"Jesting" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... night when I handed you the rough sketch I had made of the scarabaeus. You recollect, also, that I became quite vexed at you for insisting that my drawing resembled a death's-head. When you first made this assertion I thought you were jesting; but afterwards I called to mind the peculiar spots on the back of the insect, and admitted to myself that your remark had some little foundation in fact. Still, the sneer at my graphic powers irritated me—for I am considered a good ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... It is the fashion in the States to speak of "poor old Punch," and to affect astonishment at seeing in its "senile pages" anything that they have to admit to be funny. Doubtless a great deal of very laborious and vapid jesting goes on in the pages of the doyen of English comic weeklies; but at its best Punch is hard to beat, and its humours have often a literary quality such as is seldom met with in an American journal ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... treason is this," said the general, "that you have meditated against me,—me, who have ever treated you with honor, confiding in your words, as in those of a brother?" "You jest," replied the Inca, who, perhaps, did not feel the weight of this confidence; "you are always jesting with me. How could I or my people think of conspiring against men so valiant as the Spaniards? Do not jest with me thus, I beseech you."19 "This," continues Pizarro's secretary, "he said in the most composed and natural manner, smiling all ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... not arouse this, but, on the contrary, they answered all other questions properly, and without attributing any special significance to them. Our questions merely served them as a subject of mirth and jesting as to how such and such a one was to be set down in the list, when he was to be reckoned as two, and when two were to be reckoned ...
— The Moscow Census - From "What to do?" • Lyof N. Tolstoi
... Kennedy, "and talk without excitement. The moment you give up jesting about it, we ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... yesterday morning and saw Mr. Dutton standing there, leaning on the rail, with his bare head bowed between his hands. You can't think how it impressed Hugh. He said he felt reverent towards him all through that day, and he was quite angry with Rosalind and Adela for jesting because, when the shower began as we were coming out of church, Mr. Dutton rushed up with an umbrella, being the only person there who had one, I believe. Hugh says you may be proud of such a friend. I wish you could have seen Hugh.—Your ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... been ignorant that his friend's hold on life was precarious; some such scene as this had often been in his mind before; only, insensibly, Rainham's own jesting attitude towards his disabilities had half imposed on him, and made that possibility appear intangible and remote. But now, in view of the change which the last fortnight had wrought in him, he could cherish no illusions; the worst that was possible was all now that one could expect. ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... sprouting grass,'" answered the hemp-dresser in a slightly hoarse but terrible voice. "You must be jesting, my poor friends, singing us such time-worn songs. You see very well that we can stop you at the ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... brother; the late jesting Monsieur Makes now your brothers dying prophesie equall At all parts, being ...
— Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois • George Chapman
... Collins, this is no time for jesting. Go and dry these arms, and when you have them so that they can send a bullet from their throats, join Jackson and Philips in covering the boat. Weston and I will take up our ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... Expecting, I shall wait till at my door I see you enter, each and every one Tumultuous, eager all, with clamorous speech, To hide my stammering welcome and my tears. I am no host carousing long and late, Enticing guests with epicurean hints; Nor am I Timon, sick of this sad world, Who, jesting, cries, "The sky is overhead, And underneath that famous rest, the earth: Show me the man who can ...
— Poems • Elizabeth Stoddard
... them. Our medicines produce no effect on them, and all we can do is, like quacks, to increase the dose. Of course, if ten boxes of Morison's pills have killed a man, it only proves that—he ought to have taken twelve of them. We are jesting, but, as an Ulster Orangeman would say, "it is in ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... so little as to apprehend my jesting in a serious sense? Know that two of those whom you saw on my right hand are spies of the Landgrave. Their visit to me, I question not, was purposely made to catch some such discoveries as you, my friends, would too surely have thrown in their way, but for my determined rattling. ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... door had disappeared. An indefinable dream crept over Thusnelda, and she was cast down. For the first time a jest failed her trembling lips, and she wept with anguish. Yes, she, the keen, mordant, jesting little woman, prayed and implored her Maker to unloose her from the enchantment, and permit her to find the long-sought-for entrance. But praying was in vain, the door was not to be found, it was witch craft, and she must submit to it. The rustling ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... this way!" she said in amazement. "Surely you are jesting. Take the effect on the polling places alone. Compare those of New York with those of Denver, and I have seen them in full operation in both places. In the first is the atmosphere of barrooms; in the second the manners and air of drawing-rooms. If I were a Colorado man I should ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... jesting allusion to his office reminded him of his professional duties, he added: "I plumb forgot, Auntie Sue, this gentleman is Mr. Ross. He is one of William J. Burns's crack detectives. Don't be scared, though, ...
— The Re-Creation of Brian Kent • Harold Bell Wright
... talk, ribaldry, buffoonery, P; harlatrye, jesting Lat. scurrilitas (eutrapelia), W; ...
— A Concise Dictionary of Middle English - From A.D. 1150 To 1580 • A. L. Mayhew and Walter W. Skeat
... blue eyes; very tall, so much so that it was long before any of the royal robes could be found to fit him. He was anxious to imitate Constantius, often occupying himself with serious business till after midday, and being fond of jesting with his ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... and she had a thousand half-pouting, half-jesting complaints to urge. She put them forth rather incoherently; in fact, she talked for five minutes without giving her husband opportunity for a single word. Yet she loved him dearly, and had in her heart no objection to being saved ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... proposed that the example of Kamakura should be followed, and that an Imperial prince should be invited to assume the office of shogun. Thereupon Hotta Masatoshi, one of the junior ministers, vehemently remonstrated. "Is the prime minister jesting?" he is reported to have asked. "There is no question whatever as to the succession. That dignity falls to Tsunayoshi and to Tsunayoshi alone. He is the legitimate son of the late shogun, Iemitsu, and the only brother of the present shogun, Ietsuna. ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... mean what I say," she continued in a low voice that vibrated with emotion, for her obvious distress was enhanced by his evident belief that she was jesting. "I have given my word—written it—entered into a most solemn obligation. Somehow, the prospect of reaching a civilized place to-morrow induces a more ordered state of mind than has been possible since—since the Andromeda ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... soda fountain, and I feel that I'm all right as long as I can see that. The people get rather hazy occasionally, and have no features to speak of. But I do n't know that I look very impressive myself," he added in the jesting mood which seems the natural condition of Americans in ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... the evening. It fell to Antelope to open his bundle first. Loud laughter pealed forth when the reluctant youth brought forth a superb pair of moccasins—the recognized lovegift! At such times the warriors' jokes were unmerciful, for it was considered a last indulgence in jesting, perhaps for many moons. The recipient was well known to be a novice in love, and this token first disclosed the fact that he had at last succumbed to the allurements of woman. When he sang his love-song he was obliged ...
— Old Indian Days • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... of the ride outside the walls, of the grand fete given by Hugh de Meung, of the feasting and the drinking in which I took little part. Only of the end of the adventure will I write, which begins with where I stood jesting with Philippa herself—ah, dear God, she was wondrous beautiful. A great lady—ay, but before that, and after that, ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... he said, "to be forever looking up at the same beams and rafters, and out upon the same cabbage patch. I have a queer humour of my own, too, and I might be jesting and scorning where I should be silent. Sir Arthur and I might not long agree. Besides, what would the country do for its gossip—the blithe clatter at e'en about the fire? Who would bring news from one farm-town to another—gingerbread to the lassies, mend fiddles for the lads, ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... think, Mr. Bertram, with your worthy friend here, that I have been rather jesting with edge-tools; and although neither you nor I, nor any sensible man, can put faith in the predictions of astrology, yet, as it has sometimes happened that inquiries into futurity, undertaken in jest, have in their results produced serious ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... that—by the bridge! Now stop this jesting, dear General, and do as I would have done ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... it was that same motive kept you there, at peace for three whole years, in slothful ease, the motleyed Fool, jesting and capering for his enemy's delectation—you, a man with the knightly memory of your foully-wronged parent to cry hourly shame upon you. No doubt you lacked the opportunity to bring the tyrant to account. Or was it that you were content to let him make a mock of you so long as he ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... backward, and the Vizier beat him. So he turned to the Vizier and said to him, "What art thou that thou shouldst beat me? It is no fault of mine: didst thou not bid me ask some considerable thing? Let me go to my own country." With this, the Sultan knew that he was jesting and took patience with him awhile; then turned to him and said, "O my brother, ask of me some considerable thing, befitting our dignity." So the stoker said, "O King of the age, I ask first of God and then ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous
... of piquant interest. She had never had a flirtation with a man of this character, therefore there was all the zest of novelty. Had she been less fearless, she would have shrunk from it, however, with something of the superstitious dread that many have of jesting in a church, or a graveyard. But there was a trace of hardihood in her present course that just took her fancy. From lack of familiarity with the class, she had a vague impression that ministers differed ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... jesting with the name of Caesar," he said, sternly. "This is Caesar's ring. Doubtless it was stolen from him. You may have taken it from the robber by force, or fraud, or as a gift—I know not which—but do not mock me with such a ...
— For the Temple - A Tale of the Fall of Jerusalem • G. A. Henty
... suspect that the renegade gunner had betrayed him; and he stepped back and drew out his knife, also taking the gunner's out of its sheath; so that the Turk, seeing him with two knives, threw down his sword, saying he was only jesting. But the gunner, seeing that Rawlins suspected him, whispered something in his ear, calling Heaven to witness that he had never breathed a word of the enterprise, and never would. Nevertheless, Rawlins kept the knives in his sleeve all night, and was somewhat troubled, though afterwards ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... morning at seven the sick-watchers[7] took their seats in the queen's chamber, sharing with the Countess of Provence, the Princesse de Lamballe, and the Count d'Artois the task of keeping order and quiet in the sick-room till eleven at night. Though there was no scandal, there was plenty of jesting at so novel an arrangement. Wags proposed that in the case of the king being taken ill, a list should be prepared of the ladies who should tend his sick-bed. However, the champions were not long on duty: at the end of ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... and joyous,—as irresponsible as a young colt freshly turned out to pasture. His sister Laure, now living at Villeparisis with her parents, continued to receive his confidences. He wrote her the most minute details of his solitary existence,—jesting and burlesquing in a vein of ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... they have no peculiar religious significance, but that they afford the parent a vital opportunity for direct religious instruction. These questions must be treated seriously; something is missing in parental consciousness when the child's questions furnish only material for jesting relation to ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope
... He was not jesting. All the man's pride rose to assert dominion. The prime characteristic of his nation, that personal arrogance which is the root of English freedom, which accounts for everything best, and everything worst, in the growth of English power, possessed him to the exclusion of all less essential ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... almost volatile nature kindles the philosophy of hers. She knows now that Floyd Grandon did not marry her for love, that he did not even profess to, and that in most marriages there is at least a profession of love at the beginning, and it is very sweet. Even such half-jesting love as these two young people make unblushingly before her face, in the naughty audacity of youth, is delightful. Mr. Grandon could never do or say such things; he is too grave ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... how her boy would stand the blow, but he'd took it like the brave, staunch man he was, being such a help to her when they had to move to a furnished room near the old home where they both had been so happy. He'd fairly made the place ring with his musical laughter and his merry jesting about their hardships. ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... and Urtas; then turning a corner saw Jifna at some distance, in the midst of a plain enclosed by hills; and there it must have been that the manipulus with S.P.Q.R. was posted in front of Italian tents, and the soldiers bustling about or jesting in Latin or British language, before their retiring to rest, in the spring season of the ...
