"Mischievous" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... gently opened the pan and scattered the powder, and then laid it down again; for Edward said to himself, "That man has come out after me, that I am certain; and as there are no witnesses, he may be inclined to be mischievous, for a more wretched-looking person I never saw. Had he been deer-hunting, he would have brought his dog; but he is man-hunting, that is evident. Now I will leave him, and should he fall in with anything, he will not kill at first shot, that's certain; and if he follows me, ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... this resolution: "While we recognize the disabilities which legal marriage imposes upon woman as wife and mother, and while we pledge ourselves to seek their removal by putting her on equal terms with man, we abhorrently repudiate 'free loveism' as horrible and mischievous to society, and disown any sympathy with it." It was the first time the subject had been brought before a woman's rights convention and its introduction was indignantly resented by the "old guard." Lucy Stone exclaimed: "I feel it is a mortal shame to give any foundation for ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... of Irish Romanists who have emigrated to the States, and whose feelings are too often disaffected and anti-American, evade the naturalisation laws, and, by surreptitiously obtaining votes, exercise a most mischievous influence upon the elections. Education has not yet so permeated the heterogeneous mass of the people as to tell effectually upon their choice of representatives. The electors are caught by claptrap, noisy declamation, and specious promises, coupled ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... fished beside Junkie, on feeling a tug worthy of a whale; and, "Hee! hee!" burst from Junkie, whose mischievous hand had caused the tug when ...
— The Eagle Cliff • R.M. Ballantyne
... curly-haired, mischievous little sprite, the agony of the teacher and the love and admiration of the boys! Who climbed trees, rattled to school in the butcher wagon, never knew a lesson, but was always leading lady in the school colloquies, and was surely ...
— The Romance of an Old Fool • Roswell Field
... petted by his eccentric master, oftener at Paris than in his country home, had gained a very bad reputation. I recollect seeing him once in the presence of certain ladies show almost as much insolence as if he had been a man. His master was obliged to kill him, so mischievous ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... valueless in separation from each other; and are then likely to be injurious in proportion to the degree of culture. Knowledge without wisdom is insane and mischievous; and both without virtue serve but to give greater energy and efficiency to those naturally destructive elements which are common both to individuals and society. Virtue alone, if it could be supposed to exist without knowledge and wisdom, would ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith
... he referred, and half laughing at his excited manner, she replied, as she stole a mischievous glance towards Mr. Hastings, "I received a letter from Eugenia not long since, and she seemed very anxious to know in what part of Europe Mr. Hastings was now traveling, and if he were ...
— Dora Deane • Mary J. Holmes
... with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. "Wouldst have me cover my breast like a married woman! Look to thine own attire. ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... really felt for one of them a deeper sentiment than a man advanced in years ever likes to own even to his nearest friend—hazarded a proposal, and met with a rebuff? If so, Alban conjectured the female culprit by whom the sentiment had been inspired, and the rebuff administered. "That mischievous kitten, Flora Vyvyan," growled the Colonel. "I always felt that she had the claws of a tigress under her patte de velours!" Roused by this suspicion, he sallied forth to call on the Vyvyans. Mr. Vyvyan, a widower, one of those quiet gentleman-like men who sit much in the drawing-room ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... and often become very affectionate. A young squirrel may be allowed to run about the room, and it will often be found curled up fast asleep in mamma's work-basket, or papa's pocket, or some other funny hiding-place. As it grows older it becomes more mischievous, and must be kept in a cage, or books, furniture, and everything in the room will bear the marks of its sharp little teeth. It belongs to the order Rodentia, or gnawing animals, and if kept in confinement, ...
— Harper's Young People, January 6, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... drainage to its primitive narrow channels; and in drying deadly morasses by opening the natural sluices which have been choked up, and cutting new canals for drawing off their stagnant waters. He must thus, on the one hand, create new reservoirs, and, on the other, remove mischievous accumulations of moisture, thereby equalizing and regulating the sources of atmospheric humidity and of flowing water, both which are so essential to all vegetable growth, and, of course, to human and lower ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... endeavoring to make that question, I have purposely forborne any public expression upon it. As appears to me, that question has not been, nor yet is, a practically material one, and that any discussion of it, while it thus remains practically immaterial, could have no effect other than the mischievous one of dividing our friends. As yet, whatever it may hereafter become, that question is bad as the basis of a controversy, and good for nothing at ...
— Lincoln's Inaugurals, Addresses and Letters (Selections) • Abraham Lincoln
... a' nature there's a mair curiouser cratur than a monkey. I mak this observe frae being witness to an extraordinar' event that took place in Hamilton. Folk may talk as they like about monkeys, and cry them down for being stupid and mischievous, I for ane will no gang that length. Whatever they may be on the score of mischief, there can be nae doubt, that, sae far as gumption is concerned, they are just uncommon; and for wit and fun they would beat ony man black and blue. In fact, I dinna think that monkeys are ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 275, September 29, 1827 • Various
... good-looking as you are as a lad, there would be none more welcome than yourself up at the big house. Pretty gals, bless ye, need no introduction yonder; and yet one would have thought that Squire would know better than to meddle with the mischievous hussies—he took his lesson early enough, at all events. Why, he married before he was your age, and not half so much of a man to look at, neither. You have heard talk of that, I dare say, ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... who had been elected to the Legislature, and had also been judge of the County Court. His elevation, however, had made him somewhat pompous, and he became very fond of using big words. On his farm he had a very large and mischievous ox, called "Big Brindle," which very frequently broke down his neighbors' fences, and committed other depredations, much ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure
... her children, even when her mind fails at the last: and old Maisie's memory was still green over the loss of these two. But the third—how about the one who survived his childhood? When she spoke of him, his image was that of an innocent mischievous youngster, full of mad pranks, his father's favourite, not a trace in him of the vices that had made his manhood a curse to himself and his mother. In some still feebler stage of her failing powers the happier phase of his career ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... clouds, with a bitter, wet, west wind rasping the bleak highlands. There were spiteful showers with intervals of mocking sunshine; it was a mischievous and prankish bit of weather, no day for riding. But the Lady was indomitable, so we left the Patriarch in his tent, wrapped ourselves in garments of mackintosh and took the ...
— Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land - Impressions of Travel in Body and Spirit • Henry Van Dyke
... love could devise to reform him. But all was useless. He seemed to have no idea of truth or honor, of affection or duty to me. When, at times, I thought he was showing signs of improvement, I always found, afterward, that he was only concealing his mischievous acts more carefully. I call them mischievous, though the word 'malicious' would perhaps describe them better; for they were all undertaken in a spirit of evil, and not of fun." The old gentleman here rested, and refreshed himself with a sip of ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... these people! Their animation was almost like the animation of a nightmare. Some were ugly, some looked wicked; others mischievous, sympathetic, coarse, artful, seductive, boldly defiant or boisterously excited. But however much they differed, in one quality they were nearly all alike. They nearly all looked vivid. If they lacked anything, at least it was not life. Even their ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... palpitations of the heart, and pains all over me, by which I had been bed-ridden for nearly six months. Unhappily, among my neighbour's and landlord's books were a large parcel of medical reviews and magazines. I had always a fondness (a common case, but most mischievous turn with reading men who are at all dyspeptic) for dabbling in medical writings; and in one of these reviews I met a case, which I fancied very like my own, in which a cure had been effected by the Kendal Black Drop. In an evil hour I procured it:—it ...
— The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1838 • James Gillman
... own one; it was thus a kind of monster which, if encouraged, would override all popular rights. From this economic criticism the enemies of the railroad passed to details of construction: the rails would be washed out by rains; they could be destroyed by mischievous people; they would snap under the cold of winter or be buried under the snow for a considerable period, thus stopping all communication. The champions of artificial waterways would point in contrast to the beautiful packet boats on the Erie Canal, with ...
— The Railroad Builders - A Chronicle of the Welding of the States, Volume 38 in The - Chronicles of America Series • John Moody
... the maid was dressing me, I unluckily inquired if she had seen the Hindoo—and, hearing that she had, I still more unfortunately asked her to tell me what he was like. She described him as being very tall and lean, with a dark brown complexion and glittering black eyes. My mischievous fancy instantly set to work on this horrid combination of darknesses. Try as I might to resist it, my mind drew a dreadful picture of the Hindoo, as a kind of monster in human form. I would have given worlds to have ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... orators interlarding their speeches with frequent classical quotations, reminds us of a piece of mischievous waggery perpetrated by one of the greatest men of his time. Sheridan once electrified the country gentlemen in the House of Commons, by concluding an animated appeal to their patriotism, with a quotation ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 395, Saturday, October 24, 1829. • Various
... he answered. "Well, it won't be for long, at any rate. And as to not seeing Esther, you must remember that I come from outside this little domain, and I see nothing more in Mr. Fentolin than a bad-tempered, mischievous, tyrannical old invalid, who is fortunately prevented by his infirmities from doing as much mischief as he might. I am not afraid of your brother-in-law, or of the bully he takes about with him, and I am going to see your daughter somehow or other, and ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... unreserve. How could these circumstances have transpired to the people but from those nearest the person of Her Majesty, who, knowing the public feeling better than their royal mistress could be supposed to know it, did their own feeling little credit by the mischievous exposure? The people were exasperated beyond all conception. The Abbe Vermond placed before Her Majesty the consequences of her communicativeness, and from this time forward she never repeated the error. After the lesson she had received, none of her female attendants, not even the Duchesse ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... to understand the word in this sense, then we are entirely changing its meaning and connotation. And we cannot do this, in regard to words like penitent and penitence, without producing confusion of thought. It is time, surely, that this misleading and mischievous fallacy of the penitence of Christ should be finally abandoned ...
— Gloria Crucis - addresses delivered in Lichfield Cathedral Holy Week and Good Friday, 1907 • J. H. Beibitz
... tubes and their brilliant, flaring red—an irresistibly attractive color to the ruby-throat—it would appear that this is a bird flower. Certainly its adaptation is quite as perfect as the salvia's. Mischievous bees and wasps steal nectar they cannot reach legitimately through bungholes of their own making in the bottom of the ...
— Wild Flowers Worth Knowing • Neltje Blanchan et al
... unpleasant way, and then, after she had carefully restored the corn-cob doll to her wrappings, she knelt down and began to gather up the old toys which the children had scattered over the hearth-rug. Ann and Rudolf helped her, and Peter who, though a very mischievous little boy, was always honest, confessed that he had been the one to open the old cupboard and take out the box. He seemed to feel rather uncomfortable about it, and after the things had been put away, he climbed upon Aunt Jane's lap and hid his head upon her shoulder. ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... these men will always be sycophants. If you give power to Marylebone, they will fawn on the householders of Marylebone. If you leave power to Gatton, they will fawn on the proprietor of Gatton. I can see no reason for believing that their baseness will be more mischievous in the former case ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... supposed to be performed: in this horrid part Virgil places two sorts of souls; first, of such as have shown their impiety and rebellion toward the gods; and secondly, of such as have been vile and mischievous among men: those, as he himself says of the latter more particularly, who hated their brethren, used their parents ill, or cheated their dependants, who made no use of their riches, who committed incest, or disturbed the marriage union of others, ...
— Roman Antiquities, and Ancient Mythology - For Classical Schools (2nd ed) • Charles K. Dillaway
... throw a stone through the lower part of the window. Then I shall hide. They will rush out, and when they can find no one, they will conclude that the stone was thrown by some mischievous boy going along the road. When all is quiet again I will creep up to the window, and it will be hard if I don't manage to learn something of what ...
— A Jacobite Exile - Being the Adventures of a Young Englishman in the Service of Charles the Twelfth of Sweden • G. A. Henty
... which tales of this kind acquire by often being repeated, that the then Ordinary of Newgate thought it became him to mention it to the prisoner. Mrs. Griffin appeared to be much affected at her character being thus stained by the fictions of idle suspicions of silly mischievous persons. She declared her innocence in the most solemn manner, averred she had never lived near the place, nor had heard so much as the common reports as ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... Unbelief.]—This sin may be called the white devil, for it oftentimes, in its mischievous doings in the soul, shows as if it was an angel of light: yea, it acteth like a counsellor of heaven. Therefore a little to discourse of ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... those who still believe, is getting restive. Through the roof of what we call Fatherland social currents begin to filter. There remains only one ideal in presence of which the most hardened sceptic raises his hat,—the People. But on the base of this statue mischievous spirits are beginning already to scribble more or less ribald jokes, and, what is still more strange, the mist of unbelief is rising from the heads of those who, in the nature of things, ought to ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... out and cross, and it was a relief to know that the squadron would go to sea the next morning. During the rapid run through Holland, Wilton and Perth had found abundant opportunities to discuss their mischievous scheme of running away with the Josephine. They had so contrived it that eight of the Knights of the Golden Fleece had occupied a compartment by themselves in the railway carriages. As the squadron would arrive at Havre on Friday or Saturday, no time was to be lost in arranging the details ...
— Dikes and Ditches - Young America in Holland and Belguim • Oliver Optic
... you find yourself, my love?" said Zenobia, lifting a corner of the gauze, and peeping beneath it with a mischievous smile. "Ah, the dear little soul! Why, she is really going to faint! Mr. Coverdale, Mr. Coverdale, pray bring a glass ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... refuge in a convenient affectation of unreason, or whether he had in fact paid for his dishonor by the loss of his wits. In the latter case, just now, he felt little more tenderly to the foolish old man than in the former. Responsible or not, he was equally an accomplice of his detestably mischievous daughter. Newman was going to leave him abruptly, when a ray of entreaty appeared to disengage itself from the old man's misty gaze. "Are you ...
— The American • Henry James
... righteousness spoken by myself also, those heroes will never disobey, for the Pandavas are all of righteous soul." Piteously lamenting, O Suta, I spoke these and many such words unto my son. Foolish as he is, he listened not to me! I think all this to be the mischievous influence of Time! There where Vrikodara and Arjuna are, and the Vrishni hero, Satyaki, and Uttamaujas of the Panchalas, and the invincible Yudhamanyu, and the irrepressible Dhrishtadyumna, and the unvanquished ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... enjoyed their curiosity; she was in a teasing and mischievous mood, to which she had been ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... change, so loudly talked of by some, so inconsiderately by others." "A number of characters, of the greatest eminence in this country, object to this government for its consolidating tendency. This is not imaginary. It is a formidable reality. If consolidation proves to be as mischievous to this country as it has been to other countries, what will the poor inhabitants of this country do? This government will operate like an ambuscade. It will destroy the state governments, and swallow ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler
... German folk-lore a water-sprite of a mischievous disposition, believed to have been suggested to the imagination by the reflection of ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... of the conspirators should be confiscated, and themselves kept in custody in the municipal towns; fearing, it seems, that, if they remain at Rome, they may be rescued either by their accomplices in the conspiracy, or by a hired mob; as if, forsooth, the mischievous and profligate were to be found only in the city, and not through the whole of Italy, or as if desperate attempts would not be more likely to succeed where there is less power to resist them. His proposal, therefore, if he fears ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust
... sleep by the warm stove. Being in the way, and also in danger of tumbling upon the floor, some of us removed him to an old settee, where he slept soundly, entertaining us with rather an unmusical serenade. There were two or three mischievous fellows about the place, and one of them suggested it would be capital fun to black W—'s face, and "make a darkey of him." No sooner said than done. Some lamp-black and oil were mixed together in an old tin cup, and a coat of this paint laid over the face of W—, who, all unconscious of ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur
... ruins of an old mill, the moss-covered water-wheel forever silent, the roof sagging and falling in, the windows broken out by mischievous boys, the whole presenting a most melancholy and ...
— Frank Merriwell Down South • Burt L. Standish
... occasional hissing gibe of hereticos! But there was no attempt at violence except when some half-dozen boys began to throw stones. But the stringing of the Englishmen's bows, and the fitting of a few arrows to the strings, sent the mischievous young urchins to the right-about in double-quick time, and within a minute the landing had been accomplished and ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... of a species of palm is called by-yu, and it is a curious fact, that, although in its natural state this is a rank poison, the natives have, nevertheless, a method of depriving it of its mischievous qualities, and it becomes an agreeable and nourishing article of food. Europeans, ignorant of the mode of preparing this nut, are sure to pay for their rashness, if they venture to eat it in its unprepared state. The women collect these nuts from the palms in the month ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... girl came to the door at his summons, listened to his polite request, and stood for a moment blushing and confused. Then, running into the garden, she plucked a flower, handed it with a mischievous air to the warrior, and disappeared within the house. Ota, angrily flinging down the flower, turned away, after an impulse to force his way into the house and help himself to the coat. He returned to the castle wet and fuming at the slight to ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... drew back a step. As he kept his eyes fixed on the object, a maiden of astonishing beauty appeared before him, such as he had never before seen. Her face was veiled, and his turban was on her head: smilingly she removed it, and extended it to him, saying, with a mischievous look, ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... bear any delay, in her anxiety to join her mother, we set out at once—the only thing to mar my full enjoyment at the moment being the sight of the identical vestments I had so lately figured in, bobbing up and down before my eyes for the whole length of the stage, and leading to innumerable mischievous allusions from my friend Mr. O'Leary, which were far too much relished by ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... you, I suppose. Your fame has spread." Heywood spoke with a slow, mischievous drawl; but he crossed ...
— Dragon's blood • Henry Milner Rideout
... all difficulties the teacher had to deal with, Polly Vaughn was the greatest. She was nearly perfect in all her studies, but a little mischievous and very dear to him. "Pretty;" that is one thing all said of her there in Faraway, and they said also with a bitter twang that she loved to lie abed and read novels. To Sidney Trove the word "pretty" was inadequate. As to lying abed and reading novels, ...
— Darrel of the Blessed Isles • Irving Bacheller
... says the chief evil in this solicitation business is the so-called "runner." Here is his description of this mischievous genus homo. "It is he who goes around in eastern and southern Europe from city to city and village to village telling fairy tales about the prosperity of many immigrants in America and the opportunities offered ...
— Aliens or Americans? • Howard B. Grose
... auntie was half distraught At his tricks as the days went by; "The most mischievous child in the world!" She said, with a shrug ...
— De La Salle Fifth Reader • Brothers of the Christian Schools
... partly to myself again; and by the time a third and fourth had bounced into the battery, I began to take things pretty coolly—my heart beating rather quicker than usual, I acknowledge; but, nevertheless, I began to find an indescribable sort of pleasure, a mischievous joy, if I may so call it, in the peril and excitement ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... having been killed in Sark more than once. It usually occurs in the autumn, and, as a rule, has a very short lease of life after its arrival in the Islands, which is not to be wondered at, as it is considered, and no doubt is, mischievous both to sheep and poultry; and in so thickly populated a country, where every one carries a gun, a large bird like the White-tailed Eagle can hardly escape notice and consequent destruction for any length of time. ...
— Birds of Guernsey (1879) • Cecil Smith
... days would have shuddered at her neck and arms, bare, not only in the evening, but by day! When she was a little younger she could so shrink up from her clothes that Griff, or little Martyn, in a mischievous mood, would put things down her back, to reappear below her petticoats. Once it was a dead wasp, which descended harmlessly the length of her spine! She was a good-humoured, affectionate, dear sister, my valued ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... bunch of the wild roses that hung around and above her, and dashed them petulantly into the stream. She watched them as their course was interrupted by the large masses of rock, and they were tossed here and there by the angry mischievous water. At last they hung trembling on a huge stone, stranded, as it were, on their impetuous course. Again, for a moment, a serious comparison arose in her mind, and she wondered whether her life might be like that of the flowers she ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... been earnestly dissuaded from making public the contents of this volume on account of apprehended mischievous consequences. He thought, however, that the age of pious frauds ought to be past, and their principle discarded, at least in Protestant countries. Deception and error are always, sooner or later, discovered; ...
— The Grounds of Christianity Examined by Comparing The New Testament with the Old • George Bethune English
... and new wounds inflicted on its trunk with knives, hatchets, and other implements. Here not a mark, not a scratch had been made on any one of its four trunks or on the ivy stem by any thoughtless or mischievous person, nor had any branch been cut or broken off. Why had they one and ...
— Dead Man's Plack and an Old Thorn • William Henry Hudson
... when he had ceased speaking, they both waited in silence. At last Amy looked up with a mischievous smile, seeking to throw off the serious mood into which Austin's speech had put them. She was always afraid ...
— The Hero of Hill House • Mable Hale
... raking a living for himself out of the dust-heap of human woe? Imagine, if you can, a perfect world—a world where men and women never said foolish things and never did unwise ones; where small boys were never mischievous and children never made awkward remarks; where dogs never fought and cats never screeched; where wives never henpecked their husbands and mothers-in-law never nagged; where men never went to bed in their boots and sea-captains never swore; where plumbers understood their work and old ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... despotism. There have not, I am aware, been found wanting individuals to deny both the existence and the obligations of such a necessity. There are men, actuated in some instances, by a blind and mistaken enthusiasm, and in others, by a spirit of mischievous intent, loudly calling on us, in the names of justice and humanity, for the immediate and unqualified emancipation of our slaves. To men of this description, it is in vain to point out the inevitable effects of such a course, as well on the objects of their real or pretended ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... of moving into the new house (1844) that the Tom Sawyer days—that is to say, the boyhood of Samuel Clemens—may be said to have begun. Up to that time he was just Little Sam, a child—wild, and mischievous, often exasperating, but still a child—a delicate little lad to be worried over, mothered, or spanked and put to bed. Now, at nine, he had acquired health, with a sturdy ability to look out for himself, as boys will, in a community like that, especially where the family is rather ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... out of poor Green, or rather a final allusion to a long-standing one. When the battalion got its route for the Soudan, the lad was as keen to see active service as any one of them, and it was a severe shock to him when one of the most mischievous of his brother officers pretended to discover that one of his legs was crooked, which would incapacitate him, he feared, from ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... the sake of a sort of startled sensation; and it is a taste that becomes unwholesome when it absolutely delights in dwelling on horrors and cruelties for their own sake; or upon shifty, cunning, dishonest stratagems and devices. To learn to take interest in what is evil is always mischievous. ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... stupid, mischievous, evil and cunning in Saxo's eyes. Oldest of beings, with chaotic force and exuberance, monstrous in ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... be needful, and each assistant was required, prior to making his return, to "cause a correct copy of the schedule, signed by himself, to be set up at two of the most public places within his division, there to remain for the inspection of all concerned." It is from this crude law that the mischievous custom is borrowed of having a copy of the census returns deposited with the county court clerk. As originally conducted, the system was harmless, since only the names of heads of families were given and only the number of persons constituting the family reported. The compensation was ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... next. Some mischievous person drew a caricature of Byelikov walking along in his goloshes with his trousers tucked up, under his umbrella, with Varinka on his arm; below, the inscription 'Anthropos in love.' The expression was caught to a marvel, you know. The artist must have worked for more ...
— The Wife and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... which the power of so distinguishing is of practical value. Bluntly enough, I have pronounced it to be false. With equal bluntness, I now add that, even if it were true, it would, all the same, be practically mischievous, and directly opposed to the very utility from which it takes its name. The argument in support of this charge shall ...
— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... wife of sir John. She is subjected to divers indignities, and insulted morn, noon, and night by her surly, drunken husband. Lady Brute intrigues with Constant, a former lover; but her intrigues are more mischievous than vicious.—Vanbrugh, The Provoked ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... are our servants and profit-makers, or mortgage lifters. Always treat them kindly. Never permit anyone to strike, or stone them. Even the pig of your neighbor, when he becomes a mischievous intruder in your field, if you give him a friendly chase, will conduct you to a hole in the fence ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... forth she was sacred to me. I have carried her image in my heart for sixty-three years—all lonely thee, yes, solitary, for it never has had company—and I am grown so old, so old; but it, oh, it is as fresh and young and merry and mischievous and lovely and sweet and pure and witching and divine as it was when it crept in there, bringing benediction and peace to its habitation so long ago, so long ago—for it ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... of America, almost the very first word that met her ear had been from him, the brother whom she had killed, about the 'Pussy' of times long past; how the gallant young man had hung upon her words, as in her native Basque she described her own mischievous little self, of twelve years back; how his color went and came, whilst his loving memory of the little sister was revived by her own descriptive traits, giving back, as in a mirror, the fawn-like ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... and overcoming with good the evil he has wrought by his wilful mismanagement. But then it is a bitter trial to behold him, on his return, doing his utmost to subvert my labours and transform my innocent, affectionate, tractable darling into a selfish, disobedient, and mischievous boy; thereby preparing the soil for those vices he has so successfully cultivated ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... of Christians who are so hard to discover," Laura said, with decision, and Mrs. Simpson, rebuked, thought of the mischievous nature of class prejudices. Laura herself—had she not been drawn from what one might call distinctly the other end of the ship; and who, among those who vaunted themselves ladies and gentlemen, could compare with Laura? The idea that she had shown a want of sympathy ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... once too often. Even though his crimes were never more serious than putting guinea-pigs into the master's desk, yet that sort of conduct time after time is not to be tolerated in any school. The example set by a mischievous boy to his fellows is not good; and if his scrapes are winked at always, the time will come when others will be encouraged to follow in his steps, and behave badly too. Sam, no doubt, deserved the punishment he got; and because one bad boy who is punished is no worse ...
— Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... tends to be filled up with bridge. The difficulty in dealing with the situation is that the thing itself is not only not wrong, but really beneficial; it is better to be occupied than to be idle, and it is hard to preach against a thing which is excellent in moderation and only mischievous in excess. ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... effusions of love, others are satirical, pastoral, and burlesque, and many descriptive of the manners and amusements of the people at large; but all of them are true representations of Spanish life. They are marked by an attractive simplicity of thought and expression, united to a sort of mischievous shrewdness. No such popular poetry exists in any other language, and no other exhibits in so great a degree that nationality which is the truest element of such poetry everywhere. The English and Scotch ballads, with which ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... Captain Kirle to wait upon him. His name was John Hilliard, and he was precisely what any of these good-humored, mischievous fellows outside would have been, hired on a brigantine two centuries ago; disposed to shirk his work in order to stand gaping at Black Ben fishing, or to rub up secretly his old cutlass for the behoof of Kidd, or the French when they should come, while the Indian Venus stood by looking ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various
... all sophistical and nonsensical; and she knew it, for there was a mischievous little gleam in her eye as she spoke. But none the less, shutting her ears to the unsympathetic Stephanie, did she continue to show herself alone in public with the beautiful youth. She had thrown her crown over the windmills for a few happy days; for a few happy days she was feeding her ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... startled by the sudden plunge of the alligators into the water, close to the boats, and of whose propinquity we were not aware until they made the plunge. All these rivers are infested with alligators, and I believe they are very often mischievous; at all events, one of our youngsters was continually in a small canoe, paddling about, and the natives cautioned us that if he was not careful he certainly would be taken by one of ...
— Borneo and the Indian Archipelago - with drawings of costume and scenery • Frank S. Marryat
... his gratitude for the present, and Rose unconsciously curtsied, much as she must have thirteen years before. Her lips and eyes smiled her shy thanks, but it appeared to Donald that mischievous amusement struggled ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... 15, to the postulate of an original universal stage of savagery, whence civilised races inherit their incredibly repulsive myths, why, in pp. 197, 198, does he denounce that very postulate as not proven, not capable of being proved, very mischievous, and one of the evils resulting from our method of comparing savage and civilised rites and beliefs? I must be permitted to complain that I do not know which is Mr. Max Muller's real opinion—that given with such hearty conviction in p. 15, ...
— Modern Mythology • Andrew Lang
... of knowledge all we gained from those soldier friends. They taught us the alphabet, how to spell easy words, and then to form letters with pencil. They explained the meaning of fife and drum calls which we heard during the day, and in mischievous earnestness, declared that they, the best fighters of Colonel Stephenson's famous regiment of New York Volunteers, had pledged their arms and legs to our defence, and had only come to see if we were worth the price they might have to, pay. Yet they made grim faces when, all too soon, the retreat ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... depend upon God's truth, and his holy word, and receive with humble faith the mysteries which are too high for comprehension. Above all, Swift points out, with his usual forcible precision, the mischievous tendency of those investigations which, while they assail one fundamental doctrine of the Christian religion, shake and endanger the whole fabric, destroy the settled faith of thousands, pervert and mislead the genius of the learned and acute, destroy ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift
... telegraph-office of the White House, laughing. He had picked up a child's book in his son "Tad's" room and looked at it. It was a story of a motherly hen, struggling to raise her brood to lead honest and useful lives; but in her efforts she was greatly annoyed by a mischievous fox. She had given him many lectures on his wicked ways, and—said the President: "I thought I would turn over to the finis, and see how they came out. This is what ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... was that nothing was done by anybody to put a stop to all this mischievous talk, and to put out of the world a matter which was of the greatest injury to the regiment and to the whole corps of officers,—a matter, too, in which the civilian population was perfectly justified in pointing the finger of ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... Is he not himself in some measure accountable? In those days when they raced through the Catechism together, did he never provoke her mocking smiles by his sneers at the ponderous language? Did he not tempt her to some mischievous sally of mirth, on many a day when they were kneeling in couple about ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... the masses, and even competent authorities. The natural cowardice of men often makes them shut their eyes to avoid nuisances, and causes them to take no action against the most dangerous monsters, and especially against those who are most mischievous by their pens. This is why the martyrdom of unfortunate women and children illtreated by chronic alcoholics, sadists and other neuropaths or psychopaths, never comes to an end, owing to the stupid outcry against so-called violation of ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel
... at 160,000 years ago—what an amusing idea that will seem!—But the truth is we must wage war against this mischievous foreshortening of history. I have no doubt there have been empires going, from time to time, in Egypt, since before Atlantis fell; people have the empire-building instinct, and it is an eminently convenient place for empire-building. I have no doubt there have been dozens of ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... amusement and might have passed unnoticed by the conceited little auditor if it had not been followed by another, less humorous, but more personal and satirical, signed in the same way, but the second communication was written by two mischievous (if not malicious) girls—Mary Todd and her friend, Julia Jayne. This stinging attack made Shields wild with rage, and he demanded the name of the writer of it. Lincoln told the editor to give Shields his name as if he had written both contributions and thus protect the two young ladies. ...
— The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln • Wayne Whipple
... same lively, restless group who filled those desks in the days of long-ago. Again I saw the bright smile which was often hidden from the searching eye of our teacher, behind the covers of the well-worn spelling-book, again I saw the mischievous glances, and heard the smothered laughter when the attention of the teacher was required in some other part of the room. But these happy, careless days of childhood are gone never to return. Were I inclined, I could trace the after-history ...
— Stories and Sketches • Harriet S. Caswell
... party that has fallen a sacrifice to its own rectitude will arise another phenix of political virtue, with fresh vigour and immortal hope. It is sometimes contended, that a man must go with his party, though it be against his conscience. Mischievous and infamous language. What! a man put himself into chains, that he may plead captivity as an excuse for sin? Shall the partisan with his own hand efface the prerogatives of his humanity, and dare to trample on the laws of God, though he has not, and because he has not, the ...
— The Religion of Politics • Ezra S. Gannett
... say, without incurring the charge of vanity, that he has here indicated the natural division of those symptoms. They are necessarily of two kinds: the unicorns and the bicorns. The unicorn Minotaur is the least mischievous. The two culprits confine themselves to a platonic love, in which their passion, at least, leaves no visible traces among posterity; while the bicorn Minotaur is unhappiness ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... a mischievous Pug[103] Contrived of the claret to empty each jug, But not unperceived by young Miss Exclamation,[104] Who by her loud cries caused immense consternation. Meanwhile came the Sweep,[105] with the Chimney Sweep's ...
— The Emperor's Rout • Unknown
... not got wrong with the minutes when the rattle began again, the puppet emerged, and the four quarters were struck fitfully as before. One could almost be positive that there was a malicious leer upon the hideous creature's face, and a mischievous delight in its twitchings. Then followed the dull and remote resonance of the twelve heavy strokes in the tower above. The women were impressed, and there was ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... was last of all—he did not go on with the rest, but stayed, as if in wonder, looking at her. A tall, slender lad. His jacket was unbuttoned, his cap a trifle on one side, and a mischievous expression ...
— The Song Of The Blood-Red Flower • Johannes Linnankoski
... mouthfuls. I have never appreciated the name of "sloth bear" given to Ursus labiatus, as it is a creature that works hard for its food throughout the year, and being an inhabitant of the tropics, it never hybernates. This species is very active, and although it refuses flesh, it is one of the most mischievous of its kind, as it will frequently attack man without the slightest reason, but from sheer pugnacity. A full-grown male weighs from 280 to 300 lbs. The skin is exceedingly thick and heavy. The hair is long and coarse, with a bunch upon its back of at least 7 inches in length, but there is ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... beautiful voice, exquisitely modulated, never raised in talk, was thoroughly Devonian. So too were his imperfect sense of the effect produced by what he said upon ordinary minds, and his love, which might almost be called mischievous, of giving small electric shocks. In the case of Carlyle, however, the out-cry was wholly unexpected, and for a time he was distressed, though never mastered, by it. What he could not understand, what it took him a long time to live down, was that friends who really knew him should ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... the theatre he had a mischievous impulse to test what Le Chapelier had told him of the state of public feeling in the city. They were playing "The Terrible Captain," in the last act of which the empty cowardice of the bullying braggart Rhodomont is ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... vacancy of thought,—dreaming perhaps of other scenes, or inwardly repining at the eternal monotony and tedium of a teacher's life. His boys took no interest in their work, and of course made no progress. They were sometimes unnecessarily idle, and sometimes mischievous, but never usefully or pleasantly employed; for the whole hour was past before the pens could all be brought down. Wasted time, blotted books, and fretted tempers, were all the ...
— The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... canvas cover was removed from the particular boat in which the small submarine was hidden, and the mischievous little toy was carefully hoisted out, lowered into the water, submerged until only the top of her diminutive conning tower showed above water, and then effectually concealed by being moored to the boat boom, between the gig and the steam pinnace. Then advantage was taken ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... and boys throw the pillow aside. This is the other extreme, and wrong. It is unhealthy to lie constantly on the back. You must frequently change to the side. But when you turn upon the side, if you have no pillow, you must either twist the shoulders into a mischievous attitude, or let the head fall down to the level of the shoulder, as seen in Fig. 4. This disturbs the circulation ...
— Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No. 1 - An Illustrated Magazine • Various
... not intend to flinch, and if the mischievous smile lurking at the corners of her mouth died away, she still regarded him with a calmness equal to his own, and with the impishness quite emphatically still in her eyes. Then suddenly she felt as if there had been some invisible sword-play between them. Her instinct ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... for the contemplation of nature has in no small degree contributed to the mischievous skepticism promulgated by our poet. In early times, when a rural theogony was the standard of belief, when each star had its deity, each deity its undisputed, unquestioned prerogative and worship, there was ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... State comes nearest home to a man's feelings, and includes the altar and the hearth, while the General Government claims his devotion only to an airy mode of law, and has no symbol but a flag,) is exceedingly mischievous in this point of view; for it has converted crowds of honest people into traitors, who seem to themselves not merely innocent but patriotic, and who die for a bad cause with a quiet conscience as if it were the best. In the vast extent of our ...
— Hawthorne - (English Men of Letters Series) • Henry James, Junr.
... and, from the appearance of the ground behind the hillock, believed it might be as the boy said, and accordingly determined to strike up a peace with so light-footed and ready-witted an enemy. "Come down," he said, "thou mischievous brat! Leave thy mopping and mowing, and, come hither. I will do thee no harm, ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... Napoleon has placed her among the elect," remarked the Countess Helene, with a mischievous glance towards the Marquise, each understanding that the mention of the Second Empire was like a call ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan
... perfectly contented. He would have been had it not been for his terrible wife, the hair-dresser's daughter, who had a dismal, mischievous, sullen nature, a venomous tongue, and a savage temper. She kept Haydn in hot water continually, till at last he broke loose from this plague by separating from her. Scandal says that Haydn, who had a very affectionate and sympathetic nature, found ample ...
— The Great German Composers • George T. Ferris
... 'people came out, and cattle, and dogs.' In Australia, a god is swallowed. As in the myth preserved by Aristophanes in the 'Birds,' the Australians believe that birds were the original gods, and the eagle, especially, is a great creative power. The Moon was a mischievous being, who walked about the world, doing what evil he could. One day he swallowed the eagle-god. The wives of the eagle came up, and the Moon asked them where he might find a well. They pointed out a well, and, as he drank, they hit the Moon with a stone tomahawk, and out flew the eagle. ...
— Custom and Myth • Andrew Lang
... indited the reply. It thankfully acknowledges "the success which the merciful God has given to the sedulous and assiduous endeavors of our honorable rulers to defeat the abominable witch crafts which have been committed in the country, humbly praying that the discovery of those mysterious and mischievous wickednesses may be perfected. It is pleasant to note, after all, the ministers' advice to the civil rulers not to rely too much on "the devil's authority"—on the evidence, that is, of those possessed. The court heeded this injunction all too little, but ...
— History of the United States, Vol. I (of VI) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... worn by the women and could not overcome them. The crystal glasses sparkled in the light of the wax candles, the jewels, and the bright eyes round the table. The servants poured out the noble Rhine wine, the celebrated Burgundy, the elegant Bordeaux, and the mischievous Champagne, whose colored embodiment was reflected on the white hands of the guests, and carried their imaginations away in its flight from gray reality to the immortal land of ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... half-trained servants to watch it, she gave the precious oil in charge to this youth, who was one of her favorites, bidding him, after a stated time, remove it from the chimney to a cooling-place; now not finishing her directions, the lad indulged his mischievous propensities by attempting to place the kettle of boiling lard to cool in the square-room fire-place; but finding it heavier than his strength could carry, its contents were suddenly deposited on the carpet, save such sprinklings ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 1 July 1848 • Various
... your case, and get Clip," said Cora with a mischievous smile, "and I will attend to ...
— The Motor Girls on a Tour • Margaret Penrose
... [148] mingling with them certain abuses which contaminated these masses with practices that were superstitious, and contrary to the holy rites of the church. These were tolerated under the cloak of devotion, and, although to some they appeared mischievous, they did not dare to rebuke these rites in public lest they excite against themselves the pious feelings of the common people, and as this matter was one of those which belong to the zeal and foresight of the ecclesiastical superiors. Finally the holy Congregation of Rites, in ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various
... terrified that he climbed to the interior of a wagon to comply with the demand of the savages. When I saw this, I drew my rifle from its place under my bedding and placed it in readiness. Plainly I saw Don Juan come out of the wagon with the mischievous stone jug, as this happened in the bright light of our camp fire. That will never do, thought I, and quickly drawing my revolver, I persuaded the Don to drop the jug, incidentally smashing it with a 44 caliber bullet, taking care not to hurt anybody; and this was easily done, as the jug was a large ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... Miss Knowles, in defiance of the knowledge, born of many afternoons, that he preferred cream. She took a keen and mischievous pleasure in annoying this hot-tempered young man, and she generally succeeded. But to-day he was not to be diverted from the purpose which, at the very moment of his ...
— New Faces • Myra Kelly
... still on fire; and the light embers were carried to an amazing distance by the wind, falling like a black-shower around us. As we knew that the natives never made such extensive conflagration, unless they had some mischievous object in view, our apprehension for the safety of Riley, with ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... the cards were besmeared with mud and one or two in such a freakish way as to give a curious turn to their meaning. On one card a mischievous little rivulet of mud or wetted ink had ingeniously changed a T into a crude R and the travelers read ...
— Pee-wee Harris • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... profession, who overlap the workhouse population, and are estimated to number 20,000 to 30,000 in England and Wales, when the genuine unemployed are eliminated, are everywhere found to be a very degenerate class, among whom the most mischievous kinds of feeble-mindedness and mental perversion prevail. Inebriates, the people who are chronically and helplessly given to drink, largely belong to the same great family, and do not so much become feeble-minded because they drink, but possess the tendency to drink because they ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... enters its second phase. Krishna is no longer a mischievous baby, indulging in tantrums yet wringing the heart with his childish antics. He is now five years old and of an age to make himself useful. He asks to be allowed to graze the calves. At first Yasoda is unwilling. 'We have ...
— The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry • W. G. Archer
... blue-jay alighted on the bank and made a prospecting peck at the tobacco pouch. It yielded in favor of a gopher, who endeavored to draw it toward his hole, but in turn gave way to a red squirrel, whose attention was divided, however, between the pouch and the revolver, which he regarded with mischievous fascination. Then there was a splash, a grunt, a sudden dispersion of animated nature, and the head of Mr. Lance Harriott appeared above the bank. It was a startling transformation. Not only that he had, by this wholesale ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... cried Swinton, laughing; "he has fallen into an ant-eater's hole, depend upon it; that mischievous little urchin ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... when one amuses himself with imagining the impossible, it is not worth while to be scrupulous about details. I am not the Grand Bashaw; and when I pronounced them fit for his harem, I merely meant a compliment to their superlative beauty. That Floracita is a mischievous little sprite. Did you ever see anything more roguish than her expression while she was singing ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... quiet fun Steve and his friend Red Wolf had already enjoyed in a very similar occupation. The squaws had insisted upon making all the boys and girls who were big enough swim instead of going over on pony-back, and the youngsters in their turn had revenged themselves by doing all the mischievous pranks ...
— The Talking Leaves - An Indian Story • William O. Stoddard
... are honest, and believe that your cause is the right one. I recognise, too, though this is a very difficult thing to do, that you have every right to form and hold your own political opinions. It seems to me that they are very wrong and very mischievous, but it is quite possible that I am mistaken and prejudiced. In any case, I am not called upon to refuse you my affection or to separate you from my daughter because we differ ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... provide him with a warrant. It seemed simple enough, at first, to draw a warrant for old Zack's arrest, but legal difficulties arose. He could not well be taken for assault, for it was the lawyer that had attacked him; or for wanton mischief, for his intent in going to school was not mischievous; or yet for trespass, for he had offered to ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens
... have, by prejudice and rage, he will do some things he would not think of doing if he were in his right mind. Look at Rodney," said Dixon; and Marcy wondered if he knew or suspected that Rodney had written that mischievous letter. "It's in the mouth of every rebel in town whom we talk with that the committee burned those houses, and what everybody says must have some ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... political organization, to the resisting of the exploitation of the mother country by inflowing masses of foreigners, are declared to be bad patriots, dead to the sentiment of the flag, dead to the call of the bugle, are silenced in fact by a fustian as senseless and mischievous as that which in some marvelous way the politician, hypnotized by the old formulae, has managed to make pass ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... a mischievous, sly fellow, full of wiles and deceit, and always quick to suggest a way out of a difficulty. On this occasion his plan was to allow the man to build the fortress, and to promise him the terms demanded, but subject to the condition that he fulfilled his task in a way that would be impossible ...
— Told by the Northmen: - Stories from the Eddas and Sagas • E. M. [Ethel Mary] Wilmot-Buxton
... has taken up his quarters for the winter hunting not far from us, with six or seven of the young warriors, who look up to him, and he is mischievous. If the Injun nation won't make war, he will do something on his own account, if he possibly can. He's not badly ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... single sentiment that can by possibility alienate old friends, or can ever be quoted as evidence that the editor had dared to assert his manhood. Is this loyalty to the Constitution and the Union? Is this the allegiance which a citizen owes to his country? Away with the mischievous sophistry, that the Government is not the country, and does not represent the people! Can any sane man doubt that an Administration legally chosen, and rightfully in power, and receiving the emphatic indorsement of decisive majorities in Congress, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... abundantly. Neither do they now stay with such of these fruits as are wholesome in their kinds, but adventure further upon such as are very dangerous and hurtful, as the verangenes, mushrooms, etc., as if nature had ordained all for the belly, or that all things were to be eaten for whose mischievous operation the Lord in some measure hath ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed
... afterwards agitated before the council of Constance; and it was with difficulty that a feeble decision in favor of the contrary opinion, was procured from these fathers of the church, the ministers of peace and of religion. But the mischievous effects of that tenet, had they been before anywise doubtful, appeared sufficiently from the present incidents. The commission of this crime, which destroyed all trust and security, rendered the war implacable between the French parties, and cut ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... moods that varied from feminine pettishness to the teasingly mischievous. But he had never seen her in quite the same pitch of spirits that caught his attention as soon as ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... fun, and soon a rollicking game of underwater tag was in full swing. The dolphins seemed as playful and mischievous as small children. ...
— Tom Swift and the Electronic Hydrolung • Victor Appleton
... from knowing of the great affection that I bear you. Although it is honourable enough to be everywhere proclaimed, yet those who know nothing of lovers' hearts often judge contrary to the truth, and thence come reports as mischievous as though they were true. I have been prompted to say this, and led to declare my love to you, because Paulina, feeling in her heart that I cannot love her, holds me in suspicion and does nought but watch my face wherever I may be. Hence, when you come and speak ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. II. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... Virtue, Reason, and Truth, be forever our only divinities." What has made virtue so difficult and so rare? Religion, which divides men instead of uniting them. What has so long delayed the illumination of the reason, and the discovery of truth? Religion with its mischievous errors, God, spirit, freedom, immortality. Immortality exists only in the memory of later generations; man is the creature of a day; nothing is permanent but the great whole of nature and the eternal law of universal change. Can a clock broken into a thousand ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg
... barque, and shot into the deep water in the middle of the stream, evidently with the intention of speaking us. As, however, she was just half-way across, floating helplessly, unable to reach the bottom with the spear she had used as a puntpole in the shallower water, a mischievous black imp canted her over, and souse she went into the river. It was amazing to see how boldly and well the old woman struck out for the shore, keeping her white head well out of the water; and, having reached dry land once more, sat down on her haunches, and began ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... grandparents of a given pony have all been perfect in every point. Good! You naturally expect that a pony with such exceptionable ancestry will itself be without a flaw. But is it? No, often it is not. Too frequently you get bitter water from sweet, and thistles instead of grapes. Just look at that tricky, mischievous, ill-tempered, wall-eyed little rascal. Where did he get his evil cantrips and his wall-eye? I have known his ancestors for four generations back and they were all without a blemish." The minister made ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... raillery not being held in check by any personal esteem for his character. Nevertheless, as it is still the sincerity of nature which, even in the simplicity caused by surprise, pierces suddenly through the veil of dissimulation, a satisfaction of a superior order is mixed with the mischievous joy we feel in having caught any one in the act. This is because nature, opposed to affectation, and truth, opposed to deception, must in every case inspire us with esteem. Thus we experience, even in the presence ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... Of course she is; the mischievous old thing! Trying to take the girl from a comfortable ...
— The House of Souls • Arthur Machen
... at him in mischievous challenge of his subterfuge, and he added frankly, with a voice that shook ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... perjured King,' well as we guard him? (Ibid. 409.) Unhappy perjured King!—And so there shall be Baker's Queues, by and by, more sharp-tempered than ever: on every Baker's door-rabbet an iron ring, and coil of rope; whereon, with firm grip, on this side and that, we form our Queue: but mischievous deceitful persons cut the rope, and our Queue becomes a ravelment; wherefore the coil must be made of iron chain. (Mercier, Nouveau Paris.) Also there shall be Prices of Grain well fixed; but then no grain purchasable by them: bread not to be had except by ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... sixteenth-century peasant (of the modern imagination) and the nineteenth-century villager of actual fact. His own small army from the stable and the garden were powerless to cope with the disorderly mob they had been encouraged to invite in this interesting celebration. And those most mischievous and conspicuous roughs whom the coachman had driven off with the whip on the way up, revenged themselves for this drastic treatment by coming in through the front gate of the park, breaking down the fence between park and garden, and every ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden
... have been the boy who stopped as he ran before them, and smacked the stomach of a large pumpkin lying at the feet of an old market-woman, and then dashed away before she could frame a protest against the indignity. From this incident they philosophized that the boys of Dusseldorf are as mischievous at the end of the century as they were at the beginning; and they felt the fascination that such a bounteous, unkempt old marketplace must have for the boys of any period. There were magnificent vegetables of all sorts in it, and if the fruits ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... amiable domestics would be clattering up and down the back yards all the evening, and the news would surprise nobody when she came to tell it next day. She was too true a woman to want to part with such a pleasure. Then she had—ah! must it be confessed?—a little mischievous desire of her own to see how Mrs. Turner would take it, for those who knew Mrs. Turner best were given to the belief that she would far rather have the attention of the masculine element of the garrison ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... that there is no art to read the mind's complexion in the face. These fellows pretend that your villain is often smooth-faced as well as smooth-tongued, and pleases the eye to the benefit of his mischievous ends. Whereas, on the other hand, many an honest fellow is damned for a scoundrel because with the nature of an angel he has the mask of a fiend. In which two fancies I have no belief. A rogue is a rogue all the world over, and flies his flag in his face for those who can read the bunting. ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... a long time, however, before the "peachy one" appeared. Then suddenly one day a great jagged shadow enveloped them in its purple coolness. The men looked up, startled. She must have come upon them slowly and quietly, for she was close. Her mischievous face smiled alluringly down at them from the wide triangle ...
— Angel Island • Inez Haynes Gillmore
... of either Eben or Noodles. Why, after they passed the crossroads where the ruins of the old blacksmith shop lay, in which they had held their first meetings, but which had been mysteriously burned down, some thought by mischievous and envious town boys—after they had gone by this well-known spot, and sighted the Scroggins farm beyond, every fellow had actually forgotten such a thing as fatigue. They held themselves up straight, and walked with a springy step that would go far toward ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... led her to a small chair directly under the mischievous-looking lady in the frame; and she felt a kind of satisfaction in being placed out of her sight. But it seemed, even then, as she cast a furtive glance upward, that those roguish eyes were trying to peer over the picture frame, and get a look ...
— Poor and Proud - or The Fortunes of Katy Redburn • Oliver Optic
... the special laws against it, the mischievous consequences of it, the sore punishments appointed to it), we may consider, that to common sense vain swearing is a very unreasonable and ill-favoured practice, greatly misbecoming any sober, worthy, or honest person; but especially most absurd ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... Sometimes a mischievous child risked his skin and bones for the ineffable pleasure of driving a pin into Quasimodo's hump. Again, a young girl, more bold and saucy than was fitting, brushed the priest's black robe, singing in his face the sardonic ditty, "niche, niche, the devil is caught." Sometimes a group of squalid ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... gift of nature, or effect of art, however beneficial to mankind, which, either by casual deviations, or foolish perversions, is not sometimes mischievous. Whatever may be the cause of happiness, may be made, likewise, the cause of misery. The medicine, which, rightly applied, has power to cure, has, when rashness or ignorance prescribes it, the ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... Mandy slipped the words in slyly, for she knew that they were against the pastor's wishes, but she was unable to restrain her mischievous impulse to sow the seeds of curiosity that would soon bear fruit in the inquisitive mind of the ...
— Polly of the Circus • Margaret Mayo
... truth, that these disasters were often the product of pure malicious frolic. For instance, in recommending a certain kind of quickset fence, he insists upon it, as one of its advantages, that it will not readily ignite under the torch of the mischievous wayfarer: "Naturale sepimentum," says he, "quod obseri solet virgultis aut spinis, praetereuntis lascivi non metuet facem." It is not easy to see the origin or advantage of this practice of nocturnal travelling (which must have considerably increased the hazards ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... also do its cock-and-bull stories. Its laugh is the mouth of a volcano which spatters the whole earth. Its jests are sparks. It imposes its caricatures as well as its ideal on people; the highest monuments of human civilization accept its ironies and lend their eternity to its mischievous pranks. It is superb; it has a prodigious 14th of July, which delivers the globe; it forces all nations to take the oath of tennis; its night of the 4th of August dissolves in three hours a thousand years of feudalism; it makes of its logic the ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... pink and lilac; and undergarments edged with yellowing lace. A sweet scent rose from them, as of some gentle presence that strove to reach the light and air once more. A pair of little white kid slippers looked as though they longed to twinkle in and out beneath a soft silk skirt. Angel's mischievous brown hands dived among the light folds, discovering opera glasses,—(treasures to be secured if possible, against some future South Sea expedition), an inlaid box of old-fashioned trinkets, a coral necklace, gold-tasselled earrings, and a brooch ...
— Explorers of the Dawn • Mazo de la Roche
... mountain vales, the white-crowned sparrows, one of whose nests I was so fortunate as to come upon. It was placed in a small pine bush, and was just in process of construction. One of the birds flew fiercely at a mischievous chipmunk, and drove him away, as if he knew him for an ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser |
