"Banter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... me a good deal. Nevertheless, I could not find out what he thought; and I knew, I thought, what he did not know so well. I knew the fiery proud spirit of my native portion of the people. While his banter fell on my ears, my eyes went off to the sunlit green fields where the troops were parading; on Southern soil; and I saw in imagination the rush and fury of vengeful onset, which might come over those very fields; I saw the unequal contest; I saw - what happened soon after. ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... humorous companion!—and the programme of the past years had been all work and no play. As he sat in Mrs Trevor's drawing-room that first afternoon, he listened in a somewhat dazed fashion to the banter which went on between Jack and his sisters; but after some time had passed his face began to soften, the corners of his mouth twitched, and presently out flashed that delightful, whole-hearted smile, and Betty, meeting it, ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... speech; the banter died away on her lips; memory gave a sudden twinge, and her heart grew dark under the dim cloud that was ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... catch some more canaries?" said she. "I suspect," said I, "that you would like to have ours escape." "Perhaps," said she, "that would be a relief to you from your present embarrassment." Then I saw that all this was banter. She wished to teaze me a little. The truth is, I have two fine singing canaries and a mocking-bird. Some of my pro-slavery friends delight to pester me about them. They say that they mean to issue a habeas corpus, and take them before Justice Bird, (who, ...
— The Sable Cloud - A Southern Tale With Northern Comments (1861) • Nehemiah Adams
... had a Blissett breech-loading double-barrel. They had chosen their location to the north of the island, near a channel usually opening early in the season, but now covered with ice that would have borne the weight of an elephant. With much banter as to who should count first blood, the party separated at the door; the younger Davies and Creamer, with Kennedy and La Salle, plunging into the drifted fields to the eastward, and in Indian file, trampling a track to be daily used henceforward, until the snows should disappear forever. The two ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... Tenderness being seldom found together. Zeokinizul perceiv'd that the young Bassa, who till then had talked loudly against Love, was become more pensive than usual. He himself had too much Experience not to guess the Source of this Alteration. He mildly banter'd him upon it, and diverted himself with raillying him for a Sensibility, which he often had boasted he would ever resist. There was no Way for the young Bassa to make the King give over these stinging Ironies, but by discovering his Passion. The Excess of his Love made him unhappily ...
— The Amours of Zeokinizul, King of the Kofirans - Translated from the Arabic of the famous Traveller Krinelbol • Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crbillon
... banter Isabel responded in kind, and rapidly sketched the life they could lead aboard. Since they could not help it, they mocked the public provision which, leaving no interval between disgraceful squalor and ludicrous splendor, accommodates our democratic 'menage' to the ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... to the seventeenth arrondissement, and so the old friendship was picked up where it had been dropped, and the ruddy-faced agent found it both convenient and agreeable to drop in frequently at Madame Caille's on his way home, and exchange a few words of reminiscence or banter for a box of sardines or a minute package of tea. But, with the deterioration in his old friends' wares, and the almost simultaneous appearance of the Salon Malakoff, his loyalty wavered. Flique sampled the advantages of Hippolyte's establishment, and, being won ...
— Lords of the Housetops - Thirteen Cat Tales • Various
... themselves in serious debate with Slim, Chip put away his magazine and went down to visit Silver in the box stall. He was glad they had not attempted to draw him into the banter—they had never once thought to do so, probably, though he had been thrown into the company of the Little Doctor more than any of the others, for several good reasons. He had broken the creams to harness, and always drove them, for the Old Man found them more than he cared to tackle. ...
— Chip, of the Flying U • B. M. Bower
... liking by your knowledge. I thought every schoolboy knew the cuckoo-flower!" cried Adelaide, trying to seem natural and not bitter in her banter, and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... pertly. "Everyone's doing this sort of thing now. Come along, dad. See the fun." He caught his father's arm and they re-entered, taking the stairs, this time, to the boxes above. From one came a man's laughing banter. "That's he," Frank whispered, Hastily he drew his half reluctant father into a vacant box. A waiter brought them beer, collected half a dollar and inquired if they wanted ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... companions and at times are the cause of many amusing incidents which beguile the tedium of the journey. Also they often lead to your picking up chance acquaintances. I have known one stone placed in a dimly lighted corridor of a train productive of much merriment and harmless banter. Being of considerable weight they do not readily respond to a playful kick, but having no sharp corners they are seldom responsible for serious injury to ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 21, 1914 • Various
... was who taught the use Of the bow and the spear, and sent the moose Into the Indian banter's hands; Glooskap who strewed the ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland
... should be? Are we not both jackals hunting in the one pack, and jackal does not bite jackal." Then his mood changed with a swiftness which La Mothe soon found to be characteristic, a kindliness cast out the jarring banter from his face, and his luminous eyes grew wistful. "Friends? It is a good word, the very best word in the world. Friends are more than family or kinship, and not many care to call old Francois Villon friend nowadays. There was ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond
... the words, arrested in his banter by the sudden memory of a name. As in a flash he perceived the truth. The man Forrest was ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton
... tone in which the woman said this left no doubt in the man's mind of her meaning. She was not trifling with him now, he knew. In her low-voiced words he found no trace of banter, of sophistry, nor of aught that he might in ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... was riding his horse back and forth in front of his men, as if to banter me, and I concluded to accept the challenge. I galloped toward him for fifty yards and he advanced toward me about the same distance, both of us riding at full speed, and then, when we were only about thirty yards apart, I raised my rifle ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... dost thou think, that after all this pains, that I have been at to get an answer to my question, that thou canst banter me with such sham stuff as this? Hold the candle to his face that we may see ...
— State Trials, Political and Social - Volume 1 (of 2) • Various
... bird, nor to color my fancy for a horse. As for a mistress, or for those fugitive affairs of the heart which English fashion countenanced—nay, on which fashion insisted—I had no part in them, and brooked much banter from the gay world in consequence. It was not merely lack of money, nor yet a certain fastidiousness implanted, nor yet the inherent shrinking of my English blood from pleasure forbidden, for my Renault blood was hot enough, God wot! It ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... would make him ultimately miserable. I'll remind him that her beauty is no deeper than he sees it. But that Caroline there, admirable girl, seething with affection in a figure warranted against time or accident—" her expression brought his banter to an end. He studied her seriously, revolved what she had said. She was right about Myrtle, who was undoubtedly a vain and silly little fish. His father's immoderate admiration for her had puzzled him as well as the elder sister. ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... eyes of Sieur Sarpy, who sat at the table sipping his wine and enjoying the amusement of the young people. Zulma's spirits had completely revived; and she was in high feather, enlivening the occasion by songs, and anecdote and banter, while she bustled around the table playing tricks upon her brother, and teasing the gentle Pauline. Now and then she would stop suddenly as if to listen, and her face would assume an expression of disappointed expectancy, but the shadow would ...
— The Bastonnais - Tale of the American Invasion of Canada in 1775-76 • John Lesperance
... and there was a little tinge of banter, if not of sarcasm, as well as a good deal of seriousness in her voice: "And suppose, in one of the Indian villages through which you might pass, a sun or ghost dance, or even the ceremony of the devil worship or dog feast might be going on, ...
— Oowikapun - How the Gospel Reached the Nelson River Indians • Egerton Ryerson Young
... on in low tones, had passed under cover of noisy mirth, snatches of song, banter, and gigglings; nobody paid heed to the two men talking in a corner. Yet the stranger lowered his voice to a ...
— The Secret of the Tower • Hope, Anthony
... practice of adequate payment, which he states—in a spirit of banter—to be potent to remove temptation to bribery and corruption, has received attention in connection with recent ameliorations of the terms of subordinate service in India, and it is believed has met with a certain ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... this portentous age of reticence and pose, was wholly free from solemnity, and when he heard or saw what was ludicrous was not afraid to laugh at it. Sir Robert Peel was an excellent hand at what our fathers called banter and we call chaff. A prig or a pedant was his favourite butt, and the performance was rendered all the more effective by his elaborate assumption of the grand seigneur's manner. The victim was dimly ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... bearing. There was none of the bluster of the armchair Jingo, none of the loud hectoring and swaggering and bravado that distinguish the carpet warrior. On the contrary, when they were talking of the war amongst themselves they had an air of quiet determination, of good-humoured banter, and of easy, serious confidence far more ominous for an enemy than any amount of fluent rant. After the world of politics, with its hair-splitting and word-mincing, it was good to be with soldiers—the ...
— The Relief of Mafeking • Filson Young
... of the feast—the banter of the younger women, the duenna's lachrymose confidences, the incessant interchange of theatrical jargon and coarse pleasantry—there remained to Odo but a confused image, obscured by the smoke of guttering candles, the fumes of wine and the stifling air of the low-ceilinged tavern. ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... banter. It was understood that the President should not be told—and that I should not tell him—of my talk with Mr. Sandford. Colonel Lamont undertook to arrange an audience with Mr. Cleveland for me. "You had better wait," he said, "until I can approach him with the suggestion that there's ...
— Under the Prophet in Utah - The National Menace of a Political Priestcraft • Frank J. Cannon and Harvey J. O'Higgins
... plainly avows his conviction that they were trees, which on a prodigious tall stem had short and slender branches, not discernible at a distance. Captain Cook, it is very evident, uses the language of banter, not quite consistent with either the dignity of his own character, or the respect due to even the mistaken opinion ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... the actors were breathless from their past exertions. The struggle for freedom sank into acquiescence in the dominion of the most worthless of mankind; and zeal for religion fled before the spirit of banter and sneer. The enthusiasm of 'fierce wars and faithful loves,' of piety and of freedom, were succeeded by the reign of profligacy ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... rocking of the ship and the occasional splashing of water against its sides, we can easily imagine that we are a thousand miles from the sea. Passengers sit at the long tables, reading or chatting. Other groups are playing cards or chess. In the cushioned corners, young men and maidens are exchanging banter with words and glances. A young lady is playing the piano, and over all this scene of life, and light, and gaiety, the electric ...
— Story of Chester Lawrence • Nephi Anderson
... his nephew gently and assiduously tends him while he quite recovers. When Jasper is restored, he lays a tender hand upon his nephew's shoulder, and, in a tone of voice less troubled than the purport of his words—indeed with something of raillery or banter ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... to cap something perfectly funny with something so flat that you are obliged to turn the conversation. Dryden does the same thing, not with jokes, but with his sublimer passages. But sometimes a child's deliberate banter is quite intelligible to elders. Take the letter written by a little girl to a mother who had, it seems, allowed her family to see that she was inclined to be satisfied with something of her own writing. The child ...
— The Children • Alice Meynell
... as if there never would be an end to the stream of leisurely people who answered his banter with laugh and joke. But finally the last of them were fairly on the stair, and he turned to Agnes Maine ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various
... banter. She needed to ask him no questions about his presence here; his ease of bearing had conveyed to her unconsciously from the first instant that her previous half-contemptuous estimate of him had been altogether wrong and that ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... a tremendous fuss over the old lady. He also threw the aunties into pleased confusion by pretending that he was going to kiss them, and occasioned no end of laughter and good-natured banter by his incessant teasing of Mr. Chester. He was in that state of effervescence ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... giving up the riddle in her dancing eyes and seemingly mocking smile, he appears about to lead her back into the ballroom, there is, at least so I like to read the music, a pretty little laugh, as much as to say, "Can't you read my real feelings under my mask of banter," a tender glance indicated by a retard on a charmingly expressive little turn of the melody—and ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb
... a little proud of the thickness of the fleeces of their respective flocks and much good-natured banter passed ...
— The Story of Wool • Sara Ware Bassett
... processionals and of recessionals—a certain popular version of "Lest we forget" their unvaried theme; the more I hear the cries of derision raised by the makers of this likeness of something unworshipful on the earth beneath, so much the more am I convinced that the national humour is that of banter, and that no other kind of mirth so gains as does this ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... evening passed with the banter that invariably took place when Rube was of the party. It was late when they left the Squire's, the constable going along with them, and all singing merrily as birds ...
— 'Way Down East - A Romance of New England Life • Joseph R. Grismer
... greatly. Humorous, self-contained, remorseless in trade, they were most delightful companions when off duty. They liked my father in his private capacity, but as a factor of the Grange he was an enemy. Their kind was new to me and I loved to linger about and listen to their banter when there was ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... was probably one of the most thoughtful and judiciously-minded; yet of every one but myself the business in being abroad was sober and reasonable, while mine was utterly ridiculous and silly. And the girl whose banter had driven me to it—perhaps she had attached no seriousness whatever to my petulant vow and had even now forgotten it. With these reflections were mingled the pangs of parting from my home and family; and for a time I ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... soup in Calais, had we not?" continued Blakeney in the same tone of easy banter, "and wine that I vowed was vinegar. Monsieur... er... Chaubertin... no, no, I beg pardon... Chauvelin... Monsieur Chauvelin and I quite agreed upon that point. The only matter on which we were not quite at one was the ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... "A long banter then growed out of the 'boot money.' The Elder, asked 7 pounds 10s. Goodish swore he wouldn't give that for him and his hoss together; that if they were both put up to auction that blessed minute, they wouldn't bring it. The Elder hung on to it, as long as there was any chance of the boot, and ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... from more than one point of view. At first Lorimer had tried to banter him out of the plan, insisting that the guardianship would be sufficient. There was something in his earnest desire that touched the heart of the man of wide experience. He wondered why he could not be as persistent to win the lady! ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas
... been sure, by a certain good-humored twinkle in the large eye, that all this banter was sure, in the long run, to turn out a cash concern, he might have been somewhat out of patience; as it was, he laid down a greasy pocket-book on the cotton-bales, and began anxiously studying over certain papers in it, the young ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... to tell my mother that I had given up the California trip. I knew that her triple intuition would connect the change of plan with Lucy Fulton, and I was not in the mood to meet such an accusation with the banter and levity ...
— We Three • Gouverneur Morris
... I gaed to the Hilltap to see Tibby, an' as usual there was a lad or twa in the kitchen, an' the crack was gaun screevin' roond. But I can tak' my share in that," continued Tammas modestly, "so we fell on to the banter. ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... a-laughing, and began to banter her. The gentleman who was sent to try the slipper looked earnestly at Cinderella, and, finding her ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... Versailles was at that very moment labouring to counteract Pitt's diplomatists. But though Fox censured the French treaty, which formed the leading topic of the king's speech, he voted for the address, a circumstance for which he received a little banter from the lips of the minister. Pitt remarked:—"I am happy that, notwithstanding the vehemence with which the right honourable gentleman has argued against the address, he is ready to vote for it. I hope ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... there that they amuse themselves, and that they jest, and that they banter, and that they make sport of France! It is there that they pocket hap-hazard, amid great shouts of laughter, the millions of louis and the millions of votes! See them, look at them! They have treated the Law like a girl, they are content! Right is slaughtered, ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... for just then her father and the Colonel came back, and she had barely time to call up her dimples and toss her head in merry banter before they were at ...
— The Old Stone House and Other Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... girls are slim, supple and strong as the young men, the mothers and older women rather stiff, and usually hampered by at least one child, which they carry on their backs or on their hips, while another holds on to the garment which replaces our skirts. There is plenty of laughter and banter with the men, who look on unmoved at the efforts of the weaker sex, only rarely offering a ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... shook hands, engaged in a parting rally of good-humoured banter; the beaten man said his handsome word; the best man capped it with a compliment to him. They drink of different cups to-day. Both will drink of one cup in the day to come. But the day went too clearly to crown ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... a bit grieved at the knight's banter, "I even heard the King's fool remark that since the man was so good, the master need must be. And then and there he hazarded a shrewd guess that if this master were not the King, nor Sir Launcelot, then it must ...
— In the Court of King Arthur • Samuel Lowe
... work—heartened by the feel of the snow. The tingling air was filled with familiar man-sounds—the resonant stroke of axes, and the long crash of falling trees, the metallic rattle of chains, the harsh rasp of saws, and the good-natured calls of men in rude banter; sounds that rang little and thin through the mighty silence ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx
... the looks of that barometer, I won't have to do a blessed thing," replied Lester in the same tone of banter. "My stage manager, old Father Neptune, is going to be right on the job, and when he gets going I don't feel called on to interfere. I've seen a few of his performances and I must confess that I haven't seen much ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... accordance with the desires of the betters than their judgment, I selected an outsider, and took the longest date named for my day, August 20th. The odds fluctuate daily in the market, according to the view the knowing ones take of the weather: these bets form a subject of interest and banter ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... room, pushing the others ahead of him. Turning at the door to throw another banter at his guest, he faced an ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... so close that her stool touched the chair. She bent her cheek upon the shrivelled hand resting upon the arm. The excitement and feverish banter of Truedale affected her painfully. She reproached herself bitterly for having left him to the mercy of his loneliness and imagination. Her interest in, her resentment for, Conning faded before the pitiful display of feeling ...
— The Man Thou Gavest • Harriet T. Comstock
... of Brand, Braund, and Barnes, is a Banter on Criticks, and Genealogists, who make such a Pother about the Orthography of Names and Things, that many Times, three Parts in four of a Folio Treatise, is taken up in ascertaining the Propriety of a Syllable, by which Means the Reader is ...
— A Learned Dissertation on Dumpling (1726) • Anonymous
... could be taking Venza now to Mars. I was glad to see her. She was diverting. Educated. Well-traveled. Spoke English with a colloquial, theatrical manner more characteristic of Great-New York than of Venus. And for all her light banter, I would rather put my trust in her than any Venus girl I had ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various
... far all had gone well, but she didn't know how long she could match his banter. So she favoured him with a deliberate gaze, and said, "Bridge, is it? I'm fond of the game, but I play only with ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells
... roast the dab; I'll arrest the rascal.—Also to jeer, ridicule, or banter. He stood the roast; he was the butt.—Roast meat clothes; Sunday or holiday-clothes. To cry roast meat; to boast of one's situation. To rule the roast; ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... before he noticed it? He should know; he'd been close at hand when it happened. He felt a warm emotion, a sense of comradeship, for the referee. He'd surely been square; he'd made Holliday break clean. He felt an impulse to joke with the referee, to banter him, and bid him count a ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans
... in the end, Jack; he'll not even give you Mary," Reid said, speaking lazily, neither derision nor banter in ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... at once." Fred dropped his banter. "I'll tell you what, Nancy. I may not be able to do much right off, but I'll promise you that he has a fair ...
— The Calico Cat • Charles Miner Thompson
... long rifles and in their sashes were pistols, and those keen carved knives called jambiyahs. At first our natives, believing that they were friendlies, went forward enthusiastically, determined to drive them back with banter, there not being room to pass, but very soon Omar ordered another halt, and turning towards us, cried in a loud voice ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... of banter in Rosco's manner, yet this was associated with an air and tone of such calm decision that the mate felt curiously uncomfortable. He obeyed orders, however, promptly, and stood with a pistol in each hand. It must have been a tantalising position, for, had they been cocked, he could have ...
— The Madman and the Pirate • R.M. Ballantyne
... juxtaposition, like farce after tragedy; and indeed, in many parts of his poem, he is not only what he seems, but follows his saturnine countryman with a peculiar propriety of contrast, much of his liveliest banter being directed against the absurdities of Dante's theology. But hasty and most erroneous would be the conclusion that he was nothing but a banterar. He was a true poet of the mixed order, grave as well as gay; had a reflecting mind, ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt
... you think I have sense enough to love you," said Fanny, still in a tone of banter. "We part as friends, however, and if you insist on coming to call upon my sister, Mrs Barton, of course I cannot help it, only do not for a moment suppose that I ...
— The Ferryman of Brill - and other stories • William H. G. Kingston
... the other hand she possessed the native haughtiness of good birth, and that indescribable something which may be called "pedigree." So, on Monday her turn would come. And, moreover, the Marquise knew that as soon as people learned that the stranger was her cousin, they would suspend their banter and look twice ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... sight altogether. The air is redolent with the smell of balsam and pine. After nightfall, when the lights are burning in the busy market, and the homeward-bound crowds with baskets and heavy burdens of Christmas greens jostle one another with good-natured banter,—nobody is ever cross down here in the holiday season,—it is good to take a stroll through the Farm, if one has a spot in his heart faithful yet to the hills and the woods in spite of the latter-day city. But it is when the moonlight ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... eye at you when he wins," explained Judge Colfax as we went out into the sunlit street again, and he patted me on the shoulder in gentle banter. ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child
... lined the shore, where peasants in bright-coloured shirts and vests lounged. After much haggling and good-humoured banter, Sanine hired one of the little boats. Ivanoff was a deft and powerful oarsman, and the boat shot forward across the water like a living thing. Sometimes the oars touched reeds or low-hanging branches which for a long while after such contact trembled above the deep, dark ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... speaking of Greece, he only gave the substance of the article he had written for the Revue des Deux Mondes, as the paper was yet unpublished all the remarks were novel, and the anecdotes fresh and sparkling. The tone of light banter and raillery in which he described public life in Greece and Greek statesmen, might have lost some of its authority had any one remembered to count the hours the speaker had spent in Athens; and Nina was certainly indignant at the hazardous effrontery of the criticisms. ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... Though not accustomed to have that remark taken seriously, still it usually provoked a laugh or a paragraph of sentimental banter. And he hated to be called fresh, except in a joking way. His charitable impulse died and he ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... Happy. The biggest ketch you ever seen in your life. It's ketch the Flying U outfit and squeeze the life out of it; that's the ketch." Andy's tone had in it no banter, but considerable earnestness. For, though Chip would no doubt convince the boys that the danger was very real, there was a small matter of personal pride to urge Andy into trying to convince, them himself, without aid from Chip or any ...
— The Flying U's Last Stand • B. M. Bower
... supercilious; the taunt is defiant. The jeer and gibe are uttered; the gibe is bitter, and often sly or covert; the jeer is rude and open. A scoff may be in act or word, and is commonly directed against that which claims honor, reverence, or worship. Compare BANTER. ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... they jogg'd; and since an hour of talk Might cut a banter on the tedious walk, As I remember, said the sober mouse, I've heard much talk of the Wits' Coffee-house; Thither, says Brindle, thou shalt go and see Priests supping coffee, sparks and poets tea; Here rugged ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... a low laugh of delight. He convinced himself that she had entered into the light spirit of banter in which he believed that he ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells
... it is a crucifix, and Eugene is going to entrap us into a confession," returned De la Roche, who loved to banter his cousin. ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... isn't it lovely for the people who can do those things!" said Miss Lord, who was governess in a very wealthy household, and liked to talk of the city's prominent families. "Some day you and I will have to find a million dollars and run away for a year in Italy! I wonder, Sue," the mild banter ceased, "if you could get Mary's dinner? I hate to go into the kitchen, they're all ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... some parts. The audience was not a pleasant one to face. It was the First Consul's habit to invite forty persons to dinner, and a hundred and fifty for the evening, and consequently to hear, criticise, and banter us without mercy" (Memoirs of Duchesse d'Abrantes, tome ii. ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... of the journey was certainly fatiguing, but the travellers kept up good hearts by pleasant banter and dogged determination. ...
— The Fiery Totem - A Tale of Adventure in the Canadian North-West • Argyll Saxby
... a true statement, so far as his general attitude was concerned. At eighteen, in New York and Philadelphia, his letters had been grave, reflective, advisory. Now they were mostly banter and froth, lightly indifferent to the serious side of things, though perhaps only pretendedly so, for the picture did look old. From the shock and circumstance of his brother's death he—had never recovered. He was barely twenty-eight. From the picture he might have ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... beyond the grave—these traits are common in the literature of the second century, and show the change which had come over the minds of men. Gibbon is colour-blind to these shades of the religious spirit: he can only see the banter of Lucian.[13] In reference to these matters he was a true son of his age, and could hardly be expected ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison
... banter his antagonist. "You are a fine gentleman," he said; "you have been at Baiae" (Baiae was a fashionable watering-place on the Campanian coast). "Well," said Cicero, "that is better than to have been at the 'matrons' ...
— Roman life in the days of Cicero • Alfred J[ohn] Church
... night. At midnight Don Juan and his friends are making merry when a knock is heard at the door and the stone guest enters. Don Juan, who does not lose his bravery even in the presence of the supernatural, plays the host, maintaining his air of insulting banter. At the end of the evening the guest departs, offering to repay the hospitality the following night if Don Juan will visit his tomb at midnight. Though friends try to dissuade him, Don Juan fearlessly accepts the invitation. At the appointed hour he visits the tomb. Flames emerge ...
— El Estudiante de Salamanca and Other Selections • George Tyler Northup
... aphorism heavy with meaning, which sticks to the memory, like a saying of Talleyrand's. His umbrae, who have put but little of allaying Tiber in their cups, grow boisterous and abusive, and having insulted nearly everybody at the table by coarse personal banter, the party breaks up, and we are glad to get out with flushed cheeks and dizzy head into the cool air of an early summer night—all the more, that for the last half-hour young Piso at our elbow has been importuning us with whispered specimens of his very rickety elegiacs, and ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... said Marston; "the case is too serious for banter of this kind. My dear boy," he added, kindly, "I am glad to see you angry, but nevertheless, you must condescend to explain. The longer you allow suspicion to rest on yourself the longer it will be before it falls on the right person. Come, what were you doing in the passage ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley
... the important purpose I had formed, and to which the banter now recalled me. So fair an opportunity might never offer again. In the vicissitudes of a soldier's life, the chance of to-day should not be disregarded—to-morrow may bring change either in the scene or the circumstances; and I was skilled enough ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... driven about by my servant like an apothecary, uncle?" No, Major Pendennis would on no account have his nephew appear like an apothecary; the august representative of the house of Pendennis must not so demean himself. And when Arthur, pursuing his banter, said, "And yet, I daresay, sir, my father was proud enough when he first set up his gig," the old major hemmed and ha'd, and his wrinkled face reddened with a blush as he answered, "You know what Bonaparte said, sir, 'Il faut laver son linge sale en famille.' There ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... asked Calvin. He flicked hossy on the ear, but his tone was not the usual one of friendly banter. Hossy ...
— The Wooing of Calvin Parks • Laura E. Richards
... doorway, quiescent as an odalisque and with the golden tinge of a sunflower lighting her darkness, Miriam Binswanger held the picture for a moment, her brother greeting her with bow and banter. ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... a suggestion of laughter in the husky voice, now, of a sort of contemptuous banter. But Cairn stolidly shook his head and ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... humor clothed in the neatest expressions. It is international; the contrast of American and foreign ways runs through it, and Mr. Howells has added the contrast of the old and the new Americanism. The hero is a Western journalist, a Mugwump, much given to banter of ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 3: New-England Sunday - Gleanings Chiefly From Old Newspapers Of Boston And Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... lie.' He had a confused sort of impression that the two girls were merely and lightly teasing him. But having eyes that were keen and a brain which, though a plain-dealing man's, was quick, he understood that somehow there was a stern seriousness under all of this seeming banter. Single-purposed he turned to Helen; bluntly he intended to tell how he had seen Sanchia and how ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... mood, watched her narrowly throughout, that he might tax her, if possible, with a humorous attitude toward the preacher or a quizzical treatment of his flock. He had not yet pardoned her "ways" along Main Street, on the occasion of one or two shopping excursions. She had not hesitated to banter the admiring young clerks that held their places behind those shop-fronts of galvanized iron in simulation of red brick and of cut limestone, and she had been startlingly free in her accosting of several time-honoured worthies encountered on the dislocated plank walks ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... abate until nightfall, and during that time the men were engaged in digging their habitations clear of the snow that almost threatened to bury them. In this work, McTavish cheerfully took a hand, and, by his good-humored banter, won his way to the hearts of his fellow-toilers. Notwithstanding his industry, the Hudson Bay man kept his eye open for glimpses of Maria who, as he expected, was constantly about, now that Charles Seguis had returned. He was surprised that Seguis ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... at once how important it was that Marcellus, at all events, should not suspect the grave revelations that had been made, although they had been sufficient to have paralyzed one of less courage and resolution than himself, he outwits his companions by banter, treating the apparition with intentional and grotesque disrespect and jocularity at a moment when an irresolute mind would ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... her car, but she was not in the mood to talk with them. She felt that there was something to be thought out and fixed in her mind, some impression that life had for her that afternoon that she did not want to lose in the mild fritter of gay banter that would be sure to follow if she stopped and took home some of the boys. So she bowed graciously and swept by at a high speed as if in a great hurry. The war! The war! It was beating itself into her brain again in much the same ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill
... said musingly. . . "I wonder . . ." then she laughed forgivingly. "Come, let us cease this constant banter. We have been at it ever since we met, and it ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... Ibla, daughter of Malek, the son of Zoheir. Ibla, fair as the full moon, was somewhat younger than Antar. She was accustomed to banter him in a familiar way, feeling that he was her slave. "And you," she said to him, "you, born so low, how dared you kill the slave of a prince? What provocation can you have against him?" "Mistress," replied Antar, "I struck that slave because he deserved it, for he had insulted a poor ...
— Oriental Literature - The Literature of Arabia • Anonymous
... John! I hope I may never have to do that again. What is that you mean?' This he said very seriously. There was usually in his voice something of a tone of banter,—a subdued cynicism,—which had caused everybody near him to be afraid of him, and which even yet was habitual to him. But now that was all gone. Was there to be any new source of trouble betwixt him ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... that sort of thing. But to a certain extent he had laid himself open to banter by the lasting character of his impressions which were connected with the passion of love and, perhaps, were not of such a rare kind as he seemed to think them. What made his comrades tolerant of his rhapsodies was the fact that ...
— Tales Of Hearsay • Joseph Conrad
... of defense. Possibly her explanation, whatever it was, had seemed convincing when she poured it out to him in the heat of their first private colloquy; but now that it was exposed to the cold daylight of judicial scrutiny, and the banter of the town, he was thoroughly ashamed of it, and would have sacrificed her without a scruple to save his professional reputation. But the obstinate Judge—who perhaps, after all, was more inquisitive than kindly—evidently wanted ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 1 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... emotion which stirred within him. At last the train came and from one of the long string of Pullmans, Gloria alighted. She kissed her brother and greeted Philip cordially, and asked him in a tone of banter how he enjoyed army life. Dru smiled and said, "Much better, Gloria, than you predicted I would." The baggage was stored away in the buck-board, and Gloria got in front with Philip and they were off. It was ...
— Philip Dru: Administrator • Edward Mandell House
... what I said to the Count, and he seemed to be somewhat affected by it. But the Duc de Bouillon was enraged, and told me, by way of banter, "Your blood is very cold for a gentleman of your age." To which I replied in these very words: "All the Count's servants are so much obliged to you, monsieur, that they ought to bear everything from you; but were it not for this consideration ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... prepare wires for the stems. My affected desire for occupation made me soon skilful. We talked as we worked. When I had nothing to do, I read new books to her, for I had my part to keep up as a man weary of life, worn out with griefs, gloomy, sceptical, and soured. My person led to adorable banter as to my purely physical resemblance—with the exception of his club foot—to Lord Byron. It was tacitly acknowledged that her own troubles, as to which she kept the most profound silence, far outweighed mine, though ...
— Honorine • Honore de Balzac
... than that all my foes should thus depart forever far away from my abode." Those about him made merry over Henry III., a refugee at Bordeaux, deserted by the English and plundered by the Gascons. "Hold! hold! said Louis; "turn him not into ridicule, and make me not hated of him by reason of your banter; his charities and his piety shall exempt him from all contumely." The Count of La Marche lost no time in asking for peace; and Louis granted it with the firmness of a far-seeing politician and the sympathetic feeling of a Christian. He required ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... wise relief for overwrought brains or high-strung sensibilities, our fireside sparkled with brilliant repartees and scintillating mirth. It is [137] pleasantly remembered that, in such by-play, Dr. Dewey, while often satirical, and prone to good-tempered banter, was never cynical, and was intolerant of personal gossip or he intrusion of mean slander. And to close the chapter of boyhood's acquaintance, it is gratefully recalled how cordially sympathetic this ...
— Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D.D. - Edited by his Daughter • Orville Dewey
... of a mile on smooth water appears but a short distance, and the people of the two boats could hold converse at will. The opportunity was not neglected by those of the Belle to pay back the boasts of the Magnolians. Shouts of banter reached their ears, and their former taunts ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... had been different, the chin protrusive, and the cervical vertebrae a trifle more curved in their position, ten to one Gwendolen's words would have had a jar in them for the sweet-natured Rex. But everything odd in her speech was humor and pretty banter, which he was only anxious to turn ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... "civilized" undertook to banter me on my non-appearance in the classic regions of Barnwell.—Bristed's Five Years in an Eng. Univ., ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... assumed an air of doubt, shrugged her shoulders, and told him that he was really too chicken-hearted. Her one great aim now was to embroil him with the Quenu-Gradelles, and she employed every means she could think of to effect her purpose, both anger and banter, as well as affectionate tenderness. She also cherished another design. When she had succeeded in marrying Florent, she would go and administer a sound cuffing to beautiful Lisa, if the latter did not yield up the money. As ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... Birdsell with round-eyed steady stare. He was a superb type of man. It gave Bradley a feeling of awkwardness to stand beside him and a consciousness of stupidity to listen to their banter, but Ida dismissed Cargill and Birdsell summarily and walked home with Bradley. He was not keenly perceptive enough to see that Ida put Birdsell off with a brusqueness that argued a ...
— A Spoil of Office - A Story of the Modern West • Hamlin Garland |
