"Gab" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... be gone over an hour, children," said Curly. "Cards don't draw me like a good gab round the fire. And Diana's ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow
... sold an occasional box of salve, and in an emergency pulled teeth, in addition to the compensation which he received for what was designated privately as his "gift of gab." But the Major, nevertheless, had his dark moments, in which he contemplated the day when age should force him to retire to private life. Since the wagon containing his patent leather valise was his home, ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... to say that since the tremendous enlargement of the American colony, the whole pace of London drawing-room talk has enormously improved. We British are not by nature a sprightly and speechful race, with the gift of gay gab, but under the American woman's cheerful influence we are enjoying a ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... there fer the ranch mail," began Lloyd, "an' Nick Porter was crookin' his elbow a-plenty. And talking a heap, too. In front of the Red Light he had a feller in flashy clothes with a sandy mustache, and the two was goin' it some in the gab line. I was leanin' against the front of the Red Light, at the time, a-readin' a letter, an' I couldn't help hear a little of what them two said. 'Sam'll put down a hole an' blow out a bag o' samples,' ...
— Frank Merriwell, Junior's, Golden Trail - or, The Fugitive Professor • Burt L. Standish
... be all the breakfast he wants," Elizabeth's uncle said, with his meager chuckle. "David's as big a donkey as any of 'em, though he hasn't the gift of gab on the subject." ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... in what is called the gift of gab, had no soothing words at his command, full as his heart was of compassion. And after sitting some time by the unhappy boy, patting him softly on the shoulder, he arose, and went away; concluding that his absence would be a relief to ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... register his protest very forcibly. Nine Boers were shot down; three on the British side were injured. Meanwhile the force under Major Peakman was protesting at Carter's Farm. The enemy there made a bold effort to silence Peakman. But a Maxim gun has a remarkable gift of the gab; the Major had one with him, and he let it do all the talking—with results that quickly drove the Boers beyond the range ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... to lend my name. 'No,' I said, 'gentlemen; I feel much honoured, but I do not like extremes;' and they went away. They are making a little more noise now, because they have got a man who has the gift of the gab, and the people like to go and hear him speak. But as I said to a friend of mine, who seemed half inclined to join them, 'Well; if I did anything of that sort, I would be led by a Lancashire lad. They have got a foreigner to lead them, a fellow out of Berkshire; an ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli
... the Gab-ri[1] wild, A seer is resting on a rock; exiled By his own will from all the haunts of men, Beside a pool within a rocky glen He sits; a turban rests upon his brow, And meets the lengthened beard of whitest snow. This morn an omen comes before his eyes, And him disturbs with a wild ...
— Babylonian and Assyrian Literature • Anonymous
... promoted to be non-commissioned officer! That everlasting chatterer, who only owed it to his gift of the gab that he had been able to boast of himself as confidential ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... Sunday evenin', d'ye see, gentlemen?—he'd walk across t' valley up there to Whitcliffe and stop an hour or two, enjoyin' hisself. Well, now, as you're no doubt well aweer, Mr. Eldrick, he were a reight hand at talkin', were yon Parrawhite—he'd t' gift o' t' gab reight enough, and talked well an' all. And of course him an' me, we hed bits o' conversation at times, 'cause he come to t' house reg'lar and sometimes o' week-nights an' all. An' he tell'd me 'at he'd had a deal o' experience i' racin' matters—whether it were true or not, I couldn't ...
— The Talleyrand Maxim • J. S. Fletcher
... such ill effect. "What do you say, Mr. Stephenson?" asked Sir Robert Peel, enjoying the dean's discomfiture. "Why," returned George Stephenson, "I only say this, that of all the powers above and under earth, there seems to me no power so great as the gift of the gab." This is the story. But there are facts which contradict it. The only visit paid by George Stephenson to Drayton Manor was made in the December of 1844, not the January of 1845. The guests (invited for Dec. 14, 1844), were Lord Talbot, Lord Aylesford, ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... de lan' shall hyeah his thundah, Lak a blas' f'om Gab'el's ho'n, Fu' de Lawd of hosts is mighty When he girds his ahmor on. But fu' feah some one mistakes me, I will pause right hyeah to say, Dat I 'm still a-preachin' ancient, I ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... have enough trouble with our telephone even with Carrie to supply discretion for the whole town. Party lines and rubber ears are the source of all our woe. You know what a party line is, of course. It's a line on which you can have a party and gab merrily back and forth for forty minutes, while some other subscriber is wildly dancing with impatience. Most of our lines have four subscribers apiece, and it's just as hard to live in friendliness on a party ...
