"Hoodoo" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... deserted, her linen stored and checked in her closets, her pillows bunked in her seats, and her curtains folded in her uppers, save and except in one single instance—Section Eleven, to conform to certain deeply held ideas of the porter, Raz Brown, as to what might and might not constitute a hoodoo, was made up. Raz Brown did not play much: he could not and hold his job; but when he did play he played eleven always whether it fell between seven, twenty-seven, or four, forty-four. And whenever Raz Brown deadheaded a car through, he always made up section eleven, and laid the ...
— The Daughter of a Magnate • Frank H. Spearman
... to his lair at last, and now, unless that infernal hoodoo looms upon the scene, I can get in my work in good shape. I would have had my game weeks ago, but ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... dum hoodoo!" Zeke muttered, in huge disgust. "An' the chief said I must git another the first chance." Then he grinned vaingloriously into the darkness of the fore-peak. "But I reckon hit hain't put no cuss on me yit—seein' as how I got a job an' a peck o' money right ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... bandage, "Take care of that hand, Mack; don't get funny with it just because it's well enough to use again." To another, "How is the wife, Frank, better? Good, that's fine." Again it was, "You fellows on number six machine made a record this week." Again, "Who's the hoodoo on number seven furnace?—four accidents in six days is going some—better look around for your Jonah." And again, "I heard about that stunt of yours, Bill; the kid would have been killed sure if you hadn't kept your head and nerve. It was great ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... 'the star that presides over bad luck and evil and disappointment and nothing doing and trouble. I was born under that star. Every move I make, up bobs Saturn and blocks it. He's the hoodoo planet of the heavens. They say he's 73,000 miles in diameter and no solider of body than split-pea soup, and he's got as many disreputable and malignant rings as Chicago. Now, what kind of a star is that ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... the house and threw open the door for her to enter. The intense heat of two great stoves struck in their faces; and Annie saw the big burner, erected in all its black hideousness in the middle of the front room, like a sort of household hoodoo, to be constantly propitiated, like the gods of Greece; and in the kitchen, the new range, with a distracted tea-kettle leaping on it, as if it would like to loose its fetters and race away over the prairie after its ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... if I ain't got nothing more the matter with me than Bananas' hoodoo I shall be sitting up and taking nourishment ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... hermaphrodite? A few coins will doubtless be discovered—if the excavators avoid the Texas treasury—and triumphant Populism take it for granted that 'twas on these curious disks that our "infant industry" cut its teeth. The "In God We Trust" inscription may be regarded as a barbaric hoodoo to prevent infantile bellyache or the evil eye, but the dollar mark will be entirely unintelligible to a people so many thousand years removed from the savage superstition of metallic money. Of ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... as the spirits of the dead, either human or animal, independent disease demons, or individuals who might act by controlling the spirits or agencies of disease. We see this today among the negroes of the Southern States. A Hoodoo put upon a negro may, if he knows of it, work upon him so powerfully through the imagination that he becomes very ill indeed, and only through a more powerful magic exercised by someone else can the Hoodoo ...
— The Evolution of Modern Medicine • William Osler
... there was God's curse on this Klondike gold," he said; "now I'm sure of it. There's a hoodoo on it. What it's a-goin' to cost, what hearts it's goin' to break, what homes it's goin' to wreck no man'll ever know. God only knows what it's cost already. But this ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... their superstitions, for diseases are supposed to be cured by charms and incantations of the shaman or priest; and everything in the way of hunting, fishing, cooking, or of clothing themselves must be done in a prescribed way or it is "taboo" or "hoodoo" as the negroes say. When you read "The Baby Eskimo" you will see just a tiny bit of the hardships, but I should not like to tell you how much more terrible a time he might have had, if he had happened ...
— A Treasury of Eskimo Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss
... of producing evil. Bad qualities.] Badness. — N. hurtfulness &c. Adj[obs3].; virulence. evil doer &c. 913; bane &c. 663; plague spot &c. (insalubrity) 657; evil star, ill wind; hoodoo; Jonah; snake in the grass, skeleton in the closet; amari aliquid[Lat][obs3], thorn in the side. malignity; malevolence &c. 907; tender mercies [ironically]. ill-treatment, annoyance, molestation, abuse, oppression, persecution, outrage; misusage &c. 679; injury &c. (damage) 659; knockout drops ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... sick, down, couldn't do nothin'. Someone got to telling her about Cain Robertson. Cain Robertson was a hoodoo doctor in Georgia. They there wasn't nothin' Cain couldn't do. She says, 'Go and see Cain and ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Arkansas Narratives Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... passed into the slang of the day, "73" being well known as a telegrapher's expression of compliments or good wishes, while "23" is an accident or death message, and has been given broader popular significance as a general synonym for "hoodoo." All of this came easily to Edison, who had, moreover, as his Herald showed, an unusual familiarity with train movement along that portion ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... wanted to go to the Yellowstone river region—wanted specially to see the National Park, and the geysers and the "hoodoo" or goblin land of that country; indeed, hesitated a little at Pueblo, the turning point—wanted to thread the Veta pass—wanted to go over the Santa Fe trail away southwestward to New Mexico—but turn'd and set my face eastward—leaving behind ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... again. Oh, dear, I was never so sorry for a high-born lady in my life, but to encourage her I told her I read of a white woman in Alabama that turned black in a single night, and the niggers would never have anything to say to her, because she was a hoodoo, and wasn't in their class, and then she yelled again and wanted me to send for a doctor, and I told her there wasn't any negro doctor in town, and what she wanted was to send for a scrubwoman, and then ...
— Peck's Uncle Ike and The Red Headed Boy - 1899 • George W. Peck
... mind. I need to wear it so that I will be reminded of something—something important as a hoodoo," she said, ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... exclaimed Teddy. "There isn't enough to take us another mile. There's a hoodoo in it. We no sooner see those fellows than we lose ...
— The Rushton Boys at Rally Hall - Or, Great Days in School and Out • Spencer Davenport
... States which have already sent in reminiscences of ex-slaves, Tennessee is the only one in which the workers are asking ex-slaves about their belief in signs, cures, hoodoo, etc. Also, the workers are requesting the ex-slaves to tell the stories that were current among the Negroes when they were growing up. Some of the best copy that has come in to the office is ...
— Slave Narratives, Administrative Files (A Folk History of - Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves) • Works Projects Administration
... lady's man an' thar's our pretty hoodoo over thar to feed an' amoose," remarked Shady Jones, with a smile ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... of it is," Moslof went on, "Rockland has a pitcher who is a hoodoo for Camden. He is pie for Thomaston, but he makes monkeys ...
— Frank Merriwell's Cruise • Burt L. Standish
... no hoodoo and I don't believe in none, but a seventh child can more or less tell you things that are a long way off. If you want to beat the devil you got to do right. God's got to be in the plan. I tries to do right. I am not perfect but ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... would you; bless me if he ain't got some white sheets, and a regular nightgown. Now, what dye think of that, fellows? Are we going to allow such sissy goings-on in this, our first camp? He'd hoodoo the whole business, sure. No luck with such baby play. Use the sheets for towels when we go in swimming; I've got an extra pair of pajamas along, that I'll lend him, if he promises to be a true scout, ready to rough and ready it in camp. Next thing he'll be ...
— The Boy Scouts' First Camp Fire - or, Scouting with the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... tones of deep emotion he knew the matter was serious. He thought at once of the Hoodoo. But he could make out no meaning to this bit ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon |
