"Trick" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of trumpets over some new trick in playing with syllogism, when the whole thing is utterly worthless? And the Professor upsets himself in his own lecture, thus: "If the middle tub is contained in the big tub, and the little tub is contained in the middle tub, then the little tub is contained ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, September 1887 - Volume 1, Number 8 • Various
... one of her places there was a fine tabby cat, or rather a good-sized kitten, which would never eat anything in the kitchen, and was so particular in his ways that he was called 'Sir Thomas.' At dinner time he had a trick of jumping up as quick as lightning just when any one was going to put his food into his mouth with his fork. He would give the fork a knock with his paw, so that the meat tumbled off; which he ate before one could see what had happened! ...
— Woodside - or, Look, Listen, and Learn. • Caroline Hadley
... like that shield," Major Dunlop remarked; "it shows that there is some more than usually intelligent scoundrel among them, and he will be up to some new trick." ...
— In Times of Peril • G. A. Henty
... the appearance of the Landgrave, with my letter in his hand, may well be supposed; I had the presence of mind, however, to deny my handwriting, and affect astonishment at so crafty a trick. The Landgrave endeavoured to convict me, told me what Lieutenant Kemnitz had repeated at Vienna concerning my possessing myself of Magdeburg, and thereby showed me how fully I had been betrayed. But as no such person existed as Lieutenant Kemnitz, and as ...
— The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck - Vol. 2 (of 2) • Baron Trenck
... "I'm just dreaming up a nice, dirty trick," he admitted. "Tried something like it once before, on a smaller scale. It worked." He ...
— Millennium • Everett B. Cole
... kegs, and told his men to bury them in the sand. This ingenious captain proceeded as he fancied smugglers would have done, and he intended to go round to the coastguard's cottage and inform him of the trick in the morning. Just as the casks had been triumphantly covered, a voice called ...
— The Romance of the Coast • James Runciman
... shaken by the sharpers, who differ only from the boatmen of Beirut in that they wear pantaloons and intersperse their Arabic with a jargon of French. These brokers, like rapacious bats, hover around the emigrant and before his purse is opened for the fourth time, the trick is done. And with what ceremony, you shall see. From the steamer the emigrant is led to a dealer in frippery, where he is required to doff his baggy trousers and crimson cap, and put on a suit of linsey-woolsey ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... upon the heels of her boots a pair of tiny, sharp rowelled spurs, that a riding quirt hung from her right wrist by its rawhide thong, that her cheeks were a little flushed as though from excitement but that she knew the trick of forbidding her eyes to tell what her excitement was. He saw that her throat, where her neck scarf fell loosely away from it, was very round and white. He saw that while her grey riding habit covered her body it hid none of her body's grace ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory
... would be a serious matter, supposing what you think to be true, to intrust you with the secret. I know not whether you are disposed toward king or Parliament, and to put the lives of many honorable gentlemen into the hands of one of whose real disposition I know little would be but a fool's trick." ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty
... North. The cohorts of abolition are the Zouaves of the Republican camp. It is their enthusiasm, their fiery zeal, and intolerant hate of all southern institutions, that give the Republican party no small amount of its power. The nomination of Lincoln over Seward was a trick of expediency, like the nomination of Fremont. The real leaders of the Republican organization have points too sharply defined to be trusted as candidates before the nation. Obscure men are sought, who from their very want of being known, fail to concentrate the deadly fire that would pour upon ...
— The Relations of the Federal Government to Slavery - Delivered at Fort Wayne, Ind., October 30th 1860 • Joseph Ketchum Edgerton
... I know that the 'bug-birds,' that are always seen on or near cattle, do not feed on the bugs with which the cattle are covered, but on the locusts that fly about the herd. Last week, when our guards took us for a walk outside the fort, I noticed that a kind of sparrow in India has the same trick of catching the locusts that are driven on ahead ...
— On Commando • Dietlof Van Warmelo
... benevolence. Deedora, in the meanwhile, sat talking with the sergeant and me. Soon after, another native, named Morunga, brought back the canoe, and now came our turn to cross. The sergeant (from a foolish trick which had been played upon him when he was a boy) was excessively timorous of water, and could not swim. Morunga offered to conduct him, and they got into the canoe together; but, his fears returning, he jumped out and refused to proceed. I endeavoured to animate him, and Morunga ridiculed ...
— A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson • Watkin Tench
... Mark! You're not of legal age—I'll drive you forth. I'd rather see you dead, here, at my feet, Than baulk my counsels thus. Nay, try and see If sentiment will feed you, trick you out. O, who ...
— Cromwell • Alfred B. Richards
... feet and stretched himself. He wondered what Alfieri was disinterring at Suleiman's Well if the legion of Aelius Gallus had followed the old-world route described by the Arab. Perhaps it was all a mad dream, and this latest development but an added trick of fantasy. Abdur Kad'r, looking up ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... maybe he bites," warned the anxious conductor. "I wager this is some boy's trick to stop the ...
— Ruth Fielding of the Red Mill • Alice B. Emerson
... a stronger check upon his confederate than was afforded by his own knowledge of that anonymous letter and the competition trick. For were the competition lost to him, Havill would have no further interest in conciliating Miss Power; would as soon as not let her know the secret of ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... the barn-yard, and she straightway forgot about wheel-barrows and painters, for Jose, the little brown donkey, was loose, and was trying with might and main to open the further gate of the yard, a trick of which he was extremely fond, and in ...
— Five Mice in a Mouse-trap - by the Man in the Moon. • Laura E. Richards
... this distance to answer some purpose of his own, I re-embarked on the instant, and set off on my return to Lundu, indignant enough. However, I had the poor satisfaction of dragging them after me, and making them repent their trick, which I believe was nothing else than to visit the island of Talang Talang for turtles' eggs. We were pretty well knocked up by the time we reached Samatan, having been pulling thirteen hours, the greater part of the time under ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... house to live in three months in the year, with a flock of servants and a fleet of motor-cars, and a string of what she'll call cottages to float around among, the rest of the time. And she'll want a nice, tame, trick husband to manage things for her and be considerate and affectionate and amusing, and, generally speaking, Johnny-on-the-spot whenever she wants him. If she has sense enough to know what she wants in advance, it will be all right. She can ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... for a fool, son of Mopo," said one of the men with me to Umslopogaas; "presently I will beat you till the blood comes for this trick." ...
— Nada the Lily • H. Rider Haggard
... child again. And I never saw her again, not even when she died. I loved the mother, and she deceived me and disgraced me and broke my heart, and I only wish she had killed me; and I was beginning to love her child, and I vowed she should not live to trick me too. I had suffered as no man I know had suffered; in a way a boy like you cannot understand, and that no one can understand who has not gone to hell and been forced to live after it. And was I to go through that ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis
... them their valets, as the "marquis of Mascarille" and the "viscount of Jodelet." The girls are taken with their "aristocratic visitors;" but when the game has gone far enough, the masters enter and unmask the trick. By this means the girls are taught a most useful lesson, and are saved from any serious ill consequences.—Moli['e]re, Les Pr['e]cieuses ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... spirit with the stones. Saduko, get you to sleep. Macumazahn, you who are a Watcher-by-Night, come and sit with me awhile in my hut, and we will talk of other things. All this business of the stones is nothing more than a Kafir trick, is it, Macumazahn? When you meet the buffalo with the split horn in the pool of a dried river, remember it is but a cheating trick, and now come into my hut and drink a kamba [bowl] of beer and let us talk of ...
— Child of Storm • H. Rider Haggard
... "If you will consult your recollections of the habits of wild-fowl you will see that this particular specimen was a RARA AVIS. It's an old trick, Petrie, but a good one, for it is used in decoying. A dacoit's head was concealed in that wild-fowl! It's useless. He has certainly made good his escape ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... discouraged at slow progress. The trick over some stroke you have worked over for weeks unsuccessfully will suddenly come to you when least expected. Tennis players are the product of hard work. Very few are born ...
— The Art of Lawn Tennis • William T. Tilden, 2D
... coat. He looked utterly foolish. Bill was the first to recover, and inquired with apparent nonchalance: "What are you gentlemen after?" In the meantime he had noticed that the two men at the door wore soldiers' caps with broad peaks, and he construed this as a new holdup trick. ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... knight, or to anyone who has the gift of the fairies and can see them. but the man who scoffs at them, and does not believe in them or care for them, he never sees them. Only now and then they play him an ugly trick, leading him into some treacherous bog and leaving him to get out as ...
— The Fairy-Land of Science • Arabella B. Buckley
... order to weaken the logical consequences of deductions they are the first to be the victims of this childish trick. ...
— Common Sense - - Subtitle: How To Exercise It • Yoritomo-Tashi
... new trick of a ruling and aristocratic class. From the days when the patricians of Rome forced the people into war whenever the people showed a disposition to demand their rights, autocracies have always turned to war as the best antidote against the ...
— My Four Years in Germany • James W. Gerard
... parts or voices, which, however, were more or less exact reproductions, at different pitch, of the principal or given melody, while the former was composed of entirely different melodic and rhythmic material. This gave rise to the science of counterpoint, which, as I have said, consists of the trick of making a number of voices sing different melodies at the same time without violating certain given rules. The given melody or "principal" soon acquired the name of cantus firmus, and the other parts were each called contrapunctus,[11] as before ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell
... say me nay?" he cries, "Why talk of chaperones severe? I am in love and know the art to trick a listening ear." ...
— The Elegies of Tibullus • Tibullus
... in his throat. Johnny quickly drowned the thought in a flood of inconsequential nonsense, a trick he had learned as a green pilot. He might sleep though, if sleep were a possible thing in this cold emptiness. No one, to his recollection, had ever done so outside a ship or station—the space psychology ...
— Far from Home • J.A. Taylor
... the essence of enjoyment, and the author who would confer pleasure must possess the art, or know the trick, of destroying for the time the reader's own personality. Undoubtedly the easiest way of doing this is by the creation of a host of rival personalities—hence the number and the popularity of novels. Whenever a novelist ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... comes thundering forth, Let barren face beware; For a trick it will find, with a razor of wind, To shave the ...
— At the Sign of the Barber's Pole - Studies In Hirsute History • William Andrews
... crystal. Baker wished he could reach the cursed thing and hurl it away from him. That must be how Atkins was communicating with him. Yes, somehow it was possible. He had found no trick, no gimmick. ...
— The Great Gray Plague • Raymond F. Jones
... were not drowned. I will land you at Kungla free of payment, as you are so anxious to get there. So he gave him dry clothes to wear, and a berth to sleep in, and Tiidu and his friend secretly made merry over their cunning trick. ...
— The Crimson Fairy Book • Various
... 'we should simply march over the Four Quarters and be blessed by the nations! Only, avoid your trick of dashing headlong to the other extreme. He has ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... did your trick, let me ask you to do one of mine." Then taking four sacred arrows he passed them transversely through his chest, back and forth, one at a time. As he pulled each arrow out the second time he passed it to one of the four Monsters, saying, "If you can do this, my people will not come; if not, then ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... was goaded to it!" said he. "Women think so much of their looks. I am told the dragoons have tried that trick ...
— Jacques Bonneval • Anne Manning
... Ralph, starting to his feet, and indulging in a long-drawn-out whistle. "This is a nice fix! We're in the middle of a cloud. I never saw it coming up. It will be uncommonly awkward to get out of it. What a shame of old Pendle Tor to play us such a trick!" ...
— The Manor House School • Angela Brazil
... is no great danger in the steady advance of a line of men, provided they are at close intervals of 5 or 8 yards apart, and that they keep this line intact. It is a common trick, when the beaters are nervous, to open out the line in gaps, and the men resolve themselves into parties of ten or twenty, advancing in knots, at the same time howling and shouting their loudest to keep up the appearance of a perfect line. In such cases the tiger is certain to break back ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... love her so much, and because I love you. If you could forget the other and love this one it seems as though I should be glad even in heaven, but if you do not feel that way when you see her, John, don't mind my writing this letter, for it pleased me much to play this little trick upon you before I left; and the dear girl must never know—unless indeed you love her—and then I do not care—for I know she will forgive me for writing this silly letter, and love me ...
— The Man of the Desert • Grace Livingston Hill
... I can't be mistaken; it was you I met in the wood? Have you been playing some trick on me? (To the others.) It was for her I ...
— Dear Brutus • J. M. Barrie
... same as the German 'Spuk' and the Danish 'Spogelse,' without the sibilant aspiration. These words are general names for any kind of spirit, and correspond to the 'pouk' of Piers Ploughman. In Danish 'spog' means a joke, trick, or prank, and hence the character of Robin Goodfellow. In Iceland Puki is regarded as an evil sprite; and in the language of that country, 'at pukra' means both to make a murmuring noise and to steal clandestinely. The names of these spirits seem to have originated ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... expressions. "Don't worry! I'll put her on a wide orbit and I'll stick out every alarm on board. I'll also sleep in the control chair. But in case somebody gets here early, we've got to be around to tell them about that space termite trick." ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... who kept his flock at a little distance from the village. Once he thought he would play a trick on the villagers and have some fun at their expense. So he ran toward the village crying out, with all ...
— Stories to Tell to Children • Sara Cone Bryant
... ruse, he saw; no cunning trick to find out which way the Markhams had gone, but a true honest feeling for one who had been a friend, but was now transformed by political troubles ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn
... lady-love, the other for your armorial bearings—if you have a gold chain to your watch, keep it, but the less you show of it the better. Avoid a foolish custom now springing up, of fastening the coat with a couple of supplementary buttons, attached by a metallic link. This is the trick of some scoundrel tailor, who sent home a coat too small for the wearer, and thus persuaded him (he must have been an ass) to tie two buttons together, and so make both ends meet. It will do very well for a commercial gent, but not for a gentleman. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various
... sneaked back with the key to the place she took it from. And then there's all the rest—the putting the key back and fitting in times and all that.... Seems to me a bit too much of the Box and Cox trick—a sort of jig-saw ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... steps of Miss Teeturn's boarding-house for the dowdy servant-girl's return—such dirty, unkempt steps as they were, and such a dingy door-plate, spotted with rain and dust, not like Malachi's, he thought—he could hardly restrain himself from beating Juba with his foot, a plantation trick Malachi had taught him, keeping time the while with the palms of his ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Brittany from Turkey. The plan succeeded, and the birds thus stolen were brought to the King, who exclaimed, "By our holy Lady of Clery! what will the Duke Francis and his Bretons do? They will be very angry at the good trick ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... out the canoe. The craft was not particularly heavy, but it was long, and he had trouble when he endeavored to get it upon his back. He had more than once carried the Siwash river-canoes over a portage in this fashion, but there is a trick in it, and the birch craft was larger and of a different shape. He felt that he could have managed it had there been nobody to watch him, but to do it while the girl noticed every movement with a kind of sardonic amusement was quite a different matter. He ...
— The Gold Trail • Harold Bindloss
... By a trick of memory Clemens gives The Little Duke as his suggestion for The Prince and the Pauper; he should have written The Prince and the Page, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... up a bit," said Howells, who had worshiped Hiram Ranger and in a measure understood what had been in his mind when he dedicated his son to a life of labor. "If it becomes absolutely necessary I'll talk to him. But maybe you can do the trick." ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... me! Don't leave me up in a tree like this!" begged the Calico Clown, who had sat down astride the limb after he had done his last funny trick. "Come ...
— The Story of Calico Clown • Laura Lee Hope
... was engaged in that rich and intricate mass of pleasures, duties, and discoveries which for the keeping off of the profane, we disguise by the exoteric name of Nothing. At the moment in question I was throwing a big Swedish knife at a tree, practising (alas, without success) that useful trick of knife-throwing by which men murder each ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton
... where it was before. But Matt struggled with it as if it were some quite new thing, and spent himself in trying to determine how he should present it to them. In his own mind he had very great doubt whether Northwick was in the accident, and whether that dispatch was not a trick, a ruse to cover up the real course of his flight. But then there was no sense in his trying to hide his track, for he must have known that as yet there was no pursuit. If the telegram was a ruse, ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... want to interfere unless I am convinced that Andy is trying an underhand trick. My plans are missing, and I think he took them. If his machine is made after those plans, it is, obviously, a steal, and I want him ruled out of ...
— Tom Swift and his Sky Racer - or, The Quickest Flight on Record • Victor Appleton
... the familiar odious phrase fell from the farmer's lips, and added to her anger was the crystallized fear that had been haunting her for weeks. She did not know whether Bob could really be returned to the poor-house or whether it was another trick of Peabody's, but she feared the worst ...
— Betty Gordon in Washington • Alice B. Emerson
... in caves not far distant from his own, they soon came trooping over the hills from all sides, and assailed the door of the cave with inquiries concerning the cause of his cries and groans. But as his only reply was, "Noman has injured me," they concluded that he had been playing them a trick, and therefore ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens
... with blank cartridge. This policy has been played off already eight or nine times; and by one time, as it happens, too many; for it was tried upon the stern Havelock, who took away both horses and carbines from the offenders. Too late it is now for Bengal to baffle this sharper's trick. But Bombay and Madras, should their turn come after all, ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... you almost disgusted with life, little man? I will tell you a wonderful trick That will bring you contentment if anything can— Do something for somebody, quick. Are you very much tired with play, little girl? Weary, discouraged, and sick? I'll tell you the loveliest game in the world— Do something for ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Literature • Ontario Ministry of Education
... in spite of this, he had looked much less unhappy of late. "And he doesn't nearly so often do that trick of his, so like his father, of wiping his eyes and passing his hand across his forehead. I think myself that in his heart of hearts he doesn't love his ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... on't, how beastly it becomes me! poorly! A trick put in upon me? well said Governess: I vow I would not wear it—out, it smells musty. Are these your tricks? now I begin to smell it, Abominable musty; will you help me? ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (2 of 10) - The Humourous Lieutenant • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... given to him in marriage. After this Abu al-Hasan the Wag abode with his wife in eating and drinking and all delight of life, till whatso was with them went the way of money, when he said to her, "Harkye, O Nuzhat al-Fuad!" Said she, "At they service;" and he continued, "I have it in mind to play a trick on the Caliph[FN60] and thou shalt do the same with the Lady Zubaydah, and we will take of them at once, to begin with, two hundred dinars and two pieces of silk. She rejoined, "As thou willest, but what thinkest thou to do?" And he said, "We will feign ourselves dead and this is the trick. ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... however, gave strong reasons to believe that the armistice was a mere ruse to gain time while Morillo could be recalled and General Torre placed in command. Bolivar, no doubt incensed by this apparent trick, determined, upon the expiration of the armistice, to strike a blow that would not soon be forgotten; which he did at Carabolo, by attacking and completely routing General Torre's command, compelling the fleeing fragments ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 • Various
... four stout walls between In an old enchanted tower; Death was on the cards for me, But amid the sudden strife Ere the last trump came, my life Won the trick and I got free. I ne'er ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... who shook hands with him. He sat down before the fire, and commenced fumbling his cap in the old way. "With the exception of that trick, and his shyness, there was little of the ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... always the eldest son who goes out first, and comes to grief on these occasions, and it is always the third son that succeeds. Send Alphonso" (this was the youngest brother), "and he will do the trick at once. At least, if he fails, it will be most unusual, and Enrico can ...
— Prince Prigio - From "His Own Fairy Book" • Andrew Lang
... spare; hence he had no kindness, no geniality; for geniality is almost definable as strength to spare. He had no god-like carelessness; he never forgot himself; his whole life was, to use his own expression, an arrangement. He went in for "the art of living"—a miserable trick. In a word, he was a great artist; but emphatically not a great man. In this connection I must differ strongly with Professor Raleigh upon what is, from a superficial literary point of view, one of his most ...
— Heretics • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... ring hung at his belt, while around his wrist a neat watch was fastened. The longest march, through mud and rain and wind and sun, would find him as trim and clean at the finish as though he had just stepped out of a bandbox. Jumma had the happy faculty of never looking rumpled, a trick which I tried hard to learn, but all in vain. He was as black as ebony, yet his features were like those of a Caucasian; in fact, he strikingly resembled an old ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon
... consequence of this ill-starred outburst of hypocrisy about treaties! Everybody has said over and over again that this war is the most tremendous war ever waged. Nobody has said that this new treaty is the most tremendous blank cheque we have ever been forced to sign by our Parliamentary party trick of striking moral attitudes. It is true that Mr. J.A. Hobson realised the situation at once, and was allowed to utter a little croak in a corner; but where was the trumpet note of warning that should have rung throughout ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... airplane goes faster is a property of air and not of the plane. Maybe we need to work out a theory that all inertia is a property of space. We'll see if we need that. But anyhow, just as a plane can go faster in thin air, so matter—any matter—will move faster in this field as soon as we get the trick of ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... sold the refuse wheat; or the worst of the wheat; making the shekel great, yet hoisting up the price (Amos 8). This was Mr. Badman's way. He would sell goods that cost him not the best price by far, for as much as he sold his best of all for. He had also a trick to mingle his commodity, that that which was bad might go off with the least mistrust. Besides, if his customers at any time paid him money, let them look to themselves, and to their acquaintances, for he would usually attempt to call for that payment ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... this was all a trick to get hold of my skin. The man said it on his way to the door, his ape-face shining dim as he turned it a little back in the direction of my uncle, who followed with the candle. I lost the last part of the sentence in the terror which sent me bounding ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... longest flight as at the nearer ranges. So the amateur bowman, suitably armed, may lay this much of comfort to his soul: if by the grace of Robin Hood and the little capricious gods of luck he does manage to stray a shaft into a beast, it is going to do the trick for him. And of course if he keeps on shooting arrows in the general direction of game, the doctrine of chances will land him sooner ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... he falls! An ambuscade? 'Twas impossible to strike him! Are there Tories in the glade? Such a trick is very like him. See! his comrade by him kneels, turning him in terror over, Then takes nimbly to his heels. Have they really slain the rover? It is worth some risk to know; so, with firelocks ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... off to the next meadow, and commanding a deep bend, the haunt of heavy trout); I suppose I have lost the trick; but catch them I can't. I have risen six fish, and lost the only ones that took me. Here's the keeper. What are they ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior
... fronts had often suffered through a trick of false surrender by German soldiers. It is best described by one of our boys who was lying on a table in a base hospital, waiting his turn to be operated upon, when he heard another who was being wheeled out ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... she was climbing over a rail-fence. Her lip at once assumed a Bourbon contour, and I reached the conclusion, by some tacit syllogism of infancy, that the rail-fence was at least half to blame for the catastrophe, and always carefully avoided it. I likewise avoided the wasps; a certain trick they have of giving a hitch to their after-parts as they walk along always struck me as ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne
... opportunity of doing so," he agreed seriously. "That young lady," he went on in a low, confidential tone, "played a trick on me that I find it hard to forgive. I look forward, with some satisfaction, to the day when the laugh will be on my side. I admit I ought to be above such paltry considerations, but, what would you? I don't think I am. But please don't mention my presence to her, or her friend. ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... Heh! Partner, we got 'em. Pull off wid your king. Dey got to play 'em. (When that trick is turned, triumphantly:) Didn't I tell you, partner? (Stands on his feet and slams down with his ace violently) Now, come up under this ace. Aw, hah, look at ol' low, partner. I knew I was gonna catch 'em. (When LUM plays) Ho, ho, there goes the ...
— The Mule-Bone: - A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts • Zora Hurston and Langston Hughes
... dear Cunningham, that you and I ever talked on the subject of religion at all. I know some who laugh at it, as the trick of the crafty FEW, to lead the undiscerning MANY; or at most, as an uncertain obscurity which mankind can never know anything of, and with which they are fools if they give themselves much to do. Nor would I quarrel with ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... hadn't one either," rejoined the princess; "it is so stupid! I have a great mind," she continued, "to play them all a trick. Why couldn't they leave me alone? They won't trust me in the lake for a single night!—You see where that green light is burning? That is the window of my room. Now if you would just swim there with me very quietly, and when we are all but under the balcony, give me such a push—up you ...
— The Light Princess and Other Fairy Stories • George MacDonald
... Pastor; "but of traditions of places, there are very many, and, as an example, there was in Randers province an island, and on the island a mansion; and when the family owning it were absent, three women-servants determined to play the priest a trick. They dressed up a sow like a sick person in bed, and sent for the priest to administer the sacrament to a dying person. The priest, however, saw the wicked deception, and at once left the island in his boat. Immediately the whole island sank as soon as he lifted ...
— A Danish Parsonage • John Fulford Vicary
... turned to look at Adelaide and her mother, and saw that they were tremulous with pleasure and delight at their little trick. He felt himself mean, sordid, a fool; he longed to punish himself, to rend his heart. A few tears rose to his eyes; by an irresistible impulse he sprang up, clasped Adelaide in his arms, pressed her to his heart, and stole a kiss; then with the simple heartiness ...
— The Purse • Honore de Balzac
... him, passed the pickles, and drove the antmires out of a sandwich, and handed it to him on a piece of shingle, but he either passed or turned it down. He said he couldn't take a trick. Later on, when the lemonade was brought on, the flies were skimmed off of some of it, and a little colored water was put in to make it look inviting, but his eyes were sot. He said they couldn't fool ...
— Peck's Sunshine - Being a Collection of Articles Written for Peck's Sun, - Milwaukee, Wis. - 1882 • George W. Peck
... room in the sanatorium, the supervisor entered. Drawing a table close to the bed, he placed upon it a slip of paper which he asked me to sign. I looked upon this as a trick of the detectives to get a specimen of my handwriting. I now know that the signing of the slip is a legal requirement, with which every patient is supposed to comply upon entering such an institution—private in character—unless ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... tail wildly whipping, came smack on the trail of an old stager of a cock-grouse—on, on over rock, log, wet gully, and dry ridge, twisting, doubling, circling, every wile, every trick employed and met, until the dog crawling noiselessly forward, trembled and froze, and Siward, far to left, wheeled at the muffled and almost noiseless rise. For an instant the slanting barrels wavered, grew motionless; but only a stray sunbeam glinting struck a flash of cold fire ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... body, the stock of which will shortly become exhausted, but a faculty acquired by the body-cells, which they will retain, like other results of education, for years, and even for life. When once the body has learned the wrestling trick of throwing and vanquishing a particular germ or bacillus, it no longer has much to dread from that germ. This is why the same individual is seldom attacked the second time by scarlet fever, ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... wonderful skill and address in evading the assault of the bull. They can almost always trick him by waving their cloaks a little out of the line of their flight. Sometimes, however, the bull runs straight at the man, disregarding the flag, and if the distance is great to the barrier the danger is imminent; for swift as these ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... matter, right. But over a long enough time—you know this as well as I do—random factors will eventually produce a life form. By some trick of radiation this process has been speeded up here. The substance the machine produces has in ...
— Sweet Their Blood and Sticky • Albert Teichner
... that after luck has favoured us so long she will play us such a trick now," Frank Mallett said. "Besides, the other regiments have done something in the way of fighting already while we have not fired a shot; and I think that Sir Colin would be more likely to choose the 75th, or, in fact, ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty
... But words have a trick of trapping us, and we note that the word "taken" is invariably used in referring to modern Masonic initiation. Verily they have "taken" the degree in its outward semblance. They have not attained to ...
— Sex=The Unknown Quantity - The Spiritual Function of Sex • Ali Nomad
... all kept quiet. The scabbard was never found again. Kjartan always treasured the sword less hereafter than heretofore. This affair Kjartan took much to heart, and would not let the matter rest there. Olaf said, "Do not let it pain you; true, they have done a nowise pretty trick, but you have got no harm from it. We shall not let people have this to laugh at, that we make a quarrel about such a thing, these being but friends and kinsmen on the other side." And through these reasonings of Olaf, Kjartan let matters rest ...
— Laxdaela Saga - Translated from the Icelandic • Anonymous
... in the Yorkshire rustic Hawbuck. His face and person are well adapted to a certain class of low comedy; his voice still more so. If he will but avoid that bane of comedians, the effort to raise laughter by spurious humour and low trick, he ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter
... enterprise laboured at that day made it impossible to expand into a modern "article," were quite sufficient to tell a whole story to Rome. Cornelia realized instantly that she had been made the victim of some vile trick, which she doubted not her would-be lover and her uncle had executed in collusion. She took the tablets from Herennia's hand, without a word, read the falsehoods once, twice, thrice. The meaning ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... front of the lion the boy placed the butt of his spear upon the ground, gave a mighty spring, and, before the bewildered beast could guess the trick that had been played upon him, sailed over the lion's head into the rending embrace of the ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... answered Nahoon, "the devil is dying, but he will try to play us another trick before he dies." And he went on peering ...
— Black Heart and White Heart • H. Rider Haggard
... poor,' it works the nation like a charm, my dear sir, and never a man suspects that it is an advertisement; but your secular paper sticks you right into the advertising columns and of course you don't take a trick. Give me a religious paper to advertise in, every time; and if you'll just look at their advertising pages, you'll observe that other people think a good deal as I do—especially people who have got little financial schemes to make everybody rich with. Of course I mean your great big ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Ruth awoke and slipped down to the kitchen again. But she heard her uncle rattling the stove grate. He was a very early riser. She peered into the kitchen and saw the grove of drying clothing, so knew that her trick of the night before had kept Fred Hatfield ...
— Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp • Alice Emerson
... the Cardinal, "that I have been duped. I will pay for the necklace; my desire to please your Majesty blinded me; I suspected no trick in the affair, and I am sorry ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... his complexion was a hideous yellow colour, he seems quite all right. I shall play a little trick on him at ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... said Pereo, trembling. "Alone! Eh! And the Coyote is not here!" He passed his hand over his staring eyes. "So." Suddenly he turned upon Carroll. "Ah, do you not see, it is a trick! The Coyote is escaping with Faquita! Come! Nay; thou wilt not? Then will I!" With an unexpected strength born of his madness, he freed his arm from Carroll and darted down the alley. The figure of Maruja, evidently alarmed at his approach, glided into the hedge, as Pereo ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte
... Curiosity so far that I immediately bought the Opera, by which means I perceived the Sparrows were to act the part of Singing Birds in a delightful Grove: though, upon a nearer Enquiry I found the Sparrows put the same Trick upon the Audience, that Sir Martin Mar-all [1] practised upon his Mistress; for, though they flew in Sight, the Musick proceeded from a Consort of Flagellets and Bird-calls which was planted behind the Scenes. At the same time I made this ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... number, and a hundred to one against your repeating the same throw three times in succession: and so on in an augmenting ratio. What is luck? Is it, as has been suggested, a blind man's buff among the laws? a ruse among the elements? a trick of Dame Nature? Has any scholar defined luck? any philosopher explained its nature? any chemist shown its composition? Is luck that strange, nondescript fairy, that does all things among men that they cannot account for? If so, why does not luck make a fool ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... would try to take the little obstinate creature by surprise, and casually ask her the word while she was thinking of something else; frequently she would begin to say it, and then suddenly cheek herself, with a provoking look that seemed to say, 'Ah! I'm too sharp for you; you shan't trick it ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... right," replied I, "nor is it my hope; there is some trick afloat of which we may as well ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... father and son. This raised a doubt in me whether it was so; which was farther confirmed, by a canoe, conducted by two men, coming along-side, as we were standing out of the bay, and demanding the young man in the name of Otoo. I now saw that the whole was a trick to get something from me; well knowing that Otoo was not in the neighbourhood, and could know nothing of the matter. Poreo seemed, however, at first undetermined whether he should go or stay; but he soon inclined to the former. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... yesterday. Wiggins? What! That scoundrel? that blackleg? that villain who was horsewhipped at Epsom? Why, the man is almost an outlaw. It seemed to me incredible when I heard he was steward here; but when you tell me that he is your guardian it really is too much. It must be some scoundrelly trick ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... think that it was a downright contemptible trick to play on the defenceless engineer. Had I been able to render him any assistance, I should have ...
— Mr. Hawkins' Humorous Adventures • Edgar Franklin
... any of your Ellen Berstouns. If she's played this trick on me, that's enough of her. But I tell you plainly I'm not going to let you rob me to keep a pack of worthless painters and people out of the gutter, without taking some steps. I warn ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... those about a deathbed cling to the hope that a miracle may supervene and save their loved one. There was a possibility that Chrystie had gone on some mysterious adventure of her own, was playing a trick, was doing anything but eloping with a man that no one had ever thought she cared for. The only way to find out whether Mayer had any part in her disappearance was ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... and unexpected that Paul was at first bewildered. But he quickly recovered his presence of mind, and saw into the trick. He raised his hat, and darted in pursuit of Mike, not knowing in what ...
— Paul the Peddler - The Fortunes of a Young Street Merchant • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... of the port watch went on duty at eight o'clock, when the secret poll for the choice of a captain, under the new order of events, was closed. Shuffles was in this watch, but as neither his "trick at the wheel" nor his turn on the lookout came within the first hour, he had an opportunity to attend to the important business of the League. Pelham and the two receivers of votes belonged in the second part of the port watch, and there was nothing to prevent them from attending the conference ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic
... chose to persist. I remain. To sit in an empty whorehouse and masturbate.... No! If this hallucination grows powerful enough to trick my senses into clownish fornications, let my madness enjoy them. Not I. We are no longer friends, my madness ...
— Fantazius Mallare - A Mysterious Oath • Ben Hecht
... occupied the place of conscience in McLane's being, was troubled. He thought of the nice girl at home, and fervently hoped nothing of this would ever reach her ears. No matter how careful a man is, chance sometimes plays him a scurvy trick. McLane remembered instances, and regretted the world was so small. Sometimes a cry of recognition from one on the pavement to a comrade in the park, shouted through the iron railings, sent a shiver through McLane. Art students had an uncomfortable habit of ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr
... who had a discreet but provoking trick of omitting the proper name wherever we specially thirst to know it, thus ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell
... sciolism, and mental poverty among too many of those who set up as arbiters of taste. A somewhat cruel man of letters is said to have led on one of the shallow pretenders in a heartless way until the victim confidently affected knowledge of a plot, descriptions, and characters which had no existence. The trick was heartless and somewhat dishonest; but the mere fact that it could be played at all shows how far the game of literary racing has ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... describing his mistress for us, though he has done it better earlier in the play; he harps upon her dark beauty here to praise it, just as he praised it in sonnet 127; it is passion's trick to sound the extremes of ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... my dissevered sons;" and thus their tales Of curse and blessing on her head proclaim Each other's falsehood. No, she ne'er has brought A curse, the innocent; nor time was given The blessed promise to fulfil; their tongues Were false alike; their boasted art is vain; With trick of words they cheat our credulous ears, Or are themselves deceived! Naught ye may know Of dark futurity, the sable streams Of hell the fountain of your hidden lore, Or yon bright spring ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... last year I have had plenty of time to think things over, and now I am at a loss to understand why I have done this. Suppose it is a piece of stupidity—a carefully planned and irrevocable folly? Suppose my irritable nerves have played a trick upon me? ...
— The Dangerous Age • Karin Michaelis
... dear, don't believe everything you hear. I am sure that my chief fault is that I don't possess land. Cicely, how much land must you possess if you really want to hold your head up? Would a hundred acres or so do the trick? I suppose not. Two hundred acres, now! I might run to that if the land ...
— The Squire's Daughter - Being the First Book in the Chronicles of the Clintons • Archibald Marshall
... have to be hunted as he stalked the rabbit and the partridge. Early in the afternoon he slipped off into the bush, followed by Gray Wolf. He had often begun the stalking of a rabbit by moving away from it and he employed this wolf trick now with the beavers. Beyond the windfall he turned and began trotting up the creek, with the wind. For a quarter of a mile the creek was deeper than it had ever been. One of their old fording places was completely submerged, and at last Kazan plunged in and swam across, leaving Gray Wolf ...
— Kazan • James Oliver Curwood |
