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More "Joker" Quotes from Famous Books



... the words broke the spell of supernatural terror which had hung over Andy; he knew, by the words of the speaker, it was the bully joker of the election was present, who browbeat O'Grady and out-quibbled the agent about the oath of allegiance; and the voice of the other he soon recognised for that of Larry Hogan. So now his giants were diminished into mortal men—the pot, which had been mentioned to the terror ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... hardly the way to speak of an Honorary Canon who expects to become a bishop, if his father-in-law lives long enough to get into another Cabinet. Then, for one thing, Jimmy won't propose for some time yet, not until Vera has been away and come back again; and when they are engaged what can the old joker, as you call him, ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt

... a verse on that extremely stylish person Who insists upon the hat of emerald hue; I have made a lot of fun of things that honestly were none of My blanked business—and I knew that it was true. At the shameless subway smoker I have been a ceaseless joker—— For that nuisance daily gets me in a huff— But the one that makes me maddest is that pestilential faddist Who is carrying ...
— Tobogganing On Parnassus • Franklin P. Adams

... horse trader, who stops over to rest his stock, and learns their trouble. He tells 'em to quit their worry; that he's a notary public and can perform a marriage as good as any Baptist preacher they ever saw. I never been able to make out whether he was crazy or just a witty, practical joker. Anyway, he married the pair with something like suitable words, wouldn't take a cent for it, and gave 'em a paper saying he had performed the deed. It had a seal on it showing he was a genuine notary public, ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson

... Gay Young Joker, A George Francis the Ubiquitous Glimpses of Fortune Gossip in a School-house Good for Something Better Gravestones For Sale Grant's Blackbird pie Greeley's Aid to Literary Effort Greeley on Bailey Great Canal Enterprise, The Great African Tea Company, ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 26, September 24, 1870 • Various

... laughed again. "You can't always tell when Putney's joking; he's a great joker. Perhaps he ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells

... Of course it would be better to trip him up on this case, but if you can get hold of something else Luke has done that can be proved anyways shady it would be four aces and the joker. Luke would have to pull in his horns about this mortgage. And if I know Luke, he'd do it. He's got nerve, but it ain't cold enough nor witless enough to go ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White

... was a frolicsome fat person. And she was a great joker. The joke that she loved most was this: she loved to bump into people that were flying through the air—to bump into them and knock them, ...
— The Tale of Mrs. Ladybug • Arthur Scott Bailey

... got our attention completely fixed upon this here floating joker, the real sub might have sneaked up within range and sent us a lover's note in the ...
— Navy Boys Behind the Big Guns - Sinking the German U-Boats • Halsey Davidson

... they ain't got enny pistols. He's got one, an' shows 'em how straight he shoots, jest in case there should be enny trubble between 'em. Plays both ends to the middle, does Carlsen. Slick! But he ain't won the pot. They's a joker in this game. Mebbe ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn

... having disposed of the joker, paid no further attention to him, caring naught whether he swam or was drowned. The lesson was one that he would not forget, and produced a salutary effect upon the rest of the multitude. They instantly fell back so far that Bippo, finding he had not been seriously ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis

... he's been telling lies," said Daly. "The fellow will have his joke. Never saw such a joker in ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed

... bow to your superiority," replied Corentin, assuming the air of a professional joker, as if he said, "If you mean humbug, by all means humbug! I have everything at my command, while you are single-handed, ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac

... "we are talking about Grace Noir. You say you don't want her; you've already drawn yourself out. That leaves her to poor Bob—he'll have to take her, unless the Joker gets the lady—the Joker is named the Devil...So the game isn't interesting any more." She threw down all the cards, and looked up, beaming. "My! but I'm ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis

... little coachman, as he was called, on account of his small size, in spite of his years, which were not few. He was a tiny scrap of a man, nimble, snub-nosed, curly-haired, with a perennial smile on his infantile countenance, and little, mouse-like eyes. He was a great joker and buffoon; he was able to acquire any trick; he set off fireworks, snakes, played all card-games, galloped his horse while standing erect on it, flew higher than any one else in the swing, and even knew how to present Chinese shadows. There was no one who could amuse children ...
— A Reckless Character - And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... most part base characters, much detested by the people. Flambard, or Firebrand, whom the late King had made Bishop of Durham, of all things in the world, Henry imprisoned in the Tower; but Firebrand was a great joker and a jolly companion, and made himself so popular with his guards that they pretended to know nothing about a long rope that was sent into his prison at the bottom of a deep flagon of wine. The guards took the wine, and Firebrand took the rope; with which, when ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens

... arrange all that. In a little time diamonds and dowry will take an airing, and they have need of it; to think of them as always in the same strong boxes! 'Tis against the laws of circulation. What a joker he is!—He sets you up as a young man of means. He is so kind, he talks so finely, the heiress comes in, the trick is done, and we all cry shares! The money will have been well earned. You see we have been here six months. Haven't we put on the look of idiots! Everybody in the neighborhood takes ...
— Vautrin • Honore de Balzac

... strictly true. The introduction of Sam Weller had, to begin with, some merely accidental and superficial effects. When Samuel Weller had appeared, Samuel Pickwick was no longer the chief farcical character. Weller became the joker and Pickwick in some sense the butt of his jokes. Thus it was obvious that the more simple, solemn, and really respectable this butt could be made the better. Mr. Pickwick had been the figure capering before the footlights. But with the advent of Sam, Mr. Pickwick had become a sort of black background ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton

... importunate demand for accommodation. For my part, I do not know which is the less desirable, the tenant or the tenement There are dogs that submit to be kissed by women base enough to kiss them; but they have a secret, coarse revenge. For the dog is a joker, withal, gifted with as much humor as is consistent ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce

... this space joker, Sinclair," commented Connel, "was the way he had everyone fooled. I couldn't figure out how he was able to get around so quickly until I learned about ...
— The Revolt on Venus • Carey Rockwell

... bandages and a plentiful application of tarwater had made him, in three days, able to use his leg as well as ever. While this communication was under grave discussion—it must be remembered that many then thought tarwater had extraordinary remedial properties—the joker contrived that a second letter should be delivered, which stated that the writer had forgotten, in his previous communication, to mention that the leg was a wooden leg! Horace Walpole told this story, I suppose for the first time; ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan

... this she instantly replied, with an explosive laugh, "He says that if he did it was all blown out of him!" I will only comment on this reply, that it was quite in accordance with the character of my brother to joke on the most serious subjects—he was an inveterate joker. ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James

... revenue officers in the Sussex humour. To be confounded by too swift a horse or too agile a "runner" was all in the night's work; but to be hoodwinked and bamboozled by the deliberate stealthy southern fun must have been eternally galling. The Sussex joker grinds slowly and exceeding small; but the flour is his. "There was Nick Cossum the blacksmith [the words are a shepherd's, talking to Mr. Lower]; he was a sad plague to them. Once he made an exciseman run several miles after him, to take away a keg of yeast he was a-carrying ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas

... named Halsey, a practical joker, and one of the most disagreeable of his class. He would remain broad awake for a year at a time, for no other purpose than to break other people of their natural rest. And I must admit that from the wreck of his faculties upon the rock of insomnia he had somehow ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)

... irresistible command to drink, the alarm clock to one accustomed to it an equally imperative and not-to-be-disregarded order to arise. The story of the old veteran who was carrying home his dinner and who dropped his hands to his side and his dinner to the gutter when a practical joker called "Attention"; the pathetic plight of the superannuated business man who is totally at a loss away from his familiar duties, are often quoted illustrations of how completely habit may determine ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman

... Burton translates, "these accurseds," reading melaa'n (pl. of melaoun, accursed); but the word in the text is plainly mulaa'bein (objective dual of mulaa'b, a trickster, malicious joker, hence, by ...
— Alaeddin and the Enchanted Lamp • John Payne

... York Legislature passed an act, in 1892, which apparently limited the working hours of railroad employees to ten a day. There was a gleam of sunshine, but lo! when the act was critically examined after it had become a law, it was found that a "little joker" had been sneaked into its mass of lawyers' terminology. The surreptitious clause ran to this effect: That railroad companies were permitted to exact from their employees overtime work for extra compensation. This practically made the ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers

... for some dry sort of joker, whose jokes, he being a customer, it might be as well to appreciate, "he, he! You understand well enough, sir. Take this seat, sir," laying his hand on a great stuffed chair, high-backed and high-armed, ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville

... what the Governor was. But they were not able to score. They made several efforts, but the Governor defeated these efforts without any trouble and went on smiling his pleasant smile as if nothing had happened. Finally the joker chiefs of Carson City and Virginia City conspired together to see if their combined talent couldn't win a victory, for the jokers were getting into a very uncomfortable place: the people were laughing ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain

... status (from stare, to stand). The scene in the car recalls moreover the joke in a story which often used to occur to T. "A lady invited to a reception, where there were also young girls, a Hungarian [accentuated now, on account of what follows] (the typical Vienna joker), who is feared on account of his racy wit. She enjoined him at the same time, in view of the presence of the girls, not to treat them to any of his spicy jests. The Hungarian agreed and appeared ...
— Hidden Symbolism of Alchemy and the Occult Arts • Herbert Silberer

... yourself in my place. Even if were a man sick for adventures, how could I listen seriously to such an insane proposition as this? What do I know about you, or your past record? You may be a practical joker, or you may have come out of a madhouse—I know nothing about it. If you claim to be an exceptional man, and want my cooperation, you must ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay

... merry fellow, and a merry fellow was never yet a respectable man. Indiscriminate familiarity either offends your superiors, or else dubs you their dependent and led captain. It gives your inferiors just, but troublesome and improper claims to equality. A joker is near a-kin to a buffoon; and neither of them is the least ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore

... run across the subject of Protection. The very same figures have an ugly way of proving both sides of a question. You run down a fact, and think you've got it, but, before you know it, it has slipped, like the "little joker," over ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 9, May 28, 1870 • Various

... Beaumanoir. "There was a deuce of a shindy when three fat johnnies tried to pull me out of my compartment. I told 'em I didn't give a tinker's continental for their bally frontier, and then the band played. I slung one joker through the window. Good job it was open, or he might ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy

... his death, this simple Western attorney, who according to one party was a vulgar joker, and whom the doctrinaires among his own supporters accused of wanting every element of statesmanship, was the most absolute ruler in Christendom, and this solely by the hold his good-humored sagacity had laid on the hearts ...
— Our American Holidays: Lincoln's Birthday • Various

... Chicago. His opinion was that the coin is "of the rare mintage of Domitius Domitianus, Emperor in Egypt." As to its discovery in an Illinois mound, Dr. Emerson disclaims responsibility. But what strikes me here is that a joker should not have been satisfied with an ordinary Roman coin. Where did he get a rare coin, and why was it not missed from some collection? I have looked over numismatic journals enough to accept that the whereabouts of every rare coin in anyone's possession is known to coin-collectors. Seems ...
— The Book of the Damned • Charles Fort

... the grounds, assisted by his entire force of uniformed men. He evidently did not intend that any boy, with a mind that turned to practical joking, should have a chance to exercise his evil propensities unchecked. Should such a thing be attempted the joker would find himself up against a snag immediately; and, as those posters announced, he was going to be harshly dealt with up to the "extreme penalty of ...
— The Chums of Scranton High on the Cinder Path • Donald Ferguson

... a little inclined to think that Josh would have backslid if he hadn't been a practical joker, and a critter of that breed is about as afraid of a laugh on himself as a raw colt of a steam roller. So he stuck it out, and began to take an interest in meal time. Kicked because it didn't come eight or ten times a day. The first thing he knew he had fatted up till he filled out ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer

... in his chair. His eyes blinked wearily. He'd spent hours going over the facsimile-transmitted contract with Joint Networks, and had weeded out a total of six joker-stipulations. He was very tired. ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... grimly. Yet had he told the entire truth he would have said he had administered such a beating to the practical joker, upon learning where he had sent Bob, as Fairfax had never seen given by one man ...
— Bob Chester's Grit - From Ranch to Riches • Frank V. Webster

... one come to town, but I don't know whether he be friend or foe, Delany: But, however, if he be come, bring him down, and you shall go back in a fortnight, for I know there's no delaying ye. O! I forgot too: I believe there may be one more, I mean that great fat joker, friend Helsham, he That wrote the prologue,[3] and if you stay with him, depend on't, in the end, he'll sham ye. Bring down Longshanks Jim[4] too; but, now I think on't, he's not yet come from Courtown,[5] I fancy; For I heard, a month ago, that he was down there a-courting sly Nancy. ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... concerned; and there are those, too, who are so completely busied with either the consciousness of being noticed, or the hope of being noticed, or the hatred of it, that they take note of nothing else. Fifth Avenue expressions are a filling meal for the prowling lonely joker; but what will most satisfy his cannibal appetite is the passage of the self-conscious men and women. For here, on a good day, he cannot fail to relish some extreme cases of their whimsical disease: fledgling young men making believe to be haughty to cover ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington

... a chap came racing past me on a horse they called 'The Quiver', And said he, 'My country joker, are you going to give it best? Are you frightened of the fences? does their stoutness make you shiver? Have they come to breeding cowards by the side of Snowy River? Are there riders on Monaro? ——' but I never heard ...
— The Man from Snowy River • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson

... Corrigan, he was joker to the college of the Sorebones (* Sorbonne) in Paris; he got as much education as enabled him to say mass in Latin, and to beg oats ...
— The Ned M'Keown Stories - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton

... Person in the Ship.* (* This history of Mr. Orton's misadventure is omitted from the Admiralty copy. It is an illustration of the times to note that the fact of Orton having got drunk does not seem to call for the Captain's severe censure. In these days, though the practical joker receives punishment, the drunkard would certainly come in for a large ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook

... spasmodic nervous power, quite dazzle and stun us. But this restless gaiety too often grows fatiguing, as the rollicking fun begins to pall upon us, as the jokes ring hollow, and the wit gets stale by incessant reiteration. We know how much in real life we get to hate the joker who does not know when to stop, who repeats his jests, and forces the laugh when it does not flow freely. Something of the kind the most devoted of Dickens's readers feel when they take in too much at one time. None but the very greatest can maintain ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison

... The habit of material trust is too strong for us. Kings, queens, presidents, princes, prime ministers, congresses, parliaments, and all other representatives of material strength, may repeat for formal use the conventional clause; but there is always what we flippantly know as a "joker" in the lip-recitation. "Kingdom, power, and glory," we can hear ourselves saying in a heart-aside, "lie in money, guns, commerce, and police. God is not sufficiently a force in the affairs of this world for us to give Him more ...
— The Conquest of Fear • Basil King

... conclusion was that Luck had dealt him the most remarkable card in the deck, and that for years he had overlooked it. Love was the card, and it beat them all. Love was the king card of trumps, the fifth ace, the joker in a game of tenderfoot poker. It was the card of cards, and play it he would, to the limit, when the opening came. He could not see that opening yet. The present game would have to play to some ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London

... unseen joker announced that he could find his way through the fog all right, but was afraid he had not strength enough to push his boat ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... to which one would probably be so favored. Amzi had fluted in the Schumann Quartette, devoted to chamber music, but his asthma had broken up the club, and he now rarely essayed the instrument. Still, Amzi loved his joke, and Nan was a joker. So it was clear that either Kirkwood or Montgomery might with propriety marry either Rose or Nan. Whenever a drought seemed imminent in ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson

... wasn't accustomed to taking orders from some joker that barged in and shot an unauthorized landing. He was the one who should be giving the orders. He started to ...
— The Best Made Plans • Everett B. Cole

... chosen EVERY MAN IN HIS HUMOUR, with special regard to the singleness and individuality of the "humours" portrayed in it; and our company included the leaders of a journal then in its earliest years, but already not more renowned as the most successful joker of jokes yet known in England, than famous for that exclusive use of its laughter and satire for objects the highest or most harmless which makes it still so enjoyable a companion to mirth-loving right-minded men. Maclise took earnest part with ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... which he had allowed to grow since the war, spread like a fan over his chest, and gave him a look of Henri IV. I knew that this formidable exterior concealed the merriest companion and the most delightful sly joker that ever lived. So I was not much impressed by his thoughtful brow ...
— In the Field (1914-1915) - The Impressions of an Officer of Light Cavalry • Marcel Dupont

... "Isn't he a joker, that officer! One, two—get out of the way," cried a colossal grenadier. "No, you won't, hey! ...
— Adieu • Honore de Balzac

... "I see you're a joker," he said. "And it really seems a pity," he went on, "that a bright young fellow like you shouldn't wear the finest clothes to be had anywhere. If you'll come to my shop I'll make you a suit such as you never saw before in ...
— The Tale of Brownie Beaver • Arthur Scott Bailey

... our joker referred, had been in the village only about a year, and, in that time, had succeeded in making but a small practice. Not that he was wanting in ability; but he lacked address. In person, he was rather awkward; and, ...
— The Last Penny and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur

... the Juggler, the little Joker. Muensterberg has sufficiently revealed the variety-stage, "the Subconscious," and his biography of the various individual players and troupes is very elaborate. They are, one and all, Suggestions. And suggestion is the "Juggler," and the ...
— The New Avatar and The Destiny of the Soul - The Findings of Natural Science Reduced to Practical Studies - in Psychology • Jirah D. Buck

... and I believe, as you do, that they will take it a little better if we also agree to pay this year's taxes on the land they put under the mortgage. It would be a great sweetener to some of them, and I can slip in an option to sell the land to us outright as a kind of a joker in small type." His brassy eyes were small and beady as his brain worked out the details of his plan. He put his hands affectionately on General Hendricks' shoulders as he added, "You mustn't forget to write to Bob, General; ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White

... what I have expended in saving George from being turned loose upon the world without education, I suppose it is a joke. Ha! ha! ha! I never thought of laughing at it before, but now I will. I always heard that you were a joker, Sir Lionel. Ha! ha! ha! I dare say you have laughed at ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope

... by a practical joker, he would be made to look ridiculous in the eyes of all who were in the secret. And that thought brought him back to the question which over and over he asked in his mind. Who could have written the ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... ticket, pals!" cried the Chourineur, addressing those prisoners who ranged themselves on his side; "you have hearts; you will not see a man murdered who is half dead; only cowards are capable of such conduct. Skeleton is no bad joker; he is condemned in advance; that is the reason why he urges you on. But if you aid him to kill Germain, you will be roughly treated. Besides, I have a proposition to make. Skeleton wants to finish this young man. Well! let him come and take him, if he can: it will be a match between ourselves; ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue

... peers at people as Vidocq might, to see if they are not thieves. If a lover, a thief, or you—I make no comparisons—could get the better of this first wicket, well, in the first hall, which is shut by a glazed door, you would run across a butler surrounded by lackeys, an old joker more savage and surly even than the porter. If any one gets past the porter's lodge, my butler comes out, waits for you at the entrance, and puts you through a cross-examination like a criminal. That has happened to ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac

... continually loaded with shot, under the direction of one Mr. Hatchway, who had one of his legs shot away while he acted as lieutenant on board the commodore's ship; and now, being on half-pay, lives with him as his companion. The lieutenant is a very brave man, a great joker, and, as the saying is, hath got the length of his commander's foot—though he has another favourite in the house called Tom Pipes, that was his boatswain's mate, and now keeps the servants in order. Tom is a man of few words, ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... naive, Lieutenant. Whoever does it, is going to need little integrity. You don't win in a sharper's card game by playing your cards honestly. The biggest sharper wins. We've just found a joker somebody dropped on the floor; if we ...
— Medal of Honor • Dallas McCord Reynolds

... gentleman of about forty, pausing at the door in the attitude of an awkward harlequin. This was Mr. Hardy, whom we have before described, on the authority of Mrs. Stubbs, as 'the funny gentleman.' He was an Astley-Cooperish Joe Miller—a practical joker, immensely popular with married ladies, and a general favourite with young men. He was always engaged in some pleasure excursion or other, and delighted in getting somebody into a scrape on such occasions. He could sing comic songs, ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... as much hurt and surprised at this long silence as poor Lady Dillaway herself: it was most mysterious, inexplicable. The only letter they had received ever since they had left home was one—only one, from John, which had frightened them exceedingly. Some practical joker (the bridesmaid's brother was suspected), by way of giving Maria a present on her approaching wedding, as it would seem, had cleverly imitated her father's hand-writing, and—that letter was a forgery! to every body's great ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... disappeared. It was impossible for the most skilled ear to pick up the thread of the musical idea, or even to imagine that there was one. Fantastic instrumentations, humoristic sallies became grotesque through the coarseness of the execution. It was lamentably stupid, the work of an idiot, of a joker who knew nothing of music. Christophe tore his hair. He tried to interrupt, but the friend who was with him held him back, assuring him that the Herr Kapellmeister must surely see the faults of the execution and would put everything ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland

... his mouth, has of late succeeded in his tricks. The affairs of this kind-hearted grocer are troubling him. Were we within a yard of that round-shouldered man from the country, we should smell leather; for he works on his bench, and is unmarried. Here comes an atheist who is a joker and stubborn as a mule. There goes a man of no business at all: very probably it is the best occupation he is fitted for, as he has no concentrativeness. The schoolmistress crossing the street is an accomplished ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various

... really want any honey. All he wanted to do was to play a joke on his friend, but it very often happens that the practical joker gets the worst of it in the end. And as Coonie stepped up to the hive and pretended to knock, he put his paw right down on top of the Queen Bee, whom he did not see sunning herself ...
— Hazel Squirrel and Other Stories • Howard B. Famous

... at Annan, who has the best end of the profit, and takes none of the risk, I should be well enough—as well as I want to be. Here is no lack of my best friend,'—touching his case-bottle;—'but, to tell you a secret, he and I have got so used to each other, I begin to think he is like a professed joker, that makes your sides sore with laughing if you see him but now and then; but if you take up house with him, he can only make your head stupid. But I warrant the old fellow is doing the best he can ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott

... proceeded to examine into the question. In the stillness of the night he made a business of patrolling that portion of the principal Government edifice, and, sure enough, the footsteps followed along behind him. He cornered them; it was surely some trickster! There was no possibility for the joker to get away. But, a moment later, the steps were heard in another part of the hall; they had evaded him successfully. Similar experiments were tried on other nights, but they all ended ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various

... each other in that way; but when they both straightened their faces the instant I saw them, and assumed a very innocent expression, then I began to suspect that they were up to some mischief: little did I dream what it was, though! Phil is a fearful practical joker; you never know where he's going to break out. I'm pretty bad, but he is ever so much worse; and Felix helps him ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus

... says Scraggs, still perfectly polite and uninterested. "'Have you?' says he, removin' his pipe and spitting carefully outdoors again. And then he slid the joker a'top of Smithy's play. 'Well, I have been a Mormon,' ...
— Mr. Scraggs • Henry Wallace Phillips

... argument is worth six positive ones; that it never pays to knock your competitor; that it's wise to fight shy of that joker ...
— Personality Plus - Some Experiences of Emma McChesney and Her Son, Jock • Edna Ferber

... You're clever, too, so of course you know what I mean as well as I know myself. Perhaps you thought I was being clever on the sly. But I'm above that. Haven't I always showed you my cards, trumps and joker ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... I was sayin', he was a queer old joker as arsted for the name of Snowdon. Shouldn't wonder if you see him ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing

... thought in politics, had agreed in threatening me with many ludicrous misadventures, and with sudden death in many surprising forms. Cold, wolves, robbers, above all the nocturnal practical joker, were daily and eloquently forced on my attention. Yet in these vaticinations, the true, patent danger was left out. Like Christian, it was from my pack I suffered by the way. Before telling my own mishaps, let me, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... it. But, Timothy, hearken to me," said the Grandfer earnestly. "Though known as such a joker, I be an understanding man if you catch me serious, and I am serious now. I can tell 'ee lots about the married couple. Yes, this morning at six o'clock they went up the country to do the job, and neither vell nor mark have been seen of 'em since, though ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy

... he wandered through a chaos of canyons and divides which did not yield themselves to any rational topographical plan. It was as if they had been flung there by some cosmic joker. In vain he sought for a creek or feeder that flowed truly south toward the McQuestion and the Stewart. Then came a mountain storm that blew a blizzard across the riff-raff of high and shallow divides. ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London

... man!" went on Mrs. Jane Jukes Jopp. "What practical joker ever lured you into appearing ...
— The Clicking of Cuthbert • P. G. Wodehouse

... sure that the voices that spoke to us last night were a subtle delusion, an emanation from our own bodies—or the work of a joker. My reason repels them ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland

... commercial traveller class are very bad, for their mirth is prepared; their jokes have run the length and breadth of the United Kingdom, and they are not always prepared to sacrifice the privilege of being coarse which used to be regarded as the joker's prerogative. In moving about the world I have always found that the society of the great commercial room set up for being jolly, but I could never exactly perceive where the jollity entered. Noise, sham gentility, the ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman

... Corrie, gravely, at the same time laying his hand impressively on his companion's arm, "I'm a tremendous joker—awful fond o' fun ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne

... turned towards the boatswain's mate and ordered him to pipe the men to dinner in a sharp tone; and he said to Mr Cheffinch, the gunnery lieutenant, when he crossed over the deck to go on board the old Blake to lunch, "He had me nicely there, like that other joker the chimney-sweeper. It must have been a planned thing between ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson

... muzzle of a large coast-defense cannon. Merriwell was astonished, though such a piece of recklessness was just like Danny. It was not that Frank feared any peril to Danny from the gun, but the officers and gunners would be indignant, no doubt, if they caught the little joker playing hide-and-seek in that way with one ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish

... king, queen, knave, jack, ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, trey, deuce; joker; trump, wild card. [card suits: list] spades, hearts, clubs, diamonds; major suit, minor suit. bower; right bower, left bower; dummy; jackpot; deck. [hands at poker: list] pair, two pair, three of a kind, straight, flush, full-house, four of a kind, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... string, until with pure apprehension of what Fontenette might presently do or say, my blood ran hot and cold. But Monsieur showed neither amusement nor annoyance, only a perfectly gracious endurance. Yet how could I know what instant his forbearance might give way, or what serpent's eggs the joker's inanities might in the next day or hour turn out to be, laid in the hot heart of the Creole gentleman? Then it was that this slender little German seamstress-wife shone forth like the first star ...
— Strong Hearts • George W. Cable

... he reflected. "But the girl was English, a thoroughbred, too. What was it he said? 'Work of the right sort, for a man with brains and pluck.' Well, I shall give this joker a call. If he wants me to tackle anything short of crime, I'm his man. Failing him, I shall see Jack to-morrow, when he is ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy

... but a step from the sublime to the ridiculous, it is not even a step from the absurd to the ludicrous and amusing. The professional wit or joker is never so richly amusing as the man who is utterly unconscious that he is in the least funny, while heroically in earnest. The professed comedian never furnishes so much amusement as the would-be heroic tragedian, who, like the Count Joannes, furnishes uproarious merriment ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, September 1887 - Volume 1, Number 8 • Various

... joker, and his statements were apt to be somewhat embellished by his vivid imagination, so that we accepted them with caution; but now he looked exultant, and we believed him, especially as he took his hat and stick ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller

... Pedgift Junior withdrew. "You mustn't bleed him, sir," whispered the incorrigible joker, as he passed the back of his father's chair. "Hot-water bottles to the soles of his feet, and a mustard plaster on the pit of his stomach—that's ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins

... afternoon." He stood up. "You and I break even, Barger, understand? Don't take me wrong. I'm not turning you loose entirely. You belong to me. Whenever I call for the joker, Matt, I ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels

... Ketchim, smiling pallidly, "the little joker that James inserted in the contract, about your getting fifty thousand in the event of a favorable report. I told him it didn't look well—but he said it would test you. He would be funny, though, no matter how serious the business. But you showed ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... his pupil, he turned to the priest, with intention to appeal to his determination; but the Jew pulled him by the sleeve with great eagerness, saying, "For the love of God, be quiet: the Capuchin will discover who we are." Joker, offended at this conjunction, echoed, "Who we are!" with great emphasis; and repeating nos poma natamus, asked ironically, to which of the tribes the Jew thought he belonged? The Levite, affronted at his comparing him to a ball of horse-dung, replied, with a most significant grin, "To the tribe ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... by an inveterate joker three hundred years ago, is justified curiously by any of our modern railways; but to see the picture represented in startling accuracy you should find some busy "junction" among the coal-mountains. Here you may observe, from your perch upon ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 31. October, 1873. • Various

... been within hearing distance, and the good priest was fast asleep in his chamber, the only reply he got was the echoes of his own bawlings. Mistaking the nature of the sounds, he came to the conclusion that the good priest had turned joker, and was trifling with his misfortunes. Losing his patience, then, he called his elbows into service, and succeeded after much perturbation in escaping feet-foremost from his shell. And as he stood erect upon his feet, a thousand queer fancies again crowded ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"

... Jos's elephant, Sambo!" cried the father. "Send to Exeter 'Change, Sambo"; but seeing Jos ready almost to cry with vexation, the old joker stopped his laughter, and said, holding out his hand to his son, "It's all fair on the Stock Exchange, Jos—and, Sambo, never mind the elephant, but give me and Mr. Jos a glass of Champagne. Boney himself hasn't got such in his cellar, ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray

... imprison those whom they know to be unable to pay them; one will answer, that his debtor once lived better than himself; another, that his wife looked above her neighbours, and his children went in silk clothes to the dancing-school; and another, that he pretended to be a joker and a wit. Some will reply, that if they were in debt, they should meet with the same treatment; some, that they owe no more than they can pay, and need therefore give no account of their actions. Some will confess their resolution, that their debtors shall rot in ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson

... I had gone, I suppose, and my brain had been very active the while, when something occurred to me which placed a new complexion upon this second summons. I thought of the falsity of the first, of the improbability of even the most hardened practical joker practising his wiles at one o'clock in the morning. I thought of our recent conversation; above all I thought of the girl who had delivered the message to Eltham, the girl whom he had described as a French maid—whose personal charm had so completely enlisted his sympathies. Now, ...
— The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer

... recollect, to pretend that he couldn't keep his teeth from chattering, whenever mention was made of an Alguazill in connexion with the adventures of Gil Blas; and I remember that when Gil Blas met the captain of the robbers in Madrid, this unlucky joker counterfeited such an ague of terror, that he was overheard by Mr. Creakle, who was prowling about the passage, and handsomely flogged for disorderly conduct in the bedroom. Whatever I had within me that was romantic and dreamy, was encouraged by so much story-telling in the dark; and ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... out of our own house by a practical joker?' said I. 'Why, we should have the whole ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle

... calls "an allegorical practical joker." But Chesterton gives a better description ...
— G. K. Chesterton, A Critical Study • Julius West

... "Ah, the joker!" exclaimed Michel Ardan. "He hopes! He is not quite sure! And he waits till we are encased to make this deplorable acknowledgment! I ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne

... Pompey was killed by a slave, Goliath smitten by a stripling. Pyrrhus died by the hand of a woman; tremble, thou great Gaul, from whose head an armed Minerva leaps forth in the hour of danger; tremble, thou scourge of God, a pleasant man is come out against thee, and thou shall be laid low by a joker of jokes, and he shall talk his pleasant talk against thee, and thou shall be ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury

... believe for a moment that Wyatt Gifford was dead, and although it was impossible not to be affected by the general uneasiness, he was disposed to be more angry than frightened. At Cambridge Gifford had been an incorrigible practical joker, and by no means had outgrown the habit; it would be like him to cut across the country in his evening clothes, board a cattle-train, and amuse himself touching up the picture of ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton

... of his death, this simple Western attorney, who, according to one party was a vulgar joker, and whom the doctrinaires among his own supporters accused of wanting every element of statesmanship, was the most absolute ruler in Christendom, and this solely by the hold his good-humored sagacity ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham

... now and began to protest. They said that this farce was the work of some abandoned joker, and was an insult to the whole community. Without a doubt these signatures were ...
— The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg • Mark Twain

... like many of his profession, something of a humorist and dry joker, "if that be the case, Mr. Saddletree, I think we have changed for the better; since we make our own harness, and only import our lawyers ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... cried the monkey, mournfully. "Now, do I look like a joker? I never made a joke in my ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam

... told her son. "She sends you her regards. And this Yegor Ivanovich is such a simple fellow, such a joker! He speaks so comically." ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky

... from sneering at genuine artists. Thus, to the interviewer, he referred to Stephane Mallarme as a "fumiste." No English word will render exactly this French slang; it may be roughly translated a practical joker with a trace of fraud. There may be, and there are, two opinions as to the permanent value of Mallarme's work, but there cannot be two informed and honest opinions as to his profound sincerity. It is indubitable that he had ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett

... frolicsome fat person. And she was a great joker. The joke that she loved most was this: she loved to bump into people that were flying through the air—to bump into them and knock them, spinning, upon ...
— The Tale of Mrs. Ladybug • Arthur Scott Bailey

... trusted in the hands of the agents of the British Court. Franklin was appointed Postmaster General. He had attained the age of sixty nine years. Notwithstanding his gravity of character and his great wisdom, he had unfortunately become an inveterate joker. He could not refrain from inserting, even in his most serious and earnest documents, some witticism, which men of the intensity of soul of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, felt to be out of place. Still the wisdom of his counsels invariably commanded respect. Upon learning of ...
— Benjamin Franklin, A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago - American Pioneers and Patriots Series • John S. C. Abbott

... snakes in the islands of the Indian Archipelago, and a Yankee skipper who lived a year among the natives informs us that he "once saw some arter a boa in Sumatra." The skipper, however, is a small joker, and always ready to Sacrifice Truth on the Alter Ego of a miserable pun. A vile habit this, but one that it is to be feared ...
— Punchinello, Vol.1, No. 12 , June 18,1870 • Various

... a joker that runs the world, and maybe the devil runs it. Anyhow it's a queer system. Here was Charlie Tavor, straight as a string, down and out. And here was Nute Hardman, so crooked that a fly couldn't light on him and stand level, ...
— The Sleuth of St. James's Square • Melville Davisson Post

... apprehended that a reserve party was about to carry off their baggage. They ran to secure it. The reserve party, however, galloped by, whooping and yelling in triumph and derision. The last of them proved to be their commander, the identical giant joker already mentioned. He was not cast in the stern poetical mold of fashionable Indian heroism, but on the contrary, was grievously given to vulgar jocularity. As he passed Mr. Stuart and his companions, he checked his horse, raised ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... bluff, bridge, bridge whist; lotto, monte, three-card monte, nap, penny-ante, poker, reversis^, squeezers, old maid, fright, beggar-my- neighbor; baccarat. [cards: list] ace, king, queen, knave, jack, ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, trey, deuce; joker; trump, wild card. [card suits: list] spades, hearts, clubs, diamonds; major suit, minor suit. bower; right bower, left bower; dummy; jackpot; deck. [hands at poker: list] pair, two pair, three of a kind, straight, flush, full-house, four of a kind, royal flush; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... listener chuckled, and the words broke the spell of supernatural terror which had hung over Andy; he knew, by the words of the speaker, it was the bully joker of the election was present, who browbeat O'Grady and out-quibbled the agent about the oath of allegiance; and the voice of the other he soon recognised for that of Larry Hogan. So now his giants were diminished into ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... cheerful as it was diverse. There were some officers on their way to rejoin their units, a bevy of tarts from Marseille, a rich Mahommedan merchant, returning from Mecca, some strolling players, a Montenegran prince, a great joker this, who did impersonations.... Not one of these people was sea-sick and they spent the time drinking champagne with the captain of the Zouave, a fat "Bon viveur" from Marseille, who had an establishment there and another ...
— Tartarin de Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet

... chair. His eyes blinked wearily. He'd spent hours going over the facsimile-transmitted contract with Joint Networks, and had weeded out a total of six joker-stipulations. He was very ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... "This joker did the same job we just finished," he continued. "He put the new gauge in place while his partner fished the old one out. Then he forgot that he had put the new gauge in place, uncapped mind you, and when they took off he ...
— The Thirst Quenchers • Rick Raphael

... Rondeauform ("Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, according to an old legend, in rondeau form"), op. 28.[173] Here his disdain is as yet only expressed by witty bantering, which scoffs at the world's conventions. This figure of Till, this devil of a joker, the legendary hero of Germany and Flanders, is little known with us in France. And so Strauss's music loses much of its point, for it claims to recall a series of adventures which we know nothing about—Till crossing the market place ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland

... Austrian name," he reflected. "But the girl was English, a thoroughbred, too. What was it he said? 'Work of the right sort, for a man with brains and pluck.' Well, I shall give this joker a call. If he wants me to tackle anything short of crime, I'm his man. Failing him, I shall see Jack to-morrow, ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy

... the poor butt suffer. On one occasion the kingly joker had a brace of bear cubs laid in Gundling's bed, and the drunken historian tossed in between them, with little heed of the danger to which he exposed the poor victim of his sport. On another occasion, when Gundling grew sullen and refused to leave his room, the king ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris

... this world of ours: Cause and effect are grim, relentless powers. They rule the world. (A king was shot last night. Last night I held the joker ...
— Songs of a Sourdough • Robert W. Service

... steed, the extreme distress of body thence resulting, make up a passage more moving than anything in Rabelais. The same contrast, between an innocent style of narrative and the huge palpable nonsense of the story told, marks the tale of the agricultural newspaper which Mr. Twain edited. To a joker of jokes of this sort, a tour through Palestine presented irresistible attractions. It is when we read of the "Innocents Abroad" that we discern the weak point of American humour when carried to its extreme. Here, indeed, ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang

... invectives that have been hurled since the beginning of literature against this loathly dirt-born insect, this living carrion, this blot on the Creator's reputation—and thereto add a few of my own. Lucian, the pleasant joker, takes the fly under his protection. He says, among other things, that "like an honest man, it is not ashamed to do in public what others only do in private." I must say, if we all followed the fly's example in this aspect, life would at last ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas

... seemed to be acting under the stress of violent emotion; he was talking to himself, and all that George could catch were the words "Oh, God!" Nor did he appear to know what he was doing, or where going; but stared, hesitated, moved like a man out of his mind; and from being merely a joker in search of amusement, George felt that he must see the ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... the design of a joker. But tread not on the domain of the scientist, for he will prove to you that each separate queerness is only a trick of nature to fit its owner to the necessities of his habitat. The parrot-fish are screamingly fantastic. There are not even ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien

... a legislature know about conditions up here?" demanded Flagg, with fury. "They loaf around in swing chairs and hearken to the first one who gets to 'em. They pass laws with a joker here and a trick there, and they don't know what the law is really about. You're stealing my water. By the gods! there's no law that allows a thief to operate. And if you've got a law that helps you steal I'll take my chance on keeping my own ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day

... To this she instantly replied, with an explosive laugh, "He says that if he did it was all blown out of him!" I will only comment on this reply, that it was quite in accordance with the character of my brother to joke on the most serious subjects—he was an inveterate joker. ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James

... work ruin. Sometimes, you know, we have a spell of hot weather in the late winter that fools the growing things into thinking spring has come, and the poor misguided plants begin to put out their leaves. Then, like a mischievous joker, old Winter comes back and nips the trusting little creatures. Cotton doesn't fancy that sort of joke. Nor does it like too much wet weather, for then the cotton gets damp and sodden and cannot be picked. Should ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett

... they got to one of these, as the resulting card had too little structural strength to avoid buckling inside the mechanism. Card punches could also jam trying to produce these things owing to power-supply problems. When some practical joker fed a lace card through the reader, you needed to clear the jam with a 'card knife' — which you used on the ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0

... pals!" cried the Chourineur, addressing those prisoners who ranged themselves on his side; "you have hearts; you will not see a man murdered who is half dead; only cowards are capable of such conduct. Skeleton is no bad joker; he is condemned in advance; that is the reason why he urges you on. But if you aid him to kill Germain, you will be roughly treated. Besides, I have a proposition to make. Skeleton wants to finish this young man. Well! let him come and ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue

... Morrison, of course! Of course, I know! How are you, Morrison? And, by the way, Where are you? What! You never mean to say You are down there yet? Well, by the Holy Poker! What are you doing there, you ancient joker? ...
— The Daughter of the Storage - And Other Things in Prose and Verse • William Dean Howells

... around for the joker and saw Padre Salvi, who was seated at the right of the Countess, turn as white as his napkin, while he stared at the mysterious words with bulging eyes. The scene of ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal

... accommodation. For my part, I do not know which is the less desirable, the tenant or the tenement There are dogs that submit to be kissed by women base enough to kiss them; but they have a secret, coarse revenge. For the dog is a joker, withal, gifted with as much humor as ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce

... Where's the joker? You, is it? Here's hot news You've brought us; all the valley's hissing aloud, And makes as much of you falling into it As a pail of water ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)

... "What a joker you be for a man that's had so much responsibility!" smiled Mrs. Tobin, after they had done laughing. "Ain't you never 'fraid, carryin' mail matter and such valuable stuff, that you'll be set on an' ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett

... with a chuckle; "you play a mighty safe game, don't you? You're not takin' any chances on the cards. I believe you reckon I've got the joker up my sleeve, hey? But you're wrong, 'cos me sleeves is rolled up. But you've got a tidy twist on ye for mutton, all the same, an' I reckon it's lucky for you I killed that staked ewe. Now, how d'ye like plain damper? Just see how ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson

... than slaughtering. They sat limply in their chairs, nervously twitching their yellowed slimy fingers, their dull eyes intent upon the worn spots in the carpet. It was funny! Even Carol smiled, not the serene sweet smile that melted hearts, but the grim hard smile of the joker when the tables are turned! She flattered herself that this wretched travesty on parsonage courtesy would be ended before there were any further witnesses to her downfall from her proud fine heights, but she was doomed to disappointment. Fairy, on the Averys' porch, had heard the serenade. After ...
— Prudence Says So • Ethel Hueston

... Some joker in the dear, dead days now virtually beyond recall won two-bit immortality by declaring that, "What this country needs is ...
— Lighter Than You Think • Nelson Bond

... corporal, an unpleasant-looking fellow, much disliked by Lennox and Dickenson for his smooth, servile ways, had grown so hollow-cheeked that he was always spoken of as the "Lantern," after being so dubbed by the joker ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn

... once, but, not being a gossip by nature, he thought nothing of this, and was intent only on pouncing out on them when they should reach a certain stone in the path. Truth constrains us to admit that our young friend, like many young folk of the present day, was a practical joker—yet it must also be said that he was not a very bad one, and, to his honour be it recorded, he never practised ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne

... amazing thing about this space joker, Sinclair," commented Connel, "was the way he had everyone fooled. I couldn't figure out how he was able to get around so quickly until I learned ...
— The Revolt on Venus • Carey Rockwell

... always a fee in it for him," was the answer. And then the joker had to dodge an olive and a pickle that Dave and Phil hurled at him, while all ...
— Dave Porter and His Rivals - or, The Chums and Foes of Oak Hall • Edward Stratemeyer

... was effective—though desperate. It was to suppress the inventor and his labor. They bought the sole rights from the inventor, promising him glittering royalties. The joker was that the invention was suppressed. None were ever manufactured. Hence there were no royalties and the corporations went on undisturbed while Brent and Balcom collected huge retainers for the ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey

... "The little joker wouldn't part with it at first—afraid of getting into more hot water ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey

... Mrs. Gifford at length, remembering that Hunt was a guest, forced a momentary, ghastly smile. Annie was looking melancholy enough before, but a slight compression of the lips indicated that she had received the full effect. Certain degrees of badness in jokes stamp the joker as a natural inferior in the eyes of even the most rabid of social levelers. Scarcely any possible exhibition of depravity gives quite the sickening sense of disappointment in the perpetrator imparted by a genuinely bad or stale ...
— Potts's Painless Cure - 1898 • Edward Bellamy

... Thomas grimly. Yet had he told the entire truth he would have said he had administered such a beating to the practical joker, upon learning where he had sent Bob, as Fairfax had never seen given by ...
— Bob Chester's Grit - From Ranch to Riches • Frank V. Webster

... face wore a scowl as he dragged himself forward on his sticks, whining at every step to indicate his suffering. As soon as they saw him they stopped talking, but suddenly his neighbor, Daddy Malivoire, a big joker, who knew all the little tricks and ways of people, began to yell, just as Cesaire used to do, by making ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... looked up with a grin. "I don't know what the old joker will say if you bring your scheme to ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt

... to keep his gravity, as he turned towards the boatswain's mate and ordered him to pipe the men to dinner in a sharp tone; and he said to Mr Cheffinch, the gunnery lieutenant, when he crossed over the deck to go on board the old Blake to lunch, "He had me nicely there, like that other joker the chimney-sweeper. It must have been a planned thing ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson

... Vargnes, the Examining Magistrate, was the exact opposite of a practical joker. He was dignity, staidness, correctness personified. As a sedate man, he was quite incapable of being guilty, even in his dreams, of anything resembling a practical joke, however remotely. I know nobody to whom he could be compared, unless it be the present president of the French Republic. I think ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Mystic-Humorous Stories • Various

... glee. Further, Black Sheep was then bound to repeat his lessons at bedtime to Harry, who generally succeeded in making him break down, and consoled him by gloomiest forebodings for the morrow. Harry was at once spy, practical joker, inquisitor, and Aunty Rosa's deputy executioner. He filled his many posts to admiration. From his actions, now that Uncle Harry was dead, there was no appeal. Black Sheep had not been permitted to keep any self-respect at school; at home he was of course utterly discredited, and grateful ...
— Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II • Rudyard Kipling

... many clubs—not to the hunters. An' he's found out they ain't got enny pistols. He's got one, an' shows 'em how straight he shoots, jest in case there should be enny trubble between 'em. Plays both ends to the middle, does Carlsen. Slick! But he ain't won the pot. They's a joker in this game. Mebbe he ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn

... of one Mr. Hatchway, who had one of his legs shot away while he acted as lieutenant on board the commodore's ship; and now, being on half-pay, lives with him as his companion. The lieutenant is a very brave man, a great joker, and, as the saying is, hath got the length of his commander's foot—though he has another favourite in the house called Tom Pipes, that was his boatswain's mate, and now keeps the servants in order. Tom is a man of few words, but an excellent hand at a song concerning the boatswain's whistle, hustle-cap, ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... Stevens, as Larry relaxed in relief. "Whoever this practical joker is, we will show him he is wasting his talents—even though it means carrying a supernumerary for ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various

... for a moment too bewildered to do anything. Christophe carried off his plate, thinking that he had finished his soup, so that when Goriot had pushed back his cap from his eyes his spoon encountered the table. Every one burst out laughing. "You are a disagreeable joker, sir," said the old man, "and if you take ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac

... profit, and takes none of the risk, I should be well enough—as well as I want to be. Here is no lack of my best friend,'—touching his case-bottle;—'but, to tell you a secret, he and I have got so used to each other, I begin to think he is like a professed joker, that makes your sides sore with laughing if you see him but now and then; but if you take up house with him, he can only make your head stupid. But I warrant the old fellow is doing the best he can for ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott

... Dubois was the joker of the regiment and everybody laughed. Even Leon smiled. He was feeling much better now and all the men except Earl returned to their holes. Jacques had been taken to the rear by the Red Cross to have ...
— Fighting in France • Ross Kay

... is closest around them is concerned; and there are those, too, who are so completely busied with either the consciousness of being noticed, or the hope of being noticed, or the hatred of it, that they take note of nothing else. Fifth Avenue expressions are a filling meal for the prowling lonely joker; but what will most satisfy his cannibal appetite is the passage of the self-conscious men and women. For here, on a good day, he cannot fail to relish some extreme cases of their whimsical disease: fledgling young ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington

... he said, his laugh lacking sincerity. "You're a bit of a joker, Mr. Tibbetts. Now, what do you say to this? This is Stivvins' Wharf and Warehouse. Came into the market on Saturday, and I bought it on Saturday. The only river frontage which is vacant between Greenwich and Gravesend. Stivvins, precious metal refiner, went broke in the War, as you may ...
— Bones in London • Edgar Wallace

... of you, Sir Charles Grandison: but I am quite mistaken in you: I expected to see a grave formal young man, his prim mouth set in plaits: But you are a joker; and a free man; a very free man, I ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson

... same, if we'd got our attention completely fixed upon this here floating joker, the real sub might have sneaked up within range and sent us a lover's note in the ...
— Navy Boys Behind the Big Guns - Sinking the German U-Boats • Halsey Davidson

... majesty's squadron has been augmented on the West India station. The brig 'Firefly,' corvettes 'Croaker' and 'Joker,' touched at Nassau, New Providence, on the 2d instant, bound to leeward. We also learn that the United States have fitted out a squadron of small vessels, called the Musquito Fleet, to search for the noted pirate Brand, who has ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise

... existence of the sororities, and therefore could not perceive the significance of the fact that certain girls were thus served while others went free, flew into a towering rage, and accused Peachy, whose reputation as a practical joker was not altogether undeserved, of having played the shameless "joke." Peachy, smarting with the injustice of the false charge, forgot herself and ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil

... minutes after that Heiny has my old seat, and I'm inside behind the ground-glass door, sittin' at a reg'lar roll-top, with a lot of file cases spread out, puzzlin' over this incorporation junk that makes the Fundin' Comp'ny the little joker in ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford

... you have made us!" cried Gabrielle. "You cruel joker; but we forgive you. Oh, you do not know—you can never know the service you have performed this day. Our lives would have been ruined had you not been here ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent

... joke was played upon Nicodemus a day or two later—he walked up the middle aisle of the village church, Sunday night, with a staring handbill pinned between his shoulders. The joker spent the remainder of the night, after church, in the cellar of a deserted house, and Nicodemus sat on the cellar door till toward breakfast-time to make sure that the prisoner remembered that if any noise was made, some rough treatment would ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... herself. Gradually she was learning that the way to rob Dolly's jokes and teasing tricks of their sting, and the best way, at the same time, to cure Dolly herself of her fondness for them, was never to let the joker know that they had had ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at Long Lake - Bessie King in Summer Camp • Jane L. Stewart

... To be confounded by too swift a horse or too agile a "runner" was all in the night's work; but to be hoodwinked and bamboozled by the deliberate stealthy southern fun must have been eternally galling. The Sussex joker grinds slowly and exceeding small; but the flour is his. "There was Nick Cossum the blacksmith [the words are a shepherd's, talking to Mr. Lower]; he was a sad plague to them. Once he made an exciseman run several miles after him, to take away a keg of yeast he ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas

... from becoming a "celebrity." Once he had received a passionate love letter, signed by "a lady of high degree, who deplored with tears of blood" the dividing difference of rank between them. It was transparently the coarse work of a practical joker; but Henke in his conceit believed in the high-born heiress, and this dream quite turned his head. He ever afterwards posed as a fine gentleman, ogled all the elegant women of the town, and had hardly a glance left for his wife. ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein

... my terms," said the landlady, when she came into the room. "Faith! an' I've got the pick o' the basket! Well, come along, my joker; we'll be off to the parson. But you'll take my arm all the way, d'ye see!—as is right an' nat'ral for bride and bridegroom. You ain't agoin' to give me the slip afore the knot's tied, I can tell you. Not if I ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang

... "Joker!" replied the old maid, "you know very well you settled that business last night; but you also know, of course, that her own inclinations incline ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... this "Post Office Jumble" card was also the cause of the puzzled postmen taking the trouble to decipher and deliver the far more amusing artistic jokes of that irrepressible joker, Mr. Linley Sambourne. By his permission I here publish a page, a selection of the envelopes he has sent ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss

... Preston. That pious man liked to have the talk mainly to himself, and he thought that anything not obscene was tame. By the way, these abrupt and insolent remarks are characteristic of public-house wit. A favourite joke is to ask a friend a serious question. When he fails to answer, then the joker shouts some totally irrelevant and indecent word, and the questioned man is regarded as "sold." I cannot repeat the interlude with which Billy Preston favoured us, but it was very spicy indeed, and referred to some of those sacred secrets ...
— The Chequers - Being the Natural History of a Public-House, Set Forth in - a Loafer's Diary • James Runciman

... Major Flint, with his bawlings and his sniffings, the least mysterious. He laid all his loud cards on the table, great hulking kings and aces. But Miss Mapp felt far from sure that Captain Puffin did not hold a joker which would some time come to light. The idea of being Mrs. Puffin was not so attractive as the other, but she occasionally gave it ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson

... Tory party is down the wind, not from political opinions, but from personal aversion to Canning. Perhaps his satirical temper has partly occasioned this; but I rather consider emulation as the source of it, the head and front of the offending. Croker no longer rhymes to joker. He has made a good coup, it is said, by securing Lord Hertford for the new administration. D.W. calls him their viper. After all, I cannot sympathise with that delicacy which throws up office, ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott

... and vulgarities of Philippe Bridau, and thus caused the breaking off of the marriage of this weather-beaten soldier with Mlle. Amelie de Soulanges. A talented cartoonist, distinguished practical joker, and recognized as one of the kings of bon mot, he led a free and easy life. He was on speaking terms with all the artists and all the lorettes of his day. Among others he knew the painter, Hippolyte Schinner. He turned a pretty penny, during the ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe

... meet two popular figures in Sicilian tales, whose jokes are repeated elsewhere as detached stories. One of these persons is Firrazzanu, the practical joker and knave, who is cunning enough to make others bear the penalty of his own boldness. In the story in Pitre (No. 156, var. 2) Firrazzanu's master wants a tailor for some work, and Firrazzanu tells him ...
— Italian Popular Tales • Thomas Frederick Crane

... What sort of a joker are you? Are you trying to put me in the wrong, when you have to answer to me for a crime that would make every honest man spit at you as you passed in the street if I were to ...
— Misalliance • George Bernard Shaw

... Hundreds of soldiers were idling about the station. They had no idea what was taking place. They thought either that the locomotive had been carried up the track to take on or leave a freight car, or that some practical joker was playing a prank. They showed their enjoyment of the situation by laughing and cheering loudly when Captain Fuller, followed by Engineer Cain and Mr. Murphy, started after the "General ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris

... present of as dandy an auto as rolls in France. I would have, too, but he simply wouldn't listen to me; told me he'd send it back freight if I did; and I had to believe him, though, it seemed unnatural. But they wouldn't let me go look at their blame trenches. I tried to get this General joker to pass me in, but he wouldn't fall for it. 'No, no,' he gurgles and splutters. 'A Benevolent Neutral in the trenches! Never do, never do. We'll have to put some new initials on the Mechanical Transport,' he says, 'B.N.M.T. ...
— Action Front • Boyd Cable (Ernest Andrew Ewart)

... little inclined to think that Josh would have backslid if he hadn't been a practical joker, and a critter of that breed is about as afraid of a laugh on himself as a raw colt of a steam roller. So he stuck it out, and began to take an interest in meal time. Kicked because it didn't come eight or ten times a day. The first thing ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer

... as merry with this notion as he pleases; a man not the best qualified for a joker, as not having the wit and sense of his country.[126] Let him say that a voluble round Deity is to him incomprehensible; yet he shall never dissuade me from a principle which he himself approves, for he is of opinion there are Gods when he allows ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... fact the Consumers' League's bill carried a "joker" which made its full enforcement practically impossible. The matter of inspection of stores was given over to the local boards of health, supposedly experts in matters of health and sanitation, but, as it proved, ignorant of industrial ...
— What eight million women want • Rheta Childe Dorr

... who was, like many of his profession, something of a humorist and dry joker, "if that be the case, Mr. Saddletree, I think we have changed for the better; since we make our own harness, and only import ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... active the while, when something occurred to me which placed a new complexion upon this second summons. I thought of the falsity of the first, of the improbability of even the most hardened practical joker practising his wiles at one o'clock in the morning. I thought of our recent conversation; above all I thought of the girl who had delivered the message to Eltham, the girl whom he had described as a French maid—whose ...
— The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer

... effect the mention of Ann's name had had. The General's expression from being interested and generous had grown suddenly obstinate and set. Tabs hurried on. "So I can understand Terry's preference. And yet, as you've owned, despite your advantages, I hold the winning card. I can joker all your aces by telling—well, the things to which you have referred." He leant forward across the table. "I don't want to have to tell. To do that I should have to make myself still more inferior to you than you ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson

... being presented for it; but since we, the forlorn, are not so happy to have that Aid, let my Antagonist, the Reformer, who, for all the gravity in some part of his Book, and the solid Piety he would insinuate in his Arguments, I perceive to be a Joker, and as full of Puns, Conundrums, Quibbles, Longinquipetites, and Tipiti-witchets, as the rest of us mortals, be pleas'd to take the length of my Weapon at that sport, for now I cannot help telling my Audience, which is the Town, that he has laid his reforming ...
— Essays on the Stage • Thomas D'Urfey and Bossuet

... Scraggs, still perfectly polite and uninterested. "'Have you?' says he, removin' his pipe and spitting carefully outdoors again. And then he slid the joker a'top of Smithy's play. 'Well, I have ...
— Mr. Scraggs • Henry Wallace Phillips

... Vautrin, will arrange all that. In a little time diamonds and dowry will take an airing, and they have need of it; to think of them as always in the same strong boxes! 'Tis against the laws of circulation. What a joker he is!—He sets you up as a young man of means. He is so kind, he talks so finely, the heiress comes in, the trick is done, and we all cry shares! The money will have been well earned. You see we have been here six months. Haven't we put on the look of idiots! Everybody ...
— Vautrin • Honore de Balzac

... figures can't lie; but look out for the exceptions when you run across the subject of Protection. The very same figures have an ugly way of proving both sides of a question. You run down a fact, and think you've got it, but, before you know it, it has slipped, like the "little joker," over ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 9, May 28, 1870 • Various

... devoted admirer, wife of a Vienna pianist, longed for a lock of the composer's outrageously unkempt hair, and asked a friend to get her one. At his suggestion, Beethoven, who was a practical joker of boorish capabilities, sent her a tuft from the chin of a goat. The trick was discovered, and the scorned woman vented her fury in a letter; the repentant Beethoven made ample apology to her, and spent his wrath on the head of ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes

... held four kings more than once," was the prompt reply; "but, your Highness, I never held four kings and the royal joker before." ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore

... in Miss Chase's room, she has but to touch the wire by her bed, and the communicating bell will ring close to me, so that I can fly to her rescue. I do not need to say that the practical joker will ...
— Dainty's Cruel Rivals - The Fatal Birthday • Mrs. Alex McVeigh Miller

... though a great joker on the peculiarities of Oldys, was far from insensible to the extraordinary acquisitions of the man. "His knowledge of English books has hardly been exceeded." Grose, too, was struck by the delicacy of honour, and the unswerving ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... day of his death, this simple Western attorney, who according to one party was a vulgar joker, and whom the doctrinaires among his own supporters accused of wanting every element of statesmanship, was the most absolute ruler in Christendom, and this solely by the hold his good-humored sagacity had laid on the hearts and understandings of his countrymen. Nor was this all, for it ...
— Our American Holidays: Lincoln's Birthday • Various

... mansion on the same site. The visitor at Kirk Ella, after paying his devoirs to the youthful Chatelain and Chatelaine, can admire at leisure Mr. Levey's numerous and expensive stud: "Lollypop", "Bismark," "Joker," "Jovial," "Tichborne," "Burgundy," "Catch-him-alivo," a crowd of fleet steeds, racing and trotting stock, surrounded by a yelping and frisky pack of "Peppers," "Mustards," "Carlos," "Guys," "Josephines," "Fidlers;" Mastiffs, French ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine

... another bucket of water," remarked Max; "and I'd advise our practical joker here to jump out of those wet duds and get into some ...
— With Trapper Jim in the North Woods • Lawrence J. Leslie

... to town, but I don't know whether he be friend or foe, Delany: But, however, if he be come, bring him down, and you shall go back in a fortnight, for I know there's no delaying ye. O! I forgot too: I believe there may be one more, I mean that great fat joker, friend Helsham, he That wrote the prologue,[3] and if you stay with him, depend on't, in the end, he'll sham ye. Bring down Longshanks Jim[4] too; but, now I think on't, he's not yet come from Courtown,[5] I fancy; For I heard, a month ago, that he was down there a-courting sly Nancy. ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... to the track like a Modoc on the war path. Before I had gone a half-mile I was overtaken by "That Jim Peasley," as he was called in Swan Creek, an incurable practical joker, loved and shunned by all who knew him. He asked me as he came up if I were "going to the show." Thinking it was best to dissemble, I told him I was, but said nothing of my intention to stop the performance; I thought it would be a lesson to That ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce

... in being large, corpulent, oily men, as well as inimitable jokers. Whether people grow fat by joking, or whether there is something in fat itself which predisposes to a joke, I have never been quite able to determine; but certain it is that a lean joker is a rara avis ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... might be, probably was, a blind, or the kidnappers, having touched there, might have departed in any direction—to Iceland, for what he knew. But the name, 'the Seven Hunters,' was not likely to have been invented by a practical joker in London. If not, the conspirators had really captured and kept to themselves Mr. Macrae's line of wireless communications. How could that have been done? Merton bitterly regretted that his general information did not ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang

... "The joker was not to be discerned; the mate therefore took no notice. Some one brought a pannikin of cold water, and after a little the man came to, by which time the watch below had returned to their hammocks, and the ...
— The Honour of the Flag • W. Clark Russell

... manager now lived in an atmosphere of Stygian gloom. Two of the most extensive purchasers of newspaper space, the Boston Store and the Triangle Store, had canceled their contracts immediately after the attack on the Pierces, through a "joker" clause inserted to afford such an opportunity. All the other department stores threatened to follow suit when the "Clarion" took up the cause ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... George!" said John. "It seems to me that I've fallen into a pretty soft thing here. There'll be a joker in the deck somewhere, I guess. There always is in these good things. But I don't see it yet. You can count me ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse

... must be stated that the cardinal of Ragusa had given her as a present an article, which this holy joker called in articulo mortis. It was a tiny glass bottle, no bigger than a bean, made at Venice, and containing a poison so subtle that by breaking it between the teeth death came instantly and painlessly. He had received it from Signora Tophana, the celebrated maker of poisons ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac

... "Some joker has been at that game before me," he announced. "A chunk of wire has been forced in there after the door ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy

... "You joker," cried Concha, smiling at her triumph. "You are as nice as can be but you are very perverse. Come here, ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... des Rameures said to the cure, "you were about to read us your sermon on superstition last Thursday, when you were interrupted by that joker who climbed the tree in order to hear you better. Now is the time to recompense us. Take this seat and we will ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet

... I never set up as a joker either," said the carpenter; "but about this 'ere head of mine, I allus reckoned it was more useful than ornamental. What did you mean was the matter with ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn

... night he made a business of patrolling that portion of the principal Government edifice, and, sure enough, the footsteps followed along behind him. He cornered them; it was surely some trickster! There was no possibility for the joker to get away. But, a moment later, the steps were heard in another part of the hall; they had evaded him successfully. Similar experiments were tried on other nights, but they all ended in ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various

... weights were seated round the tables. An audacious challenge which embraced them one and all, without regard to size or age, could hardly be regarded otherwise than as a joke—but it was a joke which might be a dear one for the joker. ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... little better if we also agree to pay this year's taxes on the land they put under the mortgage. It would be a great sweetener to some of them, and I can slip in an option to sell the land to us outright as a kind of a joker in small type." His brassy eyes were small and beady as his brain worked out the details of his plan. He put his hands affectionately on General Hendricks' shoulders as he added, "You mustn't forget to write to Bob, General; ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White

... it would be better to trip him up on this case, but if you can get hold of something else Luke has done that can be proved anyways shady it would be four aces and the joker. Luke would have to pull in his horns about this mortgage. And if I know Luke, he'd do it. He's got nerve, but it ain't cold enough nor witless enough to go ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White

... euchered him, Wallis. It was the old Little Joker; and there's another of the same ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various

... Music enlivened the hours for a time; but the fiddler was soon voted a bore, and silenced by some one pouring a pint of molasses into the f-holes of his instrument. The enraged musician completed the job by breaking it over the head of the joker. After several weeks, they put into Cape Town. Here the practical joker of the crew made himself famous by utterly routing an inquisitive old lady, who asked, "What do you do with your prisoners?" The grizzled old tar dropped his voice ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot

... as the sheerest humor, a sort of lunatic farce for the laughter of some cosmic joker. He swung the gunsights up towards the smiling face. Amusement bubbled in his blood and he heard himself laugh—heard it with a ...
— The Man Who Staked the Stars • Charles Dye

... hand or the other. But it was in neither. He must have left it back on his tray. Now he must return for it. He went as quickly as he could. The Montague girl was holding it up as he approached. "Here's the little joker, ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson

... No. 15, who assisted her husband to spend the French taxes. Was also a practical joker, her humor terminating at Versailles when she advised a mob to eat cake during a bread famine. Her wit was unappreciated. Ambition: Anything but October 16, 1791. Recreation: Versailles; looking through a grated window. Address: ...
— Who Was Who: 5000 B. C. to Date - Biographical Dictionary of the Famous and Those Who Wanted to Be • Anonymous

... introduction of Sam Weller had, to begin with, some merely accidental and superficial effects. When Samuel Weller had appeared, Samuel Pickwick was no longer the chief farcical character. Weller became the joker and Pickwick in some sense the butt of his jokes. Thus it was obvious that the more simple, solemn, and really respectable this butt could be made the better. Mr. Pickwick had been the figure capering before the footlights. But with the advent ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton

... man! that, with our species upon the edge of extermination or appalling degradation, with no clear prospect before us but the chance of a horrible death, we could sit following the chance of this painted pasteboard, and playing the "joker" with vivid delight. Afterwards he taught me poker, and I beat him at three tough chess games. When dark came we decided to take the ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells

... they were eager to try their arts on big game, and that was what the Governor was. But they were not able to score. They made several efforts, but the Governor defeated these efforts without any trouble and went on smiling his pleasant smile as if nothing had happened. Finally the joker chiefs of Carson City and Virginia City conspired together to see if their combined talent couldn't win a victory, for the jokers were getting into a very uncomfortable place: the people were laughing at them, instead of at ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain

... the Palais Royal, for mixed performances, tragedy, comedy, and opera. There Mlle. Mars commenced her career. The prosperity of the company dates from 1798, when the celebrated Brunet joined it. Brunet was the theatrical joker of his time; and all stray puns and witticisms, good, bad, and indifferent, were attributed to him as regularly as, at a later day, and in another country, they have, been fathered upon a Jekyll and a Rogers. Many of his jests had a political character, and got him into serious scrapes. This, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various









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