"Make-believe" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... gently. "Yes, but games of make-believe come true. You couldn't meet him, but you might meet some one his equal—a man who's, perhaps, already waiting for you, while you squander yourself on makeshifts and ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... found a scene before me which was not Tolstoi's scene, a foolish, sentimental conversation in which I recognised hardly more than a sentence of Tolstoi (and this brought in in the wrong place), and, in short, the old make-believe of all the hack-writers for the stage, dished up again, and put before us, with a simplicity of audacity at which one can only marvel ("a thing imagination boggles at"), as an "adaptation" from Tolstoi. Tolstoi has been hardly ...
— Plays, Acting and Music - A Book Of Theory • Arthur Symons
... reality. It had been all right as a provision merchant, but when it fancied itself capable of higher things it had deceived itself. Foolish little image with its brave dreams and its swelling words from Browning! All make-believe of the feeblest. He was a coward, running away at the first threat of danger. It was as if he were watching a tall stranger with a wand pointing to the embarrassed phantom that was himself, and ruthlessly exposing ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... lately become the bride of a millionaire and adoring duke; the peerless Berengaria wrought havoc with the peace of Lord Arthur, and had more suitors than she could count on the fingers of both hands. It was a fascinating make-believe; but, as Ruth plaintively remarked, it did come with somewhat of a shock to be dragged ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... with subtler smile Than hers who in the yellow South, With make-believe mysterious mouth, Deepens the ennui ...
— The Worshipper of the Image • Richard Le Gallienne
... act as director, with such men as Nairn, when it was a question of running a mine; but it's doubtful if I'd make a successful financial juggler. It's hard to keep one's hands off some of the professional tricksters. Bluff, assumption, make-believe—Pshaw! I've had enough of them. Better stick to the ax and cross-cut; that's what I ...
— Vane of the Timberlands • Harold Bindloss
... unscrupulous outsider the opportunities for illicit gain afforded by the service made an irresistible appeal. Sham gangs and make-believe press-masters abounded, thriving exceedingly upon the fears and credulity of the people until capture put a term to their activities and sent them to the pillory, the prison or the fleet they ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... know there is no longer anything between Josephine and me," he said. "To-night she told me everything. I have seen the baby. Her secret she has given to me freely—and it has made no difference. I love her. Tomorrow I shall ask her to end all this make-believe, and my heart tells me that she will. We can be married secretly. ...
— God's Country—And the Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... with slightly heightened color in spite of all the make-believe. Then Annie ran to a vase of artificial flowers which stood upon the mantel, and pulled out ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... can't want to marry your little niecelet, the funny little 'kiddo,' that used to burn her fingers and the beefsteak over that old studio gas stove. We had such lovely kinds of make-believe together. That's what our association always ought to mean to us,—just chumship, and wonderful and preposterous pretends. I couldn't think of myself being married to you any more than I could Jack the giant ...
— Turn About Eleanor • Ethel M. Kelley
... realizes without argument, frequently without what is called education (though I think it the goal and apex of all education deserving the name), an intuition of the absolute balance, in time and space, of the whole of this multifariousness this revel of fools, and incredible make-believe and general unsettiedness, we call THE WORLD; a soul-sight of that divine clue and unseen thread which holds the whole congeries of things, all history and time, and all events, however trivial, however momentous, like a leashed dog in the ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... written. A sustained piano note is, indeed, the great mechanical desideratum for the music of the future. In music, as at present written and published for the piano, which is, and must continue to be, the real "King of Instruments," there is a good deal of make-believe. A long note—or two notes tied in a certain method—is intended to be played as a continued sound, like the note of an organ; whereas there is no piano in existence which will produce anything even approximately approaching to that effect. The characteristic of the ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... then he went back to the trucking business, because he wasn't born an artist and the whole thing seemed silly to him. He couldn't stand the make-believe any longer, because he had no imagination, no art—nothing but the ...
— Alex the Great • H. C. Witwer
... I don't know that our republican friend there spoke what is every thoughtful man's verdict upon me? (They are silent.) But how could I possibly undertake my task, as long as I believed everything to be make-believe and falsehood, without exception? Now I know the root of the falsehood! It is in our institutions; he was quite right. And one kind of falsehood begets another. You cannot imagine how ludicrous it appeared to me—who up till then had led such a sinful, miserable existence—when ...
— Three Dramas - The Editor—The Bankrupt—The King • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... to turn a deaf ear. It did not occur to him, at first, that Selma was seriously in earnest. He regarded her suggestions of neglected opportunities, which were often whimsically uttered, as more than half playful—a sort of make-believe envy of the meteoric progress in magnificence of their friendly neighbors. He was even glad that she should show herself appreciative of the merits of civilized comfort, for he had been afraid lest her ascetic scruples would lead her judgments too far in the opposite direction. He ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... furnished an inspiration for our plot. It was the arrest of a make-believe Italian female organ-grinder, whose offence appeared to be that she was carrying about in a cradle attached to the organ an infant that did not belong to her. And as the infant brought her in much more money than her music did, she protested in very strong ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... this, and made quite a big fort, getting inside it and throwing snowballs at a make-believe ...
— Six Little Bunkers at Grandpa Ford's • Laura Lee Hope
... like a masterless torpedo, alternately leaping forward through the air and shooting along on, or just under, the surface—switchbacking, they call it; and that, I dare to fancy, if it proves anything, proves that the coyness was only make-believe, and that she had allowed the daring admirer to catch her up and force her to act as if she were already vanquished and using the last arts ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... He comes to see her about twice a week, and I've heard her say, "Goodness me, there's that tiresome old bachelor again." But she treats him just as polite as she does anybody; and when he brings her candy, she says, "Oh, Mr. Martin, you are too good." There's a great deal of make-believe about ...
— Harper's Young People, June 8, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... on your return home and see. Then the print. Observe that the type is identical on both sides of this make-believe clipping, while in fact there is always a perceptible difference between that used in the obituary column and that to be found in the columns devoted to other matter. Notice also," I continued, holding up the scrap of paper between her and the light, "that the alignment on one side ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... valour merely, but "noble patriotism" as well; "a true English heart breathes, calm and strong through the whole business ... this man (Shakespeare) too had a right stroke in him, had it come to that." I find no valour in it, deathless or otherwise; but the make-believe of valour, the completest proof that valour was ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... you," said Mr. Jones, sharply and emphatically. "What do you mean by hangin' fire so? Do you s'pose this is child's play and make-believe? Don't ye know that when quiet, peaceable neighbors git riled up to our pitch, they mean what they say? Sw'ar, as I said, and be mighty sudden ...
— Driven Back to Eden • E. P. Roe
... and then another, brought them back rudely from a make-believe wood near Athens to a peril-haunted park in an English county. For the second time that night Sylvia knew what fear meant. Intuitively, she shrank close to the strong man who seemed destined to be her protector; and when an arm clasped her again, ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... the light of a gas lamp a dingy prostitute stood lurking—"was in Babylon and Nineveh. Your little lot make believe there won't be anything of the sort after this Parliament! They're going to vanish at a few top notes from Altiora Bailey! Remington!—it's foolery. It's prigs at play. It's make-believe, make-believe! Your people there haven't got hold of things, aren't beginning to get hold of things, don't know anything of life at all, shirk life, avoid life, get in little bright clean rooms ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... attracts me more than I could have thought possible. No one in these noisy streets has any rightful claim upon me. I have cut away at one stroke lectures, and Boards of Studies, and tutors' meetings, and all the rest of the wearisome Oxford make-believe, and the creature left behind feels lighter and nimbler than he has felt for years. I go to concerts and theatres; I look at the people in the streets; I even begin to take an outsider's interest in social questions, in the puny dykes which well-meaning ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... too, were further lightened that afternoon when she was made the special messenger to carry to Miss Almira Belt the very lavender and white wrapper which she and Patty had picked out that day when they were doing the make-believe shopping. Marian, of course, told Mrs. Hunt all about it, and as one of the Guild which looked after such things, it had been voted to give Miss Almira some such present, and Mrs. Hunt had gone with Mrs. Perkins to select it. They ...
— Little Maid Marian • Amy E. Blanchard
... finger. Needless to add, these screens would serve to obscure neither sound, sight, nor smell of drunken rowdies who sat behind them! In summer cars black and white passengers may be separated not even by a make-believe screen; they are simply required, respectively, to occupy certain seats in the front or the back ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... him next, smilingly listened to my tale and heartily approved of my action, but Burroughs regarded it as a weak surrender. "A silk hat and steel-pen coat on a Whitman Democrat," he said, "seems like a make-believe," which, in a sense, ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... gambling, as well he might for the good of his kingdom, and that he is determined to do as his mother told him and be a real king. He doesn't look as though he'd exactly know how. You should have heard him laugh over a little silly joke, when one of the actors sat in a chair on a make-believe baby and a ventriloquist squalled just like a baby. But they says he's obstinate and the colonies can't make ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... understand. I see you are strong: we shall go together. I shall throw you across my saddle. No sedan-chair— they are used only in make-believe abductions! I return soon! [He ...
— The Romancers - A Comedy in Three Acts • Edmond Rostand
... revolutionary metaphysics, and we see the winsome face of the child. Perhaps none of his poems is more purely and typically Shelleian than The Cloud, and it is interesting to note how essentially it springs from the faculty of make-believe. The same thing is conspicuous, though less purely conspicuous, throughout his singing; it is the child's faculty of make- believe raised to the nth power. He is still at play, save only that his play is such as ...
— Shelley - An Essay • Francis Thompson
... of make-believe wedding," replied Mrs. Clifford; "that is all. And since you are to be bridesmaid, Dotty, I wonder if I cannot find a pair of white slippers for you. I remember Grace had a pair some years ago, which she has ...
— Dotty Dimple Out West • Sophie May
... prevents our putting one unpleasant question to you, anyway. I knew that your innuendo in the cabin was all make-believe." ...
— The Iron Pirate - A Plain Tale of Strange Happenings on the Sea • Max Pemberton
... know, you onbelievin' swab, as how the Singapore mail steamer was nearly as possible plundered by a whole gang o' them gettin' aboard of her as make-believe passengers and then setting fire to her and plundering the cargo, and that this ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson
... spoke up Master Burbage, "this is all very well for Will and thee; but, pray, where do Hemynge, Condell, and I come in upon the bill? Come, man, 'tis a pity if we cannot all stand together in this real play as well as in all the make-believe." ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... Incredulity infected Lanyard's mind. Nothing so tiny, so insignificant, so make-believe as that silhouette of a ship could conceivably be ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... Halloween—that is, it isn't really Halloween, because it's too late. I lost that, being sick, you know. So we're going to pretend, and Mr. Jack is going to show me what it is like. That is what Mr. Jack and Jill always do; when something ails the real thing, they just pretend with the make-believe one. He's planned lots of things for Jill and me to do; with nuts and apples and candles, you know. It's to-morrow night, so ...
— Just David • Eleanor H. Porter
... Phil!" cried Joel Jackman, showing signs of growing excitement. "Nothing make-believe about that alarm, let me tell you. There's a genuine fire broken out ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton
... tender to her, was having coffee and buttered rolls and talk and laughter that were no talk and laughter at all with her; his fear was in his jesting postponing perverting voice; it was just in this make-believe way he had brought her out to imitate the old London playtimes, to imitate indeed a relation that had wholly changed, a relation that she had with her very eyes seen in the act of change when, the day before in the salon, Mrs. Beale rose suddenly before her. She rose before her, ...
— What Maisie Knew • Henry James
... pathetic spectacle on our human stage than the figure of poor puppy in his beach suit and his tuxedo jacket seeking in vain to amuse himself for ever. A leisure class no sooner arises than the melancholy monotony of amusement forces it into mimic work and make-believe activities. It dare not ...
— The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice • Stephen Leacock
... to herself, "did the Pani really think she was so stupid? Rats had to be [Pg 5] here. The Pani wished rats to be here; the Pani tried to make-believe that rats were here. Well, let people who were more stupid than she was believe it, for she, Marianna ['S]roka, was much too clever, nobody could humbug her. The mistress must have some reason for saying it, for there were ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... about me. I'm going to die and I know it—and before long.... There, there," as his caller uttered a protest, "don't bother to pretend, Kendrick. We aren't children, either of us, although you're a good many years younger than I am; but we're both too old to make-believe. I'm almost through. Well, it's all right. I've lived past my three score and ten and I'm alone in the world and ought not to mind leaving it, I suppose. I don't much. It's an interesting place and there are two or three matters I should ...
— Fair Harbor • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... coming; they had hardly thought of this before and were not at all prepared for it. But it was still warm, for the June afternoon lingers long and far into the evening. Then they fell to eating strawberries again, for make-believe tea where everything is water and sand is not very satisfactory. After the strawberrying they came back to the shore again, and little Bo, now quite disheartened began to make a noise which sounded a little like crying, it was a whimper; but Yulee was brave and kept her ...
— Seven Little People and their Friends • Horace Elisha Scudder
... suggestive of the Mediterranean than Yorkshire, for the blueness of the sea seems almost unnatural, and the golden greens of the pretty little gardens among the houses seem perhaps a trifle theatrical; but the fisher-folk play their parts too well, and there is nothing make-believe about the delicious bread-and-butter and the newly-baked cakes which accompany the tea awaiting us in a spotlessly ...
— Yorkshire—Coast & Moorland Scenes • Gordon Home
... not make-believe. I am in love with him myself, and have been any time since Nelson and the Nile. As for you, Dolly, since he went away six months ago, you have been positively in the megrims. I shall date your loss of appetite from George Austin's vanishing. No, my dear, our family require entertainment: ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson
... pretending that the reptile was crushing him, fighting his way free of the folds, picking up his club and attacking it in turn, beating the make-believe head with his club, and finally indulging in a war-dance as he jumped round, dragging the imaginary serpent after him, pretending all the while that it was very heavy, before stooping down to smell it, making a grimace, ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn
... better. I occupied a seat in his 'eligible pew' last Sunday. The lath and plaster walls pretended to be Caen stone. The cheap deal was all 'make-believe' oak. The brick pillars were 'blocked off,' and unblushingly claimed to be granite. As I entered, I observed that the pulpit stood under the arch of a recess, roofed with carved stone, with clustered columns rising on the sides and spreading into graceful arches overhead. As I walked ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various
... grind something a great deal better than that," cried Kitty. "I'd grind a real piano, and I'd learn to play on it my own self. I wouldn't have any old make-believe ...
— Eyebright - A Story • Susan Coolidge
... thee. It's like last week thy last sweetheart were drowned; but thou's not one to waste time i' rememberin' them as is gone—if, indeed, thou iver cared a button for yon Kinraid—if it wasn't a make-believe.' ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. II • Elizabeth Gaskell
... ride bicycles, and the leopards jump about wherever the trainer tells them to; a monkey acts as clown, and a little elephant runs a make-believe automobile. That act alone is worth ...
— Peck's Bad Boy at the Circus • George W. Peck
... line of argument in The Prophetical Office of the Church was taken by Mr. Newman. It was certainly no make-believe, or unreal argument. It was a forcible and original way of putting part of the case against Rome. It was part of the case, a very important part; but it was not the whole case, and it ought to have been evident from the first ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church
... not hear, during the remainder of the evening, with the result that that very night at least six boys told other boys or their own parents, in the strictest confidence, of course, that there was more truth than make-believe about Paul Grayson as an Indian. And the parents told the same story to other parents, the boys told it to other boys, and within twenty-four hours Paul Grayson was a far ...
— Harper's Young People, October 19, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... it the address of that dear old friend, living on Fifty-blankth, on whom he was going to call. This was to convince the policeman of the perfect purity of his intentions. The fact that there was no policeman nearer than the man on fixed post a block away did not lessen Carl's pleasure in the make-believe. He industriously inspected the house-numbers as he followed the quickly moving girls, and frequently took out his watch. Nothing should make him late in calling on ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... evening meal. If she was thinking of Giovanni Celleni, his brute face filled with semi-madness; if she was thinking of a burned baby, sobbing alone in a darkened tenement while its mother breathlessly watched the gay colours and shifting scenes of a make-believe life, her expression did not mirror her thought. Only once she spoke, as she was folding ...
— The Island of Faith • Margaret E. Sangster
... takes the children where they love to be, into the world of "make-believe." In this lovely world the children are blacksmiths, carpenters, wheelwrights; birds, bees, butterflies; trees, flowers, sunbeams, rainbows; frogs, lambs, ponies,—anything they like. The play is so characteristic, so poetic, so profoundly touching in its simplicity and purity, so full of ...
— Children's Rights and Others • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... at all unlike that of human children. They loved to dig holes in the ground; to hide behind tree-trunks and spring out upon one another with terrifying cries and pretended fierceness; all kinds of make-believe appealed to them greatly, and to none of them more keenly than to Finn, who liked to come galloping down from the other end of the orchard to the old oak tree, flying exaggerated danger signals, and making believe that he was pursued by a savage and ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... and any passer-by could look who had the heart. But when night came, and they were in their garret bed, Tommy was once more seeking to comfort Elspeth with arguments he disbelieved, and again he succeeded. As usual, too, the make-believe made him happy also. ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... in peace, without setting us here to taste of every pain and mortification, to become acquainted with every grief, and then to perish miserably?" Old questions these, which the sprightly critic justly condemns as morbid and futile, and not to be dangled before a merry world of make-believe. Perhaps he is right. It is better to play at marbles on a sepulchre than to lift the lid and peep inside. But, for all that, they will arise when we sit alone at even in our individual wildernesses, surrounded, perhaps, by mementoes of our broken hopes and tokens ...
— Jess • H. Rider Haggard
... discovers that the greatness of love lies not in forward-looking thoughts; Flower-gathering nor yet in any spur it may be to ambition. Rose Pogonias He is no dissenter from the ritualism of nature; Asking for Roses nor from the ritualism of youth which is make-believe. Waiting—Afield at Dusk He arrives at the turn of the year. In a Vale Out of old longings he fashions a story. A Dream Pang He is shown by a dream how really well it is with him. In Neglect He is scornful of folk his scorn cannot reach. ...
— A Boy's Will • Robert Frost
... brain, we would be of opinion that Mr. Gough's cranium contained a greater quantity than that of any other living man. When speaking before an audience, he can weep when he pleases; and the tears shed on these occasions are none of your make-believe kind—none of your small drops trickling down the cheeks one at a time;—but they come in great showers, so as even to sprinkle upon the paper which he holds in his hand. Of course, he is not alone in shedding tears in ...
— Three Years in Europe - Places I Have Seen and People I Have Met • William Wells Brown
... Griselda; she looked like a fairy queen, or princess, at least, for even her little white feet had what looked like butterfly shoes upon them, though these, you will understand, were only a sort of make-believe, as, of course, ...
— The Cuckoo Clock • Mrs. Molesworth
... in a dark delight, almost fiendish in its sudden revelation of a gulf of strange emotion deep within him. Whatever had happened to Riggs had not been too much for Roy Beeman. Helen remembered hearing her uncle say that a real Westerner hated nothing so hard as the swaggering desperado, the make-believe gunman who pretended to sail under the true, wild, and ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... vaguely comforting and he, too, fell adreaming. Most of us foiled humans learn to play the game of make-believe and to find such consolation as we may therein. Often and often in his lonely hours Dick Carson had summoned Tony Holiday to his side, a Tony as bright and beautiful and all adorable as the real Tony, but a dream ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... lack of moral and intellectual elevation, in spite of frivolity and make-believe, this art was infinitely better than the pompous imitation of foreign example set up by Louis XIV. It was more spontaneous, more original, more French. The influence of Italy began to fail, and the painters began to mirror French ...
— A Text-Book of the History of Painting • John C. Van Dyke
... was a summer palace of the present fashion, but there was one good thing about it: it had no tower, nor any make-believe balconies hung on the outside like bird-cages. The rooms were spacious, and had big fireplaces, and ample piazzas all round, so that the sun could be courted or the wind be avoided at all hours of the day. It was, in short, not a house for retirement ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... you instead. Youd appreciate my qualities then: you would indeed sir. I shant never do myself justice at soljering, sir: I cant bring myself to think of it as proper work for a man with an active mind, as you might say, sir. Arf of its only ousemaidin; and the other arf is dress-up and make-believe. ...
— Press Cuttings • George Bernard Shaw
... remained in bed all day, where she would talk softly to herself. She always brightened up when Mavis came into the room, and was ever keenly interested in the latest news from the academy, particularly in Mr Poulter's physical and economic wellbeing. Seeing how make-believe inquiries of Mr Poulter after his accompanist's health cheered the lonely old woman, Mavis had no compunction in employing these white lies to brighten ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte
... times when the country of make-believe was swept down by a whirlwind, a whirlwind of realization which crashed through Katie's consciousness and knocked over the fancyings. Those whirlwinds would come all unannounced; when Ann seemed most Ann, playing with Worth, perhaps wearing one of the prettiest dresses and smilingly ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell
... allowances for art-in-error. His hand fell heavy only upon those heretics who not merely denied the faith but pretended that artifice was better than nature, that decoration was more than structure, that make-believe was something you could live by as you live by truth. He was not strongest, however, in damnatory criticism. His spirit was too large, too generous to dwell in that, and it rose rather to its full height in his appreciations of the great authors whom he loved, and whom he commented from the ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... a pitiable state of suppressed excitement before the ordeal was concluded. The solemnity and impressiveness of the vows she was taking disturbed the serenity with which she had schooled herself to regard the marriage as "make-believe." She was frightened at her own daring. A dread that the tie she was so lightly assuming might be harder to undo than she had contemplated was fluttering her heart and almost paralyzing her limbs. But Curtis was unemotional as an icicle; or, at any rate, he looked ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... deeply. It was a knock-down blow, surely. He was a just man, so far as he knew, and as he studied the situation over he could not blame the girl. In the light of her convincing wrath he comprehended that the sharp things she had said to him in the past were not make-believe-not love taps, but real blows. She had not been coquetting. with him; she had tried to keep him away. She considered herself too good for a hired man. Well, maybe she' was. Anyhow, she had gone out of his ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... in the ribs, remembering those four feverish days, with a facetious, "Ah! vieux polisson de Sisteron, va! Nous autres, nous n'avons pas fait des farces a Paris dans notre jeunesse!" to M. Sisteron's unbounded delight. It was in the genuine spirit of Tartarin de Tarascon, with all the mutual make-believe on both sides. His wife, Mme. Sisteron, was fond of assuring her friends that she owed her excellent health to the fact that she invariably took a bath twice a year, whether she required it ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... After her mother died my little gal an' I lived alone. I wasn't a gardener then, I was in the cobblin' line, an' sat all day mendin' an' patchin' the folks' boots an' shoes. Mollie wur a lovin' little thing, an' oncommon sensible in her ways. She'd sit at my feet an' make-believe to be sewin' the bits of leather together, an' chatter away as merry as a wren. Then when I took home a job, she'd come too an' trot by my side holdin' me tight by one finger—a good little thing she was, an' all the folks in the village was fond of her, but she always liked ...
— The Hawthorns - A Story about Children • Amy Walton
... soil or apples or potatoes at me now; but he would often make-believe to be about to hurl something, and if he could not get away because of his work he always turned ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... political situation in the North, during that momentous year, was to be found in the great number of able Whigs who, seeing that their own party was lost but refusing to be sidetracked by the make-believe issue of the Know-Nothings, were now hesitating what to do. Though the ordinary politicians among the Republicans doubtless wished to conciliate these unattached Whigs, the astuteness of the leaders was too great to allow them to succumb to that temptation. They seem to ...
— Abraham Lincoln and the Union - A Chronicle of the Embattled North, Volume 29 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Nathaniel W. Stephenson
... bury his wee hands in the fuzzy hair of the cub and pull with all his might, and the cub would growl with make-believe fury, but it seemed to know that the baby did not intend to hurt it, and did not offer to bite. When the baby pulled its ears too hard, it ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes
... complain that 'love' and common morality have no place in satiric comedy is either to contemplate ridicule of them or to ask comedy to be other than satiric. We know what happened when the dramatists gave way: there followed, Hazlitt says, 'those do-me-good, lack-a-daisical, whining, make-believe comedies in the next age, which are enough to set one to sleep, and where the author tries in vain to be merry and wise in the same breath.' These in place of 'the court, the gala day of wit and pleasure, of gallantry, and Charles the Second!' And all because people would not ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... put his poser to me, turning with angry eyes, but ended on a short laugh of contempt. "Do not try make-believe with me, ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... reanimation of external Venice. But there was a thunderbolt in it; for about an hour before sunset, when the ladies were superintending and trying not to criticize the ingenious efforts to produce a make-believe of comfort on board for them, word was brought down to the boat by the count's valet that the Marquis de Rouaillout had arrived. Renee turned her face to her brother superciliously. Roland shrugged. 'Note this, my ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... forehead in a pretty make-believe of woe—the question of the sale had ceased to be acute: 'I just came out here to think ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... relation for human use. The propensity may in large measure be overborne by the more immediately constraining incentive to a reputable leisure and an avoidance of indecorous usefulness, and it may therefore work itself out in make-believe only; as for instance in "social duties," and in quasi-artistic or quasi-scholarly accomplishments, in the care and decoration of the house, in sewing-circle activity or dress reform, in proficiency at dress, cards, yachting, golf, and various sports. But the fact that it may under stress ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen
... war a-watering after the Dew beasts in the pinfold, and after the brown horse in partickelar! And so I loaned him a horse, and sent him off to Logan's. Well, sir, and what does the brute do but ride off, for a make-believe, to set us easy; for he knew, the brute, if he war in sight of us, we should have had guards over the cattle all night long; well, sir, down he sot in ambush, till all were quiet; and then he stole back, and turning my own horse among the others, as ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... think, when I reflect upon the lives of theatrical artists, that they are altogether unnatural existences, and produce—pardon the bull—artificial natures, which are misplaced anywhere but in their own unreal and make-believe sphere. They are the anomalous growth of our diseased civilizations, and, removed from their own factitious soil, flourish, I half believe, in none other. Do not laugh at me, but I really do think that creatures ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... a poor make-believe, hung milky pale behind cloud strata above the cramped city. Wet and draughty were the gable-fringed streets, and now and then there fell a sort of soft hail, not ice ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... meantime, the hunters at the temporary camp were aroused to a high pitch of excitement. Some turned their buffalo robes and put them on in such a way as to convert themselves into make-believe bison, and began to tread the snow, while others were singing the buffalo song, that their spirits might be charmed and allured within the circle of the camp-fires. The scout, too, was singing his buffalo bull song in a guttural, lowing chant as he neared the hunting camp. Within arrow-shot he paused ...
— Indian Child Life • Charles A. Eastman
... girls were certain that all this was pure "make-believe," but they did not communicate their conviction to each other by look or suggestion of any kind. They played their part very well, and it is quite possible that Langford, peeking through his eyewinkers, was considerably puzzled by their manner. He had ...
— Campfire Girls at Twin Lakes - The Quest of a Summer Vacation • Stella M. Francis
... basket by a string out of the window, and you and I will go and drop the letters into the basket, and stand by the gate and see her pull it up. That will be funny, won't it? We will play that you are my little girl, and that you have a real mamma and a make-believe mamma." ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... far from rewarding him for being of the true sort, you do nothing but snub him, that I can see. He looks to me as good for work as any man I know; but you'll give your livings to any kind of wretched make-believe before you'll give them to Frank. I am aware," said the heir of the Wentworths, with a momentary flush, "that I have never been considered much of a credit to the family; but if I were to announce my intention of marrying and settling, there is not one of the name that ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... "Tired? No, I'm not tired. I'm having a great time. Playing make-believe is a good game. I haven't played it lately, and I was doing it rather hard. I wonder what that bunch of people are over there for? A number of children ...
— The Man in Lonely Land • Kate Langley Bosher
... be considerable bluster about this business, and I'll wager something you won't have to stand up before him if you will put on a bold front and make-believe you ...
— Frank Merriwell Down South • Burt L. Standish
... stumbled and out came a thoughtless 'Mein Gott!' for he thought he had broken his ankle. Now of course that would have been a catastrophe indeed, but so was that slip into the German tongue. A kindly Providence saw to it that an alert Tommy had heard, and in a trice those six make-believe English soldiers had been rounded up and were on their way to headquarters. Next morning there was a sunrise party, for those Germans must be taught it isn't ever healthy for them ...
— Shelled by an Unseen Foe • James Fiske
... response of unmistakable passion. It had not come, and she had nothing left but to loathe herself. She did so, violently, for a long time, in the dark corner of the box, and she felt that he loathed her too. 'I love you!'—how pitifully the poor little make-believe words had quavered out and how much disgust they must have represented! 'Poor man—poor man!' Laura Wing suddenly found herself murmuring: compassion filled her mind at the sense of the way she had used him. At the ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... of "Wonder Tales" there is a capital air of make-believe, which imposes upon you most delightfully, and makes you accept the most incredible doings, as you accept them in a dream, as the most natural thing in the world. In the later series, where the didactic tale becomes more frequent ("The Pine Tree," "The Wind's Tale," ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... glare of wrath at Banks had been followed by one last yearning look at Brenda, and some sentimental realisation of his loss rose and choked him, temporarily superseding the powers both of make-believe and instinct. One lesson he had learnt at Harrow and Oxford so thoroughly that he re-acted to it even in this supreme crisis of his life. He might give expression to brutal passion, but in no circumstances whatever must he break down and ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... there is no suggestion of make-believe in Fiesco's courting of Julia. When he exclaims in soliloquy that she loves him and he 'envies no god', one is justified in assuming that chivalrous devotion to his wife is not among his virtues. It is to be supposed, apparently, that he makes love to Julia in order to be seen ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... a Chinese actor has many more difficulties to face than his colleague in the West. In addition to the expression of all shades of feeling, from mirth to melancholy, the former has to keep up a perpetual make-believe in another sense, which is further great strain upon his nerves. There being no scenery, no furniture, and no appointments of any except the slenderest kind upon the stage, he has to create in the minds of his audience a belief that all these missing accessories are nevertheless before ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles
... he said, his fingers closing upon the looseness of the linen as he spoke. "A weakling—girl! And so, girl-like, he loves to play at make-believe. You know their games? There is the shell of a ruined house beyond the walls and he holds it against all-comers with a sword of lath, or carries it by assault at the head of his army of two stable-boys. Then he cries, ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond
... see old missis,' he says. 'She yabber that one make-believe constable bin there. Gammon-like it surveyor, and bimeby old man Ben gon' alonga hut, and that one pleeceman fire at him and all about, and him ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... maintained his anger against his wife for more than a week after the scene at Richmond, feeding it with reflections on what he called her disobedience. Nor was it a make-believe anger. She had declared her intention to act in opposition to his expressed orders. He felt that his present condition was prejudicial to his interests, and that he must take his wife back into favour, in order that he might make progress with her father, but could ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... like a fairy tale," Rod exclaimed. "But, no, it isn't, either," he mused. "A fairy tale is only a make-believe, while this is really true. It's better than a fairy tale. Isn't it great!" and his eyes sparkled. "But, say, do grandad and ...
— Rod of the Lone Patrol • H. A. Cody
... told him to banish his fears, and to speak up; no one would hurt him. Manabozho began again, and he would have gone over the same make-believe of pain, had not his father, whose strength he knew was more than a match for his own, threatened to pitch him into a river about five miles off. ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... a plait down her back," cried the woman, greeting with a chuckle her first game of make-believe for many a long year; "your nobleman might pass his daughter twenty times like that, an' never ...
— Ambrotox and Limping Dick • Oliver Fleming
... had not chanced to reach me in the black fit which preceded one of my make-believe new honeymoons, I should doubtless have been a good deal more elated than I was by the letter I received from Mr. Sylvanus Creed, the well-known connoisseur and arbiter of literary taste, who presided over the fortunes of the publishing ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson
... borrowing their own phrases. They know that man, the drunkard, values intoxication more than food, and so they try to pass themselves off as an intoxicant. As a matter of fact, but for the sake of man, woman has no need for any make-believe." ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore
... now going into business, sport, social events, frivolities, make-believe and the deliberate destruction of waste and war could be directed to planning, utilizing, beautifying on the circumferences and at the centers of population concentrations, immense forward strides could be taken ...
— Civilization and Beyond - Learning From History • Scott Nearing
... make-believe," she exclaimed. "There is no make-believe in the sun's brightness and its warmth. We see it and we feel it, and we are none the less glad of it because the time of year should be November; rather do we take the greater joy in it. And it is not yet November in your life, not ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... creation. They could exist quite comfortably on three meals a day without ever suspecting the terrible emptiness that there was inside of them. They could even wring a stale satisfaction out of this imitation existence—this play of make-believe being alive. And around them all the time there was the wonder and ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... is a great game of make-believe. All sorts of liberties are taken, the clock is put forward or back at the command of the general, a great enemy army is created in the twinkling of an eye, day is turned into night and a regular game of topsy-turvydom indulged in. On the occasion of which ...
— The Amateur Army • Patrick MacGill
... looking down at her. There had been no make-believe on her part when he held her in his arms. He knew that. And now? She had said that she hated him. Perhaps she did for having made her do that which she had never dreamed of doing. But he told himself that he could stand a whole lot of that kind of hate. ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... all this testimony. For it was often difficult for him to feel any more certain about the cowboy than he did about his four millionaires, or Sir Galahad, say, or Uncas, or Goliath, or Crusoe. He could revel gloriously in make-believe, yes; but perhaps for this very reason he found himself terribly prone to doubt facts! And as each day went by, he came to wonder more and more about the reality of One-Eye, though the passing time as steadily added romantic touches to the figure ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... or monkeys seize each other and wrestle, fall, and roll over and over, indefinitely. They make great pretenses of biting each other, but it is all make-believe. My favorite orang-utan pet in Borneo loved to play at biting me, but whenever the pressure became too strong I would say chidingly, "Ah! Ah!" and his jaws would instantly relax. He loved to butt me in the chest with his head, make wry faces, and make funny noises with his lips. ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... to suffer. He said that they'd get you, too, before mornin' an' that we'd all be hanged as rebels an' traitors to Mexico. He laughed at the way he fooled us. He said that spat he had with Sandoval was only make-believe. He said that we'd never get San Antonio; that he'd kept Cos informed about all our movements an' that Santa Anna was comin' with a great army. He said that most of us would be chawed right up, an' that them that wasn't chawed ...
— The Texan Star - The Story of a Great Fight for Liberty • Joseph A. Altsheler
... I might stay here with you to-night. I have heard this opera before, and it will be so tiresome. I get so sleepy while they are singing, for I never care to watch the acting. I did at first, when it was new, but now it seems insipid to see them make-believe, while the theatre is worse yet," and ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... father) who had just returned from a performance of Siegfried say with a look of anxious surprise that "somehow or other he felt ashamed of enjoying the music as he did," for beneath it all he was conscious of an undercurrent of "make-believe"—the bravery was make-believe, the love was make-believe, the passion, the virtue, all make-believe, as was the dragon—P. T. Barnum would have been brave enough to have gone out and captured a live one! But, that same ...
— Essays Before a Sonata • Charles Ives |
