"Hoax" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... most extraordinary—yes, there is no doubt of it—in the most naughty way, had brought Leucha round to her side. But if Leucha were told the truth that a hoax had been played upon her, that there was no real ghost, then indeed her wrath would burn fiercely; and, in fact, to put it briefly, there would start in the school a profound feud. Several of the girls, more especially the English girls, would go over to Leucha's ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade
... alone had the necessary knowledge of antiquities, we are still met by the improbability of old Mrs. Hogg being engaged in the hoax. Moreover, Leyden was probably too keen an antiquary to take part in one of the deceptions which Ritson wished to punish so severely. Mr. Child expresses his strong and natural suspicions of the authenticity of the ballad, and Hogg is, certainly, ...
— A Collection of Ballads • Andrew Lang
... presently. He not only bore the basin of warm water but a towel as well. Jud watched operations curiously. He was seeing what was a strange thing according to his ideas. He could not quite bring himself to believe that there was not some cruel hoax hidden in this act of apparent friendliness, and that accounted for the way he kept his teeth tightly closed. He did not wish to be taken unawares ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Snowbound - A Tour on Skates and Iceboats • George A. Warren
... About a dozen of us were at Executive Palace for hours, bullying him into that. Why, we almost had to twist one of his arms while he was signing the order with the other. And now he has the gall to run for re-election on the strength of his heroic actions at the time of the Travis Hoax!" ...
— The Cosmic Computer • Henry Beam Piper
... apology to their easy consciences that "he gave himself such courtly airs as were quite ridiculous—that his presumption was astonishing. In short, they were all idle, and it was exceedingly amusing to lounge a morning with the rich Dundases and hoax Monsieur." ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... not generally known that, contrary to common report, Francis Bacon was not arrested for debt in 1598; but that, during the time he was supposed to have been in prison, he was actually engaged in building up in his own behalf the greatest hoax in history. ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... a place. It surely is not a hoax," said Amy, although at first she had thought it was a joke. "And there is ...
— The Campfire Girls of Roselawn - A Strange Message from the Air • Margaret Penrose
... fortuitous coincidence of circumstances. They will find this easier. Uncompromising deniers of facts, rebels against evidence, may be all the more positive, and may declare that the writers of these extraordinary narratives are persons fond of a joke, who have written them to hoax me, and that there have been persons in all ages who have done the same thing to mystify thinkers who have taken ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... arranged that, if opened in the ordinary way, the whole would have been fired, and two barrels discharged different ways. No doubt a box so packed was received, but whether anything serious was intended, or whether it was a hoax, cannot be said with any certainty. The Earl of Oxford is said to have met allusions to the subject with a smile, and Swift seems to have been annoyed at the reports ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... the paternal roof in requital of just such profligate conduct as Savage displayed; so that, grant his improbable story, still he was a disorderly reprobate, who in these days would have been consigned to the treadmill. But the whole was a hoax. ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... have an evidence of her having been the victim of as well concerted and admirably conducted a hoax, as was ever played off upon any one—it surpasses that which was put upon poor Malvolio in "Twelfth Night." After making the remark upon which we have already commented, that a second work on France from her pen could "alone be ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... weasel teeth bared yellow, draws down his left eye with a finger and barks hoarsely) Hoax! Beware of the flapper and bogus mournful. Lily of the alley. All possess bachelor's button discovered by Rualdus Columbus. Tumble her. Columble her. Chameleon. (More genially) Well then, permit me to draw your attention to item number three. There ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... "It is a hoax," was the first gutteral sound that escaped from Miss Carlyle's throat when speech ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... slowly spreading grins I saw they agreed with me that somebody, signing himself James Skaw, was still trying to hoax the Great ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... borrows and loses a diamond necklace valued at $7200. That, at least, is what Madame Loisel thought for ten terrible years, and that is what the reader thinks till he comes to the last words of the story. The plot belongs, therefore, to that large group known as hoax plots. In most of these stories one person plays a joke on another. In this story a grim fate is made to play the joke. In fact, the current phrase, "the irony of fate," finds here perfect illustration. We use the expression not so much of a great misfortune as of a misfortune that seems brought ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... It may be said that all five were concerned in a complicated hoax on Mr. Gurney. Nor would such a hoax argue any unusual moral obliquity. Surtees of Mainsforth, in other respects an honourable man, took in Sir Walter Scott with forged ballads, and never undeceived his friend. Southey played off a hoax with ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang
... another hoax, and a most daring and gigantic one, on the part of Jack and his friends, upon ...
— Jack Harkaway's Boy Tinker Among The Turks - Book Number Fifteen in the Jack Harkaway Series • Bracebridge Hemyng
... the foremost of his transactions, and a bad omen—next, the fire, and all its wonderfuls, the saving of the old bedridden woman's precious life, and the destruction of the poor cat—syne the robbery of the hen-house by the Eirish ne'er-do-weels, who paid so sweetly for their pranks—and lastly, the hoax, the thieving of the cheese-toaster without the handle, and the banishment ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - tailor in Dalkeith • D. M. Moir
... and his sermons jokes; But both were thrown away amongst the fens; For wit hath no great friend in aguish folks. No longer ready ears and short-hand pens Imbibed the gay bon-mot, or happy hoax: The poor priest was reduced to common sense, Or to coarse efforts very loud and long, To hammer a horse ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... King'?" asked Flavia, leaning over my shoulder, so that the ripple of her hair played on my cheek. "Is it a hoax?" ...
— The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... her to the house," he says. "This may be a stupid hoax, or a quarrel exaggerated. See to it yourself, and hear what the doctor says. If it is serious, send word back here directly, and let nobody enter the place or leave it till we come. Stop! You know the form ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... in a curious way along the seat away from his interlocutor. "But you was just a-going to tell me about this here Invisible Man!" protested the mariner. Mr. Marvel seemed to consult with himself. "Hoax," said a Voice. "It's ...
— The Invisible Man • H. G. Wells
... you here? 'Tar'n't a hoax, then, though I was mightily 'feared it was. Them students is the Devil for chivying of a feller,—beggin' your pardon, Mr. Blount. Have you got him yonder, Doctor?" said he, his keen eye noticing Mac and Clarian ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... had been compelled to concoct this other scheme to obtain their assistance against Simms and Ward; then they could throw the three into irons and all would be lovely; but now that fool Ward had upset the whole thing by hitting upon this asinine fire hoax as an excuse for boarding the Lotus in force, and had further dampened Theriere's pet scheme by suggesting to Skipper Simms the danger of Theriere being recognized as they were boarding the Lotus and bringing suspicion upon ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... even your reputation, I resolved to go myself with Dona Rosita to Los Osos and explain the matter to her father. Some rumor of the ridiculous farce I have just witnessed reached us through Ezekiel, and frightened the poor girl so that she declined—and properly, too to face the hoax which you and some nameless impersonator of a disgraced fugitive have gotten up for purposes of your own! I wish you joy of your work! If the play is over now, I presume I may be allowed to ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte
... filled with confusion and anger. A hoax on the part of some of the Corn Cob Club, he thought to himself. He flushed painfully to recall ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... seeing a gentleman, said afterwards to have been Lord John Scott, the popular but somewhat madcap brother of the Duke of. Buccleugh, gallop up the street bareheaded, waving his hat above his head and shouting "The Queen, the Queen!" The listeners looked at each other and laughed. How well the hoax was gone about; but who would presume to play such a trick, it was too much even from Lord John—did not somebody say it was Lord John? On the line of route too! What were ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... crimes which appear in the chronicles. But who will tell me what 'the Carpet-bag Mystery' was, which my Father and I discussed evening after evening? I have never come across a whisper of it since, and I suspect it of having been a hoax. As I recall the details, people in a boat, passing down the Thames, saw a carpet-bag hung high in air, on one of the projections of a pier of Waterloo Bridge. Being with difficulty dragged down—or perhaps up—this bag was found to be full of human remains, dreadful butcher's business ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... raided round the army, and captured the fowls! Butler's colored troops had got all the turkeys, and had been feeding on fowl for two days! The officers had "gobbled" the whole consignment for their own use! The whole story of the Thanksgiving dinner was a newspaper hoax! Nothing was too incredible ...
— Old Man Savarin and Other Stories • Edward William Thomson
... that they had no bearing upon it whatever; that for anything seen or heard by him the world might hold no such precious gem, and the Russian's letter to Signor Lampini might be nothing more than an elaborate hoax. ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 4, April, 1891 • Various
... the Star, in his half-playful and suggestive way, chose to put it as though he regarded the article in the Pall Mall Magazine as a hoax, perpetrated by some clever, unscrupulous writer, intent on provoking both Mr Henley and his friends, and Stevenson's friends and admirers. This called forth a letter from one signing himself "A Lover of R. L. Stevenson," which ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... drawing-room, stood open, and looking into the mirror, he caught sight of the girl shaking with laughter as she gesticulated and made signs to her mother. The old artist understood beyond a doubt that he had been the victim of some cowardly hoax. Pons went slowly down the stairs; he could not keep back the tears. He understood that he had been turned out of the house, but why and wherefore ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... His motive and his personality still remain matters of conjecture. Whether the whole affair was a figment of Shelley's brain, rendered more than usually susceptible by laudanum taken to assuage intense physical pain; whether it was a perilous hoax played upon him by the Irish servant, Daniel Hill; or whether, as he himself surmised, the crime was instigated by an unfriendly neighbour, it is impossible to say. Strange adventures of this kind, blending fact and fancy ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... as we saw the way to Solomon's treasure chamber thrown open at last, that I for one began to tremble and shake. Would it prove a hoax after all, I wondered, or was old Da Silvestra right? Were there vast hoards of wealth hidden in that dark place, hoards which would make us the richest men in the whole world? We should know ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... asleep at all!" she exclaimed, laughing and quite unembarrassed. "But I think you were wicked to hoax us so. Did you hear everything ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... Somewhere there must be a natural explanation; it was only a question of finding it. Among other things it occurred to me that someone, for reason unknown, might be playing a series of practical jokes upon me, but it was hard to believe a hoax of such malignant and serious intent. Besides, it did not explain the death of Price which, I felt more and more convinced, was in some way connected with the bronze statue. I felt it would be my own fault ...
— War and the Weird • Forbes Phillips
... eyes of the public, but he injures his own moral fibre, and he contracts such a habit of unveracity that he never can hope for genuine literary success. For there never was yet any genuine success in letters without integrity. The clever hoax is no better than the trick of imitation, that is, conscious imitation of another, which has unveracity to one's self at the bottom of it. Burlesque is not the highest order of intellectual performance, but it is legitimate, and if cleverly done it may be both useful and amusing, but it ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... no end of fun to scare 'Cousin Maud.' There was no mistaking the official paper on which the document was written, and it bore the seal of the Chancery of the Russian Embassy; but in Lady Maud's opinion the mention of the Patriarch of Constantinople stamped it as an egregious hoax. ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... receiver-general, the colonel in command of the garrison, the head of the Naval School, the president of the Court, and so forth. The poet, poor fellow, was feted so magnificently, and so belauded, that anybody but a young man of two-and-twenty would have shrewdly suspected a hoax. After dinner, Chatelet drew his rival on to recite The Dying Sardanapalus, the masterpiece of the hour; and the headmaster of the school, a man of a phlegmatic temperament, applauded with both hands, and vowed that Jean-Baptiste Rousseau had done nothing finer. ...
— Two Poets - Lost Illusions Part I • Honore de Balzac
... card sharping, stacked deck, loaded dice, quick shuffle, double dealing, dealing seconds, dealing from the bottom of the deck; artful dodge, swindle; tricks upon travelers; stratagem &c (artifice) 702; confidence trick, fake, hoax; theft &c 791; ballot-box stuffing [U.S.], barney [Slang]; brace game [Slang], bunko game, drop game [Slang], gum game [U.S.], panel game [U.S.], shell game, thimblerig, skin game [U.S.]. snare, trap, pitfall, decoy, gin; springe^, springle^; noose, hoot; bait, decoy-duck, tub ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... presents itself for consideration under other colors.... What defence can be made against this new crime of giving color to ideas?" As for trifling with the House by presenting a petition which in the course of debate had become pretty well known and acknowledged to be a hoax designed to lead Mr. Adams into a position of embarrassment and danger, he disclaimed any such motive, reminding members that he had given warning, when beginning to present his petitions, that he was suspicious that ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... was the triumph of audacity. In 1834 he had said to Lord Melbourne, who enquired his object in life, "I want to be Prime Minister"—and now that object was attained. At Brooks's they said, "The last Government was the Derby; this is the Hoax." Gladstone's discomfiture was thus described by ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... the point," cried the clerk. "To hoax the travellers and have a bit of fun I told them a lot of stuff about Egypt and Greece and Spain. As I happened to be wearing spurs I have myself out for a colonel of cavalry: ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac
... means; but heavenly Clouds, great divinities to idle men; who supply us with thought and argument, and intelligence and humbug, and circumlocution, and ability to hoax, and comprehension. ...
— The Clouds • Aristophanes
... breath. He felt as though a cruel hoax had been played on him. After all, Possy could have lied about the cat and the other creatures. And the boy was quite obviously bright enough to learn lines and play a ...
— When I Grow Up • Richard E. Lowe
... feet were as wet as they could get. Unless the river rose to unbelievable height, he could not be drowned in the makeshift oubliette, unless he voluntarily lay down in the shallow water and inhaled it. He worked on the panel slowly, but with the earnestness of a very angry victim of a hoax. The panel fell outward with a splash, and floated away. Philo Gubb bent sideways and squeezed out of the small opening ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler
... spoken of in his presence. Such an air of reality was given to the narrative by incidental references to actual persons and occurrences that many believed it true, and some were found who remembered Philip Nolan, but had heard different versions of his career. The author of this clever hoax—if hoax it may be called—was Edward Everett Hale, a Unitarian clergyman of Boston, who published a collection of stories in 1868, under the fantastic title, If, Yes, and Perhaps, indicating thereby that some of the tales were possible, some of them probable, and others might even ...
— Initial Studies in American Letters • Henry A. Beers
... said the Duke. "Either it's a hoax, and we needn't bother about it; or the threat is genuine, and we have the time to ...
— Arsene Lupin • Edgar Jepson
... Robert Westcote, the stranger, the cause of it all? He had not heard from him since the day of their visit to Mrs. Bean's, and but for the cheque which he had received he would have been inclined to consider the whole thing as a hoax. ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... in the first instance, of showing or recommending a proper spirit. Never let the debutant regard how young or how feeble he may be—he must make head against the first insult—he must avenge the first hoax. No doubt he will be worsted, and get a good beating; but that one will save him from many hundreds hereafter, and, perhaps, the necessity of fighting a mortal duel. Your certain defeat will be forgotten in the ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... could unravel what fantasy had seized him to lead him to hoax me in this manner, since for many years I had never opened my mouth concerning the life he led, whilst he, on his side, had said not a word to me relating to it. Yet it is true that sometimes being alone with confidential valets, some complaints have escaped him (but never before ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... who had examined Jeanne, held various opinions concerning her. Some declared that her mission was a hoax, and that the King ought to beware of her.[648] Others on the contrary held that, since she said she was sent of God, and that she had something to tell the King, the King ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... in the church—you say, It's likely, for they're always there. Not Sunday? No? A funeral? Who? Who, Harry? how you shake and stare! All well, you say, and all were out. What ails you, Hal? Is this a hoax? Why don't you tell me like a man: What is the matter with ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... at our house we call 'Paddy': She's not 'goody-goody', but 'baddy'; She loves practical jokes, Or to play us a hoax, Though we tell her such tricks ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... give me a fair ball, you sly fox," cried Ernest, for Tom was notorious for his tricks and dodges of every sort. If a good hoax was played on the school, or on any individual, its authorship was generally traced to him. To do him credit, they were never ill-natured. He generally, when found out, bore his blushing honours meekly, and if not discovered, contented ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... how the Chinaman discovered it, is a most characteristic bit of the productions of Elia. We have cut from a recent paper, what seems an authentic story, of one of this race having obtained a kind of mausoleum. We hope it is not a hoax, but that it is as genuine as all that is in one of ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... barn was about a mile from a similar rise on Sam Atkins' place. They communicated across that distance in all the ways, including various kinds of codes, that Fenwick could think of to find some evidence of hoax. Afterwards, they returned to the laboratory and sawed in two the crystals they had just used. Then they showed him the tests they had devised to determine the nature of the radiation ...
— The Great Gray Plague • Raymond F. Jones
... "May be a hoax for all you know. Better wait till the money's in your hand before you run into extravagance piling up debts for us to work off later. I guess it's a true saying that if you put a beggar on horseback, ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... Boswell's record we have a character called Mudge, an "out of the way" name; and in Pickwick we find a Mudge. George Steevens, who figures so much in Boswell's work, was the author of an antiquarian hoax played off on a learned brother, of the same class as "Bill Stumps, his mark." He had an old inscription engraved on an unused bit of pewter—it was well begrimed and well battered, then exposed for sale in ...
— Pickwickian Manners and Customs • Percy Fitzgerald
... compliments, quarrels, cards and custard, which rack the wit of all society? What joys has kind nature provided for us dear creatures! There seems to be no interval between greatness and meanness. When the spirit is not master of the world, then it is its dupe. Yet the little man takes the great hoax so innocently, works in it so headlong and believing, is born red, and dies gray, arranging his toilet, attending on his own health, laying traps for sweet food and strong wine, setting his heart on a horse or a rifle, made happy with a little gossip or a little praise, that the ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... after edition on the strength of it, until the St. James's Gazette put an end to the excitement by publishing a telegram from the Mayor of Liverpool denouncing the report as an insane and criminal hoax. ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... had to take immediately, was to get my guests together. As I have said, I knew nothing of them and for a moment thought it not improbable that even if I did manage to get hold of their names and addresses they might when they received the letter think it was a hoax. However, the thing had to be done, so it was no use to waste time by foreseeing difficulties. My first step was to get the help of my friend, Sir Harry Brittain (then Mr. Brittain). I wrote to him, asking for the names and addresses of all the correspondents of American newspapers ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... a poor hoax, dear President, which proves a miserable failure! I intended to let them loose on the Lunar Continent at the first favorable opportunity. I often had a good laugh to myself, thinking of your astonishment and the Captain's ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne
... him out of his misery. Intensely agitated, poor little Fresh is hurried by pretended friends into a carriage, and driven off; and it is not till a week afterwards that he learns he has been the victim of a hoax. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... the meaning of this hoax?" the admiral demanded sternly. "Mr. Fitzgerald tells me that he had no idea you were hiring ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath
... Other conscience stories are "The Man of the Crowd"; "The Tell-Tale Heart," also depicting insanity; and "The Black Cat," of which the atmosphere is horror. "The Adventures of One Hans Pfaal" and "The Balloon Hoax" are examples of the pseudo-scientific tales, which attain their verisimilitude by diverting attention from the improbability or impossibility of the general incidents to the accuracy and naturalness of details. In "The Descent into the Maelstrom," scientific reasoning is skillfully ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... the prompt response. Nevertheless the artist threw an affectionate glance at the painting as one might in saying, "You were my people." The piquancy of the situation caused him to smile. "Gentlemen," he said, "if this is some hoax, believe me it is in very poor taste. Taste? Yes, for I haven't eaten in two days. What's your game? I've just come from a pawnbroker's, where I had gone with the paltry jewels of a model, to try and secure enough to pay my rent. You offer me a crown. Corduroys and blouse," he pointed to ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton
... no more, but his heart sank like a lump of lead in his breast. The talk of a ship being in sight must be a hoax, unless Crabtree referred ...
— The Rover Boys on the Great Lakes • Arthur M. Winfield
... throughout the remainder of the Old Regime, and much of the colony's iron came from them to supply the blacksmiths. From time to time rumors of other mineral discoveries came to the ears of the people. A find of lead was reported from the Gaspe peninsula, but an investigation proved it to be a hoax. Copper was actually found in a dozen places within the settled ranges of the colony, but not in paying quantities. Every one was always on the qui vive for a vein of gold or silver, but no part of New France ...
— Crusaders of New France - A Chronicle of the Fleur-de-Lis in the Wilderness - Chronicles of America, Volume 4 • William Bennett Munro
... mirth-compelling practical-joker. But in Brattleboro, Newfane, and throughout Vermont everybody says, "That's jest like his uncle Charles Kellogg. There was never such another for jest foolin'. He'd rather play a hoax on the parson that would embarrass him in the face of his congregation than eat." When they were boys, it was Charles that led Roswell into all kinds of mischief. "Uncle Charles Kellogg"—they always give him the benefit of the second name ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... Haven't you heard about it? My letter says Rhoda's invited both of you girls, too, and that Walter is going. Is—it a hoax?" ...
— Nan Sherwood at Rose Ranch • Annie Roe Carr
... no hoax, it's quite serious. The professor came on behalf of the Society, for so they call themselves, and asked you whether you'd accept the fete. You accepted it; so it ...
— The Road to Damascus - A Trilogy • August Strindberg
... the lady in almost stentorious accents, "or is this an unmanly hoax?" Suddenly she stopped in undeniable consternation. "Good heavens," she muttered, "if Abner should believe this. He is SUCH a fool! He has lately been queer and jealous. Oh dear!" she said, turning to Polly Jenkinson with the first indication ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... "Some of the fellows have been sending Ketch an invitation to sup at Jenkins's off tripe and onions, and when he arrived there he found it was a hoax, and Mrs. Jenkins turned him out again. That's what Master Charley must ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... stale and feebly nourishing bread from his mouth, and gave nothing in return. They emptied his heart, and left it starving. What did it boot to tell a man that the orthodox dream of eternal bliss beyond the gates of death was but a hoax, if no substitute be offered? Why point out the fallacies, the puerile conceptions, the worse than childish thought expressed in the religious creeds of men, if they were not to be replaced by life-sustaining ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... linger over the limitations of the tallow-chandler's son. The catalogue of his beneficent activity is a vast one. Balzac once characterized him as the man who invented the lightning-rod, the hoax, and the republic. His contributions to science have to do with electricity, earthquakes, geology, meteorology, physics, chemistry, astronomy, mathematics, navigation of air and water, agriculture, medicine, and hygiene. In some of these fields he did pioneer work of lasting ...
— The American Spirit in Literature, - A Chronicle of Great Interpreters, Volume 34 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Bliss Perry
... hoax was recently perpetrated in Paris, where a number of politicians consented to assist in raising a statue to Hegesippe Simon, the educator of the Democracy and author of the famous epigram, "The darkness vanishes ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, February 4, 1914 • Various
... contemporaneous optimism was confronted with this dusky old-world expedient. To see a woman made for him and for motherhood to his children juggled away in this tragic travesty—it was a thing to rub one's eyes over, a nightmare, an illusion, a hoax. But the hours passed away without disproving the thing, and leaving him only the after-sense of the vehemence with which he had embraced Madame de Cintre. He remembered her words and her looks; he turned ...
— The American • Henry James
... right and left, then up and down, but her pressure was so slight and nervous that it did not stir the heavy wood. She breathed a great sigh of relief, and beginning now to believe herself the victim of some cruel hoax, she dared a firmer pressure. The panel responded—moved—slid slowly behind its fellow—revealing the steel muzzle of a safe let into the solid masonry. It seemed the result of some evil witchcraft; her blood chilled. Yet, ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford
... imagine, because M. Reybaud has happened to say heedlessly yes and no to a question of which he does not seem to have yet formed a clear idea, that I class him among those speculators of socialism, who, after having launched a hoax into the world, begin immediately to make their retreat, under the pretext that, the idea now belonging to the public domain, there is nothing more for them to do but to leave it to make its way. M. Reybaud, in ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... to the steps. Monck went, half-suspicious of a hoax. But he had barely reached the path below when through the rain there came the sound ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... he had caught her hands in an eager, boyish clasp. "Olga, don't—there's a dear!" he begged with headlong ardour. "I don't love you any the less because I didn't do it. I believe myself it's a beastly hoax, and I'm just as furious as you are. But, I say, can't we found a partnership on it? Is it asking too much? Pull me up if it is! I don't want to be premature. Only I won't have you sick or sorry about it, anyhow so far as I am ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... the house. The cook had eaten the last bit of bread. This could not go on. It did, however, until two, when my sensations were terrible. After all, I began to think the document very absurd. Perhaps it might only be a gigantic hoax. Besides, some means would surely be found to keep my uncle back from attempting any such absurd expedition. On the other hand, if he did attempt anything so quixotic, I should not be compelled to accompany him. Another line of reasoning partially ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... MS. which we kept under our pillow for thirteen days and nights, was beginning to worry us. After all, might it not be a literary hoax, we thought, and might not this Khalid be a myth. And yet, he does not seem to have sought any material or worldly good from the writing of his Book. Why, then, should he resort to deception? Still, we doubted. And one evening we were detained by the sandomancer, or sand-diviner, who was sitting ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... conspiracies are hatched. Not only do his words carry with the crowds that gather before his house to hear his prophecy, but his warnings shape the actions of some of the Transvaal Generals. The Government report will not go so far as to brand "Oom Niklaas" as a hoax. Says ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... one. We were driving to an unknown place, on an unknown errand. Yet our invitation was either a complete hoax,—which was an inconceivable hypothesis,—or else we had good reason to think that important issues might hang upon our journey. Miss Morstan's demeanor was as resolute and collected as ever. I endeavored to cheer and amuse her ...
— The Sign of the Four • Arthur Conan Doyle
... they were composed of water they could not cause a flood on the earth; the report that some strange, misty object is visible in the starry heavens is based on a misapprehension; and finally, the so-called calculations of the author of this inexcusable hoax are baseless ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss
... even though he kept his foot firmly in the aperture. The woman still regarded him with a pitying amusement; yet gradually curiosity got the better of her common sense, which told her that he was the victim of some hoax, ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... Les Dames Vertes, in which the fable seems to lead us over the borders of the supernatural; but the secret of the mystification, well kept till the last, is itself so pleasing and original that the reader has no disappointing sense as of having had a hoax played upon his imagination. ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas
... Law Quarterly Magazine says:—To the best of our information, James's coup d'essai in literature was a hoax in the shape of a series of letters to the editor of the Gentleman's Magazine, detailing some extraordinary antiquarian discoveries and facts in natural history, which the worthy Sylvanus Urban inserted without the least suspicion. In 1803, he became a constant contributor to the ...
— Books and Authors - Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches • Anonymous
... Newson, ye had better say nothing about this hoax, and take no heed of it. And if the person should say anything to you, be civil to him or her, as if you did not mind it—so you'll take the clever person's laugh away." In speaking his eyes became fixed upon her dress, ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... to discover what lends Such terror to all timid folks— That serpent whose mystery tends To make one believe it a hoax. ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard
... who was much the oldest of the three. "Did you expect us to fall upon your neck before we could believe it wasn't a hoax ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... word," said he, when Jonathan had concluded, "I hope that you may not have been made the victim of some foolish hoax. Let me see what it is she ...
— The Ruby of Kishmoor • Howard Pyle
... more surprising, I continued at my own work in the dockyard, besides acting (though really but nominally) as sub-contractor in the excavating work at the cemetery. In about a week, however, Mr Macpherson "smelt a rat," and found out that the job was a hoax so far as I was concerned; nevertheless the work went on all right. The land was very soft and easily worked, being mostly formed of sand and pebbles; and the contract was completed within five weeks. The payment ran ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... very bone) who had with more caution than propriety withheld their names. The article was headed, "The Crayfish-eaters' Ticket." It continued further to say that, had not the publication of this ticket been regarded as a dull hoax, it would not have been suffered to pass for two weeks unchallenged, and that it was now high time the universal wish should be realized in ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... Basham (Dr. Bastian before mentioned), Director of the Museum of Berlin," were pronounced to be of very fine water. It is possible that the sandstone may afford precious stones like the itacolumite of the Brazil ("Highlands of the Brazil," i. 380), but the whole affair proved a hoax. In mid-stream rose No. 2, "One-Tree Island," Zunga chya Nlemba or Shika chya Nzondo; in Tuckey it is called Boola Beca or Blemba (the husband) Rock; the old ficus dying at the head, was based upon a pedestal which appeared groin-shaped from the east. Here the mirage was very distinct, and the ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... look as if they are going to put in an appearance to-night," he said to himself, as the liquor in the glass began to wane. "Can this letter have been a hoax, an attempt to draw me off the scent? If so, by all the gods in Asia, they may rest assured I'll ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... in the negative, and said he had better go and see who it was; for looks of alarm had been exchanged between him, the Squire, and Murphy, lest any stranger should enter without being apprised of the hoax going forward; and Dawson had just reached the dining-room door on his cautionary mission, when it was suddenly thrown wide open, and in walked, with a rapid step and bustling air, an active little gentleman dressed in black, who was at Mrs. Egan's side in a moment, exclaiming ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... Stepanovitch rapped out dryly. "What does he mean by a telegram from the Secret Police and; a pension? It's obviously a hoax." ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... a hoax," commented Admiral Timworth, at last. "Yet it is impossible for me to conceive how two British battleships are to be sunk near Malta, or near anywhere else, and Americans blamed for the act. Captain Allen, can you imagine ...
— Dave Darrin on Mediterranean Service - or, With Dan Dalzell on European Duty • H. Irving Hancock
... What did he mean? But when the witty dog reached the declaration that he could only thrive in a high spiritual altitude, then the guests broke into peals of merriment and understood that it was a capital hoax. The merry blade—hadn't he almost fooled them all! "Poor remnants of the intellectual life of the seventies!" Didn't we have Paulsberg and Irgens, and Ojen and Milde, and the two close-cropped poets, and an entire army ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... no difference in his standing or welcome. The people seemed unconscious of the part his father played at Washington. Stoneman's Confiscation Bill had not yet been discussed in Congress, and the promise of land to the negroes was universally regarded as a hoax of the League to win their followers. The old Commoner was not an orator. Hence his name was scarcely known in the South. The Southern people could not conceive of a great leader except one who expressed his power through the ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon
... down his knife and fork for a moment, then took them up again. Something in the old man's tone made him a bit wary. "Maybe it's just a hoax," he thought to himself. Aloud he said, "it ...
— The Emperor of Portugalia • Selma Lagerlof
... sent information to Calcutta and asked for a strong body of police to be sent at his expense. They arrived, and his country residence was extra well guarded for some time. But nothing happened! Madhub Babu concluded that the letter had been a hoax. So ...
— Bengal Dacoits and Tigers • Maharanee Sunity Devee
... century. Aronius records a curious incident. Charles the Great, between the years 787 and 813, ordered a Jewish merchant, who often used to visit Palestine and bring precious and unknown commodities thence to the West, to hoax the Archbishop of Mainz, so as to lower the self-conceit of this vain dilettante. The Jew thereupon sold him a mouse at a high price, persuading him that it was a rare animal, which he had brought with him from Judea. Early in the eleventh century there was a fully organized Jewish community with ...
— The Book of Delight and Other Papers • Israel Abrahams
... days of "hobgoblin lore," it may not be incurious to add, that Woodstock is distinguished in Dr. Plot's History of Oxfordshire (the title of which is well known to all readers of the marvellous) as the scene of a series of hoax and disturbance played off upon the commissioners of the Long Parliament, who were sent down to dispark and destroy Woodstock, after the death of Charles I.; and Sir Walter Scott thinks it "highly probable" that this "piece of phantasmagoria was conducted by means of the secret passages and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 327, August 16, 1828 • Various
... and the followers of Catholicism absolutely worship this mechanism of man, and it has proven a great drawing card, and you can rest assured that Catholicism is pushing the scheme along good and hard, and "The St. Anthony Bread Box" hoax is another scheme that is not very old, but which the Catholic Church has found to be another great paying investment, and they are working "St. Anthony" for ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... to keep it. If I can't get rid of it, I'll bring it back. It's a hoax or an endless chain device or something of the sort. ...
— The Girl and The Bill - An American Story of Mystery, Romance and Adventure • Bannister Merwin
... that he did not state "the points which have suggested this notion of its being a hoax." For my own part, I cannot see the motive for such a falsification; and if it is one, it is the contrivance of some one who had more epigraphic skill than is usually ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 69, February 22, 1851 • Various |
