"Prank" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... turned up at that critical moment seemed a wilful prank on the part of fate. Sandy bit his lip and raged inwardly. He had a wild impulse to rush back to Ruth, seize her hand, and begin where he had left off. He might have done it, too, had not the promenade happened to land Dr. Fenton ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... called. The horse stopped and stretched out his head, sniping. Prank and Allen came to the tent opening. "Keep back!" called Will, in even tones. "I think I have him. Prince! ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Rainbow Lake • Laura Lee Hope
... boys met and vanquished the savage hostility of Josh Owen and Dan Jaggers; they remember the desperate battle, in the ocean's depths, with the crazy boatswain's mate. They recall the dashing, laughable prank that Captain Jack played on one of the big battleships of the Naval maneuvers fleet, and remember the pretty romance, in which the submarine boys aided greatly, through which Mr. Farnum secured beautiful Grace Desmond as his bride. Our readers who have pored over the pages of the preceding ...
— The Submarine Boys' Trial Trip - "Making Good" as Young Experts • Victor G. Durham
... too breathless to articulate, the two fat youths lay there gasping for breath, while those gathered about them made mock gestures of "first aid to the injured." Nobody had been hurt, however, and the victims of the prank took it in the way ...
— The Brighton Boys in the Radio Service • James R. Driscoll
... little thought, that day of pain When, launched as on the lightning's flash, They bade me to destruction dash, That one day I should come again, With twice five thousand horse, to thank The Count for his uncourteous ride. They played me then a bitter prank, When, with the wild horse for my guide, They bound me to his foaming flank: At length I played them one as frank— For time at last sets all things even— And if we do but watch the hour, There ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... frolicking with each other, and I scarcely knew which mood was least troublesome. If they quarrelled, everything went wrong; and if they were friends, they were continually playing off some confounded prank upon each other, or upon me; for I had unhappily acquired among them the character of an easy, good natured fellow, the worst character ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... and strode towards the beech clump. Prank of the moonlight! Nothing! In and out of the boulders and thorn trees, muttering and cursing, yet with a kind of terror, he rushed and stumbled. Absurd! Silly! Then he went back to the apple tree. But ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... The streets are choked with messy mist; I'm the proverbial Bachelor, An old, prosaic Pessimist. Yet somehow—who can tell me why?— Urged by the Past's dim Phantom, I'm Disposed my cosy Club to fly, And prank it at the Pantomime. ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., Jan. 17, 1891 • Various
... The sun will be shining in the morning, and all you'll see to remind you of to-night will be the rather worn looks of your companions. But what is one night's loss of sleep, anyway? I just know when you were at school you lost many a good night's sleep through some prank. Now, ...
— Dorothy's Triumph • Evelyn Raymond
... to listen to the fun as the simple presents and absurd jokes came to light, one after another, while Jean now wiped away a tear or two over Katharine's dainty gift, now laughed convulsively over some ridiculous prank of Alan's plotting? And all the time, the chorus went on, now explaining, now joking, but always bringing to Jean the welcome assurance that her friends did not forget her even in ...
— Half a Dozen Girls • Anna Chapin Ray
... in a gratified voice, "that there was nothing to compel him to give me this paper and thus make himself known. It was a mere schoolboy prank on his part, which gave me the ...
— The Blonde Lady - Being a Record of the Duel of Wits between Arsne Lupin and the English Detective • Maurice Leblanc
... a tone which she tried to make very severe, "you have passed all reasonable bounds in this last prank; you have outraged and insulted my faithful servant—and, worse than all, you have told an untruth. If it had not been for this last, I might have forgiven you after you had made fitting apologies to the prime minister; even now I shall lighten your punishment, because this pure ...
— The Fairy Nightcaps • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... somewhat as Mr. Belknap-Jackson did last night and when my own deportment was quite all that could be wished. It occurs to me now that it was because his lordship was, how shall I say?—quite far gone in liquor at the time, so that I could without loss of dignity pass it off as a mere prank. Indeed, he regarded it as such himself, performing the act with a good nature that I found quite irresistible, and I am certain that neither his lordship nor I have ever thought the less of each other because of it. I ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... the brains o' a cock spug," I heard him sayin' till himsel', "ye michta jaloosed they were to play ye some prank. You muckle, dozent gozlin'," he says; an' he took himsel' a skelp i' the side o' the heid wi' his open luif that near ca'd him on his back. In his stagger his feet tickled amon' his claes, an' he gaithered them up, an' lookit fair dumfoondered ...
— My Man Sandy • J. B. Salmond
... view to take of the thing!' cried Urania, with an injured air. 'An innocent practical joke, not involving harm of any kind; a little girlish prank played on the spur of the moment. I thought you were more sensible than to be offended—much less seriously angry—at ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... inaccurate too; for who can reduce a fantasy to a formula? Nor should they ever be allowed to clip the wings of romance. But the painter who bade his subject sit under a sodium light would justly be deemed a lunatic, and any analysis of Spencer's character drawn from his latest prank would ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... He was the centre and the head of the revel, unquenchably joyous, a contagion of fun. He multiplied himself, and in so doing multiplied the excitement. No prank he suggested was too wild for his followers, and all followed save those that developed into singing imbeciles and fell warbling by the wayside. Yet never did trouble intrude. It was known on the Yukon that when Burning Daylight made a night of it, wrath and evil ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London
... midst of a lively caper, dolly went bounce into the garden below, for the string fell from Poppy's hand when she suddenly saw grandpa at the window opposite, laughing as heartily as any one at her prank. ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... doing penance because of his wretched failure as a prank player, Bandy-legs did work, bringing wood to the outside of the cabin ...
— With Trapper Jim in the North Woods • Lawrence J. Leslie
... saluted his fourth spouse With all the ceremonies of his rank, Who cleared her sparkling eyes and smoothed her brows, As suits a matron who has played a prank; These must seem doubly mindful of their vows, To save the credit of their breaking bank: To no men are such cordial greetings given As those whose wives have ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... muttered. "A wife, and a pretty foreigner too, that is a bird of another color! What will Prince and Princess Delgrado say now, I wonder? What will Kosnovia say, when it is in every man's mind that you should marry a Serb? And what mad prank of fortune sent her here to-day? By thunder! I thought things were quieting down in Delgratz; but I was wrong—they are just ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... more pansylike than ever, but she was much more talkative and animated than she used to be. Very little of the old superior bearing remained, and the looks that she bent upon Nyoda were those of an humble and adoring slave. Proof positive of the change that had taken place in her was the prank she had played upon them that night in masquerading as the cook—she who had once refused to help prepare one of the famous suppers in the House of the Open Door, disdainfully remarking that cooking was work for servants, ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... through a narrow sunbeam into the brown shade to meet him, with such a shamefaced, boyish air of conscious delinquency. Conscious, indeed, that he was the author of a certain commotion, but very far, assuredly, from being conscious that he, Gifford Crayshaw, by means of this schoolboy prank, was taking the decisive step towards a change in the destiny of every soul then bearing a ...
— Fated to Be Free • Jean Ingelow
... had been no wrongdoing; not even a mischievous prank, except, perhaps, the breaking down of the ladder, and yet it seemed a pity that Stella should have suffered the most, when she never would have dreamed of staying at the tree-house after it began to look like rain, had it not been ...
— Marjorie's Vacation • Carolyn Wells
... said Slimak bitterly, 'there was no policeman to certify that it was we who saved you the hog, but when a boy plays a prank on you, you ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... that Sunday afternoon when his prospects seemed to be so rosy. He never thought of that. He cursed every circumstance and person impartially and fluently, but he omitted from the Satanic litany the one girlish prank of tree-climbing that led Iris to spring out of sight amid the sheltering arms of an elm when her uncle and Captain Coke deemed the summer-house a suitable place for "a plain talk ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... governess set to laughing in the pleasant French way that shakes all over and has no spite. Emboldened, I asked why Hortense could not play with us any more. Hortense, she explained, was become too big to prank on ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... had gone a babel of tongues broke forth, and there were loud and angry cries for Le Brusquet, whose "fool's prank," as they called it, had caused this storm. Le Brusquet, however, was not to be seen. He had stolen in, thrown his apple of discord, and stolen forth again like a ghost. None knew or understood better than he the wayward character of Vendome, ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... it in his usual health, it was feared some accident had happened. The congregation then dispersed, much concerned at the absence of the worthy pastor, who, however, atoned in the evening, by unwonted eloquence, for his unpremeditated prank ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts
... an act of justice. I deserved what you said, but I didn't deserve what has followed. I meant no harm—it was a silly prank, and I have suffered for it as if it were a crime, and the consequences are not ended yet. I should think that, if there is a moral government of the universe, the Judge of all the earth would know when to hold his hand. And now the worst of it is to come yet." She caught ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... certainly a mystery," he went on to say, trying to take the thing as a joke. "Some kind friend sends me a solemn warning, and then neglects to sign his name. Do you think any of the fellows of the escadrille could be up to a prank?" ...
— Air Service Boys Over The Enemy's Lines - The German Spy's Secret • Charles Amory Beach
... himself was a goody-goody—far from it; he was a terrible prank maker, and more than once narrowly missed suffering serious consequences. But when he really grew up and it came to an acquaintance with women, very few have even attracted him. I began to fear that he was becoming hardened and would never find just what his fastidious ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... somewhat to disguise her feats of metathesis, about which she has doubts and which are involuntary: the "stand-wash," the "sweeping-crosser," the "sewing chamine." Genoese peasants have the same prank when ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... and holy hermit, sir, the pious clerk of Copmanhurst, that you wot of, who played many a prank with us in the days that we knew King Richard. Ah, noble sir, that was a jovial time and ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... given to playing games of hide-and-seek just at dinner-time, is she?" asked Arthur, laughing. "I am never surprised at anything Peggy does. She has some little prank on hand, depend upon it, and will turn up in good time. It's her own fault if she misses ...
— About Peggy Saville • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... poles should frisk about And stand upon their heads! I hope I'm ready for the worst, Whatever prank betides." ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... This prank encouraged him very much indeed, for he then felt that now he had certainly escaped without any bad consequences; so he went on applauding his own ingenuity, and came to a farm where several little boys were at play. He desired leave to play with them, which they allowed him to do. But he ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... till the purple dieth, And short dry grass under foot is brown, But one little streak at a distance lieth Green, like a ribbon, to prank the down. ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... and ought to exist, in real life. Their world is a conventional world. Their heroes and heroines belong, not to England, not to Christendom, but to an Utopia of gallantry, to a Fairyland, where the Bible and Burn's Justice are unknown, where a prank which on this earth would be rewarded with the pillory is merely matter for a peal of elvish laughter. A real Horner, a real Careless, would, it is admitted, be exceedingly bad men. But to predicate morality or immorality of the Horner of Wycherley and the Careless ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... amidst loud exclamations of indignation and sorrow, I will not say of the loyalists—for I rather think there are none—but of simply every human being. That madman runs riot: thinks after this mad prank of nothing short of murdering his opponents: canvasses the city street by street: makes open offers of freedom to slaves. For the fact is that up to this time, while trying to avoid prosecution,[402] he had a case, difficult indeed to support, and obviously bad, but still a case: he might ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... the water's edge, where he would not be easily seen by anyone coming into the place. Then, ordering some rum and water and a pipe of tobacco, he composed himself to watch for the appearance of those witty fellows whom he suspected would presently come thither to see the end of their prank and to enjoy ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle
... on this in another way than ye do, for methinks it was a foolish prank — they were sure to bear in mind their griefs, even though they were not reminded of them anew; but those men who try others so heavily must look ...
— Njal's Saga • Unknown Icelanders
... won't go here, Franklin. I expect my students to have more common sense than that. Of course, it may have been nothing but a boyish prank, and if you can give me your word that the snowball which went down the stairs and hit Professor Duke was not aimed at him deliberately, I shall feel inclined to ...
— The Rover Boys at Big Horn Ranch - The Cowboys' Double Round-Up • Edward Stratemeyer
... participation in the rude affrays, the catastrophe of which dramas was in general an almost universal flogging match. My admiration naturally led to its probable result, a desire to imitate—I firmly resolved to become a Peregrine. I soon promoted myself to be the leader of every mad prank that the wit of a spirit suddenly excited to activity could devise. In the first fortnight I got flogged for tying a huge mass of brown paper to the tail of the favourite cat of the master's lady, with which she rushed ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 274, Saturday, September 22, 1827 • Various
... spirits at thought of her prank, while Droop closed the tight iron shutters at each window, thus confining ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... whereon moss and lichens grew; skirting this, I presently espied that I sought—a place where the coping was gone with sundry of the bricks, making here a gap very apt to escalade; and here, years agone, I had been wont to climb this wall to the furtherance of some boyish prank on many a night such as this. Awhile stood I staring up at this gap, then, seizing hold of massy brickwork, I drew myself up and dropped into a walled garden. Here were beds of herbs well tended and orderly, and, as I went, ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... startled out of their sleep, would listen for a moment till the hurry-scurry had clattered by, and then exclaim, "Ay, there goes Brom Bones and his gang!" The neighbours looked upon him with a mixture of awe, admiration, and good-will; and, when any madcap prank or rustic brawl occurred in the vicinity, always shook their heads, and warranted Brom Bones was at the bottom ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... solium of the solid wave, Prank'd with rude shapes by the fantastic frost, He stood in silence;—now keen thoughts engrave Dark figures on his front; and, tempest-toss'd, He fears to say that every hope is lost. Meanwhile the multitude as death are mute; ...
— The Poetical Works of Henry Kirke White - With a Memoir by Sir Harris Nicolas • Henry Kirke White
... He knew in what manner a good-natured, competent, lusty horse should be handled and trained. We didn't, and necessarily had to learn. He trained himself while we took hearty lessons in holding him. Once he decided to gallop with a sled. It was a mere whim—a gay little prank—but Tom couldn't stop him. He ran too, holding on to the reins at arm's length, contrary to my counsel, urged from discreet distance. Christmas ran faster, and by and by Tom sat down on his chin, and Christmas went on without him. He didn't quite ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... the familiar human figures seemed all departed. I looked in vain for sobered versions of the faces that had smiled, of old, around tables in comfortable cafA(C)s, in an atmosphere of youthful gaiety, where at any moment one might be enmeshed in a Florentine prank that Boccaccio ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... act," he said to himself, mentally strung once more. "He couldn't have played me such a fool's prank as that. Now, where am I? The writing table should be ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... reprimands of the faculty more severe. At last came the final prank, which had resulted in his disgrace and expulsion. Even then, she and mother was ready to forgive and had written him to come home. No answer from Richard had ever been received. Instead, came the news that the boy had disappeared, run away; the last seen of ...
— The Alchemist's Secret • Isabel Cecilia Williams
... little more before this mad prank it would have been better for everybody," he said, "Well, she'll have plenty of time to think yet." He stepped to the kitchen door, and from the nail above ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... in hand, George Gaylord said: "Allow me, Miss Fenwick, to introduce to you my friend and college chum, Fillmore Flagg: for a peculiar purpose of his own he wishes to regain possession of that flighty paper which, fortunately for him, the prank playing wind carried to your feet ...
— Solaris Farm - A Story of the Twentieth Century • Milan C. Edson
... mirror caught and held his attention. Could that harsh semblance of a man be himself? Various periods of his life flashed in separate pictures before him. Glimpses of his college days; this and that gay prank of irresponsible youth. Then came incidents of his first business ventures; his dealings with Jefferson Henderson stood out sharply. The old man's first intuitive fears of coming loss rang in his ears, followed by curses of ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... here," he said when I finished. "Whatever mad prank took them away, it would look better if they were ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... was once prisoner here, being with his ship at Plymouth, hath played some freakes there, for which his men being beat out of the town, he hath put up a flag of defiance, and also somewhere there about did land with his men and go a mile into the country, and did some prank; which sounds pretty odd to our disgrace, but we are in condition now to bear any thing. But, blessed be God! all the Court is full of good news of my Lord Sandwich having made a peace between Spain and Portugall; which is mighty ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... my gracious Lord, To chide at your extreames, it not becomes me: (Oh pardon, that I name them:) your high selfe The gracious marke o'th' Land, you haue obscur'd With a Swaines wearing: and me (poore lowly Maide) Most Goddesse-like prank'd vp: But that our Feasts In euery Messe, haue folly; and the Feeders Digest with a Custome, I should blush To see you so attyr'd: sworne I thinke, To shew ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... the tribunes of the people, The tongues o' the common mouth. I do despise them; For they do prank them in authority, Against ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... to prevent possible loss from some prank of mischievous boys or thieving negroes, Maurice had secured a long and stout chain, with a padlock, and at night this was so attached to the dinky that no one could sneak the stumpy little craft away without the use of a hatchet to chop out the staple; and while this was being done the owners ...
— The House Boat Boys • St. George Rathborne
... sat moping in the prow of his boat, or kept step with him in the race. Like the Sun-god, he was buoyant and beautiful, careless, free, elastic, unfading. Years never cramped his bounding spirits, or dimmed the lustre of his soul. He was ever ready for prank and pastime, for freak and fun. Of all his loves at Elleray, boating was the chief. He was the Lord-High-Admiral of all the neighboring waters, and had a navy at his beck. He never wearied of the lake: whether she smiled or frowned on her devotee, he worshipped all the same. Time and season ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various
... Powder (gun) pulvo. Powder pulvro, pudro. Power povo, potenco. Power (of attorney) konfidatesto. Powerful multepova. Powerless senpotenca. Practical praktika. Practice (custom) kutimo. Practice praktiko, kutimo, uzado. Practise praktiki. Prairie herbejo. Praise lauxdi. Prank petoleco—ajxo. Prate babili. Prattle babili. Pray (religious) pregxi. Pray (to request) peti. Prayer pregxo. Prayer-book pregxlibro. Preach prediki. Preacher predikisto. Preaching predikado. Preamble antauxparolo. Prebendary kanoniko. Precarious ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... in which Francesco, Giovanni, Garzia, and Ernando, the Duke's sons, were joined by young Malatesta de' Malatesti and other pages of the household. One such boyish prank, when the Court was at Pisa, in the winter of 1550, had a tragic ending. In the pages' common room the lads were playing with shot-guns, which were supposed to be unloaded. Picking up one of these, by mere chance, Malatesta aimed it jokingly at his companions, ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... her some whiskey and sugar, which soon brought a vivid red to the tip of her chin and the region of her cheek-bones, after which she professed that she felt very comfortable. But the boys, frightened at the effect of their thoughtless prank, did not make their appearance. Joe, seeing Miss Betsy fall, thought she was dead, and the two hid themselves in a bed of dead leaves, beside a fallen log, not daring to venture home for supper. Sally ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor
... prank with the wig, you can't suppose that Pen could have been very ill upstairs; otherwise, though she had grown to care for him ever so little, common sense of feeling and decorum would have prevented her from performing any tricks or trying ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... at one another much in the same way as we used to do years before, when she had detected me in some boyish prank, and assumed the mentor while I felt a culprit. How really I felt a culprit at that moment she could ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... pains never to show that Henry had supplanted him; nevertheless, she showed it all the time. Tom's faults flourished and multiplied. There can be no question that he was idle, untruthful, and unreliable. In earliest youth he had been a merry prank; he was still a prank, but not often merry. His spirit seemed to be overcast; and the terrible fact came out gradually that he was not 'nicely disposed.' His relatives failed to understand him, and they gave him up like a puzzle. He was self-contradictory. For instance, though a shocking ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... this do the rules provide! This is scandal, this is a shame, This madcap prank in Our Lady's name. Out of the doors with him; back to the street: He has no place ...
— Giant Hours With Poet Preachers • William L. Stidger
... turns up quite permiskus, and always upon the full trot; He seemed mixed up with Portias, and Doges, smart gals, and the dickens knows wot. All kep waving their arms like mad semy-phores, doin' the akrybat prank, As if they was swimming in nothink, or 'ailing ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, August 27, 1892 • Various
... profit, the more prisoners he had, the happier he was, and the higher in rank the prisoners happened to be, the prouder he felt. Aramis assumed the expression of countenance he thought the position justified, and said, "Well, dear Athos, forgive me, but I almost suspected what has happened. Some prank of Raoul and La ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... had observed Dousterswivel stand somewhat disconsolate and sad, looking into the open grave. Age had not dulled Edie's wit, nor caused him to relish less a boyish prank. His quick eye had caught some writing on the lid of the box of treasure, and while all were admiring the solid ingots of precious metal laid bare before them, Edie kicked the piece of wood aside without ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... residence, after spending the evening there, but he was still burning for revenge against Andy and his cronies. He had half a notion to go to Andy's house and tell Mr. Foger how nearly serious the bully's prank at the sub marine had been, but he concluded that Mr. Foger could only uphold his son. "No, I'll settle with him myself," ...
— Tom Swift and his Submarine Boat - or, Under the Ocean for Sunken Treasure • Victor Appleton
... nearest linked in order bright, Cheek after cheek, like rosebuds in a wreath; And those more distant showing from beneath The others' wings their little eyes of light. While see! among the clouds, their eldest brother, But just flown up, tells with a smile of bliss, This prank of Pluto to his charmed mother, Who turns to greet the tidings with ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... that same afternoon that she felt ashamed of her prank. "I do hate her ways," she exclaimed, "but I'm sorry I let her know we 'spected her; and so to make up, I gave her that little piece of broken coral I keep in my bead purse; you ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... give myself away, And abdicate on foolscap flimsy, Let me implore you, mark the day— Time-honoured feast of prank ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 1, 1893 • Various
... no further alarm, my child. But come with me, for your feet are cut and bruised, and Mrs. Lyon will give you dry clothing. Melvina does not blame you in her story of this mischievous prank. But I doubt not you are both blameworthy. But 'twill be your parents' duty to see to thy punishment." As the minister spoke he drew her toward a door at the far end of the room and opened it, calling for Mrs. Lyon, who rose ...
— A Little Maid of Old Maine • Alice Turner Curtis
... the girl's face as she caught Sherm's glance. "Oh, dear, and he had told her only that morning that girls should be different!" She liked Sherm—she didn't want him to think she was a bold, awful girl. Some way their prank seemed to need excusing. She replied to the look in Sherm's eyes rather than to her ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... best thing was not to pay any attention to him, for if he did, as soon as the sot felt that eyes were upon him, he would take to making faces or launch out into a speech. Then Jean-Christophe would turn away, trembling with fear lest he should commit some outrageous prank. He would try to be absorbed in his work, but he could not help hearing Melchior's utterances and the laughter of his colleagues. Tears would come into his eyes. The musicians, good fellows that they were, had seen that, and were sorry for him. They would hush their laughter, and ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... him into the city to the Alcazar, that they might see their brides Doa Elvira and Doa Sol. Doa Ximena had her daughters ready to receive them in full noble garments, for since midnight they had done nothing but prink and prank themselves. Full richly was the Alcazar set out that day, with hangings both above and below, purple and samite, and rich cloth. The Cid entered, between the Infantes, and all that noble company went in after them; and they went into the chief hall of the ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... guessed, at farthest, two weeks. "I have been two months in one shirt? Impossible!" he exclaimed. His serious idea (he cherished it for the support of his reason) was, that the world above had played a mad prank since he had been ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the lady, and to tell the truth I really believe she would have been equal to such a prank some years back. There's a lurking spirit of mischief in her eyes to this day, though I know she has met with a great grief lately, for I heard all about poor little Joe," Paul ...
— Darry the Life Saver - The Heroes of the Coast • Frank V. Webster
... of Wales had sent them a piano, and many fine pictures ornamented the walls from famous persons. An old English lady who spends her summers up there seemed much amused at the prank of the girls, and evidently wondered ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... instead of sinking into his former shame, endeavoured to support himself by surliness and asperity. "He was not the first that had played away a few trifles, and of what use were birth and fortune if they would not admit some sallies and expenses?" His mamma was so much provoked by the cost of this prank, that she would neither palliate nor conceal it; and his father, after some threats of rustication which his fondness would not suffer him to execute, reduced the allowance of his pocket, that he might not be tempted by plenty to profusion. This method ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... de Duras, you should have advanced the clock by half an hour, and sent your husband to bed at half-past ten, when of course he found no one in his apartments to wait upon him. [Footnote: Campan. 129.] All Paris has laughed at this mischievous prank of the queen. Can you deny this, ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... and bowed to him. He walked past them without acknowledging their greetings. His presence silenced and confused the crowd, and evoked embarrassed smiles and low exclamations, as of repentant children who had already come to regret their prank. ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... that the young Pole had been well discussed by the children. They watched him constantly to see what new prank he was preparing for their entertainment. He swaggered under their astonished gaze, and insolently made requests aloud without raising his hand for permission to speak. Just before recess, upon chancing to glance his way, ...
— The Biography of a Prairie Girl • Eleanor Gates
... and risk her good name thus. However, thank Heaven she has played this prank with an honest lad that will ne'er expose her folly. But oh, the perverseness! Could she not bestow her nauseousness on thee?" Denys sighed and shrugged. "On thee that art as ripe for ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... it was nothing to laugh at, though!" remarked Lawless; "she'd have been regularly cooked, if Prank Fairlegh hadn't put her out when he did, and I should have been tried for 'Unjustifiable Girl-icide,' or 'Maliciously setting fire to a marriageable female,' or some such thing; and I daresay the young woman wasn't insured anywhere: I should have got into ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... look crept into the man's eyes, his face flushed like the face of a schoolboy who had been caught in a foolish prank, and he returned the hat awkwardly ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... words they were perplext as to their affair, and said one to other, "What shall we do? Indeed we are unable to sit out three days in this stead." Hereupon the Pieman said to them, "Nay, rather let us play a prank whereby we may escape," and said they, "What may be the device thou wouldest devise?" Quoth he, "Whatso I do that do ye look upon and then act in like guise," and so speaking he arose and taking his minced meat fell to sticking ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... where he declined to learn, and where he only did harm by his riotous example. Indeed, I believe he nearly set fire to Nevil's Court, that beautiful new quadrangle of our college, which Sir Christopher Wren had lately built. He knocked down a proctor's man that wanted to arrest him in a midnight prank; he gave a dinner-party on the Prince of Wales's birthday, which was within a fortnight of his own, and the twenty young gentlemen then present sallied out after their wine, having toasted King James's health with open windows, and sung cavalier songs, and ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... wish his father to know he had been roaming the streets with Ted Slavin and his cronies. Of late Ted had been getting into unusually bad odor with the town people, and perhaps Mr. Kenwood was trying to break off the intimacy known to exist between his son and the prime prank player ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... hung in her father's house, she used to be both annoyed and terrified at the manner in which the eyes of the portrait followed her about the room with persistent and, as she thought, reproving gaze. Especially when she had been guilty of some childish prank, the silent reproach in her grandfather's eyes was intolerable. One day she climbed upon a chair before the portrait, and with a pin attempted to blind the eyes. The pin pricks are ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... freezing sky, nor sultry, checking me, Nor stranger intermeddling with my joy. Even in the spring and play-time of the year That calls the unwonted villager abroad With all her little ones, a sportive train, To gather king-cups in the yellow mead, And prank their hair with daisies, or to pick A cheap but wholesome salad from the brook, These shades are all my own. The timorous hare, Grown so familiar with her frequent guest, Scarce shuns me; and the stock-dove unalarmed Sits cooing in the pine-tree, nor suspends His long ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... I had been working at it for more than a year every evening after the hellish torture of the day's teaching, and all day every holiday, but now I had a good rest while it was playing its boomerang prank of returning to me once a month. The only gleam of hope came from Bentleys, who wrote to say that they could not make up their minds to reject it; but they prevailed upon themselves to part with it at last, though not without asking ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III., July 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... of the beast. Its fit hour of activity is night. Its actions are insane like its whole constitution; it persecutes a principle; it would whip a right; it would tar and feather justice, by inflicting fire and outrage upon the houses and persons of those who have these. It resembles the prank of boys, who run with fire engines to put out the ruddy aurora streaming to the stars. The inviolate spirit turns their spite against the wrongdoers. The martyr cannot be dishonored. Every lash inflicted is a tongue of fame; every prison, a more illustrious ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... to fly out at the top, and soot and swallows' nests to come tumbling down upon the hearth. Then, scared at what she had done, the little mischief-maker hastily buried her fire, swept up the rubbish, and ran off, thinking no one would discover her prank if ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... he had long limited his daily fare to an anchovy and half-a-dozen olives. As for Abbe Jouve, he never knew what he was eating, and his blunders and forgetfulness supplied an inexhaustible fund of amusement. Jeanne, meditating some prank in this respect, was even now stealthily watching him with her ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola
... the judge was saying; "it will prove to be only some wild prank on the part of his mates; Christopher will turn up presently, safe and sound. You say he went out last night; do you happen ...
— Fred Fenton on the Track - or, The Athletes of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... looked upon the other occupants as she did the furniture. Without even a direct glance at the young people in the corner she swept up to a chair within a few feet of them and sat down to wait. Jimmy, in the midst of some tale about a prank that the High School Invincibles had played on a rival base-ball team, faltered, grew confused and finished haltingly. For all her spectacles and crape the golden haired stranger was fascinatingly ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... the gang having one night challenged a fellow-student and received no answer, fired, and took such good aim that the poor young man fell dead on the pavement. Horrified and amazed at the fatal result of his mad prank, the student fled, hoping to ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus
... quite sure Miss Mischief had been up to some prank, which had turned out disastrously. But it must have been a serious one, and perhaps there were ...
— Marjorie's New Friend • Carolyn Wells
... but he was not therefor to be pitied, for he had a right merry soul and was easily content, and loved many things. Good temper and a high spirit looked out of his great blue eyes; aye, and when he had played some prank which was like to bring him into trouble he had a look in his eyes—a look that might have melted a stone to pity, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... anybody, to do anything he was told to do, so as to have'an easy time, a sufficiency of food, and a warm corner to crawl into! What could have persuaded fate to pick him for the victim of this cruel prank; to put him into this position, where he could not avoid suffering, no matter what he did? They wanted him to tell something, and Peter would have been perfectly willing to tell anything—but how could he tell it when he did not ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... act of Yorick's in getting off his chair and picking up the chesnut, as a plain acknowledgment in him, that the chesnut was originally his—and in course, that it must have been the owner of the chesnut, and no one else, who could have played him such a prank with it: What greatly confirmed him in this opinion, was this, that the table being parallelogramical and very narrow, it afforded a fair opportunity for Yorick, who sat directly over against Phutatorius, of slipping the chesnut in—and consequently ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... looked as though I had driven my friend into a corner from which he would find it difficult to extricate himself. But I did him an injustice and shall therefore do everything in my power to right it. My memory, as it so frequently does, played me a prank. At the same time that I answered him, I was in active correspondence with one of the delegates to the Chicago Parliament of Religions, at which the love of God and one's neighbour had been adopted, as a sort of ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller
... they were men who when at home manifested the most gentle and wide-reaching feelings; most of them could not by any possibility have slapped a kitten merely for the prank and yet all of them who had seen an unknown man shot through the head in battle had little more to think of it than if the man had been a rag-baby. Tender they might be; poets they might be; but they were all horned with a provisional, temporary, ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... very day Margaret and her son, and the wife and daughter of Lord Warwick, landed, at last, on the shores of England. [Margaret landed at Weymouth; Lady Warwick, at Portsmouth.] Come they for joy or for woe, for victory or despair? The issue of this day's fight on the heath of Gladsmoor will decide. Prank thy halls, O Westminster, for the triumph of the Lancastrian king,—or open thou, O Grave, to receive the saint-like Henry and his noble son. The king-maker goes before ye, saint-like father and noble son, to prepare your thrones amongst the living ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... this fragrant spring is clad, And mantled round in sweet nymph Flora's robes: Here grows th'alluring rose, sweet marigolds And the lovely hyacinth. Come, nurse, gather: A crown of roses shall adorn my head, I'll prank myself with flowers of the prime; And thus ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... It was true that he was usually in some scrape or other. It was not that he did mean or vicious things; Donald Hall was far too fine a lad for that. But he never could resist playing a prank, and whenever he played one he was invariably caught. Even though every other member of the crowd got away, Donald never contrived to. The boys declared this was because he was slow and clumsy. But the truth really was that he was wont, ...
— Paul and the Printing Press • Sara Ware Bassett
... of mine took a chance; put down a well on his own. The usual thing happened; they broke him. It took a lot of doing, but they broke him. One little trick they did was to cock a bit and drop it in the hole. That prank cost him sixteen thousand dollars before he could 'side track' the tool. He quit, finally, less 'n a hundred feet from big pay. Then, having bought up solid for near nothing they came back and started business, laughing merrily. That's ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... you. Won't you try it? I would do anything on earth for you, and now you deny me this—and who knows but my spirit might enter into you and form a part of your own? How can you refuse me when you know that I think more of you than I do of anybody? This is no boy's prank—I'm ...
— The Colossus - A Novel • Opie Read
... be so stupid was unbelievable, and Wally, seeing himself the object of a senseless prank, was roused ...
— Going Some • Rex Beach
... come. Two libel suits mushroomed into view in as many days, provoked, as it were, out of conscious nothing; unimportant but harassing: one, brought by a ne'er-do-well who had broken a leg while engaged in a drunken prank months before, the other the outcome of a paragraph on a little, ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... roof is seen Arch'd with the enlivening olive's green: Where Science, prank'd in tissued vest, 15 By Reason, Pride, and Fancy drest, Comes, like a bride, so trim array'd, To wed with Doubt ...
— The Poetical Works of William Collins - With a Memoir • William Collins
... at length he became resigned, noticing that among the three or four hundred in his class only about forty merited the honor of being questioned, because they attracted the professor's attention by their appearance, some prank, comicality, or other cause. The greater part of the students congratulated themselves that they thus escaped the work of thinking and understanding the subject. "One goes to college, not to learn and study, but ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... its imprint on the thought of the time. The results of this special prank with the astrologer were: first, to cause the wits of the town to join in the hue and cry that Partridge was dead; second, to increase the contempt for astrologers; and, third, in the words of Scott: "The most remarkable consequence of Swift's frolic was ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... of mischief was speeding him into other experiences ere he reached his bed that night. Some of the consequences of his mischievous prank were to be ...
— The High School Boys' Fishing Trip • H. Irving Hancock
... represent his early creative work. We were in the better sense a small band of Bohemians, the few friends and companions who will be found figuring in the tales under one guise or another. Many a merry prank and many a jest is recalled by these pages. Of criticism I have no word to say. Let the reader understand how they came into being and they will explain themselves. "Bob" Stephens took his own environment, the anecdotes he heard, the persons whom he met and ...
— Tales From Bohemia • Robert Neilson Stephens
... now did I tell Uncle Kit of the prank I played on the black tyrant. I also told him why I was so anxious to get away from St. Louis. That it was I feared Drake would discover me and take me back to his farm and the society of ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... himself and act wisely, something about Just's brave acknowledgment, where silence would have covered the whole thing, appealed to him. The thought of the way the absent father and mother had met every confession of his own that he could remember in a life of prank-playing softened the words which ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... open windows into the apartment, whistled and danced a hornpipe, and before they could recover from their amazement jumped out again. A few minutes later my father walked in at the door as sedately as though quite innocent of the prank, and shook hands with everyone; but the sight of their amazed faces proving too much for his attempted sobriety, his hearty laugh was the signal for the rest of the party to join in his merriment. But judging from his slight ability in later years, I fancy that he must ...
— My Father as I Recall Him • Mamie Dickens
... condemn to death for freaks like ours? You, whom I've found *** you understand—for shame Your crimes are such as all must blush to name. Though I may have a negro for gallant, And erred when Atis for me seemed to pant, His merit and the black's superior rank, Must lessen, if not quite excuse my prank. Howe'er, old boy, you presently shall see, If any belle solicited should be, To grant indulgencies, with presents sweet, She will not straight capitulation beat; At least, if they be such as I have viewed:— Moor, change to dog; immediately ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... have taken it for a prank," remarked the Principal, without administering any reproof for the interruption. "And we may as well ...
— The Girl Scouts' Good Turn • Edith Lavell
... befitting the new grace vouchsafed. And from my bosom had not yet upsteamed The fuming of that incense, when I knew The rite accepted. With such mighty sheen And mantling crimson, in two listed rays The splendors shot before me, that I cried, "God of Sabaoth! that dost prank them thus!" As leads the galaxy from pole to pole, Distinguished into greater lights and less, Its pathway, which the wisest fail to spell; So thickly studded, in the depth of Mars, Those rays described ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... said Groves at last, as if a bright thought had struck him, "I know what it must be, sir. You're up to a prank sometimes—in fact, rather often—and you've hidden away the yacht, for there's been no one else in the Cove but you; though where you can have put it I'm puzzled to say, seeing there's not a place fit to hide a walnut-shell I haven't looked in, not to say a schooner yacht drawing ...
— The Story of the White-Rock Cove • Anonymous
... thing," replied Poole; "keep a strict watch for the next prank they will play, and beat them off again till they get tired and give it up as a ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... no disturbance. Pray don't mention it. I am only sorry that some one has played a mischievous prank on you—a servant, doubtless. Madame," sternly, looking at his step-mother. "I insist that you shall investigate the matter, and discharge ...
— Dainty's Cruel Rivals - The Fatal Birthday • Mrs. Alex McVeigh Miller
... is not like to play that prank, or I err," answered Percy, who well knew that Lord Northumberland was not in all cases cognisant of the use made of his name by this very worthy cousin: "as to death, of course that may hap,—we are all prone to be tumbled out of the world at short ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... having passed at some previous time through a precisely similar experience, but, also, of taking part in a ridiculous dream. At that instant Jervaise Hall, its owners, dependants and friends, had the air of being not realities but symbols pushed up into my thought by some prank of the fantastic psyche who dwells in the subconscious. I should not have been surprised at any incongruity in the ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... talked, you may be sure. The Lunda boys were decidedly in favour of Yaspard's scheme—was there ever a boy who would have objected to any such prank? They saw no harm in it whatever, ...
— Viking Boys • Jessie Margaret Edmondston Saxby
... account of the holy abbot's endeavors to purify the monastic orders from the stain of simony, her hand clutched his, and doing a delicate cake-walk she compelled him along with her, announcing, "The Hornet and the Bumble-bee went walking hand in hand!" Fancying this prank not to have been without success, she next performed an improvised pas seul illustrative of the text, "The mountains ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... you, Garry," he admitted. "You have your own pride; you have your own position here in The Corner. But I want you to notice that mine is different. You've spent a day for what you have in The Corner, here. I've spent ten years. You've played a prank, acted a part, and cast a jest for what you have. But for the place which I hold, brother mine, I've schemed with my wits, played fast and loose, and killed men. Do you hear? I've bought it with blood, and things you buy at such a price ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... spanned impossible gaps, bore impossible weights, scaled unscalable heights, died incredibly heroic and unutterably tragic deaths, and who did these preposterous things as simply and unquestioningly as a child falling to sleep. The bitter humors of this prank of fate—the things shattered which should have been whole, the things preserved which no hand but that of error had ever created. The ruthless mixture of the farcical and the pathetic; the fire horse struck to earth by a falling wall, screaming in anguish—and the coal heaver, carrying hurriedly ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... both laughed under our breath, for it seemed like a schoolboy's prank. Well, after the long toil in the fen, we were like boys just freed from school, though our game was the greatest of all—that of war—the game of Hodur's playground, ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... and then up the Indus to Attock." And added, "But, bear witness all, if the young devil turn up again some day, that I had no quarrel with him.... A pity! A pity!... Where shall we find his like, a Prank among the Franks, an Afghan among Afghans, a Frenchman in Algiers, a nomad robber in Persia, a Bey in Cairo, a Sahib in Bombay—equally at home as gentleman or tribesman? Where shall we find his like again ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren
... Sir George, I found Dorothy in close consultation with the queen and two of her ladies. I heard the name of Lord James Stanley spoken amid suppressed laughter, and I suspected Dorothy had on foot some prank touching that young man, to which her ...
— Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall • Charles Major
... degrees of Phrinzy. Here is th' inconsistency of conduct that marks a disturbance of the reason: and, to tell the truth, I once knew a young fellow that played this very prank at a wedding, and the nixt thing we hard, my lorrd ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... commander of the guard and the prince's tutor, under plea of the bath and stows them away in baskets which suggest Falstaff's "buck-basket." In Miss Stokes' "Indian Fairy Tales" the fair wife of an absent merchant plays a similar notable prank upon the Kotwal, the Wazir, the Kazi and the King; and akin to this is the exploit of Temal Ramakistnan, the Madrasi Tyl Eulenspiegel and Scogin who by means of a lady saves his life from the Rajah and the High Priest. Mr. G. H. Damant (pp. 357-360 ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... together with bursts of laughter and exclamation and emphatic little gestures, they gave her all the petty gossip of the week just past. By the by, and how about Bordenave? What had he said about her prank? Oh, nothing much! After bawling about having her brought back by the police, he had simply put somebody else in her place at night. Little Violaine was the understudy, and she had even obtained a very pretty success as the Blonde Venus. Which piece of news ...
— Nana, The Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille • Emile Zola
... do you mean to do?" said the stranger. "I don't think you can pull home in her. One doesn't know how much she may be damaged. She may sink in the lock, or play any prank." ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... missing." It increased his discomfort over the whole hateful business and made him thankful for the first time that he was alone in the world. At least no mother or sister had been tortured by this strange prank of fate. ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... not only because my mother would rather have permitted any other offence to pass unpunished, but because I had an opportunity of perceiving its ugliness very early in life. When only seven or eight years old I heard a boy—I still remember his name—tell his mother a shameless lie about some prank in which I had shared. I did not interrupt him to vindicate the truth, but I shrank in horror with the feeling of having ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... oddest prank which this hummer performs is to dart up in the air, and then down, almost striking a bush or a clump of grass at each descent, repeating this feat a number of times with a swiftness that the eye can scarcely ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... His rifle he discarded. In his un-mittened hand he held his revolver. With staring eyes he looked for Bram out where the wolves had passed. And then, all at once, came the shock. It was tremendous. The trickery of sound on the Barren had played an unexpected prank with his senses, and while he strained his eyes to pierce the hazy starlight of the plain far out, Bram himself loomed up suddenly along the edge of the bush not twenty ...
— The Golden Snare • James Oliver Curwood |
