"Joking" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... a frank, simple soldier, who thinks of every man in his brigade as a comrade. I understand now what an enormous difference this makes to men in the ranks. A chance word of praise dropped in our hearing, a joking remark during a hot fight (repeated affectionately over every camp-fire at night), any little touch of nature that obliterates rank, and makes man and general "chums" for the moment; such trifles ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers
... be joking. Now, decline He.' 'Nominative he, possessive his, objective him.' 'You see, his is possessive. Now, you can say his book, but you can't say him book.' 'Yes, I do say hymn book, too,' said the impracticable scholar, with a quizzical twinkle. ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... but I was joking," the old rascal declared. "Wash and I always prank with each other. You can take a ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read
... me feeling puzzled, for I hardly knew what he meant, whether he was joking me or laughing at me for what I said. But it was all put out of my head directly by a little bustle at the gate, where the men who had been scouting were beginning to return, so as to be well in shelter before it grew dark; and as I followed ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn
... coach, "What would I be joking about? I warned you what would happen ... and the same thing's going to happen to anyone else who wilfully violates rules. You're through, Mooney, and you're through for good. Turn in ...
— Interference and Other Football Stories • Harold M. Sherman
... men smoking cigarettes, until the word of command should pass down the line. We knew what it meant. It was true our barrage would make it comparatively safe; but we knew, too, that many of the lads who were joking with each other, and telling stories of what they did in pre-war days, would never see England again, while many more, if they went back, would go back mutilated and maimed for life. Still, it was all in the day's work. The Boches had to be beaten, and ...
— "The Pomp of Yesterday" • Joseph Hocking
... becoming manners, with much care for etiquette.[1397] A thirteenth-century writer says of the Mongol women that they are "chaste, and nothing is heard amongst them of lewdness, but some of the expressions they use in joking are very shameful and coarse." The same is true now.[1398] An Arab author is cited as stating that at Mirbat women went outside the city at night to sport with strange men. Their own husbands and male relatives passed them ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... Go on, you're joking, Nell!" cried Dick; "and yet you look pleased enough for it to be true! Mr. Vernon! Hurrah! Sorry, mamma, but my feelings, which ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... master of her faithless lover, a young good-looking man, entered. "So, my good Suzette, I find you have lost your place!" cried he, "I am come to offer you one for life—will you marry me?" "I, Sir? you are joking." "No, indeed, I want a wife, and I am sure I can't find a better." "But everybody will laugh at you for marrying a poor girl like me," "Oh! if that is your only objection we shall soon get over it; come, come along; ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various
... was on pins and needles lest he should really do something of the kind, and if he should hurt the feelings of her dear Miss Isabel whom she adored, Molly did not know what she should do. Miss Isabel might not understand her uncle's joking ways and—oh, dear! Her anxious look made ...
— Three Little Cousins • Amy E. Blanchard
... joking, Jim," cried Mr. Connor; and he tried to count; but the cats were in such a scrambling mass, he could not ...
— The Hunter Cats of Connorloa • Helen Jackson
... extremes, it cannot be denied that Glooskap appears in several of these stories as Spring, or as the melter of ice, the conqueror of the frozen stream and of the iceberg. In this narrative he is active and creative Nature itself, directing and sporting with the warring elements. His vast practical joking cannot fail to remind the reader yet again of the Norse deities and ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland
... remark to my belated Moor, and it brought tears to his eyes. He cannot stand any joking on his love, so I let him off easily, and only called him a ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac
... He continued joking about our bathrooms while he was eating supper; and later, before retiring, he said, "I know you are a neat woman, Aunt Ruth, and I guess before I go to bed I'll take ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens
... there, whittling and whistling that brings little old Provincetown right up before my eyes. I can see old Captain Ames sitting there on the wharf on a coil of rope, whittling just as you are doing, and joking with Sam and the crew as they pile into the boat to go out to the weirs. I can see the nets spread out to dry alongshore, and smell tar and codfish as plain as if it were here right under my nose. And ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... instant Heron did not speak. But when words came, he seemed to fling them at his friend: "You're not joking when you say that, O'Reilly. You have a meaning. What's in ...
— The Lion's Mouse • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... were in high good humour, joking with each other and the two Irish servants, who were beginning to think that being "stuck up" was not so terrible after all, while the cook took her apron from her face and joined in the chaff. Hollis was thankful for it. It enabled him to say what ...
— The Moving Finger • Mary Gaunt
... some heat: "If you are joking, you've carried this thing far enough. If you are really strapped, as you say you are, how does it happen that you are occupying the ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... his arm in utter amazement. "You ain't joking about it?" and then—he was but a little fellow, and hunger is hard to bear—at the sight of the provisions Patch was laying out on the newspaper wrapper, he began to cry ...
— Little Folks (November 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... joking, they followed the road back to the dam and embarked in the launch with all speed, for the sun was already sinking beneath the treetops and they had a two-hour ride ahead of them. Mrs. Evans took Hinpoha back in the machine and delivered her to her aunt safe and sound ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at School • Hildegard G. Frey
... Imperial eagles over the door, laughing.... Red Guards came to mount guard. All the soldiers turned to look, curiously, as if they had heard of them but never seen them. They laughed good-naturedly and pressed out of line to slap the Red Guards on the back, with half-joking, half-admiring remarks.... ...
— Ten Days That Shook the World • John Reed
... for some time believe but that the admiral must be joking, when he talked in such a strain; but he was very soon convinced to the contrary, by the latter actually walking out and once more asking him, Mr. Chillingworth, if he meant to go with him, ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... Ted. He was only joking but Tony with her sharpened sight knew that it was thin ice for Larry and suspected he had non-professional reasons for wanting Ruth alone in the canoe with him that night. Poor Larry! It was all a horrible tangle, just as ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... Perseus, likewise, and was so astonished that he almost fancied his companion was joking with him, and that there were no such old women ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... good deal of rough joking and laughter in the battery. The Canadian gunners took their task lightly enough, though their work was of the hardest—and of the most dangerous, too. But jokes ran from group to group, from gun to gun. They were constantly kidding one ...
— A Minstrel In France • Harry Lauder
... us all in at Fallow field, except Drummond,' he said. 'Drummond would have it you were joking. I see it now. And you're a confoundedly clever fellow into the bargain, or you wouldn't be quill-driving for Uncle Mel. Don't be ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... with furs and were to take supplies back. It was very interesting to me to watch the loading and unloading of this boat. I was not yet familiar with those half breed drivers. They seemed sociable fellows, among themselves, laughing, joking ...
— Old Rail Fence Corners - The A. B. C's. of Minnesota History • Various
... you are joking. You would have better reasons than these for slighting so respectable a class of ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... order, that the troops had everywhere received their rations, and that the officers were acquainted with the orders for the morrow. He stayed a short time in the camp of each regiment and troop, saying a few words of encouragement to the soldiers, and laughing and joking with the officers. He paused a short time and chatted with Sir Ralph Pimpernel, who, at his request, introduced each of ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... me. It was attended with a great deal of noisy pleasantry, flavored every now and then with a dash of irritation. There was a young man of whom I made a note; he was such a beautiful specimen of his class. Sometimes he was very facetious, chatter- ing, joking, punning, showing off; then, as the game went on and he lost, and had to pay the consomma- tion, he dropped his amiability, slanged his partner, declared he wouldn't play any more, and went away in a fury. Nothing could be more perfect or more amusing ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... going from Puerto Cortez to Tegucigalpa. At Belize the Governor treated us charmingly and gave us orderlies and launches and lunches and advice and me a fine subject for a short story. For nothing has struck me as so sad lately as did Sir Anthony Moloney K. C. M. G. watching us go off laughing and joking in his gilded barge to wherever we pleased and leaving him standing alone on his lawn with some papers to sign and then a dinner tete-a-tete with his Secretary and so on to the end of his life. It was pathetic to hear him listen to all the gossip from the outside world and to ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... am an old Jacobin, sans-culotte and terrorist—if this were a real Republic with the Convention sitting and a Committee of Public Safety attending to national business, you would all get your heads cut off. Ha, ha . . . I am joking, ha, ha! . . . and serve you right, too. Don't ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... and feelings. The grossest of all the absurdities in this dialogue is, attributing to Aristophanes, so much of a scoffer and so little of a visionary, the silly notion of male and female having been originally complete in one person, and walking circuitously. He may be joking: who knows? ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... all about it," exclaimed Tad impetuously. "But promise me that you won't tell the boys. They'd never cease joking me about it. I'm going back there to-morrow to see if I can find the fellow who shied the rock at me. No; I didn't see him at all. I was sitting with my back to him when he let fly at me. But I pinked him, Mr. ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Rockies • Frank Gee Patchin
... "No, no. He's joking. This is a serious business. It's of vital importance to me and it ought to be of vital importance to ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... Florida, but six of them were proposals from enthusiastic ladies, all well dowered, and eager to give their charms and their cash to the safe keeping of the man who had saved their lives. It was with reference to some joking comment by Courtenay on these missives that his sister wrote to congratulate him on having escaped matrimony under such conditions. Elsie, brimful of high spirits, amused herself by teasing him with nice phrases culled from ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... you are joking," replied the abbe, smiling—but one of Bonaparte's angry looks fell upon his broad, well-fed face, and forced ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach
... which I shall interrupt, and Kezzy will open her eyes at such a monster, and father will want to horsewhip me, but restrain himself and turn me from the door. Or perhaps he will lock me up—oh Patty, cannot you see that I'm weeping, not joking? But it has to be done, and I am going to be brave ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... father," said old Mariuccia, mocking him, "do you fast on Sundays, that you look so pale?" Whereat Nino struck an attitude, and began singing a love song to the ancient woman. Indeed, she was joking about the fast, for she had expended my substance of late in fattening Nino, as she called it, for his appearance, and there was to be broiled chickens for supper that very night. He was only pale because he was in love. As for me, I made up my mind to stand ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... "Oh, she's just joking us," laughed the third girl. "Of course he's a farmer—he owns half a dozen farms. But he's the kind of a farmer who rides around in his automobile ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd
... badness of the road renders it necessary for the traveler to be out of bed a little earlier than usual to face the ordeal. The road to-day has been practically as bad as walking along the sides of the Yangtze. But as I studied the patience and physical vitality of my three men, laughing and joking with the light-heartedness of children, with nearly seventy catties dangling from their shoulder-pole, without a word of murmuring, I felt a little ashamed of myself that I, whose duty it was merely to walk, should have made such a fuss. These ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... reappeared in the clearing, laughing and joking among themselves; and, having thrown their shovels and picks down by the side of one of the huts, they picked up their spears and advanced expectantly toward the circle of bound men, baring their ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... rivulets in the dust that caked their cheeks. Some of them were so glad that, though in the heaviest marching order, they leaped up and down and stepped out of line to dance to the music of the bagpipes. For hours they crowded past, laughing, joking, and cheering, or staring ahead of them, with lips wide apart, panting in the heat and choking with the dust, but always ready to turn again and wave their helmets at ...
— Notes of a War Correspondent • Richard Harding Davis
... passed out upon the steps with a joking speech to the company at the table, and she heard their laughing answers; but she herself remained ...
— Tales of Two Countries • Alexander Kielland
... "Of course I was joking; but others will, and he will be spoilt. I wonder whether he will live to be a Grand Lama or a popular Minister. There cannot be two positions further apart. My husband, no doubt, thinks a good deal of himself ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... so a very full service was held in the pretty little church. When it was over, I witnessed an amusing rural scene. The people poured out of the church,—I counted ninety-six, which is an extraordinarily numerous assemblage for Iceland,—formed into little groups, chatting and joking, not forgetting, however, to moisten their throats with brandy, of which they had taken care to bring an ample supply. Then they bridled their horses and prepared for departure; now the kisses poured in from all sides, and there was no ...
— Visit to Iceland - and the Scandinavian North • Ida Pfeiffer
... back to Beaumont. He held out his hand to show me that he had his pistol and I nodded, but whispered to him not to be too quick to shoot, as there might be some silly practical joking at work, after all. He had got a lamp from a bracket in the upper hall which he was holding in the crook of his damaged arm, so that we had a good light. Then we went down the passage toward the billiard room and you can imagine that we ...
— Carnacki, The Ghost Finder • William Hope Hodgson
... next week we are to learn it?" she asked, and when the answer came, "For to-morrow," she shrieked aloud in dismay. "What! The lot of it? Grammar, and arithmetic, and geography? All those pages, an' pages, and pages! I couldn't finish to-day if I sat up all night! You're joking with me! It isn't really and ...
— Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... "Grandfather was joking," said Celia. "I've often heard him laugh at people that way. It's just nonsense—Thomas and Jones don't know any better. Do they eat frogs in ...
— The Adventures of Herr Baby • Mrs. Molesworth
... let loose, Down to the witless, waddling Goose. Some peck'd at him, some flew, some flutter'd, Some hiss'd, some scream'd, and others mutter'd: The Crow, on carrion wont to feast, The Carrion Crow, condemn'd his taste: The Rook, in earnest too, not joking, Swore all his singing was but croaking. Some thought they meant to show their wit, Might think so still—"but that they writ"— Could it be spite or envy?—"No— Who did no ill could have no foe."— So wise Simplicity esteem'd; Quite otherwise ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... had not the least affection for joking, very contentedly suffered the doctor to enjoy his victory, which he did with no small satisfaction; and, having sufficiently sounded his depth, told him, "He was thoroughly convinced of his great learning and abilities; and that he would be obliged ...
— Joseph Andrews Vol. 1 • Henry Fielding
... midst sat the Celebrity, likewise in wonderful spirits. His behavior now and again elicited a loud grunt of disapproval from Mr. Trevor, who was plying his knife and fork in a manner emblematic of his state of mind. Mr. Allen was laughing and joking airily with Mr. Cooke and the guests, denying, but not resenting, their accusations with all the sang froid of a hardened criminal. He did not care particularly to go to Canada, he said. Why should he, when he was innocent? But, if Mr. Cooke ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... the calcium, all right, with plenty of powder and paint on and the orchestra playing 'Under the Old Apple Tree.' But don't put on your hat and chase downstairs to fly to the Little Church Around the Corner with me. I've been up against peroxide and make-up boxes before. Say, all joking aside—don't you ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... you are joking, my worthy man!" said d'Artagnan. "It appears to me that if my boots need a sponge, your stockings and shoes stand in equal need of a brush. May you not have been philandering a little also, Monsieur Bonacieux? Oh, the devil! That's unpardonable in a man of your ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... the most ample apology.' This is his version; hers, of course, is different. He says that he meant the whole thing as a joke. It was a very bad joke if it was one, and as he knows how she abuses him, one may suspect that there was something more than joking in it. ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... only joking," returned the American. "But, of course, you can marry anybody you like, and why not the dark lady? On the whole, though, if I were you, I would like to astonish the natives before I left. Now, you might buy the castle here and ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford
... "Yes, I'm joking—and what for no?—but they might have been, for onything ye wad hae hindered them to the contrair, I'm thinking. Na, na, ye maunna lock the ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... carrying on the campaign was soon brought into disrepute, owing to the fact that certain juveniles, seeing in this new idea of bill-posting a fresh field for practical joking, began to adorn the walls of the "grub-room," and other spaces which did not often come under the eye of a master, with placards exhibiting inscriptions which had no bearing on the elections—such irrelevant ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery
... I says, "joking or no joking, if you hear anything said about a runaway nigger, don't forget to remember that YOU don't know nothing about him, and I don't know ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... she cried (nothing offended Katenka so much as to be called by that term, which is why Lubotshka used it). "Just because I have the secret of which you know," she went on, with anger ringing through her tone, "you purposely go and upset me! Please do understand that it is no joking matter." ...
— Youth • Leo Tolstoy
... elsewhere. He was wondering suddenly about Cayley. Cayley was just an ordinary man—like himself. Bill had had little jokes with him sometimes; not that Cayley was much of a hand at joking. Bill had helped him to sausages, played tennis with him, borrowed his tobacco, lent him a putter.... and here was Antony saying that he was what? Well, not an ordinary man, anyway. A man with a secret. Perhaps a murderer. No, not a murderer; not Cayley. ...
— The Red House Mystery • A. A. Milne
... and the vicar called him to order. Then he became terrified at his own audacity. The Erdmanns must have understood that on this subject he would not stand any joking, and made no further attempts to tease ...
— Dame Care • Hermann Sudermann
... writer should be taken to task about his books, is fair, and he must abide the praise or the censure. But that a publisher should be criticised for his dinners, and for the conversation which did NOT take place there,—is this tolerable press practice, legitimate joking, or honorable warfare? I have not the honor to know my next-door neighbor, but I make no doubt that he receives his friends at dinner; I see his wife and children pass constantly; I even know the carriages of some of the people who call upon him, and could tell their names. Now, suppose his ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... place where we set that trap, I reckon," remarked Bandy-legs, partly to change the course of the conversation, for it sometimes made him feel uncomfortable when Steve got to joking upon the subject ...
— With Trapper Jim in the North Woods • Lawrence J. Leslie
... hollow." A clever sobriquet fathered on him, burlesquing the monosyllabic names of a well-known diarist and official, he repelled indignantly. "He is my friend, and had I been guilty of the jeu, I should have broken two of my commandments; that which forbids my joking at a friend's expense, and that which forbids my fashioning a play upon words." He entreated Madame Novikoff to visit and cheer Charles Lever, dying at Trieste; deeply lamented Sir H. Bulwer's death: "I used to think his a beautiful intellect, and he was wonderfully ...
— Biographical Study of A. W. Kinglake • Rev. W. Tuckwell
... lively Lemminkainen, He the handsome Kaukomieli, 150 Ended soon the women's laughter, And the joking of the maidens. There was not a single daughter, Not a maid, however modest, But he did not soon embrace her, ...
— Kalevala, Volume I (of 2) - The Land of the Heroes • Anonymous
... Jack!" said I; "I've not heard you talk so much in earnest for a long time. But, joking aside, I am very glad indeed, old fellow, to hear that you are going to turn over a new leaf. As you very truly say, you have wasted time enough; the moment has arrived when, if you wish to make headway in your profession, as I suppose you do, you must begin to ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... jovial even in spite of my mother, would annoy me frightfully by joking about my going to sea. He was always asking me when I meant to run away and be "a bloody pirate." He took it for granted I liked the sea, was thrilled by the sea, when the truth of it was that I hated the sea! It was business now, ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole
... to pretend that Hamdi was really only joking, in a shockingly exaggerated, practical way, and that presently, when the suitable time had elapsed, he would present himself, smiling, to ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... would never do to ask his mother for the money, since, as he believed, she had none to spare. Billy was fond of joking with little boys. ...
— Captain Horace • Sophie May
... "See what your joking has led to," he said, at last. "I have got to be a wanderer over the face of the earth, all on account of ...
— Light Freights • W. W. Jacobs
... first to see that something was wrong. As he jumped up and hurried over to confer, others took the alarm. Joking ceased, and a look of real concern might be noticed upon many a face that, but a brief time before, was ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... said the gentle SUSAN, wringing the water out of her flannel skirts, "none of your joking here. Come, take ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870 • Various
... weeded. bughts] sheep-folds. daffing] joking. leglin] milk-pail. hairst] harvest. bandsters] binders. lyart] gray-haired. runkled] wrinkled. fleeching] coaxing. swankies] lusty lads. bogle] bogy, hide-and-seek. ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... joking and picking the blossoms they found as they walked, the little party walked along the creek till they came to a bend where the creek widened a bit and where some big bowlders made an ...
— Mary Jane: Her Book • Clara Ingram Judson
... having grunted themselves up Cat Street—running from the east end of Saint Mary's to Broad Street—a further half-hour of waiting ensued, beguiled by rough joking on the part of the crowd. Then Haimet called down ...
— One Snowy Night - Long ago at Oxford • Emily Sarah Holt
... occur to you that we might embark for the tropics? We'd have a hut, and I might learn to raise fruits and vegetables. I sigh for some verdant isle—and I am not joking. We might find some place where steamers came now and then, and some one in New York could attend to ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair
... old man, come on! Come on, fear not the company, the laughing and joking of these pretty gentlemen. Hunt about the tables for the dainties and the carcasses. Hast thou a good jaw? Here, catch this piece of pork and toss off a ...
— Frederic Mistral - Poet and Leader in Provence • Charles Alfred Downer
... little orphan brood. Even after the Judge's carriage, which was to take them to the station, disappeared around the bend of the creek road, the enthusiastic crowd of friends and neighbors clustered about the sagging gate continued to shout their joking warnings and happy wishes upon ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown
... be made is this: Whether or not Punning, Quibbling, and that which they call Joquing [joking], and such delicacies of Wit, highly admired in some Academic Exercises, might not ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... "I am sure you are joking," she said. "Lord Carbury says you know ever so much more than he does. I suppose I asked a stupid question. What are those reels of ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... a different way—and better, too. I respected you and was grateful to you. I liked you for correcting my faults as a spoiled child, for enlarging my mind, for teaching me to appreciate all that is beautiful, elevated and noble; and all, too, in a joking way by making fun of everything that is ugly and worthless and of everything that is dull or mean and cowardly. You taught me how to play ball and how to endure being bored to death with imbeciles. I have to thank you for much of what I think about, for ...
— Rene Mauperin • Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt
... on 'silver sound,' 'sweet sound,' 'sound for silver,' 'no gold for sounding,' are further examples of Shakespeare's fondness for joking on musical matters. Peter's reply to the Third Musician, 'You are the singer; I will say for you,' may be a just reflection on Mr James Soundpost's lack of words, or perhaps indicates that the pronunciation of singers even in that musical age ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor
... imprudence; but I was not inclined to be bothered, and said it was Gladys's affair if she chose to make herself ill, but all the same she ought to be ashamed of such skittishness at her age. I don't believe Gladys knew I was joking; that is the worst of her, she never sees a joke; Etta does, though, for she burst out laughing when my lady walked off to bed in rather a dignified manner. I hope you are not ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... Americans," Frenchy explained. "Zey grow so queeck—so beeg. In Europe, zey haf' nevaire seen anyzing like zis—zis army," he added, indicating with a sweeping wave of his hand the groups of lolling, joking soldiers. ...
— Tom Slade on a Transport • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... he said. "Yours, too, Caroline. I was only joking. There's a little beast of a bookkeeper down at the office who is forever talking of his 'nice flat in the Bronx.' It's a standing guy, you know. So far as I can see, these are pretty snug quarters. And attractively arranged, too. Your taste, ...
— Cap'n Warren's Wards • Joseph C. Lincoln
... me a bit feverish," he said in a curious tone, almost as though he were joking, and by his manner I at once put him down as one of those eccentric persons who are sceptical of any ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... close together, and leave one great girl in charge of the whole, which is an economy, releasing other children for work; for the hayfield and the corn-harvest are the labourer's gold-mine. There is not so much rough joking in the corn-field; they do not work so close together, and the husband or father is near at hand; neither is there time nor inclination in the midst of such severe labour, to ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies
... robber, and now I find you are not; I have a good mind—' 'To do what?' 'To serve you out; aren't you ashamed—?' 'At what?' said I; 'not to have robbed you? Shall I set about it now?' 'Ha, ha!' said the man, dropping the bullying tone which he had assumed; 'you are joking—robbing! who talks of robbing? I wonder how my horse's knees are; not much hurt, I think—only mired.' The man, whoever he was, then got upon his horse; and, after moving him about a little, said, 'Good night, friend; where are you?' 'Here I am,' ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... those who really want to sell, I'm a born psychologist," Mister shrilled. "Actually, I have an advantage. I have a Ph.D. in psychology. I would prefer staying at home for laboratory work, but since I can help my starving children—I am not joking—so much more by coming to a foreign land and working at something that will put food in their mouths, I do it. I can't stand to see my little ones go hungry. Moreover," he said with a wave of his long-fingered hand, "this whole ...
— They Twinkled Like Jewels • Philip Jose Farmer
... conversation. Oh, you didn't mean that line? You meant the Siegfried line, or the Wotan line, or the Hindenburg line? Yes, I see, it was a Witz, a play of words. Yes, I am sorry I could not at once see what your Majesty was driving at, but now I see it is good. I must practise my joking. Ha-ha-ha! Are you there? No, he's gone (rings off). (To himself) He is a queer Emperor who is able to make jokes while his soldiers are dying by thousands and thousands. It can't last like this—and as for the Hindenburg line, I'm perfectly ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 30, 1917 • Various
... fancy me as a step-mamma?" she queried. "But, joking apart, I'm afraid even Blanford would pall on me after a while. It isn't my first visit here, you see. I was on a tour through these counties three ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells
... see. And your business has to do with rough places," said Miss Sampson. "Strange that papa would not see you. Stranger that he should want me to hear your business. Either he's joking or wants to ...
— The Rustlers of Pecos County • Zane Grey
... was half joking, half entreating. The minister was still hesitating on the pulpit stairs, and he looked at the stranger. "Will ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells
... you are joking, Aunt; you half frightened me at first. As far as having no fears for myself, I am really in ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... going gray. He had a neat moustache and a short beard, and the look of a man who had travelled a lot. His skin was very tanned, almost as deeply as yours, Mr. Harley. Not at all the sort of chap that goes in there as a rule. After a while he made an extraordinary proposal. At first I thought he was joking, then when I grasped the idea that he was serious I concluded he was mad. He asked me how much a year I earned, and I told him Peters and Peters paid me 150 pounds. He said: 'I'll give you a year's salary to knock a ...
— Tales of Chinatown • Sax Rohmer
... wilderness of frightened animals betrayed the presence of thousands. As long as the sun shone there had been a babel of sound; at the disappearance of our parent planet, a hushed awe had fallen with the night. Gone the rude joking and wrangling, the crying of children, and the shrill laughter of the women. A bitter breeze swept across from the waters, and the ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... with increased meekness, merely remarking, under his breath, that he didn't like that kind of joking, and that Miss Sally would be 'a much better fellow' if she forbore to aggravate him. To this compliment Miss Sally replied, that she had a relish for the amusement, and had no intention to forego its gratification. Mr Brass not caring, as it seemed, to pursue the subject any ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... Hamblin, laboriously rising and putting his spectacles into their silver case,—for it was supper-time,—"joking one side, if Uncle Capen never did set the pond afire, we 'd all rather take his chances to-day, I guess, than those of some ...
— The New Minister's Great Opportunity - First published in the "Century Magazine" • Heman White Chaplin
... reasoning; is often very dull of apprehension. Ideas are not presented in logical order, but seem to fall out promiscuously, and fairly represent the condition of a disordered brain. Attempts at joking are generally failures, as the jest is sure to be inappropriate or vulgar, and no one but himself sees any occasion for laughter except at his stupidity. Such ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... Bluhmen, who had assiduously looked on, now and then joking with the contadino and his wife, proposed, after the sketch was finished, that Caper should ask his friends to help them finish their luncheon; this was joyously agreed to, and the party, having left the road and found a pleasant spot, under a group of ilex-trees, were soon busy finishing ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... active, strong, and as handsome as he had ever been. I never remember his being ill. I presume he was indisposed at times; but no impressions of that kind remain. He was always bright and gay with us little folk, romping, playing, and joking with us. With the older children, he was just as companionable, and the have seen him join my elder brothers and their friends when they would try their powers at a high jump put up in our yard. The two younger children he petted ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son
... another island where many people stood by the shore talking and joking. They were all looking at Maelduin and his comrades, and kept gaping and laughing, but would not exchange a word with them. Then Maelduin sent one of his foster brothers on the island; but he ranged himself with the others and did as they did. Maelduin ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... making a great talk about the terrible heat of the sun in the morning. I caught the beginning of Miss Westonhaugh's answer. She had hardly appreciated the situation yet, and probably thought her uncle was joking, but she spoke very coldly, being properly annoyed at his talking in such ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... come the heavy father? That's what I can't stand. When they jaw a chap and hang him afterwards. Or was he one of the joking ones? ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... mistake," said Tom, wondering if the Irish foreman were given to joking. Yet he did not ...
— Tom Swift and his Big Tunnel - or, The Hidden City of the Andes • Victor Appleton
... that of taking a boat up the river, or a drive in a dog-cart. If a group of them should be seen by him laughing and talking, he instinctively concluded their topic must be ribaldry, whereas they would perhaps be only joking at the expense of some eccentric professor, or else chaffing one of their own number. And so it happened that Tom failed in time to distinguish between the really bad and such as he only imagined to be bad; and from his ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed
... it! There couldn't any one take your place. You're doing the best you can for all of us—we know that. Sue and Helen were only joking." ...
— Blue Bonnet in Boston - or, Boarding-School Days at Miss North's • Caroline E. Jacobs
... that Rupert and the hunters were not away," said Percy to himself. "This may be no joking matter; at the same time we must put on a bold face, and not allow the savages to suppose that we are daunted by their numbers. I only hope that Rupert will be back before they cross the river, for it would be serious were he to be caught by them; and then perhaps my father and Lionel will ...
— Hendricks the Hunter - The Border Farm, a Tale of Zululand • W.H.G. Kingston
... Petway sent it to her. It was a joke they said, but they was good and skeered. I got home then and I seen her and Maw laughing about it and Aunt Prissy was just as pink and pleased and loving looking as Pattie were and Maw was a-joking of her like Mis' Pratt—no, Hoover—did Pattie and all of a sudden I knewed it were them bad boys, 'cause I seen 'em laughing in a way I knows is badness. Oh, then I was so skeered I couldn't swoller something ...
— The Road to Providence • Maria Thompson Daviess
... descending on the crupper of D'Artagnan's horse. The jokes may, of course, amuse or not different persons, and even different moods of the same person; the practical ones, as has been hinted, may pall, even when they are not merely vulgar. Practical joking had a long hold of literature, as of life; and it would be sanguine to think that it is dead. Izaak Walton, a curious contemporary—"disparate," as the French say, of Scarron, would not quite have liked the quarrel between the dying inn-keeper, who insists on ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... night when churchyards yawn," we also had a touch of the gaping fit, and thought of rest. The room in which we had supped, was likewise our bed-room; and the bed and sofa, huddled cozily in one corner of the apartment, carried comfort and enticement on their spotless counterpanes. Joking, and suggesting all manner of plans for my repose, R—— took off his coat, and sat down on his bed. No sooner had he done so, than one might have thought his mattress was stuffed with dried leaves or panes of glass, such a rustling ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... his marriage with Sylvie, and make himself master of the house; resolving to rid himself, through his influence over Sylvie during the honeymoon, of Bathilde and Celeste Habert. So, during their walk, he told Rogron he had been joking the other day; that he had no real intention of aspiring to Bathilde; that he was not rich enough to marry a woman without fortune; and then he confided to him his real wishes, declaring that he had long chosen Sylvie for her good qualities,—in ...
— Pierrette • Honore de Balzac
... cared very little for the difficulties and dangers before them. They were laughing and joking as usual, eagerly looking forward for the signal to assault the works. In the mean time the troops, having landed, were marching up to their destined positions, the object of the general being so completely to surround the pah that ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... about 1790, according to Mr. William Clerk, that Scott was observed to lay aside that carelessness, not to say slovenliness, as to dress, which used to furnish matter for joking at the beginning of their acquaintance. He now did himself more justice in these little matters, became fond of mixing in general female society, and, as his friend expresses it, "began to set up for ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... 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 ...
— The Gap in the Fence • Frederica J. Turle
... creeping into the room through a small knot-hole in the door. Next day he made a peg, and after she had come to him, drove in the peg so that she was unable to escape. They were married and lived together many years; but one night it happened that the man, joking with his wife about the way in which he had secured her, drew the peg from the knot-hole, that she might see how she had entered his room. As she peeped through, she became suddenly quite small, passed out, and ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske
... of some task to perform, began their work with a will. With something to do it was surprising how quickly they forgot their misfortunes. In a short time they were laughing and joking with the good-natured cooktent man and making the dishes fairly ...
— The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... such high talent and learning, they may rather be expected to breed in 'considering men' very unorthodox opinions as well of the authenticity as the genuineness of both Testaments, and a strong suspicion that Chillingworth was joking when he talked about their "sufficient certainty." The author has searched Scripture in vain for 'sufficient certainty,' with respect to the long catalogue of religious beliefs which agitate and distract society. Laying claim to the character of a 'considering ...
— Superstition Unveiled • Charles Southwell
... was falling as the men joyously entered to a full-fledged, satisfying, if secondhand, meal. They came in laughing, joking boisterously, ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... Savva, it's nothing. It was so unexpected. I thought such people didn't really exist—that they were just a fiction of the imagination. And then, all of a sudden, to find you, my brother—You are not joking, Savva? Look me straight in ...
— Savva and The Life of Man • Leonid Andreyev
... 'if you can't take joking better than this, it's the last time I'll ever try joking ...
— In Homespun • Edith Nesbit
... and looked up at him as though she thought he might be joking. His face had indeed undergone a change, but there was something stern, resolute, almost brutal ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... work, and infatuated her with the stir and adventure and independence of steamboat life. Then she was promoted and become head chambermaid. She was a favorite with the officers, and exceedingly proud of their joking and friendly way ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... it isn't quite dark," she said. "There's the light of the street-lamp through the window. But it has been found that serious discussions can be carried on much better without too much light.... I'm not joking." (It was as if in the gloom her ears had caught his faint ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... not joking!" he went on with an encouraging flash of seriousness. "Five thousand a year cool, and no expenses—livin' on the fat of the land, with ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs
... the boys were more than half joking, but after they had been at the camp a few days and had begun to get acquainted, they let drop hints regarding Jimmy's prowess that aroused the interest of the lumbermen. He was covertly watched at meal times, ...
— The Radio Boys Trailing a Voice - or, Solving a Wireless Mystery • Allen Chapman
... sure I like him. He's great fun. He's always joking and never has a sensible thought, and hates study. He's an amusing soul, I must say. He's going to attend here a couple of years, and then study pharmacy. His father is a druggist in Ottumwa, and quite well off. The only ...
— Prudence of the Parsonage • Ethel Hueston
... Until that was done she would not go near the stables—it would be like a nightmare to see that dreadful head on the wall. I said I would remove it immediately; it was mine, as she had given it to me, and it was not a man's skull at all—I was only joking, so that she need not have ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson
... cases, he too ceased to trouble his head about it. Apropos of this, a quite witty remark is reported of the wife of Argentocoxus, a Caledonian, to Julia Augusta, when the latter after the treaty was joking her about the free intercourse of her sex in Britain with men. Thereupon the foreigner asserted: "We fulfill the necessities of nature in a much better way than you Roman women. We have dealings openly with the best men, whereas ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio
... ladies, which perhaps prevented his marrying. He was very happy and useful among the sailors, and died at his sister's, Mrs. Jackson, at Woolwich. She, as Elizabeth Terrot, had been a beauty, and was to the last a fine, happy, spirited, contented and joking old lady, very fond of my father, to whom she left all she had. She was bright, unselfish and amusing, even on her deathbed ...
— Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character • Edward Bannerman Ramsay
... he prints it, in England, France, Germany, and Italy, he italicizes it, puts some whopping exclamation-points after it, and sometimes explains it in a parenthesis. All of which is very depressing, and makes one want to renounce joking and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... sooner fight a Saracen, or ride such a horse as killed that poor major. Joking apart, I don't see how it is to be done. Why do ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... understand my drift; then when he gathers my meaning, he shakes his head almost in a joking way, and says: ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... 'Well! well! I'm only joking. I know you wouldn't hurt a fly. But you do look ill, that's a fact. Let me get you ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... never to inquire into his secrets, nor to effect an influence which he would not admit. He bade her avoid suffering the slightest suspicion to appear, since when suspicions are afloat men find the temptation to furnish them with a cause almost irresistible. Eily protested that she was joking, and his uneasy conscience threw him ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... Colonel cannot believe that 'tis the same child. He has been joking and teasing me to declare that we have a dead Prince hidden somewhere, and that the King showed him ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... joking. If you don't believe me, pray look back through the reports and you will find it all there. I don't recollect the official's name, but it ought to have been Pooh-Bah. Well, Pooh-Bah said all these ...
— Notes on Life and Letters • Joseph Conrad
... gone, Auta Gert, he was joking. You must know that the law did not buy this farm. The old Baas purchased it from Baas Philander. I personally helped to add up the number of morgen and to calculate the money, and there was not a penny piece from any Government. Go home, Auta Gert, and leave everything to me, and do ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... backwards on hearing Morestal's footstep in the hall, for he knew the old fellow was not given to joking. And, in fact, Morestal, the moment he entered, ran up to him and took him by the ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc
... Baldo's friend, is a giant; another friend, Cingar, who delivers him, is Panurge exactly, and quite as much given to practical joking. The women in the senile amour of the old Tognazzo, the judges, and the poor sergeants, are no more gently dealt with by Folengo than by the monk of the Iles d'Hyeres. If Dindenaut's name does not occur, there are the sheep. The tempest is there, and the invocation to all the saints. ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... varying and varied as the region traversed. If in the mountains, there were likely to be trout, saddle of deer, steaks of bear; but if through the sands, there was provided bacon or other coarser fare. Usually these crowds were joking and jolly, unless tempered by something requiring more sobriety, but always optimistic, for the fellow who became grouchy the while had generally abundant occasion to repent and mend ...
— Trail Tales • James David Gillilan
... was at the window, had thrown it open, and was craning out. Practical joking was not characteristic of Nayland Smith, and I knew of none other likely to take such a liberty. As before, the court below proved to ...
— The Hand Of Fu-Manchu - Being a New Phase in the Activities of Fu-Manchu, the Devil Doctor • Sax Rohmer |
