"Poor devil" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... New York, but the thought of my debts frightened me out of that, and so I put it off. I half wish now I hadn't been so confoundedly prudent. Perhaps it is best, though. Still I don't know. Better be the wife of a poor devil, than have one's heart broken by a ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... He seemed to recognise Dad. He stared for some time at him, then said something in a feeble whisper, which the clergyman interpreted—"He wishes you—" looking at Dad—"to get what's in his swag if he dies." Dad nodded, and his thoughts went sadly back to the day he turned the poor devil ...
— On Our Selection • Steele Rudd
... got him, that's all. They raided his store last night, and he and his papers are all in Portsmouth jail. You'll go off and he, poor devil, will have to stand the racket, and lucky if he gets off with his life. That's why I want to get over the water as ...
— His Last Bow - An Epilogue of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... favor of ce cher Monsieur X? Well, perhaps Monsieur W, for example, is a captain of dragoons and already mated. And maybe Monsieur V is a young baron whose family won't stand any nonsense about him—families are different. And as for Monsieur A—well, let us put him down for a poor devil of a student who cuts no figure at all. But Monsieur X—ah, that is different! he is pounced upon in the bosom of his family. It is Monsieur X who has the scrupulous and ...
— With the Procession • Henry B. Fuller
... of me in Washington that I could sit in my office chair and overlook a line of men and spot every last one of them that was going to get on. I never went wrong but once, and that was because the poor devil began to swell and thought he was as big as his own shadow. But if the look's there, I see it—it's something in the eye and the jaw, and the grip of the hands that nobody can give you except God Almighty—and by George, it turns me into a ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... never seen that poor devil who was running away!" exclaimed Viner with sudden passion. "They'll catch him, and I shall have to give evidence against him, and ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher
... laugh at him, shaking and talking in their midst. He was a new thing to have sport with, and N'Komo presently leaned forward, grinning, touched him on the arm, and pointed. The white man's eyes followed the black finger to where a poor devil lay on the ground, impaled by a stake through his stomach. It was N'Komo's way of telling him what to expect, and he ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... tool, and didn't have nerve enough to do any real harm by himself. He drifted around for several months, living like a stray cur, until Nick took him in tow. Nick treats him shamefully, abuses him like a beast, and works him like a slave. The poor devil stays on with him because he doesn't know what else to ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... of my customers, learning his errand, laid hold on him, and were about to toss him in a blanket, and then duck him in the horse-pond. I, however, interfered, and said 'that what he came about was between me and him, and that it was no business of theirs.' To tell you the truth, I felt pity for the poor devil, more especially when I considered that they merely sided against him because they thought him the weakest, and that they would have wanted to serve me in the same manner had they considered me a down pin; so I rescued him ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... he stood and howled, the Cockney crouched and trembled in the upper bunk, his terror-stricken gaze fixed on that awful figure, with eyes rolled back, that howled and howled. It was hard on him, too, the poor devil of a Cockney. His own reason was not any too firmly seated, and the wonder is that he did not ...
— The Road • Jack London
... be dead in an hour. I'm sorry, on her account. Strange case. I've heard she belongs to a fine family in the East. Poor devil, he's got an awful hole ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... inn; only perhaps a landowner's coach, drawn by six home-bred horses, would roll majestically by, which did not prevent either the coachman or the groom on the footboard from looking with peculiar feeling and attention at the little porch so familiar to them; or some poor devil in a wretched little cart and with three five-kopeck pieces in the bag in his bosom would urge on his weary nag when he reached the prosperous inn, and would hasten on to some night's lodging in ...
— Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... he was the premier cracksman of France? That is, going on Mademoiselle Delorme's account of him; she says there was never anybody like that poor devil for putting the comether on a safe—barring yourself, Monsieur le Loup Seul, in your palmy days. And she ought to know; those two have been working together since the Lord knows when. A sound, conservative bird, de Lorgnes; very discreet, ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... glass is a beautiful thing to see. So is water, the morning after. That is the fault with frolic; there is always an inescapable rebound. The most violent love drops into humdrum tolerance. A pessimist is only a poor devil who has anticipated the inevitable; he has his headache at the start. Mental champagnes have their aftermaths even as the ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... but that they were not true. They did not much trouble a hungry beggar of a younger son with letters; still if there had been such good news he should have heard it. He wished it might be so and as to his brother, poor devil! he would last long enough to marry and have children. Were the ducks still in the river! He said no more to me of Darthea, or of what I was to do for him, but he found a way at need, I am sure, to get letters to her, ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell
... "I remember the poor devil had a paralysis soon after," continued the friend, quite carelessly. "He could not steer any more, and also he lost his voice. When you met him he would look at you as it he thought he was talking, but all ...
— Damaged Goods - A novelization of the play "Les Avaries" • Upton Sinclair
... kid," he said in a voice new to St. Ange's knowledge of Jock; "you're not the fellow to grudge a poor devil an hour or so of heaven. There's the hope of an eternity of it for you; but for me there's going to be only—the memory of this hour. Shake hands, old man, and take this from me, straight. Keep yourself fit to touch. Lay hold of that and never ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... about a mile from here, when a gust of wind carried away both my letter and my hat. I ran after the letter, although the button of my hat was a single diamond; I caught my letter, but my hat was carried by the wind into the middle of the river. It will make the fortune of the poor devil who finds it."—"So ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... the Retainer ventured smiling, "when I say that not only do I know the hiding-place of this homicide, but that I also am acquainted with the man who kidnapped and sold the girl; I likewise knew full well the poor devil and buyer, now deceased. But wait, and I'll tell your worship all, with full details. This person, who succumbed to the assault, was the son of a minor gentry. His name was Feng Yan. His father and mother are both deceased, and he has likewise no brothers. He ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... backwoodsmen caught hold of the negro's limbs, and began pulling and tugging at them till the poor devil roared as if they ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... been a minister, left the grave above which the whistling trains passed, a freezing rain was falling and he passed out of the cemetery in the company of the poor devil who coughed so sadly within the collar of his overcoat that was tightly drawn ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... saw us coming they turned and fled, at least all but one, who came rushing at us with his lance at the charge. I caught hold of his horse, which was half mad with terror, and my chum was going to run the rider through when he noticed the awful glaze in his eyes, and we saw that the poor devil ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various
... with considerable venom upon his love of approbation and vanity. "May the Uppermost not punish me for my evil words, but to see him take his roll of bills out of his pocket and pay his contribution to the synagogue one would think he was some big merchant and not a poor devil sponging on ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... the poor devil went astray in his conjugation, and confusing the first with the third person, said, "God, I do not wish," which in the context had no meaning. "God does not ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - URBAIN GRANDIER—1634 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... stay, and fared well at his table. The doctor was a good enough fellow in himself, but his wife, a salt, domineering woman, lived in the light of the Parker Putwells, and he, poor devil, in the shadow they cast. He was playing a double game too, for whenever the red-elbowed serving-wench came into the room, he roared his dissent from our lawlessness, and drank to the King with his glass over the water-bottle as ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... young friend," said he, good-humouredly. "It is a pleasure we lose as we grow older,—that of being sleepy. However, 'to bed,' as Lady Macbeth says. Faith, I don't wonder the poor devil of a thane was slow in going to bed with such a tigress. ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book VII • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... you, Olive; the woman in you, I mean. Opdyke is morally bound to hold it all in, when you're in sight and hearing. No man that's half a man will squeak before a woman, and Opdyke's all man, fast enough. Yes, poor devil, he does have his bad days, like all the rest of us. However, the rest of us can arise and lick somebody, if the spirit moves us; and poor old Opdyke has to lie still and take it out in swearing. He does swear, too; and now and then his temper is ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... homesteader (for the contestant always won in that country) the Sawtooth would pay him for the land. Frequently a Sawtooth man would file upon land before any other man had claimed it. Sometimes a Sawtooth man would purchase a relinquishment from some poor devil of a claim-holder who seemed always to have bad luck, and so became discouraged and ready to sell. An intelligent man like Bill Warfield could acquire much land in this manner, ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... horse and mule passed over the crest of the sand bank; then, he took out his revolver. A shudder ran through the fallen horse. The Ranger's hand trembled. He stroked its neck. "Poor devil; it's none of your affair either. I wonder how the God of the game will square it ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... he admitted. "I know that. But whose fault is it? It isn't mine. I've lived the life of a brute creature for ten years. You don't abuse a one-legged man, poor devil. I've had other things amputated. I was like you once. It seemed all right to me to go under to save a woman's honor. You never have. Therefore, I say you've no right to call me a brute. Personally, I don't object. It is simply a ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... of those transactions has the smallest interest for me or anyone else in the world but him; and even he couldnt stand it if he had to do it all himself. And I'm envied: aye, envied for the variety and liveliness of my job, by the poor devil of a bookkeeper that has to copy all my entries over again. Fifty thousand entries a year that poor wretch makes; and not ten out of the fifty thousand ever has to be referred to again; and when all the figures are counted up and the balance sheet made out, the boss isnt a ...
— Misalliance • George Bernard Shaw
... quite right, old lady! All the doctors and medicines in the world could not have pulled him through after the drink and the snow had had their way with him for so many hours—poor devil! Well! I'll go back to bed now, and finish my ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... fonder of money than of blood; for all their talk about zeal for the Faith is so much wind behind the mountains. They care as much for the Faith as the mountain cares for the wind, or, let us say, as I do. They wanted to torture the poor devil, thinking that he would rain maravedis; but I gave a hint in the right quarter, and their fun was stopped. Carissima, I must stop also; it is my hour for duty, but I hope to meet you as arranged, and we will have a merry evening. Love to the newly married marquis, if you meet ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... plantation,' said the manager, who was a mere German civilian, and consequently much despised by his foreman, who had served in Africa. 'I'm afraid to keep him here, and I'm not going to punish him if he tries to get away again, poor devil.' ...
— Ridan The Devil And Other Stories - 1899 • Louis Becke
... Racine, and as to-day, everyone who shows signs of rising is stoned with Corneille, Racine and Voltaire. These tactics, as will be seen, are well-worn; but they must be effective as they are still in use. However, the poor devil of a great man still breathed. Here we cannot help but admire the way in which Scuderi, the bully of this tragic-comedy, forced to the wall, blackguards and maltreats him, how pitilessly he unmasks his classical ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... express his delight in her thoroughness. "How glad I shall be when I have you all to myself!—I shall spend every day of my life in proving to you how much I value your love, and you shall give this poor devil a chance to take up his life again. Honey!—sometimes I am sleepless with fears. It seems to me too good to be true. I am overcome with dread lest I should never carry it through! Something will be sure to happen to stop it. If so, I am done for! It will be the end of me!" He looked as if ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... judgment upon the Earth; for it shall rain pickle bottles and biscuit tins for the period of forty days, because of the wickedness of the world, unless she repent!" And I pictured to myself the perplexity of the poor devil who should see this message come ...
— Pharaoh's Broker - Being the Very Remarkable Experiences in Another World of Isidor Werner • Ellsworth Douglass
... a square of light attracted his attention. He looked up to see the outline of the bearded Russ in the window. Poor devil! He was going to have a merry time of it. Well, that was his affair. Besides, Russians, half the year chilled by their bitter snows, were susceptible to volcanoes; they courted them as a counterbalance. Perhaps he had spoken roughly, but his temper ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... ever tried to make a man's lot any harder, or to discourage him, and I never spoke an insultin' word to a soldier in my life, and I hope I'll be called to report to the Great Commander before I do. But I said something chaffin'-like to that poor devil and he struck me, and I didn't hit him back—I didn't hit him back, thank God, nor threaten to report him. But I had to tell the truth to the Colonel and take part of ...
— Betty at Fort Blizzard • Molly Elliot Seawell
... the "Medical Handbook," with reference to the remarks on amputation, gangrene, etc., and I have also been examining his leg. The poor devil is in great pain, and there is no doubt that mortification has set in, as was indeed inevitable. I have decided that he must have his last chance, and that at 8 p.m. to-night ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... had to do with a poor devil named Slim, who was a "snow-eater," that is to say, a cocaine victim. This Slim wandered about the streets of New York in the winter-time without any shelter, and would get into an office building late ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... gives an air of truth to the story. Accordingly the Devil is represented as being unpleasantly cold to the touch. "Caietan escrit qu'une sorciere demanda un iour au diable pourquoy il ne se rechauffoit, qui fist response qu'il faisoit ce qu'il pouuoit." Poor Devil! But there are cases in which the demon is represented as so hot that his grasp left a seared spot as black as charcoal. Perhaps some of them came from the torrid zone of their broad empire, and others from the thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice. Those ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... into the old man's eyes, and he put his hand to his belt again, but she hurriedly led Winfield away. "Ruth," he said, as they went down the hill, "you're a sweet girl. That was real womanly kindness to the poor devil." ...
— Lavender and Old Lace • Myrtle Reed
... he looked, poor devil! Hillard had not taken particular notice of him during the past week's excursions. Giovanni had aged ten years ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... there could be no mistake! A human voice had answered us! Was it the voice of some poor devil left behind in midocean, some other victim of that collision suffered by our ship? Or was it one of the frigate's longboats, hailing us ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... didn't shoot him. He was too far gone, poor devil, to shoot anybody.... It was the Belgian captain that he left.... He was lying there, horribly wounded. His servant was with him; they ...
— The Romantic • May Sinclair
... they make blunder after blunder, while still believing that they are hoodwinking him like mad. Schoolboys, that's what they are! However, as you seem to have some illusions left about the aforesaid Lupin, as you are counting on that poor devil to crush me and to work a miracle in favour of your innocent Gilbert, come, let's dispel that illusion. Oh! Lupin! Lord above, she believes in Lupin! She places her last hopes in Lupin! Lupin! Just wait till I prick you, ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... I came from my mother's; so that six months afterwards, when I remembered, one fine morning, that I had been Colonel Chabert, and when, on recovering my wits, I tried to exact from my nurse rather more respect than she paid to any poor devil, all my companions in the ward began to laugh. Luckily for me, the surgeon, out of professional pride, had answered for my cure, and was naturally interested in his patient. When I told him coherently about ...
— Colonel Chabert • Honore de Balzac
... street, where I must turn my back on the Common pleasures of Boston life—but yet, one glance at that seductive window of the corner store, which, indeed, is nearly all window. Flowers are there, of course,—flowers from January to January; any poor devil can have a temporary conservatory at that window, 'all for nothing;' I ought to pay a yearly tax for the pleasure I steal in that way. The woman who carries my portmonnaie, only permits me to open it for the 'necessaries' of life: the luxuries of hot-house grapes and flowers ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... vouchsafed in an undertone. "No question of it. Features identical, though face is drawn. White hair mark, broken nose, green eyes. I opened one eye. Got a bad foot, partly healed; looks as if he'd torn it on a stub. Poor devil seems nearly starved." ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... If ever a poor devil was flabbergasted, it was the head of the Boyne agency at that moment. I had a fellow feeling for that Mazeppa party who was tied in his birthday suit to the back of a wild horse. Locoed broncos were more ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... pair had lived happily, loved and respected, absolutely without want, and shielded from all material worry. And when some poor devil who has spent four sleepless nights in the trenches, on his return steals an hour or two from his well earned, much craved sleep, in order to hoe their potato patch, one would doubtless be astonished to hear such a man exclaim by way of excuse ...
— With Those Who Wait • Frances Wilson Huard
... lucky. Perhaps the last rats Crespo ate, had feasted on arsenic—rats are so whimsical. The poor devil, perhaps, was poisoned in that manner. Rather an expensive taste. Unfortunately, the lesson will do ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... tell you; it was because the Battersea people were more humane and charitable than their neighbours. There was a time when those fields were of no value; now they're worth a mint of money, they say. The body of a poor devil, who was drowned in the river, was washed on shore on those banks, and none of the parishes would be at the expense of burying it. The Battersea people, though they had least right to be called upon, would not allow the poor fellow's corpse to be lying on the mud, and ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... was just commonplace and dull—boring. Yet Sir William, the self-made man, was a study. And the young, Oxford-like Major, with his English diffidence and his one dark, pensive, baffled eye was only waiting to be earnest, poor devil. ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... off his clothes. "There! Sit on the bed. Different from Wilderling's, isn't it? Poor devil.... I'm going to have a bath if you don't mind—I've got to ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... your time on me. I'm only a poor devil of a newspaper man. There are plenty of fatter fowl to pluck. Denver's full of softheads with money ...
— The Easiest Way - A Story of Metropolitan Life • Eugene Walter and Arthur Hornblow
... who has stepped off the cliff," he said. "I never saw him before—but the sight of him shook me a bit. He has been here quite awhile, I should say—yes, through thaw and frost, frost and thaw. Aye, and the crabs have been at him, poor devil! I suppose we should bury him; but there is no place here ...
— The Harbor Master • Theodore Goodridge Roberts
... man said. He had risen, and he began to walk up and down, swaying his figure and tilting his head from side to side, and frowning his shaggy eyebrows together in a tangled hedge. Suddenly, he stopped before Dylks. "Why, you poor devil, you're not in any unusual fix. It must have been so with all the impostors in the world, from Mahomet up and down! Why, there isn't a false prophet in the Old Testament that couldn't match experiences with you! That's ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells
... power,— and, in short, that I must be on board the Pilgrim by the next morning with my chest and hammock, or have some one ready to go in my place, and that he would not hear another word from me. No court of star chamber could proceed more summarily with a poor devil than this trio was about to do with me; condemning me to a punishment worse than a Botany Bay exile, and to a fate which might alter the whole current of my future life; for two years more in California might have made me a sailor for the rest of my days. I felt all this, and saw the necessity of ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... "Humph! Poor devil, he's got off easy; but from his looks and the tussle we had with him, I don't think he'll be over grateful to you for bringing him through this. I've seen so much of this kind, that I've come to ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller
... damp, small wad of blue-bordered handkerchief. "I just couldn't tell him in the daytime. I nearly did, last night. I meant to, 'cross-my-heart,' I did! We went for a walk, and I was just—just sort of beginning when a woman came sneaking by and—said something to him. You know. And he said—'Poor devil!' That's what he called her. 'Poor devil!' That's just how he said it." Now she dropped her inadequate handkerchief and wept convulsively into her hands and a thin shaft of sunshine lighted up the ...
— Jane Journeys On • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... the Devil to their relief. To him the English presented their petitions, and explained their sad case; and he, upon certain conditions, promised to befriend them, and to give them a language. The poor Devil was little aware of what he had promised; but he is, as all the world knows, a man of too much honor to break his word. Up and down the world then he went in quest of this new language: visited all ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... score something, poor devil," said McTurk, putting on his shirt. "We've sweated a stone and a half ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... How many men there were on her lower deck! Were they really negroes, or had they blackened their faces, as men sometimes do when they are going to hang a poor devil in the woods? On the upper deck are two others whose faces do not seem to be blackened. But a moment later they are the most fearful sight of all; for only too plainly does the fugitive see that they are the same two men who stood before the doorway ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... to check over the wreckage, thinking with a detached compassion of that poor devil Braun who was the victim of men who hated the idea of the Space Platform and what it would mean to humanity. Men of that kind thought of themselves as superior to humanity, and of human beings as creatures ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster
... and a heavy sigh escaped from his own breast. All the devils in hell were mentally conjured and summoned to his aid, but they were, it is to be presumed, better employed, for although the work in hand was diabolical enough, still, Smallbones was such a poor devil, that probably he might have been considered as remotely allied ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... at once, and exhibited great anxiety to save the insect. One of them did get it, and taking it to the window set it at liberty. It was Uncle Toby and the troublesome fly over again, as immortalized by the genius of Sterne: "Get thee gone, poor devil! there is room enough in the world for thee and for me," quoth Uncle Toby. ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... more, and he rolled powerless into the road. When, in due time afterwards, the policeman stumbled upon him as he lay, that guardian of the peace turned the full light of his lantern on his face, and exclaimed, "Here's a poor devil who's been flaring up!" Then came the stretcher, on which the victim of deep potations was carried to the watchhouse, and pitched into a dirty cell, among a score of wretches about as far gone as himself, who saluted their new comrade by a loud, ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... accept my condolences, and prepare to pass them on to Philip. Poor devil! When you and I are back in our world, ...
— Claire - The Blind Love of a Blind Hero, By a Blind Author • Leslie Burton Blades
... thing is true of thousands and even hundreds of thousands all over the world. It is an age that calls for heroes, martyrs, servants, saviors. And right here in this town, where distress walks the streets and actual want already has its clutch on many a poor devil, society goes on giving its expensive parties and living in its little round of selfish pleasure just as if the volcano was a downy little bed of roses for it to go to sleep in whenever it wearies of the pleasure and wishes to retire to ...
— The Crucifixion of Philip Strong • Charles M. Sheldon
... too hard on bad observers; that a remark made by a bad observer CANNOT be right; an observer who deserves to be damned you would utterly damn. I feel entire deference to any remark you make out of your own head; but when in opposition to some poor devil, I somehow involuntarily feel not quite so much, but yet much deference for your opinion. I do not know in the least whether there is any truth in this my criticism against you, but I have often thought I would tell ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... justice I refused to interfere at all, and Omar and I had quite a tiff because he wished me to say, 'Oh, poor man, let him go; I leave the affair to God.' I thought Omar absurd, but it was I who was wrong. The authorities concluded that it would oblige me very much if the poor devil were punished with a 'rigour beyond the law,' and had not Sheykh Yussuf come and explained the nature of the proceedings, the man would have been sent up to the mines in Fazogloo for life, out of civility to me, by the Moudir of Keneh, Ali Bey. There was no alternative between ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... seems, that of all the lands I know (you will see in a minute how I connect this piece of prose’ with the isle of Cyprus), there is none in which mere wealth, mere unaided wealth, is held half so cheaply; none in which a poor devil of a millionaire, without birth, or ability, occupies so humble a place as in England. My Greek host and I were sitting together, I think, upon the roof of the house (for that is the lounging-place in Eastern climes), ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake
... down-east cuss with the crook in his back. He begged hard. Poor devil, he was up against the sandpaper side, all right. He heard from the postmaster that there was a lot of valuable mail going out, so he thought he'd make a try for it. Then what do you think he had the cold, cold ...
— The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch • Henry Wallace Phillips
... pull the poor devil out," said Uncle Martin, when in silence they had traversed fifty feet more of the shaded side of ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... "Poor devil!" he said, as the men lifted the body. "Foredoomed from birth! We can eradicate these diseases from cattle. Why not ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... for us to rig out this poor devil, but we must do more than feed and clothe him. ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... what," said Putney, with a savage burst, "that a woman who puts hell-fire before a poor devil who can't keep out of it when he sees it, is better ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... weeks, of this disgrace. His friends had been sorry for him, with just a grain of contempt; his acquaintances had grinned over it with just a pleasurable salt of pity. "Do you know Aldrich? Well, his wife's in the chorus at the Globe Theater. And he doesn't know it, poor devil." That group at the round table at the club to-night. He could fancy their faces ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... me," said Martin; "but I should be if I was you. You're a swell, and it's an awful drop for you. I'm only a poor devil—a nobody, and it's a rise in life for me to join your honorable company; ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... seen five thousand dollars in a lump sum, and they shove fifteen thousand at him for his vote. He is poor, ambitious, struggling along from hand to mouth. I reckon we ain't in a position to judge that poor devil of a harassed fellow. Mebbe he's always been on the square, came here to do what was right, we'll say, but he sees corruption all round him. How can he help getting a warped notion of things? He sees his friends and his ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... injurious lie. Neither should ever be uttered. The man who speaks an injurious truth, lest his soul be not saved if he do otherwise, should reflect that that sort of a soul is not strictly worth saving. The man who tells a lie to help a poor devil out of trouble is one of whom the angels doubtless say, "Lo, here is an heroic soul who casts his own welfare into jeopardy to succor his neighbor's; let us ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... as well confess," he said. "It will make the end easier. I will be dead in a few minutes, for I am mortally wounded. I would have released that poor devil of a Japanese, but I hadn't the strength to go ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... mention in any newscast of anyone seeing fairies or sea maidens—I expect the poor devil thinks you ...
— The Lost Kafoozalum • Pauline Ashwell
... spirit rose; a thought of flight came, but it was instantly rejected. The next moment he drew a long breath. "I'm an infernal fool and coward," he muttered. He took three steps forward, and stood beside the Figure. He laid his hand firmly upon the head; the hair fell off at his touch. "Poor devil," said he, "I'll bury your bones at any rate." The spell was broken, and Brandon was ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... he was prodded forward to the air-lock. A draft of hot fetid air swept through the corridor, carrying with it the forewarning of unspeakable things to come. And a shriek of mortal terror wafted in from outside by the stinking breeze, told of some poor devil already demoralized. The thick muscles of Luke's biceps tightened to hard knots under his ...
— Vulcan's Workshop • Harl Vincent
... a fugitive existence, a practical illustration of Irving's "Poor Devil Author," looking as often into pastry-shop windows, testing all manner of cheap Pickwickian veal-pies, breakfasting upon a chop, and supping upon a herring in my suburban residence, but keeping up pluck and chique so deceptively, ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... that; they tricked Durnovo there. They wanted to get him to themselves. In going down the river we had an accident with two of the boats, which necessitated staying at Msala. While we were waiting there, one night after ten o'clock the poor devil came, alone, in a canoe. They had simply cut him in slices—a most beastly sight. I wake up sometimes even now dreaming of it, and I am not a fanciful sort of fellow. Joseph went into his room and was ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... a trusting soul in those days, and many a hungry poor devil has hung up his hat, coat and dinner there, and blessed his kind hostess as he quaffed her red ink. We didn't say claret; we called out: "Where's my red ink bottle, Maria?" And Maria would put down the soup tureen she was going from table to table with, and ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... was the only way. And what is my life worth, or my reputation, either? It can't hurt a poor devil like me. Con., will ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... like the rest, was guillotined;— But that when, under BONEY'S reign, (A more discreet, tho' quite as strong one,) The heads were all restored again, He, in the scramble, got a wrong one. Accordingly, he still cries out This strange head fits him most unpleasantly; And always runs, poor devil, about, ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... going to—to turn into a bat and fly away. I'm just a poor devil of a doctor who's gotten himself into one unholy mess." There was no reason, he was thinking, to take out his own misery and despair by shouting at this poor kid. God knew what she'd been through with his irresponsible other self—Forth had admitted that that damned "Jason" personality was a ...
— The Planet Savers • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... Kite chanc'd to steal a bit of something from him; this poor Devil goes strait to my Lord Chief Justice's, crying, roaring, and houling for his Warrant to apprehend it.—— O, I cou'd tell ye a thousand of these ...
— Prefaces to Terence's Comedies and Plautus's Comedies (1694) • Lawrence Echard
... is the upper platform of the steps—of the government, at a small rent per annum; and woe to any poor devil of his profession who dares to invade his premises! Hither, every fair day, at about noon, he comes mounted on his donkey and accompanied by his valet, a little boy, who, though not lame exactly, wears a couple of crutches as a sort of livery,—and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... compassion on the situation I am in; conceive that I disguise nothing from you, and yet that I do not detail to you all my embarrassments, my apprehensions and troubles. Adieu, dear Marquis; write to me sometimes,—don't forget a poor devil, who curses ten times a day his fatal existence, and could wish he already were in those Silent Countries from which nobody returns with news." [OEuvres ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... muttered the porter, shrugging his shoulders disdainfully, and following the stranger with his eyes. "A very poor devil! only a room on the second floor; tea and bread and meat for supper! He must be a savant, a professor, or something of ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... gentlemen shall help her. The artist alone, by the way, is to no purpose, and remains unconsulted; his work is explained and rectified without him, by the one who was never in it—but upon whom God, always good, though sometimes careless, has thrown away the knowledge refused to the author—poor devil! ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler
... exorcised the locality, they called the Devil by all the vile names they could think of, to show their lack of respect, and finally commanded him never to return to this vicinity. Calling on Christ and the Virgin, they applied fire to the wood. "The poor Devil then fled roaring in a fury, and making ...
— Inca Land - Explorations in the Highlands of Peru • Hiram Bingham
... a poor devil! (like many another!!!) You could assist him by asking your gracious master whether he is disposed to purchase one of his small but neat pianos. I also beg you will recommend him to any of the Chamberlains or ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826, Volume 1 of 2 • Lady Wallace
... light, the same appearance as ever—but he imagined that he could make out in the nocturnal silence, new sounds, the echo of songs, Margalida's voice. There would be the odious Ironworker, and that poor devil of a Minstrel, and the rude, barbarous youths, with their ridiculous dress. Gran Dios! How was it possible that these rustics had ever managed to interest him, after all that he had seen ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... poor devil go," thought the pedler. "I don't want his black blood on my head, and hanging the nigger wouldn't unhang Mr. Higginbotham. Unhang the old gentleman? It's a sin, I know, but I should hate to have him come to life a second time ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... it is to compass the assistance Whereby one rises to the source! And, haply, ere one travels half the course Must the poor devil quit existence. ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... admitted. "I know that. But whose fault is it? It isn't mine. I've lived the life of a brute creature for ten years. You don't abuse a one-legged man, poor devil. I've had other things amputated. I was like you once. It seemed all right to me to go under to save a woman's honor. You never have. Therefore, I say you've no right to call me a brute. Personally, I don't object. It is simply a matter ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... they do," admitted the anxious one; and then, with a swift eye-shot which Blount missed: "Especially if they happen to be travelling on the quiet to catch some poor devil napping on the job." ...
— The Honorable Senator Sage-Brush • Francis Lynde
... a wholesale liquor store on his own account! Where did Hill raise the money to start in business—a poor devil who could never get eighteen pence ahead in the world? It does not appear. For one, I will say that Hiram Meeker did not furnish it. He not only belongs to the temperance society, but he believes all traffic in the 'deadly poison' ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various |
