"Joke" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Dick fully realised when he pulled up alongside his friend and they exchanged hand-grips. Lightly as he spoke of the incident, Phil knew right well that he was on the very edge of disaster at the moment that Dick pulled trigger, and though he would fain have treated the whole adventure as a joke he was none the less grateful to Dick for his timely intervention, and the pressure of his hand was quite as eloquent as much outpouring ...
— The Adventures of Dick Maitland - A Tale of Unknown Africa • Harry Collingwood
... adored, and be agreeable to her friends. Her amusements were most original—concerts, mythological representations, suppers, fireworks, comedies, readings, always something new, often in the form of a surprise or a joke. Of the latter, the best known is the one played on the Count of Guise whose fondness for mushrooms had become proverbial; on one occasion when he had consumed an immense number of them at table, his valet, who had been bribed, ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme
... child would catch his death of cold, Bernard was borne upstairs again by Felix, who found Clement in the nursery comforting the little girls, and preventing them from following the example of their valiant pioneer. Felix, now thoroughly entering into the spirit of the joke, entertained for a moment the hope of entrapping Clement; but of course Bernard could not be silenced from his bold and rather doubtful proclamation, that 'The funny boy made Felix black his own face, and I ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... exercising oppression;—Do not in such a way make a mock of things. An old man, (I speak) with entire sincerity; But you, my juniors, are full of pride. It is not that my words are those of age, But you make a joke of what is sad. But the troubles will multiply like flames, Till they are beyond help ...
— The Shih King • James Legge
... nagging at talent whenever you find it in others! " cried the young prince with a pun, which would have delighted Padmavati. "Surely you are jealous of her!" he resumed, anything but pleased with the dead silence that had received his joke; "jealous of her cleverness, and of her love for me. She is the very best creature in the world. Even you, woman-hater as you are, would own it if you only knew all the kind messages she sent, and the little pleasant surprise that she has prepared for ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... "Crop ye as close as marginal P—'s ears." As Milton had already, in his Colasterion, said enough about Prynne and the heavy margins of his many pamphlets, and as the circumstances in which Prynne had lost his ears made the subject hardly a proper one for a public joke, it was but good taste in Milton to ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... those lustrous blue eyes of his appealingly and tearfully upon Mr. Blinker, and tell him he would make the pecuniary matter all right in the fall, and that he merely shattered a chair over his head by way of a joke. The stony-hearted man was remorseless, and that night Clarence Stanly became a wanderer in the wide, wide world. As he went forth he uttered these words: "H. Blinker, beware! A RED HAND is around, my ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 3 • Charles Farrar Browne
... place in the schoolroom, in the opinion of his teachers and his schoolmates. In Mr. Burrows' school, ten was the perfect mark, and x was the very lowest grade a boy could reach. It had once been an everyday joke with Tip, that, being x, he must be perfect, because it said in the spelling-book ...
— Tip Lewis and His Lamp • Pansy (aka Isabella Alden)
... exhausted voice. "I see you don't believe me! Not for a moment! It's my fault, not yours. I ought not to have been so ready. Why, why did I degrade myself by confessing my secret to you? It's a joke to you. I see that from your eyes. You led me on to it, prosecutor? Sing a hymn of triumph if you can.... ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... away, feeling, with a certain glow of satisfaction not unmixed with self-righteousness, that I had done something to raise the post-office standard and to ensure better attention. But the joke is that, if I had myself received better attention, I should have lost thirty pounds, for St. Vitus was unplaced. This story must therefore remain without ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 22, 1920 • Various
... joke, sir," she said, coolly lifting herself to her feet by grasping his arm. "I'm Mrs. Dall, the Indian agent's wife. They said you wouldn't let anybody see you—and I determined I would. That's all!" She stopped, threw back her tangled curls behind her ears, shook the briers and thorns ...
— A Drift from Redwood Camp • Bret Harte
... with the powers that be in Berlin has long been a standing joke among his American colleagues. Shortly after the fall of Warsaw in August, 1915, when the stage in Poland was set for exhibition to the neutral world, he was roused from his slumbers in his suite at the Adlon by a midnight telephone message, apprising him that ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... the stately volume from its place. "Look!" she cried. "A keyhole. Hugh, isn't this exactly like the 'Mysteries of Udolpho?' 'Inigo Jones' is his joke, you see, or somebody's joke. Do you mind if ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards
... the matter; you will listen to reason; you will reverse your decision," pleaded the count, his nervous incoherence and confusion increasing as he grew more and more agitated. "It's for the honor of the family to say 'yes,' and therefore 'yes' is the proper answer,—eh, Madeleine? Don't joke any more, my dear; it troubles me; it gives me such a throbbing and heavy weight in my ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... I ask. But I hope," added he, "before we've lived a year, or whatever time it is till you arrive at years of discretion, you'll know me well enough, and love me well enough, not to be so stiff about a trifle, that's nothing between friend and friend—let alone the joke of ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... it cannot be expressed in words and taught. This was what I, even as a young man, sometimes suspected, what has driven me away from the teachers. I have found a thought, Govinda, which you'll again regard as a joke or foolishness, but which is my best thought. It says: The opposite of every truth is just as true! That's like this: any truth can only be expressed and put into words when it is one-sided. Everything is one-sided which can be thought with thoughts and ...
— Siddhartha • Herman Hesse
... into Cray's Folly, then, a fact which was not reported to me, a suspicious loiterer was seen in the grounds, again not reported, and someone played a silly practical joke by nailing the wing of a bat, you say, to the door. Might I ask, Mr. Harley, why you mention this matter? The other things are serious, but why you should mention the trick of some mischievous boy at a time ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer
... tear was in the eye. Petit Andre, slapping the other shoulder, called out, "Courage, my fair son! since you must begin the dance, let the ball open gaily, for all the rebecs are in tune," twitching the halter at the same time, to give point to his joke. As the youth turned his dismayed looks, first on one and then on the other, they made their meaning plainer by gently urging him forward to the fatal tree, and bidding him be of good courage, for it would be over ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... enlisted a great number of men. Among his recruits was Frank Lilly, a boy about sixteen years old, who was so weak and small that he would not have passed muster if the array had not been greatly in want of men. The soldiers made this boy the butt of their ridicule, and many a joke was perpetrated at his expense. Yet there was a spirit in the boy beyond his years. Riley was greatly attached to him; and it was reported, on good authority, that he was the fruit of one of Riley's love affairs with a ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... "Ha! You will have your joke, eh? But the Lulu is no joke. Come, we will go to the bank; I want them to tell you how much she has yielded. You'll blame me for leasing her, but how was I to know what ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... enough is the origin of the name of Picards, and from thence of Picardie, which does not date later than A.D. 1200. It was an academical joke, an epithet first applied to the quarrelsome humor of those students, in the University of Paris, who came from the frontier of France and Flanders, (Valesii Notitia Galliarum, p. 447, Longuerue. Description de ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... what gormandizers they were," replied Quicksilver; and, rogue that he was, he could not help laughing at the joke. "So you will not be surprised to hear that they have all taken the shapes of swine! If Circe had never done anything worse, I really should not think her so very much ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various
... should take to find a railway station where we might take a train for Versailles, but finally succeeded. We did not understand more from those who directed us, than the direction we should take, never knowing the distance. It is more than a joke, for a party to be obliged to walk several miles for a station, when they had expected to reach it in a quarter or half a mile at most! When we arrived at the station at Sevres, our difficulties only commenced. ...
— The Youthful Wanderer - An Account of a Tour through England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany • George H. Heffner
... it mean? I've been out since morning, and I return to find the gate locked, and a man playing at being a sentry. Why, Roy, my dear boy, surely this is not some bad joke of yours?" ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn
... Neither Johnson nor Burke wrote anything, and when I perceived that Oliver was rather sore, and seemed to watch me with that kind of attention which indicated his expectation of something in the same kind of burlesque with theirs; I thought it time to press the joke no further, and wrote a few couplets at a side-table, which, when I had finished, and was called upon by the company to exhibit, Goldsmith, with much agitation, besought me to spare him; and I was about to tear them, when Johnson wrested them out of my hand, and in a loud voice read them at ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... great caution; certainly in one case of recent years, which at first appeared to be well authenticated, it was afterwards found that a small trout had been pushed down a salmon's throat after capture by way of a joke. A consideration of the question, however, which may perhaps make some appeal to both sides, is put forward by Dr.J. Kingston Barton in the first of the two volumes on Fishing (Country Life Series). He maintains that salmon do not habitually feed ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Part 1, Slice 1 • Various
... think this is some maniac's idea of a joke, you'll have proof very soon that it isn't, because one of the people at your Center is due to leave for ...
— Warning from the Stars • Ron Cocking
... constitute the specialty. There is always a crowd about the window. They form a very pleasing ornament for the mantel-shelf of a gay young bachelor, for the boudoir of a pretty woman. You couldn't make a prettier present to a person with whom you wished to exchange a harmless joke. It is not classic art, signore, of course; but, between ourselves, isn't classic art sometimes rather a bore? Caricature, burlesque, la charge, as the French say, has hitherto been confined to paper, to the pen and pencil. Now, it ...
— The Madonna of the Future • Henry James
... within the vulgar reach, To run of errands, and to preach; Well hast thou judged, that heads like mine Cannot want help from heads like thine; Well hast thou judged thyself unmeet Of such high argument to treat; Twas but to try thee that I spoke, And all I said was but a joke. 1370 Nor think a joke, Crape, a disgrace, Or to my person, or my place; The wisest of the sons of men Have deign'd to use them now and then. The only caution, do you see, Demanded by our dignity, From common use and men exempt, Is that they may not breed contempt. Great ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... that chap would never go! Your Majesty!... Sire ... the King ... pleasant names to be called when you're not accustomed to them. I've already had twenty-four hours of it, and if it goes on much longer I shall begin to think it's not a joke. ...
— A Royal Prisoner • Pierre Souvestre
... time that Duvall had read the instructions. He had not had an opportunity to do so before. As he concluded his examination of them, his face hardened, his brow contracted in a frown, and he crushed the piece of paper in his hand. Was this some absurd joke that Monsieur Lefevre was playing upon him? The idea of separating him from Grace upon their wedding day, to send him on an expedition, the object of which was to recover a lost snuff box! It seemed preposterous. ...
— The Ivory Snuff Box • Arnold Fredericks
... company laugh. But Blaine Asher did not laugh. Serious, his rather thin face grave at he leaned his tall, muscular body above a torsion machine he was adjusting, there was nothing to indicate he had the faintest idea of a joke. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... world of alarm As the arm Most gracefully bow'd to the stream, As if a respect it would show it, Tho' so much below it! No presence of mind he dissembled, But as the branch shook so he trembled, And the case was no longer a riddle Or joke; For the branch snapp'd and broke; And altho' The angler cried "Its no go!" ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... with courage and self-sacrifice has been proved in these last six months; it is to other qualities that one must look for final victory in a war of exhaustion. The Englishman does not look into himself; he does not brood; he sees no further forward than is necessary, and he must have his joke. These are fearful and wonderful advantages. Examine the letters and diaries of the various combatants and you will see how far less imaginative and reflecting, (though shrewd, practical, and humorous,) the English ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... doubtless had for its germ a joke regarding the slowness of an errand boy in a friend's household, but which at the same time shows us how rapidly Rembrandt worked. The artist had been carried off to the country to lunch with his friend Jan ...
— Pictures Every Child Should Know • Dolores Bacon
... was prettier than Kate ever had seen her, but there was a line of discontent around her mouth, and she spoke pettishly on slight provocation, or none at all. Now she was openly, brazenly, brutally, frank in her rejoicing. She thought it was the best "JOKE" that ever happened to the boys; and she said so repeatedly. Kate found her lips closing more tightly and a slight feeling of revulsion growing in her heart. Surely in Nancy Ellen's lovely home, cared for and shielded in every way, she had no ...
— A Daughter of the Land • Gene Stratton-Porter
... such fun as we do have! A little matter like that never inconveniences mother. Once during court week, our only hotel burned. There was a big case on before father, and he brought all the witnesses and lawyers home. They were there three days. Mother seemed to think it was a joke." Then with a look at Elizabeth, she added with conviction, "A little bit of a girl like ...
— Elizabeth Hobart at Exeter Hall • Jean K. Baird
... that he lay down again rather abruptly and began to wonder. What was he doing in a woman's room, and who was the woman and how had he got there? This would be a great joke for Dalton and St. Clair ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... tried their skill on the subject of sea-sickness," said his companion; "but it's no joke to those who ...
— Story of Chester Lawrence • Nephi Anderson
... Sydney Smith used to be much amused when he observed the utter want of perception of a joke in some minds. One instance we may cite from his "Memoirs:"[98] "Miss ——, the other day, walking round the grounds at Combe Florey, exclaimed, 'Oh, why do you chain up that fine Newfoundland dog, Mr Smith?'—'Because it has a passion for breakfasting ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... you try them games, mate, for you was never cut out for the work. He thinks that's a joke, Mr Lane, sir. But do you want your jyntes rubbed ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... with a flash of anger in the dark eyes, "if you were half a dozen years older I would thrash the life out of you. Do you think that is a pretty sort of joke to make about a woman? Don't you know the mischief your gabbling tongue might make? for how is every one to know that you are talking merely ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 31. October, 1873. • Various
... laughing, "what it has withdrawn in elegance, it has made up in spirit. The joke seems to ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... of the old, mirthful mischief in his eye, as she glanced up unexpectedly. He did remember her, she was sure, yet was trying her, perhaps, as she tried him. Well, she would stand the test and enjoy the joke by-and-by. With this fancy in her head she assumed a gracious air and chatted away in her most charming style, feeling both gay and excited, so anxious was she to please, and so glad to recover her early friend. A naughty ...
— The Mysterious Key And What It Opened • Louisa May Alcott
... mean, this order that I've just received to prepare to leave the boat within a few hours?... It must be some kind of a joke of Toni's; he's an excellent fellow but an enemy to holy things and likes to tease me because of ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... too, she looked after the finances and this in itself was enough for one woman to do. Then as though this wasn't plenty she kept light-hearted for our sakes. You'd find her singing about her work whenever you came in and always ready with a smile and a joke. And if she herself had a headache you had to be a doctor and a lawyer rolled in one to ...
— One Way Out - A Middle-class New-Englander Emigrates to America • William Carleton
... Archie. "Well, at Bridgeport they take me as a joke, see? That's all right; I'll show them, some day. They voted me a nuisance at the shops and shut me out. Wouldn't let me come near their engines. I had to find out some things necessary to my inventions, so I came on to Stanley Junction. Rode in a coach like any other civilized being until I got ...
— Ralph on the Overland Express - The Trials and Triumphs of a Young Engineer • Allen Chapman
... organ," answered Philip Holt scornfully. "I am afraid Cape May people will hardly understand it. It looks as though the young women on the 'Merry Maid' were in need of money." The young man laughed as though his last remark had been intended for a joke. ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... a practical joke!" I thought, and a bitter feeling of disappointment assailed me, as I asked myself why I had not gone in the second boat to help save ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn
... some allusion to his own example; but I well knew that my uncle Ro had once been engaged, and that he lost the object of his passion by death, and too much respected his constancy and true sentiments ever to joke on such subjects. I believe he felt the delicacy of my forbearance rather more than common, for he immediately manifested a disposition to relent, and to prove ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper
... grips ye, ye cant move hand nor foot—and had my lady into the land of Nod in half a minute; thin off t' her husband; so here's th' Healer between two stools—spare the whipcord, spoil the knacker!—it would be a good joke if I was to lose both pashints for want of a little unbeequity, wouldn't it—Lash the lazy vagabin!—Not that I care: what interest have I in their lives? they never pay: but ye see custom's second nature; an d'Ive formed a vile habit; I've got to be a Healer among ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... of England," criticism and comment broke out. The old pioneers of Rough and Ready felt that they had been imposed upon, and that in some vague way the unfortunate woman had made them the victims of a huge practical joke during all these years. That she had grimly enjoyed their ignorance of her position they did not doubt. "Why, I remember onct when I was sorter bullyraggin' her about mixin' up my duds with Doc Simmons's, and sendin' me Whiskey Dick's old rags, ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte
... we return, we'll sit down to feast, Our friends shall behold us with pleasure; She'll sip with my lord—I'll drink with the priest, We'll laugh and we'll quaff without measure. The toast and the joke shall go joyfully round, With love and good humour the room shall resound. The slipper be hid—the stocking let fall, And rare blindman's-buff shall keep up the ball; Whilst the merry spinette, and the sweet tambourine, Shall heighten and ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... "The joke," observed the Candy Man, "is old, but worth repeating. But did I understand you to say another friend? And am I ...
— The Little Red Chimney - Being the Love Story of a Candy Man • Mary Finley Leonard
... next afternoon they both drove to the station to meet their new relative. In spite of herself, as the time came nearer, Theodora was inclined to treat the whole affair as an immense joke; but her husband had misgivings. Theodora was fitted to cope with any girl he had ever known; but he feared she might find the process ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... we were going to look over temples in a deluge. But our heroism was rewarded, for just as the train crossed the brigand's marsh the rain stopped and the sun shone out, and the effect of blue sky and clouds was simply glorious. We had a great joke at Paestum. A mosquito had stung me badly on one lid so that I looked as if I had a black eye. It was most uncomfortable and painful, I remember. Well, a party of French tourists were going round the ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... he had been cheekin' some one or playin' a far-fetched joke, I might be able to forgive him, but there must be reason in everythink, an' to go an' meddle with other's property is carryin' things too far. 'Heed the spark or you may dread the fire,' is a piece of wisdom I've always took to heart in rarin' ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin
... insulted her by walking into her bedroom with his muddy feet and then pretending that he hadn't known that it was her bedroom, regarding her through his hair with an ironical and malicious glance, barking suddenly when she made some statement as though he enjoyed immensely an excellent joke, but, above all, despising her, she felt, so that the wall of illusion that she had built around herself had been pulled down by at least one creature, more human, she knew, in spite of herself, than many human beings. Therefore, she hated ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole
... and sunk snow-barrows The bells are ringing loud and strangely near, The shout of children dins upon mine ear Shrilly, and like a flight of silvery arrows Showers the sweet gossip of the British sparrows, Gathered in noisy knots of one or two, To joke and chatter just as mortals do Over the days long ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman
... sternly. "His world is no joke. He has a strong clutch—but I have a stronger... Maskull was his, ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... were the six red cabbages on the purple satin lap, a very white hand, with some gold rings on the fingers, slightly holding them together, and streaming ringlets, half hiding a laughing face, drooped over them. Only half hiding! Peter saw the laugh; it was unmistakable. He was made a joke of; his gallantry, his chivalry, were the subject of a jest for a petticoat—for two petticoats: Miss Helstone too was smiling. Moreover, he felt he was seen through, and Peter grew black as a thunder-cloud. When Shirley looked ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... your books, you should set your mind on your books; and that you should think of home when not engaged in reading. Whatever you do, don't romp together with them, for were you to meet our master, your father, it will be no joke! Although it's asserted that a scholar must strain every nerve to excel, yet it's preferable that the tasks should be somewhat fewer, as, in the first place, when one eats too much, one cannot digest it; and, in the second place, good health must also be carefully attended to. ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... achieve a reputation for profound and ponderous wisdom, so long as one looks very solemn and says nothing. This is the stork's recipe. Go up to Billy here, or one of the marabous, as he stands with his shoulders humped up about his head, and make a joke. He won't see it. He will lift his eyebrows with a certain look of contempt, and continue to cogitate—about nothing. If the joke is a very bad pun—such a frightful pun that even a stork will see and resent it—perhaps he will chatter ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... obituary appeared Cibber crawled out of the house, sick-faced but convalescent, and read the notice with keen interest. Whether he was amused thereat, or dubbed the joke a poor one, is a matter which he does not record, but he tells us that he "saw no use in being thought to be thoroughly dead before his time," and "therefore had a mind to see whether the town cared to have him ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... though he has never indulged in intoxicants to excess he has never abstained entirely from either the use of tobacco or strong drink. Grandfather Whipple is one of the authorities in the place where he lives, and his memory is remarkable. His eye has a merry twinkle, and he can enjoy a joke and tell a good story with any of the ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, August 1887 - Volume 1, Number 7 • Various
... he said. 'Well, I will be a guest, too. I have my dress-suit in some of those trunks. Frank is going to Congress, is he? That's a good joke! Drive on. What are you ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... going to be a terrible snow storm, dear," she said. "I think we should get down fairly early and suggest to Gritzko that we start back to Moscow before lunch. It is no joke to be caught in this wild country. I will send you ...
— His Hour • Elinor Glyn
... a gay people, but they are fond of a joke. Lincoln's "little stories" were characteristically Western, and it is doubtful whether he was more endeared to the masses by his solid virtues than by the humorous perception which made him one of them. The humor of which we are speaking now is a strictly popular ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... wag would push forward the pockmarked brave and demand of Dud that he baptize him again, and always the puncher made motions of going through the performance a second time. The joke never staled. It always got a hand, no matter how often it was repeated. At each encore the Utes stamped their flatfooted way round the room in a kind of impromptu and mirthful dance. The baptismal jest never ceased to be ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine
... there is no ground for supposing that it was due to such a very narrow-minded prejudice as "that he would take nothing from a heathen." If he ever used these words, they must have been intended as a joke, and are not to be accepted seriously. A sufficient explanation of his decision is, that he had a supreme disdain for money, and the sum offered seemed far in excess of the post and work he had to perform. To have received L10,000 ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... way, cut off one skirt of his long coat. This excited peals of laughter. When the poor Londoner saw that this was done by a roguish American, at the instigation of his own countrymen, the tear stood in his eye. Even our jolly, big bellied captain, enjoyed the joke, and ordered the boatswain's mate to cut off the other skirt, who, after viewing him amidst shouts of laughter, damned him for a land lubber, and said, now he had lost his ring-tail, he looked ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... The joke of their eccentric general seemed but a poor one to the footsore and almost shoeless men, but they were astonished when Jack rode forward and presented to each of the officers a commission, which he had drawn out in the earl's name, as cavalry officers. Their astonishment was ...
— The Bravest of the Brave - or, with Peterborough in Spain • G. A. Henty
... the handglass, gave one look at myself, and I was inclined to let it slide off the bed to the floor, a la Camille, only Amelie would not have seen the joke. I did look old and seedy. But what of that? Of course Amelie does not know yet that I am like the "Deacon's One Hoss Shay"—I may look dilapidated, but so long as I do not absolutely ...
— On the Edge of the War Zone - From the Battle of the Marne to the Entrance of the Stars and Stripes • Mildred Aldrich
... larf, and I never smile, And I never lark nor play; But I sit and croak, and a single joke I ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... do," they all shouted with much laughing, as if it were a great joke to ask them ...
— Dickey Downy - The Autobiography of a Bird • Virginia Sharpe Patterson
... their first absorbing interest, was busily engaged in braiding a watch-chain from her splendid, Titian-red hair. These chains were the fashion of the hour, and the old family doctor, friend as well as physician, paused after a visit to the boy's mother, to joke her about it: "You're making a keepsake for ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon
... as Richards had said. We had little occasion to fear that the portmanteaus would be lost or injured; but we knew very well that the only way to get them out of the claws of these rough backwoodsmen would be by some well-contrived joke. And those jokes were exactly what I feared; for one had often to risk breaking an arm or a leg by them. There was a crowd of men in the kitchen. One young fellow, upwards of six feet high, held a lighted candle; and they were all busily engaged examining something which ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... An amusing joke, which tickled all Paris was perpetrated shortly afterward. The editor of the Bonsoir imported six hundred copies of the forbidden Treaty from Switzerland, and sent them as a present to the Deputies of the Chamber, ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... to show that it was not either an accident, or had not been fired by some passing cowboy who, from a distance, seeing the bottle on a stick, could not resist a chance to "take a crack" at it. And yet this last theory would seem to be a poor one. For if the shot had been a joke the one who had fired it would, in all reason, it appeared, ...
— The Boy Ranchers on the Trail • Willard F. Baker
... were the two great forts impregnable but the shores were lined with batteries. What could wooden ships do with such forts and guns? It was a joke that they should pretend to attack them. Their only possible danger was from the new iron-clad gunboats in the upper waters of the river. They were building two of their own kind which would be ready long before the enemy could break through the ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... squat little man—Bannon could not see until near by that he was not a boy—big-headed, big-handed, big-footed. He stood there in his shirt-sleeves, his back to Bannon, swearing good-humoredly at the men. When he turned toward him Bannon saw that he had that morning played an unconscious joke upon his bright red hair by ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... grew pharisaical. I ventured to pity my less fortunate neighbors, bound hand and foot to the slavery of mothers-in-law. I attempted to joke them, and poke them severely in the ribs with my knuckles, when the magic name was mentioned. So often did I congratulate myself on the shrewd stroke of genius displayed, that I fear even her respectability became sadly impaired in my mind, and depreciated to ...
— Trifles for the Christmas Holidays • H. S. Armstrong
... thought this light treatment of the matter an unjust attempt at diminishing his glory, answered respectfully, that it was not for the like of him to judge about that; but he rather thought it was no joke to ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... to fill the gap that Henri had left—tried to joke with the men in her queer bits of French; was more smiling than ever, for fear she might be less. But now and then in cautious whispers she heard Henri's name, and her heart ...
— The Amazing Interlude • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... for a long time. The rests were frequent, the course not of the straightest. For many years their recollection of that hill was as of a mountain. Finally the top sprang at them abruptly, as though in joke. ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... pet joke of Gabriel's did not dissipate the constraint and disappointment left upon the company by Uncle Sylvester's unsatisfying performance and early withdrawal, and they separated soon after, Kitty and Marie being ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... national importance," from sundry experiments witnessed by his grace, at Hounslow Barracks; and the coach is announced "really to start next month (the 1st) in working—not experimental journeys—for travellers between London and Bath."[1] Crack upon crack will follow joke upon joke; the Omnibus, with its phaeton-like coursers will be eclipsed; and a journey to Bath and the Hot Wells by steam will soon be ...
— The Mirror Of Literature, Amusement, And Instruction, No. 391 - Vol. 14, No. 391, Saturday, September 26, 1829 • Various
... that name at him. He threw me into the greatest confusion by laughing heartily and replying in a very sprightly manner, "No, to be sure; you're right." And to this hour I have not the faintest notion what he meant, or what joke he ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... who came back from the Ypres neighborhood a few days ago, told me a delightful story of a practical joke played upon the Germans, who were entrenched only about thirty or forty yards away from his platoon. One bright spirit was lecturing the enemy and making dialectical rings ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various
... near the Country Club so as to get the Automobile Trade, coming and going. Some of the Best People would drop in and show the Ice-Box how to take a Joke. ...
— Knocking the Neighbors • George Ade
... gifts from the king, but made a motion, that instead of nine archons, they should yearly choose nine poor citizens to be sent ambassadors to the king, and enriched by his presents, and the people only laughed at the joke. But they were vexed that the Thebans obtained their desires, never considering that Pelopidas's fame was more powerful than all their rhetorical discourse, with a man who still inclined to the ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... and already Coley's vision was, 'When I am vicar of Feniton, which I look forward to, but with a very distant hope, I should of all things like Fanny to keep house for me till I am married;' and again, when relating some joke with his cousins about the law-papers, of the Squire of Feniton, he adds: 'But the Squire of Feniton will be ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... awful foreknowledge of the dying deceived them. Wrenching himself forward, Orde looked through the curtains and saw how near was the sail. 'That's Polly,' he said simply, though his mouth was wried with agony. 'Polly and—the grimmest practical joke ever ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... superciliously. Apparently he thought that another assault had been committed upon the divine right of kings. But the Czar Nicholas appeared to be amused, and the Emperor of China, who had been studying English, laughed in his sleeve, as if he suspected that a joke had ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putnam Serviss
... were wild. He laughed softly, however, saying in Russian: "Very good, Peter—you'd joke at ...
— Red Fleece • Will Levington Comfort
... up to Mr. Excell just as the marshal stepped out of the crowd and accosted him. For the first time in his life Mose was moved to joke his father. ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... real and living than the wonder of the sweet-smelling chairs, the birds, and the elegant dogs. Richest of treats, a monkey was introduced to me. 'It 's your papa's whim,' Mrs. Waddy said, resignedly; 'he says he must have his jester. Indeed it is no joke to me.' ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... It's a dead, airless pip-squeak planetoid, just a big mile-thick rock, probably. No life, no vegetation, no people, no nothing. Guess you might call me the Man in the Second Moon—and the joke's on me! Well, one and three-quarter hours of oxygen left, by the gauge, or 105 minutes—sounds like more that way.... What's that, sir? Your voice is getting faint. Any last requests from me? ...
— Shipwreck in the Sky • Eando Binder
... looked utterly blank at this, and, suddenly realising that they were not very familiar with American coins, Patty explained the joke. They saw it, of course, but seemed to think it not very good, and Sinclair whimsically insisted on calling it, "a shilling to Bob," which he said ...
— Patty's Friends • Carolyn Wells
... delivering this charge to Tinkler, Mr Dorrit looked severely at him, and also kept a jealous eye upon him until he went out at the door, mistrusting that he might have something in his mind prejudicial to the family dignity; that he might have even got wind of some Collegiate joke before he came into the service, and might be derisively reviving its remembrance at the present moment. If Tinkler had happened to smile, however faintly and innocently, nothing would have persuaded Mr Dorrit, to the hour of his death, but that this ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... The Act of Supremacy, the spread of Protestantism, the power of the Pope, the state of England—all were discussed; and the possibilities of the future, as each party painted it in the colours of his hopes. The brethren, we find, spoke their minds in plain language, sometimes condescending to a joke. ...
— Froude's Essays in Literature and History - With Introduction by Hilaire Belloc • James Froude
... brother. English Clay is not ostentatious of that which is his own, but he is disdainful of all that belongs to another. The slightest deficiency in the appointments of his companions he sees, and marks by a wink to some bystander, or with a dry joke laughs the wretch to scorn. In company he delights to sit by silent and snug, sneering inwardly at those who are entertaining the company, and committing themselves. He never entertains, and is seldom ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... house's this! Something may come of that deed yet. Give it to Draxy; I'm sure she's earned it, if there's anything to it. Put it away for your dowry, dear," and he snatched the paper from Reuben's hands and tossed it into Draxy's lap. He did not believe what he said, and the attempt at a joke brought but a faint smile to any face. The paper fell on the floor, and Draxy let it lie there till she thought her father was looking another way, when she picked it up and put ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson
... A story was told how a couple of young, dashing French flying officers met the Queen on the beach one day but, not recognising her, started a conversation. She, seeing the possibility of a good joke, invited them to her home, and they gleefully accepted. Picture their consternation when they were presented to the King! Altogether we spent an extremely pleasant fortnight in this place, and it was by way of a study in contrasts that October 20th found us installed ...
— The Seventh Manchesters - July 1916 to March 1919 • S. J. Wilson
... always makes a change. I've known her, after being very quiet, and hardly having any thing to say, though in the midst of young company, grow all at once as merry as a cricket, and laugh and joke in a wild sort of way. And again, when she has been in one of her old, pleasant states of mind I have noticed that she all at once drew back into herself; I could trace the cause to only this—the presence of Henry Wallingford. But this doesn't often happen, ...
— The Allen House - or Twenty Years Ago and Now • T. S. Arthur
... the real thing (with a woman). It may also mean "by his incitement of me." All this scene is written in the worst form of Persian-Egyptian blackguardism, and forms a curious anthropological study. The "black joke" of the true and modest wife ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... head of the table, could be so cheerfully absorbed in the day's news and the Maryland biscuit, and that Mrs. Saunders, pottering over her begonias, could show so radiant a face over the blossoming of the double white, that Emily, at the telephone could laugh and joke. ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... Genesis gives an explanation of the diversity of languages on the earth. It does this in the truest spirit of romance. Philologists like Max Mueller and Whitney must regard the story of the Tower of Babel, and the confusion of tongues, as a capital joke. A great many parsons may still believe it, but they are ...
— Bible Romances - First Series • George W. Foote
... courses were parallel, she being bound for London, while we were from thence, we gradually neared, when an amusing conversation by signals took place. Our captain, by mistake of the signaller, invited the Yankee captain to dinner, and the reply from the American, who good-naturedly took it as a joke, was "Bad roadstead here." Our captain thought they were chaffing him, and had not the mistake been discovered in time, the rencontre might not have ended as pleasantly as it did. Our captain and second ...
— Five Years in New Zealand - 1859 to 1864 • Robert B. Booth
... was fond of a joke, laughed, and desired to be shown the proposed site. On inspecting it, he highly approved of ...
— The Missing Ship - The Log of the "Ouzel" Galley • W. H. G. Kingston
... on to make mention of divers interviews between the crew and the natives in the voyage up the river; but as they would be impertinent to my history, I shall pass over them in silence, except the following dry joke, played off by the old commodore and his schoolfellow Robert Juet, which does such vast credit to their experimental philosophy that I cannot refrain from inserting it. "Our master and his mate determined to try some of the chiefe men of the countrey whether they had ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... the Colonel, looking severely at his nephew, 'am I to understand that you married this girl without undeceiving her as to the children's, or rather Miss Rylance's, most ill-judged practical joke—that you stood before the altar in God's House, the temple of truth and holiness, and won her by ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... said, 'nobody cares; don't you look for that. Why should they? Why, you look as if you were sorry for me! What a joke!' he murmured to himself,—'what a joke! Sorry for some one else! What a fool ...
— The Little Pilgrim: Further Experiences. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. • Margaret O. (Wilson) Oliphant
... uno, alterum per dies plures, nullo alio quam organorum sexus vinculo sibi adstrictum, amicae suae corpus sursum et deorsum trahentem, mirantes vidimus!—Spanish flies, you exclaim!—as if he had not taken a dose of his own powder; but after the joke is over, we think this is another poser for the advocates of insect intelligence. We found that if either of two insects was destroyed in coition, that state was not interrupted for two or three days. The insects on which are observed this remarkable circumstance, were the Cantharis ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... saw-mill, who had all the industry, saving propensities, and superstitions of his ancestry. He was a firm believer in spells, second-sights, and ghosts. Taking advantage of these superstitions, my brother and myself made him the sufferer in many a practical joke. Upon one occasion, we put into circulation, in the neighborhood, a story full of wonder. A remarkable spectre had been seen near the mill on dark nights, and especially on those misty nights of murky gloom, common ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... Signor Mask, are pleased to joke with the unhappy child of a luckless race. That I might have been above want—nay, that I am not downright needy, may be true; but when they speak of a thousand ducats, they speak of affairs too weighty for my burdened shoulders. Were it your pleasure to purchase an amethyst or a ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper
... about it,' he said. 'It was rather a close shave, with only one man to do it all. But, there, I managed somehow, and perhaps it was just as well you weren't there. The first rush was no joke, ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... rumour puts the number at 2000. I heard at dinner that eighty had come in. Mention was laughingly made of "the lost regiment". I could not imagine at the time that we had lost a regiment and thought it was a joke of the General's, but to-day I find that a whole battalion of K.O.S.B.'s are amissing. Those must be prisoners in the hands of the Turks. They had lost so heavily before that they could not have been at anything like full strength. The curious thing is the officers ...
— The Incomparable 29th and the "River Clyde" • George Davidson
... "What a capital joke!" shouted his listeners, and amid roars of laughter, claimed the bet of fish, and wine. It was duly paid; but Tokutaro never allowed his hair to grow again, and renounced the world, and became a priest ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... for if he had referred to it, Peter would have been obliged to turn it into a joke. As it was, they smoked on in understanding silence. Finally ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... pleading a case, Claudius grew vexed and ordered that he be cast into the Tiber, near the banks of which he chanced to be holding court. Domitius Afer, who as an advocate had the greatest ability of his contemporaries, made a very neat joke on this. A man whom Gallicus had disappointed came to Domitius for assistance, whereupon the latter said to him: "And who told you I could ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio
... very simple," replied the other. "Hitherto it was the ruin of a joke that people did not see it. Now it is the sublime victory of a joke that people do not see it. Humour, my friends, is the one sanctity remaining to mankind. It is the one thing you are thoroughly afraid of. Look ...
— The Napoleon of Notting Hill • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... window, and went back to find the doctor and Helen all smiles, and ready to joke instead of scold. Then he went to the piano, and turned over the music, the airs and songs making him feel more and more sad, and again and again he ...
— Quicksilver - The Boy With No Skid To His Wheel • George Manville Fenn
... self-expression. She laughed from her heart. But her laughter was a little different. It sat by itself, an elfish thing, with a touch of seriousness about it, its arms hugging its knees, and looked beyond them all and saw how much bigger and finer the joke was than they thought it. She was the spirit of their good humour. They could ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... a living for forty years and has sent two sons through college from the Democrat, and the effort has taken the fight out of him. I never saw him resent a joke but once. That was when Pelty Amthorne told him that his wife considered the Democrat to be the best paper she had ever seen. He let Ayers burst a couple of buttons from his vest in his swelling pride before he explained that the Democrat, when cut in two, exactly ...
— Homeburg Memories • George Helgesen Fitch
... glass of wine?" he asked mockingly. The glass that he was about to put to his lips he offered in a joke to the donkey. Palikare, taking the offer seriously, came a step nearer and pushing out his lips to make them as thin and as long as possible, drank a good half of the glass which had been ...
— Nobody's Girl - (En Famille) • Hector Malot
... "You must not joke, my children," said the Father; "this is a very sad business. I am thankful it has taken place in the absence of your dear Mother, and I forbid you writing her anything about it. This must concern me, and ...
— Fanny, the Flower-Girl • Selina Bunbury
... proceed," without any reference to the sea. (The exx. are from Forc.) This passage I believe and this alone is referred to in Ad Att. XIII. 21, 3. If my conjecture is correct, Cic. tried at first to manage a joke by using the word inhibendum, which had also a nautical signification, but finding that he had mistaken the meaning of the word, ...
— Academica • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... final adjustment. He sniffed a firebug from afar, and knew without asking how much salvage there was in a bale of cotton after being twenty-four hours in the fire. He is dead, poor fellow. In life he was fond of a joke, and in death the joke clung to him in a way wholly unforeseen. The firemen in the next block, with whom he made his headquarters when off duty, so that he might always be within hearing of the gong, wished to give some tangible evidence of their regard for the ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis
... dinner tables, clubs, etc.—"little jokes" of which every point in his discourse continually reminded him, though his hearers could not always perceive the association of ideas. This gentleman was very facetious over family jars, which reminded him of a "little joke," which he told; he was also very witty upon the subject of matrimonial disputes in particular, which reminded him of another "little joke," which he also told; but most of all, he was amused at ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... and brooding away in the city." The lad's bright, clear eyes looked frankly into the captain's as he continued. "I have been making a fool of myself, Captain. Got into some mischief with a crowd of fellows at school. Of course, I got caught and had to bear the whole blame for the silly joke we had played. The faculty has suspended me for a term. I would have got off with only a reprimand if I would have told the names of the other fellows, but I couldn't ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... comment, to his jeweler, who gave 9,600 francs for the stone, but the King returned the money, and kept the gem as a curiosity. Probably it was not the original stone, but another cut in the same fashion, Saint- Germain sacrificing 3,000 or 4,000 francs to his practical joke. He also said that he could increase the size of pearls, which he could have proved very easily—in the same manner. He would not oblige Madame de Pompadour by giving the King an elixir of life: "I should be mad if I gave the King a drug." There seems to be a reference ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... have formed a favourable opinion of me, Master Quacko," he said, looking at the ape, for even in the dangerous predicament in which he was placed he could not resist a joke. ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... pluck of those who are endeavoring to work out for themselves a new revolution. They sympathize with the South from strong dislike to the aggression, the braggadocio, and the insolence they have felt upon their own borders. They dislike Mr. Seward's weak and vulgar joke with the Duke of Newcastle. They dislike Mr. Everett's flattering hints to his countrymen as to the one nation that is to occupy the whole continent. They dislike the Monroe doctrine. They wonder at the meekness with which ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... near, fell back of a sudden, awestruck, as she herself here tells us, by her words and bearing. The danger was averted, and Catherine had met one of the disappointments of her life. [Footnote: As she herself expresses it, "The Eternal Bridegroom played a great joke on me."] There is an almost childlike simplicity in her account of the inner side of the experience. Nothing could be more genuine than her grief that the crown of martyrdom was not granted her—few things more lovely than her confiding account of the fine joys which the mere ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... coon in the tree, when he saw Colonel Crockett taking aim at him," added Frank: "says the coon, 'Don't shoot! If it's you, colonel, I'll come down!' And I tell ye," cried the boy, enthusiastically, "there's something besides a joke in it. Jeff'll be glad to come down out of his tree, before we hang him ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... you girls!" Will commanded, good-naturedly. "The man in there says we have just exactly five minutes to catch that joke steamer for the island, and if he is right, we've got to hustle. Sling over that bag, ...
— The Outdoor Girls on Pine Island - Or, A Cave and What It Contained • Laura Lee Hope
... forward to the trip for several years. My cousin Kate and I had always corresponded since they had "gone west" ten years before; and Kate, who revelled in the western life, had sung the praises of her adopted land rapturously and constantly. It was quite a joke on her that, when I did finally come to visit her, I should have struck the wettest autumn ever recorded in the history of the west. A wet September in Saskatchewan is no joke, however. The country was almost "flooded out." The trails soon became nearly impassable. All ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... rose up a monk named Amador. This name had been given him by way of a joke, since his person offered a perfect portrait of the false god Aegipan. He was like him, strong in the stomach; like him, had crooked legs; arms hairy as those of a saddler, a back made to carry a wallet, a face ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac
... Gobang; but we called him Strike, because he was always asking for more pay. Hare Ware was a poacher and used to catch Welsh rabbits in a trap; we called him 'Hardware' because he had so much steal about him. Good joke, wasn't it?" ...
— Davy and The Goblin - What Followed Reading 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' • Charles E. Carryl
... 'tis a joke, that cry— Foolish and dull and small: He so bores them for votes that they mean to imply He's a ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... are hardly any signs in his Book. His almost solitary joke (I know but one more, and it pertains to the [Greek: ouk anaekonta]) occurs in speaking of the Kaan's paper-money when he observes that Kublai might be said to have the true Philosopher's Stone, for he made his money at pleasure ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... the rounds to the effect that a music-hall comedian has confessed that he has never made a joke about the Mess in Mesopotamia. It is feared that the recent hot weather has affected the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, July 25, 1917 • Various
... jokes her joke, an' cracks her crack, As spunkie as a growin' flea; An' there she sits upon my back A livin' perpetuity. She hurkles by her ingle side, An' toasts an' tans her wrinkled hide; Lord kens how lang she yet may bide To ca' ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume VI - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various |
