"Ninny" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... young fellow of our acquaintance inside there! You mustn't take me for a ninny. Don't let me catch you gallivanting about again with your ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... be hang'd, good stammering ninny, I think I have set your Redcap's heels a-running, would your pianot-chattering humour could as sa-safely se-set me fr-from the searchers' walks. Yonder comes some one. 'Hem! Skink, to your tricks this titty titty. Ah, the tongue, I believe, will ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... Saratoga, or the White Mountains this summer, just look out for them. They are dreadful creatures at home in the cities, but doubly dreadful at these resorts. You are young, simple, unsophisticated. I was at your age. But I soon got over such weaknesses. You must very soon, or be a ninny. "Simple," "artless," "unsophisticated," and such terms mean simply softness. Whatever else you are, or are not, don't be soft. The mistake of my fruitless life has been that I believed, in other years, all that was told me by the other sex. They ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 7, May 14, 1870 • Various
... ninny I am!" she said aloud as she looked at herself, her tongue chiding her apprehensive eyes, her laugh contemptuously adding its comment on her tremulousness. "It was a real nightmare—a waking nightmare, that's ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... he had done and suffered for her. Then they sent to invite her parents, the King and Queen of Long Field; and they celebrated the wedding with wonderful festivity, making great sport of the great ninny of a fox, and concluding at the last of the ...
— Stories from Pentamerone • Giambattista Basile
... Bosenna. "You ninny!" she went on with sovereign contempt. "Do you really suppose I'd marry a man that could handle my money, or was vain enough to suppose ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... suggestions of his suspicious brain, it took me fully three months to descend in his bearish estimation from a highwayman to a ninny. There was an incredibility in my apparent lack of motive that puzzled him. His dubious cordiality was doled out under protest. As an exhibitor would clutch a vicious ape, he grabbed at every show of feeling, and ...
— Trifles for the Christmas Holidays • H. S. Armstrong
... so gay and eccentric as Figaro, and so dashing and reckless as the unscrupulous Don Giovanni. That milksop, Germont Junior, known as Alfredo, was adequately played by Signor GIANNINI, whose name, were it spelt GIA-"NINNY," would partly describe ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., November 8, 1890 • Various
... sheltered life system, nursery governess, private tutor, etc., who when he came of age just ran amok, drank, fought with the colliers on his own estate, and then enlisted in an irregular corps and went to fight the Spaniards in Cuba, just to prove to himself that he wasn't the ninny his father had tried to make him. He shocked his neighbours thoroughly, but he's a man today, listened to when he speaks and just adored by the miners on his estate.... I want to make good, and though Mrs. Grundy would chatter if ...
— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns
... would balk at your using the car if he knew the circumstances," piped another boy. "We have got that match to play off, and now that the electric cars are held up by the strike how are we to get to Torrington? Don't be a ninny, Steve." ...
— Steve and the Steam Engine • Sara Ware Bassett
... buck, I thank you, but ere bed-time get under the weather, there is no telling how—so one may wake up wise, and slow of assent, very wise and very slow, I assure you, and for all that, before night, by like trick in the atmosphere, be left in the lurch a ninny. Health and wisdom equally precious, and equally little as unfluctuating possessions ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... daughter chid; "You never do as you are bid, Have I not told you o'er and o'er, That awkward gait to use no more? Learn, ninny, once for all to know, Folks forward and not backward go." "Mamma," says Miss, "how strange you talk! Have I not learn'd from you to walk? Were I to move the other way, How could I follow you ...
— Aesop, in Rhyme - Old Friends in a New Dress • Marmaduke Park
... thinking of the younger son, whom I once classed as a ninny, but who came back so ill from Nigeria. He's gone out there again, Evie Wilcox tells me—out to ...
— Howards End • E. M. Forster
... old ninny. Viola is a mighty bright girl suffering from a well-developed case of hysteria ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... ninny!" interrupted his wiser wife; "I gave William credit for more sense. Put it fairly, indeed! If he'd said nothin', but just caught her in his arms, an' clipped an' kissed her, she couldn't ha' stood out. But he's lost his chance, an' ...
— I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... of poetical massacre, this rifling of old Etruscan tombs of their honourable spoil, a very pleasant ninny would that poetaster stand forth, whose inanely conceited daring exhibited specimens from his own mint, as medals in fit contrast with those slandered "things of base alloy." No, as with politics, so with poetry; in public I abjure and do renounce the minx: and although privately ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... letters for the master of the house; the Newcome Sentinel, old county paper, moderate conservative, in which our worthy townsman and member is praised, his benefactions are recorded, and his speeches given at full length; the Newcome Independent, in which our precious member is weekly described as a ninny, and informed almost every Thursday morning that he is a bloated aristocrat, as he munches his dry toast. Heaps of letters, county papers, Times and Morning Herald for Sir Brian Newcome; little heaps of ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Utie turned blindly about for some implement of revenge. He found it in Tiltock, a fellow-clerk, a novitiate and a ninny, who was ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... news of the composition: they abused him and his wife most shamefully. "You silly, awkward, ill-bred country sow," quoth one, "have you no more manners than to rail at Hocus that has saved that clod-pated numskulled ninny-hammer of yours from ruin, and all his family? It is well known how he has rose early and sat up late to make him easy, when he was sotting at every alehouse in town. I knew his last wife: she was a woman of breeding, good humour, and complaisance—knew how to live in the world. ...
— The History of John Bull • John Arbuthnot
... cousin, and you oughtn't, you know. If it isn't wicked, it MUST be naughty to call her a ninny," said Rose. ...
— Princess Polly's Playmates • Amy Brooks
... thought, and with reason, "ever to hint that I was coming, as I did, in that foolish letter when we sent Miss Crawley the guinea-fowls. I ought to have gone without a word to the poor dear doting old creature, and taken her out of the hands of that ninny Briggs, and that harpy of a femme de chambre. Oh! Bute, Bute, why did ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... that he thought that, without any other demonstration or sufficient argument, the world would be pleased to make his blockish and ridiculous impositions the rule of their devices. In effect, according to the proverb, To a shitten tail fails never ordure, he hath found, it seems, some simple ninny in those rude times of old, when the wearing of high round bonnets was in fashion, who gave some trust to his writings, according to which they carved and engraved their apophthegms and mottoes, trapped and caparisoned their mules and sumpter-horses, apparelled their pages, quartered their breeches, ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... here is your cradle! Why surely, my Jenny, Such slender dimensions go somewhat to show You were an exceedingly small pic-a-ninny Some nineteen or twenty short ...
— London Lyrics • Frederick Locker
... replied Louis, unmoved. 'Come, I have begun the campaign by inviting Bishop Helmsdale, and I'll take the responsibility of carrying it on. All I ask of you is not to make a ninny of yourself. Come, ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy
... when I arrived at Melanie's, I found the bird had flown. That great ninny of a Ferussac, whom I never had suspected, and had introduced to her myself, had turned her head by making capital out of her love for the stage. As he was about to leave for Belgium, he persuaded her to go there and dethrone Mademoiselle Prevost. I have ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... a canny crone Who's old enough to ken she doesn't ken. You're right: for doubting is a kind of dotage: Experience ages and decays; while folk Who never doubt themselves die young—at ninety. Age never yet brought gumption to a ninny: And you cannot reckon up a stranger's wits By counting his bare patches and grey hairs: It's seldom sense that makes a bald head shine: And I'm not partial to Methuselahs. Keep your cocksureness, while you can: too soon, Time plucks the feathers off you; and you lie, Naked and skewered, ...
— Krindlesyke • Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
... py'd ninny's this?] This line should certainly be given to Stephano. Py'd ninny alludes to the striped coat worn by fools, of which Caliban could have no knowledge. Trinculo had before been reprimanded and threatened by Stephano for giving Caliban the lie, he is now supposed to repeat his offence. ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson
... acquaintance began much to doubt him: For his skin, "like a lady's loose gown," hung about him. He sent for a Doctor; and cried, like a ninny, "I have lost many pounds—make ...
— Broad Grins • George Colman, the Younger
... you blank ijjit," he growled. "I've no grudge ag'in you. If we pull out of this mess you'll 'ave to square matters wi' David Verity an' that other ole ninny, Dickey Bulmer. She's promised to 'im, you know. Told me so 'erself, so there's no mistake. I got me rag out, I admit, an' 'oo wouldn't after bein' 'owled down by those swine forrard. My godfather! Watch me put it over 'em w'en I get the chanst. Stop 'er, Norrie! ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... they? What shall I do? I won't go back. I'll jump overboard first. And you do nothing but stand there like a ninny." ...
— Little Miss Grouch - A Narrative Based on the Log of Alexander Forsyth Smith's - Maiden Transatlantic Voyage • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... to her maid, who shrank hesitating in the boat. "Berthe, you pitiful little ninny, are you coming? Then do, and do not forget the satchel." For a promenade of an hour the inhabitants of two imperial courts must needs have a satchel, filled of course with mysteries of the toilet. The maid obeyed, and followed ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... a pied ninny's this! Thou scurvy patch!— I do beseech thy greatness, give him blows, And take his bottle from him: when that's gone He shall drink nought but brine; for I'll not show him Where the quick ...
— The Tempest • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... ninny, stay where you are. Is that chattering girl gone? Didn't I tell you we would have a practice of our dance? they are all ready on the lawn. Mark me; I represent the Count, and you the Baron. [Exit, with affected dignity. ...
— The Stranger - A Drama, in Five Acts • August von Kotzebue
... Sir," cried she, "but who's fool then? no, no, you needn't trouble yourself to make a ninny of me neither, for I'm not so easily taken in, I'll ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... accrue—the dregs might be drawn from the city, and the deserted portions of Italy be repeopled. But this whole business was interrupted by the war, and has cooled off. Metellus is an exceedingly good consul, and much attached to me. That other one is such a ninny that he clearly doesn't know what to do with his purchase.[130] This is all my public news, unless you regard as touching on public affairs the fact that a certain Herennius, a tribune, and a fellow tribesman of yours—a fellow as unprincipled as he is needy—has ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... safe and well," thought Sir Norman, emphatically, "nothing short of an earthquake or dying of the plague will ever induce me to leave her again, until she is Lady Kingsley, and in the old manor of Devonshire. What a fool, idiot, and ninny I must have been, to have left her as I did, knowing those two sleuth-hounds were in full chase! What are all the Mirandas and midnight queens to me, ...
— The Midnight Queen • May Agnes Fleming
... "Ninny!" she exclaimed in a half-whisper. "What you must do is to get out to-night and hustle dog-teams. I know of two. There's Hanson's team, seven big Hudson Bay dogs—he's holding them at four hundred each. That's top price to-night, but it won't be to-morrow. And Sitka Charley has eight Malemutes ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... ninny! You'll blow the whole of us. No fellow is to speak but—you know whom," said he with ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic
... have been a gull and a ninny and a soft Tommy long enough. Time it was done. Here is a good lesson to have nothing to do with that accursed sex, that was the ruin of the man in the beginning, and will be so to the end. God knows I was happy enough before ever I saw her; God ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... deepest horror of commonplaceness. If I am free, if I am rich (and I know that I am young and pretty), I will never belong to any ninny just because he is the son of a peer of France, nor to a merchant who could ruin himself and me in a day, nor to a handsome creature who would be a sort of woman in the household, nor to a man of any kind ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... Eben Hammond may be a chronic sufferer from acute Come-Outiveness, but he ain't a ninny. Nobody'll see you, anyway. This fog's like charity, it'll cover a heap of sins. Do come right along. Wait till ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... myself? Why add fuel to the already pernicious flame? Of course I was not in love with her, the idea was preposterous. But, just the same, the confounded servants were beginning to gossip, and back stair scandal is the very worst type. It was wrong for me to encourage it. Like a ninny, I had just given Britton something to support his contention, and he wouldn't be long in getting down to the servants' hall with the latest exhibit ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... you ninny!" cried his brother Joe. "There wasn't any Fourth at all till George Washington ...
— Harper's Young People, June 29, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... on the Red Sea," says Giglio; at which the Princess burst out laughing at him, and said, "Oh, you ninny! You are so ignorant, you are really not fit for society! You know nothing but about horses and dogs, and are only fit to dine in a mess-room with my Royal Father's heaviest dragoons. Don't look so surprised at me, sir: go and put your best clothes on to receive ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... can bear witness thereof, that do and can I; for, now that I am old, I recognize without avail, but not without very sore and bitter remorse of mind, the time that I let slip, and albeit I lost it not altogether (for that I would not have thee deem me a ninny), still I did not what I might have done; whereof whenas I remember me, seeing myself fashioned as thou seest me at this present, so that thou wouldst find none to give me fire to my tinder,[286] God knoweth what chagrin I feel. With men it is not so; they are born ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... came to where Ninny the goose lived. "Ninny, Ninny," called Jack; "do you want to go to the baker's with us to buy a ...
— Baby Nightcaps • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... appear quite charmed. Also, should you catch me smirking like an infatuated ninny, remember I am only doing my ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... sentimental and love-sick letters to —-, and I would not give sixpence for your suit." So much for Mr. Vincent. Now Miss —-'s turn comes to swallow the black bolus, called a friend's advice. Say to her: "Is the man a fool? is he a knave? a humbug, a hypocrite, a ninny, a noodle? If he is any or all of these, of course there is no sense in trifling with him. Cut him short at once—blast his hopes with lightning rapidity and keenness. Is he something better than this? has ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... I continue the tail? If Mr. Dawkins had been the least bit wiser, it would have taken him six months befoar he lost his money; as it was, he was such a confunded ninny, that it took him a very short time to part ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... wind of our method of investigation, if he has any notion that you are inspecting the hands of all those who desire to leave the hospital, he won't be such a ninny as to come and ...
— The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantmas" Detective Tales • mile Souvestre and Marcel Allain
... I shall lose my labour,' he muttered to me. 'Miss Catherine, as the ninny calls her, will discover his value, and send him to the devil. Now, if it had been Hareton!—Do you know that, twenty times a day, I covet Hareton, with all his degradation? I'd have loved the lad had he been some one else. But I think he's safe from her love. ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... simpleton, dolt, dunce, defective, witling, dotterel, driveler, blockhead, beetlehead, ninny, ignoramus, numskull, booby, clodpate, nincompoop, ass, wiseacre, dunderhead, halfwit, oaf, dullard, coot, mooncalf; zany, harlequin, buffoon, jester, merry-andrew, droll, clown, scaramouch. Associated Words: ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... that Signior Bononcini Compared to Handel's a mere ninny; Others aver, that to him Handel Is scarcely fit to hold a ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 237, May 13, 1854 • Various
... was a very great lady, sufficiently high in station to allow herself such compromising caprices,—but even so, she would scarcely have cared to play the role of a coquette in a vaudeville where he himself played the part of ninny,—or she was some noted adventuress who was in the pay of this du Portail and the agent of his singular matrimonial designs. Evil life or evil heart, these were the only two verdicts to be pronounced on this dangerous siren, and in either case, it would seem, she was not very ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... Parody, made by a ninny On some little song with a popular tune, Not worth a halfpenny, sold for a guinea, And sung in the Strand by the light of the moon. I'd never sigh for the sense of a Pliny, (Who cares for sense at St. James's in June?) I'd be a Parody, made by a ninny, And sung in the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 390, September 19, 1829 • Various
... implores The weak and incurable ninny, So kicks him at last out of doors, And Georgy soon spends his last guinea. His uncle, whose generous purse Had often relieved him, as I know, Now finding him grow worse and worse, Refused to come down with ...
— Rejected Addresses: or, The New Theatrum Poetarum • James and Horace Smith
... "Why, you stupid ninny! you forget you were dead; and he could not help loving her. How could he? Well, but you see she refused him. And why? because he came without a forged letter from YOU. Do you doubt her love ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... uncle, in a voice of thunder. "Do you wish to dishonour yourself? And it is that old Mag there that you want! Well, I must compliment you, my young fellow! If you grow up with such tastes as that, you will never have any pleasure in life; and your comrades will call you a precious ninny. If you asked me for a sword or a gun, my boy, I would buy them for you with the last silver crown of my pension. But to buy a doll for you—by all that's holy!—to disgrace you! Never in the world! ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... Montriveau, the Grandlieus, La Roche-Hugon, Serisy, Feraud, and Granville, have allied ourselves against the "parti-pretre," as the party-ninny represented by the "Constitutionnel" has ingeniously said. We intend to overturn the Navarreins, Lenoncourts, Vandenesses, and the Grand Almonry. In order to succeed we shall even ally ourselves with Lafayette, the Orleanists, and the Left,—people whom we can throttle on the morrow of victory, ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... on him as a ninny, and they persuaded him to prove to them that his whip was a real whip by letting Tom Bryan do the whipping for him. Tom Bryan was a rough fellow, who ought to have been driving a plough; a ploughman's life was too peaceful an occupation for ...
— The Lake • George Moore
... and snow. The snow lay several feet deep in the forests, and the path was, in many places, quite drifted over. The white cloud-masses were whirled past by the wind, continually enveloping me and shutting out every view. During the winter the path had become, in ninny places, the bed of a mountain torrent, so that I was obliged sometimes to wade kneedeep in snow, and sometimes to walk over the wet, spongy moss, crawling under the long, dripping branches of the stunted pines. After a long time of such dreary travelling, ...
— Views a-foot • J. Bayard Taylor
... maggot, a thing all body like a nasty bear. Oh, curse the day that I set out with such tyrants! A pretty figure of fun I should make before your beautiful German, covered with mud to the knees. No, you shall hang me first! Why couldn't O'Toole do his own work, the ninny, I hate him! He's tall enough, the great donkey; but no, I must do it, who am shorter, and even then not short enough for him and you, but you must drag me through the dirt ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... after we went to bed, ninny!" Then Coru-hin-Irigod wrinkled his brow. He could remember, clearly enough, the sale of the slaves, but after that—Oh, well, he'd been drinking; it would all come back to him, after ...
— Time Crime • H. Beam Piper
... were two other servants who enjoyed it very much. I heard them laughing and I don't blame them. It was a rare treat. A child would have laughed at it. All my fault too. I behaved like a ninny. But my great mistake was in telling my father. I would give the world if I had not. Won't you please send for Mr. Jones? As I told you, I don't know ...
— The Paliser case • Edgar Saltus
... vanished from his face. It was quite obvious that he called his mother's attention to her and asked who she was. Helen felt that an introduction was imminent. She was glad of it. At that moment she would have chatted gayly with even a greater ninny than George ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... who rule the sea, was I allowed to come thus far and contemplate sand and trees? Was I brought here merely to have my nose dragged away as I was about to nibble the sacred cheese of life? It is preposterous. If this old ninny-woman, Fate, cannot do better than this, she should be deprived of the management of men's fortunes. She is an old hen who knows not her intention. If she has decided to drown me, why did she not do it in the beginning and save me all ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... must think I'm a ninny. And you have been sleeping sure! Got to keep this sort of ...
— Killykinick • Mary T. Waggaman
... it's on the Red Sea,' says Giglio, at which the Princess burst out laughing at him, and said, 'Oh, you ninny! You are so ignorant, you are really not fit for society! You know nothing but about horses and dogs, and are only fit to dine in a mess-room with my Royal father's heaviest dragoons. Don't look so surprised at me, sir: go and put your best ...
— The Rose and the Ring • William Makepeace Thackeray
... never let him know that we actually gave that wretch nearly twenty-five hundred dollars, Edith. He would never forgive us. I admit that I was a fool and a ninny, so don't tell me I am. I can see by the way you are looking that you're just crazy to. It's all Roxbury's fault, anyway. Why should he get up and make a speech in London without letting us know? Just see how it has placed us! ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon
... fantasy that she was standing again in the garret with that book in her hands, and that Mr. Philip was leaning against the wall in that dark place beyond the window laughing at her, partly because she was such a wee ninny not to know, and partly because when she did know the truth there would be something about it which would humiliate her. She cast down her eyes and stared at the floor so that none might see how close she was to tears. She was a silly weak thing that would always feel like a bairn on its ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... shoulders, and said: "Because the man said that I was a thief." Then looking at Roland with an indefinable expression of raillery and affection, he added: "Ninny!" Then suddenly he burst out: "Oh! by ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... "Why, you ninny you, didn't you repeat it just now. 'Eighth—And to his church neglect not tithes to pay.' Now that I have put the words in your mouth, what does ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton
... ninny to be afraid of a toad not bigger than a button," he said scornfully. "I'll get you whipped some day to make up for it, see ...
— A Little Girl in Old Salem • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... he said; 'there ain't no accounting for that ninny, 'is 'ead's full of starch. Anyhow, I don't take 'er on while I'm myself. ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... double-doors of the entrance. The mother was dashed, stricken, a little humiliated. But as she arranged the folds of her beautiful dress in the hansom which was carrying her away from Lamb's Conduit Street towards South Kensington, she said to herself firmly, 'I am not a ninny, after all, and I know that Rose will be ill soon. And there are things in that hospital that I ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... a ninny you are!" he exclaimed. "You are as easily frightened as a bird with a pop-gun. And now, I suppose, you will go with this nice little story to some good friend and make something interesting ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... Tuesday, and come back on Wednesday," said Lady Byrne. "The helplessness of young girls is the one thing I disapprove of in your European system of education. It is much better that they should learn to manage their own affairs; and Juliet is not such a ninny as you seem ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... Kenneth. "She had to go and faint, like a ninny, and she cried all the way home, because she ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Abroad • Edith Van Dyne
... moment the Prefect of Police was condemned. Guy's arrest, which was an act of brutal aggression, was tantamount to a dismissal signed by the Prefect himself. And Marianne! she then made a sport of Sulpice and took him for a child or a ninny! ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... before her. She meets him by accident. Suffering gives him a certain sort of dignity: but how is one to retain patience with the blindness of this insufferable ass? Don't you see, man—don't you see that she is waiting to throw herself into your arms? and you, you poor ninny, are giving yourself airs, and doing the grand heroic! And then the shy coquetry comes in again. The pathetic eyes are full of a grave compassion, if he must really never see her more. The cat plays with the poor mouse, and ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... lass," she rattled on, "have you heard what that great gammerstang of a Mother Garth has been telling 'Becca Rudd about you? 'Becca told me herself, and I says to 'Becca, says I, 'Don't you believe it; it's all a lie, for that old wizzent ninny bangs them all at lying; and that's saying a deal, you know. Besides,' I says, 'what does it matter to her or to you, 'Becca, or to me, if so be that it is true, which I'm not for believing that it is, not ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... highest walks of science and literature. At the feet of no learned professor may she sit for wisdom. Every profession but the teacher's is barred against her, and in that her services are considered not half at par. She can not get more than half-pay for her labor. In law she is but a ninny; if she is married she is less still, an absolute nonentity; her legal existence is merged in that of her husband—the two become one, and he is that one. Then in the every-day customs of life she is but a child. She is not independent, free, energetic. The sun must not shine upon ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... or no ninny, I'll go where I'm like to see him; and I'm sure I'll never bear the sight of another man afterwards; the dear, good, sweet Cathelineau, with his curly hair, and fine whiskers, and black bright eyes; he's better than all the noblemen: I declare I dreamed ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... blowing out all my illumination, feeling dreadfully guilty, and then he helped me off my chair with such an air of politeness that I could have struck him with pleasure, but I soon gathered my wits again. And, vexed with myself for being a ninny, I just dropped him a little curtsey and said, 'I've been examining my mad cousin.' 'Well, and what do you think of him?' he asked me, smiling (his abominable smile!). But I can keep my thoughts to myself as well as other ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... (pryer) Cortaplumas (penknife) Chupaflores (humming-bird) Destripaterrones (navvy) Lavamanos (wash-hand stand) Limpiabotas (boot-black) Matamoros (boaster) Mondadientes (toothpick) Papahueros (ninny) Papamoscas (ninny) Papanatas (ninny) Paracaidas (parachute) Paraguas (umbrella) Pelagatos (ragamuffin) Pintamonas (slap-dasher or bad partner) Sacacorchos (corkscrew) Salvavidas (life-boats) Sepancuantos (slap ...
— Pitman's Commercial Spanish Grammar (2nd ed.) • C. A. Toledano
... laughed contemptuously. "Why, you little ninny," he retorted, "my great-grandfather ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... NOKES. A ninny, or fool. John-a-Nokes and Tom-a-Stiles; two honest peaceable gentlemen, repeatedly set together by the ears by lawyers of different denominations: two fictitious names formerly used in law proceedings, but now very seldom, having for several years past ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... mug. The farmer took a long pull and handed it to his nephew who drank so well that he completely emptied it, and afterwards said: "We ought to lie in wait for their arrival and attack the ninny." ...
— The Silver Lining - A Guernsey Story • John Roussel
... child. That is the malady of the world, and nobody knows it until some pretty ninny like you babbles the truth. And that is why we care for those immortals in romance, those fortunate lovers who, in fable, are given and give enough of love; those magic shapes in verse and tale whose hearts are satisfied when the mad author of their being inks his ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... understand," she said when I had finished, "how a man who can read such great and beautiful thoughts with such expression, and interpret them so clearly, concisely, and intelligently, can at the same time be such a visionary and supersensual ninny as ...
— Venus in Furs • Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
... 'or if anybody wishes the idiom changed, the book of a goose. There is not an idea in it beyond what might germinate in the brain of a washerwoman.' He then proceeds to call the author by such elegant names as 'lickspittle,' 'beggarly skittler,' jackass, ninny, haberdasher, 'fifty-fifth rate scribbler of gripe-visited sonnets,' and 'namby-pamby writer in twaddling albums kept by the mustachioed widows or ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... quadrille! Sleepinbuff and the Bacchanal Queen, having opposite to them Rose-Pompon and Ninny Moulin!" ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... to it. You can't make me over, neither with hay nor a stick. But Liubka is a simple girl and a kind one. And she hasn't grown used to our life yet. What are you popping your eyes out at me for, you ninny? Answer when you're asked. Well? Do you want to or don't ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... What is become of those who once lived in these parts? They are all dead, or gone to other parts of the island. The last black near Sydney, used to talk of the old times, and say, "When I was a pick-a-ninny, plenty of black fellow then. ...
— Far Off • Favell Lee Mortimer
... the relative proportions of the hall and of the ship and ocean were such that even a careful observer might have spent hours in the former without discovering the latter; on the other hand, some blundering ninny might have lighted instantly on the ship and ocean, and awkwardly inquired what it was doing there. So Helen was really enchanted by the ruin. She handled her men with notable finesse: Uncle James savage and vindictive, ...
— Helen with the High Hand (2nd ed.) • Arnold Bennett
... moknomo. Nicotine nikotino. Niece nevino. Niggard avarulo. Nigh proksima. Nigh (time) baldauxa. Night nokto. Nightly nokta. Night, by nokte. Nightingale najtingalo. Night-watch nokta patrolo. Nightmare terursongxo. Nimble vigla. Nimbus glorkrono. Nine naux. Ninny simplanimulo. Nip pincxi. Nippers prenileto. Nitre salpetro. Nobility nobelaro. Noble nobla. Nobleman nobelo. Nobleness nobleco. Nobody neniu. Nocturnal nokta. Nocuous pereiga. Nod (beckon) signodoni. No ne. No one neniu. Noise bruo. Noisome nauxza, ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... no conjurer, I know full well: but my assistant here, And counselor, and grand controller Chremes, Outgoes me far: dolt, blockhead, ninny, ass; Or these, or any other common terms By which men speak of fools, befit me well: But him they suit not: his stupidity Is so transcendent, it exceeds ...
— The Comedies of Terence • Publius Terentius Afer
... use. Mrs. Willard was not fond of little girls, and Mrs. Gray would not take Flaxie; she must stay at home with her sister Ninny. ...
— Lill's Travels in Santa Claus Land and other Stories • Ellis Towne, Sophie May and Ella Farman
... "Why, you ninny," retorted Dave scornfully, "the football 'soreheads' have been developing that classy feeling. They wear better clothes than we do, and have more pocket money. Many of their fathers don't work for a living. In other words, the fellows ...
— The High School Left End - Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron • H. Irving Hancock
... upon an article so mean; but when I shall have made known to thee its properties and virtues, thou wilt most readily consent to take it at that valuation. Not thou alone but all men who have heard me cry my cry laugh and name me ninny." So saying, the broker showed the Spying Tube to Prince Ali and handing it to him said, "Examine well this ivory, the properties of which I will explain to thee. Thou seest that it is furnished with a piece of glass at either end;[FN327] and, shouldst thou apply one extremity thereof ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... that of a child, and to me it was a marvellous story. I conceived a deep admiration for the doctor's boy, and saw myself with eyes of worship walking reverently by his side. I suppose my poor lonely heart was hungering after comradeship, for being a sentimental little ninny I decided to offer myself to the ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... you think 'cause my trousers are tarry, And because that I ties my long hair in a tail, While landsmen are figged out as fine as Lord Harry, With breast-pins and cravats as white as old sail; That I'm a strange creature, a know-nothing ninny, But fit for the planks for to walk in foul weather; That I ha'n't e'er a notion of the worth of a guinea, And that you, Poll, can twist me about as a feather,— ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... old ninny to me," cried Miss Cornelia. "And I don't care who agrees with him. Think—THINK what it means to that poor hunted, ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... to sleep in, you ninny!" she cried. "You're going to sleep in the same bed you've been sleeping in for forty years. What are you talking about? Ain't you going to sleep with me if I appoint you ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... the palace gardens tomorrow at eleven," answered Melita, "and you will be convinced that I am not half-horse, even if my husband is a ninny." ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer
... "You're a great ninny, Rebecca Thayer," Rose said, laughing, "but I'll go if you want me to. I know William won't like it. You run away from him the whole time. There isn't another girl in Pembroke treats him as ...
— Pembroke - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... ninny!" burst out I. Tapp. "You've got about as much idea of women as you have of business. And where are ...
— Cap'n Abe, Storekeeper • James A. Cooper
... substituted for the glamour of innocence in bad luck the sickly glare of cynicism. He asked Jim if he had ever heard of the expression, "The time, the place, and the girl." He had the jury snickering at the thought of a big rich youth like Jim being such a ninny, such a milksop and mollycoddle, as to ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... suppose I must have acted like a ninny," she concluded. "But isn't he just splendid!" and as Cousin Will's handsome face, with its daring, kind eyes, came to her vision she felt comforted. "I don't believe but what he'll make every allowance for how excited I was," said she. "He seems to understand those things, for ...
— Red Saunders • Henry Wallace Phillips
... ninny, there are no policemen here. Perhaps there is a sheriff. Hello, here comes the gentleman who gave me the advice that helped me to win those handsome spurs. He's introducing himself to the Professor and Mr. Kringle. ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in New Mexico • Frank Gee Patchin
... roared Ames. "Cable Wenceslas at once to see that those fellows remain permanently in Colombia. He has ways of accomplishing that. Humph! Fools! Judge Harris, eh? Ninny! I guess Wenceslas can block his ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... as the rest of them, forgetting the doses of jalap in store for me when I was got back to the Tickle, I would now have my ninny (as they called it). Had the bar-maids left off kissing me—but they would not; no, they would kiss me upon every coming, and if I had nothing to order 'twas a kiss for my virtue, and if I drank 'twas a smack for my engaging manliness; and my only satisfaction was to damn them heartily—under ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan
... as plain as sunshine, for that must correct itself. You know I am homo unius linguae: in English, illiterate, a dunce, a ninny. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... any dog in the house, and Deacon Weight is at Conference, and won't be back till the last of the week. That will do, Direxia; you mean well, but you are a ninny-hammer. This way! This is my grandson's room—he died here—what's ...
— Standard Selections • Various
... good humour his usual tokens of kindness consisted in a little rap on the head or a slight pinch of the ear. In his most friendly conversations with those whom he admitted into his intimacy he would say, "You are a fool"—"a simpleton"—"a ninny"—"a blockhead." These, and a few other words of like import, enabled him to vary his catalogue of compliments; but he never employed them angrily, and the tone in which they were uttered sufficiently indicated that they ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... ninny never even observed that the foils were buttoned, but, throwing down his, rushed out of the room ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... Catherine. I smarted under your mockery. You sneered at my beardless chin. Many a time you have told me that I am but a ninny." ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... Go, ninny, blow yourself out with water; do you dare to accuse wine of clouding the reason? Quote me more marvellous effects than those of wine. Look! when a man drinks, he is rich, everything he touches succeeds, ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... Grass vernacular, he "didn't take any stock (he called it stawk) in that sort of gush." He knew that there was only one four-legged domestic animal of which Mrs. Turner was more desperately afraid, and that was a cow. She made a ninny of herself when she went out to drive, and the mere pricking up of the horses' ears was to her mind premonitory symptom of a runaway, and excuse for immediate demand to be set down on the open prairie and allowed to walk home. As for riding, she couldn't be induced to ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... of them," said the court "If you were to roar at every one you meet you'd never have time for anything else. Life would degenerate into one long roar. Everybody knows that Professor Titcombe is a ninny and an idiot, but the decencies of intercourse require you to say, 'How nice!' or 'How ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... nothing but a ninny!" she said to Grace; "and has eyes for no one but Kate. Oh, how I wish my darling Jules were here, or even your brother, Grace—he was ...
— Kate Danton, or, Captain Danton's Daughters - A Novel • May Agnes Fleming
... very bread they have sown." Few people at the court, and in La Bruyere's day, would have thought about the sufferings of the country folks, and conceived the idea of contrasting them with the sketch of a court-ninny. "Gold glitters," say you, "upon the clothes of Philemon; it glitters as well as the tradesman's. He is dressed in the finest stuffs; are they a whit the less so when displayed in the shops and by the piece? Nay; but the embroidery and the ornaments ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... to Bononcini, That Mynheer Handel's but a ninny; Others aver that he to Handel Is scarcely fit to hold a candle. Strange all this difference should ...
— Familiar Quotations • Various
... me ninny enough to be satisfied with reading no more than what you consider proper for me ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer
... but they saw now he was like all the rest of the men—his head had been turned by one smile on a pretty face. Instead of attending to his work, he was following that Baskerville creature about, gazing at her yearningly, like a moon-calf, making a ninny of himself before the whole room. And he with a wife and three babies at home, waiting for him and thinking he was hustling for the cause. When the meeting adjourned, and the Baskerville creature accepted the invitation of Comrade Gerrity to escort her home, the dismay of Comrade Higgins ...
— Jimmie Higgins • Upton Sinclair
... Ninny nanny netticoat, In a white petticoat, With a red nose,— The longer she stands, The ...
— Cecily Parsley's Nursery Rhymes • Beatrix Potter
... becoming impressive), Newman is a flimsy mystic; he has no foundation, but he builds logically enough—at least as far as I see—on his fancies and other people's fancies. This is to be a simple ninny. But Mr. Rogers fancies he believes a mystical religion, and doesn't; and fancies he is very logical, and isn't. This is to ...
— Phases of Faith - Passages from the History of My Creed • Francis William Newman
... filled all pockets from her hoard. A counter, in a miser's hand, Grew twenty guineas at command; She bade a rake to grasp them, fain— They turned a counter back again. The transmutations of a guinea Made every one stare like a ninny; But fair was false, and false was fair, By which ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay
... until her son is a young man and she herself married again. Olga is a splendid creature, but, as Miss LESLIE cleverly lets you see for yourself, the belief in her own principles and their application, which is the essence of her character, alienates her husband and makes something like a ninny of Arnold, her son. A Mouse with Wings is not only the sobriquet of Beryl, the cheerful young Suffragette whom he loves, but has its application also to poor Arnold, who finds the courage to face life and a way ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, August 4th, 1920 • Various
... in making him angry; and he replied to my jokes by calling names—a phrase, by the way, which, forgetting his Watts' Hymns, and failing to consult his Johnson, he characterized as not English. I was, he said, a "shallow, pretending ninny;" an "impudent illiterate lad;" "a fanatic" and a "frantic person;" the "low underling of a faction," and "Peter the Hermit;" and, finally, as the sum-total of the whole he assured me that I stood in his "estimation the ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... is the matter? If it is anything serious, I am a man and not a ninny. I am accustomed to hard struggles, and if discretion is ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... your Jacques; I am your confessor, and have come to get you off. Do not be such a ninny as to know me; and speak as if you were making a confession." He spoke with the utmost rapidity. "This young fellow is very much depressed; he is afraid to die, he will confess everything," said Jacques Collin, ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... story, for instance, of a boy who had been carried off by a Baba Yaga (a species of witch), we are told that when his sister came to his rescue she found him "sitting in an arm-chair, while the cat Jeremiah told him skazkas and sang him songs."[15] In another story, a Durak,—a "ninny" or "gowk"—is sent to take care of the children of a village during the absence of their parents. "Go and get all the children together in one of the cottages and tell them skazkas," are his instructions. He collects the children, ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... You are too good, and too sensible, and too considerate, and all the other kind of too's, while I am just an unaccountable ninny. If you ever did anything crazy you wouldn't like to have it found ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... too trying for anything—holding my foot there like a ninny in the hot sun. You haven't a thimbleful ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... says? She says she hain't had such help since she lived in the East. She says she's restin', and she feels ten years younger. That's your brother's work, Moike,—makin' a lady like Mrs. Gineral Brady feel ten years younger. If there's aught to be ashamed of in that, sure 'twould take a ninny to find out what it is. I'll warrant them delivery b'ys' horses ain't feelin' ten ...
— The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys • Gulielma Zollinger
... "You ninny, this isn't a circus performance. No; of course they don't climb up on a rope ladder as if they ...
— The Circus Boys Across The Continent • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... Jenny! To be such a ninny, To quarrel and make such a noise! For the very same day Their mama sent away Their dolls with ...
— Aunt Kitty's Stories • Various
... that Saint Remy was prosecuted for a robbery, after having made his ninny of a father believe that he had blown his brains out. An agent of the police, one of my friends, knowing that I had for a long time tracked this lord, asked me if I could not put him on the scent. I learned too late, at the time of our last writ, which he had escaped, that he was ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... ninny foe," quoth the fox, "how art thou reduced to humiliation and prostration and abjection and submission, after insolence and pride and tyranny and arrogance! Verily, I kept company with thee only for fear of thy fury and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... we played that act the way you wrote it, we'd last just about four minutes of the opening night. You gave me absolutely nothing to do! Other people talked at me and I had to stand there and be talked at for twenty minutes straight, like a blithering ninny!" ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington
... much that the third one who carried the candles had a chance to eat a penny-dip, without any person seeing him. The king rode in his chariot, drawn by two wasps. He was a very warm gentleman, and not only carried a parasol to keep off the sun, but the head ninny-hammer squirted water on the small of his back ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various
... "Run yourself, you ninny!" screamed Peace, giving the older girl a push, and then scrambling for the fence with Allee dragging ...
— At the Little Brown House • Ruth Alberta Brown
... satisfied. Shatov's appearance and conversation made it as clear as daylight that this man "was going in for being a father and was a ninny." She ran home on purpose to tell Virginsky about it, though it was shorter and more direct to go ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... heroine! My queen! And it was you against whom I was plotting treason—ninny that I was! You that have saved my house from pillage and my people from slaughter! Oh, Cap, what ...
— Hidden Hand • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... there for a little while, of course, like a ninny between them; and I wasn't the more comfortable because I thought Knowles looked like a bigger fool than I did. Bella's presence seemed to excite him to a kind of exaltation; he had a dark flush on his face and his eyes were large ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington
... Brandes, I cannot think that he has been fortunate in his treatment of Lovborg's character. It has been represented as an absurdity that he would think of reading abstracts from his new book to a man like Tesman, whom he despises. But though Tesman is a ninny, he is, as Hedda says, a "specialist"—he is a competent, plodding student of his subject. Lovborg may quite naturally wish to see how his new method, or his excursion into a new field, strikes the average scholar ...
— Hedda Gabler - Play In Four Acts • Henrik Ibsen
... grave looks, I'm afraid You cast a sheep's eye on her ladyship's maid: I wish she would lend you her pretty white hand In mending your cassock, and smoothing your band: (For the Dean was so shabby, and look'd like a ninny, That the captain supposed he was curate to Jinny.) 'Whenever you see a cassock and gown, A hundred to one but it covers a clown. Observe how a parson comes into a room; G—d d—n me, he hobbles as bad as my groom; A scholard, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... time you've "Galley"[86] Whose verses all tally, Perhaps you may say he's a Ninny, But if you abashed are Because of Alashtar, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... mean that," he resumed, again calm. "The end of that sentence was, as no doubt you guess, fool. I withdraw it, and will substitute something milder. Have you any objection to ninny?" ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... the ascendant should not address the one waning. Hardly can a word be uttered without grossly wounding. She would not do it to a younger rival: the letter strikes on the recipient's age! She babbles of a friendship: she plays at childish ninny! The display of her ingenuous happiness causes feminine nature's bosom to rise in surges. The declarations of her devotedness to the man waken comparisons with a deeper, a longer-tried suffering. Actually the letter of the rising star assumes personal feeling ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... too!" laughed the other girl, "But did you notice what a ninny I had in that last waltz-quadrille? Don't you hate partners who stand away off, and barely touch your finger-tips as they dance with you? Upon my word, I'd rather have the straight-as-a-mackerel kind, who hold you so tight you can scarcely ...
— Pretty Madcap Dorothy - How She Won a Lover • Laura Jean Libbey
... began to lose patience again: and, in spite of all his efforts, he did at last explode angrily, one day during a lesson, at the silly little ninny, who had been maddeningly impertinent and laughed at his accent, and had taken a malicious delight in doing exactly the opposite of what he told her. The girl screamed in response to Christophe's angry shouts. She was frightened and enraged at a man whom she paid daring to show ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland
... all men stopped for that, weddings would have gone out of fashion long ago. And it's well for women's peace of mind that they don't have to know the worst about the men they marry. I'm ashamed of you, Thomas! To think you've got no more gumption than to stand around like a ninny and let that city man walk off with the woman ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... ninny," Mrs. Lancaster suggested, eagerly, but Georgie, glancing at the street where Joe was holding the restless black horse in check, said nervously that Joe didn't like it until the right time. She presently went out to hand Myra to Susan while she climbed into place, ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris |
