"Booby" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at most, Tatita Sumichrast. It shall never be said that this great booby broke my head and then laughed at me, to the heart's delight of the parrots, who no doubt were the instigators ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... Forward lay the windlass and its tackle, with the chain and hemp cables, all very unpleasant to trip over; the foc'sle stovepipe, and the gurry-butts by the foc'sle hatch to hold the fish-livers. Aft of these the foreboom and booby of the main-hatch took all the space that was not needed for the pumps and dressing-pens. Then came the nests of dories lashed to ring-bolts by the quarter-deck; the house, with tubs and oddments lashed all around it; and, last, the sixty-foot main-boom in its crutch, ...
— "Captains Courageous" • Rudyard Kipling
... too easy to get hold of liquids out there, that's the worst of it," the pilot went on. "But for that any booby could manage a ship. He's only got to keep well to the right of Mads Hansen's farm, and he's got a straight road before him. And the deuce of a fine road! Telegraph-wires and ditches and a row of poplars on each side—just improved by the local board. You've ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... Lady Booby's cast-off livery, is, I think, to the full as polite as Tom Jones in his fustian suit, or Captain Booth in regimentals. He has, like those heroes, large calves, broad shoulders, a high courage, and a handsome ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the way, if only He's no booby; for all a snowy maiden Chide imperious, and her hands around him Both in jealousy ...
— The Poems and Fragments of Catullus • Catullus
... "The booby then told him the leading features of our plot, of which we had made no secret before him, as he was himself to have borne a part in it. True, he knew nothing of the alterations we had made at Paris in our original design; but he had been informed, before ...
— Manon Lescaut • Abbe Prevost
... charm, a small reproduction of the Barye lion, or the well-known Perry picture of a lion, a Dresden-china lamb or shepherdess, and a pussy-cat plate, pincushion, or paper weight are suggestions for first prizes, and four little tin horns painted green may be given as booby prizes to the four "greenhorns" ...
— Entertaining Made Easy • Emily Rose Burt
... York, the Bramble, Asp, pinnace, and our second cutter, were engaged, under their respective officers, in the survey of Endeavour Strait and the Prince of Wales Channel, which they finished before we left, thus completing the survey of the Inner Route between Dunk and Booby Islands. Previous to leaving for that purpose, the pinnace had been sent to Booby Island, for letters in the post office there, and some of us had the good fortune to receive communications from our friends in Sydney, which had been left by vessels passing through. Most passing vessels heave-to ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... diamond—the epitome of common sense! Why, he was a half-witted, impertinent, overbearing booby, and his author longed to get him across his knee, and correct him in the good old way. But meantime the point of the young warrior's sword was getting unpleasantly near the left breast-pocket of the author's dressing gown (which he ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various
... they have become the admiration of all for miles around. I told him he looked like a market gardener, collecting flowers from every place he went to. I dragged him away several times, and told him he would certainly be taken for a country booby, and scolded him for demeaning his rank with such ignoble pleasures, and what wise answer do you think he ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar
... really anything about it yet. And I'm afraid you can't know on this island. There isn't the company and there isn't the means. I can't even make you an apple-pie bed, when you sleep in a single blanket; and a booby-trap needs a door. And when there are only two people, and no one else to laugh, it's no fun to stick a cactus in a fellow's chair. Tuck, too! What do you know about tuck? What can you know about tuck when there's no shop for chocolate ...
— The Flamp, The Ameliorator, and The Schoolboy's Apprentice • E. V. Lucas
... yer great cowardly booby, will yer? So you thought you was coming hout to frighten a little lad, did ye? And you met with one of your hown size, did ye? Now will ye get hup and take it like a man, or shall I give it you as ...
— Melchior's Dream and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... at him the chamber utensil which she had just seized. "If it is the devil who has offended thee with his words," she said, "resent the insult with words likewise, jackass that thou art, but if I have offended thee myself, learn, stupid booby, that thou must respect me, and ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... too? Do you take me for a fool, telling me that you are going away? 'I am going to start to-night!'" she said, mimicking his tones. "Stuff and nonsense! Would you talk like that if you were really going away from your Naqui? You would cry, like the booby ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... good hand at such things, and he did it so nicely, that the master did not see him, and neither of us saw the B on the other. When we went out to play, all the boys cried out, "B for blockhead, B for blunderbuss, B for booby," and so on, ever so many other names beginning with B, and kept pointing at us. At last, I saw Frank's mark, and he saw mine. I can tell you we were both angry enough. Now we want to be revenged on John Green, and have a capital plan. You see he will be on his guard, and we must be very ...
— Conscience • Eliza Lee Follen
... steamboats, to an open-air couch of balsam boughs in the Adirondack forests. My means of locomotion included a safety bicycle, an Adirondack canoe, the back of a horse, the omnipresent buggy, a bob-sleigh, a "cutter," a "booby," four-horse "stages," river, lake, and sea-going steamers, horse-cars, cable-cars, electric cars, mountain elevators, narrow-gauge railways, and the Vestibuled Limited Express from New York ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... "I've no idea how to set about it, but I'll try on one condition. There's one thing we haven't tried against them. Set up an atom-bomb booby-trap, and I'll sit on it. If they try to contact me, you can either listen in or try to blow them up, and ...
— The Invaders • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... "Ladies and gentlemen, permit me to wish you health and happiness, and may you grow better and wiser in advancing years, bearing in mind that outward appearances are deceitful. You mistook me, from my dress, for a country booby; while I, from the same superficial cause, thought you were ladies and gentlemen. The mistake has been mutual." Just then Governor Caleb Strong entered and called to Mr. Whitman, who, turning to the dumfounded company, said: "I wish you ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... their novelty that the public cared for. The enthusiastic welcome given him by the Irish when he visited Dublin caused him to say in one of his letters, "Were it not from the chilling recollection that novelty is easily substituted for merit, I should think, like the booby in Steele's play,[392] that I had been kept back, and that there was something more about me than I had ...
— Sir Walter Scott as a Critic of Literature • Margaret Ball
... We all knew perfectly well that there never had been such a cat as Juno. Not that she was so fine-looking, or so expensive. She would never have taken a prize at a cat show, unless it might have been the booby prize. She was the very plainest kind of a brindled cat, and she wandered into our house from the street during her early kittenhood and calmly established herself ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 20, March 25, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... resembling hay-cocks in shape and size: we saw them three miles off, and they were the only objects visible above water, on the portion of the Barrier within our view. From our entrance, we had a fine run, and found nothing to stop us for a minute (during daylight), till clear of Booby Island at the western end of the Straits, which we passed at 10 A. M. on the ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson
... it you did not come to the rehearsal, Booby Ivanitch?" the comic man began, panting and filling the room with fumes of vodka. "Where have ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... could make in the next ten years! We're going to have the enemy supply us with power we can't get in any other way. I can't decide, Arcot, whether you deserve a prize for ingenuity, or whether we should receive booby-prizes ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell
... been in the family for the last five or six years, came staggering into the room. He had been caught by a booby-trap which Irene had placed just over his pantry door, and a shower of spiders and caterpillars and other offensive insects had fallen all over him. His face was deadly pale, and he declared that ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... with the rest of the crew. This roused my suspicions, although I said nothing; but I watched them very closely. One forenoon, as I was standing at the foot of the companion-ladder, concealed by the booby-hatch from the sight of those on deck, I heard our men talking over the side, and at last, as I remained concealed, that I might overhear the conversation, one of the slaver's men from the boat said, "To-night, at eight o'clock, we will come ...
— The Privateer's-Man - One hundred Years Ago • Frederick Marryat
... "Go, booby; do you think I am a child?" his master retorted angrily. "I've my sword and can use it. I shall not be long. And do you hear, men, keep a still tongue, ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... prodigious fellow! What do you think Booby says? He says that Foaming Fudge can do more than any man in Great Britain; that he had one day to plead in the King's Bench, spout at a tavern, speak in the House, and fight a duel; and that he found time ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... be the first to introduce it in Shannondale, she stood, flushed and triumphant, with the restored diamonds in her ears and at her throat, laughing merrily with the others at Judge St. Claire, who had won the booby prize—a little drum, as something he could beat—and who, with a perplexed look in his face, was staring at the thing as if he did not quite get ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... such a booby as you used to be, Harry," the old lady admitted. "Your manners are considerably improved, and there was much room for improvement. You're growing a good deal like ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various
... you say to yourself: 'This is a booby whom I shall persuade to do anything I wish, by telling him that I love him; he will believe it, and I will take him away to be hanged.' Come; there is only one word which will serve if ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... character as "Old Put" should have become the subject of controversy. Too much is claimed for him by some disputants, and much too little is conceded to him by others. He was certainly as far from being a rustic booby as he was from ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... three thousand years of this sport, I suppose Blackstick grew tired of it. Or perhaps she thought, "What good am I doing by sending this Princess to sleep for a hundred years? by fixing a black pudding on to that booby's nose? by causing diamonds and pearls to drop from one little girl's mouth, and vipers and toads from another's? I begin to think I do as much harm as good by my performances. I might as well shut my incantations up, and allow things to take their ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... please.' Rous'd by the news, behold him now expand, Like beaten gold, and glitter o'er the land. Well stored with nods and sly approving winks, Now first with this and now with that he thinks; Howe'er opposing, still assents to each, And claps a dovetail to each booby's speech. At random thus for all, for none, he lives, Profusely lavish though he nothing gives; The world he roves as living but to show A friendless man without a single foe; From bad to good, to bad from good to run, And find a character by ...
— The Sylphs of the Season with Other Poems • Washington Allston
... grenade," he said coldly. "It took time to fix it the way it is. At a guess, the ship was booby-trapped at the time of its last overhaul. But it was arranged that the booby trap had to be set, the trigger cocked, by somebody doing something very simple at a different place and later on. We've been flying with that grenade in the wheel well for two weeks. But it was out of ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster
... he examined the control room with care. At last, satisfied that no booby traps were set, he crossed to the control panel. He located the communicator controls, ...
— The Players • Everett B. Cole
... He said: "Women are generally more competent to vote than their husbands, and sisters better fitted to be judges than their brothers, the mother more capable of wisely exercising the elective franchise than her booby son." ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... among us, and flourished his sword, with a view to frighten us; but we refused to stir till we were ready, and some of our company called him a damned lobster backed ——, for wishing to drive us away before every one had his drink. The man was perplexed, and knew not what to do. At last the booby did what he ought to have done at first—forced the beer-seller to drive off his cart. But it is the fate of British officers of higher rank than this one, to think and act at last of that which they ought to have thought, and acted upon at first. ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... comes, the pest and terror of the yard, His full-fledg'd progeny's imperious guard; The GANDER;... spiteful, insolent, and bold, At the colt's footlock takes his daring hold: There, serpent-like, escapes a dreadful blow; And straight attacks a poor defenceless cow: Each booby goose th' unworthy strife enjoys, And hails his prowess with redoubled noise. Then back he stalks, of self-importance full, Seizes the shaggy foretop of the bull, Till whirl'd aloft he falls; a timely check, Enough to dislocate his worthless neck: ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield
... would have walked over all our dead bodies, if necessary, to marry that noble booby. And you would have married him if it had not been for me! I would not permit you to wed him then, because you were in honor bound to Regulas Rothsay. I shall insist on your accepting him now, because poor Rothsay is in ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... execrable. After getting about four miles behind the old line the villages were not so shattered and at Henin Lietard some houses were almost intact; the coal mines, however, had been ruined, and into some canals had been turned. Booby traps were numerous, and special companies were hunting for them. Their presence gave us confidence in living in the houses chosen for billets; but a few days later, we afterwards heard, a number of these were blown up by mines with delayed action. We continued our march in the direction ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... 25 fathoms, sand, the island bearing North-West 1/2 West distant a mile and a quarter. In the afternoon I landed for an hour, passing many turtles on the water both going and returning. As usual the islet was covered with seabirds, only two species, however, of which were breeding. The Brown Booby (Sula fusca) and a large tern (Thalasseus pelecanoides) existed in about equal numbers; the latter, in one great colony, had laid their solitary large speckled eggs in a slight excavation in the sand, ...
— Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John MacGillivray
... master. You are not the first man whom I have known to have fallen, even sometimes to the endangering, if not breaking, of his own neck, for endeavouring to rise all at once. A murrain seize thee for a blockheaded booby, cried the angry seller of sheep; by the worthy vow of Our Lady of Charroux, the worst in this flock is four times better than those which the Coraxians in Tuditania, a country of Spain, used to sell for a gold talent each; and how much dost thou think, thou Hibernian ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... pity in Jennings' breast, so he ordered Dauss to the booby hatch for a spanking and sent Coveleski to ladle out the pitch stuff. The young southpaw was equally generous in intent and would surely have forced in enough runs to give the Sox the game, but two of the visitors absolutely refused to accept that kind of a gift and got out. They were ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... Blasco Nunez characterized the four judges of the Audience in a manner more concise than complimentary, - a boy, a madman, a booby, and a dunce! "Decia muchas veces Blasco Nunez, que le havian dado el Emperador, i su Consejo de Indias vn Moco, un Loco, un Necio, vn Tonto por Oidores, que asi lo havian hecho como ellos eran. Moco era Cepeda, i llamaba Loco a Juan Alvarez, i Necio a Tejada, que no sabia Latin." Gomara, Hist. ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... humbuggery. Marriage is, perhaps, the only game of chance ever invented at which it is possible for both players to lose. Too often, after much sugar-coated deception, and many premeditated misdeals on both sides, one draws a blank and the other a booby. After patient angling in the matrimonial pool, one lands a stingaree and the other a bull-head. One expects to capture a demi-god who hits the earth only in high places; the other to wed a wingless angel who will ...
— Volume 12 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... yet parvenu,[327] in the house of a Parisian, himself a nouveau riche and novus homo, on whose property in Champagne his own father is a wine-farmer. He is early selected for the beginnings of Lady-Booby-like attentions by "Madame," while he, as far as he is capable of the proceeding, falls in love with one of Madame's maids, Genevieve. It does not appear that, if the lady's part of the matter had gone further, ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... continually we find tedious people interrupting the course of our pleasures! You see me enraged on account of a splendid hunt, which a booby ... It is a story I must relate ...
— The Bores • Moliere
... some of whom turned to look again, and one or two to retrace their steps and follow her at a decorous distance. This caused him to quicken his own pace, with a new anxiety and a remorseful sense of wasted opportunity. What a booby he had been, not to have made more of his contiguity to this charming girl—to have been frightened at the naive decorum of her maidenly instincts! He reached her side, and raised his hat with a trepidation at her new-found ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... Levy, returning the letter, "you must have written as cleverly as you talk, or the squire is a booby indeed." ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of the roundhouse was closed, so I did not fear the inmates would observe me entering the cabin. The break of the poop seemed clear of life. I scuttled on my hands and knees until I was past the booby-hatch; then I arose to my feet and flitted noiselessly to the cabin door. I opened it just wide enough to admit my body, and stepped into ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... a savage satisfaction from saying it, he was tired of sitting there like a booby while they discussed him, but he did not get the reaction from them he had expected. The two men merely continued to look thoughtfully ...
— The Stars, My Brothers • Edmond Hamilton
... on. Sanin walked beside him. And Sanin speculated—Polozov's lips were glued together, again he snorted heavily, and waddled along in silence—Sanin speculated in what way had this booby succeeded in catching a rich and beautiful wife. He was not rich himself, nor distinguished, nor clever; at school he had passed for a dull, slow-witted boy, sleepy, and greedy, and had borne the nickname 'driveller.' It ...
— The Torrents of Spring • Ivan Turgenev
... "Where does the sun rise?" "Please, sir, down in our meadow; I seed it yesterday!" "Hold your tongue, you dunce; where does the sun rise?" "I know—in the east!" "Right, and why does it rise in the east?" "Because the 'east makes everything rise." "Out, you booby!" ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... — N. fool, idiot, tomfool, wiseacre, simpleton, witling[obs3], dizzard[obs3], donkey, ass; ninny, ninnyhammer[obs3]; chowderhead[obs3], chucklehead[obs3]; dolt, booby, Tom Noddy, looby[obs3], hoddy-doddy[obs3], noddy, nonny, noodle, nizy[obs3], owl; goose, goosecap[obs3]; imbecile; gaby[obs3]; radoteur[obs3], nincompoop, badaud[obs3], zany; trifler, babbler; pretty fellow; natural, niais[obs3]. child, baby, infant, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... trees because they had no joints in their legs. The inhabitants, cunning fellows, sought out the favoured trees and sawed them nearly through; so that when the unfortunate elks settled themselves to sleep, the booby-traps came into operation. Having no joints in their legs, the poor beasts were unable to rise, and so became an easy prey to the savage Teuton. Herodotus, too, was somewhat credulous in the matter of animals; Sir John Mandeville ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... roundhead?—His father was positively the most dangerous man in all Scotland, cool, resolute, soliderly, and inflexible in his cursed principles. His son seems his very model; you cannot conceive the mischief he may do. I know mankind, Evandale—were he an insignificant, fanatical, country booby, do you think I would have refused such a trifle as his life to Lady Margaret and this family? But this is a lad of fire, zeal, and education—and these knaves want but such a leader to direct their blind enthusiastic hardiness. I mention this, not as refusing your request, but to make ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... farce entitled, "The Blockade of Boston," to be played on a given evening. It was a burlesque upon Washington and the American army. It represented the commander-in-chief of the American army as an awkward lout, equipped with a huge wig, and a long, rusty sword, attended by a country booby as orderly sergeant, in a rustic garb, with an old fire-lock seven ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer
... man could be so stupid? He never knew of my existence, this big, red booby. He never knew that I existed until—until his 'dream' had fled—with me! In a week we were in Paris, that dream-girl and I—in a month we had quarrelled. I always end these matters with a quarrel; it makes the complete finish. She struck me in the face—and I laughed. ...
— Tales of Chinatown • Sax Rohmer
... booby," I interposed, "can't you see that I'm not angry? I blab about you to the King? What do you take me for? I am your pal, now and always, in affairs liable to prove inartistic to the King's, or Prince George's, stomach. To begin with, what has an elephant to do ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer
... consisting of the mouth of hell, painted red and surmounted by a blue paradise starred with gold. An angel came down to play at dice with the devil for souls. In his excess of zeal, the angel cheated and the devil grew angry and called him a "big booby, a celestial fowl," and threatened to pull his feathers ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... ma'am, when I wanted to hug old Beppo, he told me to take my paws from the dog's neck; that I was a country bumpkin, and a big clumsy booby, and no brother of his; and the sooner I skedaddled home the better ...
— The Two Story Mittens and the Little Play Mittens - Being the Fourth Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... girls at recess, which was often very inconvenient when Elizabeth and Rosie wanted to teeter by themselves or stay indoors and tell secrets. Then, too, John and the Pretender teased her unmercifully. They called her beau "Booby" Oliver and said he should have been a girl. She took his part valiantly, but she did wish he wouldn't say "papa" and "mamma," it made her ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... a simple little letter, telling her that he was leaving Ireland because he had suffered a great deal, and would write to her from New York, whereas he had written her the letter of a booby. And feeling he must do something to rectify his mistake, he went to his writing-table, but he had hardly put the pen to the paper when he heard a step on the gravel outside ...
— The Lake • George Moore
... saddle horses and pack horses, we have another four-footed animal in our outfit—a large black dog of seeming little intelligence, to which we have given the name of "Booby." He is owned by "Nute," one of our colored boys, who avers that he is a very knowing dog, and will prove himself so before our journey is ended. The poor beast is becoming sore-footed, and his sufferings ...
— The Discovery of Yellowstone Park • Nathaniel Pitt Langford
... and Long is a very bad thing for Central High. We lost the game with Lumberport just because Billy wasn't at short; you all know that. I'm mighty glad the game with West High was called off for to-day. Without Billy Long, Central High is very likely to win the booby prize on the diamond ...
— The Girls of Central High on Lake Luna - or, The Crew That Won • Gertrude W. Morrison
... a German dug-out, but the enemy still occupied the "Z." The front line between there and Gommecourt was filled with deep dug-outs, all connected underground, so the Boche occupied one end, while 2nd Lieuts. Banwell and Barrett sat in the other, of the same tunnel. There were many booby traps, such as loose boards exploding a bomb when trodden on; trip wires at the bottom of dug-out steps bringing down the roof, and other such infernal machines. We were warned of ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... Torres Strait, which he called Endeavour Strait, discovered and named the Wallis Islands, situated in the middle of the south-west entrance to Booby Island, and Prince of Wales Island, and steered for the southern coast of New Guinea, which he followed until the 3rd of September without being able ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... warned by a judgement so tragic, And wipe yourselves cleanly with all books of magic— Hark! hark! it is Dives! 'Hold your Bother, you Booby! I am burnt ashy white, and you yet are ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... despatches and secret codes began to be left about in conspicuous places, in rooms conveniently vacated for notoriously suspect plotters; when the Prime Minister began to bounce and prance and to lay booby traps, into which not his enemies but his incomparable secretary promptly blundered—it was then that things ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, April 12, 1916 • Various
... welcome as a meal. I did not stop to consider whether I could have digested them. They would at all events have allayed the gnawing of hunger. I remembered reading of people suffering from hunger when navigating the ocean in open boats, and how much a flying-fish, or a booby, or a lump of rancid grease, had contributed to keep body and soul together. But neither booby nor flying-fish could I possibly obtain. I tried to think of all the various articles with which the ship was likely to be freighted. During my numerous visits to the quay alongside which she had been ...
— Dick Cheveley - His Adventures and Misadventures • W. H. G. Kingston
... Subscribes, "Dear sir, your brother loving." Thus all the footmen, shoeboys, porters, About St. James's, cry, "We courtiers." Thus Horace in the house will prate, "Sir, we, the ministers of state." Thus at the bar the booby Bettesworth,[1] Though half a crown o'erpays his sweat's worth; Who knows in law nor text nor margent, Calls Singleton[2] his brother sergeant. And thus fanatic saints, though neither in Doctrine nor discipline our brethren, Are brother Protestants and Christians, As ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... the miller. An outlandish, ignorant booby, jealous of his sister, Patty, because she "could paint picturs and strum on the harpsicols." He was in love with Fanny, the gypsy, for which "feyther" was angry with him; but, "what argufies feyther's anger?" However, he treated Fanny like a brute, and she said of him, "He has a heart as hard as ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... exclamation of Lady Booby, when Joseph defends himself: 'YOUR VIRTUE! I shall never survive it!' etc., is another instance.—Joseph Andrews. Also that of Miss Mathews in her narrative to Booth: 'But such are the friendships ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... say, benefactress? He's still a regular booby! What can you expect of him! He'll get wiser, then it ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... matched, mother, eh?" said Allan, turning to his wife. "They're marra-to-bran, as folks say. Greta, he's a girt booby, isn't he?" ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine
... hold-over. Boozerine, in the raw state. From the Latin words alco and haul, meaning "he is soused to the booby hatches, haul him to the alcove." (See Lord Macaulay's ...
— The Silly Syclopedia • Noah Lott
... lessons at home and played all day at school! Sometimes a reprimand from Mr. Wilmot would bring the tears into her eyes and she would wonder why it was she could not behave and make Mr. Wilmot like her as well as he did Julia. Then she would resolve not to make any more faces at that booby, Bill Jeffrey, for the girls to laugh at, nor to draw any more pictures on her slate of the Dame Sobriety, as she called Julia, and lastly, not to pin any more chalk rags on the boys' coats. But she was a dear lover ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes
... kid, Charlie," laughed Phil. "The fellows have got the bloodsuckers on him. Ain't he the booby? Told me he was fifteen and he's bigger'n you are. Screams ...
— Still Jim • Honore Willsie Morrow
... buccaneer birds, from their marauding habits. Seldom or never do they condescend to fish for themselves, preferring to hover high in the blue, their tails opening and closing like a pair of scissors as they hang poised above the sea. Presently booby—like some honest housewife who has been a-marketing—comes flapping noisily home, her maw laden with fish for the chicks. Down comes the black watcher from above with a swoop like an eagle. Booby puts all she knows into ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... and Mowbray, and Tourville, likewise prepare themselves. I have a great mind to contrive a method to send James Harlowe to travel for improvement. Never was there a booby 'squire that more wanted it. Contrive it, did I say? I have already contrived it; could I but put it in execution without being suspected to have a hand in it. This I am resolved upon; if I have not his sister, ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... vent to a sigh of exasperation. "When you come to talk about women's feelings, Blake, you make me tired. You will never be anything but a great big booby in that respect as ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... she went in. He crept downstairs like a mouse, and learned his lessons before breakfast. Lucy, on the other hand, got up so late that it was only by dressing hastily that she had time to prepare a thoroughly good booby-trap before she slid down the banisters just as the breakfast-bell rang. She was first in the room, so she was able to put a little salt in all the tea-cups before anyone else came in. Fresh tea was made, and Harry was blamed. Lucy ...
— Oswald Bastable and Others • Edith Nesbit
... leave him to travel along the mire and beneath the clouds? For some weeks Summer was sulky—and sullenly scorned to shed a tear. His eyes were like ice. By-and-by, like a great school-boy, he began to whine and whimper—and when he found that would not do, he blubbered like the booby of the lowest form. Still the Sun would not look on him—or if he did, 'twas with a sudden and short half-smile half-scowl that froze the ingrate's blood. At last the Summer grew contrite, and the Sun forgiving, the one burst out into a flood of tears, the other into a flood of light. ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... Massif, the publisher. He had read 'Le Tapage' and expects you. Carry him all your poems to-morrow; there will be enough to make a volume. Massif will publish it at his own expense, and you will appear before the public in one month. You never will inveigle a second time that big booby of a Gaillard, who took a mere passing fancy for you. But no matter! I know your book, and it will be a success. You are launched. Forward, march! Truly, I am better than I thought, for your success ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... and Anne and Colin, as they set the booby-trap for Pinkney. Very quiet as they watched Pinkney's innocent approach. The sponge caught him—with a delightful, squelching flump—full and fair on the ...
— Anne Severn and the Fieldings • May Sinclair
... a parallel in a Gaelic tale in my collection, where the boy dated an event which was true by a fall of pancakes or something of the kind which was not true, and was not believed though he told the truth." [At p. 385, vol. II. of the Tales of the West Highlands a "half booby" is inveigled by his mother into dating his theft of some planks by ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Anonymous
... your fine Lord de Adhemar; a fool, a rattle-head, a booby; but he is handsome, and a jolly lover. Our queen likes handsome men, and everybody knows that she is one of the laughing kind, a merry fly, particularly since the carousals on the ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... Cloten, the conceited, booby lord, and rejected lover of Imogen, though not very agreeable in itself, and at present obsolete, is drawn with much humour and quaint extravagance. The description which Imogen gives of his unwelcome addresses to her—"Whose ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... closer to him. Suddenly the blaze in her violet eyes gave way to one of mirth. "Oh, you dear big booby!" she cried. "I was just testing you." And she clung to him, laughing. "You always beat me down—you always win. Bryce, dear, I'm the Laguna Grande Lumber Company—at least, I will be to-morrow, and I repeat for the ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... Filial piety's mighty strong in Spain." He swung on his heel abruptly, and strode back to the knot of men about his prisoner. "Here!" he shouted to them. "Bring him below." And he led the way down to the waist, and thence by the booby hatch to the gloom of the 'tween-decks, where the air was rank with the smell of tar and spun yarn. Going aft he threw open the door of the spacious wardroom, and went in followed by a dozen of the hands with the pinioned Spaniard. Every man aboard ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... (d. 1742), actor, originally performed at Bartholomew and Southwark fairs. On 27 Oct. 1721 his name appears as Sir Epicure Mammon in the Alchemist at Drury Lane. Here he remained for eleven years, taking the parts of booby squires, fox-hunters, etc., proving himself what Victor calls 'a jolly facetious low comedian'. His good voice was serviceable in ballad opera and farce. On account of his 'natural timidity', according to Davies, he was selected by Highmore, the patentee, in order to test ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... a rage! Curse the fellow! He has countermined me; blown up my works! I might easily have foreseen it, had I not been a stupid booby. I could beat my thick scull against the wall! I have neither time nor patience to tell you what I mean; except that here he is, and here he will remain, ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... insinuatingly, as if her understanding could only be seized at close quarters, "I make that observation, because poor Dick Boulby, your lamented husband—eh! poor Dick! You see, Missis, it ain't the tough ones last longest: he'd sing, 'I'm a Sea Booby,' to the song, 'I'm a green Mermaid:' poor Dick! 'a-shinin' upon the sea-deeps.' He kept the liquor from his head, but didn't mean it to stop down ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... neighbor? I saw him go out a little while ago. Besides, he doesn't listen, the big booby. And I tell you that ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... twenty-four hours," he said, "and you're annoying me. I tell you, all this will end very badly. And you will have brought it upon yourself; for I have been extraordinarily patient with you. You think you are following me, you great booby, whereas it's I who am following you; and I know all that you know about me, here. I spared you yesterday, in MY COMMUNISTS' ROAD; but I warn you, seriously, don't let me catch you there again! Upon my word, you don't seem able to take ...
— The Phantom of the Opera • Gaston Leroux
... puts his head out of the companion-way, looks at the cloud, comes up, and begins to walk the deck. The cloud spreads and comes on; the tub of yarns, the sail, and other matters, are thrown below, and the sky-light and booby-hatch put on, and the slide drawn over the forecastle. "Stand by the royal halyards''; and the man at the wheel keeps a good weather helm, so as not to be taken aback. The squall strikes her. If ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... perfectly confused by meeting something so wistful in all she encountered, that at last, with a Murrain to her, she cast her bewitching Eye upon me. I no sooner met it, but I bowed like a great surprized Booby; and knowing her Cause to be the first which came on, I cried, like a Captivated Calf as I was, Make way for the Defendant's Witnesses. This sudden Partiality made all the County immediately see the Sheriff also was become a Slave to the fine Widow. During ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... against the profane interruption to Mr. Crewe's speech, bent her head to enter Mr. Crewe's booby sleigh, which had his crest on the panel. Alice was hustled in next, but Victoria avoided his ready assistance and got in herself, Mr. Crewe ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... down to feel the pig, if there were any signs of life in it. He burnt his fingers, and to cool them he applied them in his booby fashion to his mouth. Some of the crumbs of the scorched skin had come away with his fingers, and for the first time in his life (in the world's life, indeed, for before him no man had known it) he tasted—crackling! Again he felt and fumbled at the pig. It did not burn him ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... security, to set him up in business; and the devil of a ha-penny could I ever screw out of him beyond principal and legal interest at five per cent; and, now he's made his forten, he's ashamed of the name that made it for him—a mean-spirited, henpecked booby, that cast his name to the dogs to please a silly wife's vanity. He have my property! I rather calculate not! And so, having disposed of all they, I think I'll leave my estates to some of brother Thomas's sons. ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... brutish cunning, or midnight hiding in the dark, for all we enjoy. It seems well known that the farmers themselves are the Rebeccaites, aided by their servants, and that the Rebecca is no other than some forward booby, or worse character, who ambitiously claims to act the leader, under the unmanly disguise of a female, yielding his post in turn to other such petticoat heros. The "Rebecca" seems no more than a living figure to give effect to the drama, as boys dress ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... enough!" And while with all this paltry stuff She sits tormenting every guest, Nor gives her tongue one moment's rest, In phrases batter'd, stale, and trite, Which modern ladies call polite; You see the booby husband sit In admiration at her wit! But let me now a while survey Our madam o'er her evening tea; Surrounded with her noisy clans Of prudes, coquettes, and harridans, When, frighted at the clamorous crew, Away the God of Silence flew, And fair Discretion ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... You, big and stout as father and mother put together, you can't find any expedient in your noddle? you can't plan any stratagem, invent any gallant intrigue to put matters straight? Fie! Plague on the booby! I wish I had had the two old fellows to bamboozle in former times; I should not have thought much of it; and I was no bigger than that, when I had given a hundred delicate proofs ...
— The Impostures of Scapin • Moliere (Poquelin)
... it's sweeping mines (to which my fancy somewhat leans) Or hanging out with booby-traps for the skulking submarines, I'm here to do my blooming best and give the ...
— A Treasury of War Poetry - British and American Poems of the World War 1914-1917 • Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by George Herbert Clarke
... assassins. The whole thing might prove to be a false alarm, an absurd scare, and then he, who based his whole life and his whole reputation on the theory that nothing ever could induce him to make himself ridiculous or to become bad form, might turn out to be the ludicrous hero of a country-house 'booby-trap.' To do him justice, he feared this result much more than the other. But he wanted to test himself—to find himself out. All this thinking had not as yet delayed his movements by a single step, but now he paused for one short second, and he felt his pulse. ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... are described lamenting their lost loves: Briseis was taken away by force from the Grecians, Creusa was lost for ever to her husband. But Achilles went roaring along the salt sea-shore, and, like a booby, was complaining to his mother when he should have revenged his injury by arms: AEneas took a nobler course; for, having secured his father and his son, he repeated all his former dangers to have found his wife, if she had been above ground. And here your lordship may observe the ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden
... window. Everything on a night like this, and to an uneasy conscience, menaced danger. At length it occurred to him that the applicant might be Louis, whom he had sent with the message to the Porte Neuve: and he took the lamp and went to admit him, albeit reluctantly, for what did the booby mean by returning? It was late, and only to open at this hour might, in the light cast ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... with the children every day, and their diligence in studying the A B C was beyond all praise. But they were terribly stupid. The children beat them easily, showing how true is the saying that 'youth is the time to learn.' The king was always booby, and Makarooroo ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne
... had become so great a man. His father had been singularly hard of belief. Not until the news of the defence of Arcot arrived in England was the old gentleman heard to growl out that, after all, the booby had something in him. His expressions of approbation became stronger and stronger as news arrived of one brilliant exploit after another; and he was at length immoderately fond ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the bridge which he was about to mount to have a look at the standard compass and see what course the helmsman was steering, on his way from the poop, where I had noticed him talking with the skipper as I came up the booby-hatch from below. "Hullo, Haldane!" he cried, shouting almost in my ear, and giving me a playful dig in the ribs at the same time; this nearly knocked all the breath out of my body. "Is that ...
— The Ghost Ship - A Mystery of the Sea • John C. Hutcheson
... mother grew as yellow as a quince, and her appearance did not contradict the tongues of those who declared that Doctor Rouget was killing her by inches. The behavior of her booby of a son must have added to the misery of the poor woman so unjustly accused. Not restrained, possibly encouraged by his father, the young fellow, who was in every way stupid, paid her neither the attentions nor ...
— The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... not often that the angling clubs which encourage prize-taking offer booby consolations for the smallest fish, but I have known exceptions, especially at the holiday competitions by the seaside. The biggest fish are another matter altogether. Sooner or later the world is bound to hear of them. And who dare say us nay? That man was ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior
... the person who has succeeded in fastening the appendage the nearest to its natural dwelling place, receives a prize, and the player who has given the most eccentric position to the tail entrusted to his care, receives the "booby" prize, generally some gift of a nature to cause a ...
— Entertainments for Home, Church and School • Frederica Seeger
... good-will, by a lively desire to please, but of which each word is a douche of cold water; and then the hearty hand-shakes of rivals, of comrades, some very frank, others that communicate to you the weakness of their grasp; the pretentious great booby, at whose idiotic eulogy you must appear to be transported with gladness, and who, lest he should spoil you too much, accompanies it with "a few little reserves," and the other, who, while overwhelming you with compliments, demonstrates ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... there was Henry Meltham, Sir Hugh's younger son; rather good-looking, and a pleasant fellow to flirt with: but BEING a younger son, that is all he is good for; then there was young Mr. Green, rich enough, but of no family, and a great stupid fellow, a mere country booby! and then, our good rector, Mr. Hatfield: an HUMBLE admirer he ought to consider himself; but I fear he has forgotten to number humility among ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... Rossbach produced a permanent effect on the French military, and on France, and was one of the causes of the Revolution. The disgrace was laid to the account of the French commander, the Prince de Soubise, who was a profligate, a coward, and a booby, and who neither knew war ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various
... appeared in 1740. He described it as "written in the manner of Cervantes," and in Parson Adams there is the same quaint blending of the humorous and the pathetic as in the Knight of La Mancha. Although such characters as Lady Booby and Mrs. Slipslop are admittedly ridiculous, Parson Adams remains an admirable study of a simple-minded clergyman ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... go up, I wear them," said Dick composedly. "Why not? It's a roomy suit, and I hate a great topper on my head; I've had enough of that here on Sundays. But it's slow up at your office. The chaps there aren't half up to any larks. I made a first-rate booby-trap, though, one day for an old yellow buffer who came in to see you. He was in a bait when he found the waste-paper ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... shall easily discover which of these two gentlemen is the champion. In the mean time, the first paper leads our suspicions more towards Izard than Adams, from the circumstance of style, and because he is quite booby enough not to see the injury he would do to the President by such ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... him at the top of his class, and it was curious to note the rapidity with which he gravitated to the inevitable bottom. The youth was given up by his teachers as an incorrigible dunce—one of them pronouncing him to be a "stupendous booby." Yet, slow though he was, this dunce had a sort of dull energy of purpose in him, which grew with his muscles and his manhood; and, strange to say, when he at length came to take part in the practical business ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... was lame, "or that?" And in this manner he asked me of whoever was old or ugly in the room. I made no sort of answer: and when he found that I was resolutely silent, and walked on as much as I could without observing him, he suddenly stamped his foot, and cried out in a passion, "Fool! idiot! booby!" ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... coaxed Dick, pushing them gently. "Dexter, I told you you'd be a booby in any fight where you couldn't have it all your own way. I was right about it. Get up, now—and make your fly-away while I'm still able to hold these two bulldogs in leash. ...
— The Grammar School Boys of Gridley - or, Dick & Co. Start Things Moving • H. Irving Hancock
... written to her for so long. On account of anonymous letters he received; because he thought that he no longer loved her. I instantly comprehended his object. I am frantic for her, when I think what a satisfied face the booby will take with him to Mexico! And that poor girl has been crying ever since this morning. I am pleased. I foresaw everything, we must hold ourselves proudly, especially when the man wants to draw back. He invents excuses, and the poor woman believes she is deserving ...
— Marie Bashkirtseff (From Childhood to Girlhood) • Marie Bashkirtseff
... two kernels brown I take: This on my cheek for Lubberkin is worn, And Booby Clod on t'other side is borne; But Booby Clod soon drops upon the ground, A certain token that his love's unsound; While Lubberkin sticks firmly to the last. Oh! were his lips to mine ...
— The Book of Hallowe'en • Ruth Edna Kelley
... gleaming, as he set his great body against the leash, and gave evidence of a sincere desire to make free lunch of the Bannister youths. As Buster Brown afterward stated, "Neither one would take the booby prize at a beauty show, but at that, the bulldog had a better chance than Bildad!" T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., let it be recorded, could not have qualified as a judge, since his undivided attention was awarded to ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... Inc., into full operation. He fought savagely against personal publicity, but he worked himself half to death. He spent hours every day in frenzied haggling, and in the cynical examination of deftly booby-trapped business proposals. His lawyers insisted that he needed an office—he did—and presently he had four secretaries and there developed an entire hierarchy of persons under him. One day his chief secretary told him commiseratingly ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... dumb looking, overgrown young person. To get anything out of him I alternately prodded and fondled; he was a cross between a big booby and ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith
... the impression given by the German press of political powerlessness, of social ignorance and incompetence, and of boorish ignorance of the laws of common decency in international comment and controversy. A great scholar may be a booby in a drawing-room, and a lamentable failure as an adviser in matters political and social. "As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place." Germany has put some astonishing failures to her credit through ...
— Germany and the Germans - From an American Point of View (1913) • Price Collier
... "What a good-natured booby, fool, idiot, I am!" he cried, with a scornful laugh. "No, it is she who has been false and untruthful, she who must acknowledge it, she who is bound to give me, once for all, full explanation. Yes, it is she who must bend, and then she may have ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... my return to Paris to avoid being present at the great fete in honour of the peace. I know no sensation more painful than these public rejoicings in which the heart refuses to participate. We feel a sort of contempt for this booby people which comes to celebrate the yoke preparing for it: these dull victims dancing before the palace of their sacrificer: this first consul designated the father of the nation which he was about ...
— Ten Years' Exile • Anne Louise Germaine Necker, Baronne (Baroness) de Stael-Holstein
... want an idea most dreadfully," the young lady rejoined, taking the proffered chair. "I want something for a booby prize for a backgammon tournament. I don't suppose anybody ever heard of a backgammon tournament before, but it's going to be great fun. We are doing it to take the conceit out of a young man we know, who declares that there's nothing in backgammon that he didn't learn the first time he ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller
... was called to the Bar, I'd an appetite fresh and hearty, But I was, as many young barristers are, An impecunious party. I'd a swallow-tail coat of a beautiful blue - A brief which was brought by a booby - A couple of shirts and a collar or two, And a ring ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... rise for the purpose"—— On hearing the sound of his voice, the lady president rushed to the edge of the platform, and glaring on the upright figure, which shook like an aspen beneath her fiery eyes, exclaimed, in thundering accents, "What are you standing there for, you booby-faced, blubber-chopped baboon in boots?" ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... Wilson's flaming bills of "Dancing at the Old Bailey," which are so profusely stuck up about the city, are said to have occasioned several awkward jokes and blunders; among others related, is that of a great unintellectual Yorkshire booby, who, after staring at the bills with his mouth open, and his saucer eyes nearly starting out of his head with astonishment, exclaimed, "Dang the buttons on't, I zee'd urn dangling all of a row last Wednesday at ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... the bar the booby Bettesworth, Tho' half-a-crown outpays his sweat's worth, Who knows in law nor text nor margent, ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous |
