"Daft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in vain. Woe's me for lovers! Ah how many men * By nights and pine and passion low are lain! As though by stress of love they had been made * Morn-less and sleep-less by their pain and bane. When I went daft for him who conquered me * And pined for him who proved of proudest strain, My tears in streams down trickled and I cried * 'These long-linkt tears bind like an adamant-chain:' Grew concupiscence, severance long, and I * Lost Patience' hoards and grief waxed ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... dopy, daft, or what's the matter with you? Why, that man had a spring gun set, and it would have filled you full of shot ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish
... must have been clean daft to have trusted himself to one of those savage beasts of the country," said Mr. Buchanan. "And he was no so young either—about sixty, I should say. It didna look even respectable, I remember, when we met him the other day, careering over the country for all the world ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte
... be a writer; there could be no doubt about that. Everybody had noticed it. The Vicar had said, "Johnny will never do any good at Polwollop, I fear"; and the farmer for whom John scared rooks had said, "Thiccy la-ad seems daft-like," and one after another of Mrs. Penquarto's friends had given similar testimony. And now here he was, at twenty-six, in the little bed-sitting-room in Bloomsbury, ready to write the great novel which should take London by storm. ...
— The Sunny Side • A. A. Milne
... that woman's brother going to spend this money? Why, are you daft? See here! American cotton-spinning supremacy is built on cheap cotton; cheap cotton is built on cheap niggers. Educating, or rather trying to educate niggers, will make them restless and discontented—that is, scarce and dear as ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... hazardous than it naturally is. Doubtless the contesting of wills is a nuisance, generally speaking, the contestant conspicuously devoid of moral worth and the verdict singularly unrighteous; but as long as some testators really are daft, or subject to interested suasion, or wantonly sinful, they should be denied the power to stifle dissent by fining the luckless dissenter. The dead have too much to say in this world at the best, and it is monstrous and ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce
... Pittendurie, the marriage of Andrew Binnie and Sophy Traill was a fact beyond disputing. Some said "it was the right thing," and more said "it was the foolish thing," and among the latter was Andrew's mother; though as yet she had said it very cautiously to Andrew, whom she regarded as "clean daft and senselessly touchy about ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... somewhat suspicious of their recruit at first, but he went on industriously with his task, and made no attempt to communicate with anybody. They soon saw that he was an expert workman, and a quiet, innocent, half-daft, harmless creature, so he was given other things to do, such as cleaning up their rooms and going errands for beer ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... at it wi' their proverbs till I got akinda nervish, d'ye ken. They were that terriple wyze, that, as fac's ocht, mind you, they near drave some o' the rest o's daft. ...
— My Man Sandy • J. B. Salmond
... observed in the churches. The New Year, however, is still the national holiday, and January 1 a great day for visiting and feasting, the chief, in fact, of all festivals.{24} New Year's Day and its Eve are often called the "Daft Days"; cakes and pastry of all kinds are eaten, healths are drunk, and ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles
... astonishment. "So that's the kind Nick Grylls is!" he exclaimed. "He sure must have gone clean daft!" ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... is joost daft aboot her,' observed McIntosh, querulously; 'and she's ganging tae look all thro' the toun tae find the ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... younger of Germinie's sisters took her to the Rue Saint-Martin, to the house of a repairer of cashmere shawls, with whom she lodged, and who, being almost daft on the subject of religion, was banner-bearer in a sisterhood of the Virgin. She made her lie beside her on a mattress on the floor, and having her there under her hand all night, she vented upon her all her long-standing, venomous jealousy, her bitter resentment at the preference, the caresses ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... toaster, looking speculatively over her spectacles at her would-be helper. Here was another man gone daft, or apparently so. Then she ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... at her boy. "Ask her, then, Jamie; ask her, and give her the chance. She's a daft creature, but bonny; and ...
— Pirate Gold • Frederic Jesup Stimson
... "Are you a' daft, gentlemen? The lad came with Balmerino. He is no spy. Put up, put up, Chevalier! Don't glower at me like that, man! Hap-weel rap-weel, the lad shall have his chance to explain. I will see no man's ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... at the hunter where he lounged against the window, a figure straight and lithe as an Indian, not tall, but gifted with a pantherish grace, and breathing a certain tawny brightness as of sunshine through pine needles. "You're daft!" he said; then after ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... one to do it," she answered grimly. "And what's Penelope doing?" she continued, turning to Nan. "She's more sense than the rest of ye put together, for all she's so daft about music." ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... hands, and the waving barley-fields on the cliff tops shining against the sea and sky, as lights and shades change their places over a woman's hair. There were some decent bodies in the train beside me, that thought I was daft, with my head out of the window, in an awful draught, at the serious risk of brow-ague, not to speak of coal-smuts, which are horrid if ye get them in your eye. And not without reason did they think so, for I'll assure ye I would have been loth to swear ...
— We and the World, Part II. (of II.) - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... Mary seemed about half daft. She was waving aloft a copy of the Times, and scarce could speak for excitement. But she managed to point ...
— As We Sweep Through The Deep • Gordon Stables
... ye daft fule!" exclaimed Rose Cameron, in a rage. "Wha else suld I bide wi'? And noo, ye'll speer nae mair questions anent my ain preevit life, for I'll nae answer any sic. A woman maunna gie testimony in open coort against her ain husband, ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... ye'd be plum daft ef ye didn't stay away," remarked the Kentucky sheriff with a sharp and bellicose glance at his colleague from another state. "Virginny officers hain't got no power of arrest ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... I fairly stared at her, for I had thought that she could never have quite forgiven me for the way I used to carry on. That anyone out of a daft house could have liked it, was clean beyond my understanding. I thought of how when she was reading by the door I would go up on the moor with a hazel switch and fix little clay balls at the end of it, and sling them at her until I made her cry. And then I thought of how I ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... "Eh, what are the daft laddies saying now?" inquires the old lady, struggling hard to keep out of her voice the pride that shone in ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... 'Do not be so daft, Lord Malcolm,' replied the Squire, retaining his hold on the boy's bridle; 'what, rin your head into the wolf's mouth again, when we've barely brought ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... tell you, sir. You must have seen—at least—no, you were not there; but those looking on must have seen me get ahead of him within view of the starting-point; soon after that I lost sight of him. The river winds, you know; and of course I thought he was coming on behind me. Very daft of me, not to divine that the boat had ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... BELL: Does the daft beast fancy That just because he's in his own calfyard He can turn his horns on me? Michael, my son, You've got your way: and you're to be a herd. You never took to horseflesh like a Haggard: Yet your mother must do her best for you. A mattress Under a roof; and sheep to keep you ...
— Krindlesyke • Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
... result. The ladies of Pettybaw House said that the occurrence was as Fifish as anything that ever happened in Fife. The kingdom of Fife is noted, it seems, for its "doocots [dovecotes] and its daft lairds," and to be eccentric and Fifish are one and the same thing. Thereupon Francesca told Mr. Macdonald a story she heard in Edinburgh, to the effect that when a certain committee or council was quarreling as to ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... You've lost your senses and both gone clean daft! I've let you fight it out to the end o' the chapter To see how far the thing could go. Oho, ...
— Tartuffe • Jean-Baptiste Poquelin Moliere
... He just can't bear what's said about us any longer —and I don't wonder! He done his best, and so's we all. The public have just gone daft—in the West End, that is, to-day. As for the papers, well, they're something cruel—that's what they are. And the ridiculous ideas they print! You'd never believe the things they asks us to do—and ...
— The Lodger • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... Temple Camp sunset, Tommy old boy. You're going to like that fellow; he's a hundred per cent, white—only for his hair. He's got scouting on the brain—clean daft about it. He told me all about you and how he and his crew of kids were going to spend August here and make things lively. ...
— Tom Slade at Black Lake • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... of the race Esther walked through the streets like one daft, stupidly interested in the passers-by and the disputes that arose between the drivers of cabs and omnibuses. Now and then her thoughts collected, and it seemed to her impossible that the mare should win. If she did they would have L2,500, and would go to Egypt. But she could not imagine ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... "Art thou gone daft, sweetheart? The goods of which you gave the list this morning, which have but now come in on the Golden Horn," spake up Catherine, sharply. I marvelled as I heard her whether it be ease or tenderness of conscience which can appease a woman with the letter and ...
— The Heart's Highway - A Romance of Virginia in the Seventeeth Century • Mary E. Wilkins
... friend, who was as mad about old books and first editions, as he; a stuffy, elderly thing, who had never seen Lord Mountstuart's treasures before. As both were perfectly daft on the subject, they must have kept me lying there an hour, while they fussed about from one glass-protected book-case to another, murmuring admiration of Caxtons, or discussing the value of a Mazarin Bible, ...
— The Powers and Maxine • Charles Norris Williamson
... bargain he'll never be offered," retorted Wolverstone, and his earlier vehemence was as nothing to his vehemence now. "Ye're surely daft even to ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... who knew that, after all, he was the only carrier on the road, and that the vicarage was five miles from the necessaries of life; 'it's a bad job, and I's not goin' to say it isn't. But ya jest look 'ere, mum, what's a man to du wi' a daft thingamy like that, as caan't teak a plain order, and spiles a poor man's business ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... that's hamelike," she said, going closer, "it will be brave weather on Solwayside the noo. I mind when it would hae driven me out to play amang the wreaths like a daft year-auld collie—. Aye, and I am no sure that I wad not like a turn the noo—not o' that saft stuff that will melt and be gane the morn's mornin', but the fine kind that sifts up your sleeve and down your neck!—But for the puir herds on the hill, wae's ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... smilingly. "There's a heap more sense in being daft over a decent game like golf than in going crazy about football. ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... O my Father, don't kill me! I have but one child, Oh, have pity upon him! My poor boy is daft, Without wits the Lord made him, And sent him so into The world. He is crazy. Why, straight from the bath 390 He at once begins scratching; His drink he will try To pour into his laputs Instead of the jug. ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... Lewis was noisily affectionate and hopelessly clumsy; Jim could pull splendidly when he chose, but he was up to all the tricks of the trade and was extraordinarily cunning at pretending to pull; [Page 110] Spud was generally considered to be daft; Birdie evidently had been treated badly in his youth and remained distrustful and suspicious to the end; Kid was the most indefatigable worker in the team; Wolf's character possessed no redeeming point of any kind, while Brownie though a little ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... quotha—I wish the Duke of Argyle would pay his ain accounts—He is in a thousand punds Scots on thae very books when he was last at Roystoun—I'm no saying but he's a just nobleman, and that it's gude siller—but it wad drive ane daft to be confused wi' deukes and drakes, and thae distressed folk up-stairs, that's Jeanie Deans and her father. And then, putting the very callant that was sewing the curpel out o' the shop, to play wi' blackguards in the close—Sit still, neighbours, it's no that I mean to ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... the man daft. What on earth (I asked myself) was this nonsense about Sabugal and a barber's shop? I had not been near Sabugal; as for the barber's shop it sounded to me like a piece out of the childish rigmarole about cutting a cabbage leaf to ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... pulpit aboard that they were taking down to Mazatlan for some chapel or other, and this here pulpit was lashed on deck aft. Well, Billy had been most kinds of a fool in his life, and among others a play-actor; called himself Gaston Maundeville, and was clean daft on his knowledge of Shakespeare and his own power of interpretin' the hidden meanin' of the lines. I ain't never going to forgit the day he gave us Portia's speech. We were just under the tropic, and the day was a scorcher. There was mostly men folk aboard, and we lay around the deck in our pajamas, ...
— Blix • Frank Norris
... upon his brow. When I saw that I would have to keep him, I didna ken what name to gie him; but after consulting wi' my friends and the clergyman o' the parish, it was agreed that he should bear the surname o' wur family, and my faither's Christian name; so we called him Patrick Reed. But the daft awd wife came upon him one day amang the hills, and she pretended to look on his brow, and read the lines on his hand, and tald him, frae them, that Patrick Reed wasna his real name, but he would find it ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... haythen rubbish and cussing. The pore fule's daft wid the hate and the dust and the welt I give him. Shure it's the way I have to be sorry for ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... dear! my dear! ye'll think me daft to talk thus; but we men of Stair go gyte in these affairs. 'Tis love at first sight with us, or none at all; but if ye'll have me, I'll make ye Lady Stair; and what's far more, I'll try to make you a happy woman the rest of ...
— Nancy Stair - A Novel • Elinor Macartney Lane
... said the placable monarch; "the world goes daft, I think— sed semel insanivimus omnes—thou art my old and faithful servant, that is the truth; and, were't any thing for thy own behoof, man, thou shouldst not ask twice. But, troth, Steenie loves me so dearly, that he cares not that any one should ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... thought that his customer had indeed gone daft, and was beginning to repeat an old nursery rhyme ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... exclaimed, "tha wants tha young yed knocked off, Tummas Hibblethwaite. He's fair daft about th' young gentleman as—as was killed. He axes questions mony a day till I'd give him th' stick if he wasna a cripple. ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... come over you, Peter Roney?" she exclaimed. "Are you daft? Don't make such a noise! You'll wake the young ones, and I don't want them waked till need be, with no Christmas for 'em, ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... It's daft when chaps that sit i' Parliament Weant tak advice frae lads that talk farm-twang; If t' coontry goes to t' dogs, it's 'cause they've sent Ower mony city folk to ...
— Songs of the Ridings • F. W. Moorman
... ye," said Uncle William. "We'll row down and get the mail, and after that we'll plan about the boat. I ain't quite so daft as I look," he said half apologetically. "I've been turnin' it over in my mind whilst I've been doin' the kittens, and I've 'bout decided what to do. But fust, ...
— Uncle William - The Man Who Was Shif'less • Jennette Lee
... naturalist was in business at Louisville, early in the century; but in 1812, he failed in this venture, and moved to Henderson, where his neighbors thought him a trifle daft,—and certainly he was a ne'er-do-well, wandering around the woods, with hair hanging down on his shoulders, a far-away look in his eyes, and communing with the birds. In 1818, the botanist Rafinesque, on the first of his several tramps ...
— Afloat on the Ohio - An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo • Reuben Gold Thwaites
... in fact I never heard him laugh so hearty, and I got a thought hot about it; but he hadn't nothing much to say except I was well rid of Mr. Sweet. "A man like that," said Arthur, "was never meant to wed. Caution such as his in the home would mighty soon have drove you daft. And there's the makings of a tyrant in Gregory, by your own showing, for the man who resents freedom to his woman before marriage, may very like lock her ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... he burst out. "Man, you're daft. Who told you what truths are eternal? Who told you where science ends, and where theology begins? Who told you what we mean, when we say provable? For two thousand years, and then some more, we have been slowly sifting down a whole mass of ill-assorted beliefs into ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... is his son, The nimble-footed madcap, Prince of Wales, And his comrades, that daft the world aside And ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... man rose, took his stick, and went out, to the great astonishment of the others, who thought him daft. He presently came back ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... Charles Town, Bringing a gift of blankets from the king, The Sewees would not trade a pelt— Saying, "We go to see The Great White Father in his own tepee— Heap, heap much rum!" And then they passed the pipe of peace, And puffed it, and looked glum. The traders thought the redskins must be daft; They saw the huge canoes, And, wondering at their use, Asked, "What will you do with these?" And the chief pointed east across the seas; And then the ...
— Carolina Chansons - Legends of the Low Country • DuBose Heyward and Hervey Allen
... heavy boots along the floor; and after a resentful whisky at the Royal, where they laughed at his scrooging bushy eyebrows, fierce black eyes and his deadly-in-earnest denunciation of all humbugs and imposters, he returned to the aforesaid van, let down the flaps, buttoned the daft and "feekle" world out, and himself in, and then retired some more and slept, as I have said, rolled in his blankets and overcoats on a ...
— The Rising of the Court • Henry Lawson
... room," said the colonel. "I thought I was going daft. You're the first person who has heard it besides myself." He looked at Pinto. "A hell of a prospect, isn't it?" he said gloomily. "Let's ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... "No, a'm no daft; ye needna be feared; but yir tae get yir first lesson in medicine the nicht, an' if we win the battle ye can set up ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren
... her strong, body shook. She gazed at Ralph as one might look at an intimate friend gone suddenly daft. She had heard of people who lost their reason without warning. Was it possible that she was in ...
— A Spinner in the Sun • Myrtle Reed
... the miles until, in the goodness of fortune, he met natives who gave him food and water. He crawled into Perth, black with the sun, bones from want; he was not recognised by friends. A Malay, daft but harmless, led a vagrant life at Perth, getting bit and sup from the open tables of the colonists. The good wife of the outermost settlement, where Sir George Grey knocked, seeking refreshment, took ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... must be deaf, dumb, and blind not to know it. Do you suppose I believed that a man at your time of life, brought up as you have been, had suddenly gone daft ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... "He 'm daft," she said, "an' I'd think harder of him than I do, but that he's led by the nose. 'Twas that auld weasel, Billy Blee, gived him the wink to set you on a task he knawed you'd ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... he continued. "Once upon a time, I would have gone to ascertain, but my old arms can now scarcely paddle a boat across the voe, and were I to attempt to go, and the tide catch me, I might be swept helplessly out to sea. It might not be a bad ending for the puir auld daft bodie, you'll be saying, cousin, and a wonder it had never happened before. But I've some work to do before that time, Hilda. 'The prince will hae his ain again! The prince will hae his ain again!' and before long too, let me tell ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... one meenit after, I see you standing there like a daft gowk instead o' hustling for food as fast as your legs can move you? Ma conscience! But you tak' a deal of ceevilising! You dinna ken the first meaning o' the word 'hospitality.' ...
— The Fiery Totem - A Tale of Adventure in the Canadian North-West • Argyll Saxby
... shouted Mr Macdougall, when he had recovered from the surprise which the unexpected order of the boatswain, so rapidly carried out, had caused. "Are ye gone clean daft?" ...
— On Board the Esmeralda - Martin Leigh's Log - A Sea Story • John Conroy Hutcheson
... but nae sigh did he gi'e, He mounted his mare an' he rade cannilie; An' often he thocht, as he gaed through the glen, 'She's daft to refuse the Laird ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... head; drive one nuts [Coll.]. Adj. insane, mad, lunatic, loony [Coll.]; crazy, crazed, aliene^, non compos mentis; not right, cracked, touched; bereft of reason; all possessed, unhinged, unsettled in one's mind; insensate, reasonless, beside oneself, demented, daft; phrenzied^, frenzied, frenetic; possessed, possessed with a devil; deranged, maddened, moonstruck; shatterpated^; mad-brained, scatter brained, shatter brained, crackbrained; touched, tetched [Coll.]; off one's head. [behavior suggesting insanity] maniacal; delirious, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... wit; Are thy works, thy fame livin' yet? Will thae daft people never quit An ne'er ha'e done Disturbin' me in my black ...
— Verses and Rhymes by the way • Nora Pembroke
... it! They considered him a little daft and wanted to cure him of his fixed idea. That would explain the visit to the theatre and also Femke's alleged unwillingness to come with Uncle Sybrand. But—how did she dare to interfere with the policeman? And ...
— Walter Pieterse - A Story of Holland • Multatuli
... Take 'eed you don't ship with a skipper that drinks— You'd better by half play at fan-tan with Chinks!— For that'll mean nothing but muddle an' mess, It may be much more and it can't be much less, What with wrangling and jangling to drive a man daft, And rank bad dis-cip-line both forrard and aft, A ship that's ill-found and a crew out of 'and, And a touch-and-go chance she may never reach land, But go down in a squall or broach to in a sea, For them drunken skippers—they're the devil," ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. CLVIII, January 7, 1920 • Various
... hysterics, to be treated with cold water, the bellows, and an unmerciful beating between my shoulders,—I, who can but with much difficulty and many a retrogression make my way among the olden mazes of tenor, alto, treble, bass, and who stand "clean daft" in the resounding confusion of andante, soprano, falsetto, palmetto, pianissimo, akimbo, l'allegro, and il penseroso,—I was bidden to Camilla's concert, and, like a ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... as gospel," said Mrs. Shairp, touched by the ring of pain that came into the young man's voice as he spoke. "At half-past eight, by the clock, they brought the laird hame stiff and stark, cauld as a stane a'ready. The mistress is clean daft wi' sorrow; an' I doot but Mr. Brian will hae a sair time o't wi' her and the bonny young leddy ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... and unexpected was the movement, that, though the fall of the cord was the simplest thing in the world, a visible quiver passed through the bowed ranks of the bearers. "It was his ain boy Wattie come to lay his faither's heid i' the grave!" cried Daft Jess, the parish "natural," in a loud sudden voice from the "thruch" stone near the kirkyaird wall where she ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... were never cut out for one another," he remarked at last. "It was a daft-like marriage." And then, with a most unusual gentleness of tone, "Puir bitch," said he, "puir bitch!" Then suddenly: ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... dreary, The sun he wadna raise his heid, The win' blew laich and eerie. In's pooch he had a plack or twa— I vow he hadna mony, Yet Andrew like a linty sang, For Lizzie was sae bonny! O Lizzie, Lizzie, bonny lassie! Bonny, saucy hizzy! What richt had ye to luik at me And drive me daft and dizzy? ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... across the bridge to High Street. Mr. Traill struggled back to his shop, against wind and treacherous ice, thinking what kind of a bed might be contrived for the sick man for the night. In the morning the daft auld body could be hurried, willy-nilly, to a bed in the infirmary. As for wee ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson
... amused, and thinking that Hence had gone daft, but he was to learn better. A reign of forty years' terror ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... sick under her care the whole winter through, and didn't go a fishing all that year. Ever after this, too, it seemed to folks as if the lad were a little bit daft. ...
— Weird Tales from Northern Seas • Jonas Lie
... Lord Carrick. "If I were only twenty years younger, and she'd not turn up her nose at me for a big daft of an Irishman, you'd not get her, me lad. She's the sweetest little thing I have come across this many ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... here is spending every dollar in a way to make you two in spite of your daft notion—begging your pardon, sir—about not taking profits. The subscribers are coming along for stock, but fingering it gently, as though they can't well believe there's no catch in it. They say it doesn't look reasonable, and I tell ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... very unmarked. It would have been dull, almost grim, to English notions. There was no Christmas tree, no waits, no decorating of the church for the morrow. Still, it was the end of the year—the period, by universal consent, dedicated to goodwill and rejoicing all over the world—the old "daft days" even of sober, austere Scotland. Jenny and Menie, in the kitchen, were looking forward to that Handsel Monday which is the Whit Monday of country servants, and the family gathering of the ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... helping them over stiles, springing delightful little surprises upon them, just where the road looked blocked! The trouble is that I've no gift for organised charity. I have a pretty middling strong will of my own ("pigheadedness" Aunt Emmeline calls it!) and committees drive me daft. They may be useful things in their way, but it's not my way. I want to get to work on my own, and not to sit talk, talk, talking over every miserable, piffling little detail. No! If I play fairy, ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... out. "Do you know, Honora, I think marriage turns certain kinds of people, the redheads in particular, quite daft. This one is never done talking about her husband, her baby, her experience, her theory, her friends who are about to marry, or who want to marry, or who can't marry. She can't see two persons together without patching up a union ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... rode to Whiskeyhurst, When summer days were gone, And there he met with Jock McThirst Was greetin' all alone. 'McThirst what gars ye look sae blank? Have all yer wits gane daft? Has that accursed Southron bank Called up your overdraft? Is all your grass burnt up wi' drouth? Is wool and hides gone flat?' McThirst replied, 'Gude friend, in truth, 'Tis muckle waur ...
— The Man from Snowy River • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson
... after it, but the men have headed her off. The fellows at the lumber-camp got to laughing at her for the way she done. She's got down to little boy sweethearts. She's been making eyes at Johnny Cartwright, and the little fool—he ain't more than seventeen, eight years younger'n her—is clean daft about her. Poor old Mrs. Cartwright is awfully worried. The little scamp declares he is engaged to Carrie, and, instead of giving the report the lie, she actually seems proud ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... does," Holati said. "But when he starts in on those subjects, I find him difficult to follow." He looked soberly at Trigger. "There are times," he confessed, "when I suspect Professor Mantelish is somewhat daft. But probably he's just so brilliant that he keeps fading ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... proof, Captain, no more than smoke; and the family up at Mardykes wouldn't allow the king to talk o' them like that, sir; for though they be lang deod that had most right to be angered in the matter, there's none o' the name but would be half daft to think 'twas still believed, and he full out as mich as any. Not that I need care more than another, though they do say he's a bit frowsy and short-waisted; for he can't shouther me out o' the George while I pay my rent, till nine hundred and ninety-nine year be rin oot; and a man, be he ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 3 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... well; and if, on that day, a soul should say: "Oh, God, I was demented, and I had no responsibility," God will say: "Yes, you were demented; but there were long years when you were not demented. That was your chance for heaven, and you missed it." Oh, better be, as the Scotch say, a little "daft," nevertheless having grace in the heart; better be like poor Richard Hampson, the Cornish fool, whose biography has just appeared in England—a silly man he was, yet bringing souls to Jesus Christ by scores and scores—giving an account of his own conversion, ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... ashamed o' the consequences 'at's no ashamed o' the deed. Mony ane cud du the sin ower again, 'at canna bide the sicht or even the word o' 't. I hae seen a body 't wad steal a thing as sune's luik at it gang daft wi' rage at bein' ca'd a thief. An' maybe she wadna care gien 't warna for the oogliness o' 'im. Sae be he was a bonny sin, I'm thinkin' she wad hide him weel eneuch. But seein' he 's naither i' the image o' her 'at bore 'im nor him 'at got 'im, but beirs on 's back, for ever in her sicht, the ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... eye on them, however, and they're in no mischief. Master Donal reads out of his picture books and shows himself off before her grandly and she laughs and looks up to him as if he were a king. Every lad child likes a woman child to look up to him. It's pretty to see the pair of them. They're daft about each other. Just wee things ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... though idiotic, and knowing not what he does, yet full of the sweet things of love and gratitude. Come! I feel prouder leading thee by thy black hand, than though I grasped an Emperor's! There go two daft ones now, muttered the old Manxman. One daft with strength, the other daft with weakness. But here's the end of the rotten line —all dripping, too. Mend it, eh? I think we had best have a new line altogether. I'll see Mr. ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... Sea." Then the men gazed strangely on each other and on Oisin, and the overseer asked, "Of what Finn dost thou speak, for there be many of that name in Erinn?" Oisin said, "Surely of Finn mac Cumhal mac Trenmor, captain of the Fianna of Erinn." Then the overseer said, "Thou art daft, old man, and thou hast made us daft to take thee for a youth as we did a while agone. But we at least have now our wits again, and we know that Finn son of Cumhal and all his generation have been dead these three hundred years. At the battle of Gowra fell ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston
... this mean?" demanded Kathleen, angrily. "Has everybody gone daft? Eliza, ever since you came into the house, there has been nothing but turmoil. I wish you would explain. Why have you sent the ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... them he heard a raven speaking, and another raven answering him: the people laughed him to scorn, and kicked him out of their assemblies, as a one who spoke evil of dignities; and they called him a warlock, an' a daft body, to think to mak language out o' the crouping ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... Felton Falls to preach there. A mile out of town he had been accosted by a big, bearded man who had yet a singularly childish look—who urged that he come to his cabin to minister to a sick friend. He knew the fellow for one that the village of Edom called "daft" or "queer," yet held to be harmless—to be rather amusing, indeed, since he could be provoked to deliver curious harangues upon the subject of revealed religion. He remembered now that the man's face had stared at him from far back in the church the night before—a face full ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... Stendhal's "Chartreuse de Parme" and Dostoievsky's "Crime and Punishment" as one of the supreme marvels of the world. Nevertheless, certain aspects of it puzzled me. When I mentioned it to friends I was told that I had gone daft about it, and that it was not a major work. Happening to meet Mrs. Garnett, the never-to-be-sufficiently-thanked translator of Tourgeniev and of Tolstoy, I made inquiries from her about it, and she said: "It is his masterpiece." We were then separated ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... was, however, driven from her thoughts by present necessities. The din and bustle of the crowded wharf, would have been sufficient to "daze" the sober-minded country-woman, without the charge of little Will, and unnumbered bundles, and the two "daft laddies forby." On their part, Norman and Harry scorned the idea of being taken care of, and loaded with baskets and other movables, made their way through the crowd, in a manner that astonished the ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... say or do, but the joy of the father over the wee Emily was beyond anything I ever saw. To see the great bearded man taking the hour-old infant in his arms, kissing it over and over again, and speaking to it in the most daft-like language, and calling on every one to admire its beauty! No doubt the bairn had as much beauty as a thing of that age can have, but I don't think any of the men he showed it to admired it much. I know Powell, ...
— Mr. Hogarth's Will • Catherine Helen Spence
... as if he were half daft then, but he answered: "Yes, ma'am, yes, ma'am, certainly, ma'am, no danger at all, ma'am." Then he went on ordering the men: "A leetle more to the ...
— The Jamesons • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... have not had the courage until tonight; but when I see a lot of lads daft as myself over her, I just whispered in the ear of Delaven that he'd better speak quick. But I would not propose ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan
... poor woman, with neither energy nor gumption, who occupied a miserable shanty about a mile from the village, in which hardly a mean dwelling could be found. The woman was believed to be a little "daft," for she always hid herself when any of the town's people appeared near her shanty. She had a garden, in which she raised potatoes and corn, and kept a pig and a cow; and these furnished her subsistence, with the trifle which her son earned by odd jobs. The woman's ...
— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic
... did Pantagruel know? Gargantua was no bigot: he did not shut his eyes that he might not see, and he believed what his eyes told him. He saw that Pantagruel worked very hard and spent all his time at it, and yet he got no good by it. And what was worse, he was becoming daft, silly, dreamy, and besotted through it. So Pantagruel was taken away from his former masters and handed over to Ponocrates, a teacher of quite a different sort, who was bidden to take him to Paris to make a new creature of him and complete his education there. Ponocrates ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... were, an' you cudn' tell mun from real, 'cept by the weight. The very nex' day, findin' as hes Minorcy were layin' for a brood i' the loft above the cowshed, he takes up the true egg while the old fowl were away an' sets a porc'lain egg in place of et. In cou'se, back comes the hen, an' bein' a daft body, as I told 'ee, an' not used to these 'ere refinements o' civilizashun, niver doubts but 'tes the same as she laid. 'Twarn't long afore her'd a-laid sax more, and then her sets to work ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... for the King's sake it should go for two. So the King got the block and traveled home with it. He bade guests again, made a feast, and set the pot on the chopping-block in the middle of the room. The guests thought he was both daft and mad, and they went about making game of him, while he cackled and chattered around the pot, calling out, "Bide a bit! Now it boils, now it ...
— East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon • Gudrun Thorne-Thomsen
... a wild-goose chase, even if a man hoped to come to speak with a King in his palace at the end of it; but for thee to go such a journey in order to speak but for a few moments with a man thou dost not know, and in prison, it is nothing but a daft ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... get him back. He says they two will make a team for work: Between them they will lay this farm as smooth! The way he mixed that in with other things. He thinks young Wilson a likely lad, though daft On education—you know how they fought All through July under the blazing sun, Silas up on the cart to build the load, Harold along beside to pitch it on." "Yes, I took care to keep well out of earshot." "Well, ...
— North of Boston • Robert Frost
... body wad think there had been nae cherritable wark dune in the toon ava, till they theossiphies set aboot it. If yer provost and baillies lookit efter things as they ocht, there wad be a dacent puirs-house for the idignant folk, an' a wheen daft leddies like Eesabel needna gang roun' speirin' at yon infeedels for their siller tae build a ...
— The Making of Mary • Jean Forsyth
... was amply sufficient. The manager, however, was of a different sort, he hated football like poison. He even relegated the grand game to a pastime suitable for pure and unadulterated lunatics, those, as he put it, "who were too daft to get into Gartnavel." Fancy that! Woe betide the unfortunate half-back or forward, who in a weak moment relied on the magnanimity of "Sour Plums," as he was called, to let him off to a match, without first consulting the ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... tell me," exclaimed Jane, "that you are going to heed the words of that poor daft lassie? It's nothing to me what you do, of course, but that poor girl has not got her proper wits, and if I were you I would try to follow someone with ...
— Red Rose and Tiger Lily - or, In a Wider World • L. T. Meade
... thoo," she said, "thoo'rt as daft as a besom. Thoo hes made a botch on't, thoo blatherskite. Stick that in thy gizzern, and don't thoo go bumman aboot like a bee in ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... Stewart a prisoner in the stable and questioned him regarding Patterson's prospects and habits. I found both all that need be, and told Mr. Stewart about my talk with Patterson, and he said, "Wooman, some day ye'll gang ploom daft." But he admitted he was glad it was the "bonny lassie, instead of the bony one." When we went to the house Mr. Stewart said, "Weel, when are you douchy bairns gangin' ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... bad, and continually worrying the men we had shepherding. One of these was rather daft. One night the rams did not return. I got on their tracks the next day and brought them to camp, but there was no sign of the shepherd. Two evenings after we were surprised to see a couple of Myalls bringing in the lost man. We gave the blacks some ...
— Reminiscences of Queensland - 1862-1869 • William Henry Corfield
... forget it. I thought, when the police ran down stairs and left me with him, that I was talking to Mr. Narkom. I think I nearly went daft with terror when I found out ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... seen,' said Elzevir, 'I guessed that some poor soul had got shut in the vault, and was there crying for his life. And to this I was not guided by mother wit, but by a surer and a sadder token. Thou wilt have heard how thirteen years ago a daft body we called Cracky Jones was found one morning in the churchyard dead. He was gone missing for a week before, and twice within that week I had sat through the night upon the hill behind the church, watching to warn the lugger with a flare she could not put ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... did happen to see her, for they had been taught to regard her with respect, and on no account to smile at anything odd in her appearance or behaviour. "Poor Miss Barnicroft" she was generally called, though Andrew spoke less politely of her as the "daft lady." ...
— Penelope and the Others - Story of Five Country Children • Amy Walton
... of various kinds put on in varied modes. The most practicable of these is a system prepared by Daft. Most iron vessels are now constructed by every other plate lapping the edges of the one between. He proposes, instead of having the plates all the same width, to have one wide and one very narrow plate. This would ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... is with human geese full, And fiercely fights the daft declamator, Undisturbed the nursemaid can push the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 22, 1893 • Various
... be. For, when she came to luncheon next day, she told Mary Alice how she had always been "a bit daft about hair." "When I played with my dolls," she said, "I always cared much more for combing their hair and doing it up with mother's 'invisible' pins, than for dressing them. And it used to be the supreme reward for goodness when I could take down my mother's beautiful ...
— Everybody's Lonesome - A True Fairy Story • Clara E. Laughlin
... woundit?" says I. "I've lost ma wee whustle," says Sandy McGraw. "'Twas oot by yon bing where we pressed the attack, It drapped frae ma pooch, and between noo and dawn There isna much time so I'm jist crawlin' back. . . ." "Ye're daft, man!" I telt him, but ...
— Rhymes of a Red Cross Man • Robert W. Service
... up before one realizes," conceded Whitewater's acknowledged social dictator. "But what I wanted to say is this: that poor daft partner of yours has mortally offended every woman in town except three, with that silly screed of his. I've seen nearly all of them that count this morning, or they've called me by telephone. Now, why couldn't he have had the advice of some good, ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... the pilot of the boat, as he turned shoreward, "if a fellow is daft enough to sacrifice everything else for speed, on a long cruise like this, he must expect to put up with all sorts of trouble. But ...
— Motor Boat Boys Mississippi Cruise - or, The Dash for Dixie • Louis Arundel
... the money came in but slowly from any of his writings and, aside from the critics, it was many a long day before he was appreciated by the people of his own city and country. They refused to believe that "that daft laddie Stevenson," who had so often shocked them by his eccentric ways and scorn of conventions, could do anything worth while. So by far his happiest times were spent out of Scotland, principally in London, where a membership in the Savile Club added to his enjoyment. ...
— The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson for Boys and Girls • Jacqueline M. Overton
... when I picked you up in these arms nigh seven years ago. I loved you when I bandaged up that golden head o' yours. An' I've loved you—ever since. Rosie, gal, I jest don't know what I'm sayin'. How ken I? I'm daft—jest daft wi' love of you. I've tried to be honest by you. I've tried to do my duty by you—but I jest can't no longer, 'cos I ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... quoth Kitty. "Where are the men nowadays, grandma? Save for the redcoats, and I am not so daft over Sir Henry Clinton's gay officers as some—no doubt't is my Quaker blood—except for the officers, where are our gallants? Some of mine are up the Hudson beyond the neutral ground, others with ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln
... roaring and singing. Wherever we stopped, how brawlie he suited himsel' to everybody! He aye did as the lave did; never made himsel' the great man or took ony airs in the company. I've seen him in a' moods in these jaunts, grave and gay, daft and serious, sober and drunk—(this, however, even in our wildest rambles, was but rare)—but drunk or sober he was aye the gentleman. He looked excessively heavy and stupid when he was fou, but he was never out ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... these parts, runs in a strata of quartz. Now, there ain't no quartz in this range, except on Cheyenne. The old-timer down at the inn says that there's gold up here, an' he knows where it is, but you can't take no stock in these old fellers. They're daft on ...
— Buffalo Roost • F. H. Cheley
... roared out, "Indeed, minister, there's mair leears in Peebles than me." As examples of this class of persons possessing much of the dry humour of their more sane countrymen, and of their facility to utter sly and ready-witted sayings, I have received the two following from Mr. W. Chambers:—Daft Jock Gray, the supposed original of David Gellatley, was one day assailed by the minister of a south-country parish on the subject of his idleness. "John," said the minister, rather pompously, "you are a very idle fellow; you might surely herd a few cows." "Me hird!" replied ...
— Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character • Edward Bannerman Ramsay
... mad as a hare, poor fellow, And should be in chains," you say. I haven't a doubt of your statement, But who isn't mad, I pray? Why, the world is a great asylum, And people are all insane, Gone daft with pleasure or folly, Or crazed ...
— Poems of Cheer • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... And now with spreading wings it comes again, With maddened fury; fierce its eyeballs glare. It rides upon the monarch's pointed spear; The scales the point have turned, and broke the haft. Then as a pouncing hawk when sailing daft, In swiftest flight o'er him drops from the skies, But from the gleaming sword it quickly flies. Three hundred warriors now nearer drew To the fierce monster, which toward them flew; Into their midst the monster furious rushed, And through their solid ranks resistless pushed ...
— Babylonian and Assyrian Literature • Anonymous
... Rin, young chentleman! Doon wi' ye! She'll be like a daft quey the noo. I can haud her ...
— Three Boys - or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai • George Manville Fenn
... fine while before he will make one of his empty sacks stand upright. If he were not half daft he would have left off that job before he began it, and not have been an Irishman either. He will come to his wit's end before he sets the sack on its end. The old proverb, printed at the top, was made by a man who had ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... mischief take her!" he muttered. And Dan leaned over and whispered, "See, she's gone daft, ...
— The Transformation of Job - A Tale of the High Sierras • Frederick Vining Fisher
... worked an' waited as I did—he niwer thowt an' prayed as I did; everything come easy wi' him—everything allus did come easy wi' him, an' when I seed him so light-hearted an' careless about what I wur cravin' it run me daft an' blind. Seemt like he couldna cling to it like I did an' I begun to fight agen it, an' when I heerd about that lass o' Barnegats I towd yo', an' when I seen yo' believed what I didna believe mysen, it run me dafter yet, ...
— One Day At Arle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... fool," dissented the old man; "but he's kind o' daft about the river. When he was little he was allers buildin' dams in the brook, an' sailin' chips, an' runnin' on the logs; allers choppin' up stickins an' raftin' 'em together in the pond. I cai'late ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... daft! Of course, as Mother 'Oward says, there 's times when she 's straight—but they don't last long. And, if she 'd given 'er testimony in writing, Mother 'Oward says it all might 'ave been different, and we 'd not 'ave 'ad anything ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... ones now," muttered the old Manxman. "One daft with strength, the other daft with weakness. But here's the end of the rotten line—all dripping, too. Mend it, eh? I think we had best have a new line altogether. I'll ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... know DAFT saints, and they inspire a queer kind of aversion. But in comparing saints with strong men we must choose individuals on the same intellectual level. The under-witted strong man homologous in his sphere with the under-witted saint, is the bully of the ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... outshines; The lily in her breast its beauty tines; Her legs, her arms, her cheeks, her mouth, her een, Will be my dead, that will be shortly seen! For Pate looes her—waes me!—and she looes Pate And I with Neps, by some unlucky fate, Made a daft vow. O, but ane be a beast, That makes rash aiths till he's afore the priest! I darna speak my mind, else a' the three, But doubt, wad prove ilk ane my enemy. 'Tis sair to thole;—I'll try some witchcraft art, To break ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... treasons? Have you any notion that he will be the more or the less likely to do so when he learns that there's a French gentleman of your make in the country-side, and a friend of Doom's, too, which means a Jacobite? A daft errand, if I may say it; seeking a needle in a haystack was bairn's ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... bath-tub for Master Mouldy. Well, 'twas th' talk o' th' village for full a month; scarce did young Mouldy dare put out his nose from behind the lattice o' his mother's cottage. But th' other lads seemed to fall more daft about the lass ...
— A Brother To Dragons and Other Old-time Tales • Amelie Rives
... that there was always a crooked streak in the Leodograunce family? Or one Roman matron punching a chicken in the ribs, and remarking to her neighbor at the poultry man's stall: 'Well, Mrs. Gracchus, they do say Antony is absolutely daft over that notorious Queen of Egypt. A brazen-faced thing, with a very muddy complexion, I'm told, and practically no reputation, of course, after the way she carried on with Caesar. And that reminds me, I hear your little Caius suffers from the croup. Now my remedy'—and ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... felt better. He gave me some brandy to drink, and we started for the island. I begged him to run, but he wouldn't. He walked leisurely and pointed out this tree as a very fine specimen and well grown, or that one as too much crowded by its neighbors. He was daft on forestry. Patients didn't interest him a bit. Finally, however, we got to the pier, and stole somebody's row-boat, and I took the oars, and then we ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... had lighted our pipes, "I'll tell you why I'm going to the dogs. I've got to tell it to some one or go daft; and I can't say that I'm not ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... the House-boat safely anchored in the harbor. At first we didn't mind the heat, and we hunted and hunted and hunted; but after three or four hours I began to notice that three of my sailors were shrivelling up, and Conrad began to act as if he were daft. Hawkins burst right before my eyes. Then Abeuchapeta got prismatic around the eyes and began to fade, and I noticed a slight iridescence about myself; and as for Morgan, he had the misfortune to lie down to take a nap in the sun, and when he waked up, his whole ...
— The Pursuit of the House-Boat • John Kendrick Bangs
... fact was coming on apace and climbing shadows crept round the grotesque masonry. Unheeding the lad's fear, I was strongly impelled to talk with the daft creature. It was an impulse born not wholly of idle curiosity. I felt ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson
... thy love what never bore * For his fair, Kays the 'Daft one'[FN204] hight of old: Yet I chase not the wildlings of wold and wild * Like Kays, for madness ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... Jock Gordon, "that the puir deil's deed, and that we'll hae to pit up wi' Ebie Farrish. Na, na, Jock's maybe daft, but he kens better ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... that can be known about the copy of the ballad which, in 1805, Scott received from Hogg. Up to stanza xxiv. it is as given by the two old reciters. The crazy man may be the daft man who recited to Hogg Burns's Tam o' Shanter, and inspired him with the ambition to be a poet. The deranged woman, like mad Madge Wildfire, was rich in ballad scraps. From stanza xxv. to xxxiv., Hogg confessedly "harmonises" what he got in plain prose intermixed with ...
— Sir Walter Scott and the Border Minstrelsy • Andrew Lang
... but—That's just the same class o' stone as the specimen Henderson found in the back paddock twelve years ago, that sent everyone daft after a ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... from house to house like a bad shilling, which every one is in haste to pass to his neighbour; she, who used to call for her bearers as loud, or louder, than a traveller demands post-horses, even she shared the same disastrous fate. The "daft Jock," who, half knave, half idiot, had been the sport of each succeeding race of village children for a good part of a century, was remitted to the county bridewell, where, secluded from free air and sunshine, the only advantages he was capable of ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... no twenty years," said the landlady. "It's no abune seventeen in this very month. It made an unco noise ower a' this country. The bairn disappeared the very day that Supervisor Kennedy came by his end. He was a daft dog! Oh, an' he could ha' handen' off the smugglers! Ye see, sir, there was a king's sloop down in Wigton Bay, and Frank Kennedy, he behoved to have her up to chase Dirk Hatteraick's lugger. He was a daring cheild, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... thought, and wondered what his friend, the editor, would say if he knew of it. And what about his search for the missing man, Henry Redmond? Instead of throwing himself earnestly and actively into the quest he was frittering away his time, following the will-o'-the-wisp of a fancy, and going daft over a mere slip of a girl who moved serenely apart from his world of thought and being. He called himself a fool and chided himself over and over again. But for all that, he was unable to tear her out of his heart and mind. She ...
— Glen of the High North • H. A. Cody
... exploitation than any writer. It is a ruinous process—for the poet. "He so well repays intelligent study." That is it, unfortunately. There are many, like the old Scotch lady who attempted to read Carlyle's French Revolution, who think they have become "daft" when they encounter a passage such ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... thet mean?" growled Hank Kildare, as he leaped up from the couch on which he had been reclining lazily. "What derned fool is punchin' away at thet thar button like he hed gone clean daft! Hyar ther critter ring!" ...
— Frank Merriwell's Bravery • Burt L. Standish
... yer hoos, Robert Rawling! Ye're daft! Gin you met this ganglin' assassinator, wha'd be for maister? San's no to lack a father. Gae to yer ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... took to get him through the hall into the reception room, where they were alone. Arrived there, Andy fell to capering across the floor, while Richard looked on, puzzled to decide whether his weak brother had gone wholly daft or not. Recollecting himself at last, and assuming a more sober attitude, Andy came close ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... he was, nae sigh did he gie; He mounted his mare—he rade cannily; And aften he thought, as he gaed through the glen, She 's daft to refuse the Laird ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... in a state of insensibility upon the bed. Two or three negro women were gathered around him, variously occupied with rubbing his hands, chafing his temples and wiping the oozing foam from his lips. At the foot of the bed stood poor daft Fanny, with disheveled hair and dilated eyes, chanting a grotesque monologue, and keeping time with a see-saw motion from side to side. The first thing Thurston did, was to take the hand of this poor crazed, but docile creature, ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... she's fair off her heid. Dae ye ken she's just like a daft body. Did you see the look in her e'en?" and so they discussed poor Mag, who had drawn their attention by the strangeness ...
— The Underworld - The Story of Robert Sinclair, Miner • James C. Welsh
... upon his purple vestments. His face had not changed, and, as he never knew he was dying, it showed no pain or fear. It was Amory's dear old friend, his and the others'—for the church was full of people with daft, staring faces, the most exalted ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... this way, lassock: Ah've jist got to mak' ma' way in the warld. Wully is a kind brither, but the hoose is too fu' already. An' the bairns are aye merryin' here an merryin' there, an' yon daft Peter 'll be bringin' yon harum-scarum girl o' yours in ane o' thae days—not but that she's a guid honest lass, but ah dinna see whit he wants wi' an Eerish thing like yon; an' the land jist owerrun ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... everlasting ruin if I do.' 'Face the music like a man,' I said, 'and get out of it what you can.' I could see by his eyes that he was honin' to come back, but he was almighty afraid, I reckon mostly on Amada's account. He's plum' daft about her—and I don't know as I blame him very much—and he told me he had planned to get her down ...
— With Hoops of Steel • Florence Finch Kelly
... saint, the Lady Robertland, and I had much conference with the people, and profited more by them than I think they did by me; though ignorant people and proud and secure livers called them "the daft people of Stewarton."' The Stewarton sickness was as like as possible, both in its manifestations and in its results, to the Irish Revival of 1859, in which, when it came over and awakened Scotland, the Duchess of Gordon, another lady of the Covenant, acted much the ...
— Samuel Rutherford - and some of his correspondents • Alexander Whyte |
