"Ventriloquist" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... society, and, notwithstanding his lowly calling, had great wit and literary attainments, and was intimate with Handel, and many noblemen. Probably he would not have obtained a place in this Magazine but for the circumstances of his death. There was, it seems, one Honeyman, a blacksmith, who was a ventriloquist, and could speak with his mouth closed. He was introduced to Britton, and, by way of a joke, told him in a sepulchral voice that he should die in a few hours. Britton never recovered the shock, but died a few days afterwards in 1714. Among the humorous pieces in this Magazine, ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... conclude that there was a humour in tone as well as of rhythm in fashion before the time of Aristophanes, and we read that there was a certain ventriloquist named Eurycles; but Aristophanes must be content to bear the reproach of having been the first to introduce punning. He probably had accomplices among his contemporaries, but they have been lost in obscurity. Playing with words ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... business, or of a society wherein Vautrin becomes chief of police, are upon the face of it extra-mundane. It suffices that, as a general rule, in fiction-making the true artist finds an ample, if restricted, field wherein the proper functions of the preacher, or the ventriloquist, or the photographer, or of the public prosecutor, are exercised with ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... soon discovered that it was imperative, to insure a pleasant entertainment, that humor should be largely mingled with pathos; hence, he introduced a series of droll and comical pieces, in the rendition of which he is acknowledged to have no equal. As a mimic and ventriloquist he stands preeminent, and his entertainment is so varied with pathos, wit, and humor, that an evening's amusement of wonderful versatility ...
— Incidents of the War: Humorous, Pathetic, and Descriptive • Alf Burnett
... Barnum's efforts to save him, imprisoned for many months for advising a negro barber who was shaving him to run away to the Free States or to Canada. To fill up his ranks Barnum now hired Bob White, a negro singer, and Joe Pentland, a clown, ventriloquist, comic singer, juggler, and sleight-of-hand performer, and also bought four horses and two wagons. He called this enlarged show "Barnum's Grand Scientific and ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... fancied he had hit upon a scheme to stop the card games from which he could not remain away. Being a skilled ventriloquist, he was the author of the dismal groans and the mysterious voice that had so alarmed ...
— Frank Merriwell's Chums • Burt L. Standish
... there, that ventriloquism was made use of in the ancient oracles? Was the [Greek: pneuma puthonos] (Acts, xvi. 16.) an example of the exercise of this art? Was the Witch of Endor a ventriloquist? or what is meant by the word [Greek: eggastrimuthos] at Isai. xix. 3., in ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 36. Saturday, July 6, 1850 • Various
... fond of Shakspere.' A few minutes after there were sounds of violent blows, and several sceptics were struck on the head by John King's speaking-trumpet; a sofa cushion was flung at me, and something else was thrown at the gentleman from Liverpool. A sceptic who had said that any ventriloquist could imitate a deep voice, got rapped violently on the head, and John King bellowed at the same time, 'Is that ventriloquism?' A man near me said he thought he felt a cold breeze passing over his hands, and a cold finger touch his. One thing ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... a powerful inclination to sing. Just, however, as he was about to commence for his own amusement, the coach stopped to change horses. In less than two minutes they started again, and Valentine, who then felt ready for anything, began to think seriously of the exercise of his power as a ventriloquist. ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... out now, Harry," said the professor, with a queer smile. "I am a ventriloquist, and that moan did ...
— Facing the World • Horatio Alger
... During his meteoric career at the University he had been made a member of the Alpha Delta fraternity, in recognition of his varied accomplishments. Not only could he sing and dance and tell a tale with the best, but he was also a mimic and a ventriloquist, gifts which had proven invaluable in crucial conflicts with the faculty, and had constituted him a hero in several escapades. Of such material is college history made, and the Alpha Delta, recognizing the distinction of possessing this unique member, refused to accept his ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice
... said, candidly; "but I supposed you was a ventriloquist, sir, and was a-puttin' up of ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... heart, we find is strangely like our own. His reveries, his sadnesses, his exhilarations, are all ours, too. Like us he cries, "I wish I were unflinching and emphatic, and had big bushy eyebrows and a Message for the Age. I wish I were a deep Thinker, or a great Ventriloquist." Like us he has only a ghost, a thin, unreal phantom in a world of bank cashiers and duchesses and prosperous merchants and other Real Persons. Like us he fights a losing battle against the platitudes and moral generalizations ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... one or two others, works them and gives them gesture, by means of strings, which are, however, so well contrived as to be scarcely visible; and Girolamo himself speaks for all, as, besides being a ventriloquist, he has a most astonishing faculty of varying his voice, and adapting it to the role of each puppet, so that the illusion is complete. The scenery and decorations are excellent. Sometimes he gives operas as well as dramas, and there is always a ballo, with transformation of one figure into ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... Nevertheless, it's an idea that a man never would have had, that of attributing your impertinence to something wrong in your digestion. It's not my Dolph, it's his stomach that was bold enough to speak. I did not know you were a ventriloquist, ...
— Petty Troubles of Married Life, Part First • Honore de Balzac
... understood, as he sat holding the piece of branch in one hand, the bird in the other. He glanced at us to see if we were watching him, and then smoothing the feathers quickly, he began to buzz and whirr like a beetle, as cleverly as a ventriloquist. Next he made the dead bird he held dart from its perch, and imitated the quick flight of one chasing a large beetle through the air, catching it, and returning to its perch, where with wonderful accuracy he went through the movements of it swallowing its prey, ...
— Through Forest and Stream - The Quest of the Quetzal • George Manville Fenn
... dream she is mystified by the voice of a ventriloquist, foretells that she will be deceived into ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller |
