"Wa'n't" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... been plenty of folks glad enough to live here; but the house wa'n't really suited to our kind o' folks. It wa'n't a farm—there being only twenty acres going with it. And you see the house is different to what folks in moderate circumstances could handle. Nobody had the cash to buy it, an' ain't had, all ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley
... tell us about it," said Benny. "Tell us about beginning to learn it when you wa'n't ...
— The Little Gold Miners of the Sierras and Other Stories • Various
... white petticoats in the wash. The stocking was all silk, and she said she never see such nightgowns. They was fine enough for best summer dresses, and all lace, and one of 'em had a blue satin bow on it, and what was strangest of all was that there wa'n't no place to get into 'em. They was made just like stockin's with no feet to 'em, and if she wore 'em, she'd have to crawl in, either at the bottom or the top. She said she never see the beat ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed
... 's times when I 've set under Dan'l Hastings's testimonies jest mortally cramped to laugh; an' ef it 's so with a man, how will it be with a pore innercent child? I ain't a-excusin' natural sin in nobody. It wa'n't so much Freddie's natural sin as it was Dan'l's natural funniness." And there was something very like a chuckle ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... nutheh," Bo Peep replied. "I kep thinkin' bout that man come heah foh you yestedy. I jes wa'n't gwine to le' yuh ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... way to better it all! But there was no chance. His father had been a failure at everything he touched in early life, and now he was a hopeless invalid. Tom was an idiot—or almost—and himself a cripple. And Nat! Well, Nat "wa'n't willin'"—not that one should blame him. Times like these, a lump like a roc's egg would rise in the boy's throat. He had to spit—and spit hard—to ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... letter in the Herald says some generals allow That there wa'n't no fight where Lookout rears aloft its shaggy brow; But this coat sleeve swinging empty here beside me, boy, to-day, Tells a mighty different story in a ...
— Twilight Stories • Various
... dead," declared Thankful. "There's been smashin' and crackin' and hollerin' enough to wake up anybody that wa'n't buried. How that wind does blow! I—Hello! here comes that man at last. ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln
... but Hazel Golly, and she ran when I wa'n't lookin' and got so far I couldn't ketch her; anyway she ain't no loss for I live next door to her.—What'll ...
— The Girl and the Kingdom - Learning to Teach • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... Drake an' Bill Harrel are scoutin' the head o' Powell's Valley. Wanted me to go but the signs wa'n't promisin' 'nough. Logan says he'll take ten sculps for one. He still thinks Michael Cresap led the killin' at Baker's—an' Cresap was at Red Stone when it happened. Cresap wants to be mighty keerful he don't fall ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... theirselves in hot water; it don't cost nothin', but it gives yer house a ridick'lous name. Then they told Lunette they wanted their lobsters br'iled alive. 'Thar,' says she, 'I sot my foot down. I told 'em I' wa'n't goin' to have no half-cooked lobsters hoppin' around in torments over my house. I calk'late to put my lobsters in the pot, and put the cover on and know where they be,' ...
— Vesty of the Basins • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... the colored man promised. "I'se only too glad dere wa'n't no earthquake, dat's what ...
— Tom Swift Among The Diamond Makers - or The Secret of Phantom Mountain • Victor Appleton
... you, Master Chitterlings, if as big, when he stood on the fork'stle of my ship and shot the captain o' that East Injyman dead. We used to call him little Weevils, he was so young-like. But, bless your hearts, boys! he wa'n't anything to Little Sammy Barlow, ez once crep' up inter the captain's stateroom on a Rooshin frigate, stabbed him to the heart with a jack-knife, then put on the captain's uniform and his cocked hat, took command of the ship, and ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... reckon I did, and he wa'n't no manner account, nuther. He had sense enough, but he throw himself away with liquor. He painted a picture of my youngest sister, and everybody said that it favored her mightily, but John wa'n't ...
— The Colossus - A Novel • Opie Read
... comes raound he gives us all the news, and there is sech goin's on in the papers nowadays that it jest upsots my nerves to hear him and Sam talkin' 'em over. Sech murders, riots, wrackin', and killin' of folks! If it wa'n't for a dish of tea I 'low I couldn't hear to it." And the good woman held out her hand to a burly fisherman in a full suit of oil-skins, and presented him to the visitors as Sam's ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Old Series, Vol. 36—New Series, Vol. 10, July 1885 • Various
... offered for to treat me with a pint of wind; but I would not stay; and so, in going through the dark passage, he began to shew his cloven futt, and went for to be rude: my fellow-sarvant, Umphry Klinker, bid him be sivil, and he gave the young man a dowse in the chops; but, I fackins, Mr Klinker wa'n't long in his debt — with a good oaken sapling he dusted his doublet, for all his golden cheese toaster; and, fipping me under his arm, carried me huom, I nose not how, being I was in such a flustration — ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... the members of the society had not arrived, for constant inquiries were being made about Huldy Mason and 'Zekiel Pettengill. When Betsy Green asked Mandy Skinner if Hiram Maxwell wa'n't comin', the latter replied that he'd probably come up when Miss Huldy and the ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin
... "Thar wa'n't no great harm done—-except that Lieutenant Worden, who was in command of the Monitor, got hurt by the bits of a shell that drove into his face—-but the little ironclad hed proved two things. Fust, that she could hold ...
— The Boy Scouts on Picket Duty • Robert Shaler
... which she doesn't use no mo'. Ah was a sittin' on the other side o' the table, right by the window, an' my hand was on the table. By and by, Ah felt my hand burnin' as though some one had laid a match on it. Ah pulled away my hand but thar wa'n't nothin' thar. Ah thought it queer, but Ah didn't say nothin' and went on talkin'. By and by, leanin' forward to say some thin' mo' to Mammy, Ah put my hand on the table again, an' suddenly, the back of my hand began to burn as ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... talk so about Cephas," she moaned. "He's my husband. I guess you wouldn't like it if anybody talked so about your husband. Cephas ain't any worse than anybody else. It's jest his way. He wa'n't any more to blame than Barney; they both got to talkin'. I know Cephas is terrible upset about it this mornin'; he 'ain't really said so in so many words, but I know by the way he acts. He said this ...
— Pembroke - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... stationed at a ford on the Saranac, where a British column attempted to cross. Their captain ordered no one to fire until the enemy were half-way across; "and then," said he, "none of 'em ever got across, and not many of them that got into the water got out again. They found out it wa'n't of any kind of use to try to get across there, and after a while they give it up and went farther down the river; and by-and-by an officer come and told us to go to the other ford, and we went there, and so they didn't get across there ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... come to marry Hillard Watts? Wal, he wa'n't that triflin' when I married him. He didn't have so much religiun then. But I've allers noticed a man's heredity for no-countness craps out after he's married. Lookin' back now I reckin' I married him jes' to res' myself. When I'm wuckin' an' git ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... "S" stood out to show the week's beginning, (In these new-fangled calendars the days seem sort of mixed), And the man upon the cover, though he wa'n't exactly winnin', With lungs and liver all exposed, still showed how we are fixed; And the letters and credentials that was writ to Mr. Ayer I've often on a rainy day ...
— Poems of Sentiment • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... worked upon him so (They hadn't been together fer a year or two, you know), That he borrered all the stuff he could and started on a bat, And, strange as it may seem, we didn't see him after that. So, when ol' Dana hove in sight, we couldn't understand Why he didn't seem to notice that his crony wa'n't on hand; No casual allusion, not a question, no, not one, For the man who'd "worked with Dana on the Noo ...
— A Little Book of Western Verse • Eugene Field
... for a minute; then up spoke Poker Bill: "Young man, yer a stranger, I reckon. We don't wish yer any ill; But come out of the range of the Greaser, or, as sure as I live, you'll croak;" And he drew a bead on the stranger. I'll tell yer it wa'n't no joke. But the stranger moven' no muscle as he looked in the bore of Bill's gun; He hadn't no thought to stir, sir; he hadn't no thought to run; But he spoke out cool and quiet, "I might live for a thousand year And not die at last so ...
— Songs of the Cattle Trail and Cow Camp • Various
... find it easier ter git your rents, squire, if you only sided more with folks, an' wa'n't so stiff," suggested the youth. "A ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... something were going to happen. Suddenly she felt a cold wind blow through the room, the candles went out, and she could hear the rustle of "ghostly gahments" sweeping past her. The oven door sprang open of its own accord; she looked inside, and "dere wa'n't no chicken dere!" ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster
... him for more than sixty year back— Used to be somewhat older than him Fought him one night to a husking bee; Licked him in manner uncommon complete; Every one said 'twas a beautiful fight; Joe he wa'n't satisfied with it that way, Kept dinging along, and when he got through The worst looking critter that you ever see Were stretched on a bed rigged up in the hay— They carted me home the following day. Got me a sweetheart purty and trim, Told me that I ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various
... Pirate Jim, critically, "I don't think he was any bigger nor you, Master Chitterlings, if as big, when he stood on the fork'stle of my ship, and shot the captain o' that East Injymen dead. We used to call him little Weevils, he was so young-like. But, bless your hearts, boys! he wa'n't anything to little Sammy Barlow, ez once crep' up inter the captain's stateroom on a Rooshin frigate, stabbed him to the heart with a jack-knife, then put on the captain's uniform and his cocked hat, took command of the ship and ...
— Drift from Two Shores • Bret Harte
... out to bring him in. They hunted high an' low, but he wa'n't there. Then a dozen people set out to search the woods. Just now they come back to say Willie ain't to be found high nor low. That stirs the big chief some. He 'low he knows how the thing's to be did; and so he's ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... you had avisitin' here some time back, Colonel. Reckon as how he don't feel any too warm toward you, accordin' to the way he used to bring them black brows of his'n down, when he thought you wa'n't lookin'. And his name was ...
— The Saddle Boys in the Grand Canyon - or The Hermit of the Cave • James Carson
... been upon Dan all day. Yet now he stood thunderstruck, and the thing went on before his very eyes. It was more than he could believe at once,—and perhaps his first feeling was, Why should he hinder? And then the flood fell. No thought of his loss,—though loss it wa'n't,—only of his friend,—of such stunning treachery, that, if the sun fell hissing into the sea at noon, it would have mattered less,—only of that loss that tore his ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various
... All I know is, that I've et some dam queer tack in my time, but sence I ben fishin' I never had no such bundles of sticks parcelled with leather served out to me. I HEV et boot—leastways gnawed it; when I was cast away in a open boat for three weeks—but it wa'n't bad boot, as boots go. Now, if yew say that these things is boots, en thet it's necessary we should eat'em, or starve, w'y, we'll think about it. But if yew call'em chickens,'n say you're doin' us a kindness by stoppin' our'lowance of meat wile we're wrastlin' ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... "Wa'n't lookin' for me yit-a-while, was ye?" he asked. "Kind o' thought I'd s'prise ye. Did s'prise the man down in the hall. Didn't want to let me in till I told him who I was. Little gal in the entry says ye're movin'; ye do look all ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... he did for two Greasers once in a barroom at La Paz, one in front o' him, t'other straight behind, him standing between with a gun in each hand, and shootin' both guns at the same time. Well, he was just a terror," declared Bunt, solemnly, "and when he was in real good form there wa'n't a man south o' Leadville dared to ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... with an air of mysterious solemnity; "there was three nights runnin' that I dreamed I found a thousand-dollar bill to the right hand corner of my bury drawer, and every mornin' when I woke up and went to git it—it wa'n't there, so I know the rats must 'a' carried it off in the night, and a pretty shabby trick to play on a feller, too—but then you can't blame the poor devils for wantin' a ...
— Cape Cod Folks • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... Scattergood. "Mighty funny thing about that gold, now wa'n't it? Three bars. Wuth fifty thousand! Mighty slick work—to spirit it off and nobody never find ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland
... place and fro out on de back ob dere necks dem fool people what come round to bodder Marsa Frank. Ah was so skeered for fear Ah wouldn't qualify fo' de position ob 'sistant physicum janitor dat Ah jes' scratched gravel night an' day, and it wa'n't long before the reduction of the pain in mah muscles begun to took place. I was plumb busted when Marsa Frank gib me dat position. Ah didn't hab a cent about me. Eber hear ob a coon what didn't hab ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... the same as ever, Brad," said Mrs. Councill, "you'll haf to put up with it jest as if y' wa'n't a Congressman." ...
— A Spoil of Office - A Story of the Modern West • Hamlin Garland
... congregating by herself, your Honor. When a young woman as swears she's honest, goes peeking into other folks's windows after dark, I always has my suspicions,—as you would too, if you had been in the business as long as I have. It wa'n't more than a week ago that I caught her with her nose against that plate-glass window of yours, and I told her then to move on. But she didn't; and the next thing we shall be hearing some fine morning, that there's been breaking and ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... to the barn, leavin' me shakin' with his jolt. He was game all right! He figured me out as the prodigal son, and wa'n't goin' to knuckle. He intended for me to do all the knee exercise. I drifted along up the path toward ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... out to shoot big game up in the hills. I ain't seen him sence, sure. Guess nobody did." He looked away sadly. "We heerd tell of him. Guess he got fossicking after b'ar. The wind was blowin' ter'ble. He'd climbed a mount'n. It was pretty high. Ther' wa'n't no shelter. A gust o' that ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum
... think it was enough," ejaculated Mr. Cobb. "There wa'n't many names left when your mother got through choosin'! You've got a powerful good memory! I guess it ain't no trouble for you to learn ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... my pore, noble, dear, misguidened friend! ef you hed of hed a Christian raisin'! May the Lord show you your errors better'n I kin, and bless you for your good intentions—oh, no! I cayn't touch that money with a ten-foot pole; it wa'n't rightly got; you must really excuse me, my dear friend, but I cayn't ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... been disappearin' in bunches, an' purty soon them bunches begins t' seem more like herds, an' somethin' had t' be did, an' Squeak Gordon, th' manager, wa'n't no man ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... wa'n't here—that is, not at the first," spoke up the man quickly, still unconsciously backing away. "Me—I'm only Larson, Perry Larson, ye know. 'T was Mr. Holly you see last ...
— Just David • Eleanor H. Porter
... folks that talks that knows the most and is the best," said Mrs. Lynn. Then her face upon her daughter's turned malevolent, triumphant, and cruel. "I wa'n't goin' to tell you what I heard when I was in Mis' Ketchum's this afternoon," she said. "I thought at first I wouldn't, but now I'm ...
— Quaint Courtships • Howells & Alden, Editors
... chance to go about much and ask," said the widow, with a preliminary sniff; "but I've met some as wa'n't tickled ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther
... at a big bargain, to set on my lot till somebody come along and bought it. I thought buyin' sech a thing was a powerful quar thing for a young woman to do, but of course I didn't say so to her, for it wa'n't any o' my business. Well, one thing fetched on another till she got to lookin' about my shop while I was trimmin' the heel-taps, an' all at once she wanted to know—if thar was no harm in axin'—what rent I was payin'. I told 'er fifty dollars, an' she whistled kind o' keenlike an' said: 'My gracious! ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... ef I wanted to bother 'bout 'em. But Law's sakes! dey was all mixed up 'long o' de others, an' I wa'n't goin' fussin' 'bout some oder woman's ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... and was making up his mind to discontinue further exertions,—not a very easy thing to do, when you are about to go into another world, still floating on his back, with his eyes fixed on the starry heavens, thinking, as Smallbones afterwards narrated himself, that there wa'n't much to live for in this here world, and considering what there could be in that 'ere, his head struck against something hard. Smallbones immediately turned round in the water to see what it was, and found that it was one of the large corks which supported ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... my Uncle Fred p'tend He's "tramp-mans" an' will come right in; I put my ear on Rover's back So's I could hear th' growl begin. An' oncet he thought he'd try his nap Right in my grampa's big armchair. My grampa, he sat down on him, 'Cause "he wa'n't 'spectin' dogs was there." ...
— The Dog's Book of Verse • Various
... sha'n't never hear 'Nancy' now that I don't think o' that 'Hep—Hep!' and giggle. My, I guess I AM glad—" She stopped short and turned amazed eyes on the little girl. "Say, Miss Pollyanna, do you mean—was you playin' that 'ere game THEN—about my bein' glad I wa'n't named Hephzibah'?" ...
— Pollyanna • Eleanor H. Porter
... "I wa'n't a listening at key-holes, nor likewise a-eaves-dropping, which I considers beneath a gentleman to do; but I was a-looking to the back shutters, to see as they was all safe arter the fright we got, and I hearn somebody a-talking, which I was sure was more bugglers; so I made free ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... did not know just what he wanted at this period of his life, there were a great many people in the town of Rockland who thought they did know. He had been a widower long enough, "—nigh twenty year, wa'n't it? He'd been aout to Spraowles's party,—there wa'n't anything to hender him why he shouldn't stir raound l'k other folks. What was the reason he did n't go abaout to taown-meetin's 'n' Sahbath-meetin's, 'n' lyceums, 'n' school 'xaminations, 'n' s'prise-parties, ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... old to go," muttered gran'ther Greene; "but I wa'n't older'n you are when I shouldered my firelock in 1812. I'm too old ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic
... lonesome, I s'pose," she was wont to say, "if it wa'n't for the way this house is set, and this chair, and this winder, 'n' all. Men folks used to build some o' the houses up in a lane, or turn 'em back or side to the road, so the women folks couldn't see anythin' to keep their minds off their churnin' or dish-washin'; but Aaron Dunnell hed somethin' ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin
... knew I 'd slid int' some kind uv a box. Let me down quicker 'n scat over thet air grease a little ways. I out with my tew hands 'n' bore ag'in' the sides o' th' box powerful 'n' stopped myself. Then I up with these here feet o' mine. See the top o' the box wa'n't much more 'n a foot above me. Tried t' crawl up ag'in. Couldn't mek it. Dum thing slanted luk Tup's Hill. Hung on awhile, cipherin' es hard es I knew how. Hearn suthin' go kerslap. Seem so the hull ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller
... be trifled with, for he sent the officer with his elbow to the other end of the jury-box, and exclaimed, "I won't go out; I won't reconsider my verdict." Deputy.—"I will have some damage, if it be ever so small." Old man.—"I won't give any damage. Why, did not the shepherd swear there wa'n't a mite of grass for a sheep to gnaw? Then how could there be any damage? T'other'em may do what they like, but I won't stir a peg, nor alter my verdict. I won't break my oath for you, nor Squire Astley; nor all the Squires in ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt
... shouldn't begin to plough for corn just yet," replied Kinney. "It's curious," he went on, "to see how anxious we are to have a thing over, it don't much matter what it is, whether it's summer or winter. I suppose we'd feel different if we wa'n't sure there was going to be another of 'em. I guess that's one reason why the Lord concluded not to keep us clearly posted on the question of another life. If it wa'n't for the uncertainty of the thing, there are a lot of fellows like you that wouldn't stand ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... By this time there ain't no forts for it to pass! When I left Fort St. Philip there wa'n't a spot over in Fort Jackson as wide as my blanket where a bumbshell hadn't buried itself and blown up, and every minute we were lookin' for the magazine to go! Those awful shells! they'd torn both levees, the forts were flooded, men who'd lost their ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable
... the gateway, and she wavered for a spell When she heard her mother crying and her raving father yell That she wa'n't no child of his'n—like an actor in a play We saw at Independence, coming through the ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... he's been gone a long spell; He's got a room up ter the City, an' calls it a name that is queer— I ain't up in French, more's the pity—but something that's like "attyleer." I went up last month on a visit, and blamed if that place wa'n't a sight! The fourteenth or fifteenth—which is it?—well, anyhow, it's the top flight; I wouldn't have b'lieved he could be there, way up on that breath-takin' floor, If't wa'n't fer the sign that I see ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Bowlegs, "only that he's been a gettin' glummer an' glummer. I'll tell you what it is, Captain Sam, I'll bet a big button he's deserted an' gone home. He's a coward and he's been scared ever since he found out that you wa'n't foolin' about this bein' a genu-ine, dangerous piece of work, an' I'll bet he's cut his lucky, an' gone home, an' if ever I get back there I'll pull his nose for a sneak, you just see if ...
— Captain Sam - The Boy Scouts of 1814 • George Cary Eggleston
... as I understood it," persisted Mr Snow. "What does Rose say? She told me this afternoon, when we were riding, something or other, but it sartain wa'n't that." ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... down, we came to a rough pine box made as well as the poor fellow knew how to put it together. Opening it, we found all that was left of poor Hunt, respectably clad in a coarse, clean white garment which Sam's wife had made as nicely as she could out of her one pair of sheets. 'It wa'n't much,' said the good soul, with tears in her eyes, 'it wa'n't much we's could do for him, but I washed him, and dressed him, peart as I could, and Sam and me, we buried him. We wished, both on us, that we could have done ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... shakes to brag 'bout gener'ly feels sorter skittish when strange folks draps in on 'em. Goodness knows I hain't come to that pass wher' I begrudges the vittles that folks eats, bekaze anybody betweenst this an' Clinton, Jones County, Georgy, 'll tell you the Sanderses wa'n't the set to stint the'r stomachs. I was a Sanders 'fore I married, an' when I come 'way frum pa's house hit was thes like turnin' my back on a barbecue. Not by no means was I begrudgin' of the vittles. Says I, ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... this way lately. Let me go away for a week or two on this island business, and I'd likely lose somethin' good. But with somebody to kind o' go in on the deal, I'd split even at sixty-five dollars a day. I'd be some out of pocket, if there wa'n't much gold there, but I look for findin' it in a big way. It's a ...
— Isle o' Dreams • Frederick F. Moore
... "None o' yer stun pastur land where the sheep can't get their noses down through the rocks without a file to sharpen 'em! Deacon Pitkin did a putty fair stroke o' business when he swapped off his old place for this 'ere. That are old place was all swamp land and stun pastur; wa'n't good for raisin' nothin' but juniper bushes and bull frogs. But I tell yeu" preceded Biah, with a shrewd wink, "that are mortgage pinches the deacon; works him like a dose of aloes and picry, it does. Deacon fairly gets ...
— Betty's Bright Idea; Deacon Pitkin's Farm; and The First Christmas - of New England • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... quite a parcel o' sympathy for Eph," said a short, thickset coasting captain, who sat tilted back in a three-legged chair, smoking lazily. "You see, he wa'n't but about twenty-one or two then, and he was allus a mighty high-strung boy; and then Eliphalet did act putty ha'sh, foreclosin' on Eph's mother, and turnin' her out o' the farm, in winter, when everybody knew she could ha' pulled through by waitin'. Eph sot great store by the old lady, and ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 6 • Various
... bumped into me, and then stepped into the agent, and then turned around and took in my scenery, noticin' the set of my legs, I says to myself, 'painter-man or writer.' It was kind of in your eye. I figured you wa'n't no painter-man when you looked at the ...
— Partners of Chance • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... be ye?" he cried, jumping to his feet. "If it wa'n't fer hurtin' ye, I'd throw ye clean across to yon hillside!" and he pointed to a spot nearly a mile away, across ...
— Far Past the Frontier • James A. Braden
... right along till he comes back; so I guess Lucy'll have a good time for once in her life. An' Gran'ma Mullins walked back with me an' not one word o' Hiram did she speak. She was all Polly an' the deacon. She said it wa'n't in reason as Polly could imagine him with hair, an' she said she was thinkin' very seriously o' givin' her a piece o' his hair as she's got, for a weddin' present. She said Polly 'd never know what he was like the night he give her that hair. She said the moon was shinin' an' the frogs were ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... out that way," he says. "I'd jest spied it when you spoke o' giein out. Whar thar's hills, thar's a likelihood o' streams. Sposin', Frank, you stay hyar, whiles I make tracks torst them. They look like they wa'n't mor'n ten miles off anyhow. I ked easy get back by the mornin'. D'ye think ye kin hold out thet long by swallerin' a bit ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... tol' de col'nel all how it was. I was wid my Massa from Louisiana, an' he was a captain, sah! 'Bout two weeks ago he lef' me down yander on de pike wid orders fo' to stay dere till he done come back. But it wa'n't no job fo' me, sah, an' so I skipped out de first night, an' joined up wid de Yanks. I reckon I knows 'bout whar I belongs in dis yere fightin', an' I ain't nobody's slave ...
— Love Under Fire • Randall Parrish
... bit o' it. I never seed a burnin' paraira yit, thet thur wa'n't eyther a camp-fire or a Injun at the bottom o' it—thet ur 'ceptin whur lightnin ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... which-away ter turn. Her bes' beau lover, Marse Bert Mason, got kilt in the wah an' Miss Ann got it in her haid she mus' grieve jes' so long fer him. But the truf wa' that Miss Ann wouldn't a had him if he had er come back. She wa'n't ready ter step off but she wa' 'lowin' ter have her fling. Then the ol' home kotched afire an' then me'n Miss Ann didn't have no sho' 'nough home an' we got ter visitin' roun' an' Marse Bob, yo' gran'pap, kep a pleadin' an' Miss Ann she kep' a visitin', fust one place then anudder, ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... pond. Sister Coretta was with him, and she'd let him get out of her sight—which she hadn't ought to—but, childlike, she'd got to playing with the shavings, and sticking 'em over her ears, and when she sensed things Willy wa'n't nowhere to be found. They drawed off the water, and there he was, poor little thing, and they brought him home and laid him on the kitchen table, and then mother and I, we went through his pockets to see what there was, and there we found a bag ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... the gal that makes the diff'rence fer you. Say, lad," Rube laid a kindly hand on the sick man's drooping shoulders, and his manner became lighter, and there was a twinkle in his deep-set eyes, "when I'd located that I wanted Ma fer wife I jest up an' sez so. I 'lows the job wa'n't easy. I'd a heap sooner 'a' let daylight into the carkises of a dozen Injuns. Y' see wimmin's li'ble to fool you some. When they knows you're fixed on 'em they jest makes you hate yourself fer a foolhead. ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... told him," she snapped. "What business is it of his prying around? No, and he gets nothing to eat. As for you, get to work at once. I'll teach you, idling at your chores. Your father wa'n't like that. Can't I ...
— The Turtles of Tasman • Jack London
... He wa'n't one of the regular sort What you'd meet thar any day, But as near as the camp could figure it out, In a show down he'd likely stay. A shambling, awkward figure, Rawboned, tall and slim, And his schaps and togs in general Jist looked like they'd ...
— Uncles Josh's Punkin Centre Stories • Cal Stewart
... this little mess, an' give ye a comfortable chair to sit in;' an' he carried it all—blanket, book, bracelets, shawl, an' all—into the next room, an' throwed 'em on the floor in a pile in one corner. There wa'n't but them two rooms to the cabin, so that wa'n't any place for her to be hid, if so be 's there was any woman 'round; an' he said he was livin' alone, an' had been ever since he come. An' it was nigh a year ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... righteousness of it.' And Cerinthy Ann she come out, declarin' that the best folks never had no comfort in religion; and for her part she didn't mean to trouble her head about it, but have jest as good a time as she could while she's young, 'cause if she was 'lected to be saved she should be, and if she wa'n't she couldn't help ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... took on the form Of carrying his pillow in his teeth; But it's more likely he was crossed in love, Or so the story goes. It was some girl. Anyway all he talked about was love. They soon saw he would do someone a mischief If he wa'n't kept strict watch of, and it ended In father's building him a sort of cage, Or room within a room, of hickory poles, Like stanchions in the barn, from floor to ceiling,— A narrow passage all the way around. Anything ...
— North of Boston • Robert Frost
... Christian folks, good out-an'-out Calv'nist Baptists from over East'n way. They fetched me up right, made me go to meetin' an' read a chapter every Sunday, an' say a hymn Sat'day night a'ter washin'; an' I useter say my prayers mos' nights. I wa'n't a bad boy as boys go. But nobody thought o' tellin' me the one thing, jest the one single thing, that 'd ha' made all the diffunce. I knowed about God, an' how he made me an' made the airth, an' everything an' once I got thinkin' about that, an' I asked my father if God made the fishes. He said ...
— Fishin' Jimmy • Annie Trumbull Slosson
... mighty particular about the lodge meetin'," observed Newt Pinson to Mr. Cullum, who headed the nocturnal expedition; "she know'd it wa'n't the regular night, an' ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... Uncle Bart's shop with a message for Waitstill, but, just then, in came Bill Morrill, a boy of twelve, with a request for a gallon of molasses; and would Cephas lend him a stone jug over Sunday, for his mother had hers soakin' out in soap-suds 'cause 't wa'n't smellin' jest right. Bill's message given, he hurried up the road on another errand, promising to call ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... hide it from your pa," Becky whispered. "Don't you never let him know you're afraid o' the well-water. He drunk it when he was a little boy. He don't believe in the snakes. But there wa'n't none then. It's when water gets old and rotten. You can believe what Becky says. She knows! But you mustn't ever tell. Your father 'd be as mad as fire if he knowed I said anything about snakes. He'd send me right ...
— The Desert and The Sown • Mary Hallock Foote
... spiled all 'round! The woods, they wa'n't no place fer you, so ye had to quit 'em. But they spiled you fer the habitations o' man. It's a born stranger and an alien you was, an' there wa'n't no place fer ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... however. You see, there ain't rooms enough in the 'Cademy grounds. I heard the other day that there's nigh on to two hundred and twenty boys in the school this year; I can remember when they was'nt but sixty, and it was the biggest boardin' school for boys in New York State. And that wa'n't many years ago, neither. The boys? Oh, they're a fine lot, sir; a bit mischievous at times, of course, but we're used to 'em in the village. And, bless you, sir, what can you expect from a boy anyhow? There ain't none of 'em perfect by a long shot; and I guess I ought to know—I've raised eight ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... worst. I never SEE such a sick man. I got this cracked ice for him," she added, looking down at the glass she was clasping to her bosom with her free hand. "I'd 'a' looked in on you," she added, kindly, "if I hadn't been so busy, but I heard you wa'n't neither of you sick." ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... year, and it was all trampled down, and I didn't get nothing from it. I had seven pieces of meat yit, and them was all took. All I had when I got back was jest a little bit of flour yit. The fences was all tore down, so that there wa'n't one standing, and the rails was burnt up. One shell come into the house and knocked a bedstead all to pieces for me. One come in under the roof and knocked out a rafter for me. The porch was all knocked down. There was seventeen ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... Winchester could pop in this minute. You found the prepared flour, and all—baked 'em on the griddle! Wa'n't that cute! I never did see an omelet like that except from Susan Winchester's own hands, and she learned from a Frenchwoman she used to sew with. Some folks can pick up every useful trick ...
— American Cookery - November, 1921 • Various
... think of this young man? He was with you, wa'n't he, studyin' something or other?" asked Uncle Josh; ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... will he be there? Well, now I want to know! The first man in the rebel works! they called him "Swearing Joe." A wild young fellow, sir, I fear the rascal was; but then— Well, short of heaven, there wa'n't a place he dursn't ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... that was only my notion, for I thought I might have spit upon him, and so wakened his anger; but, indeed, he looked all about him, as, indeed, it was natural that he should, you know, if he meditated anything that wa'n't exactly right. There was a carriage in waiting—a close carriage—not a ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... "We wa'n't in the fairway," protested a grizzled man, evidently the mate. He was uneasy in his borrowed clothes—he had surrendered his own garments to a pantryman who had volunteered ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... hit upon a big bed of pearl-oysters, thousan's—millions of 'em! He sorter guessed what they was when he first set eyes on 'em, as he looked down through the clear green water, and tried to get down to 'em by divin'. But that wa'n't no good; the water was too deep—a good five fathom he said there was over 'em—and then there was sharks about too. So he unlaid a bit o' rope from the wreckage, knocked some nails out o' some o' the timber that had druv ashore, and fixed up a sorter small grapple, ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... some scrapes; there's notches on my gun handles to prove that I ain't been no quitter. I've rode with the vigilantes more'n once, and the vigilantes has rode after me—more'n once; in my young days I wa'n't exactly what you'd call a nickel-plated saint. But I never killed a man, 'cept in a fair fight, an' I don't believe in violence unless it's necessary. It's necessary right now, fellers! Moran's gone too far! Things have drawed to a point where we've ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... Abe Dalrimple. "It was kettles. It wa'n't none of them things," he says, alluding at ...
— The Belted Seas • Arthur Colton
... There wa'n't as many bushels of grain, by one fourth, when they were threshed out last year, as I had calculated there would be in the field. I don't know what on earth he could have done with it. I suppose it'll be the same thing ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... it, ma'am,' Julia says. 'I wa'n't lookin' for losin' my place, an' I let the young woman do the job herself. An' she done it, pert as you please. An' jest as I was seekin' a hidin'-place for the explosion, if Mr. Henshaw didn't come out lookin' a little wild, but as meek as a lamb; an' when he sees me he asked wouldn't ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... out loud for Polly, and jist as I was sayin': 'What is required in the Fourth Commandment?' I heard a splash, and there was the trout, and, afore I could think, I said: 'Gracious, Polly, I must have that trout.' She almost riz right up, 'I knew you wa'n't sayin' your catechism hearty. Is this the way you answer the question about keepin' the Lord's day? I'm ashamed, Deacon Marble,' says she. 'You'd better change your road, and go to meetin' on the road over the hill. If ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various
... we had consid'able trouble on our hands. Right erway we heard two guns go off over by the house. I knowed that our firin' had prob'ly woke up some o' the sleepers. We pounded the ground an' got thar as quick as we could. The two wimmen wa'n't fur behind. They didn't cocalate to lose us—you hear to me. Two young braves had sprung up an' been told to lie down ag'in. But the English language ain't no help to an Injun under them surcumstances. They don't understan' it an' thar ain't ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... said, in a suppressed tone. He started. "John Miller, I know ye. Common name—I wa'n't sure afore to-day. When you pulled that money out o' yer pocket I see that in yer face that satisfied me. It's fer the good name o' the dead I've come. Elseways I never'd ha' troubled ye." The astonished colonel ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.
... a stolid eye and caught a glimpse of her face and wheeled quickly—his eye searching space. "There wa'n't nobody!" he said. He almost shouted it, and his big hands gripped hard on the reins.... His face was grey—"There wa'n't nobody ...
— Mr. Achilles • Jennette Lee
... of course," replied Cap'n Lem. "There hain't never ben a time when he wa'n't as sot as ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham
... while I can. I shan't have the chance very long, if the other folks in this town are like that hack driver. A dollar to drive half a mile in that hearse! Why, the whole shebang wa'n't worth more than two dollars, to buy. And then he had the cheek to ask me to give him 'a ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... mornin' thet I ever seed in my life. They must o' ben upward of a dozen on 'em. They waz makin' fer the house when I steps in an' grabs my ol' shot gun. I hollered at 'em not to come a step nigher 'n' I guess they seed it wa'n't safe monkeyin' with me; ...
— The Oakdale Affair • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... way back to the house, and mounted the steps panting. Her mother and father were talking of the great affair. Her mother said: "Wa'n't Mr. Gearson in rather of an excited state of mind? Didn't you think ...
— Between The Dark And The Daylight • William Dean Howells
... was left to guard the ruins, lest some stray spark should be blown toward the other buildings. "Dis yere ole niggah wa'n't mistaken aftah all," he muttered. "Dee was somebody prowlin' 'roun' de premises yistiddy evenin'." Then he searched the ground, all around the cabin, for footprints in the snow. He found some tracks presently, and followed them over the meadow in the starlight, ...
— Two Little Knights of Kentucky • Annie Fellows Johnston
... wa'n't for the distance and leaving my plantation, I'd go over with any on you, and help to use up the lot myself! Let them 'come on,' as the tiger said to the young kid, and see what 'I'll do for you.' They talk of sending out their chaps here, do they; let them; ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... been here before," she said, in a thin voice, not unmusical. "I recollect you. Quite a time ago, wa'n't it?" ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington
... out; an' I sez ter Brer John Small, who wuz er standin' dar, sez I, now I lay yer he ain't got no buckeyes in his pockets; and wid dat me 'n Brer John we tuck'n turnt his pockets wrong side outerds; an', less yer soul, chile, hit wuz jes like I say; DAR WA'N'T NO BUCKEYES DAR! Well, I'd b'lieved in de ole sayin' befo', but dat jes kinter sot me on it fas'er 'n eber; an' I don't cyare wat de wedder is, nor wat de hurry is; hit may rain an' hit may shine, an' de time may be er pressin', but ole Bob he don't stir out'n his house ...
— Diddie, Dumps & Tot - or, Plantation child-life • Louise-Clarke Pyrnelle
... "I wa'n't going to speak," Jack said. "Mother found it out, and said she'd tell 'ee o't; but the last two nights I were well nigh yelping ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... "Why, there wa'n't no hurry, as long as she's he'a," he said, in prompt enjoyment of the joke, and he and Clementina sparely ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... down the cliff Jim turned lazily to smile up at the speaker, and, raising his heavy basket of quahaugs, came leisurely up the steep sand-path, which seemed to shrink from his weight at every step: "Wal', Sairy, I wa'n't a-thinkin' much o' the water: I was a-thinkin' o' thee, an' o' what fayther ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... in the fracas killed thirty-five Indians—only two of our men were wounded—so you see the five-shooters were pretty good weapons. Of course they wa'n't any account compared with these modern ones, because they were too small, but they did those things. Just after that Colonel Colt was induced to make bigger ones for us, some of which were half as long as ...
— Crooked Trails • Frederic Remington
... "It wa'n't pried loose," said the yellow negro. "Hit got kicked loose f'om de hinside. I know dat much, annerways. I seen dat oc-cur. I seen dat board bulge out an' bulge out an' bulge out twell hit bust out. An' dey hain't no turbine come out, nuther. ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler
... a boot-black,— Made the fellers laugh; Jack and me had to take it, But we don't mind no chaff. Trouble!—not much, you bet, boss! Sometimes, when biz is slack, I don't know how I'd manage If 't wa'n't for little Jack. You jest once orter hear him: He says we needn't care How rough luck is down here, sir, If some day we git up there. All done now,—how's that, sir? Shines like a pair of lamps. Mornin'!—Give it to Jack, sir, He looks ...
— Point Lace and Diamonds • George A. Baker, Jr. |
