"Dolt" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the end. The princely fortune that might have done so much good in the world has gone to fatten the foulest flock of predatory birds that ever cumbered the earth. Where are the glib parasites who came to fawn on the poor dolt? Where are the swarms of begging dandies who clustered around him? Where are the persons who sold him useless horses? Any one who has eyes can see that they point their fingers and shrug. ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... for this Mouse, But she was not a dolt To wait 'till she was caught, but made Right through ...
— The Mouse and the Christmas Cake • Anonymous
... or from Ashton himself; and, dolt as he is, I trow he has sense enough to keep his own counsel. He has not forgotten the day when he saw this dainty young sprig rise up in his golden spurs before his eyes. I know how it is! It is with him as it was with ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... person, we trust him. When we believe a thing, we are not sure of it. This is one of the few theological distinctions which are also differences. Meanwhile, the Archdeacon had been watching his youngest son, and had observed that he had at least a taste for books. Perhaps he might not be the absolute dolt that Hurrell pronounced him. He had lost five years, so far as classical training was concerned, by the mismanagement of the Archdeacon himself. Still, he was only seventeen, and there was time to repair the waste. He was sent to a private tutor's ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... pale, her eyes steely, her lips grim. And once he had kissed those lips, and those contemptuous eyes had poured into his, faith and love unstinted. As he stumbled toward the door, the thought crossed his mind that the boy who had won the love and respect of Persis Dale was not the poor dolt he had thought him. The years had brought loss as well ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... said smoothly, "we work on different lines, do we not? I wonder which of us has dirtied his hands the most. Which of the two—the two fools who quarrelled about a woman. Ha? And she married a third—a dolt. Thus are ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... believed literally that cowards had white livers] dolt!" cried Dr Thorpe sharply, and took the matchlock out of his hands. "Go behind for a child ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... And with softness touching all, Tints the human countenance With a color of romance, And infusing subtle heats, Turns the sod to violets, Thou, in sunny solitudes, Rover of the underwoods, The green silence dolt displace With thy ...
— Selections From American Poetry • Various
... deserve, for ten to one he will drop in again when he comes back from his office, and arrest you wandering in Dreamland in the beautiful twilight. Delighted to find that you are neither reading nor writing,—the absurd dolt! as if a man weren't at work unless he be wielding a sledge-hammer!—he will preach out, and prose out, and twaddle out another hour of your golden even-tide, "because he is your friend." You don't care whether he is judge or jury,—whether he talks sense or nonsense; you don't want him to talk ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... not a little disgusted, "it pulls terrifically hard, and in my opinion, if it is altered a little, and has a heavier wing put on the right side, it will yet do magnificently, and make all those howling monkeys change their tone. That dolt Ellis, and that conceited chap Bracebridge, will soon find that their finely-bedizened machine is cut out. My carriage is, I know, such a first-rate one, that it will ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... their own of judging men; or perhaps they make the best of what they can get. But you may depend on't, Margaret has too clear a sight, and too bright a mind, and thinks too well of herself, to mate with an uncouth cub, or a stupid dolt, or a girlish fop, or any of these that ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... pertness, and the vulgar wrong, The flippant folly, the malicious will, Which have assailed thee, now, or heretofore, Find, soon or late, their proper meed of shame; The more thy triumph, and our pride the more, When witling critics to the world proclaim, In lead, their own dolt incapacity. Matter it is of mirthful memory To think, when thou wert early in the field, How doughtily small Jeffrey ran at thee A-tilt, and broke a bulrush on thy shield. And now, a veteran in the lists of fame, I ween, old Friend! thou art not worse bested When with a maudlin eye and drunken aim, ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... you consider me, Arsene Lupin—we may as well use the name: yes, Arsene Lupin—which proves that you consider me fool enough, dolt enough to deliver myself like this, bound hand and ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... Villeneuve!—whom fate has marked To suffer for too firm a faithfulness.— An Emperor's chide is a command to die.— By him accursed, forsaken by my friend, Awhile stern England's prisoner, then unloosed Like some poor dolt unworth captivity, Time serves me now for ceasing. Why not cease?... When, as Shades whisper in the chasmal night, "Better, far better, no percipience here."— O happy lack, that I should have no child ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... an excellent lesson," he returned, bitterly. "That is just the thing: 'obey, obey.' Well, I will. I will be a stick, a dolt. I will be as unlike what God intended me to be as possible. I will be just what your father and Aunt Hester and you want me to be. I will let them think for me and save my soul. I am too much an imbecile ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... The dolt had not known that he was assisting at a solemnity recognized as such by experts throughout the clothed world. But Lois knew all those things. She herself was trying out a new toilette, for which doubtless Irene Wheeler was partly sponsor. She could hold her own on the terraces with ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... out from the past; musical, soft! The marquis trembled. Did not the man notice? No; he was still looking gravely before him. Dolt; did he not remember? Could he not recall the times beyond number when he had heard that voice; in the ivy-covered cottage; in the ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... elephant carrion.—Of the mountains of this earth Sinai is one of the least, yet is it most mighty before God in state and dignity.—Heardst thou not what an intelligent lean man said one day to a sleek fat dolt? An Arab horse, notwithstanding his slim make, is more prized thus ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 2, Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... dolt! But he is important. Ah, if he were wiser, I should not rid myself of him so quickly! And now for the schoolmistress,—the sweetheart of Sandy. If these men have not lied, he is in love with her; and, if he is, he has told her his secret before now; and ...
— Two Men of Sandy Bar - A Drama • Bret Harte
... temper of social men, a bondage of adventure and of wisdom. Then I thought more patiently and I saw that what had made these but as one and given them for a thousand years the miracles of their shrine and temporal rule by land and sea, was not a condescension to knave or dolt, an impoverishment of the common thought to make it serviceable and easy, but a dead language and a communion in whatever, even to the greatest saint, is of incredible difficulty. Only by the substantiation ...
— Synge And The Ireland Of His Time • William Butler Yeats
... said Joe, "you may try their fall over again, if you like; but, as for me, who am but a dolt, I prefer keeping at the medium height—neither too far up, nor too low down. It won't do to be ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... humour from mine. Some look for noble blood in a wife, some for understanding, others for money, and others again for beauty, and of the latter class I am one. As for high birth, thank Heaven and my ancestors I am well enough off in that respect; as for understanding, provided a woman is neither a dolt nor a simpleton, there is no need of her having a very subtle wit; in point of wealth, I am amply provided by my parents; but beauty is what I covet, with no other addition than virtue and good breeding. If my wife brings me this, I will thank Heaven for the gift, and make my parents ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... and to talk folly with a beautiful outland woman, and a scribe however learned," she answered bitterly, adding, "Oh! if the Prince is not mad, certainly he drives others to madness, and me, his spouse, among them. That throne is his, his; yet he suffers a cross-grained dolt to take his place, and sends him gifts ...
— Moon of Israel • H. Rider Haggard
... know whether I'm breathing yet," Tracy rejoined. She's a Goddess to me from this moment. Not like music? Am I a dolt? She would raise me from the dead, if she sang over me. Put me in a boat, and let her sing on, and all may end! I could die into colour, hearing her! That's the voice ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Mrs. Score! O dolt of a John Hayes! If the landlady had allowed the Captain and the maid to have their way, and meet but for a minute before recruits, sergeant, and all, it is probable that no harm would have been done, and that this history would never ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray
... not Mademoiselle Madeleine's fault," cried M. de Bois, coming to the rescue. "It was my folly,—another blunder of mine! I was dolt enough to think that you had only to see her for all to be well; and, instead of warning Mademoiselle Madeleine that you were in Washington, I kept from her a knowledge which would have prevented your encountering each other. It was all my imprudence, ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... with Bobby Browne and went out upon the cool, starlit balcony. There he gently cursed himself for a fool, a dolt, an idiot. ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... labour appears to have been bestowed upon the story, than was merely sufficient to throw it out of the dry, didactic form. Lucilla is totally uninteresting; so is Mr. Stanley; Dr. Barlow still worse; and Caelebs a mere clod or dolt. Sir John and Lady Belfield are rather more interesting—and for a very obvious reason, they have some faults;—they put us in mind of men and women;—they seem to belong to one common nature with ourselves. As we read, we seem to think we might act ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... that's well, Falfani," said Lord Blackadder, with a sigh of satisfaction. "But what of your friend Tiler? Thick-headed dolt, unable ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... dogmaro. Document dokumento. Doff demeti. Dog hundo. Dogged obstina. Doghouse hundodometo. Dog kennel hundejo. Dogma dogmo. Dole disdoni. Doleful funebra. Doll pupo. Dollar dolaro. Dolphin delfeno. Dolt malsagxulo. Domain bieno. Dome kupolo. Domestic hejma. Domestic servisto—ino. Domicile logxejo. Dominant potenca. Domination potenco. Dominion regeco. Dominion regno. Domino domeno. Donation donaco, oferdono. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... but a dreaming dolt, Still walking like a ragged colt, And oft out of a bush doth bolt, Of purpose to deceive us; And leading us makes us to stray, Long winter's nights, out of the way; And when we stick in mire and clay, Hob doth with laughter ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley
... was an awful resolution in her manner, that riveted me to my place.—O fool!—dolt!—barbarian! Cursed as I am, with more imperfections than my fellow wretches, kind Fortune sent a heaven-gifted cherub to my aid, and, like a ruffian, I have driven her from my side!—I must now haste to my appointment. Well, my mind is tuned for such a scene. I shall wish only ...
