those who seek advice and assistance; ...
— Argentina From A British Point Of View • Various

... to have a theory about me which I don't at all fill out. Is there anything mysterious in a purpose entertained and executed every year, in the most public manner, by fifty thousand of my fellow-countrymen—the purpose of improving one's mind by ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James

... I have not words to express, and conceive, if possible, the horrours of imprisonment attended with reproach and ignominy, of involuntary association with the refuse of mankind, with wretches who were before too abandoned for society, but, being now freed from shame or fear, are hourly improving their vices ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson

... laws was carried by those very men whom Mr Thorne had hitherto regarded as the only possible saviours of his country, he was for a time paralysed. His country was lost; but that was comparatively a small thing. Other countries had flourished and fallen, and the human race still went on improving under God's providence. But now all trust in human faith must for ever be at an end. Not only must ruin come, but it must come through the apostasy of those who had been regarded as the truest of true believers. Politics in England, as a pursuit for gentlemen, must be at an end. ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope

... gardens, parks, and home grounds will be of interest to the pupils. Simple artistic methods of ornamental planting with trees, shrubs, vines, and herbaceous perennials can now be introduced, and some scheme for improving the school grounds outlined. ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Nature Study • Ontario Ministry of Education

... He showed no aversion to war, he made the wisest preparations against invaders; and by his vigour and foresight he was enabled, without any danger of suffering insults, to indulge his inclination towards peace, and to employ himself in supporting and improving the internal government of his kingdom. He maintained a body of disciplined troops; which he quartered in the north, in order to keep the mutinous Northumbrians in subjection, and to repel the inroads of the Scots. He built and supported a powerful navy [c]; and that he might retain ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume

... a chosen employer, with a real service purpose; but be careful not to offend in your presentation. Do not bring him your idea for improving his business as if it were a great discovery you have made. He won't like it if you open his eyes to his lacks in that fashion. You might better suggest that while you have perceived what he needs, you have no doubt he either has seen it already or would ...
— Certain Success • Norval A. Hawkins

... but how is Dash? I should have asked if Mrs. Patmore kept her rules and was improving; but Dash came uppermost. The order of our thoughts should be the order of our writing. Goes he muzzled, or aperto ore? Are his intellects sound, or does he wander a little in his conversation. You cannot be too careful to watch the first ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb



Words linked to "Improving" :   rising, up, Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge



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