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Harum-scarum   Listen
Harum-scarum

adjective
1.
Cheerfully irresponsible.  Synonyms: carefree, devil-may-care, freewheeling, happy-go-lucky, slaphappy.  "Freewheeling urban youths" , "Had a harum-scarum youth"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Harum-scarum" Quotes from Famous Books



... the story I have," drawled the squire. "Where's that wild harum-scarum Tavia Travers? She's the ...
— Dorothy Dale • Margaret Penrose

... figure, of Sarah Bernhardt's unnecessary immodesty in dressing Racine's Andromaque, of the Grant reception at Healy's, of Lefevre's slipperiness of texture, of the lack of the true sentiment of piety in Bouguereau's religious pictures, of the harum-scarum amusements among the Americans at Bonnat's atelier, and the latest gossip ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various

... prancing about and hardly able to regulate their satisfaction the expedition promised to be a lively one, though the harum-scarum pair calmed down in the presence of Miss Bickford, and assumed a deportment of due decorum. The favored twelve were half seniors and half Transition, the remaining pair of the latter consisting of ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil

... Jim Barrett's plan, and it had jest enough risk and devilment in it to suit a harum-scarum young feller like me; so we got five of the boys who had good horses, lumped together all of our money, and rode out ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach

... outside the restricted limits of Methodism, and shone in it with an unflagging brilliancy altogether beyond the traditions of Tyre. Delightful as she was in other people's houses, she was still more naively fascinating in her own quaint and somewhat harum-scarum domicile; and the drab, two-storied, tin-roofed little parsonage might well have rattled its clapboards to see if it was not in dreamland—so gay was the company, so light were the hearts, which it sheltered in these new days. As for Theron, the period was one of incredible fructification ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic

... that the party that arrived in the Missisquoi were not very promising-looking boys. They had a wild, harum-scarum appearance and manner, which fully justified the description Captain Vesey had given of them. In a word, they were evidently wild boys; and in this respect they did not differ much ...
— All Adrift - or The Goldwing Club • Oliver Optic

... to-day—the tinkling of ice in the pitcher, as Susan, slowly and carefully, brings up-stairs the water we wait for. It were really a loss to have the way shorter, or the servant a harum-scarum thing who would dash in with her precious burden before one knew ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various

... Eugene Field's life would be true, no study of his personality complete, if it ignored or even glossed over "the mad wild ways of his youthful days" in Denver. He never wearied of telling of the constant succession of harum-scarum pranks that made the Tribune office the storm-centre for all the fun-loving characters in Colorado. Not that Field ever neglected his work or his domestic duties for play, but it was a dull day for Denver when his pen or his restless spirit for mischief ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson

... what the harum-scarum fellow is about?" answered the young officer. "He never danced at all, and hardly staid ten minutes in the ballroom: for he soon fell in with his friend Anderson, who is just come up from the country: their conversation turned upon books; and as Anderson ...
— The Old Man of the Mountain, The Lovecharm and Pietro of Abano - Tales from the German of Tieck • Ludwig Tieck

... between the pillars of the 6th bay of the Choir, was the tomb of WILLIAM HERBERT (1501-1569), first Earl of Pembroke of the second creation, a harum-scarum youth, who settled down into a clever politician, and was high in favour with Henry VIII., who made him an executor of his will, and nominated him one of the Council of twelve for Edward VI. He went through the reign of ...
— Old St. Paul's Cathedral • William Benham

... Certainly not, it was most ill-advised, probably some quixotic idea about not wanting to testify against his friend. If you knew the boy you would understand what a hot-headed, harum-scarum person he is. He was my pupil at one time and I grew quite fond of him. He has ability, undoubted ability, but he is a ship without a rudder; he has been drifting ever ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice

... Pendlemere with us, and have sent somebody from the village to take him home. There would have been no other way. Remember, though, that I'm responsible for you to your parents, and I really can't allow these harum-scarum tricks. Suppose there had been ...
— A harum-scarum schoolgirl • Angela Brazil

... certainly shows more partiality to him than to any one, and wonders incessantly how he managed to pick up so unworthy and harum-scarum a father. ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... one of the most delicate diplomatic missions of recent years. Everybody conceded that he had a future. If Jack had never appeared on her horizon she would have married Ned and been to him a loving wife. But the harum-scarum cousin had made ...
— The Highgrader • William MacLeod Raine

... old harum-scarum Daisy she always was, in spite of the efforts of her Lord Chesterfield of a husband to reform her," thought Judith, fondly, as her old schoolmate, catching sight of her at the window, waved her parasol so wildly that the staid old 'bus ...
— Mildred's Inheritance - Just Her Way; Ann's Own Way • Annie Fellows Johnston

... you would prefer to come quietly home with me. My maid is an excellent cook and one is very comfortable chez-moi." And often the prospect thus sketched would piquantly allure a client. Nevertheless at intervals she could savour a fashionable restaurant as well as any harum-scarum minx there. Her secret fear was still obesity. She was capable of imagining herself at fat as Marthe—and ruined; for, though a few peculiar amateurs appreciated solidity, the great majority of men did not. However, she ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett

... wandering of the mind that took the poor old woman away on this old-witch flight; and it was very curious and pitiful to witness the compunction with which she returned to herself and took herself to task for the preference which, in her wild nature, she could not help giving to harum-scarum wickedness over tame goodness. Now she tried to compose herself, and ...
— Septimius Felton - or, The Elixir of Life • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... all the same to you, Frank, an' the baby ain't got no objections, I'd like to use some of this to start a savings account for my namesake. Curry ain't no name for a baby girl, an' you ought to let me square it with her somehow. Mebbe when she gits of age, an' wants to marry some harum-scarum boy, she won't think so bad of ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan

... a great actress even then," he went on. "Colonel King had a beautiful daughter, and he was supposed to have a son—a harum-scarum, reckless lad, who went galloping over the ranges with the cowboys, roped cattle, took part in round-ups, and did all sorts of things like that. This boy was known as Tom King. Colonel King's foreman, Injun ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish



Words linked to "Harum-scarum" :   irresponsible, adventurer, tearaway, venturer



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