"Make believe" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was because no good came of him, and I knew it vexed Farmer to think on it, let alone Simon's son being there. It was all through his wanting to be a gentleman that Simon got into bad ways. Making friends with people who had money, he got to thinking he must have it, or must make believe he had it; so he spent all he had, and then—oh, dear!—he forged his father's name, and the farm had to be mortgaged to get him out of prison; and then he took to drinking, and went from bad to worse, and finally ...
— Queen Hildegarde • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... of High School Street in Oakdale!" Grace exclaimed. "If ever I feel that I'm going to be homesick, I'll just walk down this street and make believe that I'm at home! That will be the surest cure for the ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... Rose, with a pretty blush. "But then, you know, he could hardly say less after such a frank confession on my part. It is no more than decent of him to make believe, even if it is not true. Now, Katy, look at Boston, and see if you ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... crackers, even to the increased tilting of his chair. "I venture the conjecture, that if he has any darling pet name for her, such as Pinky-winky,' 'Little Fooly,' 'Chignonentily,' or 'Waxy Wobbles,' he feels horribly ashamed if any one overhears it, and coughs violently to make believe that ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 17, July 23, 1870 • Various
... Dorcas Knight! Now I must make believe I'm Clara, and do the sentimental up brown!" concluded Capitola, as she seated herself near the door where she could be heard, and ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth
... than he, cleverer at games and inventing "make believe," very strong, active, and sporting, she was the most charming, interesting, and attractive experience in his ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... by whalers and sealers—that you can't get from those fancy little guns. And then, as it seemed that the animal, whatever it might be, wasn't going to move till I did, I shuffled my high sealskin boots on the crisp snow to make believe that ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... Kent did not want to use the roads. It was with the old familiar sense of make believe adventure that they started on what they called a Bee-line southwest. And it was mid-afternoon before, hungry and leg weary, they reached the store that backed ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... has cars only every two hours, so if we didn't catch the eight-ten one, we couldn't go until the ten-ten, and that would make it very late for the Scouts to go through all the kinds of drills they had planned for. Some of us had to sprain ankles and make believe to step on snakes, and then Mamie Sue had to be lost and traced, only she didn't know it yet; so Tony said that we would have to start very early. It was about half past seven when he came for me while all the rest of them waited at the corner for us. We then trooped down to get Roxanne ...
— Phyllis • Maria Thompson Daviess
... was one of the rules of Toyland, as you know, that none of the folk who lived there could do anything while human eyes were watching them. The Dolls, Soldiers, Clowns, Rocking Horses, Lambs were not able to move, talk, or make believe come to life if a boy or a girl or any one at all ...
— The Story of a Lamb on Wheels • Laura Lee Hope
... death of your well-groomed gods, your make believe and your show; I long for a whiff of bacon and beans, a snug shakedown in the snow; A trail to break, and a life at stake, and another bout ...
— The Spell of the Yukon • Robert Service
... years so many and sweet, 'Tis known that thou and I were one, I'll think it but a fond conceit— It cannot be that thou art gone! Thy vesper bell hath not yet tolled:— And thou wert aye a masker bold! What strange disguise hast now put on, To make believe that thou art gone? I see these locks in silvery slips, This drooping gait, this altered size;— But springtide blossoms on thy lips, And tears take sunshine from thine eyes! Life is but thought: so think I will That Youth and I ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... in our house has now become a time for low subterfuge on the part of Doris and me in our attempts to be somewhere else when Junior appears dragging the "funnies" (a loathsome term in itself) to be read to him. I make believe that the furnace looks as if it might fall apart at any minute if it is not watched closely, and Doris calls from upstairs that she may be some time ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... she told Snowball. "Just make believe that there's a bear beyond the stone wall, instead of Uncle Jerry Chuck! Then—" she ...
— The Tale of Snowball Lamb • Arthur Bailey
... we do—it's good fun at any rate to make believe that robbers, and outlaws, and smugglers, and all other sorts of odd visitors are coming—and—I cannot help owning that what Bob says sounds probable. So here go two bullets for this barrel, and nine buckshot for the other. Come, Walt, load ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... would give it to him only. This was maddening to them. They would rage around just outside the throwing-distance of the whip, while Lip-lip devoured the meat and Mit- sah protected him. And when there was no meat to give, Mit-sah would keep the team at a distance and make believe to give ...
— White Fang • Jack London
... up both riddles, Al. He's the only one's got the answers and when he gets ready enough maybe he'll tell 'em. Until then it'll pay us fo'mast hands to make believe we're busy, even if we ain't. ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... then. Stroll in naturally. Make believe there is something up—some joke that we are going ...
— The Mission of Janice Day • Helen Beecher Long
... caring to look beyond the presence of the other; both alike so full of hope, and comfort, and true happiness; if only the world would let us be. And then a little sob disturbed us, and mother tried to make believe that she was only coughing. But Lorna, guessing who she was, jumped up so very rashly that she almost set her frock on fire from the great ash log; and away she ran to the old oak chair, where mother was by the clock-case pretending ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... wheat soon grew so tall that it stood above the heads of the children. They used to go in among it, and make believe that they were ...
— Chambers's Elementary Science Readers - Book I • Various
... day, to meet him, in order that they might make some purchases. She found him waiting for her at her journey's end, and they walked away together through the streets. He was in gay spirits, though still harping on that notion of their being rich; and he said, now let them make believe that yonder fine carriage was theirs, and that it was waiting to take them home to a fine house they had; what would Bella, in that case, best like to find in the house? Well! Bella didn't know: already having everything she wanted, she couldn't say. But, by degrees ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... his master and mellowed, he would make believe to work close by, so that at times they might drop into talk, recalling names that had died out of the Glen, shrewd sayings that fell from lips now turned to dust, curious customs that had ceased forever, all in great charity. Then there would ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... beside her in spite of the din of the flying wheels, and little Robbie helping to pull through the long seam. Hughie shrank from the warm, bright, loving atmosphere that seemed to fill the room, hating to go in, but in a moment he realized that he must "make believe" with his mother, and the pain of it and the shame of it startled and amazed him. He was glad that his mother did not notice him enter, and by the time he had put away his books he had braced himself to meet her bright smile and ...
— Glengarry Schooldays • Ralph Connor
... off!" cried Gosse. "They'll sit down and have a nap under the first hedge, and make believe they ran it through." ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... world and displaced the older mythology, she did but introduce new subjects of her own, to which her artists kept as closely as their pagan ancestors had kept to their heathen gods and goddesses. We now make believe to have freed ourselves from these trammels, but the departure is more apparent than real. Our works of art fall into a few well-marked groups and the pictures of each group, though differing in detail, present the same general characters. We ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... a time as we had! One man got bitten; but after a while foxy was caught. Then what did the cunning little thing do but make believe he was dead! Foxes are very cunning: they can play ...
— The Nursery, June 1873, Vol. XIII. - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest People • Various
... can ride for miles and miles through the grandest, wildest places,—and—there aren't any cigar and baking-powder and liver-pill signs plastered over the rocks, thank goodness! If man has traveled that way before, you do not have the evidence of his passing staring you in the face. You can make believe it is all your own—by right of discovery. I'm afraid your England would seem rather little and crowded after a month or two of this." She swept her hand toward the river, and the grass-land beyond, and the mountains ...
— Her Prairie Knight • B.M. Sinclair, AKA B. M. Bower
... to get about enough of it when one of the broomsticks said, 'The shutters must be closed; it's more prudent.' My boy, they were a lump of a hundred and twenty-five miles from the firing-line, but that pock-marked puppy he wanted to make believe there was danger of ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... Catharine Dillon, a native of the county of Limerick, Ireland. Eliza was an upper servant, who took care of her mistress and her children. Catharine was and is now the cook. Eliza appeared to her mistress to be a very well educated, and a very intellectual woman of 35, though she would try to make believe she could not write, and that she was subject to fits of insanity. There was then presumptive evidence that she wrote a good deal, and there is now positive evidence that she could write. She used often, in the presence of Mrs. L., to take the Bible and other books and read them, ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson
... to make believe that Priscilla was alive," said Miss Parrott, her eyes glowing with remembrance of her childhood, brought so singularly near on this morning; ...
— Five Little Peppers and their Friends • Margaret Sidney
... "I'm quite ready for the scherzo, dear, if you are." Just as if Sally had been talking all this for her own private satisfaction and amusement! And she knew perfectly well, Laetitia did, that she had been eliciting, and that she meant to wait a day or two, and begin again ever so far on, and make believe Sally had said heaps of things. And Sally had really ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... distant heroes in their rich, wonderful attire; "I won't talk about them. Because I know about them even—even if they don't know me. They sent me a message; they didn't know, but they did it just the same. So I belong too. You can make believe you have a uniform—you can. You can be miles and ...
— Pee-wee Harris on the Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... out with a complicated idea or a half-remembered fact. This is all, I say; and yet this is much. Theodore's apparent success proves it to be much, as well as the old man's satisfaction. It is a part; he has to simulate. He has to "make believe" a little—a good deal; he has to put his pride in his pocket and send his conscience to the wash. He has to be accommodating—to listen and pretend and flatter; and he does it as well as many a ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 5 • Various
... was not relieved by any change in the face of things and so they determined that it was rather stupid to stand there. Nettie brought down her two dolls and they played with these for a while, but keeping house in a make believe way was not so exciting when there was the reality close at hand, and they decided that paper ...
— A Dear Little Girl at School • Amy E. Blanchard
... think they'd be glad to be rid of you for a Summer," said Perry. "Anyhow, let's make believe it's possible, fellows, ...
— The Adventure Club Afloat • Ralph Henry Barbour
... sight now, on the bank, pretending to skip stones. Gid was like a Chinese juggler; he could make believe do one thing, while ...
— Little Grandfather • Sophie May
... disarmament, you see, was serious), whether he didn't say these things because he knew we saw him as he really was; because he saw himself as he really was, and couldn't bear it; because there was no escape for him unless he could make believe that he was in fun when he ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair
... all that and lots of other things—just to make believe. Then they came. I heard them, but I didn't know that they were not mine by right till Mrs. ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... very exciting. It is the one thing I really care for. There is often danger, but it is the kind that does not steal round your back. Hereafter I shall devote my time to butterflies. You can make believe—is that what you call it?—each butterfly is a great rascal. The more difficult the netting, the more cunning the rascal . . . ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath
... We make believe about quite serious things. In war, each country's soldiers are always the most courageous in the world. The other country's soldiers are always treacherous and tricky; that is why they sometimes win. Literature ...
— Idle Ideas in 1905 • Jerome K. Jerome
... and see what would happen to you. You'd step on it and you'd get a fall; you couldn't help it; and an unexpected fall like that might break your ankle, very easily. It has been done before now. Just make believe that you are under a theatrical producer on a Broadway stage, while you are with us here, and park your gum on a lamp post before you come into this building. Then you and the rest of the young ladies will not be in danger of meeting with an accident ...
— The Art of Stage Dancing - The Story of a Beautiful and Profitable Profession • Ned Wayburn
... the thing seemed to penetrate even his darkened mind, and then he would whisper, "I'll make believe it's Charlie, any way," so Charlie he persisted in calling her, and Richard encouraged him in this whim, when he found how much satisfaction it afforded the ...
— Darkness and Daylight • Mary J. Holmes
... before, the chapters in which the Marchioness nurses Dick in his fever, and puts his favorite philosophy to the hard test of asking him whether he has ever put pieces of orange-peel into cold water and made believe it was wine. "If you make believe very much, it's quite nice; but if you don't, you know, it hasn't much flavor:" so it stood originally, and to the latter word in the little creature's mouth I seem to have objected. Replying (on the 16th of December) he writes, ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... you where you sit, like the miserable little beetle you are! Now then.—Here, steady, Rajah!—Hold tight, Mister Archie! I am coming to you; but just you make a show of that other spear. You needn't get up, but make believe to be about to chuck it at him if he ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... Alcatraz, veiled the Exposition domes and turrets in a mystic glory. Sometimes it was like a great white nothingness; then, as if by magic, Color, Forms and Beauty leaped forth like some startling vision from a Land of Make Believe. ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... them wait; in short, he hasn't a bit of dignity. I'm often obliged to say to him: But, monsieur, monsieur le comte your predecessor, for the credit of the thing, used to punch holes with his penknife in the arms of his chair to make believe he was working. And he makes such a mess of his room. I find everything topsy-turvy. He has a very small ...
— Bureaucracy • Honore de Balzac
... play today; make believe you do not notice at all how bad it is; as soon as I get home I'll sit down and write one for you that you ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... are. You haven't to make believe, you know; you have got only to act yourself. Come, begin.—I declare, Satinalia, I think this satin dress is getting ...
— The House in Town • Susan Warner
... said Michael, "it's not the O'Donoghue at all. It's the great lord we've been waiting for so long, trying to make believe he is the Phantom Prince. Maybe, for reasons of state, he don't like to reveal himself; and maybe," he added, with a sly laugh, "he don't care to make the ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood
... his frequent attempts only resulted in a series of violent and altogether idiotical contortions of the face, that were very far from expressing what he intended. However, I knew what the poor fellow meant by it, so I smiled to him in return, and endeavoured to make believe ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... make believe before the numerous servants. How far it deceived them may be faintly guessed when one considers anyone's secrets in relation ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... indeed," answered the Candy Rabbit. "It is night now, and there are no human eyes to see what we do. So we toys may come to life and move about and make believe we are real as much as we please. We haven't had very much fun since the jolly sailor came and carried away the Lamb ...
— The Story of a Bold Tin Soldier • Laura Lee Hope
... for he is fairly rolled on his back, and in a few minutes is, figuratively speaking, turned inside out. Then they espy the good-natured admiring face of their mother, peering at them over the corner of the straw, and at her they all rush. They make believe that she is a fox, and her life is accordingly not worth an ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... near to lapsing from the love of himself; never so near to forgetting his own interests, and preferring those of Ruth. Lady Horton sat silent, her heart fluttering with dismay and perplexity. Heaven had not equipped her with a spirit capable of dealing with a situation such as this. Blake stood in make believe stolidity dissembling his infinite chagrin and the stormy emotions warring within him, for some signs of which Diana watched his ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... said, and her clear hazel eyes brimmed over with tears as she spoke. "I am very, very miserable. Nobody loves me, and I have nobody to love except you, of course, Eleanor Humphreys, and sometimes I cannot make believe that ...
— The Rebellion of Margaret • Geraldine Mockler
... The only impudence is unprovoked, or even mere dull, aggression, and I indignantly protest that I'm never guilty of that clumsiness. Ah for what do they take one, with their beastly presumption? Even to defend myself sometimes I've to make believe to myself that I care. I always feel as if I didn't successfully make others think so. Perhaps they see impudence in that. But I daresay the offence is in the things that I take, as I say, for granted; for if one tries to be pleased one passes perhaps inevitably for being pleased above all ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... on that occasion represented Aunt Glegg. But immediately afterwards Maggie had reflected that if she drove many nails in, she would not be so well able to fancy that the head was hurt, when she knocked it against the wall, nor to comfort it, and make believe to poultice it, when her fury was abated; for even Aunt Glegg would be pitiable when she had been hurt very much, and thoroughly humiliated, so as to beg her niece's pardon. Since then she had driven ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... me, Youth's no longer here! O Youth! for years so many and sweet 'Tis known that Thou and I were one, I'll think it but a fond conceit— It cannot be, that Thou art gone! Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll'd:— And thou wert aye a masker bold! What strange disguise hast now put on To make believe that thou art gone? I see these locks in silvery slips, This drooping gait, this alter'd size: But Springtide blossoms on thy lips, And tears take sunshine from thine eyes! Life is but Thought: so think I will That Youth and I ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... Pulsifer broke the silence, he said: "In jestice to Mr. Thomas, I am requested to explain that the address was originally intended to be got off at the railroad. It was forgot by accident, and him not havin' time to change it, he asks us to make believe we are standin' alongside of the track at Pleasantville just as the ...
— The Soldier of the Valley • Nelson Lloyd
... on a party of people living on Masuko fruit, and making mats of the Shuare[45] palm petioles. We have hard lines ourselves; nothing but a little maere porridge and dampers. We roast a little grain, and boil it, to make believe it is coffee. The guide, a maundering fellow, turned because he was not fed better than at home, and because he knew that but for his obstinacy we should not have lost the dog. It is needless to repeat that it is all forest on the northern slopes of the ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... carry the "far-eye," the magic instrument that makes the distant near, that brings things from miles away to within a few yards. Doubtless telescopes were on them already. Keep in a close group round the body, smuggle it under the palm-mats and make believe to have been trying to kindle a fire in an old kerosine-oil tin.... Signals of distress appeared and Moussa Isa disappeared. The great steamer approached, slowed down, and came to a standstill beside the boat of the starving castaways. From her ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren
... so only as an adulterer loves a noble woman, that is, as mistress, speaking caressingly to her and giving her beautiful garments, but saying of her privately to himself, "She is only a vile harlot whom I will make believe that I love because she gratifies my lust; if she should not, I would cast her away." The internal man of the unreformed lover of wisdom is this adulterer; his external man is ...
— Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence • Emanuel Swedenborg
... born in her, the mother said; the girl's grandfather was a musician in the old home in Germany, and so she can't help it. Why, she's just so crazy about it, she'll drum all up and down the kitchen table to make believe that——" ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... if you are anywhere near so glad to see me as I am to see you. I have been sticking to business and trying to make believe that Louisville is as nice as Ryeville, and Louisville girls are as beautiful as they are reputed to be, and that the law is the most interesting thing in the world, but somehow I can't fool myself. Are you glad ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... grass, but you can make believe. I'll bring a nose-bag as soon as you've cooled off and have ...
— Two Arrows - A Story of Red and White • William O. Stoddard
... position. It is absurd of you to fancy that I can think of you in any other light than that of a beautiful woman, gifted with more than your share of intellect. I prefer that our friendship should rest on this obvious fact. We are too old 'to make believe,' as children say. I came to this conclusion within an hour after I ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... against any other, and by examination and mathematical computation I find that the proportion of the spoken lie to the other varieties is as 1 to 22,894. Therefore the spoken lie is of no consequence, and it is not worth while to go around fussing about it and trying to make believe that it is an important matter. The silent colossal National Lie that is the support and confederate of all the tyrannies and shams and inequalities and unfairnesses that afflict the peoples—that is the one to throw bricks ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that when the neighbours proposed to heap fuel about the cabinet and to burn it the Kazi bawled out to them, "Do it not!" And they said to one another, "Verily the Jinn make believe to be mortals and speak with men's voices." Thereupon the Kazi repeated somewhat of the Sublime Koran and said to the neighbours, "Draw near to the cabinet wherein we are." So they drew near, and he said, "I am so and so the Kazi, and ye are such an one and such an one, and we are ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... the most wonderful scent of green and growing things—not only of flowers, you know, but of the new things just coming up in the vegetable garden, and—and—well, this parsley happens to be the only really gardeny thing I have, so I thought I'd bring it along and sniff it once in a while, and make believe it's the country, up there ...
— Buttered Side Down • Edna Ferber
... to you in this book, and as I have told you in other books of these "Make Believe Stories," the toys could pretend to come to life, move about, and have fun when no one was looking at them. They could talk, tell jokes and stories, as well as riddles, play games, have races and even snowball fights, as they were having one now. But the moment any ...
— The Story of a Plush Bear • Laura Lee Hope
... ought to do—ought to say—ought to pretend? That's what it comes to. Am I to refuse to accompany Gwen to the altar till she can give sureties that she is really in love, and plead the highest Spartan principles to justify my conduct? Am I to make believe that I cannot, cannot love a woman unless she produces certificates of affection based solely on the desirability of my inestimable self? I should never make anyone believe that. Why—if I thought Gwen hated me worse ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... said the top-man, "he must somehow have thought I was making sport of him a while ago, when I was only taking off old Priming, the gunner's mate. Just look at him once, White-Jacket, while I make believe coil this here rope; if there arn't a dozen in that 'ere Captain's top-lights, my name is horse-marine. If I could only touch my tile to him now, and take my Bible oath on it, that I was only taking off Priming, and not him, he wouldn't have such hard thoughts of me. But ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... manner of tricks. How to walk on his hind feet with a paper cap on his head, a plate in his mouth, begging. How to make believe he was dead, lying still a minute at a time, his odd ear furling nervously and his eyes snapping fun; how to carry a basket to the grocery on the corner, when she would limp out in the morning for a penny's worth of milk or a loaf ...
— A Gentleman Vagabond and Some Others • F. Hopkinson Smith
... year a year of sorrow Gridley!" he quivered indignantly. "I'll hang on, and make believe I'm meek as a lamb, but I'll spoil Gridley's record for this year! There was in olden times a chap who had a famous knack for getting square with people who used him the wrong way. I wish I could remember his ...
— The High School Captain of the Team - Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard • H. Irving Hancock
... the parlour, I stopped, saw her legs, and told her she had jolly fat legs. She wished I would go upstairs, for I was in the way with my chemicals, and after that ceased talking to me. But it was difficult to avoid me, I got rude, would tuck my coat between my legs, laugh and make believe to stoop down to see her ankles, but she took no notice. Begging her to kiss me one day; she gave me two or three at once saying, "There now, go on with your chemicals," in such a motherly way, that it mortified me excessively; making me feel the difference ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... is!" said the Major. "Why, it must have been born a hundred years ago, and have had a fairy for its godmother. But here comes Deborah to tell us that breakfast is ready. Toasted bacon is better than pretty speeches; so come along with you, and make believe that you have known each other ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 2, February, 1891 • Various
... first dramatists turned to the old legends and heroes of Britain for their first stage productions. To act a part seems as natural to humanity as to tell a story; and originally the drama is but an old story retold to the eye, a story put into action by living performers, who for the moment "make believe" or imagine themselves to be the ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... Gudrun to sit with him for half an hour. Usually he was ashy and wretched, with all the life gnawed out of him. But as soon as he rallied, he liked to make believe that he was just as before, quite well and in the midst of life—not of the outer world, but in the midst of a strong essential life. And to this belief, Gudrun contributed perfectly. With her, he could get by stimulation those precious half-hours of strength and exaltation and pure ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... famous for trout that rises in Sulby glen and flows into Ramsey harbour. One of the little attempts of the two lads to deceive each other was to make believe that it was their duty to fish this river with the rod, and so wander away singly up the banks of the stream until they came to "The Manx Fairy," and then drop in casually to quench the thirst of ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... story-books and fewer toys. So they had to invent stories for themselves, and as for the toys, to make believe very much indeed. But how they would have succeeded in either had it not been for Jinny I ...
— A Christmas Posy • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... the nights, with the stars up above you, and the dead still all around. And you think, and think, and think! You remember all kinds of things you've never thought of for years and years. I used to talk to myself at last, and make believe it was another man. I was out seven days: and he was only out one night. But I think it's the loneliness that got hold of him. Man, those stars are awful; and that stillness that comes toward morning!" He ...
— Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland • Olive Schreiner
... rejoined Mr. Massingbird. "I conclude you make believe to allude to the ups and downs you have had in regard to Verner's Pride. That's not the cause, Lionel Verner—if you do want to go away. You have had time to get over that. Perhaps some lady is in the way? Some cross-grained disappointment in that line? Have you been ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... to hear you're sick. Don't say that again, Gerald," she silenced him, letting her anxiety at last plainly appear. "Don't tell me you aren't sick, for I know better. It's been taking away my appetite to see you make believe to eat, and choke over it. Your cough is so tight it sounds as if it tore your lungs. Give me your hand. It's as hot, dear boy, and as dry!... Wait, let me feel ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... nigger! The throat-cuttin' was a make believe; the stab will tell the tale. But who's this yer, lurkin' aroun' the kitchen do'; if it ain't Jack Wonnell, I ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... its pontoon-bridge and crossed over during the 23d. Kilpatrick arrived the next day, in the midst of heavy rain, and was instructed to cross the Catawba at once, by night, and to move up to Lancaster, to make believe we were bound for Charlotte, to which point I heard that Beauregard had directed all his detachments, including a corps of Hood's old army, which had been marching parallel with us, but had failed to make junction with, the forces immediately opposing us. Of course, I ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... forewarned me erginst you. I 'lowed he war lyin'—but I couldn't take no chances. Thar war jest one feller I knowed I could trust without question, an' thet feller was Bud. So he tuck ther money an' thet bundle I rid away from bank with was jest make believe. I aimed ter lead ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... gradually coming down about our ears; the drawing-room carpet is full of holes; the old silver is shockingly dented and the Royal Worcester all chipped. There are other household secrets I need not go into. People are kind enough to make believe not to notice—even when they get a chunk of plaster on ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... where I was going he took me back in the library and started in," she went on. "He was so angry he could scarcely speak. If he had let it go it wouldn't have been so bad. But to try to make believe he wasn't angry! His hypocrisy ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... being middle-aged and steady, John, and pretend that we are a humdrum couple, going on in a jog-trot sort of way, it's only because I'm such a silly little thing, John, that I like, sometimes, to act as a kind of Play with Baby, and all that: and make believe." ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... a priest because you believe, or do you make believe that you believe because you ...
— Caesar or Nothing • Pio Baroja Baroja
... this method is, that the individual laggard cannot screen his deficiencies, as he can when reciting in concert. He cannot make believe to know the lesson by lazily joining in with the general current of voice when the answers are given. His own individual knowledge, or ignorance, stands out. This is clear, and so far it is an advantage. But ascertaining what a pupil knows of a lesson, is only one end, and that by no ...
— In the School-Room - Chapters in the Philosophy of Education • John S. Hart
... you can take them outdoors and eat them while they're hot," she said. "Make believe you're having ...
— Four Little Blossoms at Brookside Farm • Mabel C. Hawley
... grows, Master Farwell, in—a night," she said with a quiver in her voice. "I went happily away with Jerry-Jo, quite, quite a girl, only yesterday. I had the feeling of a child trying to make believe I was a woman. I wanted to show my father he could no longer control me as he always had before. I—I wanted to have my way, and then my way brought me to—those black hours of horror when something in me died forever and something new was born. And how strange, Master Farwell, that when ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... as stuck-up people pretend to look down at the place, I frequently am. Not only so, but I always see that class largely represented there when I do go. To be sure, they always make believe that they only come to amuse the children, or because their country cousins visit them; and never fail to refer to the vulgar set one finds there, and the fact of the animals smelling like anything but Jockey Club; yet I notice that after they've been in the hall three minutes ...
— A Brace Of Boys - 1867, From "Little Brother" • Fitz Hugh Ludlow
... with the honors of war has always been the triumph of the ablest generals," replied Monsieur de Bourbonne. "Bow to Troubert, and if his hatred is less strong than his vanity you will make him your ally; but if you bow too low he will walk over you rough-shod; make believe that you intend to leave the service, and you'll escape him, Monsieur le baron. Send away Birotteau, madame, and you will set things right with Mademoiselle Gamard. Ask the Abbe Troubert, when you meet ...
— The Vicar of Tours • Honore de Balzac
... laughter. He very well understood the old man's lament. In Italy, if there is one thing more than another that pleases the native it is to make believe to himself that he has got the better of a bargain. A shrewd purchase enlivens the whole day; it is talked about, laughed over, and becomes the history of the day that Tomass', or Pietro, or Paoli, or whatever his name may be, has bested the ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... she was so awkward a little dress-maker. There is her straw hat,—she made that oak-leaf wreath about the crown one bright summer day, as we sat on the soft moss in the cool fragrant wood. Nelly liked the woods. She liked to lie with her ear to the ground and make believe hear the fairies talk; she liked to look up in the tall trees, and see the bright-winged oriole dart through the branches; she liked to watch the clouds, and fancy that in their queer shapes she saw cities, and temples, and chariots, ...
— Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends • Fanny Fern
... book, won a new reputation by reason of its pictures. Then came "AEsop's Fables," in Dent's "Banbury Cross" Series. The next year saw Mr. Gabriel Setoun's book of poems, "Child World," Mrs. Meynell's "The Children," Mr. H. D. Lowry's "Make Believe," and two decorated pages in "The Parade" (Henry and Co.). The present Christmas will see several books ...
— Children's Books and Their Illustrators • Gleeson White
... voices of my fellow-boarders, "be a good fellow and sing us one of the old chap's songs; or at least something or other of that day, and we'll make believe it was the air with which ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee
... all alone in the nursery, And I want to talk to you, dear; So you must come and sit by me, And make believe you hear. ...
— Harper's Young People, December 30, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... de chile, she doan forget ole Willium nor dat horse," chuckled the darkey. "Dat steed, miss, hardly git a good feed now once a week, but he knows dat he carries his Excellency, an' dat de army 's watchin' him, an' he make believe he chock full of oats all de time. He jus' went offen his head when Ku'nel Forrest's guns wuz a-bustin' de Hessians all to pieces dis mornin', an' de way he dun arch his neck an' swish his tail when Gin'l Howe give up his sword made ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... it up, tore it open, and flopped down on the sofa. Miss Jane snatched up an imaginary letter, tore it open (in imagination), and flopping down beside her sister, looked over her shoulder, apparently to make believe to herself that she read it along with her. Thus they read and commented on ...
— The Red Eric • R.M. Ballantyne
... and with these she carried on a gay, pretended conversation that was wittier and more fascinating than conversations are apt to be in real life, where people sometimes fail most lamentably to talk up to the requirements. In a "make believe" assembly of choice spirits everybody says just the thing you want her to say and so gives you the chance to say just what YOU want to say. Attended by this invisible company, Anne traversed the woods and arrived at the fir lane just as broad, feathery flakes ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... would be to conjure up our dear old grandmothers in their great scoop bonnets, and grandfathers with their high coat collars coming nearly to their bald crowns! And the Deacon's Seat under the pulpit—how easy to make believe the deacons in claw-hammer coats ...
— Three Young Knights • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... "You can't make believe like that, Andy Rover!" returned the old man of all work, shaking his head vigorously. "You knowed I was goin' to trim up this hedge a bit and that Aleck ...
— The Rover Boys at Colby Hall - or The Struggles of the Young Cadets • Arthur M. Winfield
... my idee of a squash pie. It isn't slickin' up and tryin' to look like custard, nor yet it don't make believe it's pumpkin; it just says, 'I am a squash pie, and if there's a better article ...
— The Wooing of Calvin Parks • Laura E. Richards
... inspiring gaiety of Paris, but is soon hurried into noisy streets until his brain feels in a whirl; and on his arrival at the Diligence-yard, when he hopes to obtain a little repose, he is annoyed by being asked for the keys of his trunks, for the Custom House officers, to make believe to look into them to ascertain that you have not smuggled any liquors or other material within the walls of Paris. Those who are fortunate enough to travel in their own carriages, are exempted from such tiresome ceremony. Some of the other entries to Paris are somewhat better, but none ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve
... ones, and in a weak, indulgent way tried to stop it. But the squirrels were persistent and would not go about their business at all with an ordinary cuff. She would put them off, run away from them, slap them, and make believe to bite; but not until she did bite, and sharply too, would they be off. All this seemed very strange and unnatural; yet a stranger thing happened one day, when Calico brought in to her family a full-grown gray squirrel which she had caught in the woods. She laid ...
— Roof and Meadow • Dallas Lore Sharp
... myself. One Dowager, SHE calls it lip-salve. Another, SHE calls it gloves. Another, SHE calls it tucker-edging. Another, SHE calls it a fan. I call it whatever THEY call it. I supply it for 'em, but we keep up the trick so, to one another, and make believe with such a face, that they'd as soon think of laying it on, before a whole drawing-room, as before me. And when I wait upon 'em, they'll say to me sometimes—WITH IT ON—thick, and no mistake—"How am I looking, ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... permission we shall, while these lessons continue, make believe that teacher and pupil are together in a class-room, or, better still, in a country workshop, with chips flying in all directions ...
— Wood-Carving - Design and Workmanship • George Jack
... of the public, assume positions in which it would seem impossible that they could remain, submit themselves to fearful tortures, or else, by their mode of living, their abstinence, and their indifference to inclement weather and to external things, try to make believe that, owing to their sanctity, they are of a species superior to that ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 446, July 19, 1884 • Various
... back to the Minster, which is not the germ of political York, or hardly religious York; the brave city was a Romano-British capital and a Romano-British episcopal see centuries before the first wooden temple was built on the site of the present edifice in 627. I should like to make believe that we found traces of that simple church in the crypt of the Minster when we went the next morning and were herded through it by the tenderest of vergers. Most of our flock were Americans, and we put our guide to such question in matters of imagination and information as ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells
... impossible to conceive anything funnier, and at the same time more provokingly stupid, dirty, and inefficient, than the tribe of black-faced heathen divinities and classicalities who make believe to wait upon us here,—the Dianas, Phillises, Floras, Caesars, et cetera, who stand grinning in wonderment and delight round our table, and whom I find it impossible, by exhortation or entreaty, to banish from the ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... find too much fault. Human nature could not stand the pork and beans, but I tried my best to put up with the beef, and make believe it ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... in a low voice. "Sometimes I pretend I have gone off in a ship, and that I've found my father. I make believe that he and I are sailing together. And oh! how I ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at Home • Laura Lee Hope |
