"Wag" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... more or less concerned for the mischance; all trying wrongly to do right; all fawning at each other's feet like dumb, neglected lap- dogs. Sometimes we catch an eye - this is our opportunity in the ages - and we wag our tail with a poor smile. "IS THAT ALL?" All? If you only knew! But how can they know? They do not love us; the more fools we to ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... devil and crocodiles black; black men call them white," replied Hassib, who was a wag. "You now see which ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... is never nervous, never cross, never snaps or snarls, and is ready, the moment after the grossest affront, to wag the tail of forgiveness,—all because kind Nature has put his dog's body together so that it always works harmoniously. If every person in the world were gifted with a stomach and nerves like his, it would be a far better ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... through some secret peephole. That had been her tribute to him and her scorn of his opponents. It about closed the incident, Pan concluded. Men were now coming along the street in both directions, though not yet close. Some wag yelled from a distance: ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... A wag who thought to have a joke at the expense of an Irish provision dealer said, "Can you supply me with a ...
— The New Pun Book • Thomas A. Brown and Thomas Joseph Carey
... pleura than the diaphragm? Why is the collar-bone the undisputed king of the osseous frame? One can understand the supremacy of the heart: it plainly bosses the whole vascular system. But why do the bronchial tubes wag the lungs? Why is the chin superior to the nose? The ankles to the shins? The ...
— A Book of Burlesques • H. L. Mencken
... chatter away at top speed, though I tried to restrain myself, to show that I was nothing more than an uncle to her. I talked to distract her, to distract us both; I let my tongue wag—I could hear it buzzing. What could I say? A little of everything—a great ...
— Look Back on Happiness • Knut Hamsun
... that thare should be no superioritie in that behalf, to the ground gois boyth the croces. And then begane no litill fray, but yitt a meary game; for rockettis war rent, typpetis war torne, crounis war knapped,[387] and syd gounis mycht have bene sein wantonly wag from the one wall to the other: Many of thame lacked beardis, and that was the more pitie; and tharefore could not bukkill other by the byrse, as[388] bold men wold haif doune. Butt fy on the jackmen that did nott thare ...
— The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6) • John Knox
... for Jedge Chinn's for to fetch away that little hawg. Dick puts him in the basket, climbs onto his mule, an' goes teeterin' out for home. On the way back, Dick stops at Hickman's tavern. While he's pourin' in a gill of corn jooce, a wag who's present subtracts the pig an' puts in one of old Hickman's black Noofoundland pups. When Dick gets home to Bill Hatfield's, Bill takes one look at the pup, breaks the big rasp on Dick's head, throws the forehammer at him, an' bids him go back ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... 'Alas, he whose strength was equal to that of a hundred thousand elephants, alas, that king sitteth today, leaning on a woman. Alas! he by whom the iron image of Bhima on a former occasion wag reduced to fragments, leaneth today on a weak woman. Fie on me that am exceedingly unrighteous! Fie on my understanding! Fie on my knowledge of the scripture! Fie on me for whom this lord of Earth lieth today in a manner that is not becoming of him! I also shall fast even as my preceptor. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... sister who told me that Mary was engaged to be married. But I had noticed for some days how the neighbors went out of their way to accost her upon our walks; to banter her kindly, to shake hands with her, to wag their heads and look chin-chucks even if they gave none. Her face wore a beautiful mantling red for hours at a time. And instead of being made more sedate by her responsible and settling prospects she shed the half of her years, which were not many, and became the most delightful romp, a furious ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... Sire.—A petition from the English detenus at Valenciennes was left for signature at the house of the colonel of gendarmerie, addressed in a fulsome manner to Bonaparte, under his title of Emperor of the French, and beginning with "Sire." Some unlucky wag took an opportunity of altering this word into "Dear Sir," and nearly caused the whole party to ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various
... created by the blue hat. It was the last to come ashore. It lingered on the gunwale with an appealing turn manwards until a red arm was offered on one side, a black arm on the other, whereupon it hopped ashore with a coy wag to the right and to the left. It was not hard to see why the boatmen ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... grandpa and grandma, because the old man is always kind to thee, and though she may sometimes wag a sharp tongue, she means well. Be patient, by-and-by thou wilt have a nice property, the country will have more people for hire, and thou wilt not have so ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... vivacity flashing up at the imputation. "What do you take me for, William Bernard, that you venture to use such a word? Am I one of those old maids whom some wicked wag has described as crying out in despair, 'Who will have me?' or a cherry, at which ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... the courtiers and the people were alike less blind and less forbearing. With that light-heartedness which has enabled the French in all ages to find cause for mirth even in their misfortunes, some wag, less scrupulous than inventive, on one occasion, under cover of the darkness, affixed above the door leading to the rooms occupied by the brothers a painting which represented the adoration of the Magi, beneath which was printed in bold letters, "At the sign of the Three Kings"; a practical jest ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... Battalion doubling up and down along the Canal side to the accompaniment of the drums. This was entertaining for a brief space, but the novelty soon wore off. Ordinary training was continued, and included several route marches. It was during one of these that the C Company "wag" brought forth a spontaneous remark one day when passing one of those little dog-carts one used to see so often. It was very heavily laden and the dog was straining every nerve. A big, powerful looking woman was walking at the side carrying ...
— The Sherwood Foresters in the Great War 1914 - 1919 - History of the 1/8th Battalion • W.C.C. Weetman
... might have saved him the trouble, had the wag honourably adhered to the institutions of chivalry, in his conflict with our novice. But on this occasion, his ingenuity was more commendable than his courage. He had provided at the inn a blown bladder, in which several smooth pebbles were enclosed; and this he slyly fixed ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... strong alliances above, That 'twere profaneness in us laity To offer earthly aid. I tell thee, Mufti, if the world were wise, They would not wag one finger in your quarrels. Your heaven you promise, but our earth you covet; The Phaetons of mankind, who fire that world, Which you were sent by preaching but ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... received the cavalcade with barks as noisy as he would have bestowed on any worldly pedlar. Nay, so very unmannerly was Colle, that when he was let go, he marched straight to the Archbishop, and after a prolonged sniff at the archiepiscopal boots, presumed so far as to wag his very secular tail, and even to give an uninvited lick to the archiepiscopal glove. The Archbishop, instead of excommunicating Colle, laid his hand gently on the dog's head and patted him; which so emboldened that audacious quadruped that he ...
— The White Lady of Hazelwood - A Tale of the Fourteenth Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... I can't be with the witch, confound her! she is such a wag, such a drole, such a mimic; disobeys me in such a mocking, cajoling, affectionate way. I could not give her pain if her soul depended ...
— Hidden Hand • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... tail, anyway; but one can always give a dog the benefit of a doubt, and she believed that it began to wag more happily. Thus it was settled between them. All the affection which his nature held, which his rearing in a large kennel of other dogs had not permitted him to bestow upon any one master, now sprang to its most perfect development and centered upon this girl. Wherever she was, he was; watchful, ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... reached and the little steamer tied up at the dock, and the boys and girls went ashore. Just before leaving, Dick took a look at Dan Baxter and saw that he wag now sleeping in earnest. ...
— The Rover Boys at School • Arthur M. Winfield
... Sun and the Moon The First Monkey The Virtue of the Cocoanut Mansumandig Why Dogs Wag Their Tails The Hawk and the Hen The Spider and the Fly The Battle of ...
— Philippine Folk Tales • Mabel Cook Cole
... elder, Mademoiselle Virginie, was the very image of her mother. Madame Guillaume, daughter of the Sieur Chevrel, sat so upright in the stool behind her desk, that more than once she had heard some wag bet that she was a stuffed figure. Her long, thin face betrayed exaggerated piety. Devoid of attractions or of amiable manners, Madame Guillaume commonly decorated her head—that of a woman near on sixty—with a cap of a particular and unvarying shape, with long lappets, like that ...
— At the Sign of the Cat and Racket • Honore de Balzac
... At present the lord of my affections is one of these bull terriers. He has a long pedigree, a crooked tail and the drollest "phiz" in dogdom. My dog friends seem to understand my limitations, and always keep close beside me when I am alone. I love their affectionate ways and the eloquent wag of their tails. ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... the bone-house, in the parish church-yard (which was about a mile distant), and bring a skull from thence with him, and place it on the table before the guests. This wager was soon accepted by one of the party, who immediately set off on his expedition to the church-yard. The wag who had proposed the bet, and who knew a nearer by-way to the bone-house than his opponent had taken, requested of the landlady to lend him a white sheet, and that he would soon cool this heroic man's ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... Jacques Menetrier. My father, Leonard Menetrier, kept a cookshop at the sign of Queen Pedauque, who, as everyone knows, wag web-footed like the geese ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... Quite a number of persons collected, each one gazing on the bronze figure, expecting to see the phenomenon. Their imagination supplied the desired marvel, and presently a street full of people fancied that they could see the lion Percy wag his tail! ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth
... man had been rewarded and plundered. Once a wag came to court, and amused every one by his drolleries. The King gave him a great many presents, including a horse. After taking leave of the King and his courtiers, the Wag bundled up the presents and put them over his shoulders, and mounting the horse, facing the tail, was going out. The ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... imagined could be turned from sacrament to circus by the indecorous behavior of the groom and the flippancy of the bride. She, above all, must not reach up and wig-wag signals while she is receiving, any more than she must wave to people as she goes up and down the aisle of the church. She must not cling to her husband, stand pigeon-toed, or lean against him or the wall, or any person, or thing. She must not run her arm through ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... were shocked when they saw a publican with Jesus, and tongues began to wag. No one seemed to notice that Levi had stopped collecting taxes. He had been a publican once, and no one except Jesus was ready to ...
— The King Nobody Wanted • Norman F. Langford
... Geoffroy Saint Hilaire[25] says that not one constant difference can be pointed out between their structure and that of the smaller races of dogs. They agree closely in habits: jackals, when tamed and called by their {25} master, wag their tails, crouch, and throw themselves on their backs; they smell at the tails of dogs, and void their urine sideways.[26] A number of excellent naturalists, from the time of Gueldenstaedt to that of Ehrenberg, Hemprich, and Cretzschmar, have expressed themselves in ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Vol. I. • Charles Darwin
... the Joker had an Inspiration, and he had to tell it to a Friend, who also was something of a Wag. ...
— More Fables • George Ade
... worrying? Fillmore's simply a baby, and he's just playing the fool. He has lost his head completely. And I can't stop him! That is the awful part of it. I used to be able to look him in the eye, and he would wag his tail and crawl back into his basket, but now I seem to have no influence at all over him. He just snorts and goes on running round in circles, ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... opinion, was distinctly Confederate. I had heard it frequently. It was an old thing. Often, when waiting for troops to pass, you would ask, "What regiment is that?" and some-would-be wag would say, "Our regiment." ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... there! Don't meddle with what doesn't concern you. You've been brought to row, now row. And if you let your tongue wag, no good will come of it. Do ...
— Twenty-six and One and Other Stories • Maksim Gorky
... giving at length her entire pedigree. To this Dr. Pigrum made a reply as follows: "Dr. Pigrum's compliments to Miss Altifiorla, and is happy to learn the name of her great grandmother." Dr. Pigrum was supposed to be a wag, and the letter soon became the joint property of all the ladies in ...
— Kept in the Dark • Anthony Trollope
... somehow flung his forked and narrow beard forward. That carefully cut and pointed yellow beard was, indeed, the most emphatic thing about him. When he clasped his hands behind him, under the tails of his coat, he would wag his beard at a man like a big forefinger. It performed almost all his gestures; it was more important than the glittering eye-glasses through which he looked or the beautiful bleating voice in which he spoke. His face and neck were of a lusty red, but lean and stringy; he always wore his ...
— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... hundred florins out in that dog-house," replied Ben, who was the wag of the party, ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... of this expression is unknown. Some wag of the day allayed public curiosity in regard to its source with the information that it is from the ballad of Robin Roughhead in Murtagh's "Collection of Ballads (1754)." It is needless to say that Murtagh is a verbal phantom, and the ballad of Robin Roughhead first appeared in ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... deck, and found that our suspicious friend had shortened sail, as if he had made us out, and wag afraid to approach, or ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... familiar with the fact of young and old animals displaying their feelings in the same manner that we hardly perceive how remarkable it is that a young puppy should wag its tail when pleased, depress its ears and uncover its canine teeth when pretending to be savage, just like an old dog; or that a kitten should arch its little back and erect its hair when frightened and angry, like an old cat. When, however, we turn to less common ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... 3 CHILD. Away, wag; what would'st thou make an implement of me? 'Slid, the boy takes me for a piece of perspective, I hold my life, or some silk curtain, come to hang the stage here! Sir crack, I am none of your fresh pictures, that use to beautify the decayed dead ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson
... certain Conde de ——, who had lately been decorated, was a most notorious rogue; in consequence of which, some wag chalked up on his door in large letters, during the night, the following lines, which, of course, were in everybody's mouth soon ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... a system, beaming warmth and gladness to every heart. Even the very dog that lay stretched at his feet, as he lazily shifted his position and yawned, would look fondly up in his master's face, wag his tail against the floor, and stretch himself again to sleep, confident of kindness and protection. There is an emanation from the heart in genuine hospitality which cannot be described, but is immediately felt, and puts ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... was yielding, but peevish: his habits were regular, and his deportment strictly decorous. Walpole was constitutionally fearless, Pelharn constitutionally timid. Walpole had to face a strong opposition; but no man in the Government durst wag a finger against him. Almost all the opposition which Pelham had to encounter was from members of the Government of which he was the head. His own pay-master spoke against his estimates. His own secretary-at-war spoke against ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... tongue shall wag To Amaryllis on the slag, Whilst I endeavour to confine Her horny ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Nov. 14, 1917 • Various
... Russian Tartary and the Crimea; she has with some of her admirers obtained the name of Dolly Drinkwater, from her known dislike to any 44thing stronger than pure French Brandy. Her present travelling cognomen is Mrs. Sp**c*r, otherwise Black Moll; and a wag of the day, who is rather notorious for the variety of his taste, has recently insisted upon re-christening her by the attractive nom de guerre of Nux Vomica. The little goddess of the golden locks, dancing with a well-known roue, is Fanny My*rs, a very efficient partner ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... wired Baxter at Medicine Bend that a herd of at least one million buffaloes was crossing the railroad at Goose Creek. As the grave despatcher seemed not greatly excited by this intelligence, Bucks followed up the story at intervals with vivid details. A wag on the wire in Medicine Bend played upon his enthusiasm by demanding frequent bulletins, even going so far as to ask the names of the leading buffaloes in the herd. When he had got all the laughs possible for the office out of the youthful ...
— The Mountain Divide • Frank H. Spearman
... her the fact that these bitter-tongued women whom she despised had dared to assail her—her, the Burra Mem, the Great Lady of their little world. Had dared to? She could not silence them. And what would they say of her, how their tongues would wag, if she ran away from her husband! And they would have a right to talk scandal of her then. The thought made ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly
... company—I was made for it, I think—so I made friends with the animals. They are just charming, and they have the kindest disposition and the politest ways; they never look sour, they never let you feel that you are intruding, they smile at you and wag their tail, if they've got one, and they are always ready for a romp or an excursion or anything you want to propose. I think they are perfect gentlemen. All these days we have had such good times, and it hasn't been lonesome for me, ever. Lonesome! No, I should say not. Why, there's ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... to me of patience; Measure his woe the length and breadth of mine, And let it answer every strain for strain; As thus for thus, and such a grief for such, In every lineament, branch, shape, and form: If such a one will smile, and stroke his beard; And, 'sorrow wag,' cry; hem, when he should groan; Patch grief with proverbs; make misfortune drunk With candle-wasters; bring him yet to me, And I of him will gather patience. But there is no such man: For, brother, men Can counsel, and speak ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Knight edition]
... for I be aud, and a hundred years is too much for any man to expect. And I'm so nigh it that the Aud Man is already whettin' his scythe. Ye see, I can't get out o' the habit of caffin' about it all at once. The chafts will wag as they be used to. Some day soon the Angel of Death will sound his trumpet for me. But don't ye dooal an' greet, my deary!"—for he saw that I was crying—"if he should come this very night I'd ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... directly for home, he halted for the night at the little town of Ardagh, and, accosting the first person he met, inquired, with somewhat of a consequential air, for the best house in the place. Unluckily, the person he had accosted was one Kelly, a notorious wag, who was quartered in the family of one Mr. Featherstone, a gentleman of fortune. Amused with the self-consequence of the stripling, and willing to play off a practical joke at his expense, he directed him to what was literally "the best house in the place," namely, the family mansion of ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving
... type; long and thin for fourteen, burnt to almost Kaffir darkness; a wag of a boy, with merry brown eyes, and a temperament unable to be depressed for more than five minutes at a time. He was always in scrapes at school, but a great favourite with masters and boys notwithstanding; and he straightway laid his boyish heart down at Norah's feet, and was her slave from ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce
... to offer Cynthia, for it had never crossed his dull mind that the disorder of the hall and the absence of Kenneth might cause her astonishment. And so when she touched upon the matter of his wound, like the blundering fool he was, he must needs let his tongue wag upon a tale which, if no less imaginative than Joseph's, was vastly its inferior in plausibility and had yet the quality of differing from it ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... clockmakers of the Eighteenth Century made many of those jolly little wall clocks called Wag-on-the-Wall. These clocks may be still picked up in out-of-the-way towns. In construction they are very much like the old cuckoo clock which has come to us from Switzerland, and the tile clock which comes from Holland. ...
— The House in Good Taste • Elsie de Wolfe
... are on record. It is said that the house dog was his close attendant, and on Sabbath day would invade even the pulpit in search of his master. Hence he was carefully fastened during 'holy time.' On one occasion, however, some wag not only loosed the animal, but actually garnished his neck with a pair of ministerial bands. The poor dog, unwitting of his sacred insignia, made his way into the pulpit without being noticed by his absent ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various
... t' the age o' three," said Jim Grimm, with a pessimistic wag of the head, "'twill be more by luck than ...
— Billy Topsail & Company - A Story for Boys • Norman Duncan
... his undress uniform was not green, but a sort of rusty-meal colour. The collar was low, so that his neck, in spite of the fact that it was not long, seemed inordinately so as it emerged from it, like the necks of those plaster cats which wag their heads, and are carried about upon the heads of scores of image sellers. And something was always sticking to his uniform, either a bit of hay or some trifle. Moreover, he had a peculiar knack, as he walked along the street, of arriving beneath ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... he said quickly. "I show you." Then the wag of a Delaware tossed the first stone fully twenty feet aloft, caught up the others, and ...
— The Daughter of the Chieftain - The Story of an Indian Girl • Edward S. Ellis
... masters because no brains. Nobody wants to adopt an idiot. They are, of course, mongrels of the most hopeless type. They are yellowish, with thick, short, woolly coats, and much fatter than you expect to find them. They walk like a funeral procession. Never have I seen one frisk or even wag his tail. Everybody turns out for them. They sleep—from twelve to twenty of them—on a single pile of garbage, and never notice either men or each other unless a dog which lives in the next street trespasses. ...
— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell
... a nice dog named Dix, and he and Splash are good friends. First they sort of growled at each other, and then they smelled noses and now they always wag their tails ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue on an Auto Tour • Laura Lee Hope
... rules, Of all beau-kind the best proportioned fools! Adjust their clothes, and to confession draw Those venial sins, an atom, or a straw; But oh! what terrors must distract the soul Convicted of that mortal crime, a hole; Or should one pound of powder less bespread Those monkey tails that wag behind their head. Thus finished, and corrected to a hair, They march, to prate their hour before the fair. So first to preach a white-gloved chaplain goes, With band of lily, and with cheek of rose, Sweeter than Sharon, in immaculate trim, Neatness ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... fog lifted and he saw the stars. In the morning the sun rose fair out of the sea, and he got a bearing. More than that, he saw before him—like a low bank of cloud—a strange coast lying on his starboard bow. He could not tell where he wag got to, or what land that might be, but was sure it was not Greenland. The land lay low, and was dark with woods. The shore was sandy, with hummocks of blown sand upon it, covered with grass; the surf very heavy. He coasted ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett
... entourage, could he possibly have been less? Rumor's hundred tongues wag with the announcement, that his Excellency is no longer inconsolable for his wife's death; and desires to testify to the happiness of conjugal relations, by a renewal of the sweet bondage; a curiously subtile compliment ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... taken the trouble to learn the lines properly and broke down at least once in every long speech, thereby justifying the popular inversion of her name to Lazy Kitty, a pseudonym which some college wag had fastened upon her early ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... lived long enough to l'arn there's two sorts of characters in the world—them that is 'arned by deeds, and them that is 'arned by tongues, and so I prefar to see and judge for myself, instead of letting every jaw that chooses to wag become my judgment. Hurry Harry spoke pretty plainly of the whole family, as we journeyed this-a-way, and he did hint something consarning Thomas Hutter's having been a free-liver on the water, in his younger days. By free-liver, I mean that ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... boys of any country, but to these Formosan lads who had had no experience with one the sound of Lu-a's harsh voice and the sight of his flying heels brought convulsions of merriment. "He's pounding rice! He's pounding rice!" shouted the wag of the party, and his companions flung themselves upon the grass and rolled about ...
— The Black-Bearded Barbarian (George Leslie Mackay) • Mary Esther Miller MacGregor, AKA Marion Keith
... keep my mouth shut in such company, and don't express my own views more than is absolutely necessary. I criticize whiles, and that gives me a name of whunstane common-sense, but I never let my tongue wag. The feck o' the lads comin' the night are not the real workingman—they're just the froth on the pot, but it's the froth that will be useful to you. Remember they've heard tell o' ye already, and ye've some sort o' reputation ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... disconcerted nor offended him. He was a philosopher—and, like so many of his kind, a laughing philosopher. When he was sufficiently recovered from his operation to get about on crutches he was the wag of the ward. He took a special delight in those practical jokes which are invented by patients to tease the nurses, and devoted the most painstaking ingenuity to their preparation. It was he who found a small hole in the lath-and-plaster wall which separates the ward from the ward's kitchen. ...
— Observations of an Orderly - Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital • Ward Muir
... continues as they go through the town, couple after couple, wandering as they list. The quiet winding closes ring with songs of love and death, so that the old townsfolk lift their heads from their pillows, and, their nightcaps pushed to one side, wag gravely at all this frivolity. But youth knows nothing of this; it plunges reveling onward, with its surging blood. And one day the old people have the best of it; the blood surges no longer, but there they are, and ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... ken him, cudna bide to hear tell o' him, and they said, "Lat's hae nae mair o' this! Hae dune wi' yer bonny man! Haud yer tongues," they cryit. But the ithers, they wadna hear o' haudin their tongues. A'body maun ken aboot him! "Sae lang's we hae tongues, and can wag them to the name o' him," they said, "we'll no haud them!" And at that they fell upo' them, and ill-used them sair; some o' them they tuik and burnt alive—that is, brunt them deid; and some o' them they flang to the wild beasts, and they bitit them ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... cried her eyes out over them with great assiduity. No coach ever passed the gate, but she expected a husband for her girls would alight from it and ring the bell. As for Miss Hetty, she allowed her tongue to wag in a more than usually saucy way: she made a hundred sly allusions to their guest. She introduced Prussia and Persia into their conversation with abominable pertness and frequency. She asked whether the present King of Prussia ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... care," said Lillie, after a pause. "I hate all these moral movements and society questions. They are always in the way of people's having a good time; and I believe the world would wag just as well as it does, if nobody had ever thought of them. People will call you ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... stanes that mark the deid, Wi' lengthened lip, the sarious read; Syne wag a moraleesin' heid, An' then an' there Their hirplin' practice an' their ...
— Underwoods • Robert Louis Stevenson
... fifty persons, mostly young tradesmen, willing to pay down for this purpose forty shillings each, and ten shillings per annum. On this little fund we began. The books were imported; the library wag opened one day in the week for lending to the subscribers, on their promissory notes to pay double the value if not duly returned. The institution soon manifested its utility, was imitated by other towns, and in other provinces. ...
— The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... all his family; and had grown to love them all right well,—him too, though that was the difficult part of the feat. For in his Irish way he played the conjurer very much,—"three hundred and sixty-five opinions in the year upon every subject," as a wag once said. In fact his talk, ever ingenious, emphatic and spirited in detail, was much defective in earnestness, at least in clear earnestness, of purport and outcome; but went tumbling as if in mere welters of explosive unreason; a volcano heaving under vague deluges ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... so would I," cried Mr. Peram. Giles had a very disagreeable habit of repeating his words. A wag once said that his ideas were so few and his words so many that he was forced to repeat. "I will fight for the rights of the people. I will lead an army myself and hurl King Charles ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... displays, to which the king invited the princes and generals of the Continent. Dunning had announced himself as Solicitor-General of England. Frederick, either knowing nothing of solicitors, though much of generals, or what is more probable—for he was the most deliberate wag in existence—determining to play the lawyer a trick, ordered him to be received as a general officer, and provided him with a charger for his presence at the grand display. Dunning, long unused to ride, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... the brain of Dr. Jones, was an actuality. Language is inadequate to describe the sensations of the little company of promoters. They said but little, but would often stand in a group, gaze upon it, then into each other's eyes, and smile and wag their delighted heads. ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman
... drowse to-night, Skirting lawns of sleep to chase Shifting dreams in mazy light, Somewhere then I'll see your face Turning back to bid me follow Where I wag my arms and hollo, Over hedges hasting after Crooked smile and baffling laughter, Running tireless, floating, leaping, Down your web-hung woods and valleys, Garden glooms and hornbeam alleys, Where the glowworm stars are peeping, ...
— Georgian Poetry 1916-17 - Edited by Sir Edward Howard Marsh • Various
... had no peace after that. The jokes were frightful, and merciless against him. "Hullo, Dobbin," one wag would say, "here's good news in the paper. Sugars is ris', my boy." Another would set a sum—"If a pound of mutton-candles cost sevenpence-halfpenny, how much must Dobbin cost?" and a roar would follow from all the circle of young knaves, usher and all, who rightly considered that ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... his new acquaintance. The lurking expression with which he felt that the eyes of the other were fixed upon him made him start for a moment. What if the Russian perhaps only had the same intention as himself, and only wanted to make his tongue wag with the champagne? At all events, he was now ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... hurriedly, under the belief that he would be induced to keep his promise: how he had thrown her over to her own devices: and how she had ever since been trying to pick up a precarious livelihood for herself in stray ways as a sempstress, work for which she wag naturally very ill-fitted, and for which she had no introductions. She slurred over nothing on either side of the story; and especially she did not forget to describe the full measure of her troubles ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... his tail a wag, and butted the first-mate's leg, submitting afterwards to being patted in the ...
— Mother Carey's Chicken - Her Voyage to the Unknown Isle • George Manville Fenn
... greater distance, we might stir up all the game we could take care of. Such was the feeling expressed by the soldiers as they discussed the situation on the march that day, and indulged in conjectures as to our probable destination and the outcome of the expedition. Of course, the company wag had a hearing while he expounded his views as to what we would do to the Confederacy or the Confederacy to us. The soldiers had confidence in General Warren, and regarded him as a prudent and efficient officer. He had the reputation ...
— In The Ranks - From the Wilderness to Appomattox Court House • R. E. McBride
... strongly in dogs, and indeed in other animals. At the house of a gentleman in Wexford, out of four dogs kept to guard the premises, three of them would always wag their tails, and express what might be called civility, on the approach of any well-dressed visitors; manifesting, on the other hand, no very friendly feelings towards vagrants or ill-dressed people. The ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... What a dog is that Kuvshinnikov! He and I attended nearly every ball in the place. In particular, there was a woman—decolletee, and such a swell! I merely thought to myself, 'The devil take her!' but Kuvshinnikov is such a wag that he sat down beside her, and began paying her strings of compliments in French. However, I did not neglect the damsels altogether—although HE calls that sort of thing 'going in for strawberries.' By the ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... of Arion on his dolphin; he wears a cap ending in a long proboscis-like horn, and plays a violin with a curious twitch of the bow and wag of the head, very graphically expressed, but still without anything approaching to the power of Northern grotesque. His dolphin has a goodly row of teeth, and the waves ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... is an idle rumor," said he; "two days ago they were still in Frankfort. You see, therefore, that some wag has amused himself by teasing you and frightening you a little for the thunderbolts which you two, and particularly the Vossian Gazette, have ...
— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach
... should go about my vengeance in this hole-and-corner fashion to set a hangman's noose about my neck. A fine vengeance that, as God lives! Was it so I dealt with you, Sir John, when you permitted your tongue to wag too freely, as you have yourself confessed? Heaven's light, man; take a proper view; consider was this matter likely. I take it you are a more fearsome antagonist than was ever poor Peter Godolphin, yet when I sought satisfaction ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... do you know that you are at this present time giving occasion for the tongues of my parishioners to wag more than is at all reasonable? Oh!" continued he, replying to a remonstrating gesture of his companion, "it is unpremeditated on your part, I am sure, but, all the same, they talk ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet
... New York by the British in 1776 the notes began to fall. In 1778 the news of the French alliance caused a little rise; but in 1781 the bills fell to a point where a thousand dollars exchanged for one dollar in specie, and a Philadelphia wag made out of the notes a blanket for his dog. The Continental currency was never redeemed, and was consequently a forced tax on those who were least able to pay, since every holder lost by its depreciation while ...
— Formation of the Union • Albert Bushnell Hart
... and a wanton; In the whole world, there is scant one ——Such another: No, not his mother. He hath pluck'd her doves and sparrows, To feather his sharp arrows, And alone prevaileth, While sick Venus waileth. But if Cypris once recover The wag; it shall behove her To look better to him: Or she will ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson
... received with shouts of rapture by the audience. These were soon, however, renewed at the expense of the jester himself, when the insulted maiden extricated, ere the paroxysm was well over, one hand from the folds of her mantle, and bestowed on the wag a buffet, which made him reel fully his own length from the pardoner, and then acknowledge the ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... to 1804, and State Senator until 1808. Although looked up to by multitudes as the political leader of his time, Peck was noted at Albany for his shabbiness of dress. He wore coarse boots, which he never blackened. On one occasion, on the eve of an important debate, some wag at the tavern blackened one of Peck's boots. Peck, in dressing for the fray, did not recognize the shining boot, and having put on one began to search high and low for the other. At last, enlightened by the laughter of his comrades, he drew on the polished boot, and with ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... with pure good heart, When lo some scurril children that lurked near, Set there by Satan for my stumbling-stone, Fell hooting with necks thwart and eyes asquint, Screeched and made horns and shot out tongues at me, As at my Lord the Jews shot out their tongues And made their heads wag; I considering this Took up my cross in patience and passed forth: Nevertheless one ran between my feet And made me totter, using speech and signs I smart with shame to think of: then my blood Kindled, and I was moved to smite the ...
— Chastelard, a Tragedy • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... of life, since the fur days of La Ramee in 1821. Having now superciliously sold out to these pilgrims, reserving only alcohol enough for its own consumption, Old Laramie was willing to let the world wag, and content to twiddle a ...
— The Covered Wagon • Emerson Hough
... compound of acids and sweets, hot water and fire-water, to steal away the brains,—but a finer mixture of subtler elements, conducive to mental and moral health; not, in a word, punch, the drink, but "Punch," the wise wag, the genial philosopher, with his brevity of stature, goodly-conditioned paunch, next-to-nothing legs, protuberant back, bill-hook nose, and twinkling eyes,—to speak respectfully, Mr. Punch, attended by the solemnly-sagacious, ubiquitously-versatile "Toby," together with the invisible ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... excited, protests against these virtuous bigots, does not wish his sister to visit the poor, to protect young girls, or to provide for abandoned children. He says all these things are clericalism, are utopianism, that the world wags in its own way, and that it must be allowed to wag in its own way, that all this associating with the lower classes only serves to put false and dangerous ideas into their heads. Now, my friend has been told that she must either leave her brother, or lie ...
— The Saint • Antonio Fogazzaro
... a remarkably awkward horseman, so much so, as generally to attract notice. Some years after this, he was riding along the turnpike road, in the county of Durham, when a wag, approaching him, noticed his peculiarity, and (quite mistaking his man) thought the rider a fine subject for a little sport; when, as he drew near, he thus accosted Mr. C. "I say, young man, did you meet a tailor on the ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... creature, does he not know, then, that every lie is accursed, and the parent of mere curses? That he must think the truth; much more speak it? That, above all things, by the oldest law of Heaven and Earth which no man violates with impunity, he must not and shall not wag the tongue of him except to utter his thought? That there is not a grin or beautiful acceptable grimace he can execute upon his poor countenance, but is either an express veracity, the image of what passes within him; or else is a bit of Devil-worship which he ...
— Latter-Day Pamphlets • Thomas Carlyle
... the stern First Lord aloud— He was a wag, though very proud, And much rejoiced to say, "You're only half a captain now— And so, my worthy friend, I vow ...
— More Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... we're not now acting with the Horned Lizard and his painted freebooters. Our fellows here have eyes in their heads, and tongues behind their teeth. They might wag the latter to our disadvantage if we allowed the former to see anything not exactly on the square. And if we were to shoot or cut down Miranda, he not resisting, that would be a scandal I might have difficulty in suppressing. It would spread surely, go over the country, get to the ears ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... trees, grouped upon the highland, Here and there make pleasant island; On the bark some wag hath wrote— "Who would ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... employ you,' said the wag. 'I am from Picardy, and will get you taken in here, where you will be treated as a queen would often like to be, and you will be able to make a ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... old Bourjac would chuckle and wag his head sagely, for he saw no Illusions now to compare with those invented by himself when he was in ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... three hundred thousand francs for an incorrigible father! Why, they have nothing left, poor wretches! And they have no fun for their money. All they have to live upon is what Victorin may make in Court. He must wag his tongue more, must monsieur your son! And he was to have been a Minister, that learned youth! Our hope and pride. A pretty pilot, who runs aground like a land-lubber; for if he had borrowed to enable him to get on, if he had run ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... in one jewelled hand, and with the other twirling a long and silken moustache. Handsome, graceful, and thoroughly inured to the public gaze, he fronted a small circle of gapers like an actor adroit to make the best of himself, and his tongue wagged fast enough to wag a man's leg off. At a casual glance he might have been taken for thirty, but his age was fifty and more—if you could catch him in the morning before he had put the ...
— Tales of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... I had but a tail I would wag it this morning with joy, At your having provided My car that's one-sided With a good and ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... anywhere, so long as I am working with you," he answered. It was much as a faithful dog would wag his tail and snuggle up for a ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... Presbyterians—as a house of worship, but was made to serve as a schoolhouse. So far as petty litigation was concerned, Squire Ichabod Inchly, the wheel-wright, was prepared to hold justice-court in the open air in front of his shop when the weather wag fine, and in any convenient place when the weather was foul. "Gentlemen," he would say, when a case came before him, "I'd a heap ruther shoe a horse or shrink a tire; yit if you will have the law, I'll try and temper ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... long again for such relish as this is, Devoutly I'll pray, wag Maecenas, I vow, With her hand that your mistress arrest all your kisses, And lie as far off as the couch ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... Link, letting the stone drop to the road, "got nerve, too, ain't you, friend? 'Tain't every cuss that can wag his tail when his ...
— His Dog • Albert Payson Terhune
... pooty well," said the man. "They ain't no particler likin' for me. Don't want to run and jump an' wag, but they know I mean well, and they mostly let ...
— 'Doc.' Gordon • Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman
... parish matters," said a wicked wag of the company; "you see, sir, our minister urged pretty hard last Sunday to have his salary paid up. He has had sickness in his family, and nothing on hand for ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... now all join to say, that it is more manly to attach a lion than a sheep?—Thou knowest, that I always illustrated my eagleship, by aiming at the noblest quarries; and by disdaining to make a stoop at wrens, phyl-tits,* and wag-tails. ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... cradle, Mr. Macy," returned Jenkins, who was a wag as well as the mate. "In my judgment, the best mode of rocking it to sleep will be by knocking over all these grim chaps that are so ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... entertaining conversation, in which, besides telling many queer stories of his own life—and he had seen service in his youth—the old man more than once used an expression, which was long afterwards put into the mouth of Dominie Sampson's mother:—"Please God, I may live to see my bairn wag his head in a ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... he, 'some day when I am asked out to dinner, some wag or another of a lord will call me parson, and ask me to crave a blessin', jist to raise the larf agin me for havin' ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... Bread-Tray,' and all those hoppery-skippery, jiggery-dancery tunes that make your feet go whether or no. But there Brother Terrapin sat, looking as unconcerned as if the fiddle had been ten miles away. He didn't even keep time to the music with his foot. More than that, he didn't even wag his head from side ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris
... was the Colonel's dry comment, "but it's much more important at times to be loyal to the last wag of your tongue." ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... a rough, shaggy dog, and his tail curled down under him in a way that showed he had been ill-treated. But he had good, faithful, brown eyes, and the drooping tail was always ready to wag at a ...
— Friends and Helpers • Sarah J. Eddy
... ground. Seeing the friendliness of their intentions, Finn wagged his tail at them, whereat they all leaped from him in sudden alarm as though he had snapped. Finn's jaws parted in amusement, and his great tail continued to wag, while he gave friendly greeting through his nostrils, and made it quite clear that he entertained no hostile feeling towards his ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... different, perhaps. Now, Sue, I've asked you before, don't let your mind grope, and your little tongue wag, every instant; it is n't good for you, and it certainly is ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... Occasionally some wag would push forward the pockmarked brave and demand of Dud that he baptize him again, and always the puncher made motions of going through the performance a second time. The joke never staled. It always got a hand, no matter how often it was repeated. At each ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine
... come to the end of a rough voyage filled the hearts of all on board. Sam Sorrel raised his head, and began to look less yellow and more cheerful. Tittles began to wag the stump of his miserable tail, and, in short, every one began to ...
— Chasing the Sun • R.M. Ballantyne
... of the "unfair sex"—as the modern wag dubs the progressive sisters who wish to have all man's rights and privileges and keep their own besides—never seem to consider their heads but from a front point of view. In consequence, as sketch No 28 hints, a head seen from the side frequently appears, ...
— What Dress Makes of Us • Dorothy Quigley
... his face turning red and hot. Almost before he knew what he was saying his tongue began to wag, and he heard himself saying, in a stiff, stilted voice, "It was very nice in the Park this afternoon!..." Oh, banal fool, he thought, she will despise you now, as if you were a ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... Priesthood, I shall say but little, Corbies and Clergy are a shot right kittle: But, under favour o' your langer beard, Abuse o' Magistrates might weel be spar'd; To liken them to your auld-warld squad, I must needs say, comparisons are odd. In Ayr, wag-wits nae mair can hae a handle To mouth 'a Citizen,' a term o' scandal; Nae mair the Council waddles down the street, In all the pomp of ignorant conceit; Men wha grew wise priggin owre hops and raisins, Or gather'd lib'ral views in Bonds and Seisins: If haply Knowledge, on a random tramp, ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... Oh, you darling!" as they caught sight of Poppy's dark head and beaming face in Esther's bed. "Just look at our letters,—oh, you have got some too? Isn't it lovely of Anna? I think she is a perfect dear." Both talked at once, and as fast as their tongues could wag. "Here's a present for you," said Penelope, laying her parcel very carefully in Poppy's lap, and kissing her on the ...
— The Carroll Girls • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... intentional in it,— just as people had before glossed on the previous external deportment of Von Plotho, so much prized in other respects, and, when once inclined towards him, had admired him as a wag, who, like his king, would place himself above all ceremonies,—one nevertheless gladly returned to the fairy ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... the dwarfs began to mock at the hero with their harsh voices, and to wag their horrid little heads at him, while they screamed in a fury that he was not dividing the treasure as ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... however, from the poorest fisherman's child to the wealthy widow, Mrs. Meadowsweet, wag expected to come to the Rectory to be feasted and petted, and made much ...
— The Honorable Miss - A Story of an Old-Fashioned Town • L. T. Meade
... 'em some day we was worth while, won't we, Baldy?" he would whisper confidently; and Baldy's reply was sure to be a satisfactory wag of his bobbed tail, signifying that he certainly intended to ...
— Baldy of Nome • Esther Birdsall Darling
... of a rampant bear, which the owner regarded with a look of mingled reverence, pride, and delight, that irresistibly reminded Waverley of Ben Jonson's Tom Otter, with his Bull, Horse, and Dog, as that wag wittily denominated his chief carousing cups. But Mr. Bradwardine, turning towards him with complacency, requested him to observe this curious ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... of this young wag seemed to be shared by the rest, for in spite of their warlike cries and gestures, everybody was capering and laughing, as if it was one of the funniest things in the world to be awaiting the flight ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... was "for an undertaking which shall be in due time revealed." The undertaker was as good as his word. He got L2,000 paid in on shares one morning, and in the afternoon the "undertaking" was revealed, for he had decamped with the money. Some wag advertised a company "for the invention of melting down sawdust and chips, and casting them into clean deal ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... of banter and impudence that George II. called him "that rascal George." "What does that mean," said the wit one day, musingly—"'rascal'? Oh, I forgot, it was an hereditary title of all the Georges." Perhaps Selwyn might have been called a "wag"—a name given to men who were more enterprising than successful in their humour, and which referred originally to ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... the Cat went on, "you see a dog growls when it's angry, and wags its tail when it's pleased. Now I growl when I'm pleased, and wag my tail when ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... now the engine ran merrily. Above its barking I sang the praises of the Englishman, with a comfortable feeling that, at least in this, the tail would wag the dog. ...
— The River and I • John G. Neihardt
... that in the magic of its Flow Anoints the Tongue to wag of So-and-So, To gabble garbled Garrulousness ere You lay the Cup and Saucer down ...
— The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Jr. (The Rubiyt of Omar Khayym Jr.) • Wallace Irwin
... Tree of mine! Have you seen my naughty little maid With a willy willy wag and a great big bag, She's ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... town now and take on a few drinks. Hunt up an old friend or two and wag your chins. Make it right secretive and confidential and make each one promise faithful not to breathe a syllable to another living soul. That way the news is sure to ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... far on to midnight, and contrived to make his six or eight shillings a week. I have often sat with him in the darkness that his "cruizey" lamp could not pierce, while his mutterings to himself of "ay, ay, yes, umpha, oh ay, ay man," came as regularly and monotonously as the tick of his "wag-at-the-wa'" clock. Hendry and he were paid no fixed sum for their services in the Auld Licht kirk, but once a year there was a collection for each of them, and so they jogged along. Though not the only kirk-officer of my time Hendry made the most lasting impression. He was, I think, the only man ...
— Auld Licht Idyls • J.M. Barrie
... was better than an alarm clock, for you didn't have to wind him. He crowed every morning his cheerful song to help the old world wag along. ...
— Little Jack Rabbit's Adventures • David Cory
... attentively at the proceedings, and others running about and amusing themselves. Close to these stand a group of young girls, convulsed with half-suppressed laughter. The cause of their merriment is a youth of some seventeen summers, evidently the wag of the village, who stands beside them with an accordion in his hand, and relates to them in a half-whisper how he is about to be elected Elder, and what mad pranks he will play in that capacity. ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... plaited, powdered, and fastened up with a comb, like themselves! The wearer of a queue was likely to be knocked on the head. These creatures used to congregate at the old Feydeau theater, or meet around the entrance of the Louvre, to talk classical jargon, and wag!" ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... now, how now, mad wag, what in thy quips and thy quiddities? what a plague have I to do with ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... the intelligence of Brownie—or of any dog, young or old—to suppose it capable of misunderstanding the gentle tone, the kindly glance, and the patting hand of Bladud. At all events, the result was that Brownie, with an expressive wag and bark, vowed fidelity from that date to the prince, and, in the same act, renounced allegiance to the hunter ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... face as full of grief as his heart was of sorrows, showing in his countenance the map of extremities. As soon as the shepherds saw him, they did him all the honor they could, as being the flower of all the swains in Arden; for a bonnier boy was there not seen since that wanton wag of Troy that kept sheep in Ida. He, seeing the king, and guessing it to be Gerismond, did him all the reverence his country courtesy could afford; insomuch that the king, wondering at his attire, began to question what he was. Montanus overhearing ...
— Rosalynde - or, Euphues' Golden Legacy • Thomas Lodge
... pelted, pestered, and pounded by one single wag, who promiseth never to forsake him ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... route are dogs. Indeed, routes are distinguished by their dogs. Mean routes are those that have terraces and mean dogs; good routes—where the houses are close together and the dogs run out and wag their tails. Though Stubby's greater difficulty came through the wagging tails; he carried in a collie neighbourhood, and all collies seemed consumed with mighty ambitions to have routes. If you spoke to them—and how could you help speaking to ...
— Lifted Masks - Stories • Susan Glaspell
... shines down upon the mounted statue of Ludwig I., in front of the Odeon, a band plays in an open Loggia, and there is always a crowd of idlers in the square to hear it. Everybody has leisure for that sort of thing here in Europe; and one can easily learn how to be idle and let the world wag. They have found out here what is disbelieved in America,—that the world will continue to turn over once in about twenty-four hours (they are not accurate as to the time) without their aid. To return ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... can't do this"—here Dr. Veiga held up a pared and finished finger and wagged it to and fro with solemnity—"you can't do this without moving your finger ... You were aware of this great truth? Then why are you upset because you can't wag your finger without moving it?... Perhaps I'm being too subtle for you. Let me put the affair in another way. You've lost sight of the supreme earthly fact that everything has not merely a consequence, but innumerable consequences. You knew when you ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... succeed, has seldom failed of fulfillment. We can not say this of the many aspiring magazines and periodicals that have solicited the charity of his name. We recollect, when brass buttons were universally worn on men's coats, a wag undertook to prove that they were very unhealthy, from the fact that more than half the persons who wore them suffered from chronic or acute disease, and died before they had reached a canonical age. According to this mode of generalization, Neal could be convicted of causing ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... sweet pudding to replace the cold meat, would wag a facetiously warning head at the young lady behind the back of the unconscious Mr. Gibbon. "Don't you go leading that nice young chap on to make a fool of hisself over you, Miss Bessie," she would caution the ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... particularly at the games of triumpho and primero, on which circumstance one of Guzmans friends played him the following trick to hold him up to ridicule. The civilians at that time wore gowns with loose hanging sleeves, into one of which some wag contrived to convey a pack of cards, so that when Torre was walking across the great square of Mexico in company with several persons of quality, the cards began to drop from his sleeve, leaving a long trail behind him as he walked along. On discovering the trick, which was heartily ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... he is very honest, and that if ever he returns to Babylon, as 'tis to be hop'd he will, he'll discharge his Debts with Interest, like a Man of Honour. But, as for your Wife, who appears to me, to be no better than a Wag-tail, never take the Trouble, if you'll take my Advice, to hunt after her any more. Be rul'd, and make the best of your Way to Babylon. I shall be there before you, as I shall ride, and you will be on Foot. Make your Applications ...
— Zadig - Or, The Book of Fate • Voltaire
... one had been forced to give in, and there was much speculation about it. Then came the rumor that Yale was to have an English coach, and the tongues of the gossips began to wag furiously. ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish
... parish of Thorpington Parva gave him a Ford car, and with this he scoured back areas for provisions and threaded his tin buggy in and out of columns of dusty infantry and clattering ammunition limbers, spectacles gleaming, cap slightly awry, while his batman (a wag) perched precariously a-top of a rocking pile of biscuit tins, cigarette cases and boxes of tinned fruit, and shouted after the fashion of railway porters, "By your leave! Fags for the firin' line. ...
— Punch, Volume 153, July 11, 1917 - Or the London Charivari. • Various
... travesty was particularly timely. It creates only a smile of amusement to-day, but it was all fresh and delightful then. Schuyler Colfax, by this time Vice-President, wrote to him: "I have had the heartiest possible laugh over it, and so have all my family. You are a wicked, conscienceless wag, who ought to be ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... powder in a fit of repentance. His influence over the stars and heavenly bodies is tremendous, and it is a well-known fact throughout the universe that he has them in such a complete state of terror and subjection, that a single comet dare not wag his tail unless by his permission. He travels up and down the milky way one night in every month, to see that the dairies of the sky are all right, and that that celebrated path be properly lighted; brings down a pail of the milk with him, which he churns into butyrus, ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton |
