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Scribble   /skrˈɪbəl/   Listen
Scribble

verb
(past & past part. scribbled; pres. part. scribbling)
1.
Write down quickly without much attention to detail.  Synonym: scrabble.
2.
Write carelessly.  Synonym: scrawl.



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"Scribble" Quotes from Famous Books



... illusion When others dolefully complain, Thy cause with jesting thou shalt gain, Honour and right shalt value duly, In everything act simply, truly,— Virtue and godliness proclaim, And call all evil by its name, Nought soften down, attempt no quibble, Nought polish up, nought vainly scribble. The world shall stand before thee, then, As seen by Albert Durer's ken, In manliness and changeless life, In inward strength, with firmness rife. Fair Nature's Genius by the hand Shall lead thee on through every land, ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe

... I trust they will give the old purchasers the additions as a supplement. I had corrected the errata of the press, throughout my copy, but I could not take the trouble of transcribing them, nor could lend them the originals, as I am apt to scribble notes in the margins of all my books that interest me at all. Pray let me know if Baker's Life is among the additions, and whether you are satisfied with it, as there could not be events enough in his retired life to justify two ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole

... and the Crown fared no better by a second Grand Jury. The second jury accompanied its rejection of the bill by a presentment against the patent,[4] and the defeat of the "prerogative" became assured. Every where the Drapier was acclaimed the saviour of his country. Any person who could scribble a doggerel or indite a tract rushed into print, and now Whitshed was harnessed to Wood in a pillory of contemptuous ridicule. Indeed, so bitter was the outcry against the Lord Chief Justice, that it is said to have ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. VI; The Drapier's Letters • Jonathan Swift

... the Marquise were enjoying the confusion into which the mention of this phantom beast threw her persecutor, she continued to scribble on scraps of paper which the concierge was told to take to the lawyer, ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre

... and ate their simple meal and went back, to wonder and speculate and devise new ways of getting some message to the outside world; but nothing came of it. They could do nothing more than scribble notes on pages torn from the diary and throw them from the tops of the windows into the light-well, where they fell harmlessly into the rubbish heap that gathered unnoticed in the corners. The day wore monotonously along ...
— A Woman for Mayor - A Novel of To-day • Helen M. Winslow

... for this great kindness to Mr. Bouncer, who whiled away the time by telling him terrible stories about the matriculation ordeal, Mr. Verdant Green and Fosbrooke ran upstairs, and spread a newspaper over a heap of pipes and pewter pots and bottles of ale, and prepared a table with pen, ink, and scribble-paper. Soon afterwards, Mr. Bouncer led ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.

... dream. Every day I try to overcome the feeling, but I can't succeed. This afternoon I made up my mind to return to our villa and write my diary. The day was lovely, and I meant to enjoy a rest and a scribble, but so strong was the horrid influence of the place that I couldn't settle to anything. I can't describe it, but it seemed to stifle me, and I can only compare it to some second sight in which one sees death. I sat as long as I could doing my writing, but I had to give in at last, and I tucked ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan

... cue from this short, spasmodic dream I had one evening in a steamer chair, of what I imagined was to happen on our coming voyage, I started to scribble; and following the fantastic idea in the vision, I shall adopt the abbreviated name of The Cork, for our good ship—although some of the passengers preferred to call her The Corker, as she was big and fine, and justly celebrated among those who go ...
— A Fantasy of Mediterranean Travel • S. G. Bayne

... fragrance of curious learning, as well as in the brighter intervals where prints and medals and miniatures were suspended on a surface of faded stuff. The place had both colour and quiet; I thought it a perfect room for work and went so far as to say to myself that, if it were mine to sit and scribble in, there was no knowing but I might learn to write as well as the author of "Beltraffio." This distinguished man still didn't reappear, and I rummaged freely among his treasures. At last I took down a book that detained me a while and seated myself in a ...
— The Author of Beltraffio • Henry James

... inconsistent, very stupid, very silly. You do not write to me. You do not love your husband. You know how much pleasure your letters would afford, and you do not write to him even six lines, which you can readily scribble out." ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach

... can go more quietly; I'll wait here." Katherine sank down on the lowest stair, while Betty flew back to scribble a note which she laid on Rachel's pillow. Then the ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton

... my new poetical talent in an epistle to Colonel Godard, whom I ridiculed to the utmost of my abilities. I showed this scribble to Madam de Merveilleux, who, instead of discouraging me, as she ought to have done, laughed heartily at my sarcasms, as well as her son, who, I believe, did not like M. Godard; indeed, it must be confessed, he was a man not calculated to obtain affection. I was tempted ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau

... used in case of an estrangement—a few bars of Schumann's melody, "The Nut Bush," should be sent, and the one who received it should at once hurry to the side of the other and all difference should be healed. But this token was never sent by me, perhaps because I did not know how to scribble the musical phrase: pride perhaps kept her from sending it; in any case five years are a long while, and she seemed to have died out of my life altogether; but one day the sight of a woman who had known her, ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore

... the "mark for the prize," if we have a clearer and more desirous view of the yet far-distant goal. "Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty, they shall behold the land that is very far off," must have been addressed to one still "very far" from the promised land. Thus I scribble to thee the musings with which, in my now shady allotment, I try to encourage myself to hope; and which perhaps are as incorrect as the lament which the beautiful spring will sometimes prompt, "With ...
— A Brief Memoir with Portions of the Diary, Letters, and Other Remains, - of Eliza Southall, Late of Birmingham, England • Eliza Southall

... my rhyming be at fault, If e'er I chance to scribble dope, If that my metre ever halt, I err ...
— Tobogganing On Parnassus • Franklin P. Adams

... worse, instead of better. He could hardly hear and he was too weak to write much. But he did manage to scribble a note: ...
— Joe Strong, the Boy Fish - or Marvelous Doings in a Big Tank • Vance Barnum

... rapture, And Buckingham rail to the end of the chapter; Lewd Rochester lampoon the King and the court, And Sidley and others may cry him up for't; Soft Waller and Suckling, chaste Cowley and others, With Beaumont and Fletcher, poetical brothers, May here scribble on with pretence to the bays, E'en Shakespear himself may produce all his plays, And not get for whole pages one mouth full ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber

... impossible. Curious to see three editions of the 1,000 Nights advertised at the same time, not to speak of the bastard. [363] I return you nine sheets [of proofs] by parcels post registered. You have done your work very well, and my part is confined to a very small amount of scribble which you ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright

... gleams of 1829. The great German died three years later, after receiving the birthday tribute, in his 82nd year, from English friends; and it is pleasant to remember that in this instance the disciple was to the end loyal to his master. To this period belong many other correspondences. "I am scribble scribbling," he says in a letter of 1832, and mere scribbling may fill many pages with few headaches; but Carlyle wrestled as he wrote, and not a page of those marvellous Miscellanies but is red with his life's blood. Under all his reviewing, he was set on a work whose ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol

... of dance have I Gone as far as Raumer quite In the art of letters—can he Scribble better than ...
— Atta Troll • Heinrich Heine

... curiosity of seeing some particulars how I passed my life when I was absent from MD this time; and so I tell you now that I dined to-day at Molesworth's, the Florence Envoy, then went to the Coffee-house, where I behaved myself coldly enough to Mr. Addison, and so came home to scribble. We dine together to-morrow and next day by invitation; but I shall alter my behaviour to him, till he begs my pardon, or else we shall grow bare acquaintance. I am weary of friends; and friendships are ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift

... exercised therein, that they pass from schools to the Universities and return from thence (some of them) more unable to write true English, than either Latin or Greek. Not to speak of our ordinary Tradesmen, many of whom write such false English, that none but themselves can interpret what they scribble in their ...
— The Orbis Pictus • John Amos Comenius

... of public education in 1837 was deplorable. There were missionary schools and a few desultory teachers, who had in very few cases the mental or the moral qualities to fit them for the task of instruction. The most they did was to teach the young idea how to read or scribble its name. For this they received trifling fees, but doubtless these fees were no more trifling than the services rendered. Such free schools as existed, and were nominally supported by Government, were so indifferently managed that they were treated with contempt, even by ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke

... and disappointment, and the course of oppression which you have run through, weaken your mind, my dearest creature, and make you see inconveniencies where there possibly cannot be any. If your talent is scribbling, as you call it; so is mine—and I will scribble on, at all opportunities; and to you; let them say what they will. Nor let your letters be filled with the self-accusations you mention: there is no cause for them. I wish that your Anna Howe, who continues in her mother's house, were but half so good as Miss ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson

... Then, you think, Mr. Lawyer, it will be as well to marry Henrietta to the baron, eh? Very well! Let me add that on the day when Henrietta goes to the altar with Baron Leonard, I will make you a present of all this scribble. Till then I shall ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai

... letter and am still going on. It seems to me that nothing matters and yet I scribble verses. I don't read them to Mariana and she is not very anxious to hear them, but you have sometimes praised my poor attempts and most of all you'll keep them to yourself. I have been struck by a common phenomenon in Russia... But, however, let the verses speak ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev

... odd that I should be sitting at that desk with a Cabinet Minister, a Field-Marshal, two high Government officials, and a French General watching me, while from the scribble of a dead man I was trying to drag a secret which meant life or ...
— The Thirty-nine Steps • John Buchan

... in prison they had so little time to discuss such details, in face of the one awful fact that he was there, and was in all probability going to die in two days. But from this incomplete, tear-stained scribble that he left behind and from the answers he gave to her few questions, she gathered that the story of his quest was ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston

... Here I am sitting at the old desk again, in the old office of the Banner. I could only scribble you a little note on the train last night to tell you that my heart still was with you, and I did not have the time to explain why I was coming. It is a dead secret, little woman, and perhaps I shouldn't tell ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White

... Over the grim precipitous edge he hung, An eagle waiting for the lightning now To swoop upon his prey. One iron hand Gripped a rough tree-root like a bunch of snakes; And, as the rain rushed round him, far away He saw to northward yet another flash, A scribble of God's finger in the sky Over a waste of white stampeding waves. His eye flashed like a falchion as he saw it, And from his lips there burst the sea-king's laugh; For there, with a fierce joy he knew, he knew Doughty, at last—an open mutineer! An open ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes

... William was one of the earliest recorded burials in the registers of St. Margaret's, Westminster. "William Shakespeare was buried April 30, 1539." A comparatively modern hand has written against this the foolish scribble, "Query if this be the poet or not?" He may have been in the service of the Court, but there are no signs that he was a man of wealth. In the churchwardens' account[312] he was only charged 2d. for the ...
— Shakespeare's Family • Mrs. C. C. Stopes

... was so villainous that it was enough of itself to arouse the dislike of a healthy-minded young fellow such as Marcy; but, moreover, the Pole had habits of sneaking about the vessel, and afterwards retiring to quiet corners, where he would scribble in a pocket notebook. Such conduct as this in a man whose position corresponded with that of a common seaman on an ordinary vessel, seemed contrary to discipline and good conduct, and he mentioned the matter ...
— The Great Stone of Sardis • Frank R. Stockton

... cheery doctor injecting something into my wrist. I then lay on a stretcher awaiting further transportation. My good servant Smith somehow discovered my whereabouts, and turned up at this hospital. He sat beside me and gave me a writing-pad to scribble a note on. I scrawled a line to my mother to say I had been knocked out, but was perfectly all right. Smith went back to the battalion, and I lay on the stretcher, partially asleep. Night came on and I went off into a series of agonizing dreams. I awoke with a start. I was being ...
— Bullets & Billets • Bruce Bairnsfather

... should be writing history, for which I am in no way qualified. However, as I must make up my mind to begin again, and write something, or give up the practice altogether, and as I don't choose (just yet, at least) to do the latter, I will scribble what occurs to me, and take a short survey of the Parliamentary campaign that is just over. The danger, whether real or supposed, which the Queen ran from the attempt of the half-witted coxcomb who fired at her, elicited whatever there was of dormant loyalty ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... not all like the Duke of Gloucester, who, when Gibbon brought him the second volume of the Decline and Fall, 'received him with much good nature and affability, saying to him, as he laid the quarto on the table, "Another d——d thick, square book! Always scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh! Mr. Gibbon?"' Best's Memorials, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell

... dear old friend of mine who died of indigestion, and gradually lead the conversation round to Nervino. I don't force it on them. I don't even ask them to try it. I merely point to myself, rosy with health, and say that I owe everything to it, and the thing is done. They thank me profusely and scribble the name down on their shirt-cuffs. And there your are! I don't suppose," said Uncle Chris philosophically, "that the stuff can do them ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse

... moment he was gone; and with a stab of pain I realized that, if the colonel had sent for him, he must miss out his dance with me. Would he even remember it? Would he scribble me a line of farewell? I longed to run out and catch him before he went, if only for a word, but I dared not dash past Di, and give her the shock of learning that I had been within three yards of her all the time. Again I was ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... laugh and did not look up at him, but continued to scribble shorthand notes on the ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr

... and the Laureate's pay, And no deductions at quarter-day? Oh, that would be the post for me! With plenty to get and nothing to do, But to deck a pet poodle with ribbons of blue, And whistle a tune to the Queen's cockatoo, And scribble of verses remarkably few, And empty at evening a ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun

... at times. The Honorable Betty understood, but her Highness would not be convinced. Thus she suffered this needless affront. Pardon this parenthesis, but when one talks from behind a curtain the parenthesis is the only available thing.) There was silence. I saw Steinbock poise the pen, then scribble on the parchment. It ...
— The Princess Elopes • Harold MacGrath

... be very happy in paraphrasing them, it is my opinion, both of them, without giving the least preference to either, should be read alternately in your schools, as the tutor shall direct. Pardon, learned Sir, this scribble to my age and weakness, both which are very great, and command me wherein I may ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson

... protocol to the effect that the "disorders" which had taken place in the Kingdom of Poland "where the Jews enjoy equal rights" (i.e., the right of residence) tend to support the theory of the "injuriousness" of the Jewish people. Official pens began to scribble more rapidly, and within a short time, by the spring of 1882, a project was ready, to be inflicted as a severe punishment upon the Jews for the atrocities perpetrated upon them. The "conquered foe," represented ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow

... of sense of the fitness of things that would make the average reporter scribble away for dear life, if, when the President's message on the tariff was being read in Congress, a large black cat had happened to walk up the aisle of the House and jumped on the back of Speaker Cannon. Such an occurrence, I venture to say, would have commanded ...
— Commercialism and Journalism • Hamilton Holt

... made up my bunch of flowers, I return home with them.... Then I ascend to my study, and generally read, or perchance scribble in this journal, and otherwise suffer Time to loiter onward at his own pleasure, till the dinner-hour. In pleasant days, the chief event of the afternoon, and the happiest one of the day, is our walk.... So comes the night; and I look back upon ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 106, August, 1866 • Various

... a good deal to have witnessed his subsequent movements, but she would have been considerably disappointed had she done so, for Hone's methods were disconcertingly direct. All he did when he found himself alone was to sit down and scribble ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell

... sure at least of sincerity, and even though the annotation be rude, he may rely upon the justness of the comment." This is calm and complacent enough, but he proceeds with some warmth: "As for the little puny critics who scatter their peevish strictures in private circles, and scribble at every author who has the eminence of being unconnected with them, as they are usually spleen-swoln from a vain idea of increasing their consequence, there will always be found a petulance and illiberality in their remarks, which should place them as far beneath the notice ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook

... snapped my lady. "They chatter and scribble; they don't feel. They write stanzas of 'gush' on Maternity; and tear the little bleating calf from its mother to bleed to death in a long, slow agony. They maunder twaddle about Infancy over some ugly red lump of human flesh, in whose ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida

... science so far, and I doubt if I ever get beyond that portion of my subject. And I don't care to. Any Muggins can write about old days on the Mississippi of five hundred different kinds, but I am the only man alive that can scribble about the piloting of that day, and no man has ever tried to scribble about it yet. Its newness pleases me all the time, and it is about the only new ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... feeble-minded enough for Annuals and Keepsake Books, and so fetch him an occasional guinea. For, my dear, the verses I write of my own accord are not sufficiently genteel to be vended in Paternoster Row; they smack too dangerously of human intelligence. So I am compelled, perforce, to scribble such jingles as I am ashamed to read, because I must write something. . . ." Paul Vanderhoffen shrugged, and continued, in tones more animated: "There will be no talk of any grand-duke. Instead, there will be columns of ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell

... him, with an air of prudence.] I tell you what I will do. [Pointing to the writing-table.] Scribble her a note— a line— and I'll give it to her. That won't attract attention. I've no objection to do that for you. Hurry up! [He sits at the writing-table and searches for writing materials.] In the drawer. [He opens a drawer and takes ...
— The 'Mind the Paint' Girl - A Comedy in Four Acts • Arthur Pinero

... silence when some rhymes are coming out; And when they're come, the very pleasant rout: The message certain to be done to-morrow. 'Tis perhaps as well that it should be to borrow Some precious book from out its snug retreat, To cluster round it when we next shall meet. Scarce can I scribble on; for lovely airs Are fluttering round the room like doves in pairs; Many delights of that glad day recalling, When first my senses caught their tender falling. And with these airs come forms of elegance Stooping their shoulders o'er a horse's prance, ...
— Poems 1817 • John Keats

... attention to the arts."[609] His neglect of literature and the arts was the more unfortunate because George III and his sons did not raise the tone of the Court in this respect, witness the remark of the King to Gibbon at a State function. "Well, Mr. Gibbon, it's always scribble, scribble, I suppose."[610] ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... follow'd by many, and our number went on growing continually. This was one of the first good effects of my having learnt a little to scribble; another was, that the leading men, seeing a newspaper now in the hands of one who could also handle a pen, thought it convenient to oblige and encourage me. Bradford still printed the votes, and laws, and other publick business. He had printed an address of the House to the governor, ...
— Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin

... now with authority, Turpin's or Monmouth Geoffry's Chronicle; Men whose historical superiority Is always greatest at a miracle. But Saint Augustine has the great priority, Who bids all men believe the impossible, Because 'tis so. Who nibble, scribble, quibble, he Quiets at once ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... foot, and the other way you work with your fingers, but I rather guess there's more headache in the stories than there is in the stitches, because you don't have to think quite so hard while your foot's going as you do when your fingers is at work, scratch, scratch, scratch, scribble, ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... old Gadley, as we laid by the last of them, "thirty years come Christmas next, he and I together. No other hands but ours have ever touched them, and now people to whom they mean nothing but so much business will fling them about, drop greasy crumbs upon them—I know their ways, the brutes!—scribble all over them. And he who always would have everything so ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome

... He there says, referring to the French Revolution of July 1830, that "unless God send us some miraculous help, we have to look forward to a period of destruction similar to that which the Roman world experienced about the middle of the third century." Now, when I see a man scribble such abject nonsense about events which are passing under our eyes, what confidence can I put in his judgment as to the connection of causes and effects in times very imperfectly ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan

... with a blank sheet of paper before him, Bob made ready to scribble at high speed, while Herb held a watch to time him. As for Jimmy, he was content to curl up on a sofa and act the part ...
— The Radio Boys at the Sending Station - Making Good in the Wireless Room • Allen Chapman

... gathering a few little things together and putting them in a large but light-weight satchel, such as she had often used to carry some of the choicest apples from the orchard when they were being gathered in. Her first care was for her manuscript,—the long-treasured scribble, kept so secretly and so often considered with hope and fear, and wonder and doubting—then she took one or two of the more cherished volumes which had formerly been the property of the "Sieur Amadis" and packed them with it. Choosing only the most necessary garments from her little store, ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli

... cannot scribble Without a glove to tear or nibble Or a small twig to whisk about— As if the hidden founts of Fancy, Like wells of old, were thus found out By mystic trick of rhabdomancy. Such was the little feathery wand,[3] That, held for ever in the hand ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al

... under the purao. Now they would write a word or two, now scribble it out; now they would sit biting at the pencil end and staring seaward; now their eyes would rest on the clerk, where he sat propped on the canoe, leering and coughing, his pencil racing glibly ...
— The Ebb-Tide - A Trio And Quartette • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... To overwrite, usually unintentionally: "I walked off the end of the array and clobbered the stack." Compare {mung}, {scribble}, {trash}, and {smash ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0

... He offers 50,000 bushels of wheat for October delivery at $1.43 7/8 per bushel. It's that fellow down there with the blazing red tie half way up his collar. He hits out with both hands at the air as he yells. A surge of buyers overwhelms him. They scribble notes upon their sales cards ...
— Deep Furrows • Hopkins Moorhouse

... many miles lie between us there is no alternative but the hastily written and imperfect scribble which will shortly be presented you, if the elements have not conspired ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour

... some readers know for the idle Books, long-winded Novels chiefly, which he wrote, was the Grandfather of this favored Princess; a good-natured old gentleman, of the idle ornamental species, in whose head most things, it is likely, were reduced to vocables, scribble and sentimentality; and only a steady internal gravitation towards praise and pudding was traceable as very real in him. Anton Ulrich, affronted more or less by the immense advancement of Gentleman Ernst and the Hanoverian or ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume V. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... more am I, perhaps. I don't think any better of the stuff that I scribble than you do. It's all an experiment with me. I'm trying my brushes—trying my brushes. Perhaps I may be able to do something stronger some day, and perhaps not. But at all events I sha'n't force my mood. I shall wait for my inspiration. ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 8 • Various

... sort of fatality in my mind, leading me to put at first my statement or proposition in a wrong or awkward form. Formerly I used to think about my sentences before writing them down; but for several years I have found that it saves time to scribble in a vile hand whole pages as quickly as I possibly can, contracting half the words; and then correct deliberately. Sentences thus scribbled down are often better ones than ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... triumph, impossible to describe. Father Caboccini looked at him with angry astonishment; when Rodin, growing still more imperious and haughty, and with an air of more sovereign disdain than ever, pushed aside the paper with the back of his dirty hand and said: "What is the date of that scribble?" ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue

... Fortune, the punctual goddess stepped down from the machine. One of the Princess's ladies begged to enter; a man, it appeared, had brought a line for the Freiherr von Gondremark. It proved to be a pencil billet, which the crafty Greisengesang had found the means to scribble and despatch under the very guns of Otto; and the daring of the act bore testimony to the terror of the actor. For Greisengesang had but one influential motive: fear. The note ran thus: "At the first council, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... in all life worse is, For abating superfluous pride, Than having to scribble on verses With the editor waiting outside; I am hearing a lecture on Shelley, Where I ought to be able to dream, But my brain is as vapid as jelly. And I cannot alight ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles

... myself had frequent experience of the automatic construction of fantastic figures, through a practice I have somewhat encouraged for the purpose, of allowing my hand to scribble at its own will, while I am giving my best attention to what is being said by others, as at small committees. It is always a surprise to me to see the result whenever I turn my thoughts on what I have been subconsciously doing. I can rarely recollect even a few of the steps by which the drawings ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton

... him. Think of it a while, my friend, and you will admit that I am not raving. Think of his seeing that spotless image, not for a moment, for a day, in a happy dream, or a restless fever-fit; not as a poet in a five minutes' frenzy—time to snatch his phrase and scribble his immortal stanza; but for days together, while the slow labour of the brush went on, while the foul vapours of life interposed, and the fancy ached with tension, fixed, radiant, distinct, as we see it now! What a master, certainly! But ah! what ...
— The Madonna of the Future • Henry James

... the scribble of doom on the dark, Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin, again? Mystery—is it a scrap of remembrance, a spark Burning still in the fog of a blind world's brain? Elf of the gossamer tangles of shadow and light, Wild electrical webs and the battle that rolls League upon perishing league thro' the ravenous ...
— Collected Poems - Volume Two (of 2) • Alfred Noyes

... say that. If it were the deuce's own scribble, and yo' axed me to read in it for yo'r sake, and th' oud gentleman's, I'd do it. Whatten's this, wench? I'm not going for to take yo'r brass, so dunnot think it. We've been great friends, 'bout the sound o' money ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... I scribble these hasty lines in all the bustle of preparation, and interrupted by the babies and by Armand, who keeps saying, "Godmother, godmother! I want to see her," till I am almost jealous. ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac

... you think I had the luxury of choosing for myself? Every day, about eleven o'clock a small boy brings me my fate on a slip of paper. Let me dictate this to you. I'm sure you can't read that penciled scribble." ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall

... school to whom we all owe a great deal of amusement. He was not so versatile nor so original as Cruickshank; he had not the genius, nor the geniality, still less the sense of beauty, of John Leech. In his later years his work became more and more unequal, till he was sometimes almost as apt to scribble hasty scrawls as Constantin Guys. M. Guys was an artist selected by M. Baudelaire as the fine flower of modern art, and the true, though hurried, designer of the fugitive modern beauty. It is recorded that M. Guys was once sent to draw a scene of triumph and certain illuminations in London, ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang

... him, trust me. Nothing comforts a poor beggar like a bit of praise when he's down; and all fellows that take to writing are as greedy after it as trout after the drake, even if they only scribble in county newspapers. I've watched them when I've ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley

... there was just time to scribble a note before she dressed for the picnic, and of course, though she had no wish to encourage Reggie's friendship, yet a birthday was a special occasion, and had she remembered it she would ...
— The Girls of St. Olave's • Mabel Mackintosh

... the frosted glass door marked "Private." With his hand reaching for the knob he halted, made an impatient gesture, plumped himself down at the long table—at its distant opposite end. With a sweep of the arm he cleared a space wherein he proceeded to spread papers from his pocket and to scribble upon them furiously. When Susan happened to glance at him, his head was bent so low and his straw hat was tilted so far forward that she could not see his face. She observed that he was dressed attractively in an extremely light summer suit of homespun; his hands were large and strong ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips

... like them, we do mischief. And that is just what we are: children that have not learnt to read let loose upon the library of the universe; and all that we can do is to pull the books about and play games with them and scribble on their pages. Everywhere the earth is defaced with our meaningless scribbling, and we tell ourselves that it means something because we want to scribble. Or sometimes we tell ourselves that there is no ...
— Essays on Art • A. Clutton-Brock

... spring, a wonder in this barren country. This was a favourite haunt of Emily, and indeed they all loved the spot. Here they would use some of their paper, for they still kept up their old habit of writing tales and poems, and loved to scribble out of doors. And some of it they would use in drawing, since at this time they were taking lessons, and Emily and Charlotte were devoted to the art: Charlotte making copies with minuteness and exact fidelity; Emily drawing animals and still-life with ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson

... which graduated in 1838. He was a reader, as so many of his fellows were, and the letters which he wrote shortly after leaving college show how intent he had been on making acquaintance with the best things in literature. He began also to scribble verse, and he wrote both poems and essays for college magazines. His class chose him their poet for Class Day, and he wrote his poem; but he was careless about conforming to college regulations respecting attendance at morning prayers; and for this was suspended ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell

... disgorge its contents—town is empty—consequently I can scribble at leisure, as occupations are less numerous. In a fortnight I shall depart to fulfil a country engagement; but expect two epistles from you previous to that period. Ridge does not proceed rapidly in Notts—very possible. In town things wear a more promising ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore

... Latin authors all! Nor think your verses sterling, Though with a golden pen you scrawl, And scribble in a Berlin: ...
— English Satires • Various

... unconscious of any evil intention, my eyes fastened upon the signature of the letter, which would have made my future secure if it had only appeared in the right place. It was an unusually well- written signature—and you know how sometimes one may absent- mindedly scribble a sheet of paper full of meaningless words. I had a pen in my hand—[picks up a penholder from the table] like this. And somehow it just began to run—I don't want to claim that there was anything mystical—anything of a spiritualistic nature back of it—for that kind ...
— Plays by August Strindberg, Second series • August Strindberg

... who delight to render obscurity more obscure, and who assume that in a multitude of words, as in a multitude of counsellors, there is wisdom! O ye critics, who vote yourselves the Areopagites of Intellect, whose decrees confer immortality in the Universe of Letters! O all ye that write or scribble,—all ye tribes, both great and small, of pen-drivers and paper-scrapers!—know ye, that, while ye are listening in your imaginative ambition to the praise of the elect or the applause of nations, your wives ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various

... group of words that have been naturalized: scribe, prescribe, ascribe, proscribe, transcribe, circumscribe, subscriber, indescribable, scribble, script, scripture, postscript, conscript, rescript, manuscript, nondescript, inscription, superscription, description. It is clear that these words are each other's kith and kin in blood, and that the strain or stock common to all ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor

... musical soul than you in refusing to trammel my inspiration with the dull rules invented by fools. I suppose you have mastered them all, eh?" He picked up some sheets of manuscript. "Great Scot! How you must have schooled yourself to scribble all this—you, with your restless nature—full scores, too! I hope you don't offer this sort of ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill

... the roll out of their hands. They feared lest I should tear it or throw it overboard; so they tried to stay me and scare me, but I signed to them that i could write, whereat all marvelled, saying, "We never yet saw an, ape write." And the Captain cried, "Let him write; and if he scribble and scrabble we will kick him out and kill him; but if he; write fair and scholarly I will adopt him as my son; for surely I never yet saw a more intelligent and well mannered monkey than he. Would Heaven my real son were his match in morals and manners." I took ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... scrape, or I scribble all day, My tunes are neglected, my verse flung away. Thy substantive here, Vice Apollo [2] disdains, To vouch for my numbers, or list to my strains. Thy manual sign he refuses to put To the airs I produce from the pen, or the gut: Be thou then propitious, ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber

... of Harold's pilgrimage: Ye who of him may further seek to know, Shall find some tidings in a future page, If he that rhymeth now may scribble moe. Is this too much? stern Critic! say not so: Patience! and ye shall hear what he beheld In other lands, where he was doomed to go: Lands that contain the monuments of Eld, Ere Greece and Grecian arts by barbarous hands ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron

... sending you into a home," said Gaisford. "Why not go out to California for six months? You can scribble there ...
— The Education of Eric Lane • Stephen McKenna

... all marble and precedence, and I wish him well out of the adventure. I can't tell you how much more and more your attitude to him, in the midst of all this, shines out by contrast. I never willingly talk to these people about him, but see what a comfort I find it to scribble to you! I appreciate it— it keeps me warm; there are no fires in the house. Mrs. Wimbush goes by the calendar, the temperature goes by the weather, the weather goes by God knows what, and the Princess is easily ...
— The Death of the Lion • Henry James

... she received the intimation that a palaver was beginning, and that a fight was imminent, she would not be ready, and would resort to stratagem: she would seize a large sheet of paper and scribble some words—any words—upon it and add some splashes of sealing—wax to make it look important. This she would despatch by a swift runner to the chiefs, and by the time they had discussed the mysterious ...
— Mary Slessor of Calabar: Pioneer Missionary • W. P. Livingstone

... Mr. Matthew Sharpin, has made a mess of the case at Rutherford Street, exactly as I expected he would. Business keeps me in this town; so I write to you to set the matter straight. I enclose, with this, the pages of feeble scribble-scrabble which the creature, Sharpin, calls a report. Look them over; and when you have made your way through all the gabble, I think you will agree with me that the conceited booby has looked for the thief in every direction but the right one. The case ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, April, 1858 • Various

... her methodical soul to have anybody else "messing" with this neat little record. It was only a trifle better that the girl should have turned to the very back of the book and chosen a fly leaf there to scribble on. Scribbling it seemed, so rapidly was it done, and after a brief time the book was returned to its owner and she silently requested to examine what had been written in it. This is what ...
— Dorothy's Travels • Evelyn Raymond

... could tell: but in a moment he himself supplied the means. For the rocks here were of some kind of slate, very hard, but scaly: and finding two pieces, a large and a small, he handed them to me, bawling that I was to write therewith. So giving him my pistol, I made shift to scribble a few words. Seeing his eyes twinkle as he ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch

... occurrence as the visit of strangers to a mail-boat. The visiting party therefore consisted of Lady Olivia, Ida, Sir Reginald, Mildmay, and Lethbridge, most of whom availed themselves of the opportunity to scribble a hasty letter or two to friends ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood

... asked Maurice," Drall confided to me, "to scribble a testimonial to Lemonbeer. It will kind of break the spell, and it wouldn't be Maurice if he didn't turn out a perfect gem of literary composition. I know my Lemonbeer is really good and I know ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, August 11, 1920 • Various

... trifling, pert, one knows not what! Form thy light Measures, nimbler than the Wind, Whilst heavy lingring Sense is left behind; With all thy Might pursue, and all thy Will, That unabating Thirst, to scribble still, Giv'n at thy Birth! the Poetaster's Gust, False and unsated as the ...
— Two Poems Against Pope - One Epistle to Mr. A. Pope and the Blatant Beast • Leonard Welsted

... to scribble a line on my card. Our father is dangerously ill—his lawyer has been sent for. Come with me to London by the first train. Meet ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins

... take Seymour's place as illustrator of Pickwick, Thackeray applied for the job, but without success. He was then a young man of twenty-five, and still hesitating between art and literature. He had begun to draw caricatures with his pencil when a schoolboy at the Charter House, and to scribble them with his pen when a student at Cambridge, editing The Snob, a weekly under-graduate paper, and parodying the prize poem Timbuctoo of his contemporary at the university, Alfred Tennyson. Then he went abroad to study art, passing a season at Weimar, where he met Goethe and filled ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers

... before the mail goes; this last chapter is equally delicate and necessary. The prayers of the congregation are requested. Eheu! and it will be ended before this letter leaves and printed in the States ere you can read this scribble. The first dinner gong has sounded; je vous salue, monsieur et cher confrere. Tofa, soifua! Sleep! long life! as our Samoan ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... portraits, but he couldn't make them out very well now. They were sort of blurred to him, but I described them and he told me who they were. "That's a girl o' mine," he said, with reference to one—a jolly, good-looking bush girl. "I got a letter from her yesterday. I managed to scribble something, but I'll get you, if you don't mind, to write something more I want to put in on another piece of paper, and ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson

... scribble a line or two; but Holland is so fascinating that I have found myself running on about it, and Mr. van Buren has seemed grateful because it's his native land, and the places he likes best have turned out to be my favorites. In that way we have happened to write each other ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson

... Sancho's couch of pack-saddles and pummels would not be a bed of down in comparison, I ordered a fresh faggot on my hearth: they brought me some ink in a gally-pot—invisible ink—for I cannot see what I am writing; and I sit down to scribble, pour ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson

... scrawl you a line of some sort I know you will begin to fancy that I neglect you, in spite of all I said last time we met. You can hardly fancy it possible, I dare say, that I cannot find a quarter of an hour to scribble a note in; but when a note is written it is to be carried a mile to the post, and consumes nearly an hour, which is a large portion of the day. Mr. and Mrs. White have been gone a week. I heard from them this morning; they are now at Hexham. No time ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter

... Sunday. He cannot post a letter, so he rings up the paper and dictates a letter by telephone. He leaves the title to his friends at the other end; he knows that they can spell "Gray," as no doubt they can: but the letter is put down by journalistic custom in a pencil scribble and the vowel may well be doubtful. The friend writes at the top of the letter "'G. K. C.' Explains," putting the initials in quotation marks. The next man passing it for press is bored with these ...
— A Miscellany of Men • G. K. Chesterton

... about myself. I want to suggest something to you. You may laugh, old boy—but I'm in earnest. I remember you're telling me once that, when you were up at the 'Varsity, you used to scribble a bit. I didn't pay much attention; in those days one didn't pay attention—ever. But now your words have come back to me once or twice, during the night, when I've been seeing dream pictures in ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile

... and spend Wednesday afternoon with you all at Dingle Cottage. If suitable, do not trouble replying to this scribble.— ...
— Aunt Judith - The Story of a Loving Life • Grace Beaumont

... wit these lose their common sense, And then turn critics in their own defence: Each burns alike, who can, or cannot write, 30 Or with a rival's, or an eunuch's spite. All fools have still an itching to deride, And fain would be upon the laughing side; If Maevius scribble in Apollo's spite, There are who judge still worse than he ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al

... the soil, or by making shoes or hobnails, that the 'genial current of the soil is frozen,' and superior talents prevented from accomplishing their proper work: it is by being connected with some cheap weekly periodical, or twice or thrice a week newspaper, and compelled to scribble on almost without pause or intermission for daily bread. We have been led to think of this matter by an interesting little volume of poems, chiefly lyrical, which has just issued from the Edinburgh press,—the production of Mr. Thomas Smibert, a man who has lived for many years by his pen, and ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller

... descended from an illustrious family, and was destined to one of the learned professions; but he could not give up his mind to anything but drawing,—as annoying to his father as Galileo's experiments were to his parent; as unmeaning to him as Gibbon's History was to George III.,—"Scribble, scribble, scribble; Mr. Gibbon, I perceive, sir, you are always a-scribbling." No perception of a new power, no sympathy with the abandonment to a specialty not indorsed by fashions and traditions, but without which abandonment genius cannot easily be developed. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VI • John Lord

... unfastened his shirt a scrap of paper slipped from it and fluttered to the floor. It was Gemma's letter, which he had worn all day upon his neck. He picked it up, unfolded it, and kissed the dear scribble; then began folding the paper up again, with a dim consciousness of having done something very ridiculous, when he noticed on the back of the sheet a postscript which he had not read before. "Be sure and come as soon ...
— The Gadfly • E. L. Voynich

... Mr. Copley, whose pen did not cease to scribble. "I can hear. No time for anything like the present minute. I've got this case by heart, and don't need to think about it. Go on, Lawrence. Has your father sent ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner

... I've begun to scrawl, but whether In rhyme or prose, or baith thegither, Or some hotch-potch that's rightly neither, Let time mak proof; But I shall scribble down some ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... contents of which are highly obliging to me: and I should be inexcusable if I did not comply with your injunctions, and be very proud and thankful for your ladyship's condescension in accepting of my poor scribble, and promising such a rich and valuable return; of which you have already given such ample and delightful instances. I will not plead my defects, to excuse my obedience. I only fear that the awe ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson

... hair-line hieroglyphics, twisted and scrawled in brownish or reddish purple, about the egg. The markings are nowhere as a rule crowded, and towards the small end are usually sparse and occasionally wholly wanting. In some eggs a bad pen seems to have been used to scribble the pattern, and every here and there instead of a fine hair-line there is a ...
— The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 • Allan O. Hume

... hand is free of the inmost minds of men past and present; their lives both within and without the pale of their uttered thoughts are unveiled to him; he needs no introduction to the greatest; he stands on no ceremony with them; he may, if he be so minded, scribble "doggrel" on his Shelley, or he may kick Lord Byron, if he please, into a corner. He hears Burke perorate, and Johnson dogmatise, and Scott tell his border tales, and Wordsworth muse on the hillside, without the leave of any man, or the payment ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)

... here hair and complexion. There I was to stay with her till—till this same sea-captain was to come and carry her off where she would give no more trouble. Oh, sir, it was too much—and my Lady knew it, for she had tied my hands so that I had but a moment to scribble down that scrip, and bid Syphax take it to you. The dear lady! she said, 'her God could deliver her out of the mouth of the lion,' and I could not believe it! I thought ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge

... you are too hopeful on your side of the water. I never believed the "canards" of the army of the Potomac having capitulated. My good dear wife and self are come to wish for peace at any price. Good night, my good friend. I will scribble ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin

... scribble a few notes of her impressions during the journey, for the benefit of Reverend Mother and the nuns, posting her letter in Paris; but as the Frenchman appeared surprised at her travelling alone, and everybody else seemed to be with friends, she decided not to ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... literary part of the character of Walpole, it is natural to allude to the transactions which took place between him and the unfortunate Chatterton; a text upon which so much calumny and misrepresentation have been embroidered. The periodicals of the day, and the tribe of those "who daily scribble for their daily bread," and for whom Walpole had, perhaps unwisely, frequently expressed his contempt, attacked him bitterly for his inhumanity to genius, and even accused him as the author of the subsequent misfortunes ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... Soane muttered. He began to scribble with a pencil. From the tone of his voice I knew that he had reached the precise stage at which something brilliant—the real thing ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad

... diaries are for ... to work off blue moods in, moods that come on without any reason whatever and therefore can't be confided to any fellow creature. You scribble away for a while ... and then it's all gone ... and your soul feels clear ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... she does not nod or smile To any other, nor her hand imbue With his fast-flowing wine, that her swift guile May scribble on the ...
— The Elegies of Tibullus • Tibullus

... to plague and starve the city; Let them stare, and storm, and frown, When they see a clergy gown; Let them, ere they crack a louse, Call for th'orders of the house; Let them, with their gosling quills, Scribble senseless heads of bills; We may, while they strain their throats, Wipe our a—s with their votes. Let Sir Tom,[4] that rampant ass, Stuff his guts with flax and grass; But before the priest he fleeces, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... myself for death. One thing only makes me uneasy: I fear that as I approach the prescribed limit, I may push it continually back, and that at forty-five I may still be thinking only of continuing to live and, perhaps, of continuing to scribble. Hard as I try to think, or to make others think, that I am different from the rest of mankind, I fear, I tremble lest ...
— The Countess of Albany • Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)

... said. "We'll try it again later to be sure. Wish I didn't scribble such a rotten hand. My capital As and Ps are ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al

... say, all preparations had been made, weather permitting; I had merely to telephone the caterers, electricians, and musicians, and scribble these invitations. I'd advise you to arrange your day to include a good long nap before dinner, for you'll be up till all hours very likely. I fancy I ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance

... amuse myself," said Lesley, meekly. "I've had so little to do since I came here, and I thought I would scribble down my impressions." ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... wayward Queen! Who rule the sex to fifty from fifteen: Parent of vapours and of female wit, Who give th' hysteric, or poetic fit, 60 On various tempers act by various ways, Make some take physic, others scribble plays; Who cause the proud their visits to delay, And send the godly in a pet to pray. A nymph there is, that all thy pow'r disdains, 65 And thousands more in equal mirth maintains. But oh! if e'er thy ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope

... innocence and unconsciousness of self in the history of men whose after lives have been torn to pieces by the storms of vicissitude and passion. So far, he had not begun to rhyme—an unusual case, as boys who can make two lines jingle, whether they be poets or not, generally scribble plentifully before leaving school. At the age of fourteen he wrote some verses to his mother on her birthday, but it is fair to suppose that they gave no hint of talent, as they have not been preserved: it was only from his temperament that his destiny might ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various

... that it shouldn't be hard; That dozens, who claim to be poets, Could scribble off stuff by the yard And fare very well; and I know it's A theme that the Masters of Rhyme Have written some excellent verse on, Which proves, as I take it, that I'm ...
— Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses • John Kendall (AKA Dum-Dum)

... replied somewhat curtly. He crossed over to his father's desk where he sat down to scribble a few words, while Mr. Bagley, who had followed him in scowling, was making ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein

... Claudia remembered her letter to her father It was now near the close of the short winter day. Her interview with the detective had occupied her so long that she had barely time to scribble and send off the few urgent lines with which the reader is already acquainted. Then she dined and resigned herself to repose for the ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth

... the letter and read it to the end, to the last scribble on the margin: "You should have married a girl like Winny Dymond." "It was a lie what I told you once about her." "You needn't be afraid of being fond of Baby." There was nothing evocative, nothing significant for him in these phrases, not even in the names. His mind ...
— The Combined Maze • May Sinclair

... this, he said to Mrs. Cliff that he was not sure but what the parsons were quite correct, and although everybody was sorry to lose two members of the party, it could not be helped, and all who had letters to send to New York went to work to scribble them as fast as they could. Mrs. Cliff also wrote a note to Captain Horn, informing him of the state of affairs, and of their reasons for not waiting for him, and this the departing clergymen undertook to leave with Beaver & Hughes, where Captain Horn would ...
— Mrs. Cliff's Yacht • Frank R. Stockton

... now,' said Gentian when Hollyhock's task was finished, and she passed her scribble to her father to see—'I wonder whether there is a similar mistake in the names of our cousins—or brothers, as ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade

... Galaxy liner which Aristides had sailed in. I had only time for a word to you; but a million words could not have told the agonies I suffered, and when I overtook him on board the Orient Pacific steamer at Plymouth, where she touched, I could just scribble off the cable sent Mr. Makely before our steamer put off again. I am afraid you did not find my cable very expressive, but I was glad that I did not try to say more, for if I had tried I should simply have gibbered, ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells

... have not had a letter from Europe since May, and wish you to write to me by way of New York. I avail myself of an unexpected passenger to scribble this in the presence of many of the court, who tell me it is time to resume our labours; therefore, my beloved brothers, adieu. I shall write again in a few days, via ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper

... too hard for me, although not so for the Lord! Jer. xxxii. 17.... And now a word: is ridicule the right thing in so solemn a matter as the discussion of Holy Writ? [Is food for ridicule the right thing? Did I discuss Holy Writ? I did not: I concussed profane scribble. Even the Doctor did not discuss; he only enunciated and denunciated out of the mass of inferences which a mystical head has found premises for ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan

... soon receive it, you may conclude that it has miscarried; in which case, I shall not consent to the universe existing a moment longer. I have no copy of it, except the wildest scribble of a first draught, so that it could never ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields

... tattered flag, its broad stripes and bright stars still gleaming through the smoke of a fierce battle, moved Francis Scott Key to scribble a few words on the back of an envelope, the words that became our National Anthem. Today, that Star-Spangled Banner, along with the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, are on display just a short walk from here. They are America's treasures. And we must ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... to me by Mr. J., one of the commercial gentlemen, a private letter from Rio Janeiro, which had been lent him. After these delays, with full materials, I sprang to work—read, read, read; wonder, wonder, wonder; guess, guess, guess; scratch, scratch, scratch; and scribble, scribble, scribble, make the only transcript I can give of the operations which followed. At first, several of the other gentlemen in the room sat around me; but soon Mr. C., having settled the deaths and marriages, ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale

... look through a pile of correspondence, and to scribble in a large saffron-coloured diary. He went out to Mr. Mayer; Mr. Mayer came in to him; they called to each other from room to room. The machinery stopped beneath and started again. A horse fell down in the yard, and Stanway, watching from ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett

... Egbert; "well, let's collaborate on this letter of thanks and get it done. I'll dictate, and you can scribble it down. 'Dear Mrs. Froplinson—thank you and your husband so much for the very pretty calendar you sent us. It was very good of you to ...
— Beasts and Super-Beasts • Saki

... irrepressible joyous sense of superiority is flavoured with pity for their sisters lying low and pale. You see, the fiddles are on the table, and even with these you have to hang on to your cup occasionally. The fiddle makes such a comfortable rest for my elbows, so I scribble this on the back of the breakfast menu (no one wants it) without being seen. I remember that neither the position nor the occupation were allowed in the nursery, and I hear of people to-day in quite good society so dead to art that they will not allow you to draw on ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch

... hyenas. And a few yards away were the rifle that would have put him out of his misery, and the water-bottle that would have alleviated his pain—to the extent, at any rate, of enabling him to think clearly and perhaps scribble a few words in blood or something, somehow, for Lucille ... Lucille! Would the All-Merciful let him see her once again for a moment in return for an extra thousand years of Hell or whatever it was that unhappy mortals got as a continuation of the joys of this gay ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren

... and told me to burn it if not yet despatched. She is forever speaking of it, and saying that it will kill you. Do not delay your departure for an instant if you wish to see the angel before she leaves us. Pray excuse this scribble, but I have not slept now for three nights. You know how much ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy

... sour his disposition even more, rough and bad as it had formerly been. They would purposely hand him the papers upside down to see his efforts to read them, and wherever he found a blank space he would scribble a lot of pothooks which rather fitly passed for his signature. The natives mocked while they paid him. He swallowed his pride and made the collections, but was in such a state of mind that he had no respect for any one. He even came to have some ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal

... the vacuity about it he fills with grotesques, which are odd fantastic figures without any grace but what they derive from their variety, and the extravagance of their shapes. And in truth, what are these things I scribble, other than grotesques and monstrous bodies, made of various parts, without any certain figure, or any other than ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... other time." They were sitting near a table where a pencil and some loose leaves of paper lay. He pulled his chair a little closer, and, with the child still upon his knee, began to scribble and sketch at random. "Ah, there's San Miniato," he said, with a glance from the window. "Must get its outline in. You've heard how there came to be a church up there? No? Well, it shows the sort of man San Miniato really was. He was one of the early Christians, and he gave the ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells

... but now my decaying memory and enfeebled brain have made me almost incapable of work, and I have nothing to tell of but treacheries, perfidies, and torturing memories. The walls around me have ears; I am encompassed by spies and vigilant enemies. Racked with anxiety and fear, I scribble page after page without revising them. An ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various

... unnecessary to write, expecting to see her; or that the illness having passed, Miss Gailey, busy, had put off writing. She could not dismiss a vision of a boarding-house in London upset from top to bottom by the grave illness of one person in it, and a distracted landlady who had not a moment even to scribble a post card. And all the time, as this vision tore and desolated her, she was thinking: "Fancy that child having a follower, at her age! She's certainly got ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett

... "Air you a-goin' t' scribble that there three thou-san' on a piece o' paper?" inquired Uncle Billy, sitting bolt upright. "Ef you air a-figgerin' on that, Mr. Kamp, jis' you save yore time. I give a man four dollars fer one o' them check things oncet, an' I owe myself ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various

... his heart ached. Such darkness seemed gathered round his happiness. He heard Big Ben chime "Three" above the traffic. The sound moved something in him, and, taking out a piece of paper, he began to scribble on it with a pencil. He had jotted a stanza, and was searching the grass for another verse, when something hard touched his shoulder-a green parasol. There above ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... that scintillating line: "A scribble of God's finger in the sky"; and an admonition to the preacher: "Thou art God's minister, not ...
— Giant Hours With Poet Preachers • William L. Stidger

... to toil on at my hack-writing, only praying that I might be let alone to scribble in peace, and often thinking, sadly, how little my friends in Harley-street could guess at the painful experience, the doubts, the struggles, the bitter cares, which went to the making of the poetry which ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al

... their names on the frescoes. We found one name "Battista," with the date "1485" against it. It is a mistake to hold that the English scribble their names about more than other people. The Italians like doing this just as well as we do. Let the reader go to Varallo, for example, and note the names scratched up from the beginning of the ...
— Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler



Words linked to "Scribble" :   write, drawing, script, squiggle, chicken scratch, handwriting, hand



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