"Outwit" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... clever; the most insignificant citizen's wife can outwit an old diplomat. What science they display under the most trying and peculiar circumstances! What profound combination in their plans of vengeance! What prudence in their malice! What patience in their cruelty! ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin
... old Hindoo scriptures monkeys figure as counsellors of nonplussed heroes, and in the crisis of the Titan war the Devas themselves condescend to seek the advice of the monkey Honuman, who contrives to outwit the prince of the night-spirits. In the international fable of "Reynard the Fox," a she-monkey on the eve of the trial by battle suggests the stratagem that turns the scales against the superior strength of the wolf Isegrim. The mens aequa in arduis is, indeed, a simian characteristic. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 • Various
... has ever led so free and happy a life as he. In those days, there was peace between the animals and the Boy Man. Sometimes they challenged him to friendly contests, whereupon He-who-was-first-Created taught his little brother how to outwit them by clever tricks and devices. This he was often able to do; but not always; for sometimes the animals by their greater strength ...
— Wigwam Evenings - Sioux Folk Tales Retold • Charles Alexander Eastman and Elaine Goodale Eastman
... sir, for thus trespassing upon your valuable time, and I certainly should not have done so but for the certainty that our interests in a certain matter which I have in hand are practically identical, in so far that we both should wish to outwit a clever rogue.' ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... calling aloud. A "seat" in this exchange was worth about ninety-five thousand dollars, and so no one of these men was poor; but yet they came, day after day, to play their parts in this sordid arena, "seeking in sorrow for each other's joy": inventing a thousand petty tricks to outwit and deceive each other; rejoicing in a thousand petty triumphs; and spending their lives, like the waves upon the shore, a very symbol of human futility. Now and then a sudden impulse would seize them, and they would become like ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair
... on the back and excitedly praised him, and Clint felt suddenly that to defeat the wicked machinations of the ambitious Cupples was the biggest thing in life. After that it was a battle royal between them, Cupples using every bit of brain and sinew he possessed to outwit his opponent and Clint watching him as a cat watches a mouse and constantly out-guessing him and "getting the jump" time after time. Cupples had a bleeding lip and a smear of brown earth down one cheek and was a forbidding ...
— Left Tackle Thayer • Ralph Henry Barbour
... men rowed in silence, each one planning how to outwit the other and each one knowing that the other was planning likewise. According to Tartar ethics the bargain was a bargain. When the boat had been pulled out of danger Mehmet hastened to fulfil his end. With one jerk he loosened a ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... from over-tenderness, and want of correct information on the subject, pursue a contrary course, and consider it as almost certain death to have a particle of fresh air reach the bodies of their infants during their slumbers, are generally sure to outwit themselves, and defeat their very intentions. For by being thus tender of their children, it often turns out that whenever the mother is ill, or when on any other account she ceases to watch over them—and such times must, in general, sooner or later come—they are much more liable to ...
— The Young Mother - Management of Children in Regard to Health • William A. Alcott
... enthusiastic praise that followed the lawyer's confession. But he was painfully conscious of what now seemed to him a monstrous situation! Here was, he believed, the actual accomplice of the road agents calmly receiving the complacent and puerile confessions of the men who were seeking to outwit them. Could he, in ordinary justice to them, to himself, or the mission he conceived he was pursuing, refrain from exposing her, or warning them privately? But was he certain? Was a vague remembrance of a profile momentarily seen—and, as he must even now ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... not Bacon's fault, though he sadly mismanaged his own private affairs, that the King's expenditure was not managed soberly and wisely. Nor was it Bacon's fault, as far as advice went, that James was always trying either to evade or to outwit a Parliament which he could not, like the Tudors, overawe. Bacon's uniform counsel had been—Look on a Parliament as a certain necessity, but not only as a necessity, as also a unique and most precious means for uniting ...
— Bacon - English Men Of Letters, Edited By John Morley • Richard William Church
... he quaked as well: a detector by dishonest means feels thief-like, and is what he feels. He made some little discoveries that guided him in his own conduct; he felt more and more sure his employer would outwit him if he could, and resolved it should be ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... fellow-men; and therefore he can get work done which the mere student (it may be) has taught him ought to be done; but which the mere student, much less the mere trader or economist, could not get done; simply because his fellow-men would probably not listen to him, and certainly outwit him. Of course, in proportion to the depth, width, soundness, of his conception of human nature, will be the greatness and wholesomeness of his power. He may appeal to the meanest, or to the loftiest motives. He may be a fox or ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... Harry, he gripped his brother's hand and the boys at once set about their preparations to outwit their treacherous enemy. In the midst of their bustle an interruption as utterly unexpected as it was ...