— The Rivals - A Comedy • Richard Brinsley Sheridan
... moon-lit sky before they limped off, and, joining their fellows, gathered in a little knot at a distance from their fractious pupil, and discussed his merits with great freedom. They voted him an ill-natured brute, a stupid dolt—in short, a perfect donkey. Scarcely had they arrived at this unanimous conclusion, when—pop! pop! bang! bang!—four loud reports, and four little rabbits lay in ...
— Harper's Young People, May 11, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... "Dolt!" cried Chicot, "you see that it is decidedly you who are drunk, for you cannot reach me across the table, while my arm is six inches longer than yours, and my sword as much longer than your sword; and ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... with laughter. "Fancy anybody being such a dolt as to rehearse without a minister!" ...
— Apron-Strings • Eleanor Gates
... pleaded, drawing her to a seat beside him. "I see it all now. What a dolt you must have thought me! How could you ever have ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... has never been such a den of murder and robbery as at this day. If there is less dust to be seen on the high-ways, said the keeper, it is by reason that it is washed away in blood. And notwithstanding all this the crazy maid runs straight into the Devil's arms, with that old dolt." ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... common face, moved mysteriously by some feeling she resented even more than she resented his presence. He was too grossly ignorant to know that a man of breeding, having entered by chance, would have turned and gone away, professing not to have seen. He seemed to think—the dolt!—that he must make ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... of heroine who would stop a play five minutes after the curtain had risen on the first act if the remaining four acts depended on her failing to see something that was plain to the veriest dolt in the audience," Marguerite replied, with spirit. "Nobody shall ever write me up save as ...
— A Rebellious Heroine • John Kendrick Bangs
... with insane fright. Who but Horace Endicott could know her crimes? All but the crime which he had named her blunder. Could this passionless stranger, this Irish politician, looking at her as indifferently as the judge on the bench, be Horace? No, surely no! Because that fool, dolt though he was, would never have seen this wretched confession of her crimes, and not slain her the next minute. Into this ambuscade had she been led by the crazy wife of Curran, whose sound advice she herself had thrown aside to follow the instincts ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... sudden access of temper. "Hundreds, aye thousands, of times have I seen her sitting with a certain gentleman, in a hired carriage. 'Tis only a blockhead like yourself that can't see what all the world sees! You are a stupid dolt, made to be taken in. I wonder it has never entered into the head of some play-writer to put you into a farce! What! a pater-familias who, when he is half-tipsy, on Sunday afternoons preaches moral sermons to daughters, who are laughing in their sleeves ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai
... on the experiences through which we have passed in previous lives, and is necessarily an individual possession. It differs where the past experience is different, as in the savage and the civilised man, the dolt and the talented, the fool and the genius, the criminal and the saint. The voice of God would speak alike in all; the experience of the past speaks differently in each. Hence also the consciences of men at a ...
— The Basis of Morality • Annie Besant
... ha!—That was neat, I grant you, Terry,' said Lord Clonbrony. 'But what a dolt of a born ignoramus must that sheriffs fellow have been, not to know Naboclish when he ...
— The Absentee • Maria Edgeworth
... him in her radiant anger, it went hard with Odo not to silence with a kiss a resentment that he guessed to be mainly directed against herself; but he controlled himself and said quietly: "Madam, I were a dolt not to perceive that I have had the misfortune to offend; but when or how, I swear to heaven I know not; and till you enlighten me I can ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... writing a tragedy, that had already been deemed worthy at least of attention from the theatre, and of the merits of which she so well could judge, for such a man she would be all kindness! all sensibility! all soul! What an incurable dolt was I! Thus repeatedly to degrade the character of bard, and thus too in vain. ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... my lord, they are ABUNDANTLY extravagant; if I charged vulgar prices, I should be only a vulgar tradesman. I, however, am not a broker, nor a Jew. Of the article superintendence, which is only L500, I cannot abate a dolt; on the rest of the bill, if you mean to offer READY, I mean, without any negotiation, to abate thirty per cent; and I hope that is a fair ...
— The Absentee • Maria Edgeworth
... ignorance. Do not then desist from advising me, now that you have begun, until I have learned clearly what this is which I am to practise, and how I may acquire it. And if you find me assenting to your words, and hereafter not doing that to which I assented, call me 'dolt,' and deem me unworthy of receiving further instruction. Once more, then, tell me what you and Pindar mean by natural justice: Do you not mean that the superior should take the property of the inferior by force; that the better ...
— Gorgias • Plato
... servant, of poor Roese, curiously enough, was uppermost. Had not Roese, dolt that he was, cunningly managed to disappear from a scene which was, in a certain sense, as unbearable as his master's at this juncture? And Roese by now was perhaps seated comfortably in a quiet corner where nobody was looking for him, and where it ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... the affair a trifle plainer, and showed how foolishly I had acted. Instead of being a stupid dolt, this Francois was really a clever fellow, who had tricked me admirably. My cheeks burned as I saw what a dupe I had been. As a matter of fact, he could have slipped away at any moment, instead of which he had purposely lured me on. His hesitation at the ...
— My Sword's My Fortune - A Story of Old France • Herbert Hayens
... be rid of that Edward Benden. Then I'd set Alice in her brother Roger's house, to look after him and Christabel. She'd be as happy as the day is long, might she dwell with them, and had that cantankerous dolt off her hands for good. Eh dear! but if Master Hall, my father-in-law, that made Alice's match with Benden, but had it to do o'er again, I reckon he'd think twice and thrice afore he gave her to that toad. ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... was aware of that!" Kate's voice went on. "Dolt! Did I catch it? You're a poor dissembler. You're too honest. You might tell the verdict before ...
— The Readjustment • Will Irwin
... ha!—That was neat, I grant you, Terry," said Lord Clonbrony. "But what a dolt of a born ignoramus must that sheriff's fellow have been, not to know Naboclish when ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. 6 • Maria Edgeworth
... of a settlement, jointure, or pin-money. She takes the will for the deed all through the piece, and is so besotted with this ignorant, vulgar notion of rank and title as a real thing that cannot be counterfeited that she is the dupe of her own fine stratagems, and marries a gull, a dolt, a broken adventurer for an accomplished and brave gentleman. Her meanness is equal to her folly and her pride (and nothing can be greater), yet she holds out on the strength of her original pretensions for a long time, and plays the upstart with decency ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... the millionaire so significantly that Robin would have been a dolt not to grasp the situation. Nothing could have been clearer than the fact that Mr. Blithers believed it to be in his power to block any effort Graustark might make in other directions ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... the south. The lugger sped through the water, and Stair Garland still sat dazed. Never had any man felt such a fool. Here he was firmly and legally wedded, and he dare not even address a word to his bride. He had spoken no syllable of gladness or affection—triple dolt—quadruple fool—prize-winner among idiots! He had nothing to say—he could say nothing. Nor was it the presence of a third person which prevented him. Perhaps, rather, something in Patsy's eye, and, though that he would not acknowledge, a lurking grimness in the ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... mighty the middle-garth over Should hold under heaven than he himself held: Art thou that Beowulf who won strife with Breca On the wide sea contending in swimming, When ye two for pride's sake search'd out the floods And for a dolt's cry into deep water Thrust both your life-days? No man the twain of you, 510 Lief or loth were he, might lay wyte to stay you Your sorrowful journey, when on the sea row'dye; Then when the ocean-stream ye ...
— The Translations of Beowulf - A Critical Biography • Chauncey Brewster Tinker
... Your Koko is a regular dolt; I can't bear him. A hare-brained fellow, a regular gad-about! Without any kind of occupation, eternally loafing around! ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al
... you any more than the others for thinking as you do. Appearances are against me, the proof is overwhelming. A year ago I was called a man, to-day they are stripping me of every claim to that distinction. The world says I am a fool, a dolt, almost a criminal—but no one believes I am a man. Peggy, will you feel better toward me if I tell you that I am going to begin life all over again? It will be a new Monty Brewster that starts out again ...
— Brewster's Millions • George Barr McCutcheon
... more placid (Optimists should not be acid.) "Come in!" I exclaimed—"confound you! Pray stand drumming there no more." But the donkey still kept tapping. "Dolt!" I muttered, sharply snapping, "Why the deuce do you come rapping, rapping at my Office-door? Yet not 'enter' when you're told to?"—here I opened wide the door— Darkness ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Volume 101, October 31, 1891 • Various
... me more," I answered, "is how he will regret ever having listened to my advice. What a dolt I was not to have told him of ...
— A Bid for Fortune - or Dr. Nikola's Vendetta • Guy Boothby
... reason why he should obey. The one thing about the message which struck a jarring note was the request for secrecy under plea of personal danger. And if a forgery—why should his enemies speak of her personal danger? A lure! So obvious a one that only the veriest dolt could be deceived by it. The situation then resolved itself into this: He was invited to go to Sarajevo—if by Marishka, to save her from personal danger or abduction by her captor—if by the German agent, with Marishka as a lure, to be the victim of a conspiracy which ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... had an experience like mine—before and since," continued Dacres, still speaking in the tone of one who was meditating aloud—"to allow such an idea even for a moment to take shape in his brain! What an utter, unmitigated, unmanageable, and unimprovable idiot, ass, dolt, and blockhead! Confound such a ...
— The American Baron • James De Mille
... letters, and mind, too, and not wink at me so often; you will remember?" Bill gave the required promise and Fanny bounded away in quest of her schoolmates, who laughed at her for taking so much pains with such a dolt as Bill Jeffrey. That afternoon Fanny resolved to retrieve her character as a scholar; so she applied herself closely to her task, and before recitation hour arrived she had learned every word of her lesson. But alas for poor Fanny. She was always stumbling ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes
... Grace! But I can imitate a farmyard. DUKE (doubtfully). I don't see how that would help us. I don't see how we could bring it in. CAS. It would not help us in the least. We are not a parcel of graziers come to market, dolt! (Luiz rises.) DUKE. My love, our suite's feelings! (To Luiz.) Be so good as to ring the bell and inform the Grand Inquisitor that his Grace the Duke of Plaza-Toro, Count Matadoro, Baron Picadoro— DUCH. And suite— DUKE. And suite—have arrived at Venice, and ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... into this matter. Is knowledge—a knowledge of those sciences which are intimately connected with agriculture as an art—of no value to the farmer? Is it necessary that he should be a dolt in order to be fitted for his vocation? Will ignorance and bad husbandry increase his crops or enable him to find a better market for his products? Or, will his enjoyment, in his daily round of toil, be any greater because ...
— Address delivered by Hon. Henry H. Crapo, Governor of Michigan, before the Central Michigan Agricultural Society, at their Sheep-shearing Exhibition held at the Agricultural College Farm, on Thursday, • Henry Howland Crapo
... Boyd, being called upon, instantly contrived some impromptu verses amid general approbation—for his intelligence was as lithe and graceful as his body was agile. And our foppish Ensign, who was no dolt by a long shot either, made a most deft rondeau in flattery of the ladies, turning it so neatly and unexpectedly that we all drew our side-arms and, thrusting them aloft, cheered both him and the fair subjects of ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... "protector" of the actress, Florentine, whom he discovered and started. In 1822 he lived at Belleville in one of the first houses above Courtille; he had then been a widower for six years. He was an uncle of Oscar Husson, and had taken some interest in and helped the dolt, until an incident occurred that changed everything: the old man discovered the young fellow asleep one morning, on one of Florentine's divans, after an orgy wherein he had squandered the money entrusted to him by ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... it is kind father for him, I stayd with him a week. At breakfast we had sometimes sowins, and sometimes stirrabout, and sometimes fraughauns and milk; but his cows would hardly give a drop of milk. For his head had lost the pachaun. His neighbour Squire Dolt is a meer buddaugh. I'd give a cow in Conaught you could see him. He keeps none but garrauns, and he rides on a soogaun with nothing for his bridle but gadd. In that, he is a meer spaulpeen, and a perfect Monaghan, and a Munster Croch to ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... yet I must confess, That I deserv'd this, being such a dolt, A very idiot, to commit my fortunes To a vile slave. I suffer for my folly, But will at least take vengeance ...
— The Comedies of Terence • Publius Terentius Afer
... the shrewishest old dolt in Tunstall Forest," returned Hatch, visibly ruffled by these threats. "Get ye to your arms before Sir Oliver come, and leave prating for one good while. An ye had talked so much with Harry the Fift, his ears would ha' ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... curious experiment, I made the attempt once, in a case of a handsome dolt, who was, nominally, a domestic in my employ for a few months. She had an affected pose and tread which she conceived to be majestic. She was stupid, awkward and slovenly about her work, and altogether so "impossible" that I disliked to send ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... figure of a bucolic guard who hailed from Humboldt County. He was a simple-minded, good-natured dolt and not above earning an honest dollar by smuggling in tobacco for the convicts. On that night, returning from a trip to San Francisco, he brought in with him fifteen pounds of prime cigarette tobacco. He had done this before, and delivered the stuff to Cecil Winwood. ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... as good a one as you thought me for you. He has no quality of youth in him, but such as you have seen to-day. Touch him upon money, and you touch no booby then. He really is a dolt, I suppose, in other things; but it answers ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... be anything in this world from which it would be desirable to see men delivered, it is from a certain small, cheap wisdom which expresses itself in general verdicts on all humanity, and enables the fribbler or dolt who can not see beyond his nose to give an offhand summary of the infinite. There is 'an aping of the devil' in this flippant assumption of our immutability, which strangely combines the pitiful and painful. Oh! if the ne plus ultra which antique Ignorance complacently inscribes on the gates ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... "Raw Recruit," The joke of the awkward squad, The rook of the rookies to boot, And a bumpkin, a dolt and a clod; But this much I'll plead in defense I seem popular with these chaps, For they keep me a'moving thither and hence ...
— The Greater Love • George T. McCarthy
... of virtue, whose whole boast is to be vicious? How dare you draw conclusions? Dolt and puppy! you can no more comprehend that angel's excellences than she can stoop to believe in your vices. And you talk morality? Anthony, I'm a man who has been somewhat roughly ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the words the truth rushed like a flash of inspiration across Cleek's mind. The cause of Germany! what a dolt he was not to have thought of that before! There was but one phrase ever used for that among the Kaiser's people, and ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... It was I who was the idiot, the owl, the dolt, not to have calculated better what the consequences of such a position might be.—But where are we going?" he asked, seeing that they had reached the barrier ...
— Colonel Chabert • Honore de Balzac
... visit Bendigo at any time, "Doria" would obviously be a danger; for, though a man of little perception—noisy dolt easily enough hoodwinked—there remained strong likelihood that he must recognize me in the Italian "Doria." And the more so that we had now renewed our former friendship. But let Robert Redmayne be reduced to silence, let Robert ...
— The Red Redmaynes • Eden Phillpotts
... sort in thy body!" said Sancho. "God help thee, what a lot of things thou hast strung together, one after the other, without head or tail! What have Cascajo, and the broaches and the proverbs and the airs, to do with what I say? Look here, fool and dolt (for so I may call you, when you don't understand my words, and run away from good fortune), if I had said that my daughter was to throw herself down from a tower, or go roaming the world, as the Infanta Dona Urraca wanted to do, ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... fox fair words, but this availed nought; so he said to him softly, 'Verily, you foxes are the most pleasant spoken of folk and the subtlest in jest, and this is but a jest of thine; but all times are not good for sport and jesting.' 'O dolt,' answered the fox, 'jesting hath a limit, that the jester overpasses not, and deem not that God will again give thee power over me, after having once delivered me from thee.' Quoth the wolf, 'It ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume III • Anonymous
... not know," replied Colville, with an odd smile. "I think there is nothing else to be done—it is all so complete. We are all so utterly fooled by this man whom all the world took to be a dolt. On Tuesday morning he arrested seventy-eight of the Representatives. When Paris awoke, the streets had been placarded in the night with the decree of the President of the Republic. The National Assembly was dissolved. The Council of State was dissolved. Martial ...
— The Last Hope • Henry Seton Merriman
... always sneering at him, and scolding him. As soon as ever he came of age and got a little money of his own, he declared he wouldn't live at home. His father wanted him to go into Parliament or the army, but he said he hated the army, and if he was such a dolt as his mother thought him it would be ridiculous to attempt politics. And so he just drifted up to town and looked out for people that would make much of him, and wouldn't snub him. And that, of course, was how he got into the toils of ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... love in a woman's heart"—answered the dear creature, with a smile and a look that Betts would have been a mere dolt not to have comprehended—"and it is my duty to take care that MY gratitude does not ...
— Autobiography of a Pocket-Hankerchief • James Fenimore Cooper
... arose and shed its light through the sky, and the great black bird executed an evolution or two and whirred off to the north, doubtless headed for Seattle or some equally inaccessible point. A great helpless wrath was upon him. Dolt that he had been to let this human leper escape from him into the world again! A kind of divine frenzy seized him to capture him yet and put him where he could work no further harm to other willing victims. Yes, he thought of Gila as a willing victim! An ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... stretched my feet out towards the low fire. With pipe newly filled, I caressed it between my joined hands, and thought. After a half hour of smoking and ruminating, I came to a conclusion. I would move to the country for the summer! What a dolt I had been all these years! The matter of board need not be considered, for that was cheaper in the country than in town. When winter came again, I could return to my present quarters, if I chose. What I wanted was a quiet old farmhouse with as few ...
— The Love Story of Abner Stone • Edwin Carlile Litsey
... stupid, fellow, dolt. Haud, hold, keep. Hawkie, cow. Hawslock, throat-lock, choicest wool. Heapet, heaped. Heie, they. Het, hot. Hie, high, highly. Hight, was called. Hiltring, hiding. Hing, hang. Hinny, honey, sweet. Hirple, hop. Histie, ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... "Impracticable dolt!" exclaimed Jonathan, furiously. "Do you think I'd part with the sweetest morsel of revenge on those terms? No! But I'll have the secret out ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... to be As if all words of mine in praise of him Were as the veriest dolt that saw the sun; And God had spoken him and said to him: "I bid you tell me what you think of it." And he should answer: "Oh, the sun is nice." So sadly fitted I to speak in praise ...
— Something Else Again • Franklin P. Adams
... plucked off a dunghill, I am moved to crave your Ladyship's kindliness for him. Here's his rattle,"—and Aunt Temperance held forth the silver pipe,—"which lacks but the bells to be as rare a fool's staff as I have seen of a summer day.—Get thee in, thou poor dizard dolt! [Note 1] to think that I should have to call ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... Luca, with a sigh sadder than ever. "But if it were three years, what difference would it make? You cannot cudgel the divine grace of art into a man with blows as you cudgel speed into a mule, and I shall be a dolt at the end of the time as I am now. What said your good father to me but yesternight?—and he IS good to me and does not despise me. He said: 'Luca, my son, it is of no more avail for you to sigh for Pacifica than for the moon. Were she mine I would give her ...
— Bimbi • Louise de la Ramee
... his side, had a mind equally busy. Mirah's anger had waked in him a new perception, and with it the unpleasant sense that he was a dolt not to have had it before. Suppose Mirah's heart were entirely preoccupied with Deronda in another character than that of her own and her brother's benefactor; the supposition was attended in Hans's mind with anxieties which, to do him justice, were not altogether selfish. He had a strong ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... "Dolt that I am," I suddenly exclaimed, "to be fooling away my time when the nearest railway station or hotel is perhaps ...
— A Crystal Age • W. H. Hudson
... her handkerchief to her face, while I was speaking, and I—ass, dolt, and idiot that I was—felt convinced that she was crying. Her frame shook with convulsive shivers, that I took for repressed sobs. I saw the little hand that held the little white handkerchief to her face—the same slender ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... foolishness; for if works of righteousness which we can do can justify from the curse of the law in the sight of God, then are not all the treasures of wisdom found in the heart of God and Christ; for this dolt-headed sinner hath now found out a way of his own, unawares to God, to secure his soul from wrath and vengeance; I say, unawares to God, for he never imagined that such a thing could be; for had he, he ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... tables contained as much heavy timber as would build a house. I wanted an hour's rest, for my knapsack had become a burden to me, and the handles of the few tools I was obliged to carry dug themselves relentlessly into my back. "White or brown beer?" asked the attendant. Dolt that I was to answer Brown! They brought me a vile treacley compound that I could not drink; whereas the Berlin white beer is a famous effervescing liquor; so good, says a Berliner, that you cannot distinguish it from champagne ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... enough?" cried his father with paternal impatience, ready to tear his hair with vexation at having such a little idiot for son. "Must you rove afield to find poverty to help, when it sits cold enough, the Lord knows, at our own hearth? Oh, little ass! little dolt! little maniac! fit only for a madhouse! talking to iron figures and taking them for real men!—What have I done, O Heaven, that ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... done for you! Ah! the dolt! To trust a wanton! To trust Warcolier! To trust everybody! ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... I was in the militia as I get in one day from my malicious wife. She beats me, the bailiff drives me to work as if I were an animal, and the deacon makes a cuckold of me. Haven't I good reason to drink? Don't I have to use the means nature gives us to drive away our troubles? If I were a dolt, I shouldn't take it to heart so, and I shouldn't drink so much, either; but it's a well-known fact that I am an intelligent man; so I feel such things more than others would, and that's why I have to drink. My neighbor Moens Christoffersen often ...
— Comedies • Ludvig Holberg
... awfully sold at first, and by no means in an amiable frame of mind. It is no joke to be done out of Christmas at home. What a dolt that Gilks was to get scarlet fever! Why could he not have ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... wait a moment—idiot, I think it was—no, no, it was fool or dolt. Yes; his majesty said that the man who had thought of the vin de Melun was something ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... her way to a tryst with Easton a spirit in her feet led her toward a police station, but another spirit carried her past, for she would visualize the sure consequences of such an exposure. If her suspicions were false, she would be exposed as a combination of dastard and dolt. If they were true, she would be sending Sir Joseph and Lady Webling perhaps to ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... doorway, were flushed by the fire-beams, though no longer with their swarthy central rose, tropic flower of a pure and abounding blood, as it had seemed. She was now beset by battle. His pity for her, and his eager championship, overwhelmed the spirit of compassion for the foolish wretched husband. Dolt, the man must be, Redworth thought; and he asked inwardly, Did the miserable tyrant suppose of a woman like this, that she would be content to shine as a candle in a grated lanthorn? The generosity of men speculating upon other men's possessions ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... would not have succeeded even as well as he did. Bliss was a strong active fellow, and good at the games, so that with most of the school he got on very well; but, nevertheless, he was generally set down as nearly half-witted—a mere dolt. Dolt or not, he did Charlie inestimable service; and if any boy is in like case with Bliss, let him take courage, for even the merest dolt has immense power for good as well as for harm, and Bliss extended to Charlie ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... Mr. Billy came in smart and handsome, I'll aver, Yet, with all his brains and beauty, he's not good enough for her: Now, though I'm somewhat homely and in gumption quite a dolt, The quality of goodness is my best and strongest holt, And as goodness is the only human thing that doesn't wane, I wonder she preferred to wed with ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... I remembered everything. Tarnowsy! The name struck my memory like a blow. What a stupid dolt I had been! The whole world had rung wedding bells for the marriage of the Count Maris Tarnowsy, scion of one of the greatest Hungarian houses, and Aline, the nineteen-year-old daughter of Gwendolen ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... a dolt and a blockhead in Art,' he said. 'Thou wilt soon see that the day of thy saints and Madonnas is past, and wilt cease to paint them over and over again in the same manner, as a child doth his ...
— Knights of Art - Stories of the Italian Painters • Amy Steedman
... on the king's highway, and put him in bodily fear; that he afterwards saw the said Crowe with a pole or weapon, value threepence, breaking the king's peace, by committing assault and battery against the heads and shoulders of his majesty's liege subjects, Geoffrey Prickle, Hodge Dolt, Richard Bumpkin, Mary Fang, Catherine Rubble, and Margery Litter; and that he saw Sir Launcelot Greaves, Baronet, aiding, assisting, and comforting the said Crowe, contrary to the king's peace, and against ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... of himself as occasionally "glancing like a meteor from the bottom to the top of the form." His schoolfellow, Mr. Claud Russell, remembers that he once made a great leap in consequence of the stupidity of some laggard on what is called the dult's (dolt's) bench, who being asked, on boggling at cum, "what part of speech is with?" answered, "a substantive." The Rector, after a moment's pause, thought it worth while to ask his dux—"Is with ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... the job merely looks easy," Tom went on, good-humoredly. "The fellow who is doing the fisherman act must have all the brains, while the fellow at the oars may be a real dolt, for all he has to know. I'll take you out with me after black bass, Danny, if we can get hold of a ...
— The High School Boys' Fishing Trip • H. Irving Hancock |
