"Fooling" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... come on home and they would protect me, but I was afraid to try it. Finally Miss Polly found that she couldn't keep me any longer and she come and told me I was free. But I thought that she was fooling me and just wanted to sell ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... got to change it, as sure as he lives! I am tired of his fooling; he is fourteen years old, big, strong, and healthy; if he would take hold of the work and show some interest in it, he would be able in a couple of years to take charge of the whole business and give me a rest, but he is frittering ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... god-like Trojan Eleven, Shining in purple and black, with tight and well-fitting sweaters, Woven by Andromache in the well-ordered palace of Priam. After them came, in goodly array, the players of Hellas, Skilled in kicking and blocking and tackling and fooling the umpire. All advanced on the field, marked off with white alabaster, Level and square and true, at the ends two goal posts erected, Richly adorned with silver and gold and carved at the corners, Bearing a legend which read, "Don't ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... wind to the coxswain, to hold on a moment, and some other words he can't catch, and the coxswain yelling back: Don't be long, sir. . . What is it? Cloete asks feeling faint. . . Something about the ship's papers, says the coxswain, very anxious. It's no time to be fooling about alongside, you understand. They haul the boat off a little and wait. The water flies over her in sheets. Cloete's senses almost leave him. He thinks of nothing. He's numb all over, till there's a shout: Here he is! . . . They see a figure ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad
... very well for you fellows," he says; "you like it, but I don't. There's nothing for me to do. Scenery is not in my line, and I don't smoke. If I see a rat, you won't stop; and if I go to sleep, you get fooling about with the boat, and slop me overboard. If you ask me, I call ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... the kitchen door, as she came into the sitting-room carrying the dish in one hand. He did not know what the other mother meant by saying "all those children"; for it was a small family for the Boy's Town, and he thought she must just be fooling. ...
— The Flight of Pony Baker - A Boy's Town Story • W. D. Howells
... up in cotton flannel and feed me warm milk with a spoon? Let go of me and quit your fooling. You delay ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... then put on my sea-weeds, and lay still to be stared at. I wanted some one to come and live on me; then I should be equal to the island of the polypes. But no one came, and I was beginning to be tired of fooling people, when I was fooled myself. An old sailor came to visit me: he had been a whaler, and he soon guessed the secret. But he said nothing till he was safely out of danger; then he got all ready, and one day, as I lay placidly in the sun, a horrible harpoon ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... nonsense of those rogues upstairs. I'll take the doll back and tell them they must fix it to-night, or I'll complain of them for their fooling at this busy time," she announced, energetically; for she noted the twitching around the corners of Katy's mouth, notwithstanding the child's ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley
... fooling!" and Thorny sat up to investigate the matter, so quickly that his sister had not time to sober down. "Ah, I've caught you! Not fair to tell, Celia. Now, Ben, you've got to learn all about this buttercup, ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, May, 1878, No. 7. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... shame of his recent low estimate of the Chinaman. Yip was fooling the Japs—perhaps coached by the safely ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... where you are!" Her words rang shrilly. "Here—fooling 'round with Isobel and you let the South High beat us by two points! You know you were the only girl we had who could beat Nina Sharpe in the breast stroke. They put in Mary Reed and she was like a rock. And you swam thirty-eight strokes under water the other day. I saw you—I counted. ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... always frightened her and made her dizzy. She paused. Some day Mrs. McGuire would look at her shrewdly and say, "You're not Mrs. Dorn. I called you Mrs. Dorn but I know better. Don't think you're fooling anybody. Mrs. ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... that abominable catalogue till four o'clock in the morning. It had looked at him with so pure and spiritual a face that he had not recognized it. But how otherwise could he have stayed here for three weeks, fooling with that unlucky conscience of his; persuading it one minute that he had nothing to do with Miss Harden, and that her father's affairs were no business of his, the next that they were so much his business that he was bound not to betray them; while as for Miss Harden, he ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... read. "Where do you think I put them to make them swim? They won't swim in the lake. It won't do no good to us for them to swim on dry land. No fooling, now, how do you make them ...
— The Water Goats and Other Troubles • Ellis Parker Butler
... Antiquary; "but go on. Why, this is, after all, the most admirable foolingI dare say the poet was very ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... words to herself she sadly spoke, Breaking the thread from the last-set stitch, When Mackerel into her presence broke— "Wife, we're—we're—we're, wife, we're—we're rich!" "We rich! ha, ha! I'd like to see; I'll pull your hair if you're fooling me." "Oh, don't, love, don't! the letter is here— You can read the news for yourself, my dear. The one who sent you that white crape shawl— There'll be no end to our gold—he's dead; You know you always would call him stingy, Because he didn't invite ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... a match, so that I could judge better just how my work looks," he sighed. "However, I don't believe Mr. Sambo Ebony will think it discreet to strike any matches either, so he won't find the place where I've been fooling with ...
— The Young Engineers on the Gulf - The Dread Mystery of the Million Dollar Breakwater • H. Irving Hancock
... this poisoning of the plants wasn't an accident. Somebody poisoned the water, then got worried when there wasn't a report on the plants; must have been someone who thought it worked faster on plants than it does. So he came to investigate, and Hendrix caught him fooling around. So he ...
— Let'em Breathe Space • Lester del Rey
... around, nearly every man in the community will turn out to hunt for mica, and not a speck of it will be found. A reminder of the imitators that clamor when the clear voice of a genius has been heard. If I keep on fooling with this subject I will regard it as strange, after all. Just think of the ten thousand things that led to the discovery of that mine. Suppose we could trace any occurrence back to its source. Take my ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read
... "Say, stop your fooling, will you? Miss Randall's not dead. She ran away, and came on board this boat. Own up now, ...
— Jess of the Rebel Trail • H. A. Cody
... This mightily frightened us, and not without cause; since we could see nothing, yet heard such various sounds and voices of men, women, children, horses, &c., insomuch that Panurge cried out, Cods-belly, there is no fooling with the devil; we are all beshit, let's fly. There is some ambuscado hereabouts. Friar John, art thou here my love? I pray thee, stay by me, old boy. Hast thou got thy swindging tool? See that it do not stick in thy scabbard; ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... never be a glee-maiden. Well, to make an end of my tale, we had one day a mighty show at Windsor, when the King and Court were at the castle, and it was whispered to me at the end that my Lord Archbishop's household needed a jester, and that Quipsome Hal had been thought to make excellent fooling. I gave thanks at first, but said I would rather be a free man, not bound to be a greater fool than Dame Nature made me all the hours of the day. But when I got back to the Garter, what should I find but that poor old Martin had been stricken with the dead palsy while he was playing his rebeck, ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... is no time for fooling. Give me your word and troth to be my wife so soon as we have the good luck to come by a Christian priest by our Lady's help, and I'll outface them all—were it Mohammed the Prophet himself, that you are my espoused and betrothed, ...
— A Modern Telemachus • Charlotte M. Yonge
... failing three times to get a pass degree. He had no special turn for anything in particular except riding and shooting and athletics of all sorts. So, like a sensible fellow, instead of stopping in England and fooling his money away, as too many younger sons do, he put four thousand pounds into my partner's hands—Lambe, I should tell you, was his aunt's solicitor—to be invested in good securities, put the other thousand into his pocket, and started ...
— The Missionary • George Griffith
... a silly little wind fooling around the Old Roads Corners and so you get all the sweet smells from Grandma Wentworth's herb garden and all the heavenly fragrance that the flower gardens of this end ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds
... I don't know. She's got a basket. He's in that, I suppose. Anyhow, he can't be any more of a bombshell than his mistress was. Now be quick, and none of your fooling, Bertram. Tell them all—Pete and Dong Ling. Don't forget. I wouldn't have Billy find out for the world! Fix it up with Kate. You'll have to fix it up with her; that's all!" And there came the sharp click of the receiver ...
— Miss Billy • Eleanor H. Porter
... gasped Terry. "Fooling with Kate's gun and trying a spin with it. It went off—drilled ...
— Black Jack • Max Brand
... of the slime round you. What little time you have over you will employ in wondering why you came to West Africa, and why, after having reached this point of folly, you need have gone and painted the lily and adorned the rose, by being such a colossal ass as to come fooling about ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... you're making love to her. But you have no business fooling around Joe Calvin's office on general principles. Keep out, and keep away from her." And then the Doctor's patience slipped and his voice rose: "What do you want to give her the household bills for? Pay 'em yourself or let Laura send her checks!" The Doctor's tones were harsh, and with the amiable ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... I didn't know what she was really leaving for! Do old folks honestly think they are fooling us all the time, I wonder? But even if I hadn't known then, I'd have known it later, for that evening I heard Mother and Aunt Hattie talking in ...
— Mary Marie • Eleanor H. Porter
... regretfully. "It's the chance of a lifetime. I had set my heart on fooling Kybird and Smith, and now all my trouble is wasted. Nathan Smith would be all ...
— At Sunwich Port, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... for several seconds. He searched Captain DeCastros' face for a sign that he might be fooling. He was not. He looked too pleasant. Mr. Wordsley had always managed to pass the Aberrations Test by the skin of his teeth, but he was sure that, like most spiritual geniuses, he was sensitively balanced, and that the power and seniority of a man like ...
— The Marooner • Charles A. Stearns
... get mad. Don't mind her, Father Kondraty, she doesn't mean it. She is a good girl. But really, why don't you leave the monastery? Why do you want to be fooling about here ...
— Savva and The Life of Man • Leonid Andreyev
... got to fooling around with the laboratory balance, Red and I encircled the balance with our arms and then squeezed together without feeling ...
— The Minus Woman • Russell Robert Winterbotham
... worked up now. He had thrown down his walking-stick and was plunging at his pockets with his teeth set. "It's that cursed young boy of mine," he hissed; "this comes of his fooling in my pockets. By Gad! perhaps I won't warm him up when I get home. Say, I'll bet that it's in my hip-pocket. You just hold up the tail of my overcoat a second ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... Wheaton, taking the proffered seat, "we've been fooling about this minister business ...
— Laicus - The experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish • Lyman Abbott
... you never going to have done fooling?" cried a tan-colored, wide-hipped peasant to her husband, who was lounging against the wagon pole, sporting a sprig of gentian pinned to his blouse. He was fat and handsome; and his eye proclaimed, as he was making it do heavy ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... her brother in a sharp, authoritative voice: "Mick! I've been talking to Paddy here, and we've reckoned we've had enough of this fooling, and we're off to England. You go in and tell old Fuzzy-Head" (she meant the Judge) "that I'm tired of this case, and I ain't goin' on wid it. Come on, Paddy, will we go and get ...
— An Outback Marriage • Andrew Barton Paterson
... of buffaloes on the shores of the river, but they were as tame as doves. At one place on the bank they saw a naked boy of ten fooling with one of them, jumping over him, and being dragged by his tail. It was but a short trip to the lake for the Blanchita, and the party sailed all around it. They were all delighted with the excursion; and the launch was hurried down the river, and reached the Blanche, where they were to ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic
... the ignorant knows no check except from without; under flattery, it is boundless, and the Cheap Jack's wife found no difficulty in fooling George to the ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... This base fooling was continuously blown upon by gales of stupid laughter. But not yet did Merton Gill know the worst. The merriment persisted through his most affecting bit, the farewell to his old pal outside—how could they have laughed ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... the girls' table, he could detect a current of uneasiness. They'd probably been fooling away more time than they should. Too bad he couldn't get more definite information from their thoughts. Like to know just how long they had been there. He tilted his wrist, taking a long look at his watch. The current of uneasiness increased. ...
— Final Weapon • Everett B. Cole
... garland woven fair; Take care! It is a fool's-cap for thee to wear; Beware! beware! Trust her not, She is fooling thee! ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... did the wits ridicule Franklin for fooling with electricity, Rumford for trying to improve chimneys, Parmentier for thinking potatoes were fit to eat, and Jefferson for believing that something might be made of the country west of the Mississippi. In all ages ridicule has ...
— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson
... sir, I wouldn't, only you made such a bad job of rubbing my knees. (aside to Libanus) Come on now, will you; you take your turn at fooling him ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius
... stuff, we had hit the great open spaces at a moment when twilight had not yet begun to cheese it in favour of the shades of night. There was a fag-end of sunset still functioning. Stars were beginning to peep out, bats were fooling round, the garden was full of the aroma of those niffy white flowers which only start to put in their heavy work at the end of the day—in short, the glimmering landscape was fading on the sight and all the air held a solemn stillness, and it was plain that this was having the worst ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... be so—humpy!" explained Betty. "We could not run the auto ice boat over the bumps. But really it might be worse; I'm not fooling." ...
— The Outdoor Girls in a Winter Camp - Glorious Days on Skates and Ice Boats • Laura Lee Hope
... mother. "No. It wouldn't be at all funny to spoil your father's morning coffee. It would be tragic. Put the salt back, rinse out the sugarbowl, and refill it with sugar. And no more April-fooling with your father's breakfast." ...
— Jerry's Charge Account • Hazel Hutchins Wilson
... was pleased at our going there and he hasn't minded my fooling round his place and he's given me a lot of points. He makes good ...
— Ethel Morton at Rose House • Mabell S. C. Smith
... pity that poor girl!' Love-making usually succeeded a whipping in short order, and then she was at her best. She would turn her head to one side, cast the most laughably provoking glances, hold one claw before her face, perhaps, like a skeleton fan, and say: 'Don't come fooling round me. Go away, you ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... — N. wit, humor, wittiness; sense of humor; attic wit, attic salt; atticism^; salt, esprit, point, fancy, whim, drollery, pleasantry. farce, buffoonery, fooling, tomfoolery; shenanigan [U.S.], harlequinade &c 599 [Obs.]; broad farce, broad humor; fun, espieglerie [Fr.]; vis comica [Lat.]. jocularity; jocosity, jocoseness^; facetiousness; waggery, waggishness; whimsicality; comicality &c 853. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... man like McGee would trust either of 'em in a matter like this? Not for a minute, Phil. He'd think they might be fooling him, just to save us from getting our downy coats. ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne
... and fast. 'I tell you, Julia,' said I, 'I'm a marrying man. I'm tired of living alone in the back end of a store with just a house-cat for company, while men no better are toasting their shins at a cheerful family fire. I'm tired of fooling. Carrie may not have as many dudes at her beck and call as some I know, but she knows what she wants in the man-line and won't take all eternity ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... administration, they should still be ready to discharge their trust, and to defend the nation from insults, injuries, and encroachments. "It is not," said Blake, "the business of a sea-man to mind state affairs, but to hinder foreigners from fooling us." This was the principle from which he never deviated, and which he always endeavoured to inculcate in the fleet, as the surest foundation of unanimity and steadiness. "Disturb not one another with domestick disputes, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... still laughing, but he checked his mirth sufficiently to answer, "Why, man, it's the whisky that's fooling you. There are no 'boys,' and no 'bunch' of horses here. Just your horse and mine; and I've got them both safe enough. You're ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum
... and was mocking me, pulling such a grimace the while that his smooth, long, thin face seemed grown to the length of two lean faces. The sight was so merry that I was fain to laugh. Whereas he nevertheless ceased not from sobbing, the Queen reproved him and bid him not carry his fooling too far. Whereupon he sobbed out: "Nay, royal and gracious Coz, thou art in error. Never have I so shamelessly forgotten to play my part as Fool, as at this moment. Alack, alack! what a thing is life! Were we not one and all born fools, and if we did but measure it as it is now and ever shall ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... thought followed up by a dogmatic assertion of infallibility as harsh as a slap on the face. The indisposition to recognize such a genius comes from the fact that he irritates as well as stimulates the minds he addresses. Everybody reads him, but the fooling he inspires is made up of admiration and exasperation. The public is both delighted and insulted. He not only does not attempt to conceal his contemptuous sense of superiority to common men, but he absolutely screeches and bawls it out. Fearful ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... lightly. "I didn't mean to alarm you. He merely carried that bug-catcher nonsense a trifle too far. I wouldn't have minded humoring him and fooling about it a little. But, Peter, do you know him quite well? Are you very sure ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... fooling around a boat in the summer time," he explained, "but you can't do that when the ice is about two feet thick. And yet if I go back to New York then I am all out of practice with my feet and legs and arms, so the only thing for me to do is to keep in the game. Besides, I ...
— Go Ahead Boys and the Racing Motorboat • Ross Kay
... fooling over this now,' he said. 'I have been talking to some of the fellows in the sixth, and they have made up their minds not to ...
— That Scholarship Boy • Emma Leslie
... not fooling. I have an album with my name and all that in it, and when I come out for an airing to-morrow I'll just bring ...
— The Girl Scout Pioneers - or Winning the First B. C. • Lillian C Garis
... it seems, never happened to catch his eye before," interpreted Kitty; and Mr. Arbuton, who was usually very restive during such banter, smiled as if it were the most admirable fooling, or the most precious wisdom, in the world. He made them wait to see the bargain out, and could, ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... we love the Mamamouchi! Grimace and habit sent you pleased away: You damned the poet, and cried up the play. This thought had made our author more uneasy, But that he hopes I'm fool enough to please ye. But here's my grief,—though nature, joined with art, Have cut me out to act a fooling part, Yet, to your praise, the few wits here will say, 'Twas imitating you ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... was not called Diogenes?" I asked tartly, suspecting, perhaps not without cause, that Ayesha was amusing herself by fooling me. ...
— Ayesha - The Further History of She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed • H. Rider Haggard
... the performance the singers might be enabled to give the conductor their absolute attention.) You have a perfect right to demand that all shall work industriously during every working minute of the rehearsal hour and that there shall be no whispering or fooling whatsoever, either while you are giving directions, or while you are conducting. If you are unfortunate enough to have in your organization certain individuals who do not attend to the work in hand even after a private admonition, it will be far better to drop ...
— Essentials in Conducting • Karl Wilson Gehrkens
... good. He's hanging out the slate with the time on it. Eighteen and four-fifths. Oh, no, never in the world. Here's the Mt. Victory boys. See that light-haired boy. Go it, towhead! Ah, they've got the ladder crooked. Eighteen. That's not so bad .... Oh, quit your fooling. He's nothing of the kind. Honestly? What! that old skeezicks? Who to, for pity's sake? Well, I thought he was a confirmed old bachelor, if anybody ever was. Well, sir, that just goes to show that any man, I don't care who he is, can get married if he—Who were ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... your fooling," Prescott advised, "or I'll let out a whoop that will bring five more fellows here. Do you know what they would do to you? They'd just about lynch you—-schoolboy fashion. Do you know what a schoolboy ...
— The High School Boys in Summer Camp • H. Irving Hancock
... this way. Poppa don't want to get fooling around any more one-horse towns than he can help, and he's got to be fixed up with the idea that Nuremberg is a prominent European sight before he drops everything to ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, September 5, 1891 • Various
... on one side and closed an eye. He eyed Garrison steadily. "Kid, it seems to me that you've only been fooling yourself. I believe you're Major Calvert's ...
— Garrison's Finish - A Romance of the Race-Course • W. B. M. Ferguson
... gullible and it takes little argument to persuade them to invest nearly all they have in something that will make them rich in a hurry, but the fact that they are foolish is not quite sufficient justification for fooling them. Even if the stocks and bonds are all the salesman believes and represents them to be, no man has a right to risk his home or his happiness for them. A worth while salesman leaves his customer satisfied and ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney
... "Oh, quit your fooling and tell us!" demanded Grace. "Then we'll go for a ride in your boat, and you can stop at the Point and get ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Ocean View - Or, The Box That Was Found in the Sand • Laura Lee Hope
... short. The man's irrepressible love of fooling, half good-humored, half malicious, ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... radio room. The signal was coming through frantically as Tiger reached for the pile of punched tape running out on the floor. But as they crowded into the radio room, Dal felt Jack's hand on his arm. "If you think I was fooling, you're wrong," the Blue Doctor said through his teeth. "You've got twelve hours to get rid ...
— Star Surgeon • Alan Nourse
... Paget, Vice-Chancellor of the University.] has taken up the game, and I am going to a committee of the University this day week to try my powers of persuasion. If the Senate can only be got to see where salvation lies and strike hard without any fooling over details, we shall do a great stroke of business for the future ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley
... bought her just as she stands, with her cargo half out, but he wasn't here when she broke cargo. If anybody else had bought her but this cursed Missourian, who hasn't got the hayseed out of his hair, I might have found out something from him, and saved myself this kind of fooling, which isn't in my line. If I could get possession of a loft on the main deck, well forward, just over the fore-hold, I could satisfy myself in a few hours, but the loft is rented by that crazy Frenchman who parades Montgomery Street every afternoon, and though old Pike County wants ...
— By Shore and Sedge • Bret Harte
... believed that President McKinley would honor me with an appointment to his cabinet, he thought he was pretty sure to succeed me in the United States Senate. My secret opinion was that the politicians who were running State affairs at that time were fooling him; but it never came to a test, as I did not ...
— Fifty Years of Public Service • Shelby M. Cullom
... right side of the safety-curtain. You are, aren't you? Oh, please say you are! But I know you are." She held out her hands to him with a quivering gesture of confidence. "If you'll forgive me for—for fooling you," she said, "I'll forgive you—for being fooled. That's a fair offer, isn't it? Don't let's think any more about it!" Her rainbow smile transformed her face, but her eyes ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... has no part in the subterfuge is shown by the fact that both patients gave up their artificial haven as soon as they saw how they had been fooling themselves. The fact remains that every neurosis is the fulfilment of a wish,—a distorted, unrecognized, unsatisfactory fulfilment to be sure, but still an effort to satisfy desire. As Frink remarks, "A neurosis is a kind of behaviour." We always choose the ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury
... and tenderness, and partly for other reasons. I suppose he was a student of human nature, though he always repudiated the notion of being a student of anything. He said that life was too short for serious study, and that every kind of pursuit should be tempered with fooling; while to prevent fooling becoming wearisome it should always be dashed with something earnest, as the sodawater is dashed with brandy, or the Government of India with Mr. ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... many sons of wealthy farmers leave their homes for the purpose of either studying in some classical college, to learn a trade, or to become book-keepers and clerks in mercantile business. I think if farmers would take more interest in agricultural papers, instead of having their children fooling away their time on novels or comic stories and pictures, it would be better for both old and young. Let the parents buy a microscope and let the young folks examine insects and fungi of all kinds, and let them write their experiences down in a book whenever ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 1, January 5, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... pleasant fooling came to an end. Charlotte advertised for a place, and found it. While she was away she had a letter from Miss Wooler, offering Charlotte the goodwill of her school at Dewsbury Moor. It was a chance not to be ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson
... dangerous nearness to the heart, its quick sense of tears, its at times desperate gaiety; and, also, a hard, indifferent levity, which, to brother and sister alike, was a rampart against obsession, or a stealthy way of temporising with the enemy. That tinge is what gives its strange glitter to his fooling; madness playing safely and lambently around the stoutest common sense. In him reason always justifies itself by unreason, and if you consider well his quips and cranks you will find them always the play of the intellect. I know one who read the essays of Elia with intense delight, and was ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... is curiously near my line, but of course I'm fooling; and your Admiral sounds like a shublime gent. Stick to him like wax - he'll do. My Trelawney is, as I indicate, several thousand sea-miles off the lie of the original or your Admiral Guinea; and besides, I have no more about him yet but one mention of his name, ...
— The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 1 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Trunk still exists in MS. It contains some tolerable fooling, but is chiefly interesting from the fact that the seat of the proposed Bohemian colony from Cambridge is to be in the Navigator Islands; showing the direction which had been given to Stevenson's thoughts by the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... foolin'—quit yer fooling" the strange voice iterated. "I'll larn ye ter be afeared o' the devil. Long legs now is ...
— Una Of The Hill Country - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... that tells what hour it is Are clamorous groans, which strike upon my heart, Which is the bell: so sighs and tears and groans Show minutes, times, and hours; but my time Runs posting on in Bolingbroke's proud joy, While I stand fooling here, his Jack o' the clock. This music mads me; let it sound no more; For though it have holp madmen to their wits, In me it seems it will make wise men mad. Yet blessing on his heart that gives it me! For 'tis a sign of love; and love to Richard ...
— The Tragedy of King Richard II • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... hastily, and flushing a little, "I've been told that Mr. Clancy's parents are dead! A plague on them both, and all people that I can't understand—I don't mean the dead Clancys, but these two who are fooling like enough. You should be able to interpret Clancy better than I, for Cousin Sophy says you were ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... What harmless, happy fooling it all was! How we laughed as we read and listened and devoured apples! Blow high, blow low, no wind can ever quench the ruddy glow of that faraway winter night in our memories. And though Our Magazine never made much of a stir in the world, or was the means of hatching any genius, ...
— The Golden Road • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... only fooling, teacher!" in an excited lisp spoke up little Tod Smith, the youngest pupil in the school. "He broke the desk, but—say, teacher! he did it—yes, sir, Andy did the double somersault, just like a real circus actor, and landed square ...
— Andy the Acrobat • Peter T. Harkness
... two fellows have been fooling us," said Gregory with evident sincerity. "Come, now. What was your occupation before ...
— The Boy Allies with Haig in Flanders • Clair W. Hayes
... "I guess you were right about Bjoernsen, McCord—that is, his fooling with the foretop. He must have been caught all of a ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... the crested deeps, Her subjects of the uncorrected heart? False is that vision, shrieks the devotee; Incredible, we echo; and anew Like a far growling lightning-cloud it leaps. Low humourist this leader seems; perchance Pitched from his University career, Adept at classic fooling. Yet of mould Human those Gods were: deathless too: On high they not as meditatives paced: Prodigiously they did the deeds of flesh: Descending, they would touch the lowest here: And she, that lighted ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Kramer. "Just watch me. I won't murder the plebe, but I've stood all the fooling ...
— Dick Prescott's First Year at West Point • H. Irving Hancock
... apparent double, treble, and almost centuple meanings, into a series of dances almost illimitable. As has been suggested more than once, the most reasonable way is probably to regard the whole as an intentional mixture of covert satire, pure fooling, not a little deliberate leading astray, and (serving as vehicle and impelling force at once) the irresistible narrative impulse animating the writer and carrying the reader on to the end—any end, if it be only the Other End of Nowhere. The "curios," living and other, of Medamothi ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... message takes place, during which any one who thinks of a bright remark may get up and fire it at the gallery; and many very lame attempts pass for good wit, and much private spite goes for harmless fooling. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... think I've been fooling all this summer!" his wife pleaded, her eyes filling afresh. "I've loved it all—the peach ice-cream, and the picnics, and everything. But—but people can't help this sort of thing, can they? It does happen, and—and they just simply have to make the best of it, don't they? ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... through one end, and seeing the banana, reached for it. He could not obtain it in this way, so he began to bite at the box and to pull at it with all his strength. During the fifteen minutes allowed him, he worked at the box in a great variety of ways, fooling with the locks which had been attached to the hasps as well as with the cross bars and continually reaching in at the one or the other end. He was somewhat distracted by the presence of the two observers and ...
— The Mental Life of Monkeys and Apes - A Study of Ideational Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes
... me?" he said, in reply to the other's question. "That kiddie is just crazy with happiness—so's Millie. Guess she'll be down along after awhile, when she's quit fooling ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum
... was a contemporary of that Flying Monk of whom I spoke in Chapter X, and he belonged to the same religious order. If, in what I then said about the flying monk, there appears to be some trace of light fooling in regard to this order and its methods, let amends be made by what I have to tell about old Salandra, the discovery of whose book is one of primary importance for the history of English letters. Thus I thought at the time; and thus I still think, with all due deference to certain grave ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... of burglars they are," growled Mr. Damon. "Two or three times they have tried to get my prize buff Orpingtons. Last night they got me out of bed twice fooling around the chicken house and yard. Other neighbors have lost their hens already. I don't mean to lose mine. Want you to help ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Locomotive - or, Two Miles a Minute on the Rails • Victor Appleton
... he exclaimed, "I will say no more on that subject. As you say, you have suffered enough already to expiate your fault. You have nearly lost your life, and you have quite lost your love; for, of course, you know that your fooling marriage with a minor was no marriage at all, unless her father had chosen to make it so by his recognition. And if you ever had a chance of winning the girl, you have lost it by your imprudence. You must try to get ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... "Stop fooling, you two, and help us think of something," Mollie demanded. "We can't stand here and admire the view ...
— The Outdoor Girls on Pine Island - Or, A Cave and What It Contained • Laura Lee Hope
... education, and much crudity of mind, who has inadvertently strayed into the literature of imagination. The earlier books were excellent story-telling, though without any Stevensonian distinction; Kipps was almost a masterpiece; Tono-Bungay a piece of admirable fooling, enriched with some real character-creation, a thing extremely rare in Mr. Wells's books; while Mr. Britling Sees It Through is perhaps more likely to live than any other of his novels, because the subject with which it deals comes home so closely ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... love is strong. I have well thought of that. It drops as fiercely down on us as if We were to be its prey. I've seen a gull That hovered with beak pointing and eyes fixt Where, underneath its swaying flight, some fish Was trifling, fooling in the waves: then, souse! And the gull has fed. And ...
— Emblems Of Love • Lascelles Abercrombie
... Will!" he moaned half aloud. "I wasn't even fooling with the trigger, as you thought. If I'd been careless in that way—but I wasn't. I never see a gun without thinking it may be loaded, and though we both believed that one wasn't still I was careful. But it caught either in your sleeve or mine—nobody will ever know, and it killed you ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... at night, to eat on the way to the other country. But lo! in the morning she came down and ate it all up, saying to her friends, "She wanted to see her aunt before departing." She lived a week longer, and died, as it was supposed, again. It is said that her friends got tired of such fooling, and being determined to end the matter, adopted the white man's mode of covering her up in the ground! Again she rose up and preferred some new request; but thinking the old enchantress had stayed long enough this side the hunting grounds, ...
— Three Years on the Plains - Observations of Indians, 1867-1870 • Edmund B. Tuttle
... you at face value. It would have been quite natural for him to have asked me about you, but he didn't. Do you know Thatcher—Edward G.? He has business interests with Bassett, and Thatcher dabbles in politics just enough to give him power when he wants it. Thatcher is a wealthy man, who isn't fooling with small politics. If some day he sees a red apple at the top of the tree he may go for it. There'd be some fun if Bassett tried to shake down ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson
... to remain in Cairo indefinitely, waiting and waiting for Michael to come back to you, when he is away fooling with another woman?" ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... forgot!" he said harshly to his wife. "You've been getting ready for the last hour. Don't either of you think that you're fooling me—I see through it! I could lay here and die, and a lot ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... a squaw man. And these are my friends. Don't you suppose I've known—for the last week—you were just fooling me along, all the time fondling Bill? Sindy at least was faithful—and her form wouldn't take anything ...
— The Snowshoe Trail • Edison Marshall
... seem to do much kidding. There was a sort of serious spirit; Haughton had such an influence over everybody, they were afraid to laugh before practice, while waiting for Haughton, and after practice everybody was usually so tired there was not much fooling in the dressing room; but we got a lot of fun ...
— Football Days - Memories of the Game and of the Men behind the Ball • William H. Edwards
... must find one of us, or it's all no use. Listen carefully, dear one. If you truly love me, you must do as I bid you. Give me my chance of fooling fate; of making my death worth while. It won't be hard." He took the little box from his pocket. ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... serious work for the Perry, he had spent it in reading half a worthless novel, and skimming through a magazine, and feeling muddled and discontented in consequence. He had the uneasy feeling that he was an arrant ass in thus fooling time away, but had not sufficient self-denial to seize upon a quiet afternoon ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... a very good fooling—for a while; and as soon as we were tired of it we arose from our seats and began to stroll about the place. It was beginning to be a little dusk and somewhat cool, but the evening air was pleasant, and the ladies, putting on their shawls, did ...
— Stories By English Authors: Italy • Various
... merrily. Then the air of the room seemed to be filled with a sweet presence. He could have fancied there was a perfume of lace and dainty things. "Sweetheart!" He laughed—he hardly knew if it was himself that had spoken. It was dear, delicious fooling. ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... says?" he exclaimed. "Mr. Ashleigh, you're fooling me! You entered this house with Sanford Quest. You must tell us ...
— The Black Box • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... temperature of the coal in the for'ard hold. Ditman Olansen was just swinging into the mizzen-top as he went up with several turns of rope over one shoulder. Also, in some way, to the end of this rope was fastened a sizable block that might have weighed ten pounds. Possum, running free, was fooling around the chicken-coop on top the 'midship- house. And the chickens, featherless but indomitable, were enjoying the milder weather as they pecked at the grain and grits which the steward had just placed in their feeding-trough. ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... "Perhaps you might be able to do something for him," he continued thoughtfully. "I'd hate to see him die. The doctor says he'll pull through if he can get care and good air and good food." He seized Stephen's arm in a fierce grip. "You ain't fooling?" he said. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... eternal religion, the only religion. How came he by this, this young Syrian? Would he rival the Buha? Rise above him? They are of kindred races—their ancestors, too, may be mine. Love the splendour of God—God the splendour of Love. Have I been all along fooling myself? Did I not know ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... new leader of the brigand party. "Hell's bells!" said he, impatiently now. "We can't be fooling around—this don't look good to me. Noon to-morrow, anyways, the Doctor ought to be here. As for us, we got ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... and childlike animal spirits of Shakespeare's Comedies need not deceive us. Why should we not forget the whips and scorns for a while, and fleet the time carelessly, "as they did in the golden age?" Such simple fooling goes better with the irresponsibility of our fate than the more pungent wit of the moral comedians. The tragic laughter which the confused issues of life excite in subtler souls is not lacking, but the sweet obliquities ...
— Visions and Revisions - A Book of Literary Devotions • John Cowper Powys
... said that all this is mere fooling. But no Englishman who has seen the play acted would agree. All his life he will remember the tense, scowling faces of the men as they watch Kichaka's outrageous acts, the glistening eyes of the Brahmin ladies as they listen to Draupadi's entreaties, their scorn of ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... time like he had been before, neither. I guess the doctor was getting along toward fifty years old. I suppose he thought if he was ever going to get anything out of his gift of the gab he better settle down to something, and quit fooling around, and do it right away. But it looked to me like he might never turn the trick. Fur he was drinking right smart all the time. Drinking made him think a lot, and thinking was making him look old. He was more'n one year older than he ...
— Danny's Own Story • Don Marquis
... with tears, over the tomb of Adam—only to be fully appreciated in connexion with his satiric indignation over the drivel of the maudlin Mr. Grimes, who "never bored, but he struck water"—is an admirable example of the mechanical fooling of self-ridicule. ...
— Mark Twain • Archibald Henderson
... she protested. "You can't be in earnest. You're only fooling; you're only trying to frighten me. You don't really mean it; oh, please, Daddy, say ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White
... sharply. "I'm not thinking of his having agreed with me and fooling me about it. He just wanted to make a pleasant impression on a girl, and said anything he thought would please her. I don't care whether he does things like that or not. What I care about is that the principle didn't ...
— Ramsey Milholland • Booth Tarkington
... "We've had sufficient fooling, Breckenridge," he said. "Clavering, I'll give you a minute to get your men away, and if you can't do it in that time ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... and they could hear the sound of the money within. All three of the boys seemed almost wild with trepidation and excitement. Griff however immediately began to hurry them away, pulling the box from them and saying, "Come, come, boys, we must not stay fooling here." ...
— Napoleon Bonaparte • John S. C. Abbott
... I am knocked out pro tem. I was fooling about where a C.O. didn't ought to, and a Bosch bullet got me so that I can't write. But don't worry at all about me. I'm too tough for anything the Bosches can do. To show how little serious it is, they tell me that I'll be conveyed to England in a day or two. So get hot-water ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... And do what thou wilt with me, smother me; But still remember, if your fooling with me, Make ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (2 of 10) - The Humourous Lieutenant • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... no! Some one has been fooling you, Dave. I am merely Major McDonald's guest. I wonder who told you ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... had as small a place in Maggie's sympathy as the redoubtable whipper-snapper himself. And now the cherished dream of triumph and conquest was over! What a "looney" she had been! Instead of inviting him in, and outdoing him in "company manners," and "fooling" him about the deserter, and then blazing upon him afterwards at Logport in the glory of her first spent wealth and finery, she had driven ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... your dear head," answered Kut-le. Then he went on, as if half to himself: "There's been an awful lot of fooling on this expedition. Perhaps I ought to have made for the Mexican border the very night I took you." He looked at Rhoda's wide, troubled eyes. "But no, then I would have missed this wonderful desert growth of yours! But now we are going straight ...
— The Heart of the Desert - Kut-Le of the Desert • Honore Willsie Morrow
... and complaisance, till I had gotten such an estate as might accord me—according to the saying of that person, whom you and I love very much, and would believe as soon as another man—cum dignitate otium. This were excellent advice to Joshua, who could bid the sun stay too. But there's no fooling with life, when it is once turned beyond forty: the seeking for a fortune then is but a desperate after-game; 'tis a hundred to one if a man fling two sixes, and recover all; especially if his hand be no luckier ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I • Francis W. Halsey
... ho!" rumbled Sam Higgins, as he lumbered in from first. "Just fooling with you, that's all! Just getting your courage up to take some of the swelling out of ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... you mustn't ask how I know what I am now going to tell you, but you must believe it implicitly, and act upon it promptly. Longworth is fooling both you and Kenyon. He is marking time, so that your option will run out; then he will pay cash for the mine at the original price, and you and Kenyon will be left to pay two-thirds of the debt incurred. ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... the street, with the bottle under his arm, he began to think. “If all is true about this bottle, I may have made a losing bargain,” thinks he. “But perhaps the man was only fooling me.” The first thing he did was to count his money; the sum was exact—forty-nine dollars American money, and one Chili piece. “That looks like the truth,” said Keawe. “Now ...
— Island Nights' Entertainments • Robert Louis Stevenson
... she replied, but so slowly that he began to fear that his confidences had alarmed her. "That's too good to be true; you're fooling, aren't you—really?" ...
— The Madness of May • Meredith Nicholson
... house up tight. If you try to get in, you'll be guilty of breaking and entering. And even if he left a door open, you've no right to go in. You can bet the neighbors will be on the phone to the constable's office if they see anyone fooling around the house." ...
— Smugglers' Reef • John Blaine
... that ran along the crest a hot fire was being kept up, and swarms of bullets sang through the air, far overhead for the most part, to drop into the sea that lay around us. Yet all the time there were full five hundred men fooling about stark naked on the water's edge or swimming, shouting and enjoying themselves as it might be at Margate. Not a sign to show that they possess the things called nerves. While we were looking, there was an alarm, and long, ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton
... even fooling his own seconds! Out standing on his feet? Why, he'd been out for rounds and rounds! He didn't quite know how many. But that didn't make any difference—but then Hamilton didn't know much about the boxing game—he was ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans
... all this fooling, fellows," begged Dick. "We all know that Ted and Hi can fight. What we want to find out is whether there are brains and muscle enough in town to get three football elevens together. Ted, put your hands in your pockets. Hi, you move back. We ...
— The Grammar School Boys of Gridley - or, Dick & Co. Start Things Moving • H. Irving Hancock
... Mr. Jires does more for his family lying flat on his back than you do for yours, up and walking around! You're not fooling me one bit, Mr. Flathers, and there's no use trying to fool yourself. You either mean seriously to go to work or you don't. Which ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... are you fooling me? For once in your life tell the truth! Has she gone? Speak, has ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... man, now, ain't you?" said Sneak. "But its all the same. My chance is jest as good as your'n. They're only fooling you, jest to laugh. I've made up my mind to die, and I ain't a going to make any fun for 'em. And you might as well say your prayers fust as last; they're only playing with you now like a cat ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... to this," he thought. "I'm not going to be bothered fooling around with visitors when I ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... me, Phillis, tell me why, You appear so wond'rous coy, When that glow, and sparkling eye, Speak you want to taste the joy? Prithee, give this fooling o'er, Nor torment your ...
— The Prince of Parthia - A Tragedy • Thomas Godfrey
... "she's like all the rest! I've been a fool—me, of all men! Here I've been thinking she was to be for me and me alone. This has been going on for God only knows how long. She has been fooling me with her drooping lashes and flushed cheeks. I was ready to marry her—fool, fool that I was. She might, for reasons of her own, have married me. There is no knowing what a woman will do. Bah! What a mollycoddle ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben |
