"Duffer" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... as strong," said Jim, "though he is paying his debts. But Dick certainly is getting to be a conceited duffer. The ayes," he sighed, "seem to have it. The next question is ways and means. Old Bixby's method in St. X looks good to me. A ...
— The House of Toys • Henry Russell Miller
... duffer in your district Whose sheer cussedness is such He has neither pride nor manners— No, nor gumption, overmuch. 'Twould be great to up and tell him Where to go. But be resolved— He's no foeman to be fought with, Just a problem to ...
— It Can Be Done - Poems of Inspiration • Joseph Morris
... Why don't he jump proper? Well, you go on. I don't know that I'm a duffer. Duffer, indeed! My word!" Heathcote had turned to the left, leaving the track, which was, indeed, the main road toward the nearest town and the coast, and was now pushing on through the forest with no pathway at all to guide him. To ordinary eyes the attempt to steer any course would have ...
— Harry Heathcote of Gangoil • Anthony Trollope
... neck. Coristine indulged in a kissing bee with the rest of them, so as to assure himself that he was the true old friend, the genuine Codlin, while the other man was Short. "Marjorie," he said, as that fishing young lady clung to him, "there's a duffer of a dude, with an eye-glass, up at the house, who says he's an old friend of your cousin Marjorie; do you know any old friend of hers?" Marjorie stopped to think, and, after a little pause, said: "It can't be Huggins." "Who is Huggins, Marjorie?" ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... been looking for you everywhere! How many dances can you give me? I've kept my programme as free as I could till I found you. I thought the pixies must have spirited you away! What did you say? I ought to ask Gwen? It isn't necessary in the least. You know I'm a duffer at it, and I should probably tread on her toes and she'd hate me for evermore. May I ...
— Monitress Merle • Angela Brazil
... one as would come at the price. 'Tain't big wages; but I'm seein' loife. Lor', I come down here with Madame and Mounseer a fortnight ago, and Monte Carlo ain't got many secrets from me. I was a duffer, though, at first. When I 'eerd all them shots poppin' off every few minutes, up by the Casino, I used to think 'twas the suicides a shooting theirselves all over the place, for before I left 'ome, I 'ad a warnin' from my young ...
— Rosemary - A Christmas story • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... him better if I had been killed outright. He wouldn't have had the humiliation of it always before his eyes. If it had been any sort of a decent accident, I believe I could bear it better, but to be knocked over in a football match, like the precious duffer that I am—bah!" ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black
... to challenge you!" laughed Nick in deprecation. "To see you again is to want tremendously to try something. But you must have an infinite patience, because I'm an awful duffer." ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... natural instinct of self-protection. The pinnated grouse, sage grouse, Bob White quail and ptarmigan exercise but little keen reason in self-protection. They are easy marks,—the joy of the pot-hunter and the delight of the duffer "sportsman." ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... eyes scouted the mule-skinner's person for evidence of hardware. Observing none, he said fiercely "You mutton- headed duffer!" and for the first time within the memory of the citizens of San Pasqual he had recourse to his hands. He clasped Mr. O'Rourke fondly around the neck and choked him until his eyes threatened to pop out, the while he shook O'Rourke as ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... she cried. "Parliament?—after that? You boy! you sentimentalist! you—you duffer! Do you think I'd let you do it for your own sake even? Do you think I want you—spoilt? We should come back to mope outside of things, we should come back to fret our lives out. I won't do it, Stephen, I won't do it. End this if you like, break our hearts and throw ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... said, assuming an enthusiasm I did not feel. Put on the gloves with this strapping, skillful boxer? Not I! I was firmly resolved to stop while my record was good. In a scientific clash with the gloves he would soon find out what a miserable duffer ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... up if a salmon bites, and when this has gone on for a few days, with no bite, Influenza, or a hard frost with curling, would be rather a relief. This kind of thing is not really angling, and a Duffer is as good at it as ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, April 2, 1892 • Various
... course they are not all exactly like Levick," said Philip, who was a little ashamed of himself for having frightened his little brother; "but I was only joking when I said that about the policeman in Borsham, Dan. What a little duffer you are!" ...
— The Gap in the Fence • Frederica J. Turle
... of what they've told you, Mr. Snelling," laughed Robert Morton. "Our friends are always over-indulgent to our faults. When I begin work under you, a thing I am greatly anticipating, you will find out what a duffer I really am." ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... afraid, mother. If I get into a chest, you may depend I shall know how to get out of it. That girl in the poem was a duffer for not having made more row; and her lover was a beastly sneak for ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... I've heard from the editor of the 'Sunday Illustrated.' He's in a beastly bad temper, and says my last batch of illustrations isn't funny enough. The old duffer's bringing out a religious serial, and he must have humour to make it ...
— Audrey Craven • May Sinclair
... to play golf himself, but he consented to walk over the course and watch the representative's strokes. The representative was rather a duffer. Teeing off, he sent clouds of earth flying in all directions. Then, to hide his confusion he said to his guest: "What do you think of ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... beat down upon it His head is sheltered by a bonnet; And though it makes him look a duffer, He hasn't half the heat ...
— A Horse Book • Mary Tourtel
... Arts hall. While he was standing there two dapper young men came walking hastily by. One caught sight of Uncle and quickly uttered a low whistle. His companion stopped short as the first one said: "Der's de old duffer; ...
— The Adventures of Uncle Jeremiah and Family at the Great Fair - Their Observations and Triumphs • Charles McCellan Stevens (AKA 'Quondam')
... right," he replied. Then soon after: "Everything's strange. That's the trouble," he confessed. "It's only in little things that don't matter, but a fellow feels such a duffer." ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... "What a duffer I am to be sure!" I said to myself. "If I begin to get notions like this in my head there is no knowing where I may end. As if any girl would ever think ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... omnibus from Islington; on which occasion it was remarked that as he did not come on Saturday there must be something wrong. A clerk, with Saturday half-holidays, ought not to be away from his work on Mondays and Tuesdays. Mrs. Duffer, who was regarded in Paradise Row as being very inferior to Mrs. Demijohn, suggested that the young man might, perhaps, not be a Post Office clerk. This, however, was ridiculed. Where should a Post Office clerk find his friends except among Post ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... "Poor old duffer! I'll bet he was disappointed," came sympathetically from Christopher. "Think of his having to stay at home and miss the fun of seeing how ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... actually muffed a chance. Now and then, perhaps, a miraculously fortunate girl has two victims on the mat simultaneously, and has to lose one. But they are seldom, if ever, both good chances; one is nearly always a duffer, thrown in in the telling to make the ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken
... new acquaintance, "to the little chap learning his French. I've forgotten mine. One feels a hopeless duffer knowing ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... that the first naval authority of his time was the target of snobs, and that, but for his strong personality and the fact that he was always ready to fight them in the open, he would have been superseded, and a gallant duffer might have taken his place, to the detriment of our imperial interests. It is a dangerous experiment to put a man into high office if he has not the instinct of judging the calibre of other men. This applies to every department of life nowadays. ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... not been for Willy Horse I should not have got the property at all. That chief with the iron toes is a shrewd old duffer. He has owned the property for some years, and all that time the Hiram Dusenbery Company has been trying, by fair means or otherwise, to buy it of him, but Old Iron-Toe put the price so high that they preferred to wait, hoping ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders in the Great North Woods • Jessie Graham Flower
... may be able to stand it all, and not get soured in temper and feeling against the Mongols. I must have patience. Some knowledge of camel's flesh also would help me not a little. As it stands, I feel an incompetent "duffer."' ...
— James Gilmour of Mongolia - His diaries, letters, and reports • James Gilmour
... have had half a chance—" began Barton, and then didn't know at all how to finish it. "Why, you're so plucky—and so odd—and so interesting!" he began all over again. "Oh, of course, I'm an awful duffer and all that! But if we'd had half a chance, I say, you and I would have been great ...
— Little Eve Edgarton • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... to the Grammar School, and the Grammar School got used to him, setting him down as a hopeless duffer at learning, but respecting him for a generous, honest nature. Only one narrow, domineering fellow, the Latin master, bullied him and made the blue eyes mad with shame and rage. There was a horrid scene, when the ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... the truth in his brother's eyes. He smiled weakly, the anger gone. "Same old blind duffer you always were. I wrote an answer to her letter. In that letter I told her . . . ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... himself running alone. Behind him a dog yelped with pain, and above the noise someone shouted: "Here, you kids, let up on that! Shame on you! Let him alone! Call off your dogs, there! Poor little duffer, let him go. Get back ...
— The Black Creek Stopping-House • Nellie McClung
... young duffer,' said Oswald, who could now smell the coffee. 'All that isn't History it's Humbug. ...
— The Wouldbegoods • E. Nesbit
... the poor old duffer is myself. They've put me in as caretaker—an excellent arrangement: ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome |
