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More "Gibberish" Quotes from Famous Books
... are again, talking your dreadful gibberish," said Rose Pompon, turning round towards Faringhea. "First of all, it is not polite; and then the language is so odd, that one might ... — The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... does not belong to the herd. Nothing real, nothing original, can be vulgar; but I should think an imitator of Cobbett a vulgar man. Emery's Yorkshireman is vulgar, because he is a Yorkshireman. It is the cant and gibberish, the cunning and low life of a particular district; it has 'a stamp exclusive and provincial.' He might 'gabble most brutishly' and yet not fall under the letter of the definition; but 'his speech bewrayeth him,' his dialect (like the jargon of a ... — Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... bold bang on the door, followed by the pious ejaculation, 'Ave Maria!' The lame, or otherwise afflicted, are content with simply directing attention to their misfortunes, while the less 'favoured' attract public regard by humming a wild air, to which a gibberish libretto is attached, or by descanting upon social and political matters. The ill-paved condition of the Cuban streets, the inefficient supply of water, the bad lighting of the town at night, the total absence of anything like proper ... — The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... heretics much wiser, who are continually sticking amen to the end of your prayers, little knowing when you do so that you are consigning yourselves to the repose of Buddh? Oh, what hearty laughs our missionaries have had when comparing the eternally sounding Eastern gibberish of Omani batsikhom, Omani batsikhom, and the Ave Maria and Amen Jesus of our ... — The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... Whitefriars, then a place of asylum, and frequented by sharpers, of whose gibberish there are several specimens in Shadwell's comedy, "The Squire ... — The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... velocity of a millstone, to the great danger of everybody in the apartment. He then galloped out upon the plain, and after half an hour's absence returned, and having placed his horse once more in the stable, came and seated himself next to me, to whom he commenced talking in a gibberish of which I understood very little, but which he intended for French. He was half intoxicated, and soon became three parts so, by swallowing glass after glass of aguardiente. Finding that I made him no answer, he directed his discourse to one of the contrabandistas, ... — The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... chance away. He come after me and followed me up all through the Midlands. Half-starved he was, pore chap. I never see such a gentlemanly sort of chap so hard pushed as he was; and at last out of charity like I took him on. And very glad I am, for he's turned out capital. He talks that Indian gibberish to the old Rajah, and the big beast follows him about like a lamb. Never have a bit of trouble with him now, only when he tries to shove one of the caravans over with that big head of his, just in play; and then Bah Klay—that's his show-name, and a very good ... — Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... said the old Gipsy man, 'Meg's true-bred; she's the last in the gang that will start; but she has some queer ways, and often cuts queer words.' With more of this gibberish, they continued the conversation, rendering it thus, even to each other, a dark, obscure dialect, eked out by significant nods and signs, but never expressing distinctly or in plain language the subject on ... — Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... got the man tied back in the still room. I 'low he ain't no revenue but they 'low different. Come back and see if you kin make out his gibberish." ... — The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess
... uninteresting subject, that tribes wandering through the mountains of Nubia, or the plains of Romania, have conversed for centuries in a dialect precisely similar to that spoken at this day, by, the obscure, despised, and wretched people in England, whose language has been considered as a fabricated gibberish, and confounded with a cant in use among thieves and beggars; and whose persons have been, till within the period of a year, an object of the persecution, instead of the protection ... — A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland
... Galleys, land of Games given at Athens Gargettus Garlic, and gallants Genetyllides, the Geres, old fop Gestation, ten months Gibberish uttered by a god Girls, unmarried, ornaments Glaucetes, a glutton Gods, the days of the Gorgos, head of Grasshopper, the, as comparison Greek words, puns on Grudge, bearing no ... — The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... Louise waited and called, and told and retold her prayer till it turned to gibberish and she began to doubt her own name and to mix the telephone number hopelessly. Then she went into her hand-bag and pawed about in the little pocket edition of confusion till she found the note that Polly had sent her at once from Washington ... — The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... mixed gibberish of the voyageur, I could gather his meaning well enough. He knew of a depository of wax-candles, and the church of the rancheria was the place in ... — The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... and the Centaur another boy with the small blue-eyed person in whom he took delight. And this fat and indolent looking boy informed them that he and the girl who was with him were walking in the glaze of the red mustard jar, which Jurgen thought was gibberish: and the fat boy said that he and the girl had decided never to grow any older, which Jurgen said was excellent good sense if ... — Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... erroneously to classify very low in the human scale and not far above the ape. Sir Lucien usually spoke to Sin Sin Wa in English, and the other replied in that weird jargon known as "pidgin." But the silly Sin Wa who murmured gibberish and the Sin Sin Wa who could converse upon many and curious subjects in his own language were two different beings—as Sir Lucien was aware. Now, as the one-eyed Chinaman resumed his seat and the one-eyed raven sank into slumber, Pyne suddenly spoke in Chinese, ... — Dope • Sax Rohmer
... poor crazed thing raved on, while sentence by sentence a scribe wrote down her gibberish, causing her at last to make her mark to it, all of which took a very long time. At the end she begged that she might be pardoned and not burnt, but this, she was informed, was impossible. Thereon ... — The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... at him. In the immediate presence of death his impudence forsook him, and he made a weak effort to justify himself. His speech was short, consisting of single words. To Lady Arabella it sounded mere gibberish, but it was in his own dialect, and meant love, marriage, wife. From the intonation of the words, she guessed, with her woman's quick intuition, at their meaning; but she quite failed to follow, when, becoming more pressing, he continued to urge his suit in a mixture of the ... — The Lair of the White Worm • Bram Stoker
... private correspondents. Figure to yourself a bald-headed personage, about forty years of age, near seven feet high, deaf as a post, stammering and making convulsive efforts to express a sentence of five words, which, after all, his gibberish made unintelligible. His dress was as eccentric as his person was singular, and his manners corresponded with both. He called himself Baron von Bulow, and I saw him afterwards, in the autumn of 1797, at Paris, with the same accoutrements ... — Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... mealy porridge, but he won't admit that it is to be called "paniche," preferring his own word "scoff;" so he shakes his head violently and says, "Nay, nay, paniche." Then, with many nods, "Scoff, ja;" and so in this strange gibberish of three languages he and the Frenchman carry on quite a pretty quarrel. Charlie also "mocks himself" of the other servants, I am informed, and asserts that he is the "indema" or headman. He freely boxes the ears of Jack, the Zulu refugee—poor Jack, who fled from ... — Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... I, "what all this gibberish of yours is about, I don't know, and I don't much care; for it seems to me that you must be a little damaged in the head. But if you are speaking of Captain Ahab, of that ship there, the Pequod, then let me tell you, that I know all about the loss ... — Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... took to the Psalms and Paraphrases—many of which he knew by heart, and, finally, he had recourse to extempore composition, which he found much easier than he had expected—the tones flowing naturally and the words being gibberish! Thus he became a sort of David to this remarkable Saul. By degrees, as he learnt the native tongue, he held long conversations with the Big Chief, and told him about his own land and countrymen and religion. In regard to the last the Chief was very ... — Jarwin and Cuffy • R.M. Ballantyne
... "Hold your outlandish gibberish," returned his lordship. "Go and fetch me some whisky. This stuff is too cold to go to sleep ... — Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... cannot doubt it any longer; they are completely mad. (Aloud). Once more, I tell you, I understand nothing of all this gibberish; I will be master, and to cut short all kinds of arguments, either you shall both be married shortly, or, upon my word, you shall ... — The Pretentious Young Ladies • Moliere
... days of absolute monotony, the island of Raza, off Rio Janeiro, was descried, and we slowly entered the harbor, passing a fort on our right hand, from which came a hail, in the Portuguese language, from a huge speaking-trumpet, and our officer of the deck answered back in gibberish, according to a well-understood custom of the place. Sugar-loaf Mountain, on the south of the entrance, is very remarkable and well named; is almost conical, with a slight lean. The man-of-war anchorage is about five miles inside the heads, directly in front of the city of Rio Janeiro. ... — The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... "I know not what gibberish thou sayest by 'jim-jams'; but he had, like thee, the wildest fantasies and imaginings; saw snakes, toads, rats, in his boots, but principally rats; said they pursued him, came to his room, his ... — The Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... could lay hands on between the Tower of London, into which they put orators, and the pillory, into which they put writers. Anne spoke a little Danish in her private chats with her husband, and a little French in her private chats with Bolingbroke. Wretched gibberish; but the height of English fashion, especially at court, was to talk French. There was never a bon mot but in French. Anne paid a deal of attention to her coins, especially to copper coins, which are the low and popular ones; she wanted to cut a great ... — The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... about by the exulting chatter of a few irrepressible and also irresponsible individuals who have military or political ambitions to look after, and no other faculty of reason or vocabulary than the gibberish "that war will clear the air." They ostentatiously claim a monopoly of patriotism; and convey their views on war matters with a blustering levity which is a marvel to the astonished soul. Their attitude towards human existence is that you cannot be a patriot or create a great ... — Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... man, a dentist and doctor, claiming to come from an eastern city, while sitting at the table last evening, after much insane gibberish, fell back intoxicated upon the floor, and lay insensible for some time. He was finally, when the others had finished eating, dragged off to bed in a most inglorious condition, to suffer later for his dissipation. O, how my heart ached for his dear old mother ... — A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... Guarine," said the Constable; "for, look you, had Vidal meant ill by us, why should he not have betrayed us to the Welsh, or suffered us, by showing such knowledge as thou and I may have of their gibberish, to betray ourselves?' ... — The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... conventional signs for Chinese sounds unknown to our languages. It was certainly possible to transcribe not only names but Sanskrit prayers and formulae in Chinese characters, and though many writers sneer at the gibberish chanted by Buddhist priests yet I doubt if this ecclesiastical pronunciation, which has changed with that of the spoken language, is further removed from its original than the Latin of Oxford from ... — Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Charles Eliot
... confusion in the alley, and among the outcries of all the waiting drivers, no one paid any heed to this wild yell, which might have been the woman's usual cry. But this gibberish, intelligible to Jacques Collin, sent to his ear in a mongrel language of their own—a mixture of bad Italian and Provencal—this ... — Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... clothes, and you know 'em, but in their work-a-day English you never know nought about 'em. I've met wi' many o' your kidney; and if I'd ha' known it, I'd ha' christened poor Jack's mermaid wi' some grand gibberish of a name. Mermaidicus Jack Harrisensis; that's just like their new-fangled words. D'ye believe there's such a thing as the Mermaidicus, master?" asked Will, enjoying his own joke uncommonly, as most ... — Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... of Tituba as seated in the old kitchen of Mr. Parris's house during the long winter evenings, telling witchcraft stories to the minister's niece, Elizabeth, nine years old. She draws a circle in the ashes on the hearth, burns a lock of hair, and mutters gibberish. They are incantations to call up the devil and his imps. The girls of the village gather in the old kitchen to hear Tituba's stories, and to mutter words that have no meaning. The girls are Abigail Williams, who is eleven; Anne Putnam, twelve; Mary Walcot; and Mary Lewis, seventeen; ... — Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... The fellow spoke to me nothing but truth and sense. I answered him just as roughly as I did the rest, who jabbered mere gibberish. I couldn't make distinctions there and then. His appearance told what he had gone through lately clearer than his words; but where is the use of ... — Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... began to yell drunken gibberish at the top of his harsh voice. He danced, howled, raved and otherwise disturbed ... — The Four Million • O. Henry
... mingle-mangle talk," ordered Mr. Meredith, fretfully. "Is 't not enough to have French gibberish in ... — Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... empty bag! But once there, they could not make enough of us. The Duke had got their hearts before, and odd sort of hearts they are. I was deaf with the wild kernes shouting round about in their gibberish—such figures, too, as they are, with their blue cloaks, streaming hair, and long glibbes (moustaches), and the Lords of the Pale, as they call the English sort, are nigh about as wild and savage as the mere Irish. It was as much ... — Grisly Grisell • Charlotte M. Yonge
... with two of the crew—Manx sailors—about the Manx language; one, a very tall man, said he knew only a very little of it as he was born on the coast, but that his companion, who came from the interior, knew it well; said it was a mere gibberish. This I denied, and said it was an ancient language, and that it was like the Irish; his companion, a shorter man, in shirt sleeves, with a sharp, eager countenance, now opened his mouth and said I was right, and ... — George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... close the closet and the trunk when Ivan appeared with a basket on his arm. The serf came for the flowers, which he had orders to carry to the apartment of his young master. Having placed five or six in his basket, he turned to Gilbert and gave him to understand, in his Teutonic gibberish mingled with French, that he had something important to communicate to him. Gilbert answered in a tone of ill-humor, that he had not time to listen to him. Ivan shook his head with a pensive air, and left. Gilbert immediately seated ... — Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... in the above, outcrops of the strong pubescent instinct to enlarge the vocabulary in two ways. One is to affect foreign equivalents. This at first suggests an appetency for another language like the dog-Latin gibberish of children. It is one of the motives that prompts many to study Latin or French, but it has little depth, for it turns out, on closer study, to be only the affectation of superiority and the love of mystifying ... — Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... and future, when a scratching, scraping, boring noise on the outside of their bark roof temporarily disturbed their slumbers. Dol called out noisily, and, as was the way of that youngster on sundry occasions, talked some gibberish in his sleep. ... — Camp and Trail - A Story of the Maine Woods • Isabel Hornibrook
... Kikuyu winds energetically back and forth on his little handle, and tries to keep his feet. And Brown! he is magnificent! His long lash sends out a volley of rifle reports, down, up, ahead, back; his cracked voice roars out an unending stream of apparent gibberish. Back and forth along the line of the team he skips nimbly, the sweat streaming from his face. And the oxen plod along, unhasting, unexcited, their eyes dreamy, chewing the cud of yesterday's philosophic reflections. ... — African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... lightly, "any American—any, that is, of the world—who has a colonial background for his family, has thought, probably, very much the same sort of things. Of course it would be all Greek or gibberish ... — Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... great charter and the praters who appeal to it will be hanged in one rope. The good Talbot will shower commissions on his countrymen, and will cut the throats of the English. These verses, which were in no respect above the ordinary standard of street poetry, had for burden some gibberish which was said to have been used as a watchword by the insurgents of Ulster in 1641. The verses and the tune caught the fancy of the nation. From one end of England to the other all classes were constantly singing this idle rhyme. It ... — The Celtic Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 2, December 1875 • Various
... ours is a way much surer; for we cheat in no language at all, but loll in our own coaches, eloquent in gibberish, and learned in jingle. Pull out the parchment [referring to the will of LORD BRUMPTON], there's the deed; I made it as long as I could. Well, I hope to see the day when the indenture shall be the exact measure of the land that passes by it; for 'tis a discouragement ... — The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... never makes nonsense rhymes from sheer gladness of heart,—nursery doggerel to keep time with the rippling of the stream, or the dancing of the sun, or the beating of his heart; the gibberish of delight. As I hummed this nonsense, a trout at least three pounds in weight, whom you would know again anywhere, leapt a yard out of the water, and I took it, in my absurd, sun-soaked heart, as a good omen, as though he had ... — The Quest of the Golden Girl • Richard le Gallienne
... und Oratorn vorzeiten haben gesagt in ihren Spruchen und Sentenzen, dasz die gedechtniss des Elends und Armuth vorlangst erlitten ist eine grosse Lust.' My friend, said Pantagruel, I have no skill in that gibberish of yours; therefore, if you would have us to understand you, speak to us in some other language. Then did the ... — Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... to see the monument, St. Paul's, and the lions; and Cooper put himself in charge of a beef-eater, and took a look at the arsenals, jewels and armoury. He had a rum time of it, in his sailor rig, but hoisted in a wonderful deal of gibberish, according to his ... — Ned Myers • James Fenimore Cooper
... replied with enthusiasm (we shall henceforth translate his gibberish), "You are right, father, we cannot embrace a light, but we can prostrate ourselves before it, ... — The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... genial shrill and tinkle of many bells meant refreshment and most gregarious frivolity for the chattering, loitering, laughing and ever-spectacular groups so far below him—and how he hated their outlandish gibberish and their arrogant European aloofness!—it meant for him hard work, and hard work of a ... — Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer
... continued Trottman, 'to afford you a sample of his gibberish; you may then examine what degree of instruction you suppose may be obtained from a heterogeneous ... — The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... that place also, poor Queequeg gave it up for lost. Thought he, it's a wicked world in all meridians; I'll die a pagan. .. and thus an old idolator at heart, he yet lived among these Christians, wore their clothes, and tried to talk their gibberish. Hence the queer ways about him, though now some time from home. By hints, I asked him whether he did not propose going back, and having a coronation; since he might now consider his father dead and gone, he being very old and feeble at the last accounts. He answered ... — Moby-Dick • Melville
... as the watches of that haunted night passed over the lonely camp, crying startled sentences, and fragments of sentences, into the folds of his blanket. A quantity of gibberish about speed and height and fire mingled oddly with biblical memories of the classroom. "People with broken faces all on fire are coming at a most awful, awful, pace towards the camp!" he would moan one minute; and the next would ... — The Wendigo • Algernon Blackwood
... guest at the board of a Jesuit priest, visiting the schools of the Mission where this young Jezebel of a singer teaches the children to chant in unknown tongues? Didn't he find him living with a wrinkled Indian witch who called him 'Padrone'—and speaking her gibberish? Didn't he find him, who left here a man mortified in flesh and spirit and pale with striving with sinners, fat and rosy from native wines and fleshpots, and even vain and gaudy in colored apparel? And last of all, didn't Brother Bulkley hear that a rumor was spread far and wide that ... — Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... still repeated she was an idle baggage, and bid her go on. Ah, master, says the gipsy, that roguish leer of yours makes a pretty woman's heart ache; you have not that simper about the mouth for nothing—The uncouth gibberish with which all this was uttered, like the darkness of an oracle, made us the more attentive to it. To be short, the Knight left the money with her that he had crossed her hand with, and got up ... — The Coverley Papers • Various
... Sirius and Canopus and the far limits of the galaxy was a good Jew like themselves, their peculiar property; He had his earthly headquarters in Jerusalem; spoke, I suppose, only Hebrew, and considered other languages gibberish; of all this earth, was only interested in a tiny corner at the south-east end of the Mediterrancan; and of all the millions of humanity only in the million or two of his Chosen People. I say at once that, considering their history, and ... — The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... listening to Liancourt. He stalked up to her, and as Liancourt, seeing her rise, rose also and moved away, he said peevishly, "You will never learn to conduct yourself properly; you are to be left here to nurse and comfort your uncle, and not to listen to the gibberish of every French adventurer. Well, Heaven be praised, I have a ... — Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Robin Hood testily, "an ye make sport of me by pattering such gibberish, it will be ill for you all, I tell you. I have the best part of a mind to crack the heads of all four of you, and would do so, too, but for the sweet Malmsey ye have given me. Brother, pass the pottle lest it ... — The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... probably never catch up to her again. Such progress as Pin might make—if she were not already glued firm to her silly notions—would be in quite another direction. For the quarrel had made one thing plain to Laura: with regard to her troubles, she need not look to Pin for sympathy: if Pin talked such gibberish at the hint of putting off an inquisitive old woman, what would she—and not she alone—what would they all say to the tissue of lies Laura had spun round Mr. Shepherd, a holy man, a clergyman, and ... — The Getting of Wisdom • Henry Handel Richardson
... all at once, mumbling to himself some inarticulate gibberish. Half an hour later, the servants came in and found him. He was seated in his chair, still doddering feebly. The house was roused. A doctor was summoned, and the Colonel put to bed. Lady Emily ... — What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... Mazarine said at last. "I never studied Greek. If a woman has a disease, there it is, and you can deal with it or not; but if she hasn't no disease, then it's chicanyery— chicanyery. Doctors talk a lot of gibberish these here days. What I want to know is, has my wife got a disease? I haven't seen any signs. Is it Bright's, or cancer, or the lungs, or the liver, or the kidneys, or the ... — The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... favourite exhibition of religious enthusiasm at Corinth. (On this subject Prof. Lake's excursus is the most instructive discussion that has yet appeared. The 'Testament of Job' and the magical papyri show that gibberish uttered in a state of spiritual excitement was supposed to be the language of angels and spirits, understood by them and acting upon them as a charm.) He urges his converts to do all things 'decently and in order.' He is alarmed at signs of moral laxity on the part of self-styled 'spiritual ... — Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge
... things natural; that all that was necessary to this end, was first to separate from Christianity all that was not Christianity, and secondly, to translate Christianity out of Latin and Greek, Hebrew and Gibberish, into the language of the ... — Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again - A Life Story • Joseph Barker
... confused, and, handing it to his wife with a request that she would look over it in his absence, went out to drive. Returning in the evening, his first question was: 'Well, my dear, what do you think of Browning's poem?' 'Bother the gibberish,' was her indignant reply, 'I can't understand a word of it.' 'Thank God,' exclaimed Jerrold, clapping his hands to his head triumphantly, 'then I ... — The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... extraordinary man, Friar Bacon, reveals two of the ingredients, saltpetre and sulphur, and conceals the third in a sentence of mysterious gibberish, as if he dreaded the consequences of his own discovery, (Biog. Brit. vol. ... — The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... story as told by contemporaries and repeated from that day to this. It is hardly necessary to say that Barneveld calmly denied having conceived or even heard of the scheme. That men could go about looking each other in the face and rehearsing such gibberish would seem sufficiently dispiriting did we not know to what depths of credulity men in all ages can sink when possessed by the demon of ... — The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... and the matted beards covering their faces. For the most part they were very ragged, and tanned exceedingly wherever the flesh took a peep through their outworn plaids. They ran about the streets in groups, looking in shop windows like children and talking their outlandish gibberish; then presently their Highland pride would assert itself at the smile of some chance passer and would send them swinging proudly off as though they had better things ... — A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... than another, I refrained from doing so, but I promised to remember him. I then begged that he would speak to his companions, and advise them to be quiet, telling them that we would do everything in our power for their benefit. I heard him shout out what appeared to me to be perfect gibberish, but it had the desired effect, and they at once became far more tranquil ... — The Two Supercargoes - Adventures in Savage Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... imagined that this gibberish would open the eyes of some at least of her votaries: their insane enthusiasm, on the contrary, increased. Joanna was absolutely inundated with the "freewill" offerings of the faithful—a costly cradle, white robes, pinafores, shoes ... — English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... nights. But they gave me a new idea of Fox, those two or three weird hours that night. It was as if I had never seen him before. The attacks grew more virulent as the night advanced. He groaned and raved, and said things—oh, the most astounding things in gibberish that upset one's nerves and everything else. At the height he sang hymns, and then, as the fits passed, relapsed into incredible clear-headedness. It gave me, I say, a new idea of Fox. It was as if, for all the time I had known him, he had been playing a part, and that only now, in the delirium of ... — The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad
... will understand. In the meantime, St. Paul, I think, answers your question better than I could, but you wouldn't understand even his words, I fancy. There they are in the Greek," he opened a Testament and showed her a passage. "I believe you would think the English almost as great gibberish as this looks to you in its ... — We Two • Edna Lyall
... the distinctions and honors and revenues which, taken from no person, are set apart for virtue. The ears of the people of England are distinguishing. They hear these men speak broad. Their tongue betrays them. Their language is in the patois of fraud, in the cant and gibberish of hypocrisy. The people of England must think so, when these praters affect to carry back the clergy to that primitive evangelic poverty which in the spirit ought always to exist in them, (and in us, too, ... — The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... affected tone, perhaps a corruption of chaunting; some derive it from Andrew Cant, a famous Scotch preacher, who used that whining manner of expression. Also, a kind of gibberish used by thieves and gipseys, ... — The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... did that over at the Whiteside Morning Record. It was typing out clear copy, then suddenly there wasn't anything but gibberish." ... — The Electronic Mind Reader • John Blaine
... helmet, reached inside it, opened a small sliding panel, and took out an object the size and shape of an aspirin tablet—the sealed unit that permitted him to understand the conversation over the police wave band. Without it, the police calls would have been gibberish. ... — Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... we had strolled about wherever we pleased, this grand conjunction of our whole force, upon one particular expedition, seemed to alarm them. But we assured them that we were not going to assault the village; and so, after a good deal of gibberish, they permitted ... — Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... sailor, who was cast away on the shore of Africa, where he was kept in slavery for three years, was, at the expiration of that period, found to be imbruted and stultified—he had lost all reasoning power; and having forgotten his native language, could only utter some savage gibberish between Arabic and English, which nobody could understand, and which even he himself found difficulty in pronouncing. So much for the humanizing influence of THE DOMESTIC INSTITUTION!" Admitting this to have been an extraordinary case of mental deterioration, ... — The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass - An American Slave • Frederick Douglass
... was abreast of the lads, one whispered something to the other, but what it was Vane could not understand, for it sounded mere gibberish. ... — The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... me. Latin was my favorite study, and it seemed sacrilege to believe this gibberish to belong to the ... — A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... turned him out o' meeting for gitting drunk and swearing—the dear good man!—but I do wish, for gracious sake, I could only jest change places with 'em—ef jest for five minutes—and I reckon as how they'd be glad to quit their gibberish, and talk like Christian folks, once in thar sneaking lives! Thar, they're done now, I do hope to all marcy's sake! and I reckons as how we'll ... — Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... "What gibberish is this?" said the lady, in fretful humor; "go and tell your master to come here this moment. I declare, my nerves are all a-tremble, and my life is worried out of me by these stupid niggers. Get out of my ... — Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... was a fool, and his mother never tired of scolding him and emphasizing her words by a beating. When Juan went to school he made more noise at his study than anybody else, but his reading was only gibberish. ... — Philippine Folk-Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss, Berton L. Maxfield, W. H. Millington,
... poor fellow mean?" demanded the admiral, more concerned than he remembered ever before to have been, on any similar occasion. "One could wish to serve him as much as possible, but all this about 'nullus,' and 'whole blood,' and 'half,' is so much gibberish to me—can you make any ... — The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... "is gibberish; mere words. Would it bring Clayte up before any one who had never seen him? Ask Captain Gilbert, who doesn't know the man. I say that's a list of the points at which he resembles every third office man you meet on the street. What I want is the points at which ... — The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... had been careful to buy a young one that could not speak, for he knew the Morris boys would not want one chattering foreign gibberish, nor yet one that would swear. He had kept her in his bunk in the ship, and had spent all his leisure time in teaching her to talk. Then he looked at her anxiously, and said, "Show off ... — Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... as he put on his great coat, "it is a curious fact that, with all his incredulity, he is exceedingly superstitious. You can hardly believe how troubled he is about some gibberish of that old hag that sets charms for lame horses, etc. I'm not at all sure but that she set charms in the other way ... — My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... their rights, and destroy the oligarchical faction. A few months would not, according to his account, have elapsed, ere the two nations, late such determined enemies, would have been identified by their principles, their maxims, their interests. The full explanation of this gibberish, (for it can be termed no better, even proceeding from the lips of Napoleon,) is to be found elsewhere, when he spoke a language more genuine than that of the Moniteur and the bulletins. "England," he said, "must have ended, by becoming an appendage to the France of my ... — The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Supplementary Number, Issue 263, 1827 • Various
... them very well; but his Irish gibberish is as Greek to me. All that I can make out is what seems to be ... — Live to be Useful - or, The Story of Annie Lee and her Irish Nurse • Anonymous
... of him by one glance from the soft eyes of a weak, blond, female creature like Flush of Gold. It was at her dad's cabin, old Victor Chauvet's. Some friend had brought Dave along to talk over town sites on Mammon Creek. But little talking did he do, and what he did was mostly gibberish. I tell you the sight of Flush of Gold had sent Dave clean daffy. Old Victor Chauvet insisted after Dave left that he had been drunk. And so he had. He was drunk, but Flush of Gold was the strong drink that made ... — Lost Face • Jack London
... flicker of rationality, the miser fell back, sputtering, into his previous gibberish, but it took now an arithmetical turn. Eyes closed, he ... — The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... above the atmosphere, and rose still higher, and the planet Kandar became a gigantic ball which filled an enormous part of the firmament. Then there were cracklings of communicators, and orders flittered through emptiness in scrambled and re-scrambled broadcasts of gibberish which came out as lucid commands in the control-rooms of the ships. Then, first, the point, then the advanced flankers, and then the main fleet, line by line and rank by rank—every ship drove on outward under ... — Talents, Incorporated • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... get them out. Why, would you believe it? I once asked one of those fellows what he called the foremast in his language, and what d'ye think he said? Why, I'm blowed if he didn't call it a 'Mar-darty-marng' (and that's the only bit of French I know); but how is it possible to work a ship in such gibberish?" ... — Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... she ran across the snowy fields to the old tumble-down house on the next road, where the new family lived. The children were at play in the yard—seven in all, and none of them larger than Hope—but at sight of her they came forward hand in hand, jabbering such queer gibberish that Peace could not understand ... — At the Little Brown House • Ruth Alberta Brown
... through the thin part of the nose; and they all twist kangaroo teeth and the bones of fishes more or less in their hair. Every thing small and diminutive they call "Pickaninnie," and any thing very good, "Merri jig." Their language is a queer, rattling, hard-sounding gibberish, incomprehensible to most people; they speak as fast as possible, laugh immoderately at trifles, and are excellent mimics. Their ... — Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... language, sir,' I tells him: 'we did not steal it.' 'Shall I tell you what it is, my good woman?' says the Poknees. 'I would thank you, sir,' says I, 'for 'tis often we are asked about it.' 'Well, then,' says the Poknees, 'it is no language at all, merely a made-up gibberish.' 'Oh, bless your wisdom,' says I with a curtsey, 'you can tell us what our language is without understanding it!' Another time we meet a parson. 'Good woman,' says he, 'what's that you are talking? Is it broken language?' 'Of course, your reverence,' says I, 'we are broken people; give a shilling, ... — Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... to share Miss Keene's sentiments; "and he's so good to those outlandish niggers in the crew. I don't see how the captain could get on with the crew without him; he's the only one who can talk their gibberish and keep them quiet. I've seen him myself quietly drop down among them when they were wrangling. In my opinion," continued the young fellow, lowering his voice somewhat ostentatiously, "you'll find out when we get to port that he's stopped ... — The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... awakened light that came into her adorable eyes, the faint blush that suffused her cheek as she met his inquiring gaze, and the conscious, half conceited, half girlish toss of her little head as she turned her eyes away, and then a file of brown Chinamen, muttering some harsh, uncouth gibberish, interposed between them. This was followed by what seemed to be the crashing in of the church roof, a stifling heat succeeded by a long, deadly chill. But he knew that THIS last was all a dream, and he tried to struggle to his feet ... — From Sand Hill to Pine • Bret Harte
... liberty of saying a word or two about the gentleman who conducts you through the rooms to explain the several pictures. When I had the pleasure of being with him, his hair was powdered, and he carried a silver-headed cane. He hurried me through the rooms, filling my ears with such gibberish as this:—"That ere picture, sir, up there, was painted, five hundred years ago, for William the Conqueror, by Wandyke."[4] This is no mean ... — The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 10, Issue 285, December 1, 1827 • Various
... home from the hill. He gave his bridle reins a shake. Love is sweet, love is brief. Spring, the fair spring, is the year's pleasant King. O! to be in England now that April's there. Men must work and women must weep. The path of duty is the way to glory—" We could listen to no more of this gibberish. ... — Monday or Tuesday • Virginia Woolf
... his tales, Much as when madhouse-inmates crowd around, Make captive any visitor and scream All sorts of stories of their keeper—he's Both dwarf and giant, vulture, wolf, dog, cat, Serpent and scorpion, yet man all the same; Sane people soon see through the gibberish! I just made out, you somehow lived somewhere A life of shame—I can't distinguish more— Married or single—how, don't matter much: Shame which himself had caused—that point was clear, That fact confessed—that thing to hold and keep. Oh, ... — Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... to myself, 'what in natur is all this hubbub about? Can this here confounded old house be harnted? Is them spirits that's jabbering gibberish there, or is I wide awake or no?' So I sets right up on my hind legs in bed, rubs my eyes, opens my ears and listens agin, when whop went every shutter agin, with a dead heavy sound, like somethin' or another thrown agin 'em, or fallin' agin 'em, and then comes the ... — The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... Much of this was gibberish to Andrea Barrofaldi, but Griffin being exclusively naval, he fancied every one ought to take the same interest as he did himself in all these matters. But, while the Vice-governatore did not understand more than half of the other's meaning, that half sufficed to render him exceedingly ... — The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... those fellows what be called the foremast in his language, and what d'ye think he said? Why, I'm blowed if he didn't call it a 'Mar-darty-marng' (and that's the only bit of French I know); but how is it possible to work a ship in such gibberish?" ... — Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... in deep silence. And he asked me to be kind enough to close my eyes. Then I heard his voice muttering, in a strange tongue, a queer dark gobbling kind of words, which may have been ancient African spell-words, or sheer gibberish such as magicians in all times and places have ... — Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... gallants! Wind, I see him! Wind, I see him! Pourbossa, pourbossa! Haul all and one!'" When the anchor was hauled above the water they cried: "Caupon, caupon; caupon, cola; caupon holt; Sarrabossa!" When setting sail they began with the same kind of gibberish. "Hou! Hou! Pulpela, Pulpela! Hard out strife! Before the wind! God send! God send! Fair weather! Many Prizes! Many Prizes! Stow! Stow! Make fast and belay—Heisa! Heisa! One long pull! One long pull! Young blood! More mud! There, there! ... — Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... 'Shall I tell you what it is, my good woman?' says the Poknees. 'I would thank you, sir,' says I, 'for 'tis often we are asked about it.' 'Well, then,' says the Poknees, 'it is no language at all, merely a made-up gibberish.' 'Oh, bless your wisdom,' says I with a curtsey, 'you can tell us what our language is without understanding it!' Another time we meet a parson. 'Good woman,' says he, 'what's that you are talking? Is it broken language?' 'Of course, ... — Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... its lawful prey, while we, caring little for the displeasure of the elements, sat comfortably talking. There was now an attempt to open the door, succeeded by a voice uttering some strange, unintelligible gibberish which my companions mistook for Greek and I suspected to be thieves' Latin. However, the showman stepped forward and gave admittance to a figure which made me imagine either that our wagon had rolled back two hundred years into ... — Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... easy rhyme by the Magnifico and his poetic satellites; while the women, over and above any relish of the fun, really began to have an itch for the Brevi. Several couples had already gone through the ceremony, in which the conjuror's solemn gibberish and grimaces over the open book, the antics of the monkey, and even the preliminary spitting, had called forth peals of laughter; and now a well-looking, merry-eyed youth of seventeen, in a loose tunic and red cap, pushed forward, holding by the hand a plump brunette, whose scanty ragged ... — Romola • George Eliot
... tow of Cooper, who soon became a branch pilot in those waters about the parks and the West End, the Monument, St. Paul's and the lions; Cooper took a look at the arsenal, jewels, and armory [Tower of London]. He had a rum time of it in his sailor's rig; hoisted in a wonderful lot of gibberish." And with his fine stories of each day's sights in old London town, the young sailor would make merry evenings for his forecastle comrades, of whom it is recorded his strength could lay flat on their ... — James Fenimore Cooper • Mary E. Phillips
... to come to Kinnakulla's rocky wall, he would recognise the temple of Cailasa, and find in the clefts and crevices whole representations from Ramagena and Mahabharata. If one should then speak to him in a sort of gibberish—no matter what, only that, by the help of Brockhaus's "Conversation-Lexicon" one might mingle therein the names of some of the Indian spectacles:—Sakantala, Vikramerivati, Uttaram Ramatscheritram, &c.—the Brahmin would be completely ... — Pictures of Sweden • Hans Christian Andersen
... lazy, Juan was a fool, and his mother never tired of scolding him and emphasizing her words by a beating. When Juan went to school he made more noise at his study than anybody else, but his reading was only gibberish. ... — Philippine Folk-Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss, Berton L. Maxfield, W. H. Millington,
... himself upon his knowledge of German. He sat down by me and asked a hundred questions, perpetually taking snuff the while—Was I the servitore? When did we arrive? Had we gone to Roma? All this I myself did not know, and really I could not understand his gibberish. "Parlez-vous francais?" I asked him at last in my distress. He shook his big head, and I was very glad, for neither did I speak French. But it was of no use, he had taken me in hand, and went on asking question after question; ... — The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... the poems—passages indicating an anthropological science as intimate as it is unpretentiously expressed. To some good folk in our days, who think that nothing can be profound which is naturally and simply spoken, and who demand that a human philosopher shall speak gibberish and wear his boots on his brows, the fact may be strange, but it is a fact. And it may be added that even if chapter and verse could not thus be produced, a sufficient proof, the most sufficient possible, ... — Sir Walter Scott - Famous Scots Series • George Saintsbury
... the above, outcrops of the strong pubescent instinct to enlarge the vocabulary in two ways. One is to affect foreign equivalents. This at first suggests an appetency for another language like the dog-Latin gibberish of children. It is one of the motives that prompts many to study Latin or French, but it has little depth, for it turns out, on closer study, to be only the affectation of superiority and the love of mystifying others. The other is a very different impulse to ... — Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... who is every day winning the king's money! You have fallen into the wrong box, for I neither like nor wish to have anything to do with such fellows.' Pimentello got warm. 'Go about your business,' said Sully, giving him a shove; 'your infernal gibberish will not alter ... — The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... wrote on the perfections of metals, of the new-found art of making gold, in a word, on the philosopher's stone, has only descended to our times as the founder of that jargon which passes under the name of "gibberish." He was, however, a great authority in the middle ages, and allusions to "Geber's cooks," and "Geber's kitchen," are frequent among those who at length saw the error of their ways, after wasting their substance in the vain search for ... — Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... Mary told Lucinda, when they were left together once more. "She puts me beyond all patience. She chatters gibberish that I can't make out a word of for an hour at a time, and then, all of a sudden, she screams, 'Dinner's ready,' or something equally silly, in a voice like a carvin' knife. It's enough to drive a sane person stark, raving mad. ... — The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... pity, Court, country, citadel with city; That ancients, with the giddy young, Should study still the Latin tongue; Should leave to levity, to dolour, The unproficient English scholar; Should give the very stranger dread, Of gibberish, that ne'er was read; That ne'er was heard, ... — A Minniature ov Inglish Orthoggraphy • James Elphinston
... then a place of asylum, and frequented by sharpers, of whose gibberish there are several specimens in Shadwell's comedy, "The Squire of ... — The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... waited and called, and told and retold her prayer till it turned to gibberish and she began to doubt her own name and to mix the telephone number hopelessly. Then she went into her hand-bag and pawed about in the little pocket edition of confusion till she found the note that Polly had sent her at once from Washington with the address, Grinden Hall, Rosslyn, and ... — The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... excellent woman, and very distinguished besides. My sister was sixteen when I left; she must be eighteen now. She was pretty, and she ought to be beautiful. Then there is my brother Edouard, a delightful youngster of twelve, who will let off fireworks between your legs and chatter a gibberish of English with you. At the end of the fortnight we will go ... — The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... it, or at the least he muttered something in some outlandish gibberish," replied the captain, laughing a little shamefacedly. "And he told me its meaning, partly in Latin, for we spoke together in that tongue, but I am such a dullard that I forgot the words as soon as he spoke them, and so asked him to write them down. Then he fell a pondering ... — Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... talking your dreadful gibberish," said Rose Pompon, turning round towards Faringhea. "First of all, it is not polite; and then the language is so odd, that one might suppose you ... — The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... censers they keep shaking them in derision, and letting the ashes fly about their heads and faces, one against the other. In this equipage they neither sing hymns nor psalms nor masses, but mumble a certain gibberish as shrill and squeaking as a herd of pigs whipped on to market. The nonsense verses ... — Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... the tail Kikuyu winds energetically back and forth on his little handle, and tries to keep his feet. And Brown! he is magnificent! His long lash sends out a volley of rifle reports, down, up, ahead, back; his cracked voice roars out an unending stream of apparent gibberish. Back and forth along the line of the team he skips nimbly, the sweat streaming from his face. And the oxen plod along, unhasting, unexcited, their eyes dreamy, chewing the cud of yesterday's philosophic reflections. The situation conveys ... — African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... happen'd before this great while, viz My Unkle & Aunt both told me, I was a very good girl. Mr Gannett gave us the favour of his company a little while this morning (our head). I have been writing all the above gibberish while aunt has been looking after her family—now she is out of the room—now she is in—& takes up my pen in my absence to observe, I am a little simpleton for informing my mamma, that it is a great while since I was prais'd because she will conclude that it is a ... — Diary of Anna Green Winslow - A Boston School Girl of 1771 • Anna Green Winslow
... head-bobbing ceased and dark faces were lifted toward the elevation. For the first time the newcomers saw the beautiful face of Lady Tennyson. They struggled to their feet, the tall chief stepping forward with outstretched arms. Then in some wild gibberish he began to speak, half to the white witnesses, half to ... — Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... kept in slavery for three years, was, at the expiration of that period, found to be imbruted and stultified—he had lost all reasoning power; and having forgotten his native language, could only utter some savage gibberish between Arabic and English, which nobody could understand, and which even he himself found difficulty in pronouncing. So much for the humanizing influence of THE DOMESTIC INSTITUTION!" Admitting this to have been an extraordinary case of mental deterioration, it proves at ... — The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass - An American Slave • Frederick Douglass
... and superior artist who reopens antique sources of inspiration and starts the modern current, is guillotined; we possess the original manuscript indictment of his examination, a veritable master-piece of gibberish and barbarism, of which a full copy is necessary to convey an idea of its "turpitudes of sense and orthography."[41158] The reader may there see, if he pleases, a man of genius delivered up to brutes, ... — The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... who have been versed in this knack of unfolding and untying riddles, are capable, in any sort of writing, to find out what they desire. But above all, that which gives them the greatest room to play in, is the obscure, ambiguous, and fantastic gibberish of the prophetic canting, where their authors deliver nothing of clear sense, but shroud all in riddle, to the end that posterity may interpret and apply it according to ... — The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... of what it is in the case of those who view the Indian at a distance and with no precise knowledge of any of his characteristics. In the estimation of such persons the Indian's vices greatly outweigh his virtues; his language is a gibberish, his methods of war cowardly, his ideas ... — Indian Linguistic Families Of America, North Of Mexico • John Wesley Powell
... scientist has endeavoured to speak like other people, preferring, to the harsh consonants of technical phrases which sound "like insults" or have the air of "a magical invocation, which make certain scientific works read like so much gibberish," the "naive and picturesque appellation, the familiar, trivial name, the popular, living term which directly interprets the exact signification of the habits of an insect, or informs us fully of its dominant characteristic, or which, at ... — Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... outsider can possibly understand; for, by common agreement, arbitrary names are applied to every object which the robbers at any time handle, and to every sort of underhand business which they transact. But this gibberish is not exactly an outcome of any moral obliquity; it is employed as a means of securing safety. The gipsy cant is the remnant of a pure and ancient language; we all occasionally use terms taken from this remarkable tongue, and, when we speak of a "cad," or "making ... — The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... south and west of England, and come round in their circuit two or three times in the year. One of these tribes calls itself by the noble name of Stanley, of which I have nothing particular to say; but the other is distinguished by an appellative somewhat remarkable. — As far as their harsh gibberish can be understood, they seem to say that the name of their clan is Curleople; now the termination of this word is apparently Grecian: and as Mezeray and the gravest historians all agree that these vagrants ... — The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... has been buen' camarada with the Spaniard, and guter Gesell with the Dutchman, and parleywood with Mounseer, and made the weight of his ship in gold for his owners, out of these here salvages, shouldn't be able to speak their gibberish. It's not so hard after all, do ye see, when one gets the weather guage of it. But here, some o' ye, gallivant the red skins up to the Governor, (a good enough fellow in his way, I dare say, if he were not so d——d hard on drinking healths,) ... — The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... appeared frightened, and for some time said nothing, but only stared at me. At length, recovering herself, she exclaimed, in an angry tone, "Why do you talk to me in that manner, and in that gibberish? I don't understand a word ... — Romano Lavo-Lil - Title: Romany Dictionary - Title: Gypsy Dictionary • George Borrow
... when Nat Straw climbed up on the wagon wheel, and likewise whispered something to his champion. The little, old, weazened mendicant took his cue, and cut into "The Irish Washerwoman" with a great flourish, and in the refrain chanted an unintelligible gibberish like the yelping of a coyote, which the audience so cheered that he repeated it several times. The crowd now gathered around the wagons and clamored for the decision, and after consulting among ourselves some little time, and knowing that a neutral or indefinite verdict was desired, ... — The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams
... merchandise," CARNALLY, while it raised him to the dignity of a "brother beloved," SPIRITUALLY? In other words, might not Philemon consistently with the request of Paul, have reduced Onesimus to a chattel, AS A MAN, while he admitted him fraternally to his bosom, as a CHRISTIAN? Such gibberish in an apostolic epistle! Never. As if, however, to guard against such folly, the natural product of mist and moonshine, the apostle would have Onesimus raised above a servant to the dignity of a brother beloved, "BOTH IN THE FLESH AND IN THE ... — The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... while the reader has been receiving information second-hand about their past and future, when a scratching, scraping, boring noise on the outside of their bark roof temporarily disturbed their slumbers. Dol called out noisily, and, as was the way of that youngster on sundry occasions, talked some gibberish in his sleep. The scraping ... — Camp and Trail - A Story of the Maine Woods • Isabel Hornibrook
... Mariel saw that you were given his job when he left PIB to edit 'Fighting World.' He didn't think you were the man, he didn't trust you—thought you had been raised too strongly on the sort of gibberish you were writing. I thought you were the only man we could use. So we let you follow the trail, and watched to see how you'd handle it. And when you came to the Nevada plant, we knew you were the man we had ... — Bear Trap • Alan Edward Nourse
... up the straw, our bedding, in one corner of the barn, swept the concrete floor, rolled the blankets, explained to the gossipy farm servant that I did not "compree" her gibberish, and (p. 037) watched her waddle across the midden towards the house, my duties were ended. I was at liberty until the return of the battalion. It was all very quiet, little was to be heard save the gnawing of the rats in the corner of the barn and the muffled booming of ... — The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill
... been careful to buy a young one that could not speak, for he knew the Morris boys would not want one chattering foreign gibberish, nor yet one that would swear. He had kept her in his bunk in the ship, and had spent all his leisure time in teaching her to talk. Then he looked at her anxiously, and said, "Show off now, ... — Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... was confusion. Aletha's cousin was saying syllables that did not mean anything at all. The other Indians joined in at intervals, speaking gibberish. Aletha's eyes were shining and she looked incredibly pleased ... — Sand Doom • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... will understand. I have worked with computers, and now and then one of them suddenly starts turning out gibberish for no apparent reason. A