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Joking   /dʒˈoʊkɪŋ/   Listen
Joking

adjective
1.
Characterized by jokes and good humor.  Synonyms: jesting, jocose, jocular.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Joking" Quotes from Famous Books



... I am not wholly joking. I mean the best part of it. Great monopolies that abuse their trust are far more dangerous enemies of public morals than an honest gambling-house at every corner. Monte Carlo as it stands is just a concentrated ...
— Post-Prandial Philosophy • Grant Allen

... Socrates, said Erasistratus, though you may be joking, Critias does seem to me to be saying ...
— Eryxias • An Imitator of Plato

... sly joking fills the place, set afloat by the master himself. Edison dearly loves a joke, and will quit work any time to hear one. It is the five minutes' sleep and the good laugh that keep his brain from becoming ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard

... back, the vines are so torn and weak; and how will he get down the lower wall? for you see the ivy grows up from that ledge, and there is nothing below. How could he do it? I was only joking when I lamented that there were no knights now, ready to leap into a lion's den for a lady's glove," returned ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott

... nation lay sunk in ignorance and barbarism. Yet the good and zealous men whose lot it was to be thus set upon by a depraved, infuriate rabble, the foremost of them active in direct assault, and the rest venting their ferocious delight in a hideous blending of ribaldry and execration, of joking and cursing, were taxed with a canting hypocrisy, or a fanatical madness, for speaking of the prevailing ignorance and barbarism in terms equivalent to our sentence from the Prophet, "The people are destroyed for ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster

... his affairs into the hands of his sons. As Robert Johnson and Thomas Anderson passed homeward from the market, having bought provisions for their respective homes, they seemed to be very light-hearted and careless, chatting and joking with each other; but every now and then, after looking furtively around, one would drop into the ears of the other some news of the battle then raging between the North and South which, like two great millstones, were grinding ...
— Iola Leroy - Shadows Uplifted • Frances E.W. Harper

... Steward asked the latter if he had any thing to say to Sir Everard? he replied, "No; but that he was his humble servant, and wished him joy of his young wife." The two last days he behaved ridiculously, joking, and making every body laugh even at the sentence. He said to Lord Ilchester, who sat near the bar, "Je meUrs pour ma patrie, et ne m'en soucie gueres." When he withdrew, he said, "Adieu! my lords, we shall never meet again in ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... "We were joking in the boat as we rowed under these cliffs and saying it would be a short-lived amusement to see the overhanging cliff part company and fall on us. So we were glad to find that we were rowing back to the ship and already 200 or 300 yards away from the place and ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard

... Greenwich, and Richmond; and such numbers of people, that when you have once sat down on the deck, it is all but a moral impossibility to get up again—to say nothing of walking about, which is entirely out of the question. Away they go, joking and laughing, and eating and drinking, and admiring everything they see, and pleased with everything they hear, to climb Windmill Hill, and catch a glimpse of the rich corn-fields and beautiful orchards of Kent; or to stroll among the fine old trees of Greenwich ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens

... our Don! you're surely joking, And 'tis fun at us you're poking! Twenty voyages we've tried, sir, Sleeping, waking, side by side, sir, And Don and I will not divide, sir; He's my friend, that's why I love him,— And ...
— Voices for the Speechless • Abraham Firth

... the Hawke came in. Will at once rowed off to her and had a chat with his friends. When he mentioned his new command his news was at first received with absolute incredulity, but when at last his messmates came to understand that he was not joking, he was heartily congratulated on his good fortune. Afterwards he was not a little chaffed on the tremendous deeds he and his craft were going to perform. When at last they became serious, Latham, the master's mate, remarked: "But what is your new ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty

... Bereford. Many times she urged upon Earl Grey the necessity of moderation, and, with a vehemence foreign to her nature, strove to impress him with prophetic visions of anxiety, doubt, and fear. Her ladyship was somewhat reconciled by the resignation of the Premier, who, in his joking manner, attributed his want of success to the hostile attitude of the wife ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour

... I, "I was only joking then; for, really, I've never seriously thought about the matter. As far as I can believe, however, I do not imagine heaven is going to be a place where we'll be singing hymns all day. I think we shall be happy there, each in our several ways, ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson

... transpire, but this is certain that, upon the marine's return to the kitchen, one of the grooms, who ventured to banter him, received such a sound thrashing from Ben that it put an end to all further joking. As Ben had taken up the affair so seriously, it was presumed that if there had been anticipation of the hymeneal rites he was himself the party who had been hasty; and that now he was married, he was resolved ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat

... you'll make good in the calcium, all right, with plenty of powder and paint on and the orchestra playing 'Under the Old Apple Tree.' But don't put on your hat and chase downstairs to fly to the Little Church Around the Corner with me. I've been up against peroxide and make-up boxes before. Say, all joking aside—don't you ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry

... every less facetious person, and over every topic on which he is ignorant or insensible, by being uneasy until he has distorted it in the small cracked mirror which he carries about with him as a joking apparatus. Some high authority is needed to give many worthy and timid persons the freedom of muscular repose under the growing demand on them to laugh when they have no other reason than the peril of being ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot

... old man had gone out about his business his bride passed her time in embroidering beautiful flowers on the bed quilt to make his heart happy. The old man was much amused. He laughed, and said to her: 'You are a good child, but I was only joking. My ...
— The Pink Fairy Book • Various

... pardon, Steve," he said. "Yours, too, Caroline. I was only joking. There's a little beast of a bookkeeper down at the office who is forever talking of his 'nice flat in the Bronx.' It's a standing guy, you know. So far as I can see, these are pretty snug quarters. And attractively arranged, too. Your ...
— Cap'n Warren's Wards • Joseph C. Lincoln

... that two days after I arrived at the Morrises', Jack, followed by all the other boys, came running into the stable. He had a newspaper in his hand, and with a great deal of laughing and joking, read this ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders

... gone far to-day before Denis Quirk said to himself: "This is a clever woman." He was not far wrong in this appreciation, for Sylvia Jackson was undoubtedly clever. Before they had come to Grey Town the two were laughing and joking with one another as though they had known each other for years. For a woman to arrive at such intimate relations with Denis Quirk in a short time was ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin

... think we're such sneaks,' said Dicky, and he got up off his chair. But the G. B. said, 'Sit down, sit down; I was only joking.' ...
— The Story of the Treasure Seekers • E. Nesbit

... it's nothing. It was so unexpected. I thought such people didn't really exist—that they were just a fiction of the imagination. And then, all of a sudden, to find you, my brother—You are not joking, Savva? Look me straight in ...
— Savva and The Life of Man • Leonid Andreyev

... monotony and adventure, drought, flood, blacks, and fire; sprees and—the rest of it. Long dry stretches on Dead Man's Track. Cutting across the country in No Man's Land where there were no tracks into the Unknown. Chancing it and damning it. Ill luck and good luck. Laughing at it afterwards and joking at it always; he and Jack—always he and Jack—till Jack got married. The children used to say Long Gully was haunted, and always hurried through it after sunset. It was haunted enough ...
— The Rising of the Court • Henry Lawson

... you really mean all that at lunch the other day? I thought you were joking. I took it for granted that you could get work whenever you wanted to or you wouldn't have made fun of it like that! Can't you really ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... was only a part of what went on, but the crowd had gotten into a good humor and was joking, and I had fallen into the same spirit. The first person I looked for when I entered the car was, of course, the sick woman. I soon picked her out: a sweet, frail-looking lady, with that fatal, transparent hue of skin and fine complexion. She was all muffled up, although ...
— The Burial of the Guns • Thomas Nelson Page

... than he ought to have been at all that Mr. Bell was saying. He was not in a mood for joking. At another time, he could have enjoyed Mr. Bell's half testy condemnation of a town where the life was so at variance with every habit he had formed; but now, he was galled enough to attempt to defend what was never ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... the church in the morning. Every face, however, was foreign. By-and-by came in three Americans, talking loudly, moving rudely, proclaiming contempt for "lager" and yelling for "liquor," bantering and offering fight, joking coarsely, profane, noisy, demonstrative in any and every way, to the end of attracting attention to themselves, and proclaiming that they were "on a spree" and highly excited. They could not keep it up; they became awkward, ill at ease, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various

... the "Nancy" was amused; he thought he had struck a character. Well, he had, but he had no idea of the real character of the man; he thought he was joking for amusement. ...
— The Dock Rats of New York • "Old Sleuth"

... proposed by Serjeant Talfourd as that of the youngest poet of England, and Wordsworth responded to the appeal with very kindly courtesy. The conversation afterwards turned upon plays, and Macready, who had ignored a half-joking question of Miss Mitford, whether, if she wrote one, he would act in it, overtook Browning as they were leaving the house, and said, 'Write a play, Browning, and keep me from going to America.' The reply was, 'Shall it be historical and English; what do ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr

... said Pinckney lightly, "it would still have been your own fault for going near such a hare-brained scamp. Oh, I'm only joking, what I really mean is that nine times out of ten the thing people call Fate is nothing more than want ...
— The Ghost Girl • H. De Vere Stacpoole

... to the world. They say this out of politeness, because what they really believe is that he belongs to Germany, and that as a matter of fact Byron is the only great poet England has ever had. I am not joking. I am not even exaggerating. This is the real opinion of the German man in the street, and it is taught in lessons in literature. An English girl went to one of the best-known teachers in Berlin for lessons in German, and ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick

... They made Sally dine with us, and Omar was admitted to wait and interpret. Wassef's younger brother waited on him as in the Bible, and his clerk, a nice young fellow, assisted. Black slaves brought the dishes in, and capital the food was. There was plenty of joking between the lady and Omar about Ramadan, which he had broken, and the Nasranee fast, and also about the number of wives allowed, the young clerk intimating that he rather liked that point in Islam. ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon

... "I'm only joking," Nick returned with sombre eyes that contradicted this profession. "But what things you ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James

... the place as we had done, almost instantly caught sight of Johnny, and immediately began to make his way across the room through the crowds of loungers. Johnny was laying a bet, bending over the table, joking with the impassive dealer, his back turned to the door, totally oblivious of his enemy's approach. I started forward, instantly realized the hopelessness of either getting quickly through that crowd or of making myself heard, and leaned back, clutching the rail with both ...
— Gold • Stewart White

... wideawake hat would have marked him as a holy man anywhere in all India. He dropped into a camp-chair by the door of the Mess-tent and slid off his boots. Three or four officers gathered round him, laughing and joking over his exploit. ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling

... names, and call you by that. Signore Arturo, the French artist, told me once that the English and Russians and Germans had such hard names they often broke their front-teeth out trying to speak them; but he was joking. I know the ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various

... as she took up her napkin, and her voice grew very low, and yet he heard, "I don't think that we can pretend to be joking any longer. You are my brother's friend, and I am a married woman. Please treat ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner

... thinking—"She'll never let him go!" He was standing with one foot on top of the other in a very uncomfortable manner. Still, he was trying to smile, as if to convey the idea that Old Mother Hubbard must be joking, ...
— Everychild - A Story Which The Old May Interpret to the Young and Which the Young May Interpret to the Old • Louis Dodge

... matter the coronal was a bye-word, and why not? The same dealers who had landed the more famous Tiara in the Louvre had the selling of it. The greater museums in Europe and America had refused it at a bargain. On Fifth Avenue and the Rue Lafitte all the dealers were joking about the Balaklava Coronal. The name of Sarafoff, its maker, had even become accepted slang. For a season we "Sarafoffed" our intimates instead of hoaxing them. And in the face of all this Vogelstein had sold the Coronal to Morrison under Brush's very nose. It seemed ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather

... joking with him about his love for his handsome, taciturn wife. But he did not laugh this time as he ...
— One Day At Arle • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... interested in our sergeant clerk, who stood 6 feet 8 inches. They were joking and pointing to him ...
— At Suvla Bay • John Hargrave

... friends accompany you to the station, be careful that your last words are not too personal or too loud. Young people are apt to overlook this, and thus sometimes make themselves ridiculous before the other passengers by joking and laughing in a way which might be perfectly proper at home, but which before a company of strangers is not ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. V, August, 1878, No 10. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various

... gentlemen were not slow to detect the superficial deficiencies of the newcomer. A system of practical joking, carried to extremes, had long been a feature of West Point life. Jackson, with the rusticity of the backwoods apparent at every turn, promised the highest sport. And here it may be written, once for all, that however nearly in point of character the intended victim reached the heroic ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... at the time I speak of, and passionate too! Two of my brother lieutenants fought a duel, much more serious than those pin- prick encounters which are now the fashion. They fought with pistols, on the very marine promenade where they had been joking with young ladies the evening before. Just as the seconds gave the signal to fire, the sun rose on the horizon. Its first ray glinted on a breast button on the uniform of one principal: the other man's bullet, as though ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville

... 'Joking apart, Jerry, old man,' he said, 'what did you ask me to come here for? The committee expects me to spend some of my time at the club, and if I hang about here all the afternoon I shall lose my job. Besides, I've got to get ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse

... frequented the cafes, questioning the patrons; they lacked imagination. Then one morning he went out on top of an omnibus. A respectable-looking gentleman was smoking a cigar beside him, a little farther away a laborer was smoking his pipe upside down, near the driver two rough fellows were joking, and clerks of every description were going to business for ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... "You must be joking," was the reply. "Does the world stop moving because one man is disabled? The news only arrived an hour ago; but all the urgent business that M. d'Escorval had in charge has already been divided among the ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau

... as she is, that it made her nervous all the time. She felt as if she were sailing under false colors. If your every-day language is not fit for a letter or for print, it is not fit for talk. And if, by any series of joking or fun, at school or at home, you have got into the habit of using slang in talk, which is not fit for print, why, the sooner you get out of it the better. Remember that the very highest compliment paid to anything printed is paid when a person, ...
— How To Do It • Edward Everett Hale

... fifitabula, knife for scraping potatoes; ai safatsilibula, a yam which has rotted; kulule iy' adedondona, a hammer for striking wood; nuni oyatonde, you are only joking; nani falawa me ...
— The Mafulu - Mountain People of British New Guinea • Robert W. Williamson

... with himself and the world. A little to his right rose the noisy activity of his troop of sun-tanned veterans, released for the time from the irksome trammels of discipline, relaxing tired muscles, laughing, joking, and smoking as they, too, prepared to eat after a twelve-hour fast. Among them, silent and taciturn, squatted five white-robed Arabs, securely bound and ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... farmers were doing the same, and the clear notes of the lure, the long curving horn, used for calling the cattle and signaling across valleys, soared from slope to slope. There was laughter and shouting and joking all the way down. Now the only persons abroad seemed to be thieving ruffians whose greed for plunder was more than ...
— Days of the Discoverers • L. Lamprey

... with grave emphasis; "I am not joking. It is a matter of the strictest fact that fiction has for the moment fixed its fancy upon my country—just as it has upon the East End of your London. Mon Dieu! what a lot of harm fiction ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman

... auntie, and has done more injury to religion than drinking. No, I'm not joking—that is a childish habit—but giving utterance to profound truth, which ought to be proclaimed on the house-tops, or ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren

... "You are joking, after the French fashion, Sir Knight, seeing that the king's devotion to me does not extend beyond a short ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac

... boots smeared with tar instead of blacking, their rough caps pulled down over their eyes, and their heavy sheep-skin frocks with the wool inside. But, queer as they look, they are a merry set, laughing and joking unceasingly, and enjoying the spectacle like a party of youths at ...
— Harper's Young People, May 4, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... pulled Tom into a dark recess, and in a few minutes more there swaggered past about six or eight young roisterers— singing, swearing, joking, threatening—more or less intoxicated every one of them, and boasting themselves loudly of the valiant deeds they ...
— Tom Tufton's Travels • Evelyn Everett-Green

... "For this is an awkward thing, and Tiburce has played me an unworthy trick. He never did know when to leave off joking; but such posthumous frivolity is past endurance. For, see now, in what a pickle it has landed me! I have outlived my friends, I may encounter difficulty in regaining my fiefs, and certainly I have lost the fairest wife man ever had. Oh, can it be, ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell

... joking?" Miss De Voe's smile had ended, and she was sitting up very straight in her chair. Women will do without eating for an indefinite period, and think nothing of it, but the thought of a hungry man fills them with horror—unless they have the wherewithal to ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford

... good men as can be found—Western fellows. If he had known the number of my men in the woods back yander he'd 'a' whipped me out of my boots." And then his eye fell again on Whistling Jim, who was laughing and joking with some of the troopers. He called to the negro in stern tones, and ordered him to ride close to his young master. "We are going to have a little scrimmage purty soon, and a nigger that's any account ought to be right where he can help his ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris

... sometimes: she sent off Leah, and wanted me to lecture Gladys for her imprudence; but I was not inclined to be bothered, and said it was Gladys's affair if she chose to make herself ill, but all the same she ought to be ashamed of such skittishness at her age. I don't believe Gladys knew I was joking; that is the worst of her, she never sees a joke; Etta does, though, for she burst out laughing when my lady walked off to bed in rather a dignified manner. I hope you are not ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... Though joking, Don Luis was nevertheless singularly impressed, as he himself said, by the terrible recollection of the two crimes which he had been unable to prevent and by the haunting vision of the two dead bodies. And he also remembered ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc

... I have the honour of serving the Kirk for once? I'll get the water from the well, minister, if you'll go in again and see how these poor devils of ours are thriving. I was but joking when I hinted at the risk; our Athole gentry are, like enough, far ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro

... his return to his mother's house, he appears to have entered upon the business of idleness with much philosophical satisfaction. If he was not quite such an unlettered clown as he has described in Tony Lumpkin, he had at least all Tony Lumpkin's high spirits and love of joking and idling; and he was surrounded at the ale-house by just such a company of admirers as used to meet at the famous Three Pigeons. Sometimes he helped in his brother's school; sometimes he went errands for his mother; occasionally he would sit and meditatively play the flute—for ...
— Goldsmith - English Men of Letters Series • William Black

... joking. This was some odd prank. He had borrowed the tin trunk and was giving me a travesty on Tip Pulsifer fleeing over the mountain from his petulant spouse: for last night Tim and I had had a little tiff. For the first time I had forgotten the post-prandial pipe, and undismayed ...
— The Soldier of the Valley • Nelson Lloyd

... he assisted her in packing the huge hamper that occupied the center of the dining-room table, "is Mister Dave sure 'pinted to be jedge of the criminal court—he ain't a-joking is he?" ...
— Andrew the Glad • Maria Thompson Daviess

... were much amused with this sportive conversation of Louis's, and Edward made many smart replies, especially joking the cardinal, who, he knew, "was a gay man with the ladies, and a ...
— Richard III - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... villages and hamlets of the district with their pigs and poultry, their dairy produce and droves of half-wild mountain cattle. The market-place was thronged with a perpetually shifting crowd, laughing, joking, bargaining for dried figs, cheap cakes, and sunflower seeds. The brown, bare-footed children sprawled, face downward, on the pavement in the hot sun, while their mothers sat under the trees with their baskets of ...
— The Gadfly • E. L. Voynich

... answered very sternly: "it is no business of thine, Jeremy; and I will have no joking ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore

... Not joking?—Oh lord! the sooner the better, for such lips to smile with, are not met with every day. Well sir, then there came up a puppy fellow of the name ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various

... the privilege of joking him on these subjects; and we always did so without mercy. Fritz would sometimes combat our assertions, but they ordinarily made him laugh so much, that a stranger would have deemed he assented ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman

... drinking their beer, doing no wrong and meaning none. I have seen in the villages of France the young people dancing gayly, with all the animation of youth and innocence, while the old people, looking on, were chatting and joking and drinking their native wines, and I could see no ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... quickly. "I know what he is. I was joking when I spoke of killing him, a little while ago. By God, I wish I had killed him! ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... said Barry, moving after him; "I was joking of course. Why, I knew it was not you before I had been in ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce

... disconcertment into which O'Mara's coming had flung him. Slowly the former's lips twisted into a mocking leer; mockery rose and swam with the hatred in his inflamed eyes. He would have spoken, sparring for time, when Steve's hand leapt in and made of the joking effort only a rattle in his throat. Beneath the stiff red stubble the flesh was livid where those fingers had been, when he was ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans

... this corroborative evidence I think it is fully proved that the event really happened in Litchfield, and that the honor was stolen for other towns by unveracious chroniclers; otherwise we must believe in an amazing unanimity of church-joking and ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle

... in his most jocund mood that morning, jauntily swinging his cane, joking about the Rialto as they crossed it, and talking a great deal about London and Paris. His companion's courage gradually oozed away. In fact it was completely gone by the time they rounded the corner of the church and came upon the happy couple basking in the sunlight and cooing affectionately ...
— Chico: the Story of a Homing Pigeon • Lucy M. Blanchard

... join in the conversation, nor understand a joking remark. When Christine laughed at her in a good-humored way, Hatty pursed up her lips, and drew herself up in a huffy manner, and would not condescend to speak a word. She even rejected Bessie's caresses and little attempts ...
— Our Bessie • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... the gentle SUSAN, wringing the water out of her flannel skirts, "none of your joking here. ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870 • Various

... My darling, I never meant that for an instant. I was only joking. There! Lucky there's no one on ...
— Under the Deodars • Rudyard Kipling

... true! The settlement had long since exhausted every possible form of practical joking, and languished for a new sensation. And here it was! It was not a thing to be treated angrily, nor lightly, nor dismissed with that single hysteric laugh. It was capable of the greatest possibilities! Indeed, ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte

... was not unwilling, too, to take, himself, such jests as he gave. One day, in conversation with a dissolute member of the court, after they had been joking each other for some time, he said, "Ah! Shaftesbury, I verily believe you are the ...
— History of King Charles II of England • Jacob Abbott

... hair, plaited tightly into little queues, stood out stiffly on each side of their heads and gave them a very curious appearance. At his first word, the fifteen fell dutifully on their noses. As soon as they were right side up, the Scarecrow, beginning at the end of the row, addressed a joking question to each in his most approved Oz style. But over they went again, ...
— The Royal Book of Oz • L. Frank Baum

... Dick," said Bob, "I take no end of impudence from you, but let there be some end to it. Now then, have you done joking?" ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn

... years old, and one or two of them, spite of dirt and hard labor, were really handsome, with bright, intelligent countenances. They earned one paul (ten cents) each a day, and seemed contented and happy, joking with each other and laughing heartily nearly all the time. Probably our Chippewa Indians would think twice before they set the young women of their tribe to hod-carrying as a livelihood; but then the Chippewas are savages. The hods carried by these girls on their heads were flat, wooden ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... joking," thought Judith as she tried to decide why the cherubims were "young-eyed." But no; a few days later Nancy was quite pettish about the preparation Miss Marlowe ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett

... to another island where many people stood by the shore talking and joking. They were all looking at Maelduin and his comrades, and kept gaping and laughing, but would not exchange a word with them. Then Maelduin sent one of his foster brothers on the island; but he ranged himself with the others and did as they did. Maelduin and his men rowed round ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

... corrective sermons? Is not the amusement of a fickle and capricious love far as the heavens from the blessedness which true, sensible love brings with it? Do you not often thank me in your heart for my instruction? You will soon make me vain! But joking aside, you do owe me a modicum of gratitude if you have made yourself worthy of Fraulein N., for I certainly did not play the ...
— Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words • Friedrich Kerst and Henry Edward Krehbiel

... furnished us meat for much joking, and then it grew almost earnest, as jokes will. We finally settled down to a cousin of his, Christina Quale. And whenever I bought anything for the house, which I did from time to time as I got money, we discussed the matter as to whether or not Christina would like ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick

... sound as if from a wilderness of frightened animals betrayed the presence of thousands. As long as the sun shone there had been a babel of sound; at the disappearance of our parent planet, a hushed awe had fallen with the night. Gone the rude joking and wrangling, the crying of children, and the shrill laughter of the women. A bitter breeze swept across from the waters, and the stars were mere ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker

... specified hour. They duly reported their presence, and were directed to assume the position of the soldier, facing the wall until released. After silently watching them for a considerable time, the lieutenant, who had a remarkable penchant for joking, called two of them into the middle of the room. He caused them to stand dos dos, at a distance of about one foot from each other, and then bursting into a laugh, which he vainly endeavored to suppress, he commanded, ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper

... interest and amiability and jealousy. Except for that one abrupt and sinister move of Gulden's—that of a natural man beyond deceit—there was no word, no look, no act at which Joan could have been offended. They were joking, sarcastic, ironical, and sullen in their relation to each other; but to Joan each one presented what was naturally or what he considered his kindest and most friendly front. A young and attractive ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey

... "Yes, I'm joking—and what for no?—but they might have been, for onything ye wad hae hindered them to the contrair, I'm thinking. Na, na, ye maunna lock the door; that's ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir

... decaying life all around, and the minute eggs of animals and spores of plants; but besides these, the pool is full of minute living plants—small jelly masses with solid coats of flint which are moulded into most lovely shapes. Plants formed of jelly and flint! You will think I am joking, but I am not. These plants, called Diatoms, which live both in salt and fresh water, are single cells feeding and growing just like those we took from the water-butt, only that instead of a soft covering they build up a flinty skeleton. ...
— Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) - Wonders of Earth, Sea and Sky • Various

... without any qualm of conscience," exclaimed the student excitedly. The officer laughed, but Raskolnikoff shuddered. The words just uttered so strongly echoed his own thoughts. "Let me put a serious question to you," resumed the student, more and more excited. "I have hitherto been joking, but now listen to this. On the one side here is a silly, flint-hearted, evil-minded, sulky old woman, necessary to no one—on the contrary, pernicious to all—and who does not ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various

... will make an oration which I shall interrupt, and Kezzy will open her eyes at such a monster, and father will want to horsewhip me, but restrain himself and turn me from the door. Or perhaps he will lock me up—oh Patty, cannot you see that I'm weeping, not joking? But it has to be done, and I am going to ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... Alexander to the other, handing him the bridle. "He seems to be skittish, and will not admit of any joking; spare the spur, and keep firm hold on the bridle until you are ...
— Sister Carmen • M. Corvus

... sound,' 'sweet sound,' 'sound for silver,' 'no gold for sounding,' are further examples of Shakespeare's fondness for joking on musical matters. Peter's reply to the Third Musician, 'You are the singer; I will say for you,' may be a just reflection on Mr James Soundpost's lack of words, or perhaps indicates that the pronunciation of singers even in ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor

... tendency to small joking and weak epigram I would also caution you to beware; they will have no success in the quarter to which you are going, and they will only damage other qualities which ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... in their midst. The Court demanded that their lord should drive in solitary state through the city: Akhnaton sat in his chariot with his wife and children, and allowed the artist to represent him joking with his little daughter, who has mischievously poked the horses with a stick. In representing the Pharaoh, the artist was expected to draw him in some conventional attitude of dignity: Akhnaton insisted upon being shown in all manner of natural attitudes—now leaning languidly upon a staff, now ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall

... your asking that question," I replied pleasantly. "You know how tolerant I am. But I'm not joking. Not that I blame you, my dear fellow. Margaret is, or used ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse

... way you sit there, whittling and whistling that brings little old Provincetown right up before my eyes. I can see old Captain Ames sitting there on the wharf on a coil of rope, whittling just as you are doing, and joking with Sam and the crew as they pile into the boat to go out to the weirs. I can see the nets spread out to dry alongshore, and smell tar and codfish as plain as if it were here right under my nose. And down in Fishburn Court there's the little house that was always a second home to me, with ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston

... joking he felt something like nervousness in thinking what people might say if anyone happened to see him flirting with such an elderly lady. She, on her side, had no ...
— Japanese Literature - Including Selections from Genji Monogatari and Classical - Poetry and Drama of Japan • Various

... and stared, and could scarcely believe my ears. But he was not joking; he was as serious as if he had addressed himself to one of his officers. I looked at them all, standing interested and expectant. Dick was as grave and erect as a deacon. Jim seemed much impressed. ...
— The Young Forester • Zane Grey

... "You're joking," said Arthur, when he was able to articulate; "and a mighty poor joke it is. Dory! Why, Del, it's ridiculous. And ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips

... "I am not joking," replied his adviser. "Rob that man, assassinate him even—that would be no worse crime than you would commit in taking a young girl in good health in order to get a portion of her dowry, when at the same time you would have to expose ...
— Damaged Goods - A novelization of the play "Les Avaries" • Upton Sinclair

... replied Constance. "Mamma has had her fears about the termination of the lawsuit, just as I have. Ah! while you boys were laughing and joking, and pursuing your sports or your studies of a night, I and mamma would be talking over the shadowed future. I told mamma that if the time and the necessity came for turning my education and talents to account, I should do it with a willing ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood

... us, and don't imagine that I shall quarrel with Nicholas. I am telling the truth. [To Nicholas Ivnovich] I am not joking at all, but it seemed to me strange that you wanted to convince Mary just when she had made up her mind to have it out ...
— The Light Shines in Darkness • Leo Tolstoy

... papa's mouth that he was joking, and, more happy than I can tell you, he jumped into the funny carriage and began to pull at the reins. But the donkey had begun to nibble the sweet, fresh grass and ...
— Berties Home - or, the Way to be Happy • Madeline Leslie

... into Masnieres' cobbled hill, rifles slung, and marched with all the nonchalance in the world towards the bridge, cigarettes and pipes going, laughing and joking—thus have I a hundred times watched ...
— Norman Ten Hundred - A Record of the 1st (Service) Bn. Royal Guernsey Light Infantry • A. Stanley Blicq

... Dorado or the Empire, where he spent an hour or so loafing with some of his numerous acquaintances. He was of the temperament that makes itself quickly popular, the laughing, hearty sort, full of badinage, and genuinely liking most men with whom he came in contact. There was always much joking in the air, but back of it was a certain reserve, a certain wariness, for every second man was a professed "fire-eater," given to feeling insulted on the slightest grounds, and flying to the duel or the ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White

... means," said Cecil. "But, joking apart, this Black Maria is, so to speak particeps criminis, and the sooner we ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells

... farces has not been fashioned and spoiled by clumsy English adaptations or imitations of intriguing levers-de-rideau, and to those who do not associate the name of farce with horse-play and practical joking. They form the best illustration of what has been described as Mr. Howells' "method of occasionally opening up to the reader through the bewilderingly intricate mazes of his dialogue clear perceptions of the true ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead

... that your ape would have indigestion if he ate me," replied Pinocchio. "Do you think that I am joking? No, I am in earnest. He really would. I came in here by chance while returning from a walk, and if you will permit me, I will go home to my father who is waiting for me. As you have no orders to give me, many thanks, good-by, ...
— Pinocchio in Africa • Cherubini

... was 'so beautiful,' did I? You are far more beautiful than she." "Oh, stop joking, please! ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... northern twilight was an hour old when Drennen called for Ygerne. She came out of her room at Marquette's ready for him. She had told him she must "dress" for the occasion. He had thought her joking. In spite of him he stared at her wonderingly a moment. And, despite her own gathering of will, a flush crept into her cheeks under his look while her own eyes widened to the alterations a little effort had made in the man. And the thing each noted swiftly of the other was scarcely less swiftly noted ...
— Wolf Breed • Jackson Gregory

... attributing to Aristophanes, so much of a scoffer and so little of a visionary, the silly notion of male and female having been originally complete in one person, and walking circuitously. He may be joking: ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... we had to wash the dishes. Such a scamper ensued back and forwards to the kitchen, which rang with noise, and merriment. Everyone was helping, hindering, laughing, joking, teasing, and brimming over with fun and enjoyment. When we had completed this task, dancing was proposed. Some of the elderly and more sensible people said it was too hot, but all the young folks did not care a rap for the temperature. Harold had no objections, Miss Derrick ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin

... heart. I have to strive so hard, nowadays, to goad you into saying these idiotic suitable dear things: and even when at last you do say them your voice is light and high, and makes them sound as though you were joking." ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell

... out the Knights and Ladies of Tabor. The singing and the drumming gradually grew upon the air. The passengers in the white cabin, came out on the guards at this unexpected fanfare. As soon as the white travelers saw the marching negroes, they began joking about what caused the demonstration. The captain of the launch thought he knew, and began an oath, but stopped it out of deference to the girl in the tailor suit. He said it was a dead nigger the society was going to ship up ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling

... or so before, even to smile at those who told me, half joking, that I might be getting my five pound a week before I died. I'd been afraid they'd think I was taking them seriously, and call me stuck up and conceited. But now I was getting near that great sum, and was sure to get ...
— Between You and Me • Sir Harry Lauder

... likes o' me to be behavin' that foolish!" She put on additional dignity. "I will always be the Widow Riley." Then relaxing again into sweetness: "Marridge is a lottery, Mr. Richlin'; indeed an' it is; and ye know mighty well that he ye're after joking me about is no more nor a fri'nd." She looked sweet ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable

... injustices you are always heaping on my poor country," the Count protested lightly. "But I confess I deserved it this time! Joking apart, I think 'L'Ami Fritz' is very fond of his"—he hesitated, then ended his sentence ...
— The Chink in the Armour • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... just joking, of course. But what's to be done about this business? Don got the contract for Dave Evans, and I want to know if we are to be kicked out of the way ...
— The Boy Trapper • Harry Castlemon

... another time." The illustrissimo took his leave; but bent upon having the picture, he shortly returned, and again inquired the lowest price. "Three hundred scudi!" was the sullen reply. "Carpo di bacco!" cried the astonished prince; "mi burla, vostra signoria; you are joking! I see I must e'en wait upon your better humor; and ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects, and Curiosities of Art, (Vol. 2 of 3) • Shearjashub Spooner

... joking for the time," said Philip quietly. "I'm very glad to get home again, and to find my mother so proud and happy to have me back—and you, ...
— Son Philip • George Manville Fenn

... returned the stranger, haughtily declining the proffered inspection. "You will find it is ill joking with Death." ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett

... party of at least four—possibly more. What made Rattleton believe that Merriwell was joking was that Frank had soberly asked Bruce Browning, the reputedly laziest man at Yale, to make ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish

... father," said old Mariuccia, mocking him, "do you fast on Sundays, that you look so pale?" Whereat Nino struck an attitude, and began singing a love song to the ancient woman. Indeed, she was joking about the fast, for she had expended my substance of late in fattening Nino, as she called it, for his appearance, and there was to be broiled chickens for supper that very night. He was only pale because ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford

... Thady," says he, "it's a toss up with me which I should marry this minute, her or Mr. Moneygawl of Mount Juliet's town's daughter—so it is." "Oh, boo! boo!" [7] says I, making light of it, to see what he would go on to next; "your honour's joking, to be sure; there's no compare between our poor Judy and Miss Isabella, who has a great fortune, they say." "I'm not a man to mind a fortune, nor never was," said Sir Condy, proudly, "whatever her friends ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth

... presently and when we overhaul you you'll be treated to a demonstration of expert horsemanship," called Peggy after the laughing, joking group, her own and Jean's laughs ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson

... your home," he said. Just that bald statement. I thought he was joking, but he pushed the door open and we walked inside. The tiny shack had evidently seen duty as a warehouse and hadn't been manicured since! But in view of the fact that the Park Service was handicapped by lack of funds, and in the throes of road building and general ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith

... the homage of his regard he took hold of himself and apologized on the ground that he had been joking. ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie

... supposing I was to come across them here in the road, do you imagine they would frighten me? Not the least in the world. I should go to meet them and cry: 'Gentlemen assassins, what do you want with me? Remember that with me there is no joking. Therefore go about your business and be quiet!' At this speech they would run away like the wind. If, however, they were so badly educated as not to run away, why, then I would run away myself and there would ...
— Pinocchio - The Tale of a Puppet • C. Collodi

... improv'd in virtue, and considering that in conversation it was obtain'd rather by the use of the ears than of the tongue, and therefore wishing to break a habit I was getting into of prattling, punning, and joking, which only made me acceptable to trifling company, I gave Silence the second place. This and the next, Order, I expected would allow me more time for attending to my project and my studies. Resolution, once become habitual, ...
— Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin

... perhaps five feet square, and could the two of them have peered down it they would have discovered that it sloped steeply, and that, looking through it, they could see the happy fellows down below still smoking heavily, still chatting and joking, waiting patiently for the moment when their services would be ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton

... with dead vines and snow. They could hear the candymakers come out, now and then, doubtless setting out pans of candy to cool. By and by the whole party seemed to come out into the little arbor, to try the candy, perhaps the joking and laughter came plainly to the boys up-stairs. About this time there appeared on the roof from somewhere two disreputable cats, who set up a most disturbing duel of charge and recrimination. Jim detested the noise, and perhaps was gallant ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... went on, Dr. Bose endeared himself to our family, who called on him whenever illness arose. He and I became fast friends, often joking together, usually with ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda

... not hooking the body, got angry, and darting the spike of the boat-hook into the abdomen, the pent-up gas escaped with a loud whiz, and the corpse instantly sank like a stone. Many jokes were passed on the occasion; but I was not in humour for joking on serious subjects: and before the watch was out I had made up my mind to go home, and to quit the service, as I found I had no chance of obeying my mother's dying injunctions if I ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat

... meant. He did say, though, he would make the loan if you could show him you knew how to improve the farm, and he did say that if HE owned the farm the first thing he'd do would be to drain the pond and plant it in corn. It was his friend that suggested the electric lights—and he wasn't joking, either, Uncle Joe," stoutly declared Bob with ...
— Hidden Treasure • John Thomas Simpson

... industry and commerce gradually died out. A few princes, subsidised and guarded by French or Imperialists, kept up an appearance of cheerfulness, but the courts even grew more gloomy as the people grew more miserable. There is more joking, more resonant laughter in Ariosto than in Boiardo, but there is very much less serenity and cheerfulness; ever and anon a sort of bitterness, a dreary moralizing tendency, a still more dreary fit of prophesying ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee

... Fenwick began to talk of old friends, and current exhibitions; and presently tea made its appearance. Watson's strength seemed to revive. He sat more upright in his chair, his voice grew stronger, and he dallied with his tea, joking hoarsely with his nurse, and asking Fenwick all the questions that occurred to him. His face, in its rugged pallor and emaciation, and his great head, black or iron-grey on the white pillows, were so fine that Fenwick could not take his eyes from him; with the double sense of the artist, he ...
— Fenwick's Career • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... respected merchants, whose family has been established here many years, whose interests must be the same as those of the Order; and because a guest of his does not care to take any active part in my joking with the girls, and because you imagine that there is a cunning expression on his face, you must straightway take it into your head that he must ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty

... these misjudged young men had committed no greater crime than that of taking a boat up the river, or a drive in a dog-cart. If a group of them should be seen by him laughing and talking, he instinctively concluded their topic must be ribaldry, whereas they would perhaps be only joking at the expense of some eccentric professor, or else chaffing one of their own number. And so it happened that Tom failed in time to distinguish between the really bad and such as he only imagined to be bad; and from his habit of looking on at them and their doings from a studied ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed

... wife,' she says. 'He's pretty well ashamed of himself for not having tried to do it before. I gave him one or two hints how to set about it—he's not over smart—and I've got an idea he will discover her.' She dropped her joking manner, and gave my arm a little squeeze. She'd have flirted with her own grandfather—that's my ...
— The Observations of Henry • Jerome K. Jerome

... a cushion with her head just behind the toboggan's curved front; Thorn found room farther back, with his legs in the snow, and amidst some laughter and joking the others pushed; them off. The surface was hard, and for a time the toboggan ran smoothly and steadily; then the pace got faster, and showers of snow flew up like spray. It beat into Grace's eyes and whipped ...
— The Buccaneer Farmer - Published In England Under The Title "Askew's Victory" • Harold Bindloss

... they were joking, but she turned the color of her dress, and sat twiddling the coin between her thumb and finger, too embarrassed to look up. They sat so long at the table that it was almost train-time when Eugenia went up-stairs ...
— The Little Colonel: Maid of Honor • Annie Fellows Johnston

... I have not said that. I was joking when I asked whether you wished to lose me. Of course you do not want to lose me." Then she wound her arm round him, and put up her face to be kissed. "But now come and dress yourself, as you call it. The dinner is late. We will talk ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope

... however, there was a general cleaning of the rifles and accouterments; then most of the men went down to the stream, and there was a great washing of clothes, accompanied with much laughing and joking. Then needles and thread were obtained, from the women of the village, and there was much mending and darning—for the past three days' work, among rocks and woods, had done no little damage ...
— The Young Franc Tireurs - And Their Adventures in the Franco-Prussian War • G. A. Henty

... the stump of an oak-tree, looking, to use a familiar, though incorrect expression, very blue indeed. And no wonder, for Ah-wow was going to be hanged. Perhaps, courteous reader, you think we are joking, but we assure you we are not. Ah-wow had just been found guilty, or pronounced guilty—which, at the diggings, meant the same thing—of stealing two thousand dollars' worth of gold-dust, and was about to expiate his crime on ...
— The Golden Dream - Adventures in the Far West • R.M. Ballantyne



Words linked to "Joking" :   jesting, humorous, jocose, humourous



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