"Swindler" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... proved before you; but I must have it for my own use." We have heard of governors being everything that is bad and wicked; but a governor putting himself in the situation of a common cheat, of a common swindler, never was, I believe, heard of since the creation of the world to this day. This does not taste of the common oppressions of power; this does not taste of the common abuses of office; but it in no way differs ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke
... these continued to fail, he tried to assist the axiom by borrowing money; but he found that his uncle had definitely done with him. He would have assisted the axiom by stealing money, but he had neither the nerve nor the knowledge to be a swindler; he was not even sufficiently expert to cheat ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... said Jim London. "The auld swindler kens the thing's worth mair than he offers. Gar him gie ye ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... again. In fact, you would have been the centre of an unpleasant amount of vulgar curiosity. As it is, the inquest will be more or less of a formal affair, and the public will never know that Fenwick has been anything more than a common swindler." ...
— The Mystery of the Four Fingers • Fred M. White
... guy; swindler, bastard, super-swanker, doubleface, bluffer, totempole, spotter, who looks like a dog ...
— Botchan (Master Darling) • Mr. Kin-nosuke Natsume, trans. by Yasotaro Morri
... world did he mean?" thought Skipper Worse, as he recalled the conversation. "Does the old swindler think to persuade me that C. F. Garman ...
— Skipper Worse • Alexander Lange Kielland
... this little liberty with the Patriarchal person, Mr Pancks further astounded and attracted the Bleeding Hearts by saying in an audible voice, 'Now, you sugary swindler, I mean to ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... Church of S. Agostino in that city, in the lesser aisles of which many citizens had caused chapels and tombs to be made for their families; and there, in the Chapel of S. Jacopo, Berna painted in fresco some little scenes of the life of that Saint, and especially vivid is the story of Marino the swindler, who, having by reason of greed of gold given his soul to the Devil and made thereunto a written contract in his own hand, is making supplication to the Saint to free him from this promise, while a Devil, showing him the contract, is pressing him with the greatest insistence ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol 2, Berna to Michelozzo Michelozzi • Giorgio Vasari
... of us who sees you has any idea that you are a charlatan or a swindler. I know there are many people going about who tell such plausible stories that it is very hard to see through them, but there is a style about your language which assures me of your good disposition. Moreover you have told the story of your own misfortunes, ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... began. Fanutza sat listlessly on her chair and looked through the window. A few minutes later, the two men called one another thief and swindler and a hundred other names. Yet each time the bargain was concluded on a certain article they shook hands and repeated that they were the best ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... you, as a friend—if you try to speechify, and play the martyr, and let out who you are, the respectable people who have been patronizing you will find it necessary for their own sakes to clap a stopper on you for good and all, to make you out an impostor and a swindler, and get you out of the way for life: while, if you are quiet, it will suit them to be quiet too, and say nothing about you, if you say nothing about them; and then there will be a chance that they, as well as your own family, will do everything in their power to hush the matter up. So, again, ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... faith, have been my ruin, and I go continually from bad to worse. Better would it have been for me if I had set myself to making matches in my youth! I should not be in such distress of mind.... I will not remain under this burden, nor be vilified every day for a swindler by those who have robbed my life and honour. Only death or the Pope can extricate me." It appears that at this time the Duke of Urbino's agents were accusing him of having lent out moneys which he had received on account for the execution of the monument. Then ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... her to save dear John. This at once aroused my aunt's suspicions; and instead of lending the money, she wrote off to Mr. Smithers instantly to come up to her, desired me to give her up the 3,000l. scrip shares that I possessed, called me an atrocious cheat and heartless swindler, and vowed I had been ...
— The History of Samuel Titmarsh - and the Great Hoggarty Diamond • William Makepeace Thackeray
... inexhaustible contrivance, prompt ingenuity,—a man very dangerous to play with at games of skill. And it is cunning regulated always by a noble sense of honor, too; instinctively abhorrent of attorneyism and the swindler element: a cunning, sharp as the vulpine, yet always strictly human, which is rather beautiful to see. This is one of Friedrich's marked endowments. Intellect sun-clear, wholly practical (need not be specially deep), and entirely loyal to the fact before it; ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... with any bars in, but we cannot as yet keep up steam with it. I hope, however, ultimately to succeed—in fact our coals are nearly finished. To show you how General Church goes on—his gunboat has only advanced twenty feet from the beach, and yet he will not send away that swindler Allen, who commands her. I told him I would not meddle with her until he dismissed that man, and things remain thus. General Church, while on board, received letters announcing the unlooked-for destruction of the Turkish fleet; still I have not entirely credited it, and I am in anxious ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, Vol. II • Thomas Lord Cochrane
... added my uncle, joining in the laugh. "Nor is this half of the argument. The State, too, in its corporate character, has been playing swindler all this time. You may not know the fact, but I as your guardian do know, that the quit-rents reserved by the crown when it granted the lands of Mooseridge and Ravensnest, were claimed by the State; and that, ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper
... his tongue is too big for his mouth, and his face is like one that you see in a nightmare. The ugly head is stuck on a body which resembles a sack of rancid engine grease. This beauty is a fairly representative specimen of our bold sportsmen. He is a deft swindler, and I have gazed with blank innocence while he rooked some courageous simpleton at tossing. The fat, rancid man can do almost as he chooses with a handful of coins, and the marvellous celerity with which sovereigns or halfpence glide between his podgy fingers is quite fascinating. On the subjects ...
— The Chequers - Being the Natural History of a Public-House, Set Forth in - a Loafer's Diary • James Runciman
... critter here says Julia knows I've got and wants me to sell to Raish Pulcifer I SOLD two months ago. Yes, by the everlastin', I sold 'em! And—eh? Yes, there he is. I sold 'em to that Bangs man there. He knows it. He'll tell you I did.... And now this swindler, this cheat, she—she—Who put you up to it? Who ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... of his giving himself, both in this state of existence and in his spiritual circle, a name to which he never had any pretensions whatever, and likewise prudently suppressing any reference to his amiable weakness as a swindler and an infamous trafficker in his own wife, the guileless Mr. Balsamo delivered, in a "distinct voice", this distinct celestial utterance—unquestionably punctuated in a supernatural manner: "My power ...
— Contributions to All The Year Round • Charles Dickens
... think that, by an intellectual stride they had advanced in the spiritual life, whereas they would be neither the better nor the worse. I know a man, once among the foremost in denouncing the old theology, who is now no better than a swindler." ...
— The Elect Lady • George MacDonald
... all control of himself. "It wasn't a trade at all! It's piracy! It's highway robbery! It was a barefaced swindle, and this swindler" ...
— The High School Boys' Canoe Club • H. Irving Hancock
... was selfish. Externally, in the ordinary action of life as distinguished from the literary action proper to his genius, he was no doubt sluggish and weak because of his giantism. He ended as an unproductive drunkard and swindler; for the repeated sales of the Daventry plot, in so far as they imposed on the buyers and were not transparent excuses for begging, were undeniably swindles. For all that, he does not appear in his writings a selfish or base-minded man. He is at ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... of three hundred a-year as a bounty, for which I could make no return, was I own humiliating to my pride. It made the question continually recur—'Whether it did not give me the air of an impostor? A kind of swindler of sentiment? A pretender to superior virtue, for the purpose of gratifying vice?' It seemed at a blow to rob me of all independence; and leave me a manacled slave to the opinions, not only of Mr. Evelyn, but, by a kind of consignment, of his relation the ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... much. Both uncle and nephew fell upon Jogesh and belaboured him sorely with their shoes. He did not retaliate, but consoled himself with the thought that he had done his duty, to God and society, by marrying his daughter, whatever fate might await him. After vowing to bring a suit against the swindler, Amarendra Babu and his uncle left the premises and did what they would have done much earlier had they not been in such a desperate hurry to marry the lad. They made inquiries as to Jogesh's position and soon discovered that he was a man of straw, quite unworthy of powder and ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... old bald-headed bottle of shoe polish," he spluttered, "you're a swindler—that's what you are! You've bought a boarding house with money belonging to your infernal ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... face was wet with tears, that his wet glasses blinded him. He put up his little fat hand and clawed them off clumsily, felt inefficiently for his pocket-handkerchief, and then, to my horror, as he clung to me, he began to weep aloud, this little, old worldworn swindler. It wasn't just sobbing or shedding tears, it was crying as a child ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... who had just started practicing in a small town and hung his sign outside of his office door. It read: "A. Swindler." A stranger who called to consult him saw the sign and said: "My goodness, man, look at that sign! Don't you see how it reads? Put in your first name—Alexander, Ambrose or whatever ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... Parisian detectives—the best in the world—going to take down from the lady's lips a minute description of the adventurer, the swindler, who had imposed upon them, and attempted to cheat a poor hack-driver out of his hard-earned wages! Then would appear the reports in the newspapers,—how a well-dressed young man, an American, Monsieur X., (or perhaps my name would be given,) had been the means ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... influences, peculiarly sensitive to opinion and guarded by intellectual tastes, would lapse into vice as soon as the traditional sanction was removed. But what is to prevent the withdrawal of the traditional sanction from producing its natural effect upon the morality of the mass of mankind? The commercial swindler or the political sharper, when the divine authority of conscience is gone, will feel that he has only the opinion of society to reckon with, and he knows how to reckon with the opinion of society. If Macbeth is ready, provided he can succeed in this world, ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... tells us that the roof of the house fell in. An imaginative fool, who is also a swindler, assures us that he later saw the roof standing. We remember that the roof was of iron girders covered with wood, and draw this conclusion: That the framework still stands, but that the healing fell through in a mass of blazing rubbish. Our common sense and our knowledge ...
— The Free Press • Hilaire Belloc
... at three of the morning, woke sharply and fully; and sharply and coldly as her father pronouncing sentence on a cruel swindler she gave judgment: ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... completely cut up, that he could not say a word, but sneaked off, hanging down his head, and looked much more like a detected swindler than a ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... a swindler. Langford owed our dear Parker twenty-five pounds, of which there was no account; but Langford desired his agents to pay Mr. Parker. Langford requested, that he would wait two or three months, as it would be more convenient to him. To which the other agreed—"Aye, ...
— The Letters of Lord Nelson to Lady Hamilton, Vol. I. - With A Supplement Of Interesting Letters By Distinguished Characters • Horatio Nelson
... is a pretty unmitigated rascal," he said at last. "And I can't flatter myself that any repentance for his misdeeds offers one an excuse for condoning them. He was a swindler and a hypocrite. You can't get away from it. I never met a more agreeable companion. He's taught me everything ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... scarecrow. That is the theory. And the practice is, that we send a child to prison for a month for stealing a handful of walnuts, for fear that other children should come to steal more of our walnuts. And we do not punish a swindler for ruining a thousand families, because we think swindling is a wholesome excitement ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... colour, save this one dread hue, society has a sanctuary and earth a refuge. The forger may find a circle in which the signing of another man's name, under the pressure of circumstances, is held to be a misfortune rather than an offence. The swindler has the gentlemanly brotherhood and sisterhood of Macaire for his family, and need never be lonely. The thief may dance away his jovial nights among kindred spirits, and be carried to his grave by sorrowing fellow-artists. The coiner may be jolly in his hiding-place among his chosen ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... very lovely, and that pains have been taken with her education. Her mother was well born and well bred. If you would get at the truth, Miss Lovel, you must teach yourself to believe that they are not swindlers. They are no more swindlers than I am a swindler. I will go further,—though perhaps you, and the young Earl, and Mr. Flick, may think me unfit to be intrusted any longer with this case, after such a declaration,—I believe, though it is with a doubting belief, that the elder lady is the Countess Lovel, and that her daughter is the legitimate ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope
... and this achievement should rest on health; and the union of both should produce the inflorescence of happiness; for the true sense of all successful achievement is in that it makes for the forces of righteousness, and a successful swindler or criminal could hardly be included under these general definitions. And so, to have good health, and to achieve good and noble work, must produce a good degree of personal happiness as inevitably as that certain ...
— The Life Radiant • Lilian Whiting
... in having him in my court, this Justin Chevassat, alias Maxime de Brevan. He must be a cool swindler, brimful of cunning and astuteness, familiar with all the tricks of criminal courts, and not so easily overcome. It will be no child's play, I am sure, to prove that he was the instigator of Crochard's crimes, and that he has hired him with his own money. ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... prepare a crushing little surprise for this defiant old fool and miser, Professor Andrew Fraser." And Red Eric Murray now inwardly rejoiced to see the end of all his masquerading as the Moonshee. He received a parting salute, also. "You are no gentleman, a vile swindler, sir," raved old Andrew, as Captain Murray allowed him to descend and enter his own door. The "History of Thibet" fraud ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... in the state, are responsible for the crimes committed against filial piety and the public laws. If a king is careless about publishing laws, and then peremptorily punishes in accordance with the strict letter of them, he acts the part of a swindler; if he collect the taxes arbitrarily without giving warning, he is guilty of oppression; and if he puts the people to death without having instructed them, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... the jeweler, "I am of the opinion that this lady is a clever swindler. I believe she wants to get hold of the rings, and carry them off ...
— Mark Mason's Victory • Horatio Alger
... thinking of the dead Uhlan and of poor Bazard; perhaps of the wretched exposure of Buckhurst—the man she had trusted and who had proved to be a swindler, and a murderous ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... is controlled by the arguments between the editor and sub-editor, which they do not publish. This casualness is our English vice. It is at once casual and secret. Our public life is conducted privately. Hence it follows that if an English swindler wished to impress us, the last thing he would think of doing would be to put on a uniform. He would put on a polite slouching air and a careless, expensive suit of clothes; he would stroll up to the Mayor, be so awfully sorry to disturb him, find he had forgotten his card-case, ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... rich dowry with his wife. The poor girl died of 'grief in the course of a year, but did not say a word till she was on her death-bed. Her foolish parents, ashamed of having been deceived so grossly, dared not say anything, and got the female swindler out of the way; she had taken good care, however, to lay a firm hold on the dowry. The story became known, and gave the good folk of Augsburg much amusement, while I became renowned for my sagacity in ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... the wages of an hireling that he might act the part of a swindler, and who skulked from his impotent attacks on the liberties of France to perpetrate more successful iniquity in the plains of Poland. Note to line 193. Notes, 1796, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... weak. His life was spent in sinning and repenting; in inculcating what was right, and doing what was wrong. In speculation, he was a man of piety and honour; in practice, he was much of the rake and a little of the swindler. He was, however, so good-natured that it was not easy to be seriously angry with him, and that even rigid moralists felt more inclined to pity than to blame him, when he diced himself into a spunging-house or drank himself into a fever. Addison regarded ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... thundered Raften; "didn't I say that that dhirty swindler of an architect was playing us into the conthractor's hands—thought we wuz simple—a put-up job, the hull durn thing. Luk at it! They're nothing but a ...
— Two Little Savages • Ernest Thompson Seton
... not be cheated by an English swindler." The clothier raised his thin voice: "Kate, ...
— My Neighbors - Stories of the Welsh People • Caradoc Evans
... Rousseau a swindler; that is a somewhat severe expression. Even if he did really steal a piece of ribbon, or a silver spoon, it is not worth talking about. I share his love for nature and his hatred of mankind. One evening lately, as the sun went down, I thought: "God! how beautiful are ...
— Historical Miniatures • August Strindberg
... show how the lust for gain plus the wiles of the swindler overcome the caution and suspicion of the "hard-headed," The Ponzi case is the latest contribution ...
— The Foundations of Personality • Abraham Myerson
... Jo, alias Big Stick Joram, alias Pinky; swindler, international confidence man, fence, burglar, gambler; convicted in 1887, and sent to Sing Sing for forgery; convicted in 1898, and sent to Auburn for swindling; arrested by my men on board the S. S. Scythian Queen, at the cabled request of John T. Burke, Esquire, and ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers
... accession of property to the offender he does not ordinarily incur the extreme penalty or the extreme obloquy with which his offenses would be visited on the ground of the naive moral code alone. The thief or swindler who has gained great wealth by his delinquency has a better chance than the small thief of escaping the rigorous penalty of the law and some good repute accrues to him from his increased wealth and from his spending the irregularly ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen
... silent. Should he put an end to the affair by making himself known, by revealing to Mr. Seehaase that he was no swindler of uncertain competence, by birth no gipsy in a green wagon, but the son of Consul Kroeger, of the Kroeger family? No, he had no desire for that. And did not these men of the civic order really have a little right on their side? To a certain extent ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... before you lead your innocent daughters, and their mamma, into places so dangerous. In the first place, you have bad dinners; and, secondly, bad company. If you play cards, you are very likely playing with a swindler; if you dance, you dance with a —— person with whom you had better have nothing ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... hardened swindler Peter procured a mule, and arranged to have the animal in the caravansary at daybreak. It was his intention to start for Kialang in search of Eileen with the first ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... something like that. Who knows? By the way, what have you to say about the affair? You knew her rather intimately. No hedging, doctor. There she sits in the cell and combs her hair. Can you imagine who is responsible? You know a woman doesn't lose her mind from a mere love affair. And this music swindler down stairs—it is impossible to get him to show his true colours. Yes, ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... that it does not necessarily follow. The clever people of the under-world do nothing by halves nor without careful inquiry beforehand; that is what makes the difference between the common pickpocket and the brilliant swindler." He turned to Ailsa. "Is that all, Miss Lorne, or am I right in supposing that there is even worse ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... from their appearances; but they are not to be trusted, for I doubt not but you would form erroneous conclusions from such premises. The company that assembles here is generally composed of a great variety of characters—the Idler, the Swindler, the Dandy, the Exquisite, the full-pursed young Peer, the needy Sharper, the gaudy Pauper, and the aspiring School-boy, anxious to be thought a dealer and a judge of the article before him—looking ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... laid the matter before the Lord Mayor, who, with equal propriety, stamped the attempt as the device of a swindler, against which publicity in the newspapers was the best precaution. The strangest thing of all, however, was, that nobody appeared to know the offender; nor was there in the 'Times,' or in the other newspapers where the circumstances were detailed, one single surmise as to the identity of this ingenious ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... up in the air. If he sees a dollar in the dirt and somebody of distinction is looking, he will let it lie. He won't pick it up. There is no denying he has an attractive appearance. He has the stuff in him for a very clever, fashionable swindler. But he would rather take it easy and live off his daughter and his daughter's admirers. It's astonishing how many people are willing to make asses of themselves. There's that Achleitner—look at the condescension with which Hahlstroem treats him and the ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... than a body of mercenaries absolutely devoted to their leader and indifferent to political affairs. Sulla himself was a hardened, cool, and clearheaded man, in whose eyes the sovereign Roman burgesses were a rabble, the hero of Aquae Sextiae a bankrupt swindler, formal legality a phrase, Rome itself a city without a garrison and with its walls half in ruins, which could be far ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... cried Newman, standing on tiptoe to look over Tim's head, who had interposed to prevent him. 'Hallo, you sir—old Nickleby!—what do you mean when you talk of "a fellow like this"? Who made me "a fellow like this"? If I would sell my soul for drink, why wasn't I a thief, swindler, housebreaker, area sneak, robber of pence out of the trays of blind men's dogs, rather than your drudge and packhorse? If my every word was a lie, why wasn't I a pet and favourite of yours? Lie! When did I ever cringe and fawn to you. Tell me that! I ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... little hand into a tight grip, still looking straight into her eyes. There was a light in his own that shone like a blue flame. "Thanks!" he said again, as he released it. "You're very good, Miss Mortimer. But you mustn't be seen with me, you know. You've got to remember that I'm a swindler." ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... O'Grady. "You needn't feel any anxiety about that. The other man is an American and a thorough-paced swindler. Nothing will happen to him that he doesn't deserve. But we mustn't waste time. We've still got to unveil the statue. You go on with what you were saying. You were just going to tell me what the Lord-Lieutenant's ...
— General John Regan - 1913 • George A. Birmingham
... everything that's happened. They caught all of the men except that wretch, Pedro. The sheriff's taken them to Perilla for trial. He says they'll surely be convicted. Better yet, one of them has turned State's evidence and implicated a swindler named Draper, who was at the bottom ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... respectable people were not being deluded or cheated by his cousin, Mr. Ramsay had no further sensitiveness on the subject. The Browns kept what he had told them even from the Ketchums, only to hear him announce in all assemblies that a cousin of his was "goin' about over here,—an awful swindler and 'leg,'—and that the best thing people could do would be to give him the widest sort of berth until he got himself into the penitentiary, as he certainly would,—at least it was quite on the cards," smiling in cheerful ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Old Series, Vol. 36—New Series, Vol. 10, July 1885 • Various
... "It was that swindler Hahn who deceived me in the beginning," Claridge said. "I have never made a mistake with a cameo before, and I never thought so close an imitation was possible. I examined it most carefully, and was perfectly satisfied, and many experts examined it afterward, and were all equally ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison
... realize on your hens to keep from bankruptcy, everybody would quit eating chicken and go to eating mutton, and there you are. I decline to invest in a hen ranch right here now, and if you try to inveigle me into it I shall have you arrested as a gold-brick swindler," and Uncle Ike patted the red-headed boy on the shoulder and ran a great ...
— Peck's Uncle Ike and The Red Headed Boy - 1899 • George W. Peck
... a quill, and against whom thou canst claim no recompense or remedy? What is a pickpocket who steals a five- pound in comparison to a dice-sharper who robs thee of a hundred pounds in the third part of a night? And what the swindler that deceives thee in a worthless old hack compared with the apothecary who swindles thee of thy money and life too, for some effete, medicinal stuff? And moreover, what are all these robbers compared with that great arch-robber who deprives ...
— The Visions of the Sleeping Bard • Ellis Wynne
... palliate the conduct he could not excuse, 'had led him to take such steps, by accommodation bills, buying goods on credit, to sell them for ready money, and similar transactions, that his character in the commercial world was gone. He was considered,' he added, lowering his voice, 'on 'Change as a swindler.' ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... Hiram, startled out of his usual calm propriety, 'do you not comprehend if that woman had gone out of your store with the calico, that she not only would never enter it again, but she would publish your name over town as a swindler and a cheat, and you never would hear the end of it. Pease had charged her double prices, and the goods would not stand a single washing. And you know whether or not you are ready to pay off the mortgage Deacon ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... then ensued, and such epithets as liar, cheat, and swindler were freely interchanged, and then there was a simultaneous spring at each other, the chairs were overturned and they were rolling upon the floor, dealing each other fierce blows and tearing each other's hair ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... of "a thousand crimes." Remember how we limit the application of other parables. The lord, it will be recollected, commended the unjust steward because he had done wisely. His shrewdness was held up as an example, but after all he was a miserable swindler, and deserved the state-prison as much as many of our financial operators. The parable of the Pharisee and the Publican is a perpetual warning against spiritual pride. But it must not frighten any one of us out of being ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... area-sneaks. The forger occupied the same berth with the body-snatcher. The man of education learned strange secrets of house-breakers' craft, and the vulgar ruffian of St. Giles took lessons of self-control from the keener intellect of the professional swindler. The fraudulent clerk and the flash "cracksman" interchanged experiences. The smuggler's stories of lucky ventures and successful runs were capped by the footpad's reminiscences of foggy nights and stolen watches. The poacher, grimly thinking of his sick wife and orphaned children, would start ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... and a humbug, if not a swindler, was enough, Wade thought, to account for any failure. But he ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... pat enough. Most swindlers have. It's their business. Not that I think him a deliberate swindler, Dysart. Possibly he believes in himself. But I hope ...
— The Wizard's Daughter and Other Stories • Margaret Collier Graham
... Vaux, a Swindler and Thief, now transported to New South Wales, for the second time, and for life. Written by himself. ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... can guard against being roped in by a scheming woman the first time; but if it happens twice he deserves it, and he should be turned out to stay an idiot, for the signs are so plain. A man swindler takes a man's money and makes a fool of him; but a woman swindler takes a man's money and leaves a smirch on him. Only a man's nearest and dearest can help him live down such a smirch; so, Agnes, if ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... all right! Hogan has done his work, and the stuff is beginning to tell on Merriwell's racer at just the right time. We'll send the fellow back to Yale penniless, and then I will jump on him with his paper. I'll expose him as a race-track gambler, a fraud, a swindler! I'll ruin his college career, as he ruined mine! But I'll not be satisfied then. I'll hound him till he is weary of his life! I'll make him remember the day he dared lift his hand against Evan Hartwick! ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish
... produce his daughter, and that the case would not come to trial. If they were only firm and decided with him, Mr. Checkynshaw would give up the block of stores, and pay over the back rents. He must do so, or his reputation would be blasted forever. He must stand before the world as a knave and a swindler, unless he did full and ample justice to the widow (who had a husband), and the orphan (who had a father and mother); for Mr. Wittleworth, when he waxed eloquent, had a ...
— Make or Break - or, The Rich Man's Daughter • Oliver Optic
... anything,' replied the brother, 'he promised he'd pay my college bills, when my father died; he promised he'd build the new wing to the Rectory. And it is to this man's son—this scoundrel, gambler, swindler, murderer, of a Rawdon Crawley, that Matilda leaves the bulk of her money. I say it's unchristian. By Jove it is. The infamous dog has got every vice except hypocrisy, and ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... Loring had so deeply loved was sister to the wife of this military castaway, this unprincipled gambler, swindler and thief, and he, Loring, had charged himself with a commission that might bring him once more face to face with ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... morning brought your letter. You ask for the money to be sent to you immediately. I have it not to send; my sin has found me out. A thief and swindler! Can it be possible that I have incurred such ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie
... a notorious swindler had been tracked by a red-haired detective to the manufacturing city, to which Miles first directed his steps. The bills describing the swindler set forth that he was quite young, tall, handsome, broad-shouldered, with black ...
— Blue Lights - Hot Work in the Soudan • R.M. Ballantyne
... perhaps this gentleman prefers it to the endless noises of greater hotels. The gratified cabman, happy over his hasty bargain, which delivered him from a half hour's stamping of feet and clapping of his fur covered hands, never cares to wonder whether the occupant of his sleigh is a disguised swindler or an Earl in-cog, but jingles his sleigh bells hurriedly in the ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... grudge her that real sacred thing called love, even of a Rawdon Crawley, who has more of that self-forgetting, all-purifying feeling for his little evil spirit than many a better man has for a good woman. We do grudge Becky a heart, though it belong only to a swindler. Poor, sinned against, vile, degraded, but still true-hearted Rawdon!—you stand next in our affections and sympathies to honest Dobbin himself. It was the instinct of a good nature which made the Major feel that the stamp of the Evil One was upon Becky; and it was the stupidity of a good ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... to the surprised Lovel how Sir Arthur's foolish speculations, and especially his belief in a certain German swindler, named Dousterswivel, had caused him to engage in some very costly mining ventures, which were now almost certain to result ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... unpleasant that the mere mention of it has roused the bile of every penny-a-liner in the Republican press. I undertook to demonstrate that one of the fifteen millions of the 'ablest men in the country,' whom you are always hearing about, is a swindler. He is, but he does not like to be ...
— An American Politician • F. Marion Crawford
... together the pieces of wood, and that the heap of boards ought to be accepted as the equivalent of two-thirds of his debt, I am afraid the creditor would regard him as little better than an impudent swindler. It obviously makes no sort of difference whether the Canariote or Teneriffian buyer advanced the wood and the food-stuffs, on which the carpenter had to maintain himself; or whether the carpenter had a stock of both, the consumption of which must be recouped by the exchange of a chest of drawers ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... Caesar, or Napoleon. Whenever a man of that stamp arrives, the highwayman has found a master. What a difference between men in power of face! A man succeeds because he has more power of eye than another, and so coaxes or confounds him. The newspapers, every week, report the adventures of some impudent swindler, who, by steadiness of carriage, duped those who should have known better. Yet any swindlers we have known are novices and bunglers, as is attested by their ill name. A greater power of face would accomplish anything, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... the Pacha. "We have discussed this matter fully, and I have no claim whatever against you; neither has this man. I settled all my accounts with him; and I have his receipt in full, signed by him, and witnessed by Captain Sharp and his wife. He is a swindler and a villain; and if I ever catch him in Morocco he shall have ...
— Across India - Or, Live Boys in the Far East • Oliver Optic
... by inches of mental disorder, and his pardon was procured by the influence of Mr. Watson. He went back to his home. The ten thousand dollars which Dock had borrowed of him was recovered, in process of law, of the person with whom the swindler had deposited it. The old man had really lost but a thousand dollars, the amount of his fine; but he was too miserable to survive long, and died two years after his discharge from prison. Levi was his heir, ...
— Freaks of Fortune - or, Half Round the World • Oliver Optic
... them adrift in the boats. Among these loyal people were some of the male convicts. The boats made their way to Rio Janeiro, whence the people ultimately reached England. Among the "respectable" convicts was one Major Semple, a notorious swindler of the time, who on this occasion behaved well, risking his life for the protection of the ship's officers—from the soldiers who had been put on board to support law and order! (He afterwards settled in the Brazils, ...
— The Naval Pioneers of Australia • Louis Becke and Walter Jeffery
... the speculation threatened to fail—I reproach myself for losing my courage. I ran away like a swindler and a thief, because I could not face my best friend and tell him I had ruined him ...
— A Little Princess • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... told you. But I soon perceived that I had kept by the naked truth too unvarnishedly, and thereby quite overshot my mark. When he learned that he was sitting in a wretched corner of an irregular house, with a felon, who had so lately been scourged and banished as a swindler and impostor, his modest nature took the alarm, and he was shocked, instead of being moved with pity. His eye fixed on some of the casual stripes on my arm, and from that moment he became restless and impatient ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... kinds flourish so well as in New York. The immense size of the city, the heterogeneous character of its population, and the great variety of the interests and pursuits of the people, are all so many advantages to the cheat and swindler. It would require a volume to detail the tricks of these people, and some of their adventures would equal anything to be found in the annals of romance. All manner of tricks are practised upon the unsuspecting, ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... shoon if ye 'ad arf a shance, I bet, s'help me!" shouted out the other man, who, from his speech, was evidently a Hebrew and a creditor. "Ye're von tarn sheet, dat's vot ye vas, a bloomin' corpse swindler, vot sheets de living, s'help me, and rops ze dead! I shpit upon ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... One can't choose one's brother; but who would choose to be the friend of a swindler? Is that what ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... the monk was that of an arrogant and erotic swindler. His intelligence was, however, extremely perceptive, and he was not wanting in finesse of the mujik order, combined with a sense of foresight that was utterly amazing. These, with his suave manner, his affectation of deepest piety, and his wonderful ...
— The Minister of Evil - The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia • William Le Queux
... compliment. I liked Elodie. Dress her at whatever Rue de la Paix rag-swindler's that you pleased, you would never metamorphose the daughter of the people that she was into the lady at ease in all company. She was a bit mannieree—on her best behaviour. But she had the Frenchwoman's instinctive ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... "As far as I'm concerned," he said, with his slow Scotch drawl, inherited from his father (for though London-born and bred, he was still in all essentials a pure Caledonian)—"As far as I'm concerned, I haven't the slightest doubt but the man's a swindler. I wonder at you, Frida, that you should leave him alone in the house just now, with all that silver. I stepped round before I left, and warned Martha privately not to move from the hall till the fellow was gone, and ...
— The British Barbarians • Grant Allen
... for all our mercies, and not any works or merit of ours; for many of us entered into the scramble to elevate to the Executive Chair of the State the present incumbent, with a perfect knowledge that he had abused thy Son, JESUS CHRIST, our Lord, on the floor of our State Senate, as a swindler, advocating unlawful interest: we knew that he had voted in Congress against offering prayers to thee: we knew that he had opposed the temperance cause, which is the cause of God and of all mankind: we knew that he had vilified the Protestant religion, and slandered the Protestant clergy, ...
— Americanism Contrasted with Foreignism, Romanism, and Bogus Democracy in the Light of Reason, History, and Scripture; • William Gannaway Brownlow
... Prosper, don't look upon me as a swindler. I am a man of honor. If I tell you that I was imprisoned, 'tis ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various
... I, "I comprehend the matter more clearly, if that is what you mean by twigging; but how shocking 58it all is! why, Cumberland is quite a swindler—gambling, borrowing money he ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... aver, Has neither hoof, nor tail, nor sting; Nor is he, as some sages swear, A spirit, neither here nor there, In nothing—yet in everything. He is—what we are! for sometimes The Devil is a gentleman; At others a bard bartering rhymes For sack; a statesman spinning crimes; A swindler, living as ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (First Series) • George W. Foote
... it in," said Mr. Lucas Holderness, "if you've any doubts about it. Pay it in. I don't know the man or what he is. He may be a swindler for all I can tell. I can't answer for him. Pay it in and see. Leave the change till then. I can wait. I'll call round ...
— Love and Mr. Lewisham • H. G. Wells
... it is," thought John, but he did not answer at once, as he was so excited he could hardly control his voice. He did not want the swindler ...
— Jack Ranger's Western Trip - From Boarding School to Ranch and Range • Clarence Young
... or acquitted, I forget which, but I know it had something to do with Uncle Colin's journey to Russia; so ridiculous of him at his age, when he ought to know better, and so unlucky for all the family, his engagement to that swindler's sister. By-the-bye, did he not cheat you out of ever ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... dim Waste beyond Creation, a man does see the Shade of his Mother, pale, ineffectual;—and days when his Mother nursed and wrapped him are all-too sternly contrasted with this day! Danton, Camille, Herault, Westermann, and the others, very strangely massed up with Bazires, Swindler Chabots, Fabre d'Eglantines, Banker Freys, a most motley Batch, 'Fournee' as such things will be called, stand ranked at the Bar of Tinville. It is the 2d of April 1794. Danton has had but three days to lie in ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... must pause before we give in to so dangerous a doctrine. Here is a man who has outraged the laws of honour, the ties of relationship, and the duties of religion: he appears before us in the triple character of a libertine, a swindler, and a suicide. Yet his follies, his vices, his crimes, are all palliated or even applauded by this specious facon de ...
— English Satires • Various
... greatest degradation would have been voluntarily to pay one." And yet was there great pretension to honor, but a man of honor of those days would in our time be considered a ruffian certainly, and probably a blackleg or a swindler. "It was a favorite boast of his (the first Lord Norbury) that he began life with fifty pounds, and a pair of hair-trigger pistols." "They served his purpose well.... The luck of the hair-triggers triumphed, and Toler ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... experience was of the remarkable coincidence between my case, in the general mind, and one Mr. Merdle's as I find it recorded in a work of fiction called LITTLE DORRIT. To be sure, Mr. Merdle was a swindler, forger, and thief, and my calling had been of a less harmful (and less remunerative) nature; but it ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... officer of the law over the terms upon which he would consent to avail himself of an opportunity to make the only reparation still possible angered the District Attorney, and, turning fiercely upon the prisoner, he arraigned him in scathing terms, stating that he was a miserable swindler and thief, who had robbed thousands of poor people of all the money they had in the world, that he showed himself devoid of every spark of decency or repentance by refusing to assist the law in punishing his ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... swindler. He buys up bad debts, too. He makes a profession of it. But enough of him! Do you know what makes me angry? It's their sickening rotten, petrified routine.... And this case might be the means of introducing a new method. One ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... you going to do with me, Cuthbert Hartington?" he asked in a weak voice. "Does all the world know that I am a forger and a swindler?" ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty
... evasions must be checked, and I cannot see why Mr. Mellasys's method was too severe. Mr. Mellasys was also considered a very unscrupulous person in financial transactions,—indeed, what would be named in some communities a swindler; and I have heard it whispered that the estimable, but somewhat obese and drowsy person who passed as his wife was not a wife, ceremonially speaking. The dusky hues of her complexion were also attributed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... neglectful treatment, Henry returned to Boston, and obtained a letter of introduction from Governor Gerry to Madison, to whom he offered to divulge the whole conspiracy, of which he had been the head and soul, for a certain sum of money. Madison gave him $50,000, and the swindler embarked for France. There is but little doubt that Henry made a fool of the Governor of Canada, and completely overreached the President. The publication of the correspondence, however, increased the hatred both against the ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... opinion which permitted and justified acts of violence. People need only come to be as much ashamed to do deeds of violence, to assist in them or to profit by them, as they now are of being, or being reputed a swindler, a thief, a coward, or a beggar. And already this change is beginning to take place. We do not notice it just as we do not notice the movement of the earth, because we are moved together with ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... not understand," said he. "I am not a swindler, and I guard myself; that is all. It may weary you or not, Mr. Cassilis, I do not care a rush; I speak for my own satisfaction, and not for your amusement. You had better go upstairs and court the girl; for my part, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... is so good-natured! If I leave him with this swindler, who knows what he may get ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet
... session, great popular feeling was excited against the coalition. The furious invectives which Fox had been for some years heaping on Lord North's luckless head, were now flung upon his own. Traitor, liar, swindler, were "house-hold words;" and Fox, with all his ability, and that happiest of all ability for the crisis, great constitutional good-humour, found himself suddenly overwhelmed. In the House he was still powerful; but, outside ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... Dutchman, with a soldierly smartness in his manner. To be exact, he had acquired it in the navy. But that was all one; he had at least been trained to desperate resolves, so he accepted the match, and the white-haired swindler pronounced the connubial benediction, and pocketed ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of idiocy. Baron de Nucingen, you know, the old certified swindler, is neighing after a woman he saw in the Bois de Vincennes, and she has got to be found, or he will die of love.—They had a consultation of doctors yesterday, by what his man tells me.—I have already eased him of a thousand francs ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... disposing of the jewels in London; the swindle was first discovered when the jeweller presented his bill to the queen, who denied all knowledge of the matter; this led to a trial which extended over nine months, gave rise to great scandal, and ended in the punishment of the swindler and her husband, and the disgrace of the unhappy, and it is believed innocent, ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... robber, the way he fixed it! If you have no luck in this world, then it's better not to live. There I spent out fifteen cents to stop up one hole, and it runs out another. How I ate out my gall bargaining with him he should let it down to fifteen cents! He wanted yet a quarter, the swindler. Gottuniu! my bitter heart on him for every penny he ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... inferior, what is interesting and graceful to the superior poet. The authority of the rogue Kirkman may be likened to the outline or profile of Mr. Mantalini's early loves: it is either no authority at all, or at best it is a "demd" authority. The same swindler who assigned to Webster and Rowley the authorship of "A Cure for a Cuckold" assigned to Shakespeare and Rowley the authorship of an infinitely inferior play—a play of which German sagacity has ...
— The Age of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... and had dedicated to her, from the moment of their meeting, all the treasures of his experience. She had judged him in advance—polyglot and universal, very dear and very deep—as probably but a swindler finished to the finger-tips; for he was forever carrying one well-kept Italian hand to his heart and plunging the other straight into her pocket, which, as she had instantly observed him to recognise, fitted it like a glove. The remarkable thing was that ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... upon his knees and commenced to conjure Danveld by all the relics in Malborg, then by the ashes and heads of his parents, to restore to him his true child and not proceed like a swindler and traitor, breaking oaths and promises. His voice contained so much despair and truth, that some began to suspect treason; others again thought that some wizard had actually changed ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... arrange such a treaty. The Bankers' Association wants it; the Merchants' Protective Alliance wants it. Amapala is the only place within striking distance of our country where a fugitive is safe. It is the only place where a dishonest cashier, swindler, or felon can find refuge. Sometimes it seems almost as though when a man planned a crime he timed it exactly so as to catch the boat for Amapala. And, once there, we can't lay our hands on him; and, what's more, we can't lay our hands on the money he takes with him. I have no right to make a ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis
... whatever of it or of "Miss Jeffries," except that I have a faint impression of having recently noticed that name among my begging-letter correspondents, and of having associated it in my mind with a regular professional hand. Your caution has, I hope, disappointed this swindler. But my testimony is at your service if you should need it, and I would take any opportunity of bringing one of those vagabonds to punishment; for they are, one and all, the most heartless and worthless vagabonds on the face ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 3 (of 3), 1836-1870 • Charles Dickens
... say that; but he's in the hands of a swindler, of a professional gambler. You see that man?" He lowered his voice as he spoke, and I looked in the direction of his glance. By this time we knew, in a way, everybody on board the ship. The particular man Smith pointed out was a fellow ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr
... face with France and as powerful as herself, like a neighbour treating on equal terms, I would have cried to her, 'It's I, Arsene Lupin! Behold the former swindler and gentleman burglar! The Sultan of Adrar, the Sultan of Iguidi, the Sultan of El Djouf, the Sultan of the Tuaregs, the Sultan of Aubata, the Sultan of Brakna and Frerzon, all these am I, the Sultan of Sultans, grandson of Mahomet, son of Allah, ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... opinion among the listeners. One of the experiences through which Albert had brought his hero was that of working as general assistant to a sharp, unscrupulous and smooth-tongued rascal who was proprietor of a circus sideshow and fake museum. He was a kind-hearted swindler, but one who never let a question of honesty interfere with the getting of a dollar. In this fourth story, to the town where the hero, now a man of twenty-five, had established himself in business, came this cheat of other days, but now he ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... people to whom he referred were among the magnates of the land. The Captain knew enough of human nature to know that if references are only sufficiently imposing, they are very unlikely to be verified. The swindler who refers his dupe to the Duke of Sutherland and Baring Brothers has a very good chance of getting his respectability accepted without inquiry, on the mere strength of ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... Glenn, a notorious swindler, who came prominently before the public in Chicago during 1905, was another "man-woman," of large and masculine type. She preferred to dress as a man and had many love escapades with women. "She can fiddle as well as anyone in the State," said a man who knew her, "can box like a pugilist, and ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... OF AN EXTENSIVE SWINDLER.—A man named William Cairnes, alias Thomas Sissons, with a host of other aliases, was placed before the magistrates at the Borough Court, Manchester, charged with one of the most singular attempts at fraud we ever remember to have heard. The prisoner, ...
— The Economist - Volume 1, No. 3 • Various
... did not look like a swindler's den. A cane-seated chair, covered with an honest leather cushion, stood before the captain's desk, and in a corner there was the locked safe. Summer was coming on, and the song of a canary sounded through the open window. The apartment was very neat ...
— Nana, The Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille • Emile Zola
... of a deliberate attempt to defraud the railroad company out of the sum of twelve dollars; who had resorted to gross lies and mean deception to carry her point. Upon my honor and conscience, I would rather have lost the twelve dollars I had advanced than had the old woman turn out to be a swindler. She might be fussy, she might be disagreeable, she might be a dozen things that are uncomfortable and unpleasant, if she had only meant to be true and honest, and I ...
— Desk and Debit - or, The Catastrophes of a Clerk • Oliver Optic
... this gigantic swindler had committed his frauds is simple enough. Having charge of the books in which the stock of the company is registered, he altered the sum standing in the name of some bona fide stockholder to a much ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... they called Chicory, or Checkerberry," whispered C. Skimmerhorn, Esq. "Anybody can see he is a swindler by his slouched hat, and beard. Shouldn't I enjoy having a good case ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... way, by the Greenes themselves, as an excuse for borrowing as much money as they could raise and living without payment of their bills. With reference to the latter hypothesis, I declared to myself that Greene did not look like a swindler; but as to Mrs. Greene—! I confess that I did not feel so confident ...
— The Man Who Kept His Money In A Box • Anthony Trollope
... good sense applied to accounts and affairs. So do you multiply your presence, or spread yourself throughout your estate. But because of the dual constitution of things, in labor as in life there can be no cheating. The thief steals from himself. The swindler swindles himself. For the real price of labor is knowledge and virtue, whereof wealth and credit are signs. These signs, like paper money, may be counterfeited or stolen, but that which they represent, namely, knowledge and virtue, ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... to tell you the truth, for you don't know me. Because you sometimes meet with deception, you think I am deceiving you; but I pledge you my honor that a fortnight from this day I will be with you again, and you will confess your self ashamed of your suspicions." "Bah! you're a swindler!" ejaculated Boniface; "this will be the last of you: take that!" and with a vigorous coup de pied, was "sped the parting guest." "You will live to regret this, landlord, I am sure; but I do not ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... his honesty. Quarriar could give as references, to show that he was an honest man and had made a true statement as to the number of his children, seven Russians (named) who would attest that the partner provided by Conn was well known as a swindler. Though he was starving, Quarriar refused to have anything further to say to Conn. Quarriar further referred to his landlord, who would willingly testify to his honesty. But being afraid of Conn, and not ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... the bag is of equal value. You "go one better" than Sir Peter Teazle and damn all sentiment, and lo! the fellow is no better than a smirking jester, whose antics you can expose till men and women, who had foolishly laughed and wept as he moved them, turn from him, loathing him as a swindler. So it is that although Tristram Shandy continues one of the most popular classics in the language, nobody dares to confess his debt to Sterne except ...
— Adventures in Criticism • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... damnedest." Somehow the shadowy Cornelius far off there seemed to be the hateful embodiment of all the annoyances and difficulties he had found in his path. He let himself go—his nerves had been over-wrought for days—and called him many pretty names,—swindler, liar, sorry rascal: in fact, carried on in an extraordinary way. He admits he passed all bounds, that he was quite beside himself—defied all Patusan to scare him away—declared he would make them all dance to his own tune yet, and so on, in a menacing, boasting strain. Perfectly bombastic ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... Frederick the Great and the French Revolution, revenged himself for the trouble it gave him by loading it with all vile epithets. If it had been a cock or a cook he could not have called it harder names. It was century spendthrift, fraudulent, bankrupt, a swindler century, which did but one true action, 'namely, to blow its brains out in that grand universal ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... only refer to the fine and bitter irony of the Count's address to the country of his ancestors on his landing in England; to the robber-scene in the forest, which has never been surpassed; to the Parisian swindler who personates a raw English country squire (Western is tame in the comparison); and to the story of the seduction in the west of England. It would be difficult to point out, in any author, passages written with more force ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... endeavours to make his story interesting, by making his hero odd. The most typical modern books are those in which the central figure is himself or herself an exception, a cripple, a courtesan, a lunatic, a swindler, or a person of the most perverse temperament. Such stories, for instance, are Sir Richard Calmady, Dodo, Quisante, La Bete Humaine, even the Egoist. But in a fairy tale the boy sees all the wonders of fairyland because he is an ordinary boy. In the same way Mr. Samuel Pickwick sees ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... lynching posse most of the time and was last heard of in New Mexico five years ago, when the Blue Chip was in full blast in Limasito. In other words, there were two Gentleman Geoffs! The second must have been a cheap swindler and card-sharp, who learned of your foster father's fame as a square gambler throughout the West and sought to profit by it. His operations were on such a small, petty scale, however, that it is no wonder ...
— The Fifth Ace • Douglas Grant
... that her father, the man she had idolized, was a thief and a swindler—a bitter heritage not to ...
— Glory of Youth • Temple Bailey
... his mind all the time had developed. He had had proof in divers ways. He said to himself, "That man is a scoundrel, a common swindler, if I know one when I see him." But suspicions as to the girl had never for one minute dwelt in his furthest fancy. He had thought speculatively of the possible complicity of the other women of the household, but never of hers. They were all very constant in their church attendance; indeed, Carroll ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... continued the humble Stanislaus, "I am rotten, I am a tief, a blackguard, a swindler, a pickpocket, a housebreak, a sticker mit de knife. I vish somebody would call me names all de day long, because I forget sometime dat I am de nashty vurm of de creation. I tink I hire a boy to call me names, and make me not forget. Oh, my lady, I alvays remember ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX. - March, 1843, Vol. LIII. • Various
... existed, but who was expected to prove his innocence. Before the next term, the Consul-General took wing, leaving his bail, a simple Frenchman, to pay the forfeit. It would be impossible for me to give anything like a history of his crimes in a letter. Suffice it to say that he is a notorious swindler, the most unblushing and inexhaustible liar and the most ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various
... conclusions were anywhere near the truth, you would be acting very well. But they are not. The King is not handling my money, nor the Prince Kalonay. It is in the keeping of Father Paul, the Father Superior of the Dominican monks, who is the only one of these people I know or who knows me. He is not a swindler, too, is he, or a retired croupier? Listen to me now, and do not fly out like that at me, or at mother. It is not her fault. Last summer mother and I went to Messina as tourists, and one day, when passing through a seaport town, we saw a crowd of people on the shore, standing ...
— The King's Jackal • Richard Harding Davis
... at better than I do,' I said. And then I said: 'What's it all about? What's your game?' And he said, as if I'd been a common swindler that he'd ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... selected by Messrs. Lang and Shorter.) Further, "He writes always from the point of a B.Sc." But the most humorous part of the criticism is this. After stating that Ponderevo acknowledges himself to be a liar, a swindler, a thief, an adulterer, and a murderer, Claudius Clear then proceeds: "He is not in the least ashamed of these things. He explains them away with the utmost facility, and we find him at the age of forty-five, not unhappy, and successfully engaged in problems of aerial navigation" ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... the newspaper, and read the first paragraph which caught her eye. It was one of those mournful episodes which are sometimes revealed at the London police-courts. A young girl—a lady swindler—had been brought up for trial there. In her defence came out the story of a life, cradled in shame, nurtured in vice, and only working out its helpless destiny—that of a rich man's deserted illegitimate child. The report added, that "The convict was led from the dock in ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... a scoundrel," she said: "a swindler, gambler,—what I believe you Americans call a confidence-man. He is also my late husband's first cousin. Some years since he found it convenient to leave England, likewise his wife and daughter. Mrs. Calendar, a country-woman ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... idea of to cozen in the Elizabethans is that of selling faulty goods in a bad light, a device said to be practised by some horse-dealers. At any rate the words for horse-dealer in all languages, from the Lat. mango to the Amer. horse-swapper, mean swindler and worse things. Cozen is a favourite word with the Elizabethan dramatists, because it enables them to bring off one of those stock puns that make one feel "The ...
— The Romance of Words (4th ed.) • Ernest Weekley
... shall I draw it for?" said the attorney, taking out his check-book,—"and to whom shall I make it payable? I suppose I may date it to-day, so that the swindler who gets it may think that there is plenty more ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... what he did. For the pleasure of being insolent and showing his boldness, he has pulled down from its pedestal what he adored, consequently the most criminal among the members of the Commune, once a swindler, now a pilferer, is free to say to M. Rossel, who is, I am told, a man of intelligence and honesty, "You are worse than I am, ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... She dared not pass the grocer or the baker in her own street and was compelled to make a lengthy circuit each time she went out. The tradespeople muttered and grumbled, and some went so far as to call her a thief and a swindler. ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola |
