"Wag" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... had been tied in his lifetime began to wag. The dark passages of his history, of the doors to which he had held the keys, were thrown open. And a horrified town discovered that their respected fellow-citizen had been a man of foul life, guilty of many a fraud and of many a crime, and that a dog's death had been too good a death ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... majority of us so poor, that I was not able, with great industry, to find more than 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 libraries were ...
— The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... fortunetellers, who prey upon the folly of the superstitious. With a treatise on physiognomy laid on a desk before them, they call out to this man that he has an ill-omened forehead, and to that man that the space between his nose and his lips is unlucky. Their tongues wag like flowing water until the passers-by are attracted to their stalls. If the seer finds a customer, he closes his eyes, and, lifting the divining-sticks reverently to his forehead, mutters incantations between his teeth. Then, suddenly parting the sticks in ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... yellow road, up over the hill by the signal corps tents, across Wig-Wag Park to the woods beyond, and sat down on a log with his letter. He told himself that it was likely one of those fool letters the fellows were getting all the time from silly girls who were uniform-crazy. He wouldn't answer it, of course, and he felt ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill
... at Nineveh, the woman, known to-day simply as Niang-tzu, walked up and down the streets of the city, warning all of the coming calamity. She was laughed at and looked upon as mad by the careless people. A pork-butcher in the town, a noted wag, took some pig's blood and sprinkled it round the eyes of the stone lions. This had the desired effect, for when Niang-tzu saw the blood she fled from the city amid the jeers and laughter of the inhabitants. Before many hours had passed, ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... every man did his full duty, and we heard very little grumbling, although I am sorry to set it down that some of the faint-hearted did wag their tongues more than was seemly; but on the whole the garrison showed themselves ...
— The Minute Boys of the Mohawk Valley • James Otis
... Bull should have had such a long pursuit, but that did not keep back Whitey's laughter when Bull staggered up to where they waited for him. He sure was a happy dog, and fatigue did not keep him from showing it, his method being to twist his body into almost a half-circle, wag his stump tail, and prance about gazing ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... Those of the Makololo who worked on board the ship were not sorry at the steamer being left below, as they had become heartily tired of cutting the wood that the insatiable furnace of the "Asthmatic" required. Mbia, who was a bit of a wag, laughingly exclaimed in broken English, "Oh, Kebrabasa good, very good; no let shippee up to Sekeletu, too muchee work, cuttee woodyee, cuttee woodyee: Kebrabasa good." It is currently reported, and commonly believed, that ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... I go out to dinner. I do my best to entertain her—trot out all my old jokes and stories, pay her delicate compliments, and do frank homage to her youth and beauty. But her attention wanders. My tongue is stiff, like my legs. It can wag through the old motions, but it has lost its spontaneity. One glance from the eye of the boy down the long table and she is oblivious of my existence. Should I try to dance with her I should quickly find that crabbed middle-age ...
— The "Goldfish" • Arthur Train
... go to 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 courage. The landlady, who enjoyed the ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... here, so she won't say anything at all," said naughty Beppo. Then he added with an important wag of his head; "Just you stick by me; I'll take ...
— The Italian Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... prey, vultures, condors and such like, with crows, as well as the smaller Republican eagles born since, are humble enough to him now. The British lion himself having been so often scratched and clawed by this fowl, has learned to shake his mane and wag his tail rather amiably in our eagle's presence, even if he has to give an occasional growl to keep his hand in. We are proud of this bird, though we are far from home, and to-day send our heartiest good wishes across the sea to the land we love ...
— Toasts - and Forms of Public Address for Those Who Wish to Say - the Right Thing in the Right Way • William Pittenger
... minds of many members—of the family—, especially those who, like Soames, had been to public schools, and were accustomed to niceness in such matters. Could he really be considered a butler? Playful spirits alluded to him as: 'Uncle Jolyon's Nonconformist'; George, the acknowledged wag, had named him: 'Sankey.' ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Puppy cannot mew or talk, He has a funny kind of walk, His tail is difficult to wag And that's what makes ...
— The Kitten's Garden of Verses • Oliver Herford
... tragedy, in no small degree, owed its downfall to Euripides. Poetry was gradually superseded by rhetoric, sublimity by earnestness, pathos by reasoning. Thus, Iphigenia and Macaria give so many good reasons for dying, that the sacrifice appears very small, and a modern wag in the upper regions of the theatre would, at the end of the speech of the latter heroine, almost have exclaimed, "Then why don't ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... has been guilty of one of those practical jokes to which she is too much addicted, in dressing with tragic buskins and muffling in the cloak of a hero of melodrama, and so palming off for earnest on two generations of mankind, the drollest wag of the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... and the earnest look which every one had in the room. How different to the vacant gaze that we have been accustomed to! I was really particularly struck by the circumstance. Every one at Premium's looked full of some great plan, as if the fate of empires wag on his very breath. I hardly knew whether they were most like conspirators, or gamblers, or the lions of a public dinner, conscious of an universal gaze, and consequently looking proportionately interesting. One circumstance particularly struck me: ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... Sturgis. How are you?" Father Murray stopped to shake hands. Mr. Sturgis was a justice of the peace and the wag of the town. He always insisted on being elected to the office as a joke, for he was ...
— Charred Wood • Myles Muredach
... prairie-dogs in dog-town Will wag each little tail, And think there's something coming Riding ...
— The Nursery, August 1873, Vol. XIV. No. 2 • Various
... Tommy Trapwit, contained concentrated extracts of wisdom, and jokes such as were current among adults. The children for whom they were meant were accustomed to nothing more facetious than the following jest: "An arch wag said, Taylors were like Woodcocks for they got their substance by their long bills." Perhaps they understood also the point in this: "A certain lord had a termagant wife, and at the same time a chaplain that was a tolerable poet, whom his lordship desired to write a copy of verses upon ...
— Forgotten Books of the American Nursery - A History of the Development of the American Story-Book • Rosalie V. Halsey
... was 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 road?" "Yes," replied Mr. C. (who was never at a loss ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... N. humorist, wag, wit, reparteeist^, epigrammatist, punster; bel esprit, life of the party; wit-snapper, wit-cracker, wit- worm; joker, jester, Joe Miller^, drole de corps^, gaillard^, spark; bon diable [Fr.]; practical joker. buffoon, farceur [Fr.], merry-andrew, mime, tumbler, acrobat, mountebank, charlatan, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... the building was always filled by strongly-visaged spinsters and mutinous wives, who twice a week were worked up by Dr. Fleabody to a full belief that a glorious era was at hand in which woman would be chosen by constituencies, would wag their heads in courts of law, would buy and sell in Capel Court, and have balances at their banker's. It was certainly the case that Dr. Fleabody had made proselytes by the hundred, and disturbed the happiness of many ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... interpretation. Much ridicule was incurred by the church because of this kind of revelation. Gunnison relates that when a woman "speaking in tongues" pronounced "meliar, meli, melee," it was at once translated by a young wag, "my leg, my thigh, my knee," and, when he was called before the Council charged with irreverence, he persisted in his translation, but got off with an admonition.** At a meeting in Nauvoo in later years a doubting convert delivered an address in real ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... that were afterwards made in the household of His Royal Highness. He continued, however, to be one of his constant companions, and while in his favour they were accustomed to practice strange vagaries. The Major was always a wag, ripe and ready for a spree or ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... thing alone could cheer her. I could do it, and I did. I applied for Letters of Naturalisation. Some weeks later I became a French citizen, and received a letter from M. ADOLPH CREMIEUX, then Minister of Justice, and never suspected of being a wag. He wrote: "Your application for Naturalisation in the midst of our great disasters, is for me the signal of a new life for us. A country which in the midst of such catastrophes recruits citizens like you, is not ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., Jan. 24, 1891. • Various
... V.vi.39 (443,2) He wag'd me with his countenance] This is obscure. The meaning, I think, is, he prescribed to me vith an air of authority, and gave me his countenance for my wages; thought me ...
— Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies • Samuel Johnson
... dignity of the red man, remained silent, waiting for more. Not so Little Tim. That worthy, although gifted with all the powers of courage and endurance which mark the best of the American savages, was also endowed with the white man's tendency to assert his right to wag ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... lanes about Covent Garden, until we stopped before a tavern from which we heard the bursts of merriment of a jovial party. There would be a loud peal of laughter, then an interval, then another peal; as if a prime wag were telling a story. After a little while there was a song, and at the close of each stanza a hearty roar and a vehement thumping ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... strongest ale, as to the next physician. It is incredible to say how our malt-bugs lug at this liquor, even as pigs should lie in a row lugging at their dame's teats, till they lie still again and be not able to wag. Neither did Romulus and Remus suck their she-wolf or shepherd's wife Lupa with such eager and sharp devotion as these men hale at "huffcap," till they be red as cocks and little wiser than their combs. But how am I fallen from the market into the ale-house? In returning therefore ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed
... seats out of their own pockets: what he objects to giving, is a little return on rent-days to help a tenant to buy stock, or an outlay on repairs to keep the weather out at a tenant's barn-door or make his house look a little less like an Irish cottier's. But we all know the wag's definition of a philanthropist: a man whose charity increases directly as the square of the distance. And so on. All the rest is to show what sort of legislator a philanthropist is likely to make," ended the Rector, throwing down the paper, and clasping his hands at the ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... fortnight with him some eighteen months ago; and certainly one of his levees with his settlers would, if as well reported, be quite as amusing as one of those Mornings at Bow Street—that about the time I left London were styled, by some wag, the leading articles ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XX. No. 557., Saturday, July 14, 1832 • Various
... licked its hind leg, and then dragged itself as if famished to the milk, lapped a little eagerly, but lay down again whining, as if in pain. Ulick and Albinia called to it, and it looked up and tried to wag its tail, whining appealingly. 'My poor brute!' he cried, 'they've treated you worse than a heathen. That's all—let me see what I ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... fresh deal all round. Call him Luck, and start him fair." A day was accordingly set apart for the christening. What was meant by this ceremony the reader may imagine who has already gathered some idea of the reckless irreverence of Roaring Camp. The master of ceremonies was one "Boston," a noted wag, and the occasion seemed to promise the greatest facetiousness. This ingenious satirist had spent two days in preparing a burlesque of the Church service, with pointed local allusions. The choir was properly trained, ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... priesthood, has a far other feeling than one of humiliation when contemplating that son eventually as the spiritual director of a congregation and parish. Similarly, the laudable ambition which, in the case of a humble Scotch matron, is expressed in the wish and exertion to see her Jamie or Geordie "wag his pow in the pou'pit," produces, when realized, salutary effects in the whole family connection. These effects, which Mr. Froude would doubtless allow and commend in their case, he finds it creditable to ignore the very possibility of in the ...
— West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas • J. J. (John Jacob) Thomas
... gamblers packed their race-horse, saddled, and rode away without a word to any of the range-riders. The men round the fire gave no sign that they knew the confidence men were on the map until after they had gone. Then tongues began to wag, the foreman having gone to the edge of ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine
... Ashikaga into the Muromachi magnates and the Kamakura chiefs brought two sets of rulers upon the same stage, and naturally intrigue and distrust were born, so that, in the end, Muromachi was shaken by Hosokawa, and Kamakura was overthrown by Uesugi. An animal with too ponderous a tail cannot wag it, and a stick too heavy at one end is apt to break. The Ashikaga angled with such valuable bait that they ultimately lost both fish and bait. During the thirteen generations of their sway there was no respite from struggle between family and family or between chief and vassal." Takauji's record ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... stood his dog, and it seemed as if he would even wag his tail. Toni was like one ...
— Toni, the Little Woodcarver • Johanna Spyri
... I have previously allluded to, 'a propos' of a song he wrote) was a merry wag who excelled in making fun of people, in highly-seasoned pleasantry, and in comic songs. Spoiled by the favour which had always sustained him, he gave full licence to his tongue, and by this audacity ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... 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 ...
— Observations of an Orderly - Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital • Ward Muir
... are you, pup?" No need to ask that question. The instantaneous wag of that speaking tail and the glance of that wakeful eye, as the dog lifted his head and laid his chin on Dick's arm, showed that he had been listening to every word that was spoken. We cannot say whether he understood it, but beyond all doubt he heard it. Crusoe never ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... a hand to check its flight. If old scars received while defending woman's name and fame in paths of peril which my traducers dare not tread, fail to speak for me, then to hell with the world, and let its harlot tongue wag howsoever it will. Never but once did I stoop to refute a cowardly falsehood circulated about myself. I was younger then—had not learned that public opinion is a notorious bawd, that "nailing a lie" but accentuates its circulation. Unfortunately, the recent assaults upon ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... returned no pressure. She seemed as cheerful as ever in her talk with others; him she kept apart from. He could not make up his mind to write. She had refused to accept such proof of his sincerity as it wag in his power to offer, and Wilfrid made this an excuse—idle as he knew it to be—for maintaining a dignified silence. Dignified, he allowed himself to name it; yet he knew perfectly well that his attitude had one very ignoble aspect, ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing
... 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
... well enough for any one who has a taste for natural beauties," replied Rose. "I haven't; I never had. There is nothing I hate so much as Nature! I'm a born cockney. I'd rather live in one room over Jordan and Marsh's, and see the world wag past, than be the owner of the most romantic villa that ever was built, I don't care where it ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... know till I met these Americans that I was such a wit—or perhaps wag is a better word. I didn't try to be funny, I didn't even know I was being funny, but every ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... jump about and wag his tail. He was always ready for fun, he told Mr. Crow. "But where is it at this time ...
— Sandman's Goodnight Stories • Abbie Phillips Walker
... awkward. No, I don't think there are any crocodiles, only a few sacred tortoises perhaps. Look! there is a tiny one—that small yellow thing that is walking away with the melancholy dignity of a retired general. Pick it up if you like certainly, see it wag its head and legs helplessly. I wish we could take it home. As you replace it, it continues its grave walk in the same direction as if it had never been rudely interrupted. At that instant a hare darts ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... now, how now, mad wag, what in thy quips and thy quiddities? what a plague have I ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... of the most valiant captains in the army, was so diminutive in size, that, when mounted, he seemed almost lost in the high demipeak war-saddle then in vogue; which led a wag, according to Brantome, when asked if he had seen Don Pedro de Paz pass that way, to answer, that "he had seen his horse and saddle, but no rider." ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... morning we looked upon the deed. We stopped our ears and held our leaping hands, but they—did they not wag their heads and leer and cry with bloody jaws: Cease from Crime! The word was mockery, for thus they train a hundred crimes while we do cure one. Turn again our ...
— The Book of American Negro Poetry • Edited by James Weldon Johnson
... appearance, the beard was still hanging to the skin of the face, and the features were still discernible. A merchant, travelling with the kafila, suddenly exclaimed, "That was my slave I left behind four months ago, near this spot." "Make haste! take him to the fsug (market)," said an Arab wag, "for fear any ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... has his guineas struck which he pays to us seamen for fighting for him. We should be in a bad way if his shiners were to come to an end; and one thing I may promise you, as long as I've got a brain to think and a tongue to wag, I shall be able to continue my wonderful ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... shape 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 relic of ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... telegraph line and to the commutator, a device which, when the operator moves the handle H to right and left, keeps reversing the direction of the current. The needles on both receiving and transmitting instruments wag in accordance with the movements of the handle. One or more movements form an alphabetical letter of the Morse code. Thus, if the needle points first to left, and then to right, and comes to rest in a normal position for a moment, ...
— How it Works • Archibald Williams
... from the pulpit. The right man for the work—that must be the ideal of the Church, that man and no other, whatever be the consequence in the way of offending well-to-do supporters whose dream it has been that son of theirs shall "wag his head in a pu'pit," whatever be the disappointment caused to the uninspired ambitions of callow youth or the conceit of later years. The pulpit is not for sale! The honour of standing there is not to be dispensed as a reward or allowed as a compliment. Wealth has no ...
— The Message and the Man: - Some Essentials of Effective Preaching • J. Dodd Jackson
... thought—indeed, productive of it. Not every officer has this habit, but most acquire it. I have been told that, however weakly otherwise, the calf muscles of watch-officers were generally well developed. There were exceptions. A lieutenant who was something of a wag on one occasion handed the midshipman of his watch a small instrument, in which the latter did not recognize a pedometer. "Will you kindly keep this in your trousers-pocket for me till the watch is over?" At eight ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... dog. 'I've made a bet with myself he won't wag his tail within the next ten minutes. I beg of you, Harrington, to remain silent ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... 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 ...
— Chastelard, a Tragedy • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... myself! Mrs. Jenkin has a good heart, but her head is as soft as blubber, so I was pretty careful not to say much," Miles answered, with a wag of his own head, which he thumped with his fist to show that at least he ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... you out of my house within the next ten minutes," said Mr. Burleigh, emphatically. "You might as well have made an allusion to my wife as to Miss Burton; and let me tell you that if you wag your wanton tongue again, I'll have my colored waiters whip ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... 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 married that you were creating ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... took Nature by the heels, and capsized her, as we say. I have a strong idea that he had sold himself to the d—l. Well, what does he do, but he catches salmon and puts them into tanks, and every day added more and more salt, till the water was as thick as gruel, and the fish could hardly wag their tails in it. Then he threw in whole pepper-corns, half-a-dozen pounds at a time, till there was enough. Then he began to dilute with vinegar until his pickle was complete. The fish did not half like ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13 Issue 364 - 4 Apr 1829 • Various
... tell,—though she often confided to her little complaints of the boys or Miss Morley,—this was no great compliment, for she would have done the same to anything that had ears. Her talk was no longer, as it had been at first, exclusively for Marian; and this wag rather a relief, for it was not at all like the talk Marian was used to ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... not abandon society, however, and the tongue of gossip continued to wag. Her immediate marriage with a former lover, Mr. Hill, was announced: 'il est bien bon,' said Lady Bessborough. Then it was whispered that Canning was 'le regnant'—that he was with her 'not only all day, but almost all night.' ...
— Books and Characters - French and English • Lytton Strachey
... (Vol. ii., p. 85.) is, I think, fit companion for MR. HICKSON's derivations of news and noise. I take FRANCISCUS for a wag: but lest others of your readers may think him serious, and be seduced into a foolish explanation of the word Parliament by his joke, I hope you will allow me to mention that palam mente, literally translated, means before the mind, and that, if FRANCISCUS or any one else tries to get "freedom ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 39. Saturday, July 27, 1850 • Various
... Be my mistress short or tall, And distorted therewithal: Be she likewise one of those That an acre hath of nose: Be her forehead and her eyes Full of incongruities: Be her cheeks so shallow too As to show her tongue wag through; Be her lips ill hung or set, And her grinders black as jet: Has she thin hair, hath she none, She's ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... wanton, smile upon my knee; When thou art old there 's grief enough for thee. Mother's wag, pretty boy, Father's sorrow, father's joy; When thy father first did see Such a boy by him and me, He was glad, I was woe; Fortune changed made him so, When he left his pretty boy, Last his sorrow, first his joy. Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee; When thou art old there 's grief enough for ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... not be merry And sing down, down, aderry? For now it is a time of joy and mirth; 'Tis said 'tis merry in the hall When as beards they do wag all; God's plenty's here, it ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow, Vol. IV (of IV) • Harrison S. Morris
... nothing much the matter, but a second look showed the boys poor old Skipper lying on the floor in front of the open fireplace which was filled with fresh green boughs—and evidently a very sick dog indeed. He gave the boys a pathetic glance of recognition as they came in, and with a feeble wag or two of his tail tried to show them he was glad to see them; but this done, he seemed to be completely exhausted, and once more laid his head between his forepaws ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol • Howard Payson
... says I. 'I don't care if it gets in fully fifteen minutes before I am shot; and if you happen to lay eyes on Beauregard or Albert Sidney Johnston or any of the relief corps, wig-wag 'em to hike along.' ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... negro whose age was supposed by Mrs. M——r to be about one hundred and twenty. He had been in her husband's house, who was an officer in the Spanish service, when she married, and first came here half a century back, and was then considered past labour. The old boy was quite a wag; cracked several jokes, as well as his want of teeth would let him, upon one of the company about to be married; and, on being shown a lump of fine Cavendish tobacco he had asked for, his eye sparkled like a serpent's. Mr. M——r assured me his appetite ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... does something more than frighten young cricketers. As Maurice Read says, "it talks to you." Other human beings wag their heads; Grace wags his beard when things are going wrong. It is even said that, with a team that knows him, he can indicate to the fieldsmen to change their positions by merely moving ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... they were instantly seized and other ropes of raw-hide were deftly twisted about their limbs and bodies, until in less than a minute they were so tightly and securely trussed up that they could scarcely wag a finger; after which they were each hoisted upon the shoulders of four Indians and borne with songs of triumph and rejoicing to the canoes, into which they were tumbled with scant ceremony. Then, with further songs ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... slight pucker of the nose and a gleam of dazzling ivory—ha! no enemy ever saw this last piece of canine language without a full appreciation of what it meant. Then as to the tail—the modulations of meaning in the varied wag of that expressive member—oh! it's useless to attempt description. Mortal man cannot conceive of the delicate shades of sentiment expressible by a dog's tail, unless he has studied the subject—the wag, the waggle, the cock, the droop, ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... Venetian merchant; Dottore a Bolognese physician; Spaviento a Neapolitan braggadocio; Pullicinella a wag of Apulia; Giangurgolo and Coviello two clowns of Calabria; Gelsomino a Roman beau; Beltrame a Milanese simpleton; Brighella a Ferrarese pimp; and Arlecchino a blundering servant of Bergamo. Each was clad in an appropriate dress, had a characteristic ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... yet the deas[47] remains, Where the gudeman aft streeks[48] him at his ease; A warm and canny lean for weary banes O' labourers doylt upo' the wintry leas. Round him will baudrins[49] an' the collie come, To wag their tail, and cast a thankfu' ee, To him wha kindly flings them mony a crumb O' kebbuck[50] whang'd, an' dainty fadge[51] to prie;[52] This a' the boon they crave, an' a' ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... taken from the "forty-horse power" of a steam-engine. That mad wag, the Reverend Sydney Smith, sitting by a brother clergyman at dinner, observed afterwards that his dull neighbour had a "twelve-parson ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... his attention. She would keep back some piece of news during dinner to be fired off with the entrance of the supper tray, and form as it were the LEVER DE RIDEAU of the evening's entertainment. Once he had heard her tongue wag, she made sure of the result. From one subject to another she moved by insidious transitions, fearing the least silence, fearing almost to give him time for an answer lest it should slip into a hint of separation. ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Oh, la, no, not he—never was so well of his lameness in all his life. He's grown quite young again, I think, and then he's so fat he can hardly wag." ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... wedding ever 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
... ship was back over the San Francisco area and those people who had maintained that people were being fooled by a wag in a balloon became believers when the object was ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... wag, you understand," explained Thorndyke, "but he has lucid intervals. He'll have one presently if we ...
— The Red Thumb Mark • R. Austin Freeman
... never was used to hittin' it none, an' it'll have a powerful effect on him." Bill opened the pup's mouth an' poured in a tol'able stiff swig, an' by cracky, the pup opened his eyes, an' when he saw Bill bendin' down over him, he tried to wag his little tail. ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... much talk!" cried Aunt Susan's voice from the adjoining kitchen. "Hands lag when tongues wag; wherefore do your work in silence. Is that almond paste ready, Keren Happuch? Then bring it quickly hither; and your manchet and sugar, Keziah, for the skins ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... was my flow'ry theme, A painted mistress, or a purling stream. Yet then did Gildon draw his venal quill;— I wish'd the man a dinner, and sat still. 150 Yet then did Dennis rave in furious fret; I never answer'd,—I was not in debt. If want provok'd, or madness made them print, I wag'd no war with Bedlam ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... through his hands and his feet, between the earth and the heavens, where he hanged for the space of six hours—to wit, from nine in the morning till three in the afternoon. No God yet appears for his help; while he hangs there some rail at him, others wag their heads, others tauntingly say, 'He saved others, himself he cannot save'; some divide his raiment, casting lots for his garments before his face; others mockingly bid him come down from the cross, and when he desireth succour, they give him ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... taste for an old-fashioned painter. Ars longa, nuda veritas! I hope (and so will the Liberal readers of the "Newcome Independent") that it is by an accident the catalogue reads—"The Traitor." "Earl Spencer, K.G." "The Moonlighters." (Nos. 220, 221, 225.) Some Tory WAG among the Hanging Committee may have taken this juxtaposition for wit: our readers will ...
— Old Friends - Essays in Epistolary Parody • Andrew Lang
... to act against that midnight assassin, the weasel, but we could not begin. The trees could not move, the earth could not wag a step, the grass could do nothing, and so it went on for some months, during all which time the weasel was busy with his wickedness, till at last the bailiff set the gin for the rat by the cart-house. Then the fox came out by day—contrary to his custom, for he likes a nap—and went to a spot where ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies
... was soon communicated to his master. Rizi immediately administered a wholesome practical rebuke, by commanding the attendance of Antinolez on his Majesty's service, and ordering him to execute a piece of painting in distemper. The unlucky wag, being quite ignorant of the mode of performing the work, and too proud to confess it, worked for a whole day, at the end of which he had merely spoiled a large piece of canvas. "So, sir," said Rizi, quietly, "you see painting foot-cloths is not so easy after all;" and ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects and Curiosities of Art (Vol. 3 of 3) • S. Spooner
... after another "do things" to her poor knee. There were consultations and X-ray photographs, and all through it old Doctor Bowerman, who had dosed her through mumps and measles, kept saying, at every opportunity, with a maddening wag of his bald head: "If you only hadn't been such a little fool as to walk on it!" Finally, after what seemed to Isobel a great deal of needless fuss, the verdict was given—in an impressive now-you'll-do-as-I-tell-you manner; she had torn the ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... shouted "drunkard," "glutton," "extortioner," with other opprobrious names. When all were gone, he locked the door and put the key in his pocket. During the night some Royalist wag nailed a placard on the door, bearing the inscription in large letters, "The House ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery
... with these objects, ridicule his rusticity. I have known a fellow with a burden on his head steal a hand down from his load, and slily twirl the cock of a squire's hat behind him; and while the offended person is swearing or out of countenance, all the wag-wits in the highway are grinning in applause of the ingenious rogue that gave him the tip, and the folly of him who had not eyes all round his head to prevent receiving ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 52, October 26, 1850 • Various
... They who had closed the barriers of London against the king could not defend them against their own creatures. They who had so stoutly cried for privilege, when that prince, most unadvisedly no doubt, came among them to demand their members, durst not wag their fingers when Oliver filled their hall with soldiers, gave their mace to a corporal, put their keys in his pocket, and drove them forth with base terms, borrowed half from the conventicle and half from the ale-house. Then were we, ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... those, woman," he said ominously, deliberately, but she could not or would not; and, before she could collect her wits, what must need old Nonna do but make bad worse, and, running, thrust herself in between, and wag her hand under the ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... wagging his stumpy 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, ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... and do away the restlessness that is upon thee." So Al-Rashid laughed at his saying and said, "See which of the boon-companions is at the door." Thereupon he went out and returning, said, "O my lord, he who sits without is Ali bin Mansur of Damascus, the Wag."[FN327] "Bring him to me," quoth Harun: and Masrur went out and returned with Ibn Mansur, who said, on entering, "Peace be with thee, O Commander of the Faithful!" The Caliph returned his salutation and said to him, "O Ibn Mansur, tell us some of thy stories." ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton
... possible to think I can be deceived; and as long as he does me the honour to esteem my poor portion of brains by coming to me for what he is good enough to call my counsel, I shall let the world wag its tongue. Between ourselves, I trust to be doing some good. I know I am of use in various ways. No doubt there is a danger of a woman's head being turned, when she reflects that a powerful Minister governing a kingdom has not considered her too ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... replied he, "that I am Ralph Jobson? Why it knew me, and seemed to wag its tail; nay, made as though ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... crook around our necks, John, an' lead us home with our tails behind us, so as our Bo Peeps'll know us when we come an' gladden us with their soft black eyes! Ain't that the way the poetry runs?" snickered a drunken wag, dropping on the post-office steps and gazing up with a befuddled air at Fairfield, who had removed his hat and ...
— The Co-Citizens • Corra Harris
... so very 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 n't good ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... with a stoop, and yet 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 ...
— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... des Mammiferes' par Prof. Gervais, 1855 tome 2 page 60.) 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 master, wag their tails, lick his hands, crouch, and throw themselves on their backs; they smell at the tails of other dogs, and void their urine sideways; they roll on carrion or on animals which they have killed; and, lastly, when in high spirits, they run round in circles or in a figure of eight, with ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication - Volume I • Charles Darwin
... What now? His tongue longed to wag, but by this time he was readily obeying Hillard ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... * *!—why do you always twit me with his vile Ebrew nasalities? Have I not told you it was all K.'s doing, and my own exquisite facility of temper? But thou wilt be a wag, Thomas; and see what you get for ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... art a wag; no more of that. Thou shall want neither man's meat, nor woman's meat, as far as his provision will ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... communicate with the land, he does so by signals; and that's the way men over there talk with their wives who live in cottages on shore. The telephone has not been found feasible, wires breaking all the time; so their wives have learned to wig-wag to them. ...
— Some Naval Yarns • Mordaunt Hall
... the Sunshine were sixteene men, whose names were these: Richard Pope Master, Marke Carter Masters mate, Henry Morgan Purser, George Draward, Iohn Mandie, Hugh Broken, Philip Iane, Hugh Hempson, Richard Borden, Iohn Philpe, Andrew Madock, William Wolcome, Robert Wag carpenter, Iohn ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, Vol. XII., America, Part I. • Richard Hakluyt
... on the mutineers, to seize their ringleaders, and to lash them down in their berths," he answered. His plan was generally approved of. We had now altogether twelve or fourteen persons prepared for the expected emergency. It wag important to communicate with Spratt, to collect the men forward who could be trusted. I volunteered immediately to do this. I knew that there was considerable risk, for I had already had an example of the way Cobb and his associates would treat me if they suspected ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... the miller, was a public-spirited and many-sided man. Something of a wag and given to writing letters in verse, his life also had its more serious side. Besides being one of the founders and a trustee of the Union Schoolhouse of Germantown, now Germantown Academy, he was a justice of the peace and a provincial commissioner in 1765. Being a Friend, he took no part in ...
— The Colonial Architecture of Philadelphia • Frank Cousins
... dear? Even the settling with our old creditors—the creditors of Grimes & Morrell—made suspicion wag her tongue more eagerly than ever. I paid every cent, with interest compounded to the date of settlement. Grimes had long since had himself cleared of his debts and started over again. I do not know even that he and ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe
... at the counter of the First National Bank, diagonally opposite,—something almost invariably impelled his glance upward to the sign of a painless dentist, immediately above the First National,—a propinquity which had caused a wag (one of the Montgomery's customers) to express the hope that the dentist was more painless than the ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... solitary traveller?—Give me a sun, I care not how hot, and sherbet, I care not how cool, and my Heaven is as easily made as your Persian's.[78] The Giaour is now a thousand and odd lines. 'Lord Fanny spins a thousand such a day,' eh, Moore?—thou wilt needs be a wag, but I forgive ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... execute twice, though he would much rather have been excused either performance; and upon Mrs. Brown's presenting a substitute he became so beside himself as to forget the figure—a mishap rendered none the clearer by a wag's performing la pastorale, when he ought to have done trenise, and moreover, not have done it in such a facetious manner, as to render it a matter of doubt if he himself could have recognized ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner
... shareholder who had arrived in the motor, fixed a deadly glance upon me and said—'If you value your po-seetion'—he was a Lowland Scot, with the Lowland accent—'if you value your po-seetion on this paper, you'll hold your tongue!' So I did hold my tongue then—but only because I meant to wag it more violently afterwards. I always devote Mrs. Mushroom Ketchup to the blue blazes, because I'm sure it was through her I lost my post. You see a shareholder in a paper has a good deal of influence, especially ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... at the rate of 186,000 miles a second—the same speed as light comes to us from the sun. As you move the wire away from the magnet, a second wave starts through the wire, flowing in the opposite direction. You can prove this by holding a compass needle under the wire and see it wag first in one direction, then ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson
... tea or dinner, there were pious pilgrims from all parts of the world, as to a shrine—from Paris, from Germany, Italy, Norway, and Sweden; from America especially. Leah had to play the hostess almost every day of her life, and show off her lion and make him roar and wag his tail and stand on his hind legs—a lion that was not always in the mood to tumble and be shown off, unless the pilgrims were pretty and of ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... observe." Dolph chuckled. "At first, I was as afraid of him as if he had been a country undertaker looking for a job; but I'm slowly coming to the belief that the fellow is an actual wag. Really, you'd be badly off without him. He'll stay ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... But they none of them minded him much, for he soon came to himself, and was sure to make them some present or other—some said in proportion to his anger; so that the sexton, who was a bit of a wag (as all sextons are, I think), said that the vicar's saying, "The Devil take you," was worth a shilling any day, whereas "The Deuce" was a shabby sixpenny speech, only ...
— My Lady Ludlow • Elizabeth Gaskell
... assembled simultaneously at the hall door, and drew their visitor from the bitter blast into the stove lit parlour. One yet more humble welcomer was there of the vagabond tribe—petty larceny in every curve of his ungainly form, and his spirit so broken by adversity that he only ventured to wag his shabby tail in recognition ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... he can," said Charles. "Lead on, Jack; but mark me, I shall inform my uncle of this intemperance, as well as of the manner in which you let your tongue wag about him behind his back, unless you ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... green wag, the gentle spring grass, lay strewn about the ballroom floor, and glistened in the warm light that was of one high-hung chandelier, ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... sure he's not. He's a nasty, mean beggar, who makes me pay ever so much for everything he does for me. You ask him," continued Mercer, giving his head a side wag at me, "if only this morning he didn't make me give him twopence ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn
... ridden something like a couple of miles on their way homeward and their tongues were just beginning to wag, girl-like, again, when both were considerably startled by a loud hallo, coming from behind. They turned quickly and saw two horsemen, who had just ridden out from behind a small grove of trees, some twenty rods back and to the right, and who ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil
... clog triumphantly. Waving it about in her small uncertain hands, she hit the friendly poodle smartly on the nose with it as he stood near; then leaning forward, grasped his drooping moustache and pulled it, which hurt him still more; but he did not cease to wag his tail with pleasure ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton
... beyond, migrating planters and slaves bound for the west, "'where the cotton land is not worn out,'" met cotton-laden wagons townward bound, whereupon the price of the staple was the chief theme of roadside conversation. Occasionally a wag would have his jest. The traveler reported a tilt between two wagoners: "'What's cotton in Augusta?' says the one with a load.... 'It's cotton,' says the other. 'I know that,' says the first, 'but what is it?' 'Why,' says the other, 'I tell you it's cotton. Cotton ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips
... all the papers here in my bag," replied Marchmont; and the conversation—such conversation as is possible "when beards wag all" over the festive ...
— The Mystery of 31 New Inn • R. Austin Freeman
... well as look; no matter if his tongue did show a decided inclination to cleave to the roof of his mouth with horror, he managed to find a way to make it wag. ...
— The Aeroplane Boys Flight - A Hydroplane Roundup • John Luther Langworthy
... steady, and his Muscles composed in so inflexible a Stupidity, that upon his first Appearance every one gave the Guinea for lost. The Pickled Herring however found the way to shake him; for upon his Whistling a Country Jigg, this unlucky Wag danced to it with such a Variety of Distortions and Grimaces, that the Country-man could not forbear smiling upon him, and by that means spoiled his ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... teach him, then, to wag his tail like the pendulum of a metronome? He'd be more use to you that way than setting up to be a musician, which Nature never meant him for—his hair's not long enough. But go ahead, old ...
— Merely Mary Ann • Israel Zangwill
... tail, yet how multifarious is it in aspect, in construction, and in function, a hundred different things and yet one. Some are of feathers and some of hair, and some bare and skinny; some are long and some are short, some stick up and some hang down, some wag for ever and some are still; the uses that they serve cannot be numbered, but one name covers them all. In the course of evolution they came in with the fishes and went out with man. What was their purpose and mission? What place have they filled in the scheme of things? ...
— Concerning Animals and Other Matters • E.H. Aitken, (AKA Edward Hamilton)
... made his choice, upon a virgin's lap; And slyly crept from thence unto her breast, Where still he meant to sport him in his hap; The virgin frowned like Phoebus in a cloud; "Go pack, sir boy, here is no room for such, My breast no wanton foolish boy must shroud." This said, my love did give the wag a touch; Then as the foot that treads the stinging snake Hastes to be gone, for fear what may ensue, So love my love was forced for to forsake, And for more speed, without his arrows flew. "Pardon," he said, "For why? You seemed ...
— Elizabethan Sonnet Cycles - Phillis - Licia • Thomas Lodge and Giles Fletcher
... and then he drew it back and licked his lips as though they were dry. Helen May found a rock that was hollowed like a crude saucer, and poured water into the hollow from her canteen. Pat lapped it up thirstily, gave his stubby tail a wag of gratitude, lay down with his front paws on the edge of her skirt with his head dropped down upon them, and took a nap—with one eye opening now and then to see that the goats were all right, and with his ears ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower
... in his ear, 'what ails thee, Euseby?' 'I wag no farther,' quoth he. 'What a number ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... up for America, and tried to think of some good antidote with the proper banes attached; but before I could do it she gave her head a little wag, and said, "Good morning; nice weather, isn't it?" and wobbled away. It struck me that the old body was a little lofty, and just then Mr. Poplington, who I hadn't noticed, ...
— Pomona's Travels - A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former - Handmaiden • Frank R. Stockton
... only Piter, who looked up in my face and gave his tail a wag, and then butted his great head against my leg, holding it tightly there as if it was so heavy that he was glad to give ...
— Patience Wins - War in the Works • George Manville Fenn
... was far more sensitive to spoken words than Jan. It was not once in three months that the Master so much as raised or sharpened his voice in speaking to Finn. If Finn were verbally reproached by a member of the household, one saw his head droop and his eyes cloud. Jan would wag his tail while being scolded, even vehemently, and five minutes later would require a second call, and in a sharp tone, before turning aside from an interesting scent or a ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... 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 his ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... a mess of skimmed milk with so honourable an action.[434] If some of the gentlemen of the press get hold of this story, what would they make of it, and how little would I care! One thing is clear: it gives me a right to decline future interference, and let the world wag, Sessa.[435] ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... passed that way. She begged him, of his well-known kindness, to inspect the cow and tell her what the matter really was. This neighbour was a wag, and knew the woman's species; he also knew the cow as an annoyance, for ever dragging out its peg and straying into planted fields. After long and serious examination he declared: "The tail is hurting her and ought to be removed. See how she swishes ...
— Oriental Encounters - Palestine and Syria, 1894-6 • Marmaduke Pickthall
... do not say anything. You do not offer me any hope. But, ah me, it is just as well—it is just as well. You could not do me any good. The time has long gone by when words could comfort me. Something tells me that my tongue is doomed to wag forever to the jigger of that remorseless jingle. There—there it is coming on me again: a blue trip slip for an eight-cent fare, a ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... fellow flogged at the market-cross, that had let his tongue run too freely. And I can tell you, I'm not one of that sort. You're welcome to stay while you behave decently, as I see you've been a help and comfort to my women here: but one word against the priests, or one wag of your head in irreverence to the holy mass, and out you go, bag and ...
— One Snowy Night - Long ago at Oxford • Emily Sarah Holt
... least reserve, and cutting their autographs in the very legs of his desk. The puzzled dunce, who stood beside it to say his lesson out of book, looked no longer at the ceiling for forgotten words, but drew closer to the master's elbow and boldly cast his eye upon the page; the wag of the little troop squinted and made grimaces (at the smallest boy of course), holding no book before his face, and his approving audience knew no constraint in their delight. If the master did chance to rouse himself and seem alive to what was going on, the noise subsided ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... to fill the vat of the Danaides! Their house is mortgaged for 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 into debt for feasting Deputies, winning votes, and ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... glu'ten de'mon cab'in wag'on cit'ron ci'on drag'on sud'den kitch'en si'phon flag'on fel'on mit'ten co'lon lin'den lem'on pis'ton o'men grav'el mel'on her'on bar'rel bev'el chan'nel ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey
... thus been blinded, so to speak, there came a regiment of fresh troops, swinging down the street for all the world as though the German Army was safely drinking beer in Munich. They passed Rene, standing open-mouthed in the doorway, and one wag of a Belgian boy, out of sheer joy of spring, did the goose step as he passed the little sentry and, head screwed round in the German salute, crossed his eyes over ...
— The Amazing Interlude • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... had not 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 in her ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... we left the Garden of Eden about six thousand years ago," responded a wag from somewhere—he was too tired to recognize the voice. "There! the skirmishers have struck that blamed cavalry again. Plague them! They're as bad ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... without hope of relief, and the nascent navy of Spain was strangled at the birth. Alberoni, in his fury, had the persons and goods seized of English residents settled in Spain, drove out the consuls, and orders were given at Madrid that no tongue should wag about the affairs of Sicily. The hope of a sudden surprise in England, on behalf of the Jacobites, had been destroyed by the death of the King of Sweden, Charles XII., killed on the 12th of December, 1718, at Freiderishalt, in Norway; the flotilla equipped by Alberoni ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... of me of all men, that you suppose I 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
... 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 of a score or two of Happar javelins from ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... "Connecticut declared her ports free. New Jersey served New York the same way. And Delaware, I am told, has lately followed the example, in opposition to the commercial plans of Pennsylvania." Many similar cases might be cited. Some wag likened such efforts to a man who plugged up most carefully the worm-holes in one end of a cask and knocked the whole head out at the ...
— The United States of America Part I • Ediwn Erle Sparks
... the public generally were completely flabbergasted some days later when Secretary Hughes and the President gave out contradictory statements as to whether the treaty included the Japanese homeland. Hughes stated to the correspondents that it did, the President said it did not. Whereupon some wag remarked that at Paris President Wilson did not let the American delegation know what he did, while at Washington the delegates did not let President Harding know what they were doing. In deference to the President's views and to criticisms of the ...
— From Isolation to Leadership, Revised - A Review of American Foreign Policy • John Holladay Latane
... doubtfully. Somehow she mistrusted him. Joe West had rather the reputation of being a wag ...
— Young Lucretia and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins
... upon the highland, Here and there make pleasant island; On the bark some wag hath wrote— "Who would fly, when ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... out. It raised me, I had afterwards reason to know, in the good opinion of all on board; and Dicky himself gained many friends by the feeling way in which he spoke of it. I was very soon seated alongside him in the berth, and our tongues were rattling away as fast as they could wag. ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... "Oh, yes, you may wag your tail, but I've a great mind to punish you for running away, and putting me to the trouble of ...
— Try and Trust • Horatio Alger
... kept himself alone in his chamber for a time, making his preparations for departure. He says he shall come back in two months, but some of us think they will be two long months which will eat themselves up like money borrowed of the Jews." A wag, moreover, posted a large placard upon the door of Granvelle's palace in Brussels as soon as the minister's departure was known, with the inscription, in large letters, "For sale, immediately." In spite of the royal ingenuity, therefore, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... thought I should have gone mad. Francois was already persuaded into setting to work with his pick, and, I should most certainly have been speedily interred, had it not been for the timely arrival of a village wag, who, planking himself unobserved behind a tombstone close to my coffin, burst out laughing in the most sepulchral fashion. The effect on the company was electrical; the majority, including the women, fled precipitately, and the rest, overcoming the feeble protests of the doctor, wrenched off ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell
... teeth, which were very firmly closed together. The lamb, whose only disorder was hunger and fatigue, began to feel the effects of this nourishment. It first began to stretch out its limbs, then shake its head, to wag its tail, and at last to prick up its ears. In a little time, it was able to stand upon its legs, and then went of itself to Flora's breakfast pan, who was highly delighted to see it take such pleasing liberties; for she cared not ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... the close of a wearisome day Homeward disheartened, you moodily stray, What would you take for your little dog Tray? Take for the wag of his tail? ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... to which Kirke White was a contributor. Hill was the Hull of Hook's Gilbert Gurney. He happened to know everything that was going on in all circles; and was at all "private views" of exhibitions. So especially was he favoured, that a wag recorded, when asked whether he had seen the new comet, he replied—"Pooh! pooh! I was present at ...
— Books and Authors - Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches • Anonymous
... in which language it means a thing. Gipsies do not, however, seem to regard it themselves, as tacho or true Rommanis, despite this testimony, and I am inclined to think that it partly originated in some wag's perversion of ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland
... see, it was this way: For five days in a week I would say, 'Quite so' to my assistant, no matter what he suggested. On Saturday I would dash into the manager's office, wag my head, knit my brow, and exclaim, 'What we need around here is efficiency.' And once I urged the ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks
... origin 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 ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett |
