"Poor devil" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... speaking of progress, Doctor Wilson said that much depended upon the action of the one who is supposed to be progressive. "I can recall," he would say in trying to make his point, "the picture of a poor devil of a donkey on a treadmill. He keeps on tramping, tramping, tramping, but he never gets anywhere. But," he continued, "there is a certain elephant that's tramping, too, and how much progress is it making?" And then, ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty
... when a gust of wind carried away both my letter and my hat. I ran after the letter, although the button of my hat was a single diamond; I caught my letter, but my hat was carried by the wind into the middle of the river. It will make the fortune of the poor devil who finds it."—"So that you ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... for a fortnight, poor devil? I'd take him for ten fortnights. Heavens, what a relief it must be ...
— The Judgment of Eve • May Sinclair
... poor devil of a French tradesman who, like Captain Booth, had infringed the laws of strict chastity and virtue. He brooded on this till he became deranged, and thought that Satan had him. He was convulsed, anaesthetic, suicidal, involuntarily blasphemous. He was not 'exorcised' ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang
... half an hour, and again sat thinking; but this time it was of poor Father Francis. He wondered what he was doing now; whether he had taken off the Roman collar of Christ's familiar slaves? The poor devil! And how far ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... sung sundry snatches of martial airs, gave Dumiger a contemptuous, indignant glance, and stalked out of the cell, taking care to rattle the bolts and bars as a punishment to Dumiger for not gratifying his curiosity. Poor devil, it was his only amusement to pry into ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 2, July 8, 1850 • Various
... going back makes me shudder; and yet, I could no more keep away than lift the roof from this house. Of course, this sounds like rigmarole to you. You think I'm raving! I don't blame you. Only it is so, and I can't help it! I am as much a prisoner as any poor devil ...
— A Monk of Cruta • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... his hand found a lump under the cloth. He drew out the apprentice magician's book. The poor devil had never achieved his twenty lifetimes, and this was probably all that was left of him. Hanson stared at it, reading the ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... Bayard, shruggin' his shoulders scornful. "The poor devil! I didn't see what good it would ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... wonder if the poor devil would be glad enough to be relieved from it all. I'll tell you what I'll do, Ricketts. I'll write to Miss Brodrick's father, and ask him to come over here before the trial. He is much more concerned in the matter than I am, and should ...
— Cousin Henry • Anthony Trollope
... falling into Mildred's chair. Then all the men spoke to one another something after this fashion, 'The drum-horse hasn't hung over the mantelpiece since '67.' 'How does he know?' 'Mildred, go and speak to him again.' 'Colonel, what are you going to do?' 'Oh, dry up, and give the poor devil a chance to pull himself together.' 'It isn't possible ...
— Soldier Stories • Rudyard Kipling
... friend, is a poor devil who never thought of anything except escaping from the crowd of those who are dying of hunger. Gavaut never had any ideas except at his elbows. Does anybody take him seriously in the political world? You may be sure that he never ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... ill, and not in a condition to write much today. It requires another head than mine to veer round so often ( changer si souvent de systame ). In fine, Nosti est au bout de son latin [is at his wit's end, poor devil)! Both Majesties have spoken openly of the favorable news from Berlin; funds rose in consequence. New Minister [Walpole come to the top of the Firm, Townshend soon to withdraw, impatient of the bottom] is all-powerful now: O TEMPORA, O MORES!" "I receive universal congratulations, ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... me out. You'll have to sic some other poor devil on this glittering proposition of yours. I ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... firewood. Then, having exorcised the locality, they called the Devil by all the vile names they could think of, to show their lack of respect, and finally commanded him never to return to this vicinity. Calling on Christ and the Virgin, they applied fire to the wood. "The poor Devil then fled roaring in a fury, and making the ...
— Inca Land - Explorations in the Highlands of Peru • Hiram Bingham
... the old lady fell in love with me; and although she was not quite the vision of youthful fancy, as the saying is, for she had only one tooth in her head, and that stuck out half an inch beyond her upper lip, still she had other charms for a poor devil like me; so I made up my mind to marry her, for she made cruel love to me as I laid in bed, and before I was fairly out of bed the thing was settled, and a week afterwards the day was fixed; but her relatives got wind of it, for, like an old fool, ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... it. Pinkerton will be on our trail in forty-eight hours. The first thing they will do will be to suspect the messenger. He will be arrested, and while they are monkeying with him we must get out of the way. I told the poor devil I would write a letter to some paper, I think I said the Globe-Democrat, which would clear him, but we must make ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... socialist," said Jimmy, "won't dream of pooling his money till the millennium. What would be the use of my setting to work and cutting out some poor devil who ...
— Enter Bridget • Thomas Cobb
... throw in a tenner myself. Don't throw the poor devil to charity. We'll collect from the troupe. We raised forty dollars for a nigger ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... "Poor devil," murmured Joseph. "I feel for him, I do indeed. He had the key made—for himself; he certainly let me use it once, but only once, and who's to prove it? And he's had the opportunity every day of using it himself. That's very awkward, Foxy, my boy. If I ...
— In Luck at Last • Walter Besant
... must tell how entered the forty lifers upon my dungeon stillness. I was asleep when the outer door to the corridor of dungeons clanged open and aroused me. "Some poor devil," was my thought; and my next thought was that he was surely getting his, as I listened to the scuffling of feet, the dull impact of blows on flesh, the sudden cries of pain, the filth of curses, and the sounds of dragging bodies. For, you see, every man ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... some concessions? Wagner was writing a gigantic work, the Nibelung Tetralogy, which, he was convinced, would never yield a penny's profit during his lifetime. Sometimes despair seized him. In one of his letters he exclaims: "Why should I, poor devil, burden and torture myself with such terrible tasks, if the present generation refuses to let me have even a workshop?" Yet the only deviation he made from his plan was that when he had reached the second act of the third of the Nibelung dramas, the poetic "Siegfried," in ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... go down, and conduct this poor devil back to his dungeon again, unless you prefer he ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... am," he admitted. "I know that. But whose fault is it? It isn't mine. I've lived the life of a brute creature for ten years. You don't abuse a one-legged man, poor devil. I've had other things amputated. I was like you once. It seemed all right to me to go under to save a woman's honor. You never have. Therefore, I say you've no right to call me a brute. Personally, I don't object. It is simply a matter ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... case), you are a little too hard on bad observers; that a remark made by a bad observer CANNOT be right; an observer who deserves to be damned you would utterly damn. I feel entire deference to any remark you make out of your own head; but when in opposition to some poor devil, I somehow involuntarily feel not quite so much, but yet much deference for your opinion. I do not know in the least whether there is any truth in this my criticism against you, but I have often thought I would ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... the landsturm officer brought to the hospital strapped fast to the stretcher, because his sobbing wrenched and tore his body so that the bearers could not control him otherwise. Something inexpressibly hideous—so it was said—had half robbed the poor devil of his reason, and the Frau Major suddenly dreaded a fit of insanity. She pinched the cavalryman's arm and exclaimed with a pretense ...
— Men in War • Andreas Latzko
... he need much room? At home in his mud-cabin there was only one room for all domestic purposes; more than one room his family does not need in England. So the custom of crowding many persons into a single room, now so universal, has been chiefly implanted by the Irish immigration. And since the poor devil must have one enjoyment, and society has shut him out of all others, he betakes himself to the drinking of spirits. Drink is the only thing which makes the Irishman's life worth having, drink and ...
— The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844 - with a Preface written in 1892 • Frederick Engels
... cry of an outcast soul. Maybe it's the spirit of some poor devil that's lost away out in the night. I hate to open the door for nothing. It will make ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... and I wondered with amusement whether he would have the moral courage to remain where he was now that his ostensible pretext was gone and that the waiter was beginning to loiter round his table as a hint that he ought to go. Poor devil, I could see that he was growing uneasy; he shuffled his feet, and the glances he threw at me became yet more furtive and reproachful. Still I gave no sign; I don't know what spirit of sarcasm and teasing possessed me. He stood it for some time, then he shoved back his ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... rights from man, for man had none to give her—none to spare from himself. Satan promised Jesus all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, if He would fall down and worship him; but it was well known that the poor devil had not a foot to give. And so man could give no rights to woman. She was born with rights, and only wanted man to recognize them. Her purpose was to demand them persistently, or, if need be, like the Prince of Orange, die in the last ditch ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... fugitive existence, a practical illustration of Irving's "Poor Devil Author," looking as often into pastry-shop windows, testing all manner of cheap Pickwickian veal-pies, breakfasting upon a chop, and supping upon a herring in my suburban residence, but keeping up pluck and ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... looking around for some place where I could lie down and nurse myself a bit, and at the same time keep clear of the shells and other things flying around. The air was full of them—making a noise like 'Whar-izz-yer?' 'Whar-izz-yer?' Haven't you often heard that sound, Senator? Some poor devil hears it once too often, every now and ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... the poor devil as used to supply us with dialect—what a face he had! It was like a mouth-organ turned edgeways; and he looked as hollow as the big drum, but warn't half so round and noisy. You can't have dwindled down to that, surely! ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... spot for an attack was the door. Unless he was hard pressed, he must not shoot; women were concerned, and the fort or Clark's might be stirred to unreasonable retaliation in their name; for example, there was that poor devil of a cow-puncher at Dodge who had been riddled simply for slapping his wife.... Obviously, the shack must be occupied without the shedding of blood. But what of his safety? "I'll jus' have t' chance it," he said, and hunted for something ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... miserly old reprobate, whose wealth places him above the possibility of ever coming to want, who would sooner "hang the guiltless than eat his mutton cold," and who would not bestow a cent upon a poor devil to keep him from starving—that old rascal, perhaps, in his capacity as a magistrate, sentences to jail an unfortunate man whom hunger has driven into the "crime" of stealing a loaf of bread! Bah! ...
— My Life: or the Adventures of Geo. Thompson - Being the Auto-Biography of an Author. Written by Himself. • George Thompson
... musical voice rang clear—"I'm only a poor devil from the short-grass country where life each year depends on that year's crop. Three years out of four, the wind and drouth bring only failure at harvest time. Then we starve our bodies and grip onto hope ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... Poor devil! see him owre his trash, As feckles as wither'd rash, His spindle shank, a guid whip-lash; His nieve a nit; Thro' blody flood or field ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... carry a load for an old man. You can encourage and help a poor devil trying to reform. You can set a good example to children. You can stick to the men with whom you work, fighting honestly ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... that one idea which had flashed across him as he strutted, cigarettiferous, beneath the grateful shadow of his limes. So crowded is this old globe of ours, and so interlaced our interests, that one cannot think a new thought without some poor devil being the better ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... knob. "Poor devil!" he muttered; and then aloud: "You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Do you ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... distinction with lawlessness, whereas the army seemed to be always weighted by a certain plodding submission to discipline. To be sure, by all accounts, the life was at first a rough one. But just then I wanted to suffer keenly; I wanted to be a poor devil of a cabin boy, kicked, beaten, and sworn at—for a time. Perhaps some hint, some inkling of my sufferings might reach their ears. In due course the sloop or felucca would turn up—it always did—the rakish-looking craft, black of hull, low ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... under the sign of the White Horse, on the Old Bath Road, but which has since disappeared. I believe the origin of it was, "a poor devil of an author, who, after having had a good filling out, found that he had not wherewith to pay; at which 'mine host' was of course in a 'way' (as he had a right to be); when the author told him, that if he would get a sign painted, he would try to put some lines upon it which ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, No. - 481, March 19, 1831 • Various
... uncongenial companion upon her, should turn from Sir Tom altogether, and put her trust in him no longer! And the men who most admired the Contessa were those who looked with the greatest horror upon a marriage made by her, and called young Montjoie poor little beggar and poor devil, wondering much whether he ought not to be "spoken to." The men were not sorry for Bice, nor thought of her at all in the matter, save to conclude her a true pupil of the guardian whom most of them believed to be her mother. But in this point where ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... advantage even longer. It's something to have studied with tolerable thoroughness the most hateful form of society yet developed. I saw it at first as a man does who is living at his ease; at last, as a poor devil who is thankful for the institution of free lunches. I went first-class, and I came back as a steerage passenger. It has been a year ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... Wilhelm, whom we saw dress up his regimental Scavenger-Executioners in French costume, for Count Rothenburg's behoof, made haste to load Gundling with Rathships, Kammerherrships, Titles such as fools covet;—gave him tolerable pensions too, poor devil, and even functions, if they were of the imaginary or big insignificant sort. Above all things, his Majesty dressed him, as the pink of fortunate ambitious courtiers. Superfine scarlet coat, gold buttonholes, ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume V. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... bank—which is the upper platform of the steps—of the government, at a small rent per annum; and woe to any poor devil of his profession who dares to invade his premises! Hither, every fair day, at about noon, he comes mounted on his donkey and accompanied by his valet, a little boy, who, though not lame exactly, wears a couple ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... whose quill I write this epistle. I wrote to Irving before leaving Kelso. Poor fellow, I am sure his sister's death must have hurt him much; though he makes no noise about feelings, yet still streams always run deepest. I sent a message by him to Edie,[88] poor devil, adding my mite of consolation to him in his affliction. I pity poor ******, who is more deserving of compassion, being his first offence. Write soon, and as long as the last; you will have Perthshire news, I suppose, soon. Jamie's ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... different in real life. Now, in those novels you have read, the poor devil is nearly worried to death for fear he'll not get her. There's a hundred things happens; he's thrown off the scent one day and cuts it again the next, and one evening he's in a heaven of bliss and before the dance ends a rival looms up and there's hell to ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... Wakem"; since I have understood from persons versed in history, that mankind is not disposed to look narrowly into the conduct of great victors when their victory is on the right side. Tulliver, then, could be no obstruction to Wakem; on the contrary, he was a poor devil whom the lawyer had defeated several times; a hot-tempered fellow, who would always give you a handle against him. Wakem's conscience was not uneasy because he had used a few tricks against the miller; why should he hate that unsuccessful plaintiff, that ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... his fat face lost colour. "Poor devil!" he said, staring at me like one fascinated. "They have ...
— In Kings' Byways • Stanley J. Weyman
... sermon that I should like to preach to you and to your elderly wealthy friends who feel that they are not so warmly appreciated as they once were. 'Wish him to be thine equal'—that is the test of charity. It is all right to give a poor devil a turkey. But are you anxious that he shall have as good a chance as you have to buy a turkey for himself? Are you really enthusiastic about so equalizing opportunities that by and by you shall be surrounded by happy, self-reliant people who have no ...
— By the Christmas Fire • Samuel McChord Crothers
... quite different from his (and this is a great relief to me, as I feared to be accused of plagiarism, but utterly failed to be sure what he meant, so thought it safest to give my view as almost the same as his), and he says he is not sure he understands it...Am I not a poor devil? yet I took such pains, I must think that I expressed myself clearly. Old Sir H. Holland says he has read it twice, and thinks it very tough; but believes that sooner or later "some view akin to it" ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... no;" and Dale shrugged his shoulders. "You prob'ly saw some poor devil of a tramp who had slept here, and was getting on the move after his night's rest." Then he took a step away from the tree, and spoke curtly. ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... the wreckage, thinking with a detached compassion of that poor devil Braun who was the victim of men who hated the idea of the Space Platform and what it would mean to humanity. Men of that kind thought of themselves as superior to humanity, and of human beings as creatures to be enslaved. So they arranged for planes to crash and burn and for men to be murdered, ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster
... How old he looked, poor devil! Hillard had not taken particular notice of him during the past week's excursions. Giovanni had aged ten years since ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... most unfortunate man in the world?" he said to himself, by way of consolation. "After having paid him so much money, to be served like this. It is too bad. But this is the way of the world. Let a poor devil once get a little under the weather, and every one must ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... "Humph! Poor devil, he's got off easy; but from his looks and the tussle we had with him, I don't think he'll be over grateful to you for bringing him through this. I've seen so much of this kind, that I've come to think it's better when they drop out quietly, no fuss, ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller
... tobacco country. You can navigate a ship by the sun and compass, and that's education enough. If you go and let it out that you're a sailor, I'll—well, you've been a captain or mate, and you know devilish well what I'll do with you. I'll serve you as you have served many a poor devil in your time." ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston
... some time after having related these particulars in England, at Sir Joseph Banks's, the conduct of George Eyre was severely blamed; but when a man breakfasts and dines to the sound of harmonious music, can he accord his interest to a poor devil sleeping on straw and nibbled by vermin, even though he have manuscripts under his shirt? I may add that I (unfortunately for me) had to do with a captain of an unusual character. For, some days later, a new vessel, The Colossus, having arrived ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago
... uninsured'—that's an intelligent guess!... 'Narrow escape of guests in their 'whatyemaycallems....'Three lives believed to have been lost ... one body recovered charred almost beyond recognition'—but later identified as Roddy—poor devil! ... 'Two guests missing, Monsieur Lanyard, the well-known connoisseur of art, who occupied the room adjoining that of the unfortunate detective, and Mademoiselle Bannon, daughter of the American millionaire, who himself escaped only by a miracle with his secretary Monsieur Greggs, the ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... can't blame you; for you see, between ourselves, I'm afraid 'tis as you say. We of the Royal Irish have done, under the rose, you know, all we can; and I'm sorry the poor devil has run himself into a scrape; but hang it, we must have a conscience; and if you think there's a risk of losing it, why I don't see that ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... you, Howard," he said. "Do you think that poor devil would have bared his breast and shown that 'D' to even his dearest friend? Good God, man, why do you badger me! Am I to wear the cap and bells always, do you expect me to be dancing like a clown every moment of the day? Do I not play ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... to be justified by circumstances as they operated upon him. There could be no hunting in County Galway next session unless things were to change very much for the better. And there was no prospect of any such change. "It's nonsense talking of a poor devil like me being ruined. You ask me what property ...
— The Landleaguers • Anthony Trollope
... gazing at her steadily in the face until she grew crimson red; and then staring round at every man who formed her circle, until, MA FOI, I stared them all away. I instructed Magny to say, everywhere, that the Countess was madly in love with me; which commission, along with many others of mine, the poor devil was obliged to perform. He made rather a SOTTE FIGURE, as the French say, acting the pioneer for me, praising me everywhere, accompanying me always! he who had been the pink of the MODE until my arrival; he who thought his pedigree of beggarly Barons of Magny ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... now. You'll never see him, or hear from him. Nor will anyone else—except me. He'll never come into your life after this. He'll never claim his legal guardianship of you, beyond that document. To you he's dead, leaving you heir to what is contained in that deed. He's just a poor devil of a man hunted and haunted through the rest of his existence by the memory of a love that was more than life to him. Try and think better of him, Nancy, my dear. He's got enough to bear. I think he deserves far better than he's ever likely ...
— The Man in the Twilight • Ridgwell Cullum
... the releasing gear was clogged up with frozen snow. Whether or not the yarn is true it is impossible to say, but imagine the fellow's feelings when, after planing down to two hundred feet with all the anti-aircraft guns in the place going full blast, he found he could not drop a single egg! Poor devil! ...
— Stand By! - Naval Sketches and Stories • Henry Taprell Dorling
... tickling the palms of each other's hands. I see no harm in it, for they put into practice the Christian precept: "Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you." The only difference consists in the tickling, but it does not seem worth while to make such a fuss about lending a poor devil half-a-crown. ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... "Poor devil! But I guess you're right," muttered Little, and helped by willing hands they clambered over the gunwale and fell panting into ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... appears that Miss Morrison got hold of a humorous book called 'The Brass Bottle,' a fantastic, farcical thing, about a genie who had been sealed up in a bottle for a thousand years getting out and causing the poor devil of a hero no end of worry by heaping riches and honours upon him in the most embarrassing manner. It happened that on the night Miss Morrison got this book, and read it aloud for the amusement of her father and lover, Carboys had persuaded ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... couldn't tell him in the daytime. I nearly did, last night. I meant to, 'cross-my-heart,' I did! We went for a walk, and I was just—just sort of beginning when a woman came sneaking by and—said something to him. You know. And he said—'Poor devil!' That's what he called her. 'Poor devil!' That's just how he said it." Now she dropped her inadequate handkerchief and wept convulsively into her hands and a thin shaft of sunshine ...
— Jane Journeys On • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... was certainly a strange one, had been confirmed by the testimony of the coachman who had lent his whip for the purpose. This coachman, who was known to be a man of extreme good nature, had seen no harm in lending his whip to a poor devil who wished to give a telegram or some such hasty message to the lady sitting just above them in a lighted window. The wind was fierce and the snow blinding, and it was natural that the man should duck his head, but ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green
... pulling an oar in an Atuona boat, when they spied a stranger in a canoe with some fish and a piece of tapu. The Atuona men cried upon him to draw near and have a smoke. He complied, because, I suppose, he had no choice; but he knew, poor devil, what he was coming to, and (as Joe said) 'he didn't seem to care about the smoke.' A few questions followed, as to where he came from, and what was his business. These he must needs answer, as he must needs draw at the unwelcome pipe, his heart the while drying in his bosom. And ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson
... glorious end." Then came the victory of Torgau, the last and one of the most desperate of his battles: a success dearly bought, and bringing neither rest nor safety. Once more he wrote to D'Argens: "Adieu, dear Marquis; write to me sometimes. Don't forget a poor devil who curses his fatal existence ten times a day." "I live like a military monk. Endless business, and a little consolation from my books. I don't know if I shall outlive this war, but if I do I am firmly ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... you if you were," he said bitterly. "I'm only a poor devil of a mountaineer, not fit to ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... "I've seen so much country all on edge that this is like getting a peep over the wall on the other side—the other side of Jordan. And yet that was God's country with the sun on it, as Gladney used to say—poor devil!" ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... intently fixed on the mocking savages before him, of whom he took me indeed to be one, continued his defensive attitude with the poker, nor was it until I had advanced and taken his weapon from him, amid the loud laughter of the young Indians, that he finally came to his senses. And yet, after all, poor devil, ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... as well confess," he said. "It will make the end easier. I will be dead in a few minutes, for I am mortally wounded. I would have released that poor devil of a Japanese, but I hadn't the ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... keep and if he'd show it at the store whenever he wanted candy, he'd have all he wanted, for nothing. And he had two half-breeds witness it. What Marshall had done was to get Lone Wolf to sign a warranty deed, giving Marshall his pine land. The poor devil of an Indian didn't know it till yesterday when he showed me his 'receipt' in great glee. Of course, they'll ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... few topnotchers I haven't met. He's the spark, the hand on the plunger. The powder is all ready in this land of ours; our job is to keep off the sparks until we can spread the stuff so it will only go puff instead of bang. This man Karlov is bad medicine for democracy. Poor devil!" ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... uplifted, and listen to the very poor reading of an officer, from the ritual, and giving the new comer his first dose of States' sovereignty and secession. This is so mystified and clouded with high-sounding words that the poor devil nods at every time the reader stops for breath, or to expectorate tobacco juice, and the ceremony is concluded, and the candidate, respectable for the good clothes which he wears this night as a rarity, follows his conductor to another door, where ...
— The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details • I. Windslow Ayer
... you. You've got the look of success about you, I've seen enough of it to know it. They used to say of me in Washington that I could sit in my office chair and overlook a line of men and spot every last one of them that was going to get on. I never went wrong but once, and that was because the poor devil began to swell and thought he was as big as his own shadow. But if the look's there, I see it—it's something in the eye and the jaw, and the grip of the hands that nobody can give you except God Almighty—and by George, it turns me into a downright heathen and makes me believe ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... whom the fever had rendered unable longer to walk, and six men who were as yet well enough to handle the canoe. By the time the remainder of the party came to the next navigable river eleven more fever-stricken men had nearly reached the end of their tether. Here they ran across a poor devil who had for four months been lost in the forest and was dying of slow starvation. He had eaten nothing but Brazil-nuts and the grubs of insects. He could no longer walk, but could sit erect and totter feebly for a few feet. ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... cooks. See what an advantage the poet has—he writes something, it goes out and reaches the inmost soul of the man who reads it, and it is signed. His work is known because he puts his name to it; but this poor devil of a cook—where is he? He has done his work as well as the poet ever did his, it has reached the inmost soul of the mortal who originally ate it, but he cannot get the glory of it because he cannot put his name to it. If the cook could sign ...
— A House-Boat on the Styx • John Kendrick Bangs
... Lads." It was the story of his duel related in a lively Gallic style. He had no difficulty in recognising himself, for he was indicated by this little joke, which frequently recurred: "A young man from the College of Sens who has no sense." He was even represented as a poor devil from the provinces, an obscure booby trying to rub against persons of high rank. As for the Vicomte, he was made to play a fascinating part, first by having forced his way into the supper-room, then by having carried off the lady, and, finally, by having behaved all through ...
— Sentimental Education, Volume II - The History of a Young Man • Gustave Flaubert
... seems strange I could have looked upon her with so much indifference, for she brought death to the brothers of Durrisdeer. After all the desperate episodes of this contention, the insults, the opposing interests, the fraternal duel in the shrubbery, it was reserved for some poor devil in Grub Street, scribbling for his dinner, and not caring what he scribbled, to cast a spell across four thousand miles of the salt sea, and send forth both these brothers into savage and wintry deserts, there to die. But such a thought was ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. XII (of 25) - The Master of Ballantrae • Robert Louis Stevenson
... thou to give, poor devil? Was e'er a human mind, upon its lofty level, Conceived of by the like of thee? Yet hast thou food that brings satiety, Not satisfaction; gold that reftlessly, Like quicksilver, melts down within The hands; a game in which men never win; A maid that, hanging on my breast, Ogles a neighbor ...
— Faust • Goethe
... and in nearly all of the productive walks of life, as well as in a large percentage of the professional and executive; intellectually the equal if not the superior of the average man—who in these days, poor devil, is born a specialist—and making a bold ...
— The Living Present • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... Go, poor devil, get thee gone; why should hurt thee? This world surely is wide enough to hold both thee ...
— Familiar Quotations • Various
... it was because the Battersea people were more humane and charitable than their neighbours. There was a time when those fields were of no value; now they're worth a mint of money, they say. The body of a poor devil, who was drowned in the river, was washed on shore on those banks, and none of the parishes would be at the expense of burying it. The Battersea people, though they had least right to be called upon, would not allow the poor fellow's corpse to be lying on the mud, and they ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... good working light now,' he said, watching his shadow placidly. 'Some poor devil ought to be grateful for this. ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... Hippisley liked that sort of thing. He thrived in a liberal air, an air of gorgeous spending, though he sported a supercilious smile at the fioritura, the luscious excess of it. He had never had too much, poor devil, of his own. I've seen the little fellow swaggering about at her parties, with his sharp, frayed face, looking fine and fastidious, safeguarding himself with twinklings and gestures that gave the dear woman away. I've seen ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... flourished his napkin with the dainty grace of a courtier; and when he lifted my luggage to his shoulder, I was on the point of apologizing. He makes my bed, polishes my shoes, performs with fidelity the most menial offices; and yet I cannot but look upon him as an equal. Poor devil! His cheek may burn with the bluest blood in France. What a pity the world ...
— Trifles for the Christmas Holidays • H. S. Armstrong
... at once!" he realized. "When the machine went over the edge, they were thrown out, just as the girl was. A miracle she wasn't carried down, with the car, and crushed or burned to death down there by the river, with that poor devil ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England
... This time the poor devil went astray in his conjugation, and confusing the first with the third person, said, "God, I do not wish," which in the context had no meaning. "God does not ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Worship," the Retainer ventured smiling, "when I say that not only do I know the hiding-place of this homicide, but that I also am acquainted with the man who kidnapped and sold the girl; I likewise knew full well the poor devil and buyer, now deceased. But wait, and I'll tell your worship all, with full details. This person, who succumbed to the assault, was the son of a minor gentry. His name was Feng Yuean. His father and mother ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... so he gave up consulting doctors: it was a waste of money: and besides he was always ill at ease with them: they could not understand each other: they lived in separate worlds. They had an ironical and rather contemptuous pity for the poor devil of an artist who claimed to be a world to himself, and was swept along like a straw by the river of life. He was humiliated by being examined, and prodded, and handled by these men. He was ashamed of ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland
... marry the fellow to a woman nearly twice his age, comparatively well off: the only profession he was really fit for. But it was not all cakes and ale. The first time I called on the couple she spied a little spot of grease on the poor devil's pantaloons and made him a screaming scene of reproaches so full of sincere passion that I sat terrified as at a tragedy ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... powers of the holy personage he had ventured to chaff. In spite of his howls and frantic efforts to escape, the iron shoe is remorselessly fitted, and nail after nail driven into the quick. Imagine the sufferings of that poor devil; observe his comically distorted countenance as he bellows with agony and impotent rage; how his tail curls round his leg in the extremity of his anguish! The worst perhaps has to follow, for in spite of the ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... out seemingly to the number of twenty, the poor devil of a coachman, frightened almost to death, fell upon his knees, and begged for mercy's sake the King of Terrors would not suffer any more of his apparitions to appear; for, though he had a multitude of sins to account ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... of flight came, but it was instantly rejected. The next moment he drew a long breath. "I'm an infernal fool and coward," he muttered. He took three steps forward, and stood beside the Figure. He laid his hand firmly upon the head; the hair fell off at his touch. "Poor devil," said he, "I'll bury your bones at any rate." The spell was broken, and Brandon was ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... Dudley, as he showed him the directed letter, "it is to the widow of the poor devil who was found in the Thames the other day—man who was once in my ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden
... this. I wanted to marry her in New York, but the thought of my debts frightened me out of that, and so I put it off. I half wish now I hadn't been so confoundedly prudent. Perhaps it is best, though. Still I don't know. Better be the wife of a poor devil, than have one's heart broken by a ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... the species called empusa by the Greeks. This demon terrified his companions half out of their wits, but Apollonius bravely assailed him with all sorts of hard words, and, to literally translate the old Greek narrative, "blackguarded" him so effectually that the poor devil fled with his tail between his legs. At Taxilia, Phraortes, the King, a lineal descendant of the famous Porus—and truly a porous personage, since he was renowned for drinking—gave the philosopher a grand reception, and introduced him to the chief of the Brahmins, whose temples ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... young lady, I mean. Well, the fellow asked nothing better than to be forgotten, only he didn't find it easy to do so himself, because he would write home now and then. Not to any of his friends though. He had no near relations. The professor had been his guardian. No, the poor devil wrote now and then to an old retired butler of his late father, somewhere in the country, forbidding him at the same time to let any one know of his whereabouts. So that worthy old ass would go up and dodge about ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad
... to drinking in Julian's studio. She was going to be an artist, you know, but she didn't succeed. When they rejected her picture at the exhibition, she threw herself at the head of this poor devil and married him ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... looking at the frock-coat. He had stripped that garment from his shoulders and had tossed it on a bush when he had decided on combat. "If I should stop to argue the matter with myself just now I should find myself flattering his good judgment. I have robbed a poor devil for a whim. Thank God, I went at it brutally and frankly. There was no 'high finance' sneak-thieving about that job. I sent him away with his face smarting. They sent me away with my ...
— The Landloper - The Romance Of A Man On Foot • Holman Day
... spark in them for these to work on. . . . What we have to do is to make ridiculous the cry of "Vengeance is mine, saith Podsnap," and, whenever anyone tells an Englishman a lie, to explain to the poor devil that it is a lie, and that he must stop cheering it as a splendid speech. For an Englishman never compares speeches either with facts or with previous speeches: to him a speech is art for art's sake, the ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... he continued: "Oh! oh! the poor devil was busy with her cooking when he struck her; see her pan of ham and eggs upon the hearth. The brute hadn't patience enough to wait for the dinner. The gentleman was in a hurry, he struck the blow fasting; therefore he can't invoke the gayety ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... war." You see, Carley, service men feel queer about that sort of thing. It's something we got over there, and none of us will ever outlive it. Now, the point of this is that I am asking you to go see Rust, and cheer him up, and do what you can for the poor devil. It's a good deal to ask of you, I know, especially as Rust saw your picture many a time and knows you were my girl. But you needn't tell him that you—we couldn't make a go ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... suddenly the same black abyss yawned before him and he felt himself sinking into it, deeper and deeper, while his voice rambled on smoothly and cheerfully: "Yes, of course I thought I'd lost the ring; no wedding would be complete if the poor devil of a bridegroom didn't go through that. But you DID keep me waiting, you know! I had time to think of every horror ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... and Austria, there is an old husband, of course; a sentimental young German nobleman, who falls in love with his wife; and the moral of the piece lies in the showing up of the conduct of the lady, who is reprehended—not for deceiving her husband (poor devil!)—but for being a flirt, AND TAKING A SECOND LOVER, to the utter despair, confusion, and ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... cried his companion eagerly. "It was easy for you to renounce games of chance because your winnings only added more to the rest, and you did not wish to pluck poorer partners. But I! A poor devil like me cannot maintain armour-bearer, servants, and steeds out of what the dear little mother at home in her faithful care can spare from crops and interest. How could we succeed in making a fair appearance at court and in the tournament if it were not for the ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... looked on upon these proceedings, although not without laughter, yet with impatience and disgust. I am one that cannot bear to see things botched or gone upon with ignorance; and the thought that some poor devil was to hazard his bones upon such premises revolted me. Had I guessed the name of that unhappy first adventurer, my sentiments ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... hurt," he murmured. He turned to Kay and her mother. "Why the poor unfortunate man is forced to remain at the Rancho Palomar in order to protect his bet." His thick black brows lifted piously. "Don't cheer, boys," he cried tragically; "the poor devil is going fast now! Is there anybody present who remembers a prayer or who ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... to blame," he said. "It is obviously a thing to laugh at, or run from, unless you happen to have received a peculiar mental and physical training. Anyhow the poor devil has found his way home now and come into port safely ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... body of Yankees approaching, and as we started to run back they fired upon us. Our pickets had run in and reported a night attack. We ran forward, expecting that our men would recognize us, but they opened fire upon us. I never was as bad scared in all my whole life, and if any poor devil ever prayed with fervency and true piety, I did it on that occasion. I thought, "I am between two fires." I do not think that a flounder or pancake was half as flat as I was that night; yea, it might be ...
— "Co. Aytch" - Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment - or, A Side Show of the Big Show • Sam R. Watkins
... who had all tired of barking at me by this time, became furiously excited, howling and leaping against their chains. The black hesitated before them, and this gave the red-haired man time to come up with him and deliver a tremendous blow between the shoulder-blades. The poor devil went down like a felled ox, and rolled in the dirt among the furiously excited dogs. It was lucky for him that they were muzzled. The red-haired man gave a yawp of exultation and stood staggering, and as it seemed to me in serious danger of either going backwards ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells
... "Listen to me. The poor devil is now pretending to be scrupulous. He will not show his tricks unless he hears the sound of gold. There are nine of us. Let us make a collection. That will spoil his scheme, and perhaps open the eyes of ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... be fun for us to rig out this poor devil, but we must do more than feed and clothe him. ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... chambers a squirrel in the usual round cage. "Ah! poor devil," said Jekyll, "he's going the ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... the poor devil slinks to sleep again, with his tail between his legs. Fierce assertion many times repeated is hard to stand against; only time separates the truth from the lie. So we ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner
... a rich sultan, I would make Adam my grand-vizier. And I believe now he would bear the exaltation as well as any poor wise man in an Eastern story. If ever I live to be a large-acred man instead of a poor devil with a mortgaged allowance of pocket-money, I'll have Adam for my right hand. He shall manage my woods for me, for he seems to have a better notion of those things than any man I ever met with; ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... informed upon the poor devil for spite," said the Commander; "here's a private note from Hayling ...
— Officer And Man - 1901 • Louis Becke
... of the abuse cite particular instances; they name the persons and their workmen who will be disturbed, while the poor devil of a reformer can only refer to the general good, which must insensibly diffuse itself among the masses. This does not have the effect ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat
... first gagged the poor devil with his own neckerchief, we stripped him quickly; and I as quickly donned the borrowed uniform and became, at least in outward semblance, a light-horse trooper of that king whose service I had once forsworn. The items of small-clothes, ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... desisting. "By the bye, I, too, have had my triumphs this evening. I shared the honors of the concert with Master Lind, who was so delighted that he insisted on bringing me off to the Bijou. He loves you to distraction, poor devil!" ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... not caring a rap whether any one else gets burnt; and then you're awfully surprised and insulted and all that if the—the victim of the fire, in his first pain, turns on you. 'Said dreadful things to you'—I should think he would have, poor devil! Perhaps young girls don't realize; but a woman over twenty, especially if she's been married, has only herself to blame if a man loses his head. Were you sweet and tender and—aloof, just because you were sick and disgusted and disillusioned, ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes
... the crown of your hat, was a sovereign remedy! Dried toads and snake skins are quite out of use around these settlements, and we think the Esculapius who would recommend such nostrums, would be looked upon as a poor devil with a fissure in his cranium, liable to cause his brains to become weather-beaten! We remember hearing of a learned old cuffy, who lived down "dar" near Tallahassee, who invariably recommended cayenne pepper in the eye to cure the toothache! Had this venerable ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... gaol! This is unlucky. Poor devil! He must now be unpeppered.[39] We are all well. Wordsworth is well. Hartley sends a grin to you? He has ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... tiff because he wished me to say, 'Oh, poor man, let him go; I leave the affair to God.' I thought Omar absurd, but it was I who was wrong. The authorities concluded that it would oblige me very much if the poor devil were punished with a 'rigour beyond the law,' and had not Sheykh Yussuf come and explained the nature of the proceedings, the man would have been sent up to the mines in Fazogloo for life, out of civility to me, by the Moudir of Keneh, Ali Bey. There was no alternative ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... for the poor devil," answered the father, "for he is dead by now. But what could a white man have been doing here? Some hunter, I suppose, who has ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... notice up this morning about Boffer,' observed Mr. Simmery. 'Poor devil, he's expelled ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... although for all his faults, I regret, for his father's sake, that this dreadful affair has happened. Well, it can't be helped, Shirley. Don't cry, my dear. I know it's terrible, but—there, there my love. Do brace up. Poor devil! For all his damnable treatment of me, I wouldn't have had this happen for a ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... twenty-two years of age, who had committed a theft and deserted in consequence of it. We were chained together for four years, and we were friends; wherever I may be I am certain to meet him when his time is up. This poor devil, whose name is Guepin, is not a scoundrel, he is merely heedless; his punishment may reform him. If my comrades had discovered that religion led me to submit to my trials,—that I meant, when my time was up, to live ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac
... indignation. He was not the Misanthrope; he was an old notary, accustomed in his business to the shrewd calculations of worldly people, to those clever bits of treachery which do more fatal injury than open murder on the high-road committed by some poor devil, who is guillotined in consequence. To the upper classes of society these passages in life, these diplomatic meetings and discussions are like the necessary cesspools where the filth of life is thrown. Full of pity for his client, Mathias ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... was interrupted. I'll write a few more lines. Hope you can read them. It's late and the wind is moaning outside. It's so cold and dismal. The fellow in the bed next to me is out of his head. Poor devil! He broke his knee, and they put off the operation—too busy! So few doctors and so many patients! And now he'll lose his leg. He's talking about home. Oh, Lenore! Home! I never knew what ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... 'n' dirty, an' our feelin's out of tune, An' it's hard on fellers for'ard that was used to go saloon; There's a broken swell among us — he is barracked, he is chaffed, An' I wish at times, poor devil, for his own sake he was aft; For they'd understand him, aft, (He will miss the bath-rooms aft), Spite of all there's no denyin' that ...
— In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses • Henry Lawson
... scoundrel made me wash his shirts," and he let drive at a poor devil, who was squattering and swimming away towards the shore, and shot him through ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... need not wonder then that the Jalno, after paying so dear to act as deputy-deity for a few weeks, should have preferred to die by deputy rather than in his own person when his time was up. The painful but necessary duty was accordingly laid on some poor devil, some social outcast, some wretch with whom the world had gone hard, who readily agreed to throw away his life at the end of a few days if only he might have his fling in the meantime. For observe that while the ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... devil, from me, I care not a single hair for thee; In spite of the devil, a noble man Should drain to the last his drinking-can. I'll sup with the Lord and the saints the first, While thou, poor devil, must ever thirst. I'll drain the mead from the flowing bowl, While the devil is sitting in hellish dole; Therefore, away, thou devil, from me, I care not ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... speaks?" cried the huntress, turning round with a glance rather of inquiry than alarm. "Down, Wolf!" commanded she, as the dog bounded forward with a growl. "Down, you savage brute! Don't you hear that some one is starving? Ha! a negro! Poor devil! where can he ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... observations to the Squire, in palliation of the delinquent's offence; but poor Slingsby spoke more from the heart than the head, and was evidently actuated merely by a general sympathy for every poor devil in trouble, and a liberal toleration for all kinds ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... only some poor devil who was alone in the world," went on Ingram without heeding his remark, "I could take you in hand and make something of you, for you've quite brains enough. Poor devils are generally more reasonable in their views than you, even when they're geniuses. You simply keep on wearing out your ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... you what I did. You poor devil, said I, you are a disgrace to your family. We must send you to a surgeon and have some kind of a Taliacotian operation performed on you. (You remember the operation as described in Hudibras, of course.) The first thing was to find a subject of similar ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... don't you think?—the grave, Farquharson's personal effects, those pages of the poor devil's diary." ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... this while she should deny me sight of her, and I would embrace that last hardship that in the end she might be the dearer prize, a queen worthy to seat beside me. Man, heave your great lubberly bones out of that chair and salute a poor devil whom, as you put it, ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... be just like Oily Ackroyd," remarked Bertram. "He's a vindictive scoundrel. Only a few days ago, he nearly killed a poor devil of a drug clerk, over some trifling dispute. He managed to keep it out of the newspapers but he had to pay ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... was peering into the water when I saw a big shark pass directly beneath me. He was fully sixteen feet in length. I saw the whole thing. He got the woolly-head by the middle, and away he went, the poor devil, head, shoulders, and arms out of the water all the time, screeching in a heart-rending way. He was carried along in this fashion for several hundred feet, when he was ...
— South Sea Tales • Jack London
... "There's another side to that. There's an English official element that would rather be rude to some poor devil with a title than draw pay (and it loves its pay, you may believe me!). You'd have friends in high places, but make enemies, too, if I go ashore ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... there. No one does smile after the first week; your sense of humour is the first thing the cure eradicates. There was a hunting man at my hotel, getting his weight down to ride a special thoroughbred, and no doubt a cheery dog at home; but, poor devil, he hadn't much chance of good cheer there! Miles and miles on his poor feet before breakfast; mud-poultices all the morning; and not the semblance of a drink all day, except some aerated muck called Gieshuebler. He was allowed to lap that up an hour after meals, ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... bishop's, and prayed him to put a stop to this state of violence. 'What do you suppose,' said he to me, 'those fellows can do with all their outbreaks? Why, if my blackamoor John were to pull the nose of the most formidable amongst them, the poor devil durst not even grumble. Have I not forced them to give up what they called their commune, for the whole duration of my life?' I held my tongue," adds Guibert; "many folks besides me warned him of his danger; but he would not deign ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... gave a sou, I'll swear!" I retorted. "You took the poor devil's balls, and left him at the gate! Ay, it is rogues like you get me a bad name!" I continued, affecting more anger than I felt—for, in truth, I was rather pleased with my quickness in discovering the cheat. "You steal and I bear the blame, and pay to boot! Off ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... found lying dead drunk in his bedroom, at eleven o'clock in the morning, on the second Sunday after his arrival. Half a dozen empty brandy bottles were afterwards discovered on the top of his wardrobe. Poor devil! ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... They're apt to put two and two together and make eight where you know it's only four." For the second time he sprung the bows back over his ears. "And when they find out their beastly mistake—why—oh—it's too late then, perhaps, for some poor devil!" ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... courage was in me. But under the magnetic influence of the woman before me I forgot what a poor devil I was. Luella looked at me, and I saw in her eyes that she understood ...
— Blindfolded • Earle Ashley Walcott
... hanged!" replied the sergeant, who was naturally a good-natured, but out-spoken fellow—"sooner than I'd take up a poor devil of a beggar that has enough to do to make out his bit and sup. Go on about your business, poor devil; you shan't be molested. Go to my uncle's, where you'll get a bellyfull, and a comfortable bed of straw, and a ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... the carpenter!" exclaimed Monsieur de Camier as he parted the foliage, which had prevented the head from being seen until then, for he recognized the workman's livid, swollen features. "It is that poor devil of a Lambernier, ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... serious look on his usually merry face, 'were you on Southberry Heath on the night that poor devil was murdered?' ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... crime as a vice," said I; "and perhaps not so much a vice as a virtue. Your crime is, that you are so stone-cold to a poor devil who loves you." ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... what I heartily dislike is the effect of his position (that of a giant among pigmies) on the lowly minds about him, and the servility, hypocrisy, and parasitism which spring up and flourish in his wide shadow whether he likes these moral weeds or not. As a rule he likes them, since the poor devil has this in common with the rest of us, that he likes to stand high in the general regard. But how is he to know it unless he witnesses its outward beautiful signs every day and every hour on every countenance ...
— A Shepherd's Life • W. H. Hudson
... do look at her," he exclaimed, turning to Miss Bart with lugubrious merriment—"I beg your pardon, but do just look at my wife making a fool of that poor devil over there! One would really suppose she was gone on him—and it's all the other way round, ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... this rise of labor, I demand to know whence the laborer is to obtain this additional three shillings. If the buyers of hats do not pay him in the price of hats, I presume that the buyers of shoes will not pay him. The poor devil must be paid ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... was taken. Her abductor got no pleasure of her and Omar's honour was unsmirched—though he never knew it, poor devil. He killed his man," added Said, with a smile of grim satisfaction. "It made no difference, he was renegade, a traitor, ripe for death. The Chief fell to my lot. It was from him I learned about Safiya—he talked before he ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... any rate, he's a man and a brother. But so am I." Miss Galbraith does not reply, and after a pause Mr. Richards resumes. "Talking of gentlemen, I recollect, once, coming up on the day-boat to Poughkeepsie, there was a poor devil of a tipsy man kept following a young fellow about, and annoying him to death—trying to fight him, as a tipsy man will, and insisting that the young fellow had insulted him. By and by he lost his balance and ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... this poor devil of a sick man—" began Carroll, when a second thought about the smoke diverted his line of thought. "Is it ...
— The Unspeakable Perk • Samuel Hopkins Adams |