— The Boy Aviators in Africa • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... being left to think over these things, was beginning to believe that, after all, her obduracy was not likely to be of much service to her. Would it not be wiser to treat with the enemy—perhaps to outwit him by a show of forgiveness? Here they were approaching the end of the voyage—at least, Christina seemed to intimate as much; and if they were not exactly within call of friends, they would surely be within rowing distance of some inhabited island, even Gometra, for example. And if ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... that," he said. "We have only been waiting until we were sure that you were strong enough to travel. I know that even now you could not go far, but once in the forest, we shall be able to outwit them and to travel slowly. Pita and I have been hiding up a store of food for the journey, and if you are willing we will try to make our escape to-night. There have, for the last fortnight, been men posted round us as soon as it became dark, but we shall be able either to crawl ...
— With Cochrane the Dauntless • George Alfred Henty
... corrupt officials, most of whom were said to be implicated in the late rebellion; he was the head of a community which was known to be split up into several sections, owing to acute religious disputes; and yet he contrived, at seventy-one years of age, to outwit the 60,000 Uitlanders at Johannesburg, and to present his rotten republic as a model of all that was excellent and high-minded to the world at large. At the same time he compelled his burghers to forget their own differences, as they hurled defiance at the common foe. It seems ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... of, gain the upper hand, gain the ascendancy, gain the whip hand, gain the start of; distance; surpass &c. (superiority) 33. defeat, conquer, vanquish, discomfit; euchre; overcome, overthrow, overpower, overmaster, overmatch, overset[obs3], override, overreach; outwit, outdo, outflank, outmaneuver, outgeneral, outvote; take the wind out of one's adversary's sails; beat, beat hollow; rout, lick, drub, floor, worst; put down, put to flight, put to the rout, put hors de combat[Fr], put out of court. silence, quell, nonsuit[obs3], checkmate, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... move, both for reasons of safety and as a matter of taste. His point of view was the abnormal one of the professional law-breaker: the world was his legitimate prey; the business of his life was to do as he pleased and keep his liberty; to outwit sheriffs and make a clean get-away. To be known among his kind as "game" and "slick," was the only distinction he craved. His chiefest ambition had been to live up to his title of "Bad Man." In this he had found glory which ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... the degree of anger consuming our impatient Ned Land. He hurled at the hapless animal the most potent swearwords in the English language. For my part, I was simply distressed to see this dugong outwit our every scheme. ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... and effectively occupy the surrounding country, we should stay there and after a protest or two the French would have to acquiesce. As it happened, he bungled the business, and, worst of all, had to be extricated by the people he meant to outwit. They led him politely but very firmly across the frontier, and now it's our part to express our regret and promise to ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... deliberately, my voice seeming to falter with the intensity of my feelings, "I beg you do not expect too much from me. Your appeal has been made to a simple frontiersman, unskilled in war except with savages, and it is hardly probable I shall be able to outwit the trained guardsmen of Spain. Yet this I will say: I have determined to venture all at your desire. As I possess small skill or knowledge to aid me, I shall put audacity to the front, permitting sheer daring ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... up and strode purposefully into the bathroom. He smiled crookedly at his own reflection in the mirror. It was damnably difficult for a President to outwit his own bodyguard. ...
— Hail to the Chief • Gordon Randall Garrett
... transporting a regular fortune in their vessel, completely alone, preferring free and wary navigation to the journey in convoy, slipping along from island to island and from coast to coast in order to outwit the submersibles. ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... for that seemed to be his one virtue; his frightfulness, for bullying and terrible deeds seemed to be the characteristic of every subject of the Kaiser—it was likely enough that this fellow would do anything to outwit the Frenchmen, and, if he could, would shatter the fort and bring it down upon his own head rather than see ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... angered almost beyond control. That a mere boy could thus outwit him, which Tad had neatly done, was too ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Ozarks • Frank Gee Patchin
... pounds (about sixty-eight dollars) and offer no further explanation, I should, in all probability, be accused of a high order of prevarication. Nevertheless, such is the fact; for among other subterfuges to outwit possible brigands, and kindred citizens, I have made cloth-covered buttons out of Turkish liras (eighteen shillings English), and sewed them on in place of ordinary buttons. Pantaloon buttons at $54 a dozen are a luxury that my wildest dreams never soared to ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... love to see thee bring to naught The plans of wily men; When simple hearts outwit the wise, Oh, thou art ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... Francisco and enjoy yourself," she said. "Interfere no farther between your sister and your parents, unless you prefer that reata to gold. Your craft cannot outwit mine, and she will read no notes. You are a foolish boy to set your sense against your mother's. I may seem harsh to my children, but I strive on my knees for their good. And when I have made up my mind that a thing is right to do, you know that my nature is of iron. No child of mine shall ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... was expected to take in capturing the rebellious raven. He crouched there on the step-ladder, waiting for his chance. Trust a lively, wide-awake boy for being able to outwit any raven that ever lived. Black Joe may have believed himself smart, but he could not match ...
— Fred Fenton on the Crew - or, The Young Oarsmen of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... entirely with him. I had tried my strength with him more than once already, and felt myself his equal in guile. Although he owed me a grudge and would certainly be upon his guard, I thought myself strong enough to face and outwit him. ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... house of Oakley. To-day, they agreed that the quicker the pair took up their abode beneath its hospitable roof, the sooner they, Mr. Davlin and his accomplice, would breathe freely. If they could get the two in the same house with themselves, they might yet outwit Mr. Percy—with the aid of their friend and ally, the sham doctor, if in no other way. Meantime, they would not make the robbery known; or rather, they would inform the servants and all others whom it seemed desirable to enlighten, that the girl, Celine, had possessed ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... visitors that the anchor was up and down. Albeit my spirits were low, 'twas no small entertainment to watch the doctor and his rivals at their adieus. Courtenay had at his command an hundred subterfuges to outwit his fellows, and so manoeuvred that he was the last of them over the side. As for me, luckily, I was not worth a thought. But as the doctor leaned over her hand, I vowed in my heart that if Dorothy was to be gained ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... there lived a wonderfully wise man, of whom it was said that he could answer correctly any question put to him. There was one, however, who thought himself clever enough to outwit the sage. This man took a poor, captive bird, and clasped it so closely in his hand that only the ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... philosophy is the following: "He persists in his bad opinion of orchards and farming, declares that the only success he ever had with a farmer was that he once paid a cent for a russet apple; and farming, he thinks, is an attempt to outwit God with a hoe; that they plant a great many potatoes with much ado, but it is doubtful if they ever get the seed back." Channing seems to have dropped such pearls of wisdom as that all along the road in their walks! Another sample of Channing's philosophy which Emerson ...
— The Last Harvest • John Burroughs
... too much accustomed to the intermeddling of the devil in all his affairs to be astonished at this new trace of his cloven claw, yet determined to outwit him, for he was sure there could be no comparison between his daughter and Marionetta in the mind of anyone who had a proper perception of the fact that seriousness and solemnity are the characteristics of wisdom. Therefore he set off to meet her in ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... almost fainted in a collapse of despair. He saw that his captors had trifled with him from the beginning, and with a sigh of utter wretchedness, he dropped back on the ground, feeling that it was worse than useless for him to expect or hope to outwit those ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... interest—that instead of treating them like the Infant Department of a Sunday School, we take away their loneliness by some good stiff rivalry! Let's call them together, and tell them more about their secret class meeting, and challenge them to try to outwit us! They'll be so busy, and they'll develop so much real class spirit that they won't have time ...
— The Girl Scouts' Good Turn • Edith Lavell
... were well protected and it took clever work to outwit them. Their machine gun nests were always cleverly concealed. Many of them were concealed in trees, and it was a common sight to see our infantrymen advance unseen by the machine gunners, and then with their rifles, shoot them out of the trees. I had ...
— In the Flash Ranging Service - Observations of an American Soldier During His Service - With the A.E.F. in France • Edward Alva Trueblood
... by his own wicked deeds. No matter who he is. An informer, perhaps. At any rate, he is not the man to outwit the Molly Swash, and her old, stupid, foolish master and owner, Stephen Spike. Luff, Mr. Mulford, luff. Now's the time to make the most of your leg—Luff her up and shake her. She is setting to windward fast, the ebb is sucking along that bluff like ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... kinships you must be prepared for slight variations in the form of the same key-syllable. Consider these words: wise, wiseacre, wisdom, wizard, witch, wit, unwitting, to wit, outwit, twit, witticism, witness, evidence, providence, invidious, advice, vision, visit, vista, visage, visualize, envisage, invisible, vis-a-vis, visor, revise, supervise, improvise, proviso, provision, view, review, survey, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... as your will is, Excellency," answered Selamlik Pasha, in a shaking voice; and he had time to wonder even then how an Englishman could so outwit an Oriental. It was no matter how Mustapha Bey, his son, was lured; he had been seized in the harem, and all truth can be forsworn in Egypt, and the game ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... and a half, but five or six. I remember in him then what I recognized after many, many years in later life, and what is often so amusing a characteristic in simple, upright and truthful minds—the notion that on occasion he could be deep enough to outwit the cunning of the unscrupulous, whereas his loyal unsuspiciousness of evil was such that he might have been cheated by the first shallow rogue who chose to exercise his vulpine craft ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various
... presentiment of danger, and tried to still his jangled nerves. For with the instinct of failing mastership he resolved to think out some scheme of defence and a spontaneous policy, by which he might not only defeat his enemies, but outwit and overwhelm ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... are wrong! I swear I will outwit him—and in a striking way! But I must make haste about it, for he has an enormous start on me—given him by Monsieur Robert Darzac, who is this evening going to increase it still more. Think of it!—every time the murderer comes to the chateau, Monsieur Darzac, by ...
— The Mystery of the Yellow Room • Gaston Leroux
... mischievous spirit, a Goblin or Brownie, who is called in the Manx language, the Glashan, and who appears under various names in Highland stories: sometimes as a hairy man, and sometimes as a water- horse turned into a man. He usually attacks lonely women, who outwit him, and throw hot peats or scalding water at him, and then he flies off howling. One feature is common to the stories about him. He asks the woman what her name is, and she always replies "Myself." So when the companions of the Glashan ask who burned or ...
— Fairy Tales; Their Origin and Meaning • John Thackray Bunce
... fortunate results. When he said that he was "looking out for that" it meant, in his case, that he had so thoroughly organized his men—and he was not the only brigadier who had, he was a type—in view of every emergency in "cleaning up" that the Germans did not outwit them. The half which reached the German trench had the situation fully in hand and details for the dugouts assigned before they went on. And they did go on. ...
— My Second Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... chummy little creature of sixteen years who did not conceal her admiration for her next elder sister, whose courage seemed unfailing through all the trying hours. The next eldest sister, with her little younger brother, was openly planning to outwit the guard and escape to the Siberian wilds. It was doubtless her undisguised activity that ultimately betrayed the Royal prisoners into the unhappy tangle that beset their ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe
... unsprung, and passing on he treated over a dozen traps in the same fashion. Very soon I noticed that he stopped and turned aside as soon as he detected suspicious signs on the trail, and a new plan to outwit him at once suggested itself. I set the traps in the form of an H; that is, with a row of traps on each side of the trail, and one on the trail for the cross-bar of the H. Before long, I had an opportunity to count another failure. Loho came trotting ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton
... because you wish to be rid of me, Geoffrey,' I answered hotly, 'and you would be rid of me because you desire to take my place at the side of a certain maid. Follow your nature and do as you will, but if you would outwit an absent man no good shall come to you ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... out that real love is a feeling utterly unlike what we pictured to ourselves. Love, indeed, is not a feeling at all, it's a malady, a certain condition of soul and body. It does not develop gradually. One cannot doubt about it, one cannot outwit it, though it does not always come in the same way. Usually it takes possession of a person without question, suddenly, against his will—for all the world like cholera or fever.... It clutches him, poor dear, ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... and similar interests in their fellow-creatures. Instructed by experience that the love of well-being and comfort is the only motive of human actions, the savage united with his neighbours when union was for their joint convenience, and did his best to blind and outwit his neighbours when their interests were adverse to his own, and he felt himself the weaker. Hence the origin of certain ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... even—but that a new personality was there beside him, adhering to him, amalgamated with him, a creature from whom he might, perhaps, be unable to liberate himself, towards whom he might have to adopt some such stratagem as one uses to outwit a master or a malady. And yet, during this last moment in which he had felt that another, a fresh personality was thus conjoined with his own, life had ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... cannot be stopped, the entire world will be threatened by destruction, and the Brungarian forces will conquer the earth. How Tom utilizes all his scientific knowledge to produce swift-action results and outwit the Brungarians makes one of the most exciting Tom Swift ...
— Tom Swift and The Visitor from Planet X • Victor Appleton
... honesty, and I astonished him by taking him quite in earnest. He has dealt with diplomatists, who imagine nothing but shuffling: the old Ironer! I love him for his love of common sense, his contempt of mean deceit. He will outwit you, but his dexterity is a giant's—a simple evolution rapidly performed: and nothing so much perplexes pygmies! Then he has them, bagsful of them! The world will see; and see giant meet giant, I suspect. He and I proposed each of us in the mildest manner contrary ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... that is what the natives call hookoomut, the faculty of so commanding that other men obey. He has to control a sneaking mussaul, an obstinate hamal, a quarrelsome, or perhaps a drunken cook, a wicked dog-boy, a proud coachman, and a few turbulent ghorawallas, while he must conciliate, or outwit, the opposition headed by the ayah. If he cannot do this there will be factions, seditions, open mutiny, ending in appeals to you, to which if you give ear, you will foster all manner of intrigue, ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA
... front trenches was alert. Post commanders moved about supervising, and the attached New Zealanders imparted useful information in regard to trench warfare methods, such as how to outwit the wily Turk; the essential discipline; and precautions to ensure safety to the individual. Opportunity of gaining an acquaintance with No-Man's Land was afforded through the necessity of examining and repairing the protective ...
— The 28th: A Record of War Service in the Australian Imperial Force, 1915-19, Vol. I • Herbert Brayley Collett
... as a scourge upon the pride of human wisdom, That the wisest of us all should thus outwit ourselves, and eternally forego our purposes in the intemperate act ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... laughed the shrewd old man. "By the exercise of a little wit, and the possession of a little knowledge of the personnel of the police, one can usually outwit them. Curious as you may think it, a very high official at Scotland Yard dined with me here only last night. As I am known as a student of criminology, and reputed to be the author of a book upon that subject, he discussed with me the latest crime problem ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... shabbiest things he can find. In all this the native displays the same craft and cunning which he is apt to practise in his dealings with the whites. He fears the power which the spirit has over him, yet he tries whether he cannot outwit the spirit like an ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... believe," said his father; "but we shall not be wiser unless we can outwit him. He will not do what his mistress ...
— Our Nig • Harriet E. Wilson
... said Legget, spreading out his hands, "Let him go. He'll outwit the bordermen if any redskin's able to. The sooner he goes the quicker he'll git back, an' we can go to work. You ought'er be satisfied to ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... these true and thorough knowers do not know that they are scientific, and can seldom give a reason for the faith that is in them. They believe themselves to be ignorant, uncultured men, nor can even the professors whom they sometimes outwit in their own professorial domain perceive that they have been outwitted by men of superior scientific attainments to their own. The following passage from Dr. Carpenter's "Mesmerism, Spiritualism," &c., may ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... he said, with devilish clearness and deliberation, "you should really know me better by this time than to think you could outwit me so easily. Is my reputation after all so small? And, while I think of it, pray let me have the pleasure of returning to you your five pound note and your letters. Your mice were perfect messengers, were they not?" As he spoke he handed me the selfsame Bank of England note I had despatched ...
— A Bid for Fortune - or Dr. Nikola's Vendetta • Guy Boothby
... a hunter to place himself directly in the way of the Apache whom he knew to be the most treacherous kind of an enemy. His purpose was to indulge in a little strategy and to seek to outwit the redskin, as he had done on many an occasion before. It required but a second for him to slide his rifle over upon his back, the stock being hastily wrapped with a leathern sheath, which he always carried for such an emergency, when he gently let himself ...
— Through Apache Lands • R. H. Jayne
... some days till the black merchants can bring more goods down from the interior. The people about here are imbued with the very spirit of commerce. They understand too how to make a sharp bargain. We have to be wide awake, or, naked savages as they are, they will contrive to outwit us." ...
— The African Trader - The Adventures of Harry Bayford • W. H. G. Kingston
... still very weak, and for a moment it seemed as if her trembling limbs would not support her, but the determination to outwit her haughty sister had taken possession of her, and she was bound to accomplish ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... 'She'll outwit you yet; or I never judged women well. Those still silent ones are the devil. She'll be off during some of your absences, having picked out some secret that will break us all on ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... dangers to meet, and robbers to evade or to outwit. At any time the lurking Indian on the banks might send a death-dealing arrow or bullet from some thicket, for pure love of slaughter. For a time it was a favorite ruse of hostiles, who had secured a white ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... and needs no food. What is Wotan to do? Loki sees the answer clearly enough: he must bluntly rob Alberic. There is nothing to prevent him except moral scruple; for Alberic, after all, is a poor, dim, dwarfed, credulous creature whom a god can outsee and a lie can outwit. Down, then, Wotan and Loki plunge into the mine where Alberic's slaves are piling up wealth for him under the ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw
... Maroney had some idea of Porter's reasons for stopping in Montgomery, and felt that if he had, he would be completely disabused of it by discovering that Porter did not follow him. He was an uncommonly shrewd man and had formed a pretty good opinion of detectives and of his ability to outwit them. ...
— The Expressman and the Detective • Allan Pinkerton
... desert to offer sacrifices unto him as their God. The plan no doubt was that the people should escape once they were outside the boundaries of Egypt; Moses evidently considered any method justifiable in the effort to outwit the oppressor. But the Pharaoh answered, "Who is Jehovah that I should hearken to his voice to let Israel go?" The request was sharply refused. It is surprising that Moses himself was not arrested and imprisoned on the spot. ...
— Hebrew Life and Times • Harold B. Hunting
... of a partition may at first blind the eyes of the confederacy, or however each of them may hope to outwit the other in the progress or in the end, the embarrassments that will arise are insurmountable. But even were the object attainable, it would not be of such general advantage to the parties as the neutrality of France, which costs them nothing, and to obtain which they ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... work. The beaver is highly intelligent, and quick to detect the signs of man's presence. Nothing can tempt him to venture where he sees that his worst enemy has been before him. The fox is the synonym of cunning, and will often outwit the shrewdest trapper. He will walk around the trap and stealthily secure the bait without harm to himself. One of those animals has been known to reach forward and spring the implement, jerking back his paw quickly enough to escape the sharp teeth. A fox, too, when caught in a steel ...
— The Hunters of the Ozark • Edward S. Ellis
... so easy to say, so hard to live up to. How, for instance, could a twenty-year-old kid on his first mail run hope to completely outwit fatigue, or even forget, for a single moment, that it was his first run. Fatigue had caused his undoing, but had he been completely fearless he might have found a way to save himself, might have managed somehow to prevent the ...
— Rescue Squad • Thomas J. O'Hara
... the question disturbing Ruth Fielding's mind. Of course, nobody but Jerry had as strong a desire as she to outwit the old real estate man. The other girls and boys—even Mrs. Tingley—would not feel as Ruth did about it. She ...
— Ruth Fielding on Cliff Island - The Old Hunter's Treasure Box • Alice Emerson
... he should cook the fish, in order that he might find opportunity to mix the gum with it; but the wife, out of pure kindness refused to allow this. He was taken all aback at this unfortunate slip in his programme. By resorting again to intense thought, he hit upon an ingenious plan to outwit her, even at this disadvantage. The children needed no commands to ...
— Oonomoo the Huron • Edward S. Ellis
... meanwhile there came also to him five hundred French lancers, and although he found himself sufficiently strong to take vengeance on his enemies in open war, he considered that it would be safer and more advantageous to outwit them, and for this reason he did not ...
— The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli
... outwit that maid. When the child is gone, Marie's power ceases. No one will ever believe her. A few thousand francs extra will ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... Austria," said Gruner, smiling; "the cause of the fatherland demands it. Dangers will not deter me, and if the Austrian police are on the lookout for me—well, I have been myself a police-officer, and may outwit them. In the first place, however, I shall go to Leipsig, to have the second volume of Arndt's excellent work, 'The Spirit of the Times,' secretly printed, and cause a printing-office to be established ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... off with Pawnee Brown, too. Rasco and Brown have been looking over the trails leading to Oklahoma. They are bound to outwit the United States cavalry, for the boomers have more right to that land than the cattle kings, and right is ...
— The Boy Land Boomer - Dick Arbuckle's Adventures in Oklahoma • Ralph Bonehill
... Cacolet, which is the name of a firm of private detectives whose exploits and devices surpass those imagined by Poe in America, by Wilkie Collins in England, and by Gaboriau in France. The manifold disguises and impersonations of the two partners when seeking to outwit each other are as well-motived and as fertile in comic effect as any of the attempts of Crispin or of some other of Regnard's interchangeable valets. Is not even the Legataire Universel, Regnard's masterpiece, overrated? To me it is neither higher comedy nor more provocative of laughter than ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various
... embarrassment, showed no sign of yielding; and when at last he left her nothing had been decided—the whole formation of the Government was hanging in the wind. A frenzy of excitement now seized upon Victoria. Sir Robert, she believed in her fury, had tried to outwit her, to take her friends from her, to impose his will upon her own; but that was not all: she had suddenly perceived, while the poor man was moving so uneasily before her, the one thing that she was desperately longing for—a loop-hole of escape. She seized a pen and dashed ...
— Queen Victoria • Lytton Strachey
... said Vajdar to himself. "You thought to outwit me; we shall see which will outwit ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... leathern-faced old financier; "and it's audacity that we must find some way to checkmate. I've never had a business rival yet that I haven't broken into submission or crushed, and a boy and a girl are not going to outwit me now. They did it once, I admit, but this time I ...
— The Girl Aviators' Sky Cruise • Margaret Burnham
... lost considerable blood. I am sure that in the hands of any physician less skilled and determined than Westmoreland he must have gone out. But Westmoreland, with his jaw set, followed his code and fenced with death for this apparently worthless and forfeited life, using all his skill and finesse to outwit the great Enemy; in spite of which, so attenuated was the man's chance that we were astonished when he turned the corner—very, very feebly—and we didn't have to place another pine box in the potter's ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler
... Cyprian. All this is really a very difficult Job to me; not worth the Candle, I dare say: only that you two will be pleased. I also increase the religious Element in the Drama; and make Cyprian outwit the Devil more cleverly than he now does; for the Devil was certainly too clever to be caught in his own Art. That was very good Fun for an Autodafe ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes - Vol. II • Edward FitzGerald
... I now remember, there must have been at least five hundred slaves in my two pens, sleek in flesh, happy in looks, and ready for the first customer who could outwit the cruiser. I quietly despatched a notice of our advent to the barracooniers, with directions as to their conduct, so that the moment my naval friends entered the stanch inclosures, full two hundred and fifty human beings, in each, rose to their feet and saluted ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... carried it into effect as far as possible. Langdon became a prominent figure in the Senate, owing to his consistent support of measures that fitted in with the public policy, or what should be the public policy, of the nation. He had learned that the only practicable way to outwit or to cope with the members of the dominating machine, made up, he was surprised to see, of members of both the parties—the only two in Washington—was to oppose what the machine wanted with enough ...
— A Gentleman from Mississippi • Thomas A. Wise
... turbulent people, embruted by the violence, and sunk in the corruption of centuries. We see him restore trade—establish order—create civilization as by a miracle—receive from crowned heads homage and congratulation—outwit, conciliate, or awe, the wiliest priesthood of the Papal Diplomacy—and raise his native city at once to sudden yet acknowledged eminence over every other state, its superior in arts, wealth, and civilization;—we ask what errors we ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... recognising Him. If His trusted subordinates in being given a free hand played Him false, they naturally played each other false, and played false to themselves first of all. Where one was afraid of another and strove to outwit him there was treachery ...
— The Conquest of Fear • Basil King
... which the pupil attempts to outwit or to destroy the sage, and is himself outwitted or destroyed (e.g., The Lady's Fifth Story, in Gibb's Forty Vezirs, pp. 76-80; and his App. B. note v., ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... baggage: the uniform was sky-blue with a white turban; and the speed and precision of their movements enabled them to deal terrible blows, even at distant tribes of Bedouins, who bent before a genius that could outwit them even ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... it and turned it loose to graze. Then he sat down in the shade of a tree, while the others still held guard over the narrow pass. He had made up his mind that he would not offer them money. He would watch his chance to outwit them, he would match his intelligence against their cunning, his patience against their brute force. It would be worth a week's captivity to turn the tables on these two rogues and get back to civilization in ...
— With Hoops of Steel • Florence Finch Kelly
... she had now to devise some means of getting into Robert Baillie's prison. For a child of her age to outwit the prison officials one would think an impossibility; but she did. Joanna Baillie states that she slipped in, noiselessly and unobserved, behind the jailer, and hid in a dark corner until he withdrew, when she stepped forward and presented the ...
— Noble Deeds of the World's Heroines • Henry Charles Moore
... think he's had a worse time, if that's any comfort, than Pony has. He has suffered the fate of all liars. Sooner or later their lies outwit them and overmaster them, for whenever people believe a liar he is forced to act as if he had spoken the truth. That's worse than having a tower fall on you, or pains ...
— The Flight of Pony Baker - A Boy's Town Story • W. D. Howells
... forth no reply. The Tanos continued to stare. It was not merely astonishment which caused them to remain motionless; there was quite as much embarrassment on their part. For these men in women's wraps had had to assume the costumes as a punishment, because they had allowed women to outwit or out-hunt them in the joint pursuit of the same animal. Whenever a man and a woman, during one of these ceremonial hunts, chase the same rabbit, and the woman succeeds in slaying it, then her male competitor must exchange his dress for that of the successful woman, ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier
... now set themselves to work to outwit Mr Jolly, and rob him of Mademoiselle Nelina. At last they hit upon a device, which did not, indeed, say much for the ingenuity of the party, but which, like many other bold ...
— The Golden Dream - Adventures in the Far West • R.M. Ballantyne
... before the whole countryside would be buzzing like a hornet's nest. In his enfeebled condition, he could hardly hope to cope with his pursuers in the matter of speed and so as he went on across the stream at the base of the hill, he tried to plan something that would outwit them. The nearest outlying houses of the town were but a few hundred yards distant, but instead of taking the road down the hill, he turned sharply to his left after crossing the road and entered the Moslem cemetery, laid according ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... vigilance, Edgar Poe found the means to outwit her, and to transmit his effusions, without difficulty, to her fair charges, who with tresses primly parted and braided and meek eyes bent in evident absorption upon their books, were the very pictures of docile obedience, and bore in their outward looks ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... he said, squaring his shoulders. "Now, let me think. We must outwit these fellows, whoever they are. By George, I remember one of them! That old fellow who bought the horse is with them. That's it! The horse is mixed up in this, I'll bet my head." They sat upon the ground for several minutes, he thinking deeply, ...
— The Daughter of Anderson Crow • George Barr McCutcheon
... Queen had always at her side her astute kinsmen, the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorraine, who were as clever as they were unscrupulous. With these powerful uncles near her, Mary was in a position to outwit the wily Catherine, between whom and the Guise faction little love was lost. Only when some scheme of deviltry joined them together in common interests, as the massacre of the Huguenots at Amboise, were Catherine and the Guise brothers ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... the wondrous gateway. The giant was sure of his prize, and chuckled to himself as he went out with his horse to drag the remaining stones; for he did not know that the AEsir had guessed at last who he was, and that Loki was plotting to outwit him. Hardly had he gone to work when out of the wood came running a pretty little mare, who neighed to Svadilfoeri as if inviting the tired horse to leave his work and come to the ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... to recover his balance and self-respect. It would have been so like a Lancashire chap to have seen and dealt shrewdly with a business schemer who tried to outwit him that he was gradually convinced that he had thought all that had been suggested, and had comported himself with triumphant though silent astuteness. He even ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... I warned Fred to carefully avoid betraying that we suspected him. The captain had had worse enemies to outwit, and had kept a pirate in good humour for a much longer voyage by affability and rum. We had no means of clouding Mr. Rowe's particularly sharp wits with grog, but we resolved to be amiable and wary, and when we did get ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... Jimmie and I led the way in a general shout of laughter, and then, as a happy family party, we adjourned to the single salon, where we grouped ourselves together, and, strive as they might, the officers could not outwit my sister nor upset ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... evolutionary force has left the bodily structure, we need expect no more marked changes there, and has gone to brain. So this feeblest of all the animals physically speaking he would be no match for a hundred different kinds of animals that are about us is able to outwit them all, that is, to outknow, he has become the ruler of the earth. And not only has this evolutionary force gone to brain, it has gone to heart; and man has become a being whose primest characteristic is love. The one thing that we think of as most perfect, that we dream of as characterizing ...
— Our Unitarian Gospel • Minot Savage
... accurate estimate of his character; he was an evil-doer, and yet easily led by the nose, being, in common parlance, a fool as well as a knave. He never was truthful with anyone, but always spoke and acted cunningly, yet any who chose could easily outwit him. His character was a sorry mixture of folly and bad principles. One may say of him what one of the Peripatetic philosophers of old said long ago, that in men, as in the mixing of colours, the most opposite qualities combine. I will therefore only describe his disposition as far as I have been ...
— The Secret History of the Court of Justinian • Procopius |