— Homeburg Memories • George Helgesen Fitch
... been wanting to my work. It is not I that am to blame, but our fine gentleman of a supercargo. He is just like any mortal: he has taken a drink of their Lethe up there, and forgotten to come back to us. He'll be wrestling with the lads, or playing on his lyre, or giving his precious gift of the gab a good airing; or he's off after plunder, the rascal, for what I know: 'tis all in the day's work with him. He is getting too independent: he ought to remember that he belongs to us, ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... le vocabulaire commun" in "Romanische Forschungen", xxiii. 401-413). These names are mentioned here in connection with the brave exploits which Christian knights, while in their cups, may boast that they will accomplish (F.). This practice of boasting was called indulging in "gabs" (Eng. "gab"), a good instance of which will be found in "Le Voyage de Charlemagne a Jeruslaem" (ed. Koschwitz), v. ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... knew him," said he. "You were all having such a love feast gab-fest when I blew in. This is Mr. Orde, who bosses this place—and most of the country around here. If you want to do good to humanity on this meadow you'd better begin by being good to him. He controls it. He's humanity ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... standing by, and amongst whose good qualities that of silence was not considered to hold a conspicuous place; "a famous cure for lockjaw, from whatever cause it may come on. There was Miss Trowlop—she had a very handsum' mouth and a considerable gift of the gab—was goin' to be married to Mr Shaver, run a hickory splinter through her prunella shoe into her foot—jaw locked as fast as old Ebenezer Gripeall's iron safe. If she'd a-had my Palmyra sarve she'd be still alive, Mrs Shaver, now; 'stead of that, the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... snarled, "you'd better just stow your gab. You're lucky to be here yourself, let alone botherin' your thick head about anybody else, and you can kiss the Book on that! Do you know why you ain't with them carrion?" He jerked his thumb toward the beach. "It's because Solomon Anderson's ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... by the devil haven't you had something else then? what've you been doing with yourselves for 'long while'? what d'ye mean, coming here starved to death, making a fellow sick to look at you? Hold your gab, and eat up that pork," pushing over his tin plate, "'n' that bread," sending it after, "'n' that hard tack,—'tain't very good, but it's better'n roots, I reckon, or berries either,—'n' gobble up that coffee, ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... The 'gift of the gab' is in this case, as in many others, a very great resource. A striking remark or bon mot will easily mystify the spectators, and attract their attention from what you are DOING. Hence all prestidigitators are always well stocked with anecdotes and funny observations; indeed, they talk incessantly: ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... look up this business of securities, and then if the young feller's talked straight, we'll try to work it through him, if we can get to him, and I guess we can, so long as I ain't lost the gift of the gab in twenty years. We'll be as good, sorrowing heirs as ever Jimmy ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... agreed; "but a fellow needs some help sometimes, if he ain't over handy with the gift of gab." ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... Endicott evasively, "that Michael has a great gift of gab! Would you like to stop and have an ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... thou glib of gab and fair of face, ignore not my case and men's fear of me; and well thou weetest how I assault the strongly walled place and uproot the vines from base. Wherefore, do as I bid thee, and stand before me even as the thrall ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... wi' bleth'rin' gab, Wha speeches wove like ony wab; O' ilk ane's corn aye took a dab, And a' for a fee; Accounts he owed through a' the toun, And tradesmen's tongues nae mair could drown; But now he thought to clout his ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... anything more upon them; they're completely worn out by this time, if it's only by putting in, and taking out again, three times a week.' 'Oh! you're a rum un, you are,' replies the old woman, laughing extremely, as in duty bound; 'I wish I'd got the gift of the gab like you; see if I'd be up the spout so often then! No, no; it an't the petticut; it's a child's frock and a beautiful silk ankecher, as belongs to my husband. He gave four shillin' for it, the werry same blessed day as he broke his ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... things come to a head," said the mountaineer, laughing, "but, as I said, if Tennessee goes out, I reckon I'll go with her. It's hard to go ag'in your own gang. Leastways, 't ain't in me to do it. Now I've had enough of this gab, an' I'm goin' to skip out. Good-bye, young feller. ...
— The Guns of Bull Run - A Story of the Civil War's Eve • Joseph A. Altsheler
... Robinson, harrangue na mair, But steek your gab forever, Or try the wicked town of Ayr, For there ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... Gab[)a]li, an ancient people of Gaul, inhabiting the country of Givaudan. Their chief city was Anduitum, now Mende, G. vii. 64; they join the general confederacy of Vercingetorix, and give hostages to ...
— "De Bello Gallico" and Other Commentaries • Caius Julius Caesar
... 'Stow this gab,' roared Hook, and the spokesmen were dragged back. 'You, boy,' he said, addressing John, 'you look as if you had a little pluck in you. Didst never want to be a ...
— Peter and Wendy • James Matthew Barrie
... to talk that way," the captain warned, "so jist shet yer dirty mouths. I've heard sich gab before, and it doesn't jar me in ...
— Rod of the Lone Patrol • H. A. Cody
... in its own wretchedness.' His hustings appearances would appear to have been at least marked by fluency, for Burns, his junior by eighteen years, declares his own inability to fight like Montgomerie or 'gab like Boswell.' ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... Zeb, mopping his forehead. "How be you, Keziah? What? You ain't all alone! Thought you'd have a cabin full of gab machines by this time. ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... the brogue so easily that it seemed natural to him—which indeed it was, as he was born not twenty miles from Cork, in the neighbourhood of which is situated the far-famed "Blarney stone," that is supposed to endow those who kiss it with the "gift of the gab;" and Charley must have "osculated it," as a Yankee would say, to ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... building their books on. How now, my spry veteran? Only a boy On a three-legged crock? Well, I own you are older, And watching your riding's a thing to enjoy; There isn't a Jock who is defter and bolder; Your power, authority, eloquence—yes, For your gift of the gab is a caution—are splendid; But—the youngster may teach you a lesson, I guess, As to judgment of pace ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 4, 1892 • Various
... batalla campal! Oh! (Prestando atencin, como si oyese algn ruido, y mirando otra vez muy sobresaltado hacia la puerta del foro.) No, nada. Se me ha colgado de los faldones del gabn..., de la corbata, que si tira algo ...
— Ms vale maa que fuerza • Manuel Tamayo y Baus
... recourse to his old expedient, and unburthened the tumult of his thoughts to his confidential friend. "This," cried he, "is a new artifice of the fellow, to prove his imagined superiority. We knew well enough that he had the gift of the gab. To be sure, if the world were to be governed by words, he would be in the right box. Oh, yes, he had it all hollow! But what signifies prating? Business must be done in another guess way than that. I wonder ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... wasted in this toil. My councillors tell me that my tower may never stand tall, unless its stones and lime are slaked with thy blood—the blood of a fatherless man." "Lord God," cried Merlin, "believe not that my blood will bind your tower together. I hold them for liars who told over such a gab. Bring these prophets before me who prophesy so glibly of my blood, and liars as they are, liars I will prove them to be." The king sent for his sorcerers, and set them before Merlin. After Merlin had regarded them curiously, one by one, "Masters," said he, "and mighty magicians, ...
— Arthurian Chronicles: Roman de Brut • Wace
... the carronade: 'First Lieutenant,' says he, 'Send all my merry men after here, for they must list to me. I haven't the gift of the gab, my sons, because I'm bred to the sea. That ship there is a Frenchman, who means to fight with we. And odds, bobs, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea, I've fought 'gainst every odds—but I've gained the victory! * * * * * * * * That ship there is a Frenchman, and if we ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... gab, The women had a confab And demanded the rights To wear the tights. Gibbery, gibbery ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... me? You'll be puttin' in your gab, an' me spakin'? How-an-iver, as I was sayin', our house was the first ye came to, an' they say there's a great blessin' to thim that gives, the first charity to a poor man or woman settin' out to look ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... her chin thrust out, her features convulsed, said nothing, not having yet acquired the Paris gift of street gab. The other continued: ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... of the gab, nothing more and nothing less. What has your knack of fine talking to do with the truth, any more than playing the organ has? I've never been in your church; but I've been to your political meetings; and I've seen you do what's called rousing the meeting to enthusiasm: ...
— Candida • George Bernard Shaw
... didn't mean it that way," she cried. "But from what you tell me I imagine that all a man needs is a front and plenty of punch. You've got the front all right with your looks and gift of gab, and I leave it to Young Brophy if ...
— The Efficiency Expert • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... sell the property to a saloonkeeper, or turn it into a moving-picture house and burn people to death in the rotten old fire-trap. And if you don't raise your hand, when I come to you fair and square, with an honest story—if you dare to order me out of here, because you've got to gab a lot of your charity drivel to a board of directors, instead of taking the interest any real man would take in something that was real and vital and eating into the very heart of New York life, I'm going to show you up, and put you out of the charity business——so ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... shifted his quid and spoke. "Tell ye what 'tis, all of ye," said he—"it's mighty easy talkin' an' givin' away gab instead of dollars. I'll bet ye anything ye'll put up that there ain't one of ye out of the whole damned lot that 'ain't got any money that would give it away ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... that has run off the track, turned upside down and its wheels making a thousand revolutions a minute. A kite in the air without a tail. A ship without a rudder. A clock without hands. A sermon that is all text; the incarnation of gab. Handsome, vivacious, versatile, muscular, neat, clean to the marrow. A judge of the effect of clothes, frugal in food and regular only in habits. With brains enough in his head for twenty men all pulling different ways. A man not bad—a practical ...
— The Story of the First Trans-Continental Railroad - Its Projectors, Construction and History • W. F. Bailey
... captain stood on the carronade—first lieutenant, says he, Send all my merry men aft here, for they must list to me: I havn't the gift of the gab, my sons—because I'm bred to the sea, That ship there is a Frenchman, who means to fight with we. Odds blood, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea, I've fought 'gainst every odds—but I've gained ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... "Stow the gab, you big Finn! I'm through. Pay me off and help yourself to another second mate." And Matt put on his coat and whistled to the winchman to steady his slingload while he climbed out of the hold. Kjellin followed and Matt preceded ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne
... blazed up like torches at the sound of the familiar tongue, and she eyed the weather-beaten face of Baltic with an amazement too genuine to be feigned. 'Duvel!' said she, in a high key of astonishment, 'who is this Gorgio who patters with the gab of a ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... dresses; And by some devilish cantrip slight {150f} Each in its cauld hand held a light, - By which heroic Tam was able To note upon the haly table, A murderer's banes in gibbet airns; Twa span-lang, wee, unchristened bairns; A thief, new-cutted frae a rape, Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape; {150g} Five tomahawks, wi' bluid red-rusted: Five scimitars, wi' murder crusted; A garter, which a babe had strangled; A knife, a father's throat had mangled, Whom his ain son o' life bereft, The grey hairs yet stack to the ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley
... Tom Ross had sech a gift o' gab," said Shif'less Sol. "He stirs me all up, he makes me want to hev some lady buy a ship fur me an' start me out to discoverin' continents. Do you think, Paul, thar's any lady who would sell her earrings an' finger rings fur me ez that ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... considerable absence on account of ill health, congratulated him on his convalescence, and added, anticipatory of the pleasure he would have in hearing him again, "I'm unco yuckie to hear a blaud o' your gab." This is an untranslatable form of saying how glad he should be to hear his minister's voice again speaking to him the words of salvation and ...
— Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character • Edward Bannerman Ramsay
... scientific branches of amputation, from the scalp-lock to the heel-tap, upon Emperors, Kings, Queens, and common folks; but upon his science in the dental way, he spread and grew luminous! In short, Dr. Wangbanger had not been long in Rockbottom before his "gift of gab," and unadulterated propensity to elongate the blanket, set every body, including poor Bill Whiffletree, in a furor to have their teeth cut, filed, scraped, rasped, reset, dug out, ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... him no such thing," Henley retorted, with an effort to control his rising temper. "I can't be responsible for the slap-dash way he puts things. I don't like his eternal gab, nohow." ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... There's time for everyone to give out their chat and their gab, and to do their business and take their ease and have a comfortable life, only the King! The beasts of the field have leave to lay themselves down in the meadow and to stretch their limbs on the green grass in the heat of the day, without being pestered and plagued and tormented and ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory
... as if you had a gift of the gab. A successful life insurance agent will make a good deal more than ten dollars ...
— Walter Sherwood's Probation • Horatio Alger
... der Seligkeit und ein Meer von bitteren Leiden Die Italienerin gab—Seligkeit, Seligkeit nur Laessest Du mich entzuendend, begeistert, befaendig empfinden, In der Spanierin fand Liebe und ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... dab! Some people have the gift of gab! Some people have no tongues at all To trip them up ...
— Happy Jack • Thornton Burgess
... the Brighton shore, Straining my very eye-balls from my Cab; First came two "ten-horse" laughs—and then a roar, "Be off, queer Chap, or I'll soon stop your gab!" ...
— Poems (1828) • Thomas Gent
... stand at the bar and discoorse about Ireland would brake yer heart. Many's the time I seen the ould waiter listenin' to him till the wather would pour out iv his two good-lookin' eyes. An, thin, 'twas Mat Harris had the gab, rest his sowl! Ye haven't anybody could come up to him barrin' owld Gladstone, divil a one." Another Athloner, speaking of an Irish Nationalist M.P., who luckily still lives, said:—"Mr. Parnell took him up because he was ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... ARE a genius then,' said David. 'I always knew you had the gift of the gab, of course; but I never believed you were half the man you are. ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... zehn Gebot', Die uns gab unser Herre Gott Durch Mosen, seinen Diener treu, Hoch auf ...
— The Hymns of Martin Luther • Martin Luther
... public-'ouse down my way sometimes. Artful 'Arry, he's called, and, for 'arf-a-quid, say, he'd frighten Uncle Dick 'arf to death. He's big and ugly, and picks up a living by selling meerschaum pipes he's found to small men wot don't want 'em. Wonderful gift o' the gab he's got.' ...
— Ship's Company, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... ein Knig in Thule, Gar treu bis an das Grab, Dem sterbend seine Buhle Einen goldnen Becher gab. ...
— A Book Of German Lyrics • Various
... col. 776; see Delitzsch, Handwoerterbuch, p. 678. Hommel (e.g., Altisraelitische Ueberlieferung, p. 39) regards Gilgamesh as a contraction from Gibil (the fire-god) and Gam (or Gab), together with ish, an 'Elamitic' ending. If the name is Elamitic, one should hardly expect a Babylonian deity entering as one ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow
... for twenty-four hours, but at the end of that time it fell, and Victor Amadeus took up his headquarters there, while Eugene marched on to Gab. He had been preceded by the Ravens, who, in imitation of their enemies, had driven the people from their houses, and had set fire to whole villages, cutting down ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... "I'm not a preacher or a Mormon. I haven't got the gift of gab. Charleton is a good talker. Let ...
— Judith of the Godless Valley • Honore Willsie
... which he had been enabled to take from the profits of his faces. A son of his, one of the children he was making faces to when my comrades entered his door, is at present a barrister, and a very rising one. He has his gift—he has not, it is true, the gift of the gab, but he has something better, he was born with a grin on his face, a quiet grin; he would not have done to grin through a collar like his father, and would never have been taken up by Hopping Ned ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... where I stand, you—you huzzy!" he said, grinning satyrically as she winced under the insult. "I'm your father, damn you! Your father—do you hear? And I'll not have you go back East to gab and gossip about me. You'll stay here, and you'll bear witness against Dakota, and you'll keep quiet about me!" He was trembling horribly as he came close to her, and his breath was coughing in his ...
— The Trail to Yesterday • Charles Alden Seltzer
... come to de McAllum plantation to live. It were in Kemper, too, 'bout eight miles from Stephenson. Us come dere endurin' of de war. Dat were when my mammy marry one of de McAllum Niggers. My new pappy went to de war wid Mr. McAllum an' were wid 'im when he were wounded at Mamassas Gab Battle. He brung 'im home to ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Mississippi Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... snarled, his face close to the others, his eyes burning, his breath hot in Garth's blanched face, "you queer this deal with your infernal gab and I'll—" ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... replied Fagin, 'and we'll have a big-wig, Charley: one that's got the greatest gift of the gab: to carry on his defence; and he shall make a speech for himself too, if he likes; and we'll read it all in the papers—"Artful Dodger—shrieks of laughter—here the ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... Have we not labored for you? We are much satisfied with our late mistress—may she enjoy eternal life!—and we are grateful to the young Prince for thinking of us," began a red-haired peasant with a gift of gab. ...
— The Awakening - The Resurrection • Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
... he. "It's the Campbells, man! You'll have the whole clanjamfry of them on your back; and so will the Advocate too, poor body! It's extraordinar ye cannot see where ye stand! If there's no fair way to stop your gab, there's a foul one gaping. They can put ye in the dock, do ye no' see that?" he cried, and stabbed me with one ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... I've heard of what you did, an' you don't talk much. I'm glad of that. I can do all the talkin' that's needed by the three of us. The Lord created me with a love of gab." ...
— The Texan Star - The Story of a Great Fight for Liberty • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the Ancient, "shut thy mouth, lad hold thy gab an' give thy poor old feyther a chance—I be tellin' 'im so fast as I can! As I was a-sayin', Peter like a fur'us lion were Jarge wi' they keepers—eight on 'em, Peter—like dogs, a-growlin' an' growlin', an' leapin', and worryin' all ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... salutatory : screed: valedictory [U.S.]. oratory; elocution, eloquence; rhetoric, declamation; grandiloquence, multiloquence^; burst of eloquence; facundity^; flow of words, command of words, command of language; copia verborum [Lat.]; power of speech, gift of the gab; usus loquendi [Lat.]. speaker &c v.; spokesman; prolocutor, interlocutor; mouthpiece, Hermes; orator, oratrix^, oratress^; Demosthenes, Cicero; rhetorician; stump orator, platform orator; speechmaker, patterer^, improvisatore^. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... he had taken too much to drink,—which he did, after the Danish fashion, far oftener than the rest of Baldwin's men,—he grew rude, boastful, quarrelsome. He would chant his own doughty deeds, and "gab," as the Norman word was, in painful earnest, while they gabbed only in sport, and outvied each other in impossible fanfaronades, simply to laugh down a fashion which was held inconsistent with the modesty of a true knight. Bitter it was to her to hear him announcing ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... The master of a school could not manage the gab, they being exceedingly contumacious. Beat them, he dared not; so he hit upon an expedient. He made a very strong decoction of wormwood, and for a slight offence, poured one spoonful down their throats: for a more serious one, he ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... their conclusions which was dangerous, and reminded him of his mother-in-law. He was a baby in public affairs, of course, as yet; but as soon as he once got going, the intensity of his convictions, together with his position, and real gift—not of the gab, like Harbinger's—but of restrained, biting oratory, was sure to bring him to the front with a bound in the present state of parties. And what were those convictions? Lord Valleys had tried to understand them, but up to the present he had failed. And this did not surprise him ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... printed, possibly read, anent the Bradley-Martin ball—all the preachers and teachers, editors and other able idiots pouring forth voluminous opinions. A tidal wave of printer's ink has swept across the continent, churned to atrous foam by hurricanes of lawless gibberish and wild gusts of resounding gab. The empyrean has been ripped and the tympana of the too patient gods ravished with fulsome commendation and foolish curse, showers of Parthian arrows and wholesale consignments of soft-soap darkening the sun as they hurtled hither and yon through the shrinking atmosphere. A man ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... old lady? Where are you going? We know, we know! She's been to gab with spirits. Look at the old fool! getting ready to cry! What have you got in an envelope, old lady? A lock of hair? An eyelash ...
— The House of Dust - A Symphony • Conrad Aiken
... thou comest back to the Tofts, to bid Jack fall upon other lands than Meadham when he rideth, because of the gift and wedding that I give thee now. So, lad, I deem that thou hast chosen thy part; but let not the tale thereof go out of thy mouth, or thou wilt gab away thy wedding. Lo, thou, I leave this door open behind me; and presently shall the smith come here to do away thine irons; and I shall send a squire to thee to lead thee to a fair chamber, and to bring thee goodly raiment, and do thou play amongst thy fellows as one of the best of them; ...
— Child Christopher • William Morris
... York a long time—what kind of a song-and-dance does this old town give you? What I mean is, doesn't the gab of it seem to kind of bunch up and slide over the bar to you in a sort of amalgamated tip that hits off the burg in a kind of an epigram with a dash of bitters ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... a' in order; His doxy lay within his arm; Wi' usquebae an' blankets warm She blinkit on her sodger; An' aye he gies the tozie drab The tither skelpin' kiss, While she held up her greedy gab, Just like an aumous dish; Ilk smack still, did crack still, Just like a cadger's whip; Then staggering an' swaggering He roar'd ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... gab?" he asked. "An' you're takin' some liberty with Miss Hammond, who never seen you before. Sure I'm makin' allowance fer amazin' strange talk. I see you're not drinkin'. Mebbe you're plumb locoed. Come, ease ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... luncheon bell rang, and he went out to the midday "gab-fest," as he inwardly characterised it. The meal proceeded to dessert without any unusual disturbance, then the diminutive Ebeneezer threw the remnants of his cup of milk into his mother's face, and was carried off, howling, to be spanked. ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... Historia ex editione Gab Brotier cum Notis et Interpretatione in usum Delphini. Varis Lectionibus Notis Variorum, 12 vols. 8vo. ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 44, Saturday, August 31, 1850 • Various
... You know who I mean. Why, she's even taught me to cut out slang. Say, Bobby, I didn't know how much like a rough-neck I used to talk. I never opened my yawp but what I spilled a line of fricasseed gab so twisted and frazzled and shredded you could use it to stuff sofa-cushions; but now I've handed that string of talk the screw number. No more slang ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... and lowering herself upon the kitchen couch, the springs of which squeaked complainingly under her weight, "Wa-al, 'tain't scurcely wuth doin' the dishes now. Jason'll stop and gab 'ith some one. It takes him ferever an' a day ter git a pail o' water. You go on about your play, Niece Janice. I'll git 'em ...
— Janice Day at Poketown • Helen Beecher Long
... cauld hand held a light: By which heroic Tam was able To note, upon the haly table, A murderer's banes, in gibbet-airns; Twa span-lang, wee, unchristened bairns; A thief, new-cutted frae a rape— Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape; Five tomahawks, wi' bluid red-rusted; Five scimitars, wi' murder crusted; A garter which a babe had strangled; A knife a father's throat had mangled, Whom, his ain son o' life bereft— The grey-hairs yet stack to the heft; Wi' mair of horrible ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... lesson, de scientia media, and sustenit the disputt thairupon, and was approven in both. The following ministers were present, Mr. Patrik Gillespie, Mr. David Dicksone, Doctor Jhone Strang, Mr. Zach. Boyde, Mr. George Young, Mr. Hew Blair, Mr. Gab. Conyngham, Mr. David Benett, Mr. Matthew Mackill. Mr. Wm. Young, Mr. Arch. Dennestoune, Mr. Jhone Carstaires, Mr. James Hamilton." The presbytery "ordaines Mr. Hugh Binnen to make ye exercise this daye fyfteen dayes, and the rest ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... be [1] True to this fraternity; That I will in all obey Rule and order of the lay. Never blow the gab or squeak; [2] Never snitch to bum or beak; [3] But religiously maintain Authority of those who reign Over Stop Hole Abbey green, [4] Be their tawny king, or queen. In their cause alone will fight; Think what they think, ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... would break down the ceremonious reserve of the severest old patriarch in the whole Greek Church, and completely carry him by storm; while I could only sit by and smile feebly, without being able to say a word. Great is "the gift o' gab." ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... paddy," said uncle Jacob, as he saw the dominie retire; "you have beaten the minister holler. Ha! ha! ha! I am really glad you silenced his gab, for he is 'tarnally blabbing about his religion; though I think he hain't much of it himself, except counterfeit stuff, like a bad bill,—ha! ha!—that ...
— The Cross and the Shamrock • Hugh Quigley
... half hour or so to talk, Mr. Philander, sir?" he asked. "I've got a couple of ideas I'd like to gab with you about, that I think might speed up ...
— Man of Many Minds • E. Everett Evans
... they?" demanded Darrin. "And now, Danny boy, we simply must stow all gab and get busy with our lessons. We've a recitation between ...
— Dave Darrin's Third Year at Annapolis - Leaders of the Second Class Midshipmen • H. Irving Hancock
... patter, we could pack the reserved benches from dirt to canvas. Honest, we could! Say, Mister, lemme put it to you on the level. You buy in with me on this Great Australian Hippodrome, a half int'rest for twelve thou cash, leave me the transportation and talent end, while you do the polite gab at the main entrance, and if we don't lug away the daily receipts in sugar barrels I'll own the boxin' kangaroos for first cousins. Why, it's the chance of a lifetime! What do you ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... your gab, I tell you! If you speak another word, I'll have you jacketed: and then b—- me, my kiddy, if you get it off again ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... gab aber im Alterthum noch einen erlaubten Ausweg fuer die Verbindung vorneluner Maenner mit geringen (freien und selbst unfreien) Frauen, den Concubinat, der ohne feierliches Verloebniss, ohne Brautgabe und Mitgift eingegangen wurde, mithin ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 47, Saturday, September 21, 1850 • Various
... his race he possessed the gift of gab, as the silver in the tongue and the gold in the full or thick-lipped mouth are oftentimes contemptuously characterized. And like many of his race he was a devoted student of the Bible to whose interpretation he brought like many other Bible students, not confined ...
— Right on the Scaffold, or The Martyrs of 1822 - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 7 • Archibald H. Grimke
... The bunch here reckoned as I, bein' gifted with the knack of gab, it fer me to speak for 'em. They're tongue- tied when there's a ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders on the Great American Desert • Jessie Graham Flower
... general, with an air in which authority and supplication were equally prominent, "you've told an awful sight of lies in your time. Don't deny it, now—nobody that ever reads the papers will b'leeve you. Now's yer chance to put yer gift of gab to a respectable use. The lady's bothered, and wants to say somethin' or ask somethin', and she'll understand your lingo better'n ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... growled Bennie. "On to more than you'll ever be. You have to empty the gab from your head to ...
— Blue Goose • Frank Lewis Nason
... ich den pfaffen raten an den triuwen min, So spraeche ir haut den armen zuo: se, daz ist din, Ir zunge suenge, unde lieze mengem man daz sin, Gedaehten daz ouch si dur Got waeren almuosenaere. Do gab ir erste teil der Kuenik Konstantin, Het er gewest, daz da von uebel kuenftik waere, So het er wol underkomen des riches swaere, Wan daz si do waren kiusche, und uebermuete laere. Hagen, Minnesinger-Sammlung, Leipsic, 1838, ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... sloop-of-war. It was he came off and gave us warning that the Shark was coming round upon us the day Kennedy was done; and he told us how Kennedy had given the information. The gipsies and Kennedy had some quarrel besides. This Gab went to the East Indies in the same ship with your younker, and, sapperment! knew him well, though the other did not remember him. Gab kept out of his eye though, as he had served the States against England, and was a deserter to boot; and he sent us word directly, that we might know ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... got into you?" he hissed. "You're cross-grained lately. You're sore. Any more of this and I'll swear you're a disorganizer.... Now, Budd, you keep your mouth shut. And you, Cleve, you pay no heed to Budd if he does gab.... We're in bad and all the men have chips on their shoulders. We've got ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... The pithy bibliographical notes which are here and there scattered throughout this catalogue, render it of estimation in the opinion of the curious.——BALUZE. Bibliotheca Balusiana; seu catalogus librorum bibliothecae D.S. Baluzii, A. Gab. Martin, Paris, 1719, 8vo., two vols. Let any enlightened bibliographers read the eulogy upon the venerable Baluze (who died in his eighty-eighth year, and who was the great Colbert's librarian), in the preface of the Bibl. Colbertina (vide post), and in the Dict. Hist. (Caen, ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... about 'm, Tom—cut your gab an' finish 'im," and here came the clatter of chairs ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... Uncle Gab. And when I take a fancy to a young fellow, my Lord, I don't allow any social prejudices to stand in the way. I should say just the same if you were a mere nobody. We ought to see more of one another. I should esteem ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 25, 1893 • Various
... tackle, and Mrs. Biggs was there with her gab, if she is my niece, and said I got ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... noch ausserdem das Werk von der groessten Bedeutung, indem es mich an das Miterlebte theils erinnerte, theils mir manches Uebersehene nun vorfuehrte, mich auf einem unerwarteten Standpunkt versetzte, mir zu erwaegen gab was ich fuer abgeschlossen hielt, und besonders auch mich befaehigte die Gegner dieses wichtigen Werkes, an denen es nicht fehlen kann, zu beurtheilen und die Einwendungen, die sie von ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... to the door and stood looking at it. In such a strait he would naturally have welcomed the visitor, scratching on the panel, and crying to any human body without to come in and see what had befallen his master. But Auld Jock had bade him "haud 'is gab" there, as in Greyfriars kirkyard. So he held to loyal silence, although the knocking and shaking of the latch was insistent and the lodgers were astir. The voice of the old ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson
... Bunkum here too, as well as there. Slavery speeches are all Bunkum; so are reform speeches, too. Do you think them fellers that keep up such an everlastin' gab about representation, care one cent about the extension of franchise? Why no, not they; it's only to secure their seats to gull their constituents, to get a name. Do you think them goneys that make such a touss about the Arms' Bill, care about ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... hear from one of Brandt's men, who rode into Pitt just before we left, that you had new friends here by that name. This fellow was a handsome chap, no common sort, but lordly, dissipated and reckless as the devil. He had a servant traveling with him, a sailor, by his gab, who was about the toughest customer I've met in many a day. He cut a fellow in bad shape at Pitt. These two will be on the next boat, due here in a day or so, according to river and weather conditions, an' I thought, considerin' how unusual the thing was, ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... how I wanted to be a lawyer and go into politics? I still think I might have made a go of it. I've kind of got the gift of the gab—anyway, I can think on my feet, and make some kind of a spiel on most anything, and of course that's the thing you need in politics. By golly, Ted's going to law-school, even if I didn't! Well—I guess it's worked out all right. Myra's been a fine ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... hear nothing," sais I, "but two Frenchmen ashore a jawing like mad. One darsen't, and t'other is afraid to fight, so they are taking it out in gab—they ain't worth listening to. How do they tell you ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... with your scarf, Jim,' said Murgatroyd. 'When Venables comes he will soon find a way to check his gab. Yes,' he continued, looking at the back of my papers, 'it is marked, as you say, "From James the Second of England, known lately as the Duke of Monmouth, to Henry Duke of Beaufort, President of Wales, by the hand of Captain Micah Clarke, of Saxon's regiment of Wiltshire foot." Cast off the ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of the squadron were engaged in the usual after mess gab fest, an orderly entered with a summons for McGee and Larkin to report to Major Cowan. Larkin had just that day secured a misfitting regulation issue uniform from the Supply Officer, Robinson, and the group had been having a great deal of fun at ...
— Aces Up • Covington Clarke
... March," answered Remsen, "that makes a good lawyer. Brains count some. If you get where you can conduct a case to a successful result you will never miss the 'gift o' the gab.' Talking's the little end of the horn in my profession, ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... that he's drivin' at: what'ull you bet me there isn't a woman in the case? Fact! 'Pon my word there is. And a devilish fine woman, too!" He shut one eye and laid a finger along his nose. "You won't blow the gab?—that's why you couldn't have your parleyvoo this morning. When milady comes to town H. O.'s NON EST as long as she's here. And she with a hubby of her own, too! What 'ud our old pa ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... must get our business finished, and we can talk after. I am offerin' three hundred pounds, twenty acres of land, five cows, six sheep, three clockin' hens, and a clutch of ducklin's, and want to know without any palaverin' or old gab, whether or not yourself and Sir Denis are prepared to ...
— Duty, and other Irish Comedies • Seumas O'Brien
... she reflected, "if the poor chap shouldn't have the gift of the gab, Abel's a good everyday workin' name, and he can drop the E if it suits 'im. 'Tain't always them as has most to say does most, that's certain; and why his father's so set on him being one of those chaps forever standing on platforms ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... notch on the eccentric rod of a steam-engine for fitting a pin in the gab-lever to break the connection ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... little varmin," he cried, "gab on. You thought you could outwit Jack, ded 'ee? Well, you be quiet ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... matter? You look as if you'd been up against it!" And then the other would begin to pour out some tale of misery, and the man would say, "Come have a glass, and maybe that'll brace you up." And so they would drink together, and if the tramp was sufficiently wretched-looking, or good enough at the "gab," they might have two; and if they were to discover that they were from the same country, or had lived in the same city or worked at the same trade, they might sit down at a table and spend an hour or two in talk—and before they got through the saloon-keeper ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... gone all on a sudden as cool as Dick, and nothing but his stertorous breathing hinted of the rage which filled him. 'That's it, is it? Then, if you're finished, hear me. I ain't got the gift o' the gab as free as you, but I can mek plain my meanin', p'raps. I'd rather see her a-layin' theer '(he pointed with a trembling hand at the ground between them); 'I'd rather lay her there, dead afore my eyes, an' screw her in her coffin a'terwards, than you or any ...
— Julia And Her Romeo: A Chronicle Of Castle Barfield - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... us ask him to show us the scold's, or gossip's, bridle. This is a rare curiosity, which is kept in the vestry. It would seem, from all that can be learned, that two hundred years ago there were in England viragoes so virulent, women so gifted with gab and so loaded and primed with the devil's own gunpowder, that all moral suasion was wasted on them, and simply showed, as old Reisersberg wrote, that fatue agit qui ignem conatur extinguere sulphure ('t is all nonsense to try to quench fire with brimstone). For such diavolas ...
— The Gypsies • Charles G. Leland |