— Byeways in Palestine • James Finn
... sleep, was disposed to look upon the matter as a tipsy man's jest. So, says I merrily: 'And what price shall I pay for this palace of mine, which is but twelve feet square, and my five poor pagodas a month? The Devil take you and your jesting: I have paid my price twice over in sickness.' At that moment my man turns full towards me: so that by the moonlight I could see every line and wrinkle of his face. Then my drunken mirth died out of me, as I have seen the waters of our great rivers die away in one night; and I, Duncan Parrenness, ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... week," she says, "I thought he had the secret of happiness." At the end of the week she was "weeping with disgust, suffering and discouragement." She had hoped to find in him the devotion of a consoler, but she found "nothing but cold and bitter jesting."(16) This experiment ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... you did not half appreciate Gratiano's jesting. Miss Levice, I am afraid you allow the sorry things of life to take too strong a hold on you. It is not right. I assure you for every tear there is a laugh, and you must learn to forget the former ...
— Other Things Being Equal • Emma Wolf
... this occupation, the Russians were known not to be far away. The sailors were soon at work hacking down the undergrowth and lopping off branches of trees. Some were making them up into faggots as fast as the others cut them, and all were laughing and jesting ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... of lovers can ill brook the least jesting with the names of their mistresses. However, Jones, though he had enough of the lover and of the heroe too in his disposition, did not resent these slanders as hastily as, perhaps, he ought to have done. To ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... Savannah—these gigantic and tremendous operations have something of that grandeur which is familiar to our thoughts—which, indeed, constitutes the staple of the ordinary American speech, apparently having all the characteristics of exaggerated jesting and idle boast. We frequently hear our enthusiastic countrymen talk of anchoring Great Britain in one of our northern lakes. They speak contemptuously of the petty jurisdictions of European powers contrasted with the magnificent domain of our States, and they sneer ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... to pay you—without lying, that is. To judge by your figure and complexion you have lived hard since I saw you last! I cannot surely be QUITE so naked as your ladyship!—I beg your pardon, madam! I trust you will take it I am but jesting in a dream! It is of no consequence, however; dreaming or waking, all's one—all merest appearance! You can't be certain of anything, and that's as good as knowing there is nothing! Life may ...
— Lilith • George MacDonald
... instinctive objection, a kind of natural antipathy such as has existed in all ages between the dwellers in a town and those in the country, between agriculture and trade. So, while Kinraid and Sylvia kept up their half-tender, half-jesting conversation, Kester was making up his slow persistent mind as to the desirability of the young man then present as a husband for his darling, as much from his being other than Philip in every respect, as from the individual good qualities ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. II • Elizabeth Gaskell
... a perfect whirlwind of joy. Where before had sounded only the moanings of despair, now the banks of Yellow Creek rang with laughter and joyous voices, bragging, hoping, jesting. One and all saw their long-dimmed hopes looming bright in the ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... scientific problems of mind and matter had awakened in him during the winter. Then he walked his physician off to Daddy during the dinner hour and boldly introduced him as a friend. The young doctor, having been forewarned, treated the situation admirably, took up a jaunty and jesting tone, and, finally, putting morals entirely aside, invited Daddy to consider himself as a scientific case, and deal with himself as such for the benefit ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... truth?" said jesting Pilate, and would not wait for an answer; the Parisians of 1870 are as indifferent about truth as this unjust Roman judge was. It is strange that their own want of veracity does not lead them to doubt that of others; they are alike credulous and mendacious. ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... highness, and listen to me! I foresee misfortune for you. Believe my prophecy, and that misfortune may yet be averted. Mark the signs by which fate would warn you! Did you not yesterday see Elizabeth driving through the streets, chatting and jesting with the soldiers, who crowded around her sledge? Have you not heard how the grenadiers of the Preobrajensky regiment shouted after her? Has it not been told you that Lestocq holds secret intercourse with the French ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... Littlefield was a willing listener; but it seemed to her that she had come in at the second act of the play. Bruce went off with Miss Crowe's promise to drive with him in the afternoon. In the afternoon he swept up to the door in a prancing, tinkling sleigh. After some minutes of hoarse jesting and silvery laughter in the keen wintry air, he swept away again with Lizzie curled up in the buffalo-robe beside him, like a kitten in a rug. It was dark when they returned. When Lizzie came in to the sitting-room fire, she was congratulated by her hostess upon having made ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... bends his brows the boldest eye goes down; Not more submissive Israel heard and saw At Sinai's foot the Giver of the Law. Less stern he seems, who sits in equal Mate On the twin throne and shares the empire's weight; Around his lips the subtle life that plays Steals quaintly forth in many a jesting phrase; A lightsome nature, not so hard to chafe, Pleasant when pleased; rough-handled, not so safe; Some tingling memories vaguely I recall, But to forgive him. God forgive ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... what might have been natural in an occasional visitor to the Rectory and Maple Cottage. He saw and meant no harm to her in his admiration, and had no idea at present that his occasional smile or idle jesting compliment made the girl's cheeks burn, her heart beat fast, made her nights restless and her days long. He took it for granted that gratified vanity alone made her receive his attentions with pleasure. His ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... fledgling," he said, half jesting, half in scorn. "But knowest thou, to fight in very earnest is something different than to read and chant it in a minstrel's lay? Better hie thee back to Florence, boy; the mail suit and crested helm are not for such as thee—better shun them now, than after ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... chair, and in less time, perhaps, than Absalom staid on his mule after his hair brought him to grief, he was reduced to ordinary humanity. He felt his loss keenly. I ventured to compliment him on features which I had never seen till then, and he answered, with asperity, that it was "no jesting matter." ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... the market-place, it was to find a very different scene from the one of the day before. The place was thronged with soldiers, but they were not laughing and jesting; instead, little groups congregated around the stalls and talked excitedly. Some of the old women had covered their faces with their black aprons, and were rocking back and forth on their chairs in ...
— Lucia Rudini - Somewhere in Italy • Martha Trent
... treasure-ship Nuestra Senora de la Concepcion, nicknamed the Spitfire because she was better armed than most of the ships plying on that coast. As they ballasted the Golden Hynde with silver from her huge hulk the jesting seamen dubbed her the Spit-silver. The little flagship was literally brimful of silver bars, ingots of gold, pieces of eight, and jewels whose value has never been accurately known. The Spanish Adelantados, accustomed to trust in their remoteness for defense, frantically ...
— Days of the Discoverers • L. Lamprey
... it wrought a dire effect, as it spread beyond the purlieus of the palace. Liberty of criticism was as easy to the rude multitude as to the witlings of the Court, and its effects, when it spread to that multitude, were far more deadly. The King's judgment might condemn, but his facile love of jesting made him inclined to listen to, the empty and sordid chatter of frivolity that sounded through his Court. "Meanwhile," says Clarendon, "all men of virtue and sobriety, of which there were very many in the King's family, were grieved and heartbroken with hearing what they could not choose but hear, ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... this volume has felt the importance of his task, and diligently sought how to distinguish true wit from false,—the pure gold from Brummagem brass. He has carefully perused the Eight learned chapters on "Thoughts on Jesting," by Frederick Meier, Professor of Philosophy at Halle, and Member of the Royal Academy of Berlin, wherein it is declared that a jest "is an extreme fine Thought, the result of a great Wit and Acumen, which are eminent Perfections of the Soul." ... "Hypocrites, with the appearance ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... exuberant expression of an affection purely platonic, not to say brotherly. When he had repeated it more earnestly, she had laughed at him, and he had laughed with her in a way which disarmed all her suspicions. But each time that he said it he laughed less, until she realized that he was not jesting. Then she reproached herself a little for having let the intimacy grow, and determined to persuade him by gentle means that he had made a mistake. She felt that she was responsible for his conduct, because she had not been wise enough to ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... particularly about bad language and bad talking, and the evil it leads to. S. Paul speaks about it very plainly when he says, speaking of the things that should not be named amongst Christians, "neither filthiness nor foolish talking nor jesting, which are not convenient." Now, boys, all indecent words and conversations are wrong—they are sinful, unmanly, degrading. I know you cannot help hearing much that is wrong. Shame, be it said, to the men of England—yes, men who ...
— Boys - their Work and Influence • Anonymous
... are very many doubts which the human race cannot abandon. The truth is that people love to lose themselves, and this is a kind of ramble of the mind, which is unwilling to subject itself to attention, to order, to rules. It seems as though we are so accustomed to games and jesting that we play the fool even in the most serious occupations, and when we least ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz
... approached, she endeavored to shrink out of sight behind a perpendicular projection of the wall, and nearly succeeded. They had passed, indeed, before they noticed her. Then they turned and gazed curiously at her; and one of them made some remark, apparently of a jesting nature, for they both laughed. Then again they turned and moved on out of sight ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No. 6, December 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... night, long after the villagers had gone to bed, the festivities in the castle were continued. Wine flowed free and the revellers became more and more boisterous. From mere jesting they came to quarrelling, and, in the midst of their drunken orgy, there was heard an alarm. A sentry on the walls of the castle reported that he heard stealthy movements in the distance as of a large number of ...
— Legend Land, Vol. 1 • Various
... not jesting? can the dead come to life? God be praised if it be so! Our poor lost boy restored to our arms after all these cruel years! Ah, it seems too good to be true, it IS too good to be true—I charge thee, have pity, do not trifle with me! Quick—come to the light—let ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... course you may have overheard some such jesting nonsense. But would one be in earnest about so ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... truth; you suppose me to be better than I really am, and attach a greater merit to me than God ever intended should be the case. Spare me, sire; for, did I not know that your majesty was the most generous man in your kingdom, I should believe you were jesting." ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... not communicate this opinion to the prisoner, but he treated the subject in a jesting manner, and told him that if he heard any more of such nonsense he would inform the prison authorities and his liberty would ...
— Bucholz and the Detectives • Allan Pinkerton
... How now, son! I am not given to jesting. I have chosen The fairest wife in Italy for you. You won her bravely, as a soldier should: And when you'd woo her, stretch your gauntlet out, And crush her fingers in its steely grip. If you will plead, I ween, she dare not say— No, by your leave. Should she refuse, howe'er, With that same ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... put off Josephine with a laugh and a jesting word, but he nevertheless conversed earnestly and seriously with his most intimate personal friends on the subject of his assuming the crown. In the course of one of these interviews, ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... man in evening dress, generally conscious of his white tie and starched shirt, and a sprinkling of unattached young women with roving eyes. Hilliard, excited by the success of his advances, and by companionship after long solitude, became very unlike himself, talking and jesting freely. Most of the conversation passed between him and Miss Ringrose; Eve had fallen into an absent mood, answered carelessly when addressed, laughed without genuine amusement, and sometimes wore the look of trouble which ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing
... of the Common Pleas in Ireland. His humour was broad, and his absolute indifference to propriety often saved the situation by converting a serious matter into a wholly ludicrous one. His Court was in constant uproar, owing to his noisy jesting, and like a noted old Scottish judge he would have his joke when the life of a human being was hanging in the balance. Even on his own deathbed he could not resist the impulse. On hearing that his friend Lord ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... soul that she usually was, had grown quite serious when Torbert spoke of a collision and an accident. Her voice was earnest as she said, "Now, Mr. Torbert, stop your jesting right away and tell ...
— Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York • Lemuel Ely Quigg
... and bells and the coxcomb of which Rabelais once made a sceptre, and let us pursue the course of this inquiry without giving to one joke more seriousness than comports with it, and without giving to serious things the jesting tone ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... some jesting answer; but it had been given to me to see that transient shadow of pain and despair, and I knew that the discomfort of the garments of civilisation had nothing to do with the swallowing of the ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... sent to pay him the money. This being accomplished the agent returned to the depot to take the train back to St. Louis when he was surprised to see the supposed sufferer stumping around on his crutches on the depot platform, laughing and jesting over the ease with which he had beaten ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... without troubling any one, for none took the least further notice of me. The party was in high spirits—lounging about and jesting—speaking sometimes of trifling matters very seriously, and of serious matters as triflingly—and exercising their wit in particular to great advantage on their absent friends and their affairs. I was too ignorant of what they were talking about to understand much of it, and too anxious and ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: German (V.2) • Various
... the office, he opened and looked over the mail, and during the hours of the morning he passed from one room to another, his shrewd eye seeing every thing, and measuring men and work, chatting and jesting as he went. But out of those shrewd eyes looked a kind and gentle heart. He knew by name the men and women and children employed in the various parts of the great buildings, interested himself in their family stories, and often ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... dubious to be entirely palatable to my feminine pride; but I was careful not to hint this to Miss Darrell, and she went on in the same light jesting way. ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... he would not reach the house that evening before 11 o'clock. He explained that he expected an art dealer. In reality he had just recalled his promise to stop at the house of Mimi. Herman, suspecting his design, made some jesting allusion to it, which caused Olga to ask what he meant. He evaded her question, and Millar, seeing another excellent opportunity to point a moral, declared that he heard ...
— The Devil - A Tragedy of the Heart and Conscience • Joseph O'Brien
... Knight did straight submit, 915 And laid his weapons at her feet. Next he disrob'd his gaberdine, And with it did himself resign. She took it, and forthwith divesting The mantle that she wore, said jesting, 920 Take that, and wear it for my sake Then threw it o'er his sturdy back, And as the FRENCH, we conquer'd once, Now give us laws for pantaloons, The length of breeches, and the gathers, 925 Port-cannons, perriwigs, and feathers; Just so the proud insulting ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... with me in this free manner. I am not in a sportive humour now: where is the money? we being strangers here, how dare you trust so great a charge from your own custody?" Dromio hearing his master, as he thought him, talk of their being strangers, supposing Antipholis was jesting, replied merrily, "I pray you, sir, jest as you sit at dinner: I had no charge but to fetch you home, to dine with my mistress and her sister." Now Antipholis lost all patience, and beat Dromio, who ran home, and told his mistress that his ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... Democratic procession that was marching along the street. While he rambled on in his breaking voice, which had begun to grow weak and old, I gazed over his head at the political banners with their familiar, jesting inscriptions. ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... made my way toward the State House I was conscious of a feeling of relief. I had no sooner gained a front seat in the gallery of the House of Representatives when the members rose, the Senate marched gravely in, the Speaker stopped jesting with the Chaplain, and over the Chaplain's face came suddenly an agonized expression. Folding his hands across his stomach he began to call on God with terrific fervour, in an intense and resounding voice. I was struck suddenly by the irony of it all. Why have a legislature ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... "Jack Warder and I are only half-fledged specimens. You should see the old fellows." Thus jesting, we rode as we were able until we reached the "banks of the Schuylkill, picketed on both shores, but on the west side not below the lower ferry, where already my companion was laying a floating bridge which ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell
... in a patched-up corner of the old Mission ruin opposite Rollinson's Ford. A few lounging "Excelsior" boys were equally astonished to see Jovita's red rose crest and black mantilla glide by, and followed her unvarying smile and jesting salutation up to the shadow of the crumbling portal. At vespers nearly all Buckeye, hitherto virtuously skeptical and good-humoredly secure in Works without Faith, made a point of attending; it was ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... church, and had noticed from behind his own curtains that one was rather pretty. This led him to think of Cherry again, and to recall the quaint yet melancholy grace of her figure as she sat on the stool opposite. Why had she withdrawn it so abruptly; did she consider his jesting allusion to it indecorous and presuming? Had he really meant it seriously; and was he beginning to think too much about her? Would she ever come again? How nice it would be if she returned from church alone early, and they could have a comfortable chat ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... in the room at the Gull's Nest when Robin recounted to the Buccaneer the peril in which Barbara had been placed; and the young sailor speedily forgot the meek jesting of the maiden in the ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... I see her now," continued the shopkeeper: "she was leaning against the counter near the scales, jesting with a fisherman of Marly, old Husson, who can tell you the same; and she called him a fresh water sailor. 'My husband,' said she, 'was a real sailor, and the proof is, he would sometimes remain years on a voyage, ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... above "article" gave the Committee his name they were amused and thought that he was simply jesting, having done a smart thing in conquering his master by escaping; but on a fuller investigation they found that he really bore the name, and meant to retain it in Canada. It had been given him when a child, and in ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... roused in Shakespeare by the episode, even if potent at the moment, were not likely to be deep-seated or enduring. And it is possible that a half-jesting reference, which would deprive Shakespeare's amorous adventure of serious import, was made to it by a literary comrade in a poem that was licensed for publication on September 3, 1594, and was published immediately under the title of 'Willobie his Avisa, or the ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... From his view-point the situation was too serious for jesting. It was outrageous that he, the son of John P. Whittington, should be expected to shift for himself like an ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman
... She thought that Choulette was mocking. But he denied the charge, indignantly, and Miss Bell said that Madame Martin was wrong. It was a fault of the French, she said, to think that people were always jesting. ...
— The Red Lily, Complete • Anatole France
... the bed sheets and knot them together," was Jimmie's next suggestion, delivered in a half jesting mood. ...
— Boy Scouts Mysterious Signal - or Perils of the Black Bear Patrol • G. Harvey Ralphson
... into her bower is sent, And ribbald rhyme and jesting spent; The lover's whisper'd words and few Have bade the bashful maid adieu; The dancing-floor is silent quite— No foot bounds there, Good ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... suggested a prayer with him, and Penny agreed in the half-jesting words: "But you'll—have to do it all for me, just as you poured the tea down. I'm no good at that sort ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... sold his horse and cart to a trader for two marks. Then they set forth upon their way, the Sheriff riding upon his horse and Robin running beside him. Thus they left Nottingham Town and traveled forward along the dusty highway, laughing and jesting together as though they had been old friends. But all the time the Sheriff said within himself, "Thy jest to me of Robin Hood shall cost thee dear, good fellow, even four hundred pounds, thou fool." For he thought he would make at least ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... jesting here. In the very spirit of serious truth, we assure you, that the delusion about "jentaculum" is even exceeded by this other delusion about "prandium." Salmasius himself, for whom a natural prejudice of place and time partially obscured the truth, admits, however, that prandium was a meal ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... said Maxley gravely. "Before I lets you go, you must tell me whether you be jesting, or whether you have really been so simple as to drop fourteen—thousand—pounds at Hardie's?" No judge upon the bench, nor bishop in his stall, could be more impressive than this gardener was, when he subdued the vast volume of his ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... enough to himself; but Lydia paused, as if in doubt whether he was jesting or not, before she asked, "Why were you ...
— The Lady of the Aroostook • W. D. Howells
... a Cynic philosopher of Gadara, who made money in Thebes by usury, lost it, and hanged himself. He wrote satirical pieces, which are lost; some said that they were the joint work of two friends, Dionysius and Zopyrus of Colophon, in whom it was one jest the more to ascribe their jesting to Menippus. These pieces were imitated by Terentius ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... care with which a careful girl chooses a sweetheart. That is why he raises himself from his blanket of nights and listens to the tread of every horse's hoofs on the distant road. That is why he broods suspiciously for days upon a jesting remark or an unusual movement of a tried comrade, or the broken mutterings of his closest friend, sleeping by ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... hailed by the administration in power, not as the Father of your Country, perhaps, but as its savior. Take this woman out of our camp, and into your own. Flock your own fowl together, you Free Soilers! Take her out of Washington, get her back to Europe—where she belongs,—and, without jesting, my dear Sir, you shall have the backing next year, two years hence—in 1853,—any time you like—of the men who make this administration, and of the men behind this compromise. A majority of the House, an even division of the Senate—Listen, my dear friend, this is not idle talk, ...
— The Purchase Price • Emerson Hough
... "don't let us waste time which is precious; we shall have, I hope, many better seasons for jesting desipere in loco is the maxim of Horace. I more than suspect this has been brought on by the villany ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... to me how that quarrel had arisen, and he said that, so far as he could judge, it was a wrong and foolish one on England's part. He added, in a jesting way, that perhaps George Washington might gain almost as great a name in history as George the Third. But there was no harm in his way of saying this: it was said laughingly, ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... was he in games of hazard, In all games of skill and hazard, Pugasaing, the Bowl and Counters, Kuntassoo, the Game of Plum-stones. Though the warriors called him Faint-Heart, Called him coward, Shaugodaya, Idler, gambler, Yenadizze, Little heeded he their jesting, Little cared he for their insults, For the women and the maidens Loved the handsome Pau-Puk-Keewis. He was dressed in shirt of doeskin, White and soft, and fringed with ermine, All inwrought with beads of wampum; He was dressed in ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... their al-fresco lodging. Large fires had been lighted, composed in great part of odoriferous shrubs and bushes abounding in the neighbourhood, which scented the air as they burned; and around these the soldiers were assembled cooking and eating their rations, smoking, jesting, discussing some previous fight, or anticipating the result of the one expected for the morrow, and which according to their sanguine calculations, could only be favourable to them. Here was a seemingly interminable row of muskets piled in sheaves, a perfect chevaux-de-frise, some hundred ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... jesting, boy," broke out the Englishman. "I am a man of consideration in my own country. The lady here will bear me out. I offered you fifty pounds. I will give you five hundred if ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... is sad stuff even for a laureate of twenty, and is jesting with difficulty. Every man, says Johnson, has at one time or other of his life an ambition to set up for a wag, but that a man who had completed the Life of Johnson should in after years complacently refer to this character of himself and 'traits in it which time has not yet altered, that egotism ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... enter it will be compassionated much as a minister is who undertakes a dangerous foreign mission. Men will stand mateless, and the ruins of the hymeneal altars everywhere crumble mournfully away, and be known to tradition only by their vanishing inscriptions: "To the unknown god." But it is ill jesting over that which tugs at every woman's heartstrings and which impinges upon the very life-centres of society. If women, on being made really free to choose, will not marry, then we must arraign men on the charge of having made the married state so irksome and distasteful to women that they prefer ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... and let us be friends," said Frances, coaxingly. "I am not a duchess. I am only a girl like yourself. My name is Mistress Jennings—Frances. Nelly Gwynn was jesting when she spoke of me as a duchess, and only wanted to tease you when she objected to the table linen. She is good and kind—no ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... of the church appeared in another instance less tragical. Archy, the king's fool, who by his office had the privilege of jesting on his master and the whole court, happened unluckily to try his wit upon Laud, who was too sacred a person to be played with. News having arrived from Scotland of the first commotions excited by the liturgy, Archy, seeing the primate pass by, called to him, "Who's fool now, my lord?" ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... as I looked round to my comrade, he stripped himself, and laid his clothes by the wayside. My heart was in my nose: I could no more move than a dead man. But he walked three times round his clothes, and was suddenly changed into a wolf. Do not think I am jesting. No man's patrimony would tempt me to lie. But, as I had begun to say, as soon as he was changed into a wolf, he set up a long howl, and fled into the woods. I remained awhile, bewildered; then I approached to take up his clothes, but they were ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... it, an apprentice coming up the street gave the hat a kick and sent it on; another did the same, and then another. This was very amusing to all save Jack, who, out of breath and angry, felt a strong desire to weep, for he knew that a positive hatred toward him was hidden under all this apparent jesting. In the meantime the bell was sounding its last strokes, and the child was compelled to relinquish the useless pursuit. He was utterly wretched, for it was no small expense to buy a new cap; he must write to his mother for money, and D'Argenton would read the letter. This was bad enough; ...
— Jack - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... those who have lived have not lived, or that he who has held honourable offices did not hold them); and that he has no other power over the past than that of oblivion; and that (in order that we may also give a jesting proof of our partnership with God) he cannot bring it about that twice ten is not twenty, and more of the same sort—by all which the power of Nature is clearly revealed, and that it is ...
— Atheism in Pagan Antiquity • A. B. Drachmann
... may seem requisite so to interpret and determine St. Paul's meaning here concerning eutrapelia (that is, facetious speech, or raillery, by our translators rendered "jesting"), that he may consist with himself, and be reconciled to Aristotle, who placeth this practice in the rank of virtues; or that religion and reason may well accord in the case: supposing that, if there be any kind of facetiousness innocent ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... you're jesting, I shall not let you off: there's such a lovely Flute-girl all ready, and we've two ...
— The Frogs • Aristophanes
... her eyes from her son's face. He made every effort not to betray his emotion; but whenever the officer laughed, his fingers twitched strangely, and the old woman felt how hard it was for him not to reply, and to bear the jesting. This time the affair was not so terrorizing to her as at the first search. She felt a greater hatred to these gray, spurred night callers, and her hatred swallowed up ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... It was monstrous, with Jane lying ill in her mother's room; it was indecent; it was grossly immoral; but he was actually jesting! Not even scandal, not even the doctor's presence in the house, could suppress his incorrigible spirit of levity. "If I were Jane, I'd never speak to him," thought Gabriella, and the question flashed through her mind, ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... beak?' Stalky replied. 'Pater went Berserk after call-over, and fell on a lot of us for jesting with him about his impot. You ...
— A Diversity of Creatures • Rudyard Kipling
... I am jesting you must have it as you please. But tell me all the same how you live, and how ...
— Father Sergius • Leo Tolstoy
... and ammunition—a most usual procedure, and clumped out again. Young Pete strolled to the door and watched them enter the adobe saloon across the way—Tony's Place—the rendezvous of the riders of the high mesas. Again a group of cowboys arrived, jesting and roughing their mounts. They entered the store, bought ammunition, and drifted to the saloon. It was far from pay-day, as Pete knew. It was also the busy season. There was some ulterior reason for so many riders assembling ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... patrons. Fire signs announcing the night's amusements blazed on every hand. Cabs and carriages, their lamps gleaming like yellow eyes, pattered by. Couples and parties of three and four freely mingled in the common crowd, which poured by in a thick stream, laughing and jesting. On Fifth Avenue were loungers—a few wealthy strollers, a gentleman in evening dress with his lady on his arm, some club-men passing from one smoking-room to another. Across the way the great hotels showed a hundred gleaming windows, ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... jesting matter. I have been a fool, I am ashamed of myself, I am trying to conquer my feelings; leave me until ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... state of the weather or the risks of war. The British soldier would have his game of "house" or "crown and anchor" even on the edge of the shell-storm, and his little bit of sport wherever there was room to stretch his legs. It was a jesting army (though some of its jokes were very grim), and those who saw, as I did, the daily tragedy of war, never ceasing, always adding to the sum of human suffering, were not likely to discourage ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... had no mind even for serious jesting. He broke out into a long lecture which sounded like a chapter of some future history: "But Mrs. Lee, is it possible that you don't see what a wrong path you are on. If you want to know what the ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... enough besides to be gloomy, I felt light and comparatively happy. My impression is, that she was quite aware of the law of appearances that existed between the people of the place and myself, and had resolved to amuse herself at my expense; for one evening, after some jesting and raillery, she, somehow or other, provoked me to attempt to kiss her. But she was well defended from any assault of the kind. Her countenance became, of a sudden, absurdly hideous; the pretty mouth was elongated and otherwise amplified ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... kept a sober face. "I wish my Spanish American was here! What makes you think it's a good plan? Why should I disappoint my father's hopes again, and wring my mother's heart by proposing to leave them for any such uncertain good as this scheme promises?" He still challenged his friend with a jesting air, but a deeper and stronger feeling of some sort trembled in ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... the oily Gulf of Mexico where tramp steamers puff down to Rio; a snow-piled cabin among somber pines of northern mountains. Elsewhere, elsewhere, elsewhere, beyond the sky-line, under larger stars, where men ride jesting and women smile. Names alluring to the American he repeated—Shenandoah, Santa Ynez, the Little Big Horn, Baton Rouge, the Great Smokies, Rappahannock, Arizona, Cheyenne, Monongahela, Androscoggin; canyon ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... of the huts and made a joy of captivity and sang hymns which sounded like profane music hall songs, and songs with an unction now lost to the world, even as Shakespeare's fools are lost—that gallant company who ran a thread of tragedy through all their jesting. ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... natives. Signs of them were seen everywhere, and we expected to hear their shouts at every point of land we doubled. The captain suggested that we should try shoe-soup on Wednesday morning! He was more than half in earnest, but spoke as if he were jesting. Pepper cocked his ears as if there was some hope still of work for him to do in his own line. Jim Crofts pulled off his shoe, and, looking at it earnestly, wondered if the sole would make a very tough chop. ...
— Fast in the Ice - Adventures in the Polar Regions • R.M. Ballantyne
... and wonderful emotions that had filled her heart on that eventful day, to Amrei was a sacred one indeed; for weeks she thought of it by day and dreamed of it by night. The jealous, sneering remarks of Rose, and the half-serious, half-jesting utterances of other people, who had been present at the wedding, meant nothing to her; she went about her work all the more diligently and ignored it all. Black Marianne could offer her no encouragement in her hope that the stranger ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... subject for jesting,' I said gravely; and I rose from my seat to move away. She laughingly caught hold of both my ...
— Dwell Deep - or Hilda Thorn's Life Story • Amy Le Feuvre
... this must seem very quixotic to you as a business man, Mr. Chelm," I continued after a moment's reflection. "Very likely you think I am merely jesting. But I am not. I am perfectly serious. I want to help Mr. Prime. I was very much interested by what he said, and I believe he is in earnest. The plan that I have just suggested seems to me entirely feasible. Even supposing that I lose a couple of hundred thousand dollars, what then? ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... say to him, 'Only fancy, my boy, the governor gives us forty sous for our breakfast;' 'Pshaw! it is impossible,' he would say. 'It is so possible that he has announced it to me, Chalamel, in my own person.' 'You are jesting.' 'I jest! This is the way it occurred: during two or three days which followed the death of Madame Seraphin, we had no breakfast at all. We liked that well enough, for no breakfast at all was better than that she gave us; but, on the other hand, our luncheon cost us money. However, we were ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... and their difference in position prevented much intercourse between the two, but his devotion was apparently as lasting as it was unselfish. According to Kreissle, it found expression once, on her asking him, in jesting reproach, why he never dedicated anything to her. "Why should I," came the reply; "everything I ever did is dedicated to you." One of his posthumous works bears her name, which would hardly have been printed unless found on the manuscript in the handwriting of this ...
— Woman's Work in Music • Arthur Elson
... her, let the chair go up and go down and sway about very unsteadily, besides that every step was with a jolting motion. It kept Daisy in constant uneasiness. Dr. Sandford walked on just before with his gun; Alexander Fish came after, laughing and jesting with the other boys. ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 2 • Susan Warner |
