"Hoax" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that Davenport didn't know how the information about the device had been transported to the United States. As it was, he considered the drawings a hoax on the part of the Russians; if he had been told that they had been sent telepathically, he would probably have gone into fits of acute exasperation over ...
— The Foreign Hand Tie • Gordon Randall Garrett
... the house until Mose himself was frightened; then Radnor saw that the hoax had reached the point where it was no longer funny, and he determined to get rid of Jeff immediately. While he drove him to the station he left Mose behind to straighten up the loft; and Mose, coming into the house to put some things away, met ghost number two just after ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster
... without comment, for the whole thing is a hoax. The Illinois Experiment Station has never owned a chicken. These "Illinois" experiments were planned and executed in a few minutes of the writer's spare time. The basis of the experiments was a pack of cards containing the individual ...
— The Dollar Hen • Milo M. Hastings
... hoax, it's quite serious. The professor came on behalf of the Society, for so they call themselves, and asked you whether you'd accept the fete. You accepted it; so it ...
— The Road to Damascus - A Trilogy • August Strindberg
... 1602, the building was the scene of the famous hoax known as England's Joy, perpetrated upon the patriotic citizens of London by one Richard Vennar.[269] Vennar scattered hand-bills over the city announcing that at the Swan Playhouse, on Saturday, November 6, a company of "gentlemen and gentlewomen ...
— Shakespearean Playhouses - A History of English Theatres from the Beginnings to the Restoration • Joseph Quincy Adams
... would have led to a settlement of the Russian problems is more than any one, however well informed, could vouch for, but I had some grounds for believing the move to be genuine and the promises overdone. No reasonable motive suggested itself for a vulgar hoax. Moreover, the overture disclosed two important facts, one of which was known at the time only to the Bolshevist government—namely, that secret pourparlers were going forward between Berlin and Moscow for the purpose of arriving at a workable understanding between the ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... weasel teeth bared yellow, draws down his left eye with a finger and barks hoarsely) Hoax! Beware of the flapper and bogus mournful. Lily of the alley. All possess bachelor's button discovered by Rualdus Columbus. Tumble her. Columble her. Chameleon. (More genially) Well then, permit me to draw your attention to item number three. There is plenty ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... she did not in the least think Nan had been there. She thought it was a hoax; but it put it into her mind to carry the joke further by really stopping herself when she went up, as she meant to do the ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... folly to linger over the limitations of the tallow-chandler's son. The catalogue of his beneficent activity is a vast one. Balzac once characterized him as the man who invented the lightning-rod, the hoax, and the republic. His contributions to science have to do with electricity, earthquakes, geology, meteorology, physics, chemistry, astronomy, mathematics, navigation of air and water, agriculture, medicine, and hygiene. In some of these fields he did pioneer work of lasting significance. ...
— The American Spirit in Literature, - A Chronicle of Great Interpreters, Volume 34 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Bliss Perry
... this is not a hoax," said James, severely. "I presume that you know too well what is due to learned counsel to attempt to make one of their body the victim of a ...
— Mr. Meeson's Will • H. Rider Haggard
... demure looks belied her character. Katherine's innocent grey eyes and doll-like complexion were the vineyards that hide the volcano. She could always be relied upon to support any enterprising project or interesting hoax that was presented for her approval. These seven comrades, close chums in the past, banded themselves together anew to enjoy life to the best of their ability, and to obtain the maximum of fun and diversion out of the forthcoming term. It is with their immediate ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... announced on April 1, 1984 in a posting ostensibly originated there by Soviet leader Konstantin Chernenko. The posting was actually forged by Piet Beertema as an April Fool's joke. Other fictitious sites mentioned in the hoax were moskvax and {kgbvax}. This was probably the funniest of the many April Fool's forgeries perpetrated on Usenet (which has negligible security against them), because the notion that Usenet might ever penetrate the Iron Curtain seemed so totally ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... our house we call 'Paddy': She's not 'goody-goody', but 'baddy'; She loves practical jokes, Or to play us a hoax, Though we tell her such tricks are ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... in a loud, confidential aside to Stephanie; "this studio ought to be full of young men in velvet coats and bunchy ties, singing, 'Oh la—la!' and dextrously balancing on their baggy knees a series of assorted soubrettes. It's a bluff, a hoax, a con game! Are you going to stand for it? I don't see any absinthe either—or even any Vin ordinaire! Only a tea-pot—a tea-pot!" he repeated in unutterable scorn. "Why, there's more of Bohemia in a Broad Street Trust Company than there is ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... into a great rage, without exactly knowing why. "This thing," I exclaimed, "is a contemptible falsehood—a poor hoax—the lees of the invention of some pitiable penny-a-liner, of some wretched concocter of accidents in Cocaigne. These fellows knowing the extravagant gullibility of the age set their wits to work in the imagination of improbable possibilities, of odd accidents as they term ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various
... to the cottage in time to admit Eric Coverly, whom he showed into the study, having informed him that I should be back in less than ten minutes. He had then proceeded to Denmark Hill railway station only to find, as I had found, that the appointment was a hoax and "the man ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... will and a contract." The name of the book is 'Ex reliquiis venerandae antiquitatis. Lucii Cuspidii Testamentum. Item contractus venditionis antiquis Romanorum temporibus initus. Lugduni apud Gryphium (1532).' Pomponius Laetus and Jovianus Pontanus were apparently authors of the hoax. ...
— Books and Bookmen • Andrew Lang
... must be such a place. It surely is not a hoax," said Amy, although at first she had thought it was a joke. "And there is another thing to ...
— The Campfire Girls of Roselawn - A Strange Message from the Air • Margaret Penrose
... appear in the chronicles. But who will tell me what 'the Carpet-bag Mystery' was, which my Father and I discussed evening after evening? I have never come across a whisper of it since, and I suspect it of having been a hoax. As I recall the details, people in a boat, passing down the Thames, saw a carpet-bag hung high in air, on one of the projections of a pier of Waterloo Bridge. Being with difficulty dragged down—or perhaps up—this bag was found to be full of human remains, ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... been told of the reception awaiting him at Guir House before leaving New York, he would doubtless have considered it a hoax. As it was, he was astounded. The odd character of the house and its inmates had already given him much ground for thought, even amazement; but to suddenly find himself face to face, tete-a-tete ...
— The Ghost of Guir House • Charles Willing Beale
... I saw the grim humor of the method they had adopted to do me this great honor, but that there was any hoax in the reality of the title they had conferred upon me was readily disproved by the sincerity of the congratulations that were heaped upon me by the judges first and ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the letter which he had picked up from the floor, and laid it in the physician's hand. As the doctor read, a look of indignant horror swept over his face. Then he said: "Can it be possible! I never suspected such a thing. It must be a cruel, senseless hoax." ...
— Iola Leroy - Shadows Uplifted • Frances E.W. Harper
... suspiciously. "I should have thought the stone in it was worth more than that, although, of course, it may be nothing but glass. The engraving, too, is first-rate. Adams," he added with severity, "you are trying to hoax us, but let me tell you what I thought you knew by this time—that you can't take in Ptolemy Higgs. This ring is a shameless swindle; but who did the Hebrew on it? He's a ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard
... consciences that "he gave himself such courtly airs as were quite ridiculous—that his presumption was astonishing. In short, they were all idle, and it was exceedingly amusing to lounge a morning with the rich Dundases and hoax Monsieur." ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... Monday, John Clare could not shut his eyes for sheer anxiety. The questions whether the bookseller would have any copies left of the wonderful poem; whether it could really be bought for eighteen-pence; and whether the big farmer's boy did not mean the whole story as a hoax, occupied his mind all night long. It seemed so improbable to him, on reflection, that a book containing the most exquisite verses could be bought for little more than the common fairy tales of the hawkers, and it seemed still more improbable ...
— The Life of John Clare • Frederick Martin
... the possibility of his doing such a thing so as to defy recognition by me. So much for your general question. As to this gentleman's being the person I once met as Murray Davenport, I can only wonder what sort of a hoax you're trying to work." ...
— The Mystery of Murray Davenport - A Story of New York at the Present Day • Robert Neilson Stephens
... electricity or candle, and the followers of Catholicism absolutely worship this mechanism of man, and it has proven a great drawing card, and you can rest assured that Catholicism is pushing the scheme along good and hard, and "The St. Anthony Bread Box" hoax is another scheme that is not very old, but which the Catholic Church has found to be another great paying investment, and they are working "St. Anthony" for all that ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... experiments, that for a few pounds, any thing, however absurd, might be universally promulgated; particularly if the absurdity was in favour of the ruling powers. For instance, he wrote a paragraph, the greatest hoax that ever was, in praise of the mild and amiable manners, the courtesy, and the humanity of Harry Dundas. Now, said he, to show you how this will be promulgated by the venal press, and how it will be swallowed by John Bull, give me five shillings, ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... accessory to the ruin of the theatre, by insisting upon a return to the former prices. Notwithstanding the little sop he had thrown out to feed the vanity of this roaring Cerberus, the only answer he received was a renewal of the noise, intermingled with shouts of "Hoax! hoax! imposition!" Mr. O'Reilly, the gallant friend of Madame Catalani, afterwards addressed the pit, and said no reliance could be placed on the report of the committee. The profits of the theatre were evidently great: they had ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... dreadful it would be if this great congress should be compelled to listen to any hoax like that which Monsieur de Rougemont imposed on the British Royal Society," she said, gravely; "and because the subject of my paper is as strange as the strangest phenomenon alleged to have been noted by Monsieur de ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... clues, and two Mohammedan merchants of Canea were arrested and deported to Malta on unimpeachable evidence of complicity. Closer investigation proved the whole affair from beginning to end a web of forgery and fraud. The hoax ended in the British Minister at Athens apologizing to the Greek Deputy, and in the Mohammedan merchants being brought back home as guests ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott
... had started the story. And since he was not in the habit of playing jokes on people, everybody believed what he said—at least, everybody except Jasper Jay. He declared from the first that Jolly Robin's tale was a hoax. ...
— The Tale of Jolly Robin • Arthur Scott Bailey
... Henrietta's uncle and guardian seemed obviously but a bit of girlish fun, of a piece with her earlier talk regarding her aristocratic ancestry; for by this time I had construed that strange story into a hoax that was never meant to ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... victim of a hoax, and were the verses not original? No; they were distinctly original, local in color, and even local in the use of certain old English words that were common in the Southwest. He had before noticed the apparent incongruity ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte
... the course of my life only three intentionally falsified statements, and one of these may have been a hoax (and there have been several scientific hoaxes) which, however, took in an American Agricultural Journal. It related to the formation in Holland of a new breed of oxen by the crossing of distinct species of Bos ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... information to Calcutta and asked for a strong body of police to be sent at his expense. They arrived, and his country residence was extra well guarded for some time. But nothing happened! Madhub Babu concluded that the letter had been a hoax. So the ...
— Bengal Dacoits and Tigers • Maharanee Sunity Devee
... "the Golden Shoemaker" persisted valiantly in his attempt to answer every letter he received. Miss Jemima's scornful disapproval was of no avail. In vain she declared her conviction that every other letter was an imposture or a hoax, and pointed out that, if people wanted their letters answered, they ought to enclose a stamp. Then, for the twentieth time, she repeated her suggestion that a secretary should be engaged. At first her brother waived this proposal aside; but at length it became imperative that help should ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth
... himself, as the perfect calm reigning over the whole establishment struck him anew. But before he had decided that he had been made the victim of a hoax, a movement took place in the area under the stoop, and an officer stepped out, with a countenance expressive of sufficient perplexity for Mr. Gryce to motion him back with the hurried inquiry: "Anything wrong? Any blood shed? All seems ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green
... sea, and even the unusual sight of a lonely white porpoise hugging the shore, or of seal or small whale, or even a much rarer sea-animal, would not have been at all likely to deceive him. It would certainly have been very easy for any person in mischief or malice to have played the hoax, but no locality in the wide world would have seemed more unlikely to be the scene of such a game; for who performs theatricals to amuse the lonely shore, or the ebbing tide, or the sea-birds that poise in the air or pounce ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... in the Star, in his half-playful and suggestive way, chose to put it as though he regarded the article in the Pall Mall Magazine as a hoax, perpetrated by some clever, unscrupulous writer, intent on provoking both Mr Henley and his friends, and Stevenson's friends and admirers. This called forth a letter from one signing himself "A Lover of R. L. Stevenson," which ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... preface, we have an evidence of her having been the victim of as well concerted and admirably conducted a hoax, as was ever played off upon any one—it surpasses that which was put upon poor Malvolio in "Twelfth Night." After making the remark upon which we have already commented, that a second work on France from her pen could "alone be justified by the novelty ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... and said he had better go and see who it was; for looks of alarm had been exchanged between him, the Squire, and Murphy, lest any stranger should enter without being apprised of the hoax going forward; and Dawson had just reached the dining-room door on his cautionary mission, when it was suddenly thrown wide open, and in walked, with a rapid step and bustling air, an active little gentleman dressed in black, who was at Mrs. Egan's side in a moment, exclaiming with ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... village, but if they ventured to carry it back to La Verendrye they were not so sure that either it or their own scalps would be safe at the Mandan village, with the ferocious Sioux hovering about. They did not know, of course, that the story of the Sioux was nothing but a hoax. ...
— Pathfinders of the Great Plains - A Chronicle of La Verendrye and his Sons • Lawrence J. Burpee
... chambermaid, Whose terrors not to be gainsaid In laughs hysteric were displayed, Was always there before them; This had its due effect with some Who straight departed, muttering, Hum! 642 Transparent hoax! and Gammon! But these were few: believing souls, Came, day by day, in larger shoals, As the ancients to the windy holes 'Neath Delphi's tripod brought their doles, Or ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... hoax," said Johnston, "and a cursed uncomfortable one for us. But here comes these fellows, just as they went, it seems. Well, boys, no ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... which we kept under our pillow for thirteen days and nights, was beginning to worry us. After all, might it not be a literary hoax, we thought, and might not this Khalid be a myth. And yet, he does not seem to have sought any material or worldly good from the writing of his Book. Why, then, should he resort to deception? Still, we doubted. And one evening we were ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... touched the very bone) who had with more caution than propriety withheld their names. The article was headed, "The Crayfish-eaters' Ticket." It continued further to say that, had not the publication of this ticket been regarded as a dull hoax, it would not have been suffered to pass for two weeks unchallenged, and that it was now high time the universal wish should be realized ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... his ear. He caught hold of his books. "I must be getting on, I think," he said. He edged in a curious way along the seat away from his interlocutor. "But you was just a-going to tell me about this here Invisible Man!" protested the mariner. Mr. Marvel seemed to consult with himself. "Hoax," said a Voice. "It's a hoax," said ...
— The Invisible Man • H. G. Wells
... lady in almost stentorious accents, "or is this an unmanly hoax?" Suddenly she stopped in undeniable consternation. "Good heavens," she muttered, "if Abner should believe this. He is SUCH a fool! He has lately been queer and jealous. Oh dear!" she said, turning to Polly Jenkinson ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... Rectory was her cousin Archie, a boy only two years older than herself, but feeling ever so much bigger and wiser; for he was an only son, a clever and rather conceited young gentleman. He was good-natured, and loved his cousin; but he loved better to tease and hoax her. Having lived all her little life in India, Meggie was exceedingly ignorant of customs and things in her new home, and was continually making laughable mistakes, and asking the most absurd questions. This "greenness," ...
— Stories of Many Lands • Grace Greenwood
... women of Selole had fled, and the few people we met exhibited symptoms of terror. An armed party had come from Mburuma in obedience to the call; but the head man of the company, being Mburuma's brother, suspecting that it was a hoax, came to our encampment and told us the whole. When we explained our objects, he told us that Mburuma, he had no doubt, would receive us well. The reason why Selole acted in this foolish manner we afterward found to be this: an Italian named ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... and his sleeves stuck out in the most awkward fashion ever assumed by drapery. I suppose that sometimes these rises in life come very unexpectedly. I have heard of a man who, when he received a letter from the Prime Minister of the day offering him a place of great dignity, thought the letter was a hoax, and did not notice it for several days. You could not certainly infer from his modesty what has proved to be the fact, that he has filled his place admirably well. The possibility of such material changes ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... signed "Frank Duveneck," were sent to the Painter-Etchers' Exhibition from Venice. The Painter-Etchers appear to have suspected for a moment that the works were really Mr. Whistler's; and, not desiring to be the victims of an easy hoax on the part of that gentleman, three of their members—Dr. Seymour Haden, Dr. Hamilton, and Mr. Legros—went to the Fine Art Society's Gallery, in New Bond Street, and asked one of the assistants there to show them some of Mr. Whistler's ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler
... saving of the old bedridden woman's precious life, and the destruction of the poor cat—syne the robbery of the hen-house by the Eirish ne'er-do- weels, who paid so sweetly for their pranks—and lastly, the hoax, the thieving of the cheese-toaster without the handle, and the ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... could scarcely be induced, by the most earnest entreaties of his friends, to take the most common precautions against assassins of whose designs he had trustworthy evidence, would have been scared by so silly a hoax; and it is quite certain that the stages of his progress had been marked, and that he remained at Oxford as long as was compatible with arrangements previously ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... was he in the way of adaptation. He could write a hoax worthy of Poe, and one of his humors of imagination was sufficiently subtle and successful to excite comment in Europe and America, and to call for an explanation and denial from a distinguished Englishman. He lived in ...
— A Little Book of Western Verse • Eugene Field
... for you," said his wife, meaning that now he would not be made to suffer for attempting to hoax her. But she was too intensely interested to pursue that matter further. "What in the world do you suppose he ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... C.'s poems, puzzled everybody to know from what author it was derived. One and another inquired of me, to no purpose, and expressed a wish that Mr. C. had been clearer in his citation, as "no one could understand it." On my naming this to Mr. Coleridge, he laughed heartily, and said, "It was all a hoax." "Not meeting" said he, "with a suitable motto, I invented one, and with references purposely obscure," as will be explained in the ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... circumstances he might have been more struck with the little embarrassment which she could not perfectly control, but at the moment he was not quite himself either. That impudent Doady Donne had played a shameful hoax on him, had actually had the audacity to declare that she had seen his wife—Nina, Mrs. Dacres—in Teddy Vere's hansom! He hadn't taken what she said very pleasantly, for the bare notion made him furious, and—though telling himself all the while that he didn't believe it—until ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various
... a false one," continued the Commissioner, "the matter would have been resolved into a meaningless hoax, but the message having been what it was, we find ourselves face to face with no ordinary problem. Remember, Inspector, that voices on the telephone are deceptive. Sergeant Sowerby has marked ...
— The Golden Scorpion • Sax Rohmer
... house. The cook had eaten the last bit of bread. This could not go on. It did, however, until two, when my sensations were terrible. After all, I began to think the document very absurd. Perhaps it might only be a gigantic hoax. Besides, some means would surely be found to keep my uncle back from attempting any such absurd expedition. On the other hand, if he did attempt anything so quixotic, I should not be compelled to accompany him. Another line of reasoning ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... planned to do was no small matter. It was a hoax which should have far-reaching results, on a gigantic scale. And if Earth government realized it had been hoaxed, the thing could become very unpleasant. That tough-minded central bureaucracy did not ordinarily bother to obtain proof ...
— Watch the Sky • James H. Schmitz
... to me, and you shall have, without a hem or haw, sirs, A Canterbury pilgrimage, much better than old Chaucer's. 'Tis of a hoax I once played off upon that city clever, The memory of which, I hope, will stick to it for ever. With my coal-black beard, and purple cloak, jack-boots, and broad-brimmed castor, Hey-ho! ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... an hour filled with quick, conflicting thoughts, suggesting a dozen explanations. Was the note really from Miss Waverly? Had she acted in good faith in sending it? What was the danger of which she spoke? Why had she not come, and why had she set an hour like this? Was it a mere hoax? ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory
... right to speak," Anitchkoff replied with dignity. "He was my master and I can admit no imputation on his memory. Besides, your guess is as good as mine. Whether he bought the picture in his precritical days, keeping it as a warning and imposing it upon his followers as a hoax—this I can merely conjecture. As for Brooks, the case is simple; he couldn't resist a Giorgione at a bargain. But since you will, you may as well hear the rest of the story—at least my ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather
... gigantic reflector of Lord Rosse, and the exquisite fifteen- inch refractors of the modern observatories, eliminate from the chaotic rubbish-heap of the surface of old Thornbush much smaller objects than such a circle as I have named. If you have read Mr. Locke's amusing Moon Hoax as often as I have, you have those details fresh in your memory. As John Farrar taught us when all this began,—and as I have said already,—if there were a State House in Thornbush two hundred feet long, the first Herschel would ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale
... Bee-hive hoax. Three Mexican variants on this idea may be noted. In one (JAFL 25 : 237), rabbit pretends that the bee-hive is a school, which he permits coyote to keep. In another (ibid., 206) rabbit pretends that a wasp-nest is a cradle, and gets coyote to rock it. The third is a Cora story given in abstract ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... standing bolt upright, levelling at his insulter a withering look from his great blue eyes, "you should rather think of your poor wife, whom you would have made a pauper if this game had not been all a hoax." ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... why should David be made Honorary President of the company? Was Robert Westcote, the stranger, the cause of it all? He had not heard from him since the day of their visit to Mrs. Bean's, and but for the cheque which he had received he would have been inclined to consider the whole thing as a hoax. ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... "A hoax," thought the man who had worked so hard all his life without the least expectation of ever seeing a penny that he did not earn himself. "Can it be that any of those heedless relatives of my wife's in Memphis have attempted a practical ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... said Eunice, who was much the oldest of the three. "Did you expect us to fall upon your neck before we could believe it wasn't a hoax of father's?" ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... (Chapter III) into arboretum. Darblay, the name of Fanny Burney's husband, is a variant. From au(l)ne, alder, we have aunai, whence our Dawnay. So also frenai has given Freeney, chenai, Chaney, and the Norm. quenai is one origin of Kenney, while the older chesnai appears in Chesney. Houssaie, from hoax, holly, gives Hussey; chastenai, chestnut grove, exists in Nottingham as Chastener; coudrai, hazel copse, gives Cowdrey and Cowdery; Verney and Varney are from vernai, grove of alders, of Celtic ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... I hoax any one? I was laughing at the way you brave scouts dodged when Joan said the animal they lost might be crouching on a ...
— Girl Scouts in the Adirondacks • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... for he had caught her hands in an eager, boyish clasp. "Olga, don't—there's a dear!" he begged with headlong ardour. "I don't love you any the less because I didn't do it. I believe myself it's a beastly hoax, and I'm just as furious as you are. But, I say, can't we found a partnership on it? Is it asking too much? Pull me up if it is! I don't want to be premature. Only I won't have you sick or sorry about it, anyhow so far as I am concerned. You ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... hoax me in that way," said the host. "The soldier has been here, but went out of the door like an honest fellow. I took care of that. You are the thieves, and you shall pay ...
— Folk-lore and Legends: German • Anonymous
... Who, if He died for mankind, died for us— He is alive, and looks from heaven on this! Oh, we have seen your baseness and your guile; Our eyes are opened and we know your ways! No longer shall you hoax us with your pleas, Or with the serpent's cunning wake distrust, Range tribe 'gainst tribe—then shoot the remnant down, And in the red man's empty cabin grin, And shake with laughter o'er his desolate hearth. ...
— Tecumseh: A Drama • Charles Mair
... Washington Government, mindful of the Cadiz hoax, refused to believe reports that the Spanish fleet was hidden behind the headlands of Santiago harbour. It was not till 27 May that Admiral Schley obtained definite proof of the fact, and formed the blockade of Santiago with his squadron. Admiral Sampson then brought his fleet round, ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... a voice which actually trembled, "Knowles, hoax or no hoax, I will be even with the gentleman who ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... their guest remain in the camp; but Preciosa was against it; and her grandmother said, that she could not go to Seville or its neighbourhood, on account of a hoax she had once played off upon a capmaker named Truxillo, well known in Seville. She had persuaded him to put himself up to his neck in a butt of water, stark naked, with a crown of cypress on his head, there to remain till midnight, when he was to step out, and look ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... a suspicion flashed across my mind on hearing these words—the very excuse given a while ago by Mr. Urquhart—that the whole affair was a hoax and the two young men were in conspiracy to fool me. I dismissed it at once: the sight of Mr. Mackenzie's face, was convincing. ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... I think," he asked seriously. "I think the whole thing's a hoax. I'll betcha there never was any settlement there. I'll betcha the colonists have pulled a whingding all ...
— Eight Keys to Eden • Mark Irvin Clifton
... Sparks; tell it by all means!' cried a number of voices; for it was clear to every one, by this time, that he was involved in a hoax. ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... discovery Maurice was inclined to declaim in that vigorous vocabulary which is taboo. He had been tricked. He was no longer needed at the Red Chateau. Four millions in a gun barrel; hoax was written all over the face of it, and yet he had been as unsuspicious as a Highland gillie. Madame had tricked him; the countess had tricked him, the Colonel ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... nations change their bounds—the theme of wonder Shall Sam go down the cataract of long years: And if there be sublimity in tears, Those shall be precious which the adventurer shed When his frail star gave way, and waked his fears, Lest, by the ungenerous crowd it might be said, That he was all a hoax, or that ...
— Masterpieces Of American Wit And Humor • Thomas L. Masson (Editor)
... rejoined Feng Tzu-ying smiling. "You're all far too credulous! It's a mere hoax that I made use of the other day. For so much did I fear that you would be sure to refuse if I openly asked you to a drinking bout, that I thought it fit to say what I did. But your attendance to-day, so soon after ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... you had come to me with such a report," he said finally, "I would have found it incredible; I would have thought you were entirely insane, or trying some wild hoax." ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... disguise of this name Swift had perpetrated an amusing hoax on an almanac-maker of the name of Partridge, and in launching his new periodical Steele availed himself of the notoriety of Bickerstaff's name and feigned his identity ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... Our correspondent will find, on referring to our First Vol., p. 445., that the so-called French original of "Not a drum was heard," is only a clever literary hoax from the pen of Father Prout, which first appeared ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 76, April 12, 1851 • Various
... filled with confusion and anger. A hoax on the part of some of the Corn Cob Club, he thought to himself. He flushed painfully to recall the simplicity ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... surprise to-night already," Desmond resumed, "in the matter of the jewel which our respected leader was about to show us: if you recollect, our friend was only prevented from giving us the explanation which he certainly owed us over his little hoax by the arrival, the most ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... that the elaborate paraphernalia of mystification which Butler used in The Fair Haven was deliberately designed in order to hoax the public. I do not believe that this was the case. Butler, I feel convinced, provided an ironical framework for his arguments merely that he might render them more effective than they had been when plainly stated in the pamphlet of 1865. He fully expected his readers to comprehend his irony, ...
— The Fair Haven • Samuel Butler
... with a pun, turn into ridicule science and the savant; despise all things which they do not know or which they fear; set themselves above all by constituting themselves the supreme judges of all. They would all hoax their fathers, and be ready to shed crocodile tears upon their mothers' breasts; but generally they believe in nothing, blaspheme women, or play at modesty, and in reality are led by some old woman or an evil courtesan. They are all equally ...
— The Girl with the Golden Eyes • Honore de Balzac
... Who had sent it? Was it a genuine warning and threat, or was it merely an elaborate hoax? He pondered the latter possibility quite at length—and thanked his stars that he had not told Ocky about it. Simon Varr was not the man to relish a jest against himself, and if Ocky ever heard about it and it subsequently proved to be the work of a practical joker—well, ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... is to a hoax played on the Premier, by a presentation made to him of a piece of the then novel fabric, velveteen, stamped with a free-trade design. Peel afterwards wrote that he was unaware that the specimen bore "any allusion to any matters which are ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... Accordingly, our hero put away the note into his wallet, determining to show it to his good friend Mr. Greenfield that evening, and to ask his advice upon it. So he did show it, and that gentleman's opinion was the same as his—that some wag was minded to play off a hoax upon him, and that the matter of the letter ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... when every one of the pursuing planes opened up their machine-guns almost simultaneously upon the first. And even this might have been considered a well-designed hoax, were it not for the unmistakable evidence that the first aeroplane, ...
— The Brighton Boys in the Radio Service • James R. Driscoll
... saw a naked sword at the bottom, which he was just about to grasp, when his sister called from the shore to tell him that his father, mother, brothers, and sisters were all dead or dying. He hurried home, but it proved to be a hoax, for they were all alive ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... everybody to know from what author it was derived. One and another inquired of me, to no purpose, and expressed a wish that Mr. C. had been clearer in his citation, as 'no one could understand it.' On my naming this to Mr. Coleridge, he laughed heartily, and said, "It was all a hoax. Not meeting," said he, "with a suitable motto, I invented one, and with references purposely obscure, as will be explained in the ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... say," raved Miss Carlyle. "What are you standing there for, like a gander on one leg?" she reiterated, venting her anger upon the unoffending man. "Is it a hoax ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... Provence, in 1209, and to be adorned not only with his statue, but also with those of his son Raymond Berengarius IV., and of Beatrix, Queen of Naples, the wife of the latter. The monument is, however, a hoax. The statues are there, but are modern, of the namby-pamby school, and of the original tomb possibly a crocket ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... High School football," commented Mr. Prescott, laying aside the paper. "They may, but it would take a good deal of courage, for that article will start Gridley on a furor of enthusiasm for the game. I wonder who got up that hoax." ...
— The High School Freshmen - Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports • H. Irving Hancock
... were not rich enough at that moment to bid higher. Our poor fisherman did not know whether to be angry at a hoax, or to go mad with joy; we drew him from his quandary by giving him the name of our landlady and telling him to take the lobster and the crab ...
— A Drama on the Seashore • Honore de Balzac
... ascertaining if he could be imposed upon; and, if the deception succeeded, those who got it up were curious to know if the venerable statesman would redeem his pledge, and present a petition, no matter who it came from. He was too wily not to detect the plot at the outset; he knew that all was a hoax; but, he resolved to present the paper, and then turn the tables on its authors. [Footnote: Reminiscences of the late John Quincy Adams, ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... determined, on Naomi's account, to clear the matter up; but it is only candid to add that my doubts of John Jago's existence remained unshaken by the letter. I believed it to be nothing more nor less than a heartless and stupid "hoax." ...
— The Dead Alive • Wilkie Collins |
