"Measly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... undecided kind of pain, which went wandering about from place to place inside of me like a strange ghost lost in Cudjo's Cave. I never knew until then what the personal sensations of a haunted house are. If only the measly thing could have made up its mind to settle down somewhere and start light housekeeping I think should have been better satisfied. I never had such an uneasy tenant. Alongside of it a woman with the moving fever would be comparatively a ...
— "Speaking of Operations—" • Irvin S. Cobb
... for himself, when he has anything to cook. He has a little garden, but it doesn't amount to much. He has no apple trees except an old one that is nearly dead and never has but a few little, measly, knerly apples on it; that's why ...
— A Dear Little Girl's Thanksgiving Holidays • Amy E. Blanchard
... fours," ordered Mr. Merriam. "You're the measly dog that barked at General Washington on that famous ride. Bark, you wretched yellow cur—bark, ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies - The Prize Detail at Annapolis • Victor G. Durham
... hands. I've wired the Bardsleys, telling them we've got to hurry up. It's always the way with these swells; when they want anything, they want it all in a minute. Something like ham and eggs! Rather different to the measly rasher and the antediluvian eggs from the grocer's opposite. But you don't seem to be very keen?" he added, as Nell pushed her plate away and absently took a slice of toast. "Miss the good old London air, Nell, or the appetizing smells ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... contrast, and, striving with courage to belie his agitation, murmured: "Look at Erasmus. Did you ever see such a measly lot? If we can't beat that crew, Ray, my boy, we must be duffers," to emphasise which remark he tickled me under both armpits, so that, nearly jumping out of my skin, I fell forward on to Johnson, who fell forward on to White, who, having ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... man won't give it up," cheered "Stump," under his voice. "That's the stuff. Now, if only that measly fog lifts and we get a trifle nearer, we'll do something ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... of a street-car all my life, were you? Five years of that sort of thing is about enough for me, and I 've worked it for all it was worth." A desire to impress her overcame his innate secretiveness. "There 's more in that job than the measly salary the company pays; and a man 's entitled to take something of what would be his by rights if things were as they should be in this world. There 's a higher law than the law made by the privileged few for their own enriching, and sometimes a man has to take the matter into his own hands and ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... stared at the chimney, but Uncle Jim's eye followed the wall around to the bunks. There were many discolorations on the canvas, and a picture of the Goddess of Liberty from an illustrated paper had broken out in a kind of damp, measly eruption. "I'll stick that funny handbill of the 'Washin' Soda' I got at the grocery store the other day right over the Liberty gal. It's a mighty perty woman washin' with short sleeves," said Uncle Billy. "That's the comfort ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... said Brad, as he sized up the Campus. "I like to encourage these Joints because they help to keep a lot of Young Fellows away from Business Offices. I find that I have here in my Vest-Pocket a measly $50,000 that I have overlooked in changing my Clothes. Give it to the Main Cheese and tell him to ...
— People You Know • George Ade
... grew tired of looking at the masses of houses, rising above one another in irregular tiers, and was glad my father did not propose to remain long in Boston. As I leaned over the rail in this mood, a measly-looking little boy with no shoes said that if I would come down on the wharf he'd lick me for two cents—not an exorbitant price. But I didn't go down. I climbed into the rigging, and stared at him. This, as I was rejoiced to observe, so exasperated him that he stood on his ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... yaller snakes? Must be nigh onto fifteen thousand people there now. The hills is plumb measly with prospect holes, and you can't look at a rock f'r less'n a thousand dollars. It shore is the craziest town that ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... git at him, cap'n!" came from Bahama Bill, who was being held back by Fred and Songbird. "I'll show him wot I think o' sech a measly scoundrel!" And he shook his brawny fist at ...
— The Rover Boys on Treasure Isle - or The Strange Cruise of the Steam Yacht. • Edward Stratemeyer (AKA Arthur M. Winfield)
... measly hide, Blake, I've told you fifty times I ain't!" The Old Man sat forward in his chair and shook his fist unabashed at his guest. "Them boys cooked that all up amongst themselves, and went and filed on that land before ever I knowed a thing ...
— The Flying U's Last Stand • B. M. Bower
... I goin' to be a dam' fool? D'you think I ain' goin' when I gets a good livin' offa Hulda? [He pulls out a dirty card-case.] Not so much as a measly pawn ticket has I got. Tell me what you want an' then ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume II • Gerhart Hauptmann
... "Just think what a treat it'd been to him, fellers, to stand there and check off all the animals big and little as they walked aboard the ark in pairs, the elephant and the kangaroo, and the little monkey too. But a measly storm oughtn't to keep you at ...
— Chums of the Camp Fire • Lawrence J. Leslie
... surprised the mischief-making upper classmen, the sudden collapsing of their fistic champion shocked them even more. Scrapper Bert was rather noted for his prowess. No one cared to put on the gloves with him, nor to gain his displeasure. To see the new boy, a "measly freshman," not as tall, as heavy nor as old as Bert, catch the assailant's hard-driven fist in the palm of an instantly extended hand and then let drive with his own right a neat, short-arm uppercut that got Bert just where he had meant to get Gus, was a needed ...
— Radio Boys Loyalty - Bill Brown Listens In • Wayne Whipple
... the memories of a former Christmas at Carter Hall still fresh in mind, and knowing the dear lady's generosity, and having seen the biggest bundle of feathers and the longest pair of legs he had ever laid his eyes on hanging head down on the measly wall of the shabby yard as he entered, screwed up his eyes, cudgelled his brain by tapping his forehead with his forefinger, ...
— Colonel Carter's Christmas and The Romance of an Old-Fashioned Gentleman • F. Hopkinson Smith
... streets, that is only one of the thousand things we have had to do. It would take years to give you an account of what we have done and why we do it. It is like a game of whist and poker combined and we bluff on two flimsy fours, and crawl the next minute to a man that holds a measly two-spot. There is not a wire we have not pulled, or a leg, either, and we go dashing about all day in a bath-chair, with a driver in a bell hat and a blue nightgown, leaving cards and writing notes ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... vacation. None of your measly little two weeks' affairs, with one week on salary, and th' other without. I ain't goin' t' take my vacation for a while—not till fall, p'raps, or maybe winter. But w'en I do take it, sa-a-ay, girl, it's goin' t' ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber
... suppose those measly old insurrectos want to chase us for in this style?" he growled. "We're attending to our private business and not bothering them one little bit. Why don't they leave a fellow alone? Goodness knows we've just got trouble enough on our ...
— The Aeroplane Boys on the Wing - Aeroplane Chums in the Tropics • John Luther Langworthy
... and this old thing here with her plates like brown paper—brown paper, s'elp me? It's all very fine for you—you get a power of pieces out of her one way and another; but what about me—what do I get? A measly hundred and fifty dollars a month and find yourself. I wish to ask you respectfully—respectfully, mind—who wouldn't chuck a dratted job like this? 'Tain't safe, s'elp me, it ain't! Only I am one of them fearless fellows . ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... can't eat and wear a measly little house, can you? That's what I'm askin' the town right now. Sure you can't! The thing to do is to sell that place for what it'll fetch, sock the money in bank for you, and it'll be there—with interest—when you've grown up and aim to start ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... these cast-off dogs around town, so why shouldn't I do the same for a poor devil of a husband? I'll make you comfortable until you get into Davis', but don't you ever let on to these damned women that you're a failure, or that you're strapped, or that that measly little wife of yours gave you the sack. No, sir! Remember who you are. You are my nephew. I won't say as I'm proud of you, but, by thunder! I don't want anybody in Blakeville to know that I'm ashamed of you. If I feel that way about ...
— What's-His-Name • George Barr McCutcheon
... reiterated Earle, in tones of intense disgust. "Only eight hours, did you say? Why, man alive, if what you say be true, in those measly eight hours I have lived years of joy and delight unspeakable. I have beheld scenes of unearthly indescribable beauty; I have participated in pageants glorious and magnificent beyond conception; I have—oh! what's the use? If I were to talk from ...
— In Search of El Dorado • Harry Collingwood
... do that! It's out of the question!" cried Mr. Manley. "I'm getting so to loathe the brute that I shall soon be quite unable to stand him. As it is, I sometimes have a violent desire to wring his neck. Now that I know that he played this measly trick on you, it will be more violent than ever. Besides, we must have a flat in town. It's really necessary to my work! I can do my actual writing down here fairly well. But what I really need is to get in touch with the right people, with the ...
— The Loudwater Mystery • Edgar Jepson
... sister had "a roughish smile" loud cries of indignation arose. Molly first cried and then had hysterics and screamed vigorously; Bill swore vengeance on the Millville Tribune and all connected with it, while the guests gravely asserted it was "a low-down, measly trick" which the Sizers ought to resent. They all began drinking again, to calm their feelings, and after the midday dinner Bill Sizer grabbed a huge cowhide whip and started to Millville to "lick the ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces on Vacation • Edith Van Dyne
... some glass in one of the meetin'-house winders. Some o' them little small panes got broke somehow—yes'm, I did, but I never meant to, honest I didn't. I was jest tryin' my new catapult, and I never thought they'd have such measly glass as all that. Well, so I see—saw him get to work, and I says to Squashnose Weight—we was goin' home from school together—I says, 'Let's go up in the gallery!' Old Booby had left the door open, and 'twas right ...
— Mrs. Tree • Laura E. Richards
... first vice president of the General Sales Company, that handled the export end of the trust's affairs. So, right in the height of his season, he's had to scratch his Horse Show entries, drop polo practice, and move into a measly six-room suite in one of them new Fifth-ave. hotels, with three hours of soul-wearin' officework ahead of him five days out of seven. He'd been at the grind a month now, and Mother had worried so about his health that ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... that turn a trick of that kind, they'll give themselves away in the long run. It's lucky, in a way, that you had paper money instead of gold; the big bills will be their downfall if they undertake to spend them in this country—and if old Hans had it straight, they're not going to pull out with a measly ten thousand dollars. It's an ugly mess, and liable to be worse before it's cleaned up. If there is a stake like that cached around the Stone, these land pirates will camp mighty close on the trail of anybody that goes looking for it. And it won't be any Sunday-school picnic dealing with ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... instead of her apron, which Mr. Bills was waving in the air like a flag, with a feeling that he had nearly exhausted his vocabulary and didn't know what next to say. Four dollars was a great deal for an apron, he knew, but he kept on ringing the changes on the four dollars,—a measly price for so fine an article, and for so good a cause as a Public Library. And while he talked and repeated his going, going, faster and faster, Tim stood like a hound on a leash fretting for ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... made transparent the meaning of their presence and argument. The big man refused to ride any farther. Evidently he had come so far without realizing it. His importunities were for "more head of stock." His scorn was for a "measly little bunch not worth the risk." His anger was for Belllounds's foolhardiness in "leavin' a trail." Belllounds had little to say, and most of that was spoken in a tone too low to be heard. His manner seemed indifferent, even reckless. But he wanted "money." The scar-faced man's name ...
— The Mysterious Rider • Zane Grey
... however, by scratching off just such another measly bunt as his brother had failed with, and when he was put out at first Sleepy and Tug realized that their running had been in vain. Sleepy thought of the terrific inconvenience the struggle for the three bases had caused him, and was almost sorry ...
— The Dozen from Lakerim • Rupert Hughes
... pack o' boys along up to the Eagles; p'raps it kim in a letter he hed from somebody, I don't know jest how thet mout be; but he seemed to know it, all right, Jim. Sez he to me, 'Hen, ef ye happens to run acrost thet thar measly little skunk what sails by the name o' Jim Hasty, jest you tell him fur me thet if he dares to put his foot up hyar in my deestrick, I'm bound to pin his ears to a tree, and leave 'em thar to give him a lesson.' An' Jim, I guess from ...
— The Boy Scouts in the Maine Woods - The New Test for the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... the tapeworm exists in the pig in little sacs not larger than a pin's head, and can be seen by the naked eye. The strong brine of the packer does not kill them, and I have known them to be taken alive from a boiled ham. The great heat of frying alone renders them harmless. When partially-cooked, measly pork is eaten by man, the gastric juice of the stomach dissolves the membranous sac which contains the living larva, and the animal soon passes into the intestines, where, clinging by its hooks, it holds on with wonderful tenacity, rapidly sending out joint after joint, until the perfect ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... her playfully. "Two measly weeks out, two weeks to astrogate her back home. And once I've got my feet wet at it, it'll be like shooting ducks in ...
— Next Door, Next World • Robert Donald Locke
... indignantly. "Hold on, now. Don't you call this a measly store. There isn't a more complete drug-store in ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... have I fought for country and king, and now in my blind old age I'm to be sent packing from a measly public-'ouse? Mark ye, ma'am, if I go, you take the consequences. Is this a inn? Or hain't it? If it is a inn, then by act of parleyment, I'm free to sling my 'ammick. Don't you forget: this is a act of parleyment job, this is. You ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson
... got to show for it? There's lots of things money can't buy. It can't buy the little woman. It can't buy capacity. What's the good of thirty millions when I ain't got room for more than a quart of cocktails a day? If I had a hundred-quart-cocktail thirst, it'd be different. But one quart—one measly little quart! Here I am, a thirty times over millionaire, slaving harder every day than any dozen men that work for me, and all I get is two meals that don't taste good, one bed, a quart of Martini, and a hundred and forty hair bridles to look at ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London
... them—them other poems didn't sell much—there was only one went, an' the man wouldn't take that till he'd made me promise he could print my letter, too, that I'd wrote with it—jest as if that was worth anything!—but he only paid a measly dollar anyhow. "Susan's voice faltered a little, though her chin was at a brave tilt. "An' I guess now I know the reason. Them kind of poems ain't stylish no longer. Rhymes has gone out. Everything's 'free verse' now. I've been readin' up about it. ...
— Dawn • Eleanor H. Porter
... and halfway decent through love. I was a gambler and a pleasure seeker through passion, I've gone to work at a mean little job and stuck to it and lived on what I've earned—through love. Do you think it's easy to give up gambling? Try it! Do you think it's easy to live in a measly little room up six flights of black, smelly stairs, with no fire in winter? Anyhow, it wasn't easy for me, but I did it—through ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett
... While waiting we went down to a fall, where the brown waters of a small river poured down over many ledges of sandstone. In this sandstone were worn many pot-holes, some of them perfect, and of all sizes. In one about the size of a butter tub was a sucker, a measly fish about a foot long. Nothing else to do, Father pulled off his coat and rolled up his sleeves, and getting down on his knees he began to chase this sucker about the pot-hole to catch him. The sucker went around and around very deliberately ...
— My Boyhood • John Burroughs
... we could not help hearing Stanley's voice. "For 'Eving's sake don't get bit and go mad by any measly pi-dog. But you can look after yourself, old man. You don't get drunk an' run about 'ittin' your friends. You takes your bones an' you eats your biscuit, an' you kills your enemy like a gentleman. ...
— Actions and Reactions • Rudyard Kipling
... Iredell. "Puts money in the hands of the owners, you mean. They get the feast and we get the crumbs. What's our measly salary compared with what they get? I was just reading in the paper that the Giants cleaned up two hundred thousand dollars this year, net profit, and yet it's the players that bring this money ...
— Baseball Joe Around the World - Pitching on a Grand Tour • Lester Chadwick
... pleasant surprise was in store. We had "train rations" on the usual measly Indian scale, but for tea on Saturday we were to rely on tea provided by Scindia at Gwalior. Happily a Maharajah's ideas of tea are superior to a Quartermaster's, and this is what we had for fifty men! Unlimited tea, with sugar, twenty-five ...
— Letters from Mesopotamia • Robert Palmer
... think we'd steal a measly rowboat?" asked Vance Lemon, but he glanced at Faswig as he spoke, and his tone was an ...
— Young Hunters of the Lake • Ralph Bonehill
... hard, maybe your dad gave you enough money for it to buy a respectable piece of chocolate with instead of that measly little sample you brought around last night," ...
— The Radio Boys' First Wireless - Or Winning the Ferberton Prize • Allen Chapman
... "I'm just naturally obliged to 'tend to this here thing what thinks he's a hoss. Come along, you ornery, pigeon-toed, knock-kneed, sway-backed, wooly-haired excuse, you. You ain't got no more manners 'n a measly coyote." ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright |
