"Nickname" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... quarter-master, whose real name or nickname (I forget which) was Billy Magnus, appeared over the gangway hammocks, holding the missing urchin in his immense paw, where it squealed and twisted itself about, like Gulliver between the finger and thumb of the ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... the tower for five days between September thirteenth and eighteenth. So sparing was this young "barbarian," in spite of provocative fire obviously directed from the French cathedral, that "the friend of the Rheims Cathedral" stuck to him as a nickname. ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... 1. There is a double meaning in the original, and the translator can give but half of it. Mentula, synonymous with penis, is a nickname applied by Catullus to Mamurra, of whom he says (cxv.) that he is not a man, but a great thundering mentula. Maherault has happily rendered the meaning of the epigram in French, in which language there is an equivalent for Mentula, that ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... impossible in practice, and she had scruples about it on principle. It would not seem quite truthful, although she had always most fully intended that he should be called Theodore when he had outgrown the ridiculous appropriateness of his nickname. The fact was that he had not outgrown it, but he must take care to remember who was meant when his grandfather ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... neat figure, plenty of coquesttishness, a dash of ambition and hardly any education. After having for a long time shone as the star of the supper parties of the Latin Quarter, at which she used to sing in a voice, still very fresh if not very true, a number of country ditties, which earned her the nickname under which she has since been immortalized by one of our neatest rhymsters, Mademoiselle Musette suddenly left the Rue de la Harpe to go and dwell upon the Cytherean heights of the ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... the three gentlemen two were known to Laura; she could have told you at least that the big one with the red hair was in the Guards and the other in the Rifles; the latter looked like a rosy child and as if he ought to be sent up to play with Geordie and Ferdy: his social nickname indeed was the Baby. Selina's admirers were of all ages—they ranged from infants ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... applied to Arouj by contemporaries. His name is given in Spanish or Italian form as "Orux" or "Harrach" or "Ordiche." The contemporary Arab chronicle published by S. Rang and F. Denis in 1837 says explicitly that Barbarossa was the name applied by Christians to Khair-ed-Din. It was no doubt a nickname given to the family on account of their red or tawny beards (Lat. barba). The founder of the family was Yakub, a Roumeliot, probably of Albanian blood, who settled in Mitylene after its conquest by the Turks. He was a coasting trader and skipper, and had four sons—Elias, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... being told that he must look to his own genius and not to the opinion of the world at large, he determined to abandon the honors of the Republic. That he should have talked among the young men of the day of his philosophic investigations till they laughed at him and gave him a nickname, may be probable, but it cannot have been that he ever thought ...
— Life of Cicero - Volume One • Anthony Trollope
... the nickname indicates; from Tottington in Norfolk, as we guess; the son of poor parents there. He has told me Jocelin, for I loved him much, That once in his ninth year he had an alarming dream;—as indeed we are all somewhat given to dreaming here. Little Samson, lying uneasily in his crib at Tottington, ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle
... geometrician will not mistake by the thickness of a hair. The quadrature of the circle is still, however, a favourite game with some visionaries, and several are still imagining that they have discovered the perpetual motion; the Italians nickname them matto perpetuo: and Bekker tells us of the fate of one Hartmann, of Leipsic, who was in such despair at having passed his life so vainly, in studying the perpetual motion, that at ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... cross," said Honor, laughing in spite of the violation of her slumbers. Lettice spoke so merrily, it was impossible to take offence, even at the nickname. "But I think you use rather summary measures. The sponge was horribly cold ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... strongly or as cleverly constructed as those of the Iroquois. Maize, pumpkins, and tobacco were the principal plants cultivated. Sunflowers were also raised, chiefly for the oil with which they greased their hair and bodies. Their very name meant "Shock-heads"—a nickname originating from the exclamation of some Frenchmen, when they first saw their grotesque way of wearing their hair, "Quelles hures!" (What a head of hair!) Champlain speaks of a tribe whom he met after ...
— Canada • J. G. Bourinot
... aphorisme in the Physickes. For the braines are neuer colde & wet saue when there is water on them; & those who do not Smoak haue no braines for Tobacco to benefit. (2) Your Majesties argumentation proueth how zealously your Majestie striueth to liue up to the nickname of the British Solomon. And, of a veritie, I could not myself run atilt more cunningly at this popular fallacie; though I might back up your Majestie with a most transparent illustration—to wit, that the affection of Mankind ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... Chetwood Belding's sister, and who rejoiced in the nickname at school of "Mother Wit," was a girl who possessed a very quick mind. Her mates expected a good deal of her, therefore, and it was not surprising that Dora and Dorothy Lockwood should consider that the rescue of the three boys in the lake was a simple ...
— The Girls of Central High on Lake Luna - or, The Crew That Won • Gertrude W. Morrison
... moderate and constitutional monarchists. They got their nickname because they held their meetings in the old convent formerly used by the feullants, a branch of Cistercians who, led by LaBarriere, broke away in 1577. The Feuillant Club was ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... himself great!' But I, I inherited fortune and position, I have studied, and now I am poor, I am not trusted with the most ridiculous office, and all say, 'He's a fool! He doesn't know how to live!' The curate calls me 'philosopher' as a nickname and gives to understand that I am a charlatan who is making a show of what I learned in the higher schools, when that is exactly what benefits me the least. Perhaps I really am the fool and they the wise ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... back-yard with his tongue hanging out, and wagging his tail in good-humor with all the world. Nothing could stop him, however, where strange dogs were concerned. He was a Whig dog, of course, as any one could tell by his name, which was Tippecanoe in full, and was given him because it was the nickname of General Harrison, the great Whig who won the battle of Tippecanoe. The boys' Henry Clay Club used him to pull the little wagon that they went about in singing Whig songs, and he would pull five or six boys, guided simply ...
— Boy Life - Stories and Readings Selected From The Works of William Dean Howells • William Dean Howells
... orthodoxy; and its outspoken and even aggressive vindication by physicists of the eminence of Huxley had a potent influence upon the attitude taken towards metaphysics, and upon the form which subsequent Christian apologetics adopted. As a nickname the term "agnostic'' was soon misused to cover any and every variation of scepticism, and just as popular preachers confused it with atheism (q.v.) in their denunciations, so the callow freethinker—following Tennyson's path of "honest doubt''—classed ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... suppose. But the cloud being rolled away I have spoken, and I don't care so much. I can face things with a quiet mind now that I have told you the truth in its own terms. You may call it sentimentality or any other nickname you like. It is quite true that it was not intended for a scientific statement. Since it annoys you, let it be extinguished. But please believe that it was serious to me if it was comedy to you. I have said that I love you and honor you and would hold you dearest of all the world. Now ...
— The Woman in Black • Edmund Clerihew Bentley
... country. A foolish parson had preached a foolish sermon against the principles of the Revolution. The wisest members of the Government were for letting the man alone. But Godolphin, inflamed with all the zeal of a new-made Whig, and exasperated by a nickname which was applied to him in this unfortunate discourse, insisted that the preacher should be impeached. The exhortations of the mild and sagacious Somers were disregarded. The impeachment was brought; the doctor ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... France his comrade called him only Mademoiselle Fifi. This nickname was bestowed upon him on account of his coquettish style of dressing and manners, his slender waist, which looked as if it were laced in a corset, his pale face on which a nascent mustache could hardly be seen, and also on account of the habit he had acquired, ...
— Mademoiselle Fifi • Guy de Maupassant
... and beasts had sharper sense than men, who are of a middle form. The Romans wore the same habit at funerals and feasts. It is most certain that an extreme fear and an extreme ardour of courage equally trouble and relax the belly. The nickname of Trembling with which they surnamed Sancho XII., king of Navarre, tells us that valour will cause a trembling in the limbs as well as fear. Those who were arming that king, or some other person, who upon the like occasion was wont to be in the same disorder, tried ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... the original the title is 'Fatteh Khân, the valiant weaver.' Victor Prince is a very fair translation of the name Fatteh Khân. The original says his nickname or familiar name was Fattû, which would answer exactly to Vicky for Victor. Fattû is a familiar (diminutive form) of the full name Fatteh Khân. See Proper Names of Panjâbîs, passim, for the explanation ...
— Tales Of The Punjab • Flora Annie Steel
... he had given up practice for a number of years, he was an excellent doctor. Sir James Paget has told me that when he and "the Professor" [Leigh's nickname at the Table] were fellow-students at "Bart's," the latter was considered quite the best man of his year. He was admirable at diagnosis, and I shall never forget one of his prognostications. He was in the company of a number of litterateurs and artists who were dining together. A well-known ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... had been laid to dry over a baker's oven. And thus she had some joke to crack upon every one: but she laughed more than all at a good king who was there. 'Look at him,' said she; 'his beard is like an old mop; he shall be called Grisly-beard.' So the king got the nickname of Grisly-beard. ...
— Grimms' Fairy Tales • The Brothers Grimm
... the chalet were enough to keep me in good cheer. There were William McClingan, a Scotchman of a great gift of dignity and a nickname inseparably connected with his fame. He wrote leaders for a big weekly and was known as Waxy McClingan, to honour a pale ear of wax that took the place of a member lost nobody could tell how. He drank deeply at times, but never to ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... boys before. Percival seemed to me quite big, though he was one year younger than Sharley and smaller for his age. Quintin was more like Nan, slow and solemn and rather fat, so his nickname of Quick certainly didn't suit him very well. But they were both very nice and kind to me. I am quite sure Sharley had talked to them well about it before I came, though it was easy to see that ...
— My New Home • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... where there is plenty of room to turn around. She is a wide-awake, resourceful girl who will instantly win her way into the hearts of other girls. And what good times she has!—with her pets, her friends, and her many interests. "Chicken Little" is the affectionate nickname given to her when she is very, very good, but when she misbehaves ...
— Mary Jane's City Home • Clara Ingram Judson
... now call up a different and a more commonplace type of the book-hunter—it shall be Inchrule Brewer. He is guiltless of all intermeddling with the contents of books, but in their external attributes his learning is marvellous. He derived his nickname, from the practice of keeping, as his inseparable pocket-companion, one of those graduated folding measures of length which may often be seen protruding from the moleskin pocket of the joiner. ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... to the 'big grand shop,' where I saw in the master the veritable Billy Egg. He was a fine portly personage, with a good open countenance, and it was evident he could not have acquired his nickname from bearing even the most remote resemblance to an egg. He served me himself with zeal and civility, and my ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... is a request he often makes to his wife and children. In 1886 the Rt. Hon. W. H. Smith became leader of the House of Commons, and had thus reached one of the highest positions any Englishman can occupy. "Old Morality" was the nickname by which he was known; and this term is one of great honour. No man ever gained higher respect from all parties, and no man was ever more fully trusted by the people at large. Thus though Mr. Smith never entered the Church, and perchance missed ...
— Beneath the Banner • F. J. Cross
... college nickname bestowed upon a small society of students at Oxford, who met together between 1729 and 1735 for the purpose of mutual improvement. They were accustomed to communicate every week, to fast regularly on Wednesdays and Fridays, ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... niver lit tu come here," said the road-mender, slyly. His toothless mouth extended into the perpetual smile which had earned him the nickname of "Happy Jack," over sixty years since, when he had been the ...
— Peter's Mother • Mrs. Henry De La Pasture
... are older than those already mentioned, and do not seem to have their roots in other lands, but to be the expression of the Mujik's own mind in its waking moments: thus the "Khlystsy"—the name is a nickname taken from the word "Khlyst" (a whip)—date back to the early days of the Seventeenth Century. They hold that Christ has made and still makes repeated appearances on earth and in Russia, and indeed they are ...
— Russia - As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Various
... next to her was the youngest of her two daughters, and might be about thirteen years of age. Her name was Matilda, but infantine circumstances had invested her with the nickname of Mimmy, by which her mother always called her. A nice, pretty, playful little girl was Mimmy Thompson, wearing two long tails of plaited hair hanging, behind her head, and inclined occasionally to be rather loud in ...
— The Chateau of Prince Polignac • Anthony Trollope
... regular feature and less clear complexion, so as to look as if he were the elder of the brothers, Prince Edmund moved by his side, using much exertion, and bending with the effort, so as to increase the slight sloop that had led to his historical nickname of the Crouchback, though some think this was merely taken from his crusading cross. He bore the arms of Sicily, to which he had not yet resigned his claim. His eye wandered, but not far away, like ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... probably a Samuel Jones whose name Lord Northmoor had noted as a boy on board David's ship. He belonged to a decent family in a country village, but had run away to sea, and was known at Westhaven by this nickname. He had a brother settled in Canada, who had lately written to propose to him a berth on one of the Ontario steamers, and it was poor Mrs. Hall's dread that her daughter should accompany him, though happily want of money prevented it. As to his appearance, as to which there had been ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... AMEDEE, nickname bestowed on Felix de Vandenesse by Lady Dudley when she thought she saw a rival in Madame de Mortsauf. ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... said, shakingly. "H-how have they treated you, Buster?" It was a nickname he had given his son when he was a sturdy, round-faced urchin of eight, and which he had laid away regretfully in lavender, so to speak, when the boy grew ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... came in again, and began to waken up people; he named each one by name, not forgetting to add some nickname, and asking whether so-and-so was awake. When he saw they were all awake, he said he was going to play with the door now, and with that he threw the door off its hinges with a sudden jerk, and sent it far ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang
... with them were Herb Fennington and Jimmy Plummer, slightly younger but nearly enough of an age to be good comrades. Jimmy was round and fat and fond of good living, a trait which had earned him the nickname of "Doughnuts." Herb was rather easy-going and fond of telling jokes, of which he always had a stock ...
— The Radio Boys at the Sending Station - Making Good in the Wireless Room • Allen Chapman
... replied. The new name struck on her ear a little oddly, but it pleased her, she had never liked Dagmar, and utterly despised the mill girls' nickname "Daggie." ...
— The Girl Scout Pioneers - or Winning the First B. C. • Lillian C Garis
... Black, Greathead, Longshanks, etc., told what a person in the eyes of men the owner presented. The hereditary or aristocratic process has killed this entirely. Men no longer make their names; even the poor foundlings, like Oliver Twist, are christened alphabetically by some Bumble the Beadle. But the nickname restores his lost rights, and takes the man at once out of the ignoble vulgus to give him identity. We recognize this gift and are proud of our nicknames, when we can get them to suit us. Only the sharp judgment of our peers reverses our own heraldry ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... when the last line reached him. They were unexpected. Then, as be faced the laughing eyes down in the street, Dalzell justified his nickname by one of those broad smiles that had made him famous ...
— Dave Darrin's Fourth Year at Annapolis • H. Irving Hancock
... with Reedville, but Joe was not called on. Toe Barter, who had gained his nickname from the queer habit he had of digging a hole for his left foot, before delivering the ball, opened the contest, and did so well that he was kept in until the game was "in the refrigerator." Then Joe was given his chance, but there was little incentive ...
— Baseball Joe in the Big League - or, A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles • Lester Chadwick
... an early period of our struggle, when the nation was groping its way to light, and are not likely to occur again. Let unworthy men sleep in the oblivion they deserve, and let others of better natures, who were then blind, but now see, not be taunted with their inconsiderate acts. The nickname of Gibeonites, applied to the colonists, may, however, be fitly remembered. It may now justly claim rank with the honored titles of Puritan and Methodist. The higher officers of the army were uniformly respectful and disposed to cooeperation. One of these ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... idleness after the rough method of Auvergne, but the mother was by to excuse and to protect. In vain Astier-Rehu scolded and snapped his jaw, a prominent feature which, in the days when he was a professor, had gained him the nickname of Crocodilus. In the last resort, he would threaten to pack his trunk and go back ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... Buffalmacco refused to say. Nevertheless they promised faithfully to get him what he wanted; for they knew him to possess the merriest wit in the world and the most fertile in amusing contrivances, having earned his nickname of Buffalmacco for these very qualities. And truly he knew some excellent turns, ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France
... sustenance; and that nothing but evil could accrue from such an act, was of course as clear as noonday. Now, when I came to trace this rumor to its source, I became apprised that it owed its publicity to an old man of our number known by the nickname of 'Mister,' who was remarkable for a rare amount of credulity, self-conceit, and obstinacy, and at the same time for being the invariable butt of his company. This wiseacre averred that he had succeeded in wringing from Mrs. Rose the confession that directly she and old Bill were made ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... Cowasji Jehangir Readymoney, an Indian baronet, who inherited immense wealth from a long line of Parsee bankers. They have adopted as a sort of trademark, a nickname given by some wag to the founder of the family, in the last century because of his immense fortune and success in trade. Mr. Readymoney, or Sir Jehangir, as he is commonly known, the present head of the house, was accompanied by his wife, two daughters, their governess, and his son, who had ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis
... of surnames were taken even before the Conquest. Titles of office were usually placed after the personal name, as AElfred King, Lilla Thegn, Wulfnoth Cild, AElfward Bishop, AEthelberht Ealdorman, and Harold Earl. Double names occasionally occur, the second being a nickname or true surname, as Osgod Clapa, Benedict Biscop, Thurkytel Myranheafod, Godwine Bace, and AElfric Cerm. Trade names are also found, as Ecceard smith, or Godwig boor. Everywhere, but especially in the Danish North, patronymics were in common use; for example, Harold Godwine's ...
— Early Britain - Anglo-Saxon Britain • Grant Allen
... that this servant of my Uncle Toby's, who went by the name of Trim, had been a corporal in my Uncle's own company. His real name was James Butter, but having got the nickname of Trim in the regiment, my Uncle Toby, unless when he happened to be very angry with him, would never call ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... abated. If the chancellor of the exchequer could show no surplus in 1826, he could at least boast that after so desperate a crisis there was no deficit, and he had no reason to be ashamed of Cobbett's nickname, "Prosperity Robinson," which he owed to his optimism, largely founded upon facts. Before the close of the year 1826, however, this optimism received a rude shock. The agitation against the corn laws ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... Christianly-simple faith to believe them: and since the majority of Klaus's auditors were not excessively that way disposed, the accounts of the boy were held for so much downright swagger; and the poor ghost-seer acquired, to the no small vexation of his parent, the unenviable nickname of Mike's Lying Klaus. It was very singular, however, and could not fail to be remarked by every reflecting mind, that all the stories related by young Nicholas were in close connexion with the notorious well belonging to his father. There it was that ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... of our school when Raffles was captain of cricket. I believe he owed his nickname entirely to the popular prejudice against a day-boy; and in view of the special reproach which the term carried in my time, as also of the fact that his father was one of the school trustees, partner in a banking firm of four resounding surnames, and manager of the local branch, ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... beginning of the eleventh century, Robert, called "The Magnificent," the fifth in succession from the great chieftain Rollo who had established the Northmen in France, was duke of Normandy. To the nickname he earned by his nobleness and liberality some chronicles have added another, and call him "Robert the Devil," by reason of his reckless and violent deeds of audacity, whether in private life or in warlike expeditions. ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... Democratic politicians known as the "Albany regency," which ruled N.Y. politics for more than a generation, and was largely responsible for the introduction of the "Spoils System" into state and national affairs. Van Buren's proficiency in this variety of politics earned him the nickname of "Little Magician." In 1821 he was elected to the U.S. Senate, and in 1828 governor of N.Y., and in the following year was made secretary of state by President Jackson, who used his influence to obtain the nomination of Van Buren for president in 1836. William Henry ...
— The Greatest Highway in the World • Anonymous
... in his time a journeyman pressman, a "bear" in compositors' slang. The continued pacing to and fro of the pressman from ink-table to press, from press to ink-table, no doubt suggested the nickname. The "bears," however, make matters even by calling the compositors monkeys, on account of the nimble industry displayed by those gentlemen in picking out the type from the hundred and fifty-two compartments of ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... Birchlegs; the poor rebellious wretches having taken to the woods; and been obliged, besides their intolerable scarcity of food, to thatch their bodies from the cold with whatever covering could be got, and their legs especially with birch bark; sad species of fleecy hosiery; whence their nickname),—his Birkebeins I guess always to have been a kind of Norse Jacquerie: desperate rising of thralls and indigent people, driven mad by their unendurable sufferings and famishings,—theirs the deepest stratum of misery, and the densest ...
— Early Kings of Norway • Thomas Carlyle
... name was Tripper, but Snow; but her father for some unknown reason got the nickname of Tripper, and his sons and daughters were also called by it, and would hardly have answered if addressed as Snow—was one of the prettiest girls in Leigh; so thought William Robson, a young artist, ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... menaces and obscenities, as she brandished a revolver. The Vengeurs de Lutece, hard-pressed and dispirited, looked stolidly at their white-faced prisoner against the wall, and then looked in each other's faces. Her fury redoubled; threatening them collectively, addressing each man by some vile nickname, pacing in front of them with a bold swing of the powerful hips, the woman dominated them, intoxicated them with ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... Captain Macshane; his intimates occasionally in sport called him Nosey, from the prominence of that feature in his countenance; or Spindleshins, for the very reason which brought on the first Edward a similar nickname. Mr. Macshane then quitted Worcester, mounted on Hayes's horse; leaving all parties at the "Three Rooks" not a little anxious for ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of unworldly inspiration. All who saw him were powerfully attracted, but half-unconsciously felt a slight doubt whether even so fine a specimen of manhood was quite fitly organized and equipped for the strife of existence. At the university he had been given the nickname of Wilhelmina, on account of a certain gentleness and delicacy of manner, and because he neither drank nor smoked. Such jokes, not ill-natured, were directed against his outward appearance, but had a shade of meaning as ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... speaks truthfully," remarked Nappy Boney, the only Frenchman in camp, and possessing a nickname playfully contracted from the name of the first emperor. "La gloire is nothing to them. Comprehends any one that they know not even of France's most ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... that it was changing, with his expression, even as I spoke, and in spite of his kindly tone and kindlier use of my old school nickname. His next words showed ...
— The Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... relatives were hard up. It seemed they just couldn't get on. They managed to scratch a lean living for themselves, and that was all. Cady—he was the saloonkeeper—had been a soldier in my father's company, and he always swore by Captain Kit, which was their nickname for him. My father had kept the surgeons from amputating his leg in the war, and he never forgot it. He was making money in the hotel and saloon, and I found out afterward he helped out a lot to pay the doctors and to bury my mother alongside of father. I was to ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... Licksy?' a drunken man called from the back of the crowd, and the nickname stuck to the great discoverer during the ...
— Tales of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... tall and thin boy, who seemed to answer to the queer name of "Lil Artha;" he had evidently been dubbed so by his comrades as an undersized cub, and when shooting up later on had been unable to shake off the absurd nickname. ...
— Afloat - or, Adventures on Watery Trails • Alan Douglas
... 'Doctor,' Mr. Elshawe; just 'Mister.' My boys like to call me 'Doctor,' but it's sort of a nickname. I don't have a degree, and I don't claim one. I don't want the public thinking I'm claiming to be something ...
— By Proxy • Gordon Randall Garrett
... mother mind Mr. Trowell's father. His name was Mr. Ben Trowell. I call him, Bub Ben. Bub was for brother. Dat de way we call folks den—didn't call 'em by dere names straight out. Mr. Trowell's mother we call, Muss, for Miss. Sort of a nickname. We call Mr. Harry Fitts grandmother, ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... Mannering, I wish I could stop, for I have incredible pain in telling the rest of my story; although I am sure I can warn you against any intentional impropriety on the part of my temporary ward, Julia Mannering. But I must still earn my college nickname of Downright Dunstable. In one word, ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... into Suffolk. It is worth asking how Suffolk came to earn the nickname of Silly Suffolk. 'Silly,' say the learned, is derived from the German selig, meaning 'holy or blessed,' and is said to have been applied to Suffolk on account of the number of beautiful churches it contains; Suffolk, at any ...
— East Anglia - Personal Recollections and Historical Associations • J. Ewing Ritchie
... to guessing," said Macaroni, as he stretched his lank legs, which had, in part, earned him the nickname. "That fake lieutenant is planning some game with the German spy, ...
— The Moving Picture Boys on the War Front - Or, The Hunt for the Stolen Army Films • Victor Appleton
... and new the first modern English police force had been established in 1829 by Sir Robert Peel — from which the British nickname of ...
— The Lumley Autograph • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... miscreants named our excellent friend. The nickname he could easily have forgiven, but the allusion to the divine source of all his melodious joy would have irritated even him. Let us hope he never knew ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope
... he was the son of a baker; and we learn from Johnson's Dictionary that the word "simnel" signified a kind of sweet-bread or cake. Now, considering the uncertainty and mutability of surnames in former times, I am led to suspect that "Simnel" may have been a nickname first applied to his father, in allusion to his trade; and I am strengthened in my suspicion by not finding any such name as "Simnel" in any index of ancient names. Could any of your correspondents throw light on this question, or tell whether ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 81, May 17, 1851 • Various
... talked for hours. Sacobie Bear was a great gossip for one of his race. In fact, he had a Micmac nickname which, translated, meant "the man who deafens his friends with much talk." Archer, however, was pleased with his ready chatter ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... longest that's in the books; but papa says that there are so many little folks who like us and come to live with us, that we mustn't spend time on long names. Oh, I've just thought! I'll name her 'Amy.' That's short, isn't it? Could a body nickname it? We don't like nicknames here. I'm the only one. I'm sometimes 'Nan' to papa. When the baby last before this one came, mamma named her Abby after Grandmother Abigail. Then she thought we couldn't ever stop to say Ab-i-ga-il, so she shortened it to Abby. Next thing, listen. Abby was crying one ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... west of France at the time of the Revolution and joined the royalists of La Vendee. It has been suggested that the name arose from the cry they used when approaching their nocturnal rendezvous; but it is more probable that it was derived from a nickname applied to their leader Jean Cottereau (1767-1794). Originally a contraband manufacturer of salt, Cottereau along with his brothers had several times been condemned and served sentence; but the Revolution, by destroying the inland customs, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... mind—'ell on'y larf," said Mr Smith, who was a talkative young man for an Australian bushman, native to the soil. (The nickname of "Cockney" had been bestowed upon him on account of his father being a Londoner, who, like a true patriot, had left his country for his country's good.) He was a good-natured, hard-working man like the rest of the hands at the camp, but was the "bad ...
— Tom Gerrard - 1904 • Louis Becke
... kept piling up. A pilot comes back from Epsilon Eridani, for example, and insists on giving everybody left-handed salutes. Another has taken a scout ship to 61 Cygni. He insists at the Officers Club that Colonel Sagen here has a nickname of 'Old Hard-Head'. Nobody else on the base is aware of any such thing. Then, still ...
— Next Door, Next World • Robert Donald Locke
... give her the juice until only one of us is left with his eyes open. If that isn't enough to pull us clear, we'll have to give her the whole works and let her ramble by herself after we all go out. How about it, Blackie?" unconsciously falling into the old Bureau nickname. "Do you think we can make it stop at unconsciousness with ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... Disbrowe immediately closed with the man, and in less than two hours Sibbald made his appearance. He was a singular and repulsive personage, with an immense hooked nose, dark, savage-looking eyes, a skin like parchment, and high round shoulders, which procured him the nickname of Aesop among his neighbours. He was under the middle size, and of a spare figure, and in age ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... In the Historical and Geographical Dictionary of Achmed Rifaat Effendi, we are told that a certain Toklou Dede was the guardian of the tombs of the companions of Khaled, who took part in the first siege of Constantinople (673) by the Saracens. 'His real name was Ghazi Ismail; Dogulu was his nickname. Now Dogh is the Persian for a drink named Airan (a mixture of curds and water), and he was called Dogulu Dede because during the siege his business was to distribute that drink to the troops. At his request a Christian church near Aivan Serai was converted into a mosque. The church was formerly ...
— Byzantine Churches in Constantinople - Their History and Architecture • Alexander Van Millingen
... uneducated, and not be ashamed to mend your ways, you may face an audience without a tremor; you will not then be a laughing-stock any more; the cultivated will no longer exercise their irony upon you and nickname you the Hellene and the Attic just because you are less intelligible than many barbarians. But above all things, do bear in mind not to ape the worst tricks of the last generation's professors; you are always nibbling at their wares; put your foot upon them once for all, and take the ancients ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata
... almost three-quarters of a century. There, at the beginning of the Civil War, was the residence of "Dr." Samuel P. Townsend. Originally a contractor, he had "discovered" a sarsaparilla, advertised it on an extensive scale, acquired a fortune and the nickname of "Sarsaparilla" Townsend. His house, a four-story brown-stone, was one of the wonders of the town. For some reason he did not live in it long, selling it in 1862 to Dr. Gorham D. Abbott, an uncle of Dr. Lyman Abbott of the "Outlook." For a number ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice
... allusions to Melchisedec, from which Tom gathered that nothing was known to the world at large as to the parentage or descent of the man they called Lord Claud, and that this title had been bestowed upon him rather as a nickname than because it ...
— Tom Tufton's Travels • Evelyn Everett-Green
... Flossy Flouncy!" cried King, and the nickname so suited the pretty, dainty little girl, that it clung to ...
— Marjorie's New Friend • Carolyn Wells
... Lecoq, the commissary's secretary added that they had become widely known, and that the unfortunate creature's force of character had won for her general respect. Among those she frequented, moreover, she was known by the nickname of "Toinon the Virtuous"—a rather vulgar but, at all events, sincere tribute to ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... whose opinions were valued highly in the settlement of all village disputes, so that he had earned for himself the nickname of "Clacking Joe," stood still as they once more turned their backs on the threatening sea, and ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... whose nickname honored a gymnastic feat which no other Madigan, however athletic, could accomplish half so successfully as the ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... fortunate, or unfortunate, enough not to know this admirable story, it may be well to say that the title is the nickname of a young person, more pleasing than proper, who forms part of a convoy or cartel of non-combatants passing through the Prussian lines in 1871. The Prussian officer, imitating more mildly (and without the additional villainy) the conduct of Colonel Kirke, refuses passage to the ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... great disfavour. He was the town beggar, known far and wide in Ithaca as the greediest and laziest knave in the whole island. His real name was Arnaeus, but from being employed to run errands about the place he had received the nickname of Irus. Highly indignant at finding his rights usurped by a new-comer, and thinking to find in that battered old man an easy victim, he began to rate his supposed rival in a big, blustering voice: "Give place, ...
— Stories from the Odyssey • H. L. Havell
... supposed to be a joke," explained the gate-man. "Your brother's nickname is Bun, you say. Well, a bun is something good to eat, but I hope you don't eat your ...
— Six Little Bunkers at Grandma Bell's • Laura Lee Hope
... as well as ridiculous. The Duke of Northumberland, for example, has nothing in particular to do with Northumberland, nor does he exercise dukeship (or leadership) over anything except his private estate. The title is a perfect absurdity; it means nothing whatever; it is a mere nickname; and Mr. Percy is a fool for permitting himself to be addressed as 'My Lord Duke,' and 'Your Grace.' Indeed, even in England, gentlemen use those titles very sparingly, and servants alone habitually employ then. American citizens who are thrown, in their travels, or in their ...
— How To Behave: A Pocket Manual Of Republican Etiquette, And Guide To Correct Personal Habits • Samuel R Wells
... front, near Lake Champlain, where Abercromby now went by the opprobrious nickname of 'Mrs Nabbycrumby,' 'The General put out orders that the breastwork should be lined with troops, and to fire three rounds for joy, and give thanks to God in a Religious Way.' But the joy was more whole-hearted among the little, half-forgotten garrisons of Nova ...
— The Great Fortress - A Chronicle of Louisbourg 1720-1760 • William Wood
... and afterwards at Hampton Court and Windsor. He got his nickname from his habit of saying that grounds which he was asked to lay out had capabilities. Lord Chatham wrote of him:—'He writes Lancelot Brown Esquire, en titre d'office: please to consider, he ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... communicate" for the prison of Mazas, or for Saint-Lazare. He had, as they say, "a good nut." He seemed to have taken his head—round as a bullet—out of a box of marbles, and it is from that, I think, that his comrades of the press—all determined billiard-players—had given him that nickname, which was to stick to him and be made illustrious by him. He was always as red as a tomato, now gay as a lark, now grave as a judge. How, while still so young—he was only sixteen and a half years old when I saw him for the first time—had he already won his way ...
— The Mystery of the Yellow Room • Gaston Leroux
... that though I give up all but two or three routine and neighboring engagements in the summer. I might plan so as to accept yours. But I find I can not come as you ask. My summer months must be devoted otherwise. I hope you will not nickname me No, for my so constantly using that monosyllable to you. Indeed, I will try ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... on their floors, yet it was never known that they had given so much as a penny or a crust in charity; they never went to mass; grumbled perpetually at paying tithes; and were, in a word, of so cruel and grinding a temper, as to receive from all those with whom they had any dealings the nickname of ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... leader. The officers and men who served under him believed in him enthusiastically, and, what with soldiers is the convincing assurance of whole-souled confidence, they had bestowed on him an affectionate nickname—they knew him among themselves as 'little Bobs.' His administrative capacity he had proved in the post of Quartermaster-General in India. Ripe in experience of war, Roberts at the age of forty-seven was in the full vigour of manhood, alert in mind, and of tough and enduring physique. ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... It would be hard to imagine two brothers more unlike than Thomas and William Fenelby, for if Thomas Fenelby was inclined to be small in stature and precise in his manner, William was all that his nickname of Billy implied, and was not so many years out of his college foot-ball eleven, where he had won a place because of his size and strength. Billy Fenelby, after having been heroized by innumerable girls during his ...
— The Cheerful Smugglers • Ellis Parker Butler
... interrupted her Grace, with a tone of contempt in her voice. "Every one laughs at him. He's the butt of the court. Do you know his nickname?" ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... rear Big Junko poled his bateau backwards and forwards exploding dynamite. Many of the bottom tiers of logs in the rollways had been frozen down, and Big Junko had to loosen them from the bed of the stream. He was a big man, this, as his nickname indicated, built of many awkwardnesses. His cheekbones were high, his nose flat, his lips thick and slobbery. He sported a wide, ferocious straggling mustache and long eye-brows, under which gleamed little fierce eyes. His forehead sloped back like a beast's, but was always hidden by ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... chase a hostile submarine which had been located by seaplanes and reported by wireless in a given locality. This, however, was what they were intended for, but bore little relation to the work they actually accomplished. Their nickname was "Scooters," and they certainly did ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... Burrell, best," continued Grace, "but they were all interesting. The girl who owned the car was a Miss McCarthy, a true Irish colleen and awfully witty. She and Nora O'Malley swore friendship on sight. Then there was a stout girl whose nickname was 'Buster,' and a quiet, brown-eyed girl named Hazel Holland. They write to me occasionally and they are all going to Overton when they ...
— Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... "that long, pale chap,—lives over toward the Dragon Spring. Confucian, very strict; keen reader; might be a mandarin, but prefers the country gentleman sort; bally mischief-maker, he's done more people in the eye than all the Yamen hacks and all their false witnesses together! Hence his nickname—the Sword-Pen." ...
— Dragon's blood • Henry Milner Rideout
... "Yes. A mere nickname, of course, though an ominous one," said Roger. "You see, the Dalahaides used to keep open house, and spend a great deal of money at one time, so that their ruin threw a gloom over the country even colder ...
— The Castle Of The Shadows • Alice Muriel Williamson
... and sloshed fresh water upon the grimy boards. While he worked, his mind swung slowly back to normal, so that he sang crooningly in an undertone; and the song was what he had sung for months and years, until it was a part of him and had earned him his nickname. ...
— The Long Shadow • B. M. Bower
... a harsh blow to know that her pet had consorted with such a person, who was not only a sheepman but had earned his nickname in a way that our best people thought not nice. He'd gone home one day years ago and found his favourite horse had been took by an Injun. Being a simple-mannered man of few words, he just said that by sundown to-morrow ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... seeming forgetfulness of their presence instantly changed. He looked up sharply, glancing right and left, and AEsop and Staupitz fell back in confusion, while Lagardere spoke to them, mocking them: "You will dub me eccentric; you will nickname me whimsical; you will damn me for a finicking stickler, and all because I am such an old-fashioned rascal as to wish to keep my correspondence to myself. There, there, don't be crestfallen. This letter makes me so merry that you shall share its treasure. ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... nickname is! Out it must come, though it carry a lie on its back. But the truth was, Argemone thought herself infinitely superior to the colonel, for which simple reason she could not in ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... to make merry at his expense, poking fun at his odd-looking garments, his uncouth appearance, and his pale, delicate face and almost white hair, which subsequently won for him the nickname of "Ghost." But when they saw that Horace was too good humored and too much in earnest with his work to be disturbed by their teasing, they gave it up. In a short time he became a general favorite, not ...
— Eclectic School Readings: Stories from Life • Orison Swett Marden
... came up just then, his freckles seeming to the girls to loom up larger and browner than ever now that they knew the origin of his nickname. "Shady says the roan's too skittish for any of ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... disunionists and their more dangerous because more timid and cunning accomplices. Rebellion smells no sweeter because it is called Secession, nor does Order lose its divine precedence in human affairs because a knave may nickname it Coercion. Secession means chaos, and Coercion the exercise of legitimate authority. You cannot dignify the one nor degrade the other by any verbal charlatanism. The best testimony to the virtue of coercion is the fact that no wrongdoer ever thought well of ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... to which we have alluded already in speaking of LES TRAVAILLEURS, are of a sort that is really indifferent in art. If Shakespeare makes his ships cast anchor by some seaport of Bohemia, if Hugo imagines Tom-Tim- Jack to be a likely nickname for an English sailor, or if either Shakespeare, or Hugo, or Scott, for that matter, be guilty of "figments enough to confuse the march of a whole history - anachronisms enough to overset all, chronology," (1) the life of their creations, the artistic truth and ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... name of the poet's for Joseph Fletcher, but the actual proper cognomen by which the man has been known on the coast since he was a lad. Most east coast fishermen have a nickname which supersedes their registered name, and "Posh" (or now "old ...
— Edward FitzGerald and "Posh" - "Herring Merchants" • James Blyth
... originally numerous and almost innumerably reproduced and varied portraits; not extremely tall, but of a goodly height, somewhat shortened by his lameness and massive make, the head being distinguished by a peculiar domed, or coned, cranium. This made 'Lord Peter' Robertson give him the nickname of 'Peveril of the Peak,' which he himself after a little adopted, and which, shortened to 'Peveril,' was commonly used by his family. His expression, according to the intelligence of those who saw him and the mood in which he found himself, has been variously described as 'heavy,' 'homely,' ...
— Sir Walter Scott - Famous Scots Series • George Saintsbury
... R. Joshua, the son of Korcha, every day they examined the witnesses under a substituted (feigned) name, for example, "Jose shall beat Jose." When the judgment was finished, they could not execute him under the nickname, but they withdrew all men outside, and interrogated the principal witness, and said to him, "tell us clearly what thou hast heard?" and he said it. And the judges stood up on their feet, and rent their garments,(402) and they were never sewn again. And the second witness said, "even I ...
— Hebrew Literature
... was felt. In Africa and India, and wherever British honor was involved, he was the resolute and unsparing enemy of that odious system of bluster and swagger and might against right, on which Lord Beaconsfield and his colleagues bestowed the tawdry nickname ...
— The Grand Old Man • Richard B. Cook
... omnibus which had posted to the railway station would return bouncing and light as an empty hearse. How long would the thing last? How long would the twenty-five or thirty little ones who remained take to die? This was what Monsieur the Director, or rather, to give him the nickname which he had himself invented, Monsieur the Grantor-of-Certificates-of-death Pondevez, was asking himself one morning as he sat opposite Mme. Polge's venerable ringlets, taking a hand in this lady's ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... have been even less self-congratulatory if he had known the Windsor Theater's reputation. Being a comparative stranger in the metropolis, he was unaware that its nickname in theatrical circles was "The Mugs' Graveyard"—a title which had been bestowed upon it not without reason. Built originally by a slightly insane old gentleman, whose principal delusion was that the public was pining for a constant supply of the Higher Drama, ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill
... well-made man, with a curling, grizzled head, and a well-featured face. It is possible that in his youth the word 'dapper' may have applied to him; a forgotten fact which perhaps accounted for his nickname. He gazed with an open mouth and puzzled, blear eyes at the ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann
... Swedish parentage, very light-complexioned, very large, and a splendid mechanic, as Swedes are apt to be when they try. Gunderson's name was, I suppose, properly entered on the company's time-book, but it never was in the nomenclature of the road. With the railroaders' gift for abbreviation and nickname, Gunderson soon came down to "Gun," his size, head, hand or heart furnished the prefix of "Big," and "Big Gun" he remains to-day. "Big Gun" among his friends, but simple "Gun" to me. I think I called him "Gun" from ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... come back empty-handed, and Joe did not like that. He had an odd and occasionally inconvenient knack of picking up something—no matter what—wherever he went. This talent of his was well known among his friends, and had gained for him the nickname before mentioned of Thieving Joe, a title of which he was actually ...
— Two Little Travellers - A Story for Girls • Frances Browne Arthur
... grace upon him, baptizing him with his own hands with great solemnity, and with demonstration of the grace and efficacy of this most divine sacrament. The name of Pablo was given to him, which from that time on he so highly prized that if at any time he was inadvertently called by his former nickname, he showed (although with a gracious and Christian spirit) regret and disdain equal to his pleasure and pride in the name of Christian. Accordingly he would answer to those who called him Sayor: "Not Sayor, but Pablo." After his baptism we married ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XII, 1601-1604 • Edited by Blair and Robertson
... a critic, and Isaac D'Israeli, who took a by no means favourable view of Dennis, said that some of his criticisms attain classical rank. The earlier ones, which have nothing of the rancour that afterwards gained him the nickname of "Furius," are the best. They are Remarks ... (1696), on Blackmore's epic of Prince Arthur; Letters upon Several Occasions written by and between Mr Dryden, Mr Wycherley, Mr Moyle, Mr Congreve and Mr Dennis, published by Mr Dennis (1696): two pamphlets in reply to Jeremy Collier's ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... of reserve; and in 1802, another in the army of the interior. He then became one of the most assiduous and cringing courtiers at the Emperor's levies; while in the Empress's drawing-room he assumed his former air and ton of a chevalier, in hopes of imposing upon those who did not remember the nickname which his soldiers gave him ten years before, of Chevalier ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... lay the crux. There was scarcely a man in the countryside who doubted the guilt of the Tailless Tyke; but, as Jim said, where was the proof? They could but point to his well-won nickname; his evil notoriety; say that, magnificent sheep-dog as he was, he was known even in his work as a rough handler of stock; and lastly remark significantly that the grange was one of the few farms that had so far escaped unscathed. For ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... be their master," he said. "You will some day have a furnace of your own, and they will fawn to you. Your nickname will be better than their names ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... young chap with the lower limbs that were a little bowed, and which fact had doubtless suggested such a nickname to his schoolmates, there were two others busily engaged in gathering the material to be used in affording them a rude, but effective shelter during the ...
— At Whispering Pine Lodge • Lawrence J. Leslie |
