"Puck" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in the eye when he would sing to you praises of the month of May. It is a month presided over by the spirits of mischief and madness. Pixies and flibbertigibbets haunt the budding woods: Puck and his train of midgets are ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry
... a prodigious worker, and had made his mark in committees, before the celebrated speech that sent him into all the newspaper columns, or that stubborn and infinitely versatile fight against odds which inspired the artist of PUCK. ...
— Stories of a Western Town • Octave Thanet
... told of a certain evil spirit named Kleure who transforms himself into a tree to escape notice, a superstition which under a variety of forms still lingers here and there.[2] It would seem, too, that in some of our old legends and superstitions the terms Puck and Devil are synonymous, a circumstance which explains the meaning, otherwise unintelligible, of many items of plant-lore in our own and other countries. Thus the word "Puck" has been identified with Pogge—toad, ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
... the eyes, for it bath been observed that divers have been poreblind even after when some small quantity thereof hath been blown into their eyes." This fungus has been called Molly Puff, from its resemblance to a powder puff; also Devil's Snuff Box, Fuss Balls, and Puck Fists (from feist, crepitus ani, and Puck, the impish king of the fairies). In Scotland the Puff Ball is the blind man's e'en, because it has been believed that its dust will cause blindness; and in Wales it is the "bag ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... when his master so rudely aroused him. Joan had hushed her sobs, although now and again a long, shuddering sigh shook her little body from head to foot, as with small, smudgy fingers she gently stroked her brother's cheek. Puck, the monkey, had skipped nimbly from his perch on the chimney of the caravan and found another more to his mind on top of Tonio's woolly head, where he sat glowering and grinning at the group, as if he wanted to ask, only he couldn't in words, "What's the matter, friends? what's ...
— Two Little Travellers - A Story for Girls • Frances Browne Arthur
... for old ladies? Oh, Mother, you know Father would never consent to that. Neither would Uncle Tom nor Big Josh. She would hate it and then there's Uncle Billy and the horses—Cupid and Puck—to say nothing ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... said Puck: "let's go and see how it looks outside." Bang! went his head, right through ...
— Harper's Young People, April 13, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... intelligence more than twenty-eight thousand times round the earth, while Puck, at his vaunted speed, was crawling round ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... or, THE FAIRY WAYS. In which we chiefly distinguish—1, The active presence of the Sprites in a human habitation. 2, Their masquerading. 3, Their dispatch of human victuals. 4, The liability of Elfin limbs to human casualties. 5, The personality of that saucy Puck, our ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... part. Gyp had asked Miss Gray to be allowed to help in the make-up room, even if she did nothing more than pass the little jars of cream and sticks of paint. And to Jerry had been assigned the especial task of shoving Puck, who was sadly rattle-brained, upon the stage, when ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... "Puck" was the little dog's name, and he appeared in a fair way of "putting a girdle round the earth," if not in forty minutes like his elfish namesake, at least in an appreciable limited space of time, Teddy never being content except he carried about ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson
... course they would come first, but, oh, I would do such a lot of things! I'd find out where money was most needed and drop it on the people anonymously so that they wouldn't be bothered about thanking anyone. I would creep about like a beneficent Puck and take worried frowns away, and straighten out things for tired people, and, above all, I'd make children smile. There's no fun or satisfaction got from giving big sums to hospitals and things—that's all right for when you're dead. I want to make happiness ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... of fretted white marble that had taken on just enough tender green to prevent any glare of reflected light. Palest of pink roses bloomed up the pillars and over the low flat roof they upheld, where Puck-like, humorous, and happy faces took the place of grinning gargoyles. Dick strolled the rosy marble pavement of the arcade and let the beauty of the place slowly steal in upon him and ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... In Deacon's Orders She Combeth Not Her Head She Cometh Not, She Said Trial of a Servant Trail of the Serpent Essays of a Liar Essays of Elia Soap and Tables AEsop's Fables Pocketbook's Hill Puck of Pook's Hill Dentist's Infirmary Dante's Inferno Holy ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... cherry. Of England, is the picture of the hounds with "ears that sweep away the morning dew"; from England, all this out-door woodland life, the clown's play and the clowns themselves,—Bottom with his inimitable conceit, and his fellows, Snug, Quince, and the rest. English is all Puck's fairy lore, the cowslips tall, the red-hipt humble-bee, Oberon's bank, the pansy love-in-idleness, and all the lovely imagery of the verse. English is the whole scenic background, and the "Wood near Athens" is plainly the Stratford boy's ...
— Shakespeare's Christmas Gift to Queen Bess • Anna Benneson McMahan
... his negotiations. It will be observed that he surrounds the subject with a degree of mystery, through the names which he gives to the gentlemen whom he interviewed. Thus the Chevalier is Sir Walter Scott; M. is Mr. Lockhart; X. is Mr. Canning; O. is the political Puck (could this be himself?); and Chronometer ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... remember the day you played Rarey with Puck, and we all looked on? Meg and Beth were frightened, but Jo clapped and pranced, and I sat on the fence and drew you. I found that sketch in my portfolio the other day, touched it up, and kept ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... "Many thanks, good Puck," replied the lady; "we are well placed; but dear me, we haven't brought, or we have lost, our vinaigrette; we positively cannot go without it. What can our ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... case, creatively woven and spread in artistic light and perspective; and between the two (if we do not press our illustration beyond clear limits) was a heat-lightning-like play of mind, showing itself, at one moment, in unexpected flashes of poetic analogy, at another in Puck-like mischief, and again in ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... near the door. Perkins Brown, as usual, was crouched on the lowest step, with one leg over the other, and rubbing the top of his boot with a vigor which betrayed to me some secret mirth. He looked up at me from under his straw hat with the grin of a malicious Puck, glanced toward the group, and made a curious gesture with his thumb. There were several empty ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... said. 'Why could they not dance in the day-time?—not when all respectable leaves and flowers were sleeping! making such a noise, especially that mischievous Puck!' ...
— Parables from Flowers • Gertrude P. Dyer
... there was very little about him, he preferred his name to that of any other knight; and he rode his old rocking-horse to death, armed with a long bamboo. Bevis he found tame; besides, it required woods and animals, of which he had none in his nursery, except his two cats, Fitz and Puck Forsyte, who permitted no liberties. For Tom Brown he was as yet too young. There was relief in the house when, after the fourth week, he was permitted to go down ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... who walk alone, come on it still, This Puck of plants The wise would do away with, The sunshine slants To play with, Our wee, gold-dusty flower, the yellow clover, Which once in Parting for a time That then seemed long, Ere time for you was over, We sealed our own? Do you remember yet, O Soul beyond the stars, Beyond the uttermost ...
— ANTHOLOGY OF MASSACHUSETTS POETS • WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE
... man, and he consorts with the Queen of Elfhame; fairy gold which turns to rubbish is commonly given by the Devil to the witches; and the name Robin is almost a generic name for the Devil, either as a man or as his substitute the familiar. The other name for the fairy Robin Goodfellow is Puck, which derives through the Gaelic Bouca from the Slavic Bog, which ...
— The Witch-cult in Western Europe - A Study in Anthropology • Margaret Alice Murray
... however, were one thing, and his deeds another. Through Puck as his instrument, his jealousy at once begins to make matters worse instead of better for the lovers. Notice the delicate appropriateness of Oberon's means of influence, namely Puck and the two flowers, the first being 'Cupid's ...
— Shakespeare Study Programs; The Comedies • Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke
... some underbough, Or cradled in a leaf, 'mid glimmering light, Like Puck thou crouchest: Haply watching how The slow toad-stool comes bulging, moony white, Through loosening loam; or how, against the night, The glow-worm gathers silver to endow The darkness with; or how the dew ...
— Weeds by the Wall - Verses • Madison J. Cawein
... taking to be good, dear," had been the verdict of the Commissioner's wife when she had first seen little Puck Merryon, ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... spring had been the world of men and women; Kenny's world held Puck and Mab and Una. He called her Oonagh. If once he remembered with longing that Oonagh's jovial fairy husband, King Fionvarra, went to his revels on the back of a night-black steed with nostrils aflame, he dismissed it as disloyal. Brian too had been tired, though ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... pretend to have touched upon all the myths referring to Fairies, as thus strictly defined; and the Kobolds and Puck, the Household Spirits and Mischievous Demons, have scarcely been so much as mentioned. Want of space forbids our going further. It is hoped, however, that enough has been said, not merely to give the readers an idea of the Fairy Mythology correct as far as it goes, but, beyond that, ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... like taking a soap-bubble in your hand to demonstrate that it was round. It's an effect of imagination and climate: imagination which gave graceful lightness and simplicity to Georgian models; climate which has played Puck-tricks with elms and other stately trees of England, turning them into fairy trees while leaving the family resemblance. Why, there's something different even about the paint on those dear old frame houses in the country over here! In no other part of the world, not even in Italy, ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... that tear,) Thou tiny image of myself! (My love, he's poking peas into his ear!) Thou merry, laughing sprite, With spirits feather light, Untouched by sorrow, and unsoiled by sin— (Good heavens! the child is swallowing a pin!) Thou little tricksy Puck! ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... to wander free With Puck on his unbridled bee Thro' heather-forests, leagues of bloom, Our childhood's maze of scent and sun! Forbear awhile your notes of doom, Dear Critics, give me still this one Swift hour to hunt the fairy gleam That flutters thro' the unfettered dream. It mocks me as it flies, I know: All too soon ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... King of the fairies, planning to punish his Queen Titania, orders Puck to procure a juice that will make her dote upon the next thing seen ...
— William Shakespeare • John Masefield
... no end of good luck in you, Will-o'-the-wisp, with a flicker of Puck in you, Wild as a bull-pup, and all of his pluck in you— Let a man tread on your coat and he'll see! Eyes like the lakes of Killarney for clarity, Nose that turns up without any vulgarity, Smile like a cherub, and hair that is carroty— Whoop, you're a rarity, Barney McGee! Mellow as Tarragon, ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... and skimming the milk, sometimes plunging his light and airy form into the butter-churn, and while he was dancing his fantastic shape in the churn, in vain the dairy-maid would labor to change her cream into butter: nor had the village swains any better success; whenever Puck chose to play his freaks in the brewing copper, the ale was sure to be spoiled. When a few good neighbors were met to drink some comfortable ale together, Puck would jump into the bowl of ale in the likeness of a roasted crab, and when some old goody was going to drink ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... affeard: Ne let th'unpleasant quyre of frogs still croking Make us to wish theyr choking. 350 Let none of these theyr drery accents sing; Ne let the woods them answer, nor theyr eccho ring. [Ver. 341.—The Pouke (Puck is a generic term, signifying fiend, or mischievous imp) is Robin ...
— The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 • Edmund Spenser
... vast pomp, and proceed at the head of twelve or eighteen armed policemen to make his caption. But, on the contrary, whenever any desperate and intrepid character was to be apprehended—some of those fellows like the notorious Ryan (Puck), who always carried a case of pistols or a blunderbuss about them, or perhaps both—-our valiant magistrate was either out of the way or had a visit from the gout—a complaint which he was very fond of ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... far from him now—and perhaps it is as well that we are so. I believe the rogue has a kindness for me, in remembrance of certain apples and nuts, which my usual companion, who delights in his wit, is accustomed to dole out to him. But it is a Robin Goodfellow nevertheless, a perfect Puck, that loves nothing on earth so well as mischief. Perhaps the horse may be the safer ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... "Goodfellow, Puck and goblins, Know more than any book. Down with your doleful problems, And court the sunny brook. The south-winds are quick-witted, The schools are sad and slow, The masters quite omitted The lore we care to ...
— A Village Stradivarius • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... have lived an' died since Ham, De whistlin'est I evah seed was ol' Ike Bates's Sam. In de kitchen er de stable, in de fiel' er mowin' hay, You could hyeah dat boy a-whistlin' pu'ty nigh a mile erway,— Puck'rin' up his ugly features 'twell you could n't see his eyes, Den you 'd hyeah a soun' lak dis un ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... jingling of the sleighbells died away across the snow, Hi offered to read jokes to Anna from "Pickings from Puck," which he had selected as a Christmas present from Kate, if she would consent to have supper in the sitting-room, where it was warm and cosy. Anna began to pop the corn, and Hi to read the jokes with more effort ...
— 'Way Down East - A Romance of New England Life • Joseph R. Grismer
... tranquillity." But she admitted he was her "only fellowship and support," and confiding at length the truth about Irving, surrendered in the words, "Decide, and woe to me if your reason be your judge and not your love." In this duel of Puck and Theseus, the latter felt he had won and pressed his advantage, offering to let her free and adding warnings to the blind, "Without great sacrifices on both sides, the possibility of our union is an empty dream." At the eleventh hour, when, in her own words, she was "married ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... pranksome elf Flash vaguely past at every turn, Or, weird and wee, sits Puck himself, With legs akimbo, on ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright
... peculiarity in the external ear, which he has often observed both in men and women, and of which he perceived the full significance. His attention was first called to the subject whilst at work on his figure of Puck, to which he had given pointed ears. He was thus led to examine the ears of various monkeys, and subsequently more carefully those of man. The peculiarity consists in a little blunt point, projecting from the inwardly folded margin, or helix. When present, it is developed ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... dimidium pollicis non habentes," but then they were "senili vultu, facie corrugata." The wrinkled face and aged countenance of the Portuni remind us of nursery Fairy tales in which the wee ancient female Fairy figures. The pranks of the Portuni were similar to those of Shakespeare's Puck. The species Grant is not described, and consequently it cannot be ascertained how far they resembled any of the many kinds of Welsh Fairies. Gervase, speaking of one of these species, says:—"If anything should be to be carried on ...
— Welsh Folk-Lore - a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales • Elias Owen
... Sinn Feiners," O'Farrell played up to me, unoffended. "Still, as a brother of one, I'm bound to search, if it takes all night. A sister's a sister. And mine is quite a valuable asset." He tossed me this hint with a Puck-like air of a private understanding established between us. Yes, "Puck-like" describes him: a Puck at the same time merry and malicious, ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... rare, with trace on trace Of passion and impudence and energy. Valiant in velvet, light in ragged luck, Most vain, most generous, sternly critical, Buffoon and poet, lover and sensualist: A deal of Ariel, just a streak of Puck, Much Antony, of Hamlet most of all, And ...
— Poems by William Ernest Henley • William Ernest Henley
... collection, files of such magazines as Life, Judge, Puck and Punch were drawn on extensively; also magazines having humorous pages or columns, such as the Literary Digest, Ladies' Home Journal, Everybody's, Harper's; also Bindery Talk and various other house organs. According to Samuel Johnson "A man will ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher |
