"Wa'n't" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... skittish when strange folks draps in on 'em. Goodness knows I hain't come to that pass wher' I begrudges the vittles that folks eats, bekaze anybody betweenst this an' Clinton, Jones County, Georgy, 'll tell you the Sanderses wa'n't the set to stint the'r stomachs. I was a Sanders 'fore I married, an' when I come 'way frum pa's house hit was thes like turnin' my back on a barbecue. Not by no means was I begrudgin' of the vittles. ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... a baby agent, as near as I can make out; he wants I should adopt this red-headed baby, but says I ain't obliged to take him too, and makes out they haven't got any home. I told him I wa'n't adoptin' any babies just now, and at that he burst out cryin', and the other two followed suit. Now, have the three of 'em just escaped from some asylum, or are they ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... tol' de col'nel all how it was. I was wid my Massa from Louisiana, an' he was a captain, sah! 'Bout two weeks ago he lef' me down yander on de pike wid orders fo' to stay dere till he done come back. But it wa'n't no job fo' me, sah, an' so I skipped out de first night, an' joined up wid de Yanks. I reckon I knows 'bout whar I belongs in dis yere fightin', an' I ain't nobody's ...
— Love Under Fire • Randall Parrish
... to marry Hillard Watts? Wal, he wa'n't that triflin' when I married him. He didn't have so much religiun then. But I've allers noticed a man's heredity for no-countness craps out after he's married. Lookin' back now I reckin' I married him jes' to res' myself. When ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... of the society had not arrived, for constant inquiries were being made about Huldy Mason and 'Zekiel Pettengill. When Betsy Green asked Mandy Skinner if Hiram Maxwell wa'n't comin', the latter replied that he'd probably come up when Miss Huldy ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin
... had had one of her lessons one evening she said to me, "I wish I wa'n't so darned infarnal ignorant. I wish I could learn enough to ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... cried the old grandmother, rushing to the rescue, brandishing a long iron spoon with which she had been stirring the gruel. "Can't nobody never have no fun in this house? Bless us! what 'ud we do, if 't wa'n't for Joey, to make us laugh and keep our sperits up? Jest you stan' back now, Bill!—'d ruther you'd strike me 'n see ye hit that 'ere ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... for 't," said his grandmother, "that boy is a regular Burbank; jest exactly what the deacon used to be at his age—always into suthin'. I knew the deacon when he wa'n't any older than Johnny, an' I remember jest how he used to act. Take off your things, my dear, and ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume VIII, No 25: May 21, 1887 • Various
... minit' you'd be calling me, and was ready to go in." And he clenched his fist in a way that showed unmistakably how he would have "gone in" had he been summoned. By this time we were driving on briskly toward the river-road. "You wa'n't smart, I reckon, to leave that there house. It was your one chance, hevin' got in. Ten chances to one she's hid away som'eres in one of them upper rooms," and he pointed to a row of dormer-windows, "not knowin' nothin' of ...
— On the Church Steps • Sarah C. Hallowell
... the same as ever, Brad," said Mrs. Councill, "you'll haf to put up with it jest as if y' wa'n't a Congressman." ...
— A Spoil of Office - A Story of the Modern West • Hamlin Garland
... it then, and all over th' mounting the woods were as black as any cellar with pines and spruce. Great-aunt Debby was the oldest one of five children and my grandfather—your great-great-grandfather—was the youngest. In them days there wa'n't but a few families in the valley and they lived far apart, so when Great-aunt Debby's father got awful sick a few days after he'd been away to get some grist ground, Aunt Debby's mother had to send her 'bout ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... I understan', they wa'n't both of 'em niggers; however, that was the story told on board. This yere Joe Kirby is pretty damn slick, let me tell you. One of 'em's a white gurl, who just pretended she wus a nigger. I reckon thet even Kirby didn't catch on ter her game et furst; an' when he did he wus too blame ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... "Wal, no, 't wa'n't," responded the other, reasonably. The third member of the party maintained an air of not being in a position to judge, and regarded Lucyet stolidly as ...
— A Christmas Accident and Other Stories • Annie Eliot Trumbull
... time, but sence I ben fishin' I never had no such bundles of sticks parcelled with leather served out to me. I HEV et boot—leastways gnawed it; when I was cast away in a open boat for three weeks—but it wa'n't bad boot, as boots go. Now, if yew say that these things is boots, en thet it's necessary we should eat'em, or starve, w'y, we'll think about it. But if yew call'em chickens,'n say you're doin' us a kindness by stoppin' ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... to colleck, I s'pose. Take what's in sight; 'tain't none of it yourn, far's I know, but anything you claim you kin have, fer all me. I've lived honest all my days an' worked fer what I got. I've harbored thieves in my old age and trusted them that wa'n't fit to be trusted. I've allus paid my debts, Seabeck. I'm willin' to pay now ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... the Senator carefully. "But after you bumped into me, and then stepped into the agent, and then turned around and took in my scenery, noticin' the set of my legs, I says to myself, 'painter-man or writer.' It was kind of in your eye. I figured you wa'n't no painter-man when you looked at the oil ...
— Partners of Chance • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... our spring, shore," commented "Mis'" Dunbar. "'N' its Dusk—but Lord! how fine she's fixed. Ye're as fine as ye want to be in the picter, Dusk, if ye wa'n't never fine afore. Don't ye wish ye had sich ...
— Lodusky • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... this, and was making up his mind to discontinue further exertions,—not a very easy thing to do, when you are about to go into another world, still floating on his back, with his eyes fixed on the starry heavens, thinking, as Smallbones afterwards narrated himself, that there wa'n't much to live for in this here world, and considering what there could be in that 'ere, his head struck against something hard. Smallbones immediately turned round in the water to see what it was, and found that it was one of the large ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... Solomon, I'm right and you're not. I'm afraid this time the mountain must come to Mahomet.' That ended it. He went away and never come back, and after a long spell she give in to her dad and married Bill Edwards. Foolish? 'Well, now, WA'N'T it!" ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... thought you'd ride better in the booby; it's a little mite chilly for the cutter." The stars seemed points of ice in the freezing sky; the broken snow clinked like charcoal around Elbridge's feet. He shut the booby door and then came back and opened it slightly. "I wa'n't agoin' to let no Simpson carry you to ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... thousand baptized savages. Mrs. Jeanne C. Carr quotes a stage-driver with whom she talked on the box as saying: "Ye see, ma'am, what them old padders didn't know 'bout findin' work for their subjicks and pervidin' for the saints 'n' angels, not to say therselves, wa'n't wuth knowin'. They carried on all kinds o' bizness. Meat was plenty, keepin' an' vittles was to be had at all the missions an' ranches too, jes' by settin' round. The pastures and hills was alive with ...
— A Truthful Woman in Southern California • Kate Sanborn
... as I laid eyes on you and heard your name; that was in the corral with the outlaw Conrad had driven in for you to work, it wa'n't a square deal to a white man. I was ...
— The Treasure Trail - A Romance of the Land of Gold and Sunshine • Marah Ellis Ryan
... kind o' meachy, and allas souzlin' theirselves in hot water; it don't cost nothin', but it gives yer house a ridick'lous name. Then they told Lunette they wanted their lobsters br'iled alive. 'Thar,' says she, 'I sot my foot down. I told 'em I' wa'n't goin' to have no half-cooked lobsters hoppin' around in torments over my house. I calk'late to put my lobsters in the pot, and put the cover on and know where they be,' ...
— Vesty of the Basins • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... say 't wa'n't so," commented Amanda; "but everybody's dead that could deny it, except Caleb, and he ...
— Ladies-In-Waiting • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... we had to do—hoein corn was a picnic to it—was pickin' stones. There was no end to that on our old farm, if we wanted to raise anything. When we wa'n't hurried and pressed with somethin' else, there was always pickin' stones to do; and there wa'n't a plowin' but what brought up a fresh crop, an' seems as if the pickin' had all ...
— Cheerfulness as a Life Power • Orison Swett Marden
... had his black horse saddled, an' I held the stirrup for him to git on, an' he rode ober to de Barbour plantation, an' didn't come back till plumb black night. When he come up I held de lantern so I could see his face, for I wa'n't easy in my mine all day. But it was all bright an' ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... wa'n't they? Well, I'll tell you what my mother used to say, and she was the best cook in Eaton county, by all odds. Them things made me think of her to-day. She used to say that 'twas with cooking just like 'twas with ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... was tellin' yer 'bout old Mendez being a Mexican revolutionary leader down in Mex, wa'n't he? Hell of a leader he is! I reckon he's been mixed up in scrapes enough down thar, but they had mighty little to do with revolutin'. He's just plain bad man, miss—cattle thief, an' all round outlaw. There's a price on his head in three States, but nobody dares go after it, because of the ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish
... unlawful congregating by herself, your Honor. When a young woman as swears she's honest, goes peeking into other folks's windows after dark, I always has my suspicions,—as you would too, if you had been in the business as long as I have. It wa'n't more than a week ago that I caught her with her nose against that plate-glass window of yours, and I told her then to move on. But she didn't; and the next thing we shall be hearing some fine morning, that there's been ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... is," Applehead corrected him. "But you don't know a danged thing about it. A girl that's behavin' herself don't go chasin' all over the mesa alone, the way she's been doin' all spring. I never said nothin' 'cause it wa'n't none of my put-in. But that Injun had a heap of business off away from the ranch whilst you was in Los Angeles, Luck. Sneaked off every day, just about—and 'd be gone fer hours at a time. You kin ast any of the boys, if yuh don't want to take my word. Or you kin ast ...
— The Heritage of the Sioux • B.M. Bower
... Saranac, where a British column attempted to cross. Their captain ordered no one to fire until the enemy were half-way across; "and then," said he, "none of 'em ever got across, and not many of them that got into the water got out again. They found out it wa'n't of any kind of use to try to get across there, and after a while they give it up and went farther down the river; and by-and-by an officer come and told us to go to the other ford, and we went there, and so they didn't get across ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... when he wa'n't more'n a baby. He pestered the life out of his mother bringing snakes into the sittin'-room, and carrying worms in his pockets. The poor woman was most mortified to death about it. Why, once when the parson was there, George used his hat to ...
— The Tangled Threads • Eleanor H. Porter
... in your wages. Every girl he takes a notion to gets up and does well. Perhaps you'll get money enough to go to school. Goodness knows what you want to go for. I s'pose it's in the blood, though Bess used to say your pa wa'n't any great at study. But, if you've struck the manager the right way, no telling what he might do. He might ...
— The Girl from Montana • Grace Livingston Hill
... tell us about it," said Benny. "Tell us about beginning to learn it when you wa'n't ...
— The Little Gold Miners of the Sierras and Other Stories • Various
... house—from old Susie Two-to-the-Pound, down to the last born kitten. You keeps cats of course, and all that? Susie must be pleased to see me. Sich laughs, to be sure, we had about her and a young man of the Excise. He was about seven feet high, and she wa'n't above four and a half, so we always called him her young man of the extra size. Wasn't it funny? But he died of a decline; and I hear she's a broad as she's long. Well, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... me with a pint of wind; but I would not stay; and so, in going through the dark passage, he began to shew his cloven futt, and went for to be rude: my fellow-sarvant, Umphry Klinker, bid him be sivil, and he gave the young man a dowse in the chops; but, I fackins, Mr Klinker wa'n't long in his debt — with a good oaken sapling he dusted his doublet, for all his golden cheese toaster; and, fipping me under his arm, carried me huom, I nose not how, being I was in such a flustration — But, thank God! I'm now vaned from all such vanities; for what are all those rarities ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... "I wa'n't going to speak," Jack said. "Mother found it out, and said she'd tell 'ee o't; but the last two nights I were well nigh yelping when 'ee took ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... may be, there he was alongside o' the driver. But what staggers of me is, that there wa'n't no Lord Vincent nowhere to be seen! He was 'mong the missin'. And that was the rummest go as ever was. A new bride a-comin' home to her 'pa without no bridegroom. And so I jest axed Mr. Frisbie, Esquire, and he telled me how his lordship missed the trail. What trail! ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... talks about, instead o' thinkin' o' how he likes rabbit meat three times a day an' betwixt meals when you an' him was 'bidin' a time on th' island over here because you wasn't havin' wings t' fly off, an' they wa'n't no other way t' get off till th' Injun lass takes ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... down, and I didn't get nothing from it. I had seven pieces of meat yit, and them was all took. All I had when I got back was jest a little bit of flour yit. The fences was all tore down, so that there wa'n't one standing, and the rails was burnt up. One shell come into the house and knocked a bedstead all to pieces for me. One come in under the roof and knocked out a rafter for me. The porch was all knocked down. There was seventeen dead horses on my land. They burnt five of 'em ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... says he. 'I wish to the land I hed,' says I. An' then I come away, for my tongue's so turrible spry an' sarcustic that I knew if I stopped any longer I should stir up strife. There's some folks that'll set on addled aigs year in an' year out, as if there wa'n't good fresh ones bein' laid every day; an' Lije Dennett's one of 'em, when ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... gateway, and she wavered for a spell When she heard her mother crying and her raving father yell That she wa'n't no child of his'n—like an actor in a play We saw at Independence, coming ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... ter come an' nuss you too. You're young side er me, Mis' 'Livy, but you're ove'ly ole ter be havin' yo' fus' baby, an' you'll need somebody roun', honey, w'at knows all 'bout de fam'ly, an' deir ways an' deir weaknesses, an' I don' know who dat'd be ef it wa'n't me.' ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt
... innowations," said Ringrope; "it's a good old fashion, that last stitch; it keeps 'em snug, d'ye see, youngster. I'm blest if they could sleep sound, if it wa'n't for that. No, no, Thrummings! no innowations; I won't hear on't. I goes for ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... boys; it seems to me we were all of a size; and she was just so careful with all of us. I can feel her hands on my feet yet!" Bartley looked at Lapham's No. 10 boots, and softly whistled through his teeth. "We were patched all over; but we wa'n't ragged. I don't know how she got through it. She didn't seem to think it was anything; and I guess it was no more than my father expected of her. HE worked like a horse in doors and out—up at daylight, feeding the ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... was kinder in a hurry to sell, for she was goin' to move. So I said I'd see to 't, an' he driv along. I thought likely I should git it cheap, ef she was in a hurry to sell, an' I concluded I'd go along next day; 't wa'n't more 'n' seven mile from the Centre, down by a piece o' piny woods, an' the woman was Miss Adams. I used ter know George Adams quite a spell ago, an' he was a likely feller. Well, it come on to snow jest as fine an' dry as sand, an' the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865 • Various
... "None o' yer stun pastur land where the sheep can't get their noses down through the rocks without a file to sharpen 'em! Deacon Pitkin did a putty fair stroke o' business when he swapped off his old place for this 'ere. That are old place was all swamp land and stun pastur; wa'n't good for raisin' nothin' but juniper bushes and bull frogs. But I tell yeu" preceded Biah, with a shrewd wink, "that are mortgage pinches the deacon; works him like a dose of aloes and picry, it does. Deacon ...
— Betty's Bright Idea; Deacon Pitkin's Farm; and The First Christmas - of New England • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Bowlegs, "only that he's been a gettin' glummer an' glummer. I'll tell you what it is, Captain Sam, I'll bet a big button he's deserted an' gone home. He's a coward and he's been scared ever since he found out that you wa'n't foolin' about this bein' a genu-ine, dangerous piece of work, an' I'll bet he's cut his lucky, an' gone home, an' if ever I get back there I'll pull his nose for a sneak, you just see if ...
— Captain Sam - The Boy Scouts of 1814 • George Cary Eggleston
... way back to the house, and mounted the steps panting. Her mother and father were talking of the great affair. Her mother said: "Wa'n't Mr. Gearson in rather of an excited state of mind? Didn't you think he ...
— Between The Dark And The Daylight • William Dean Howells |
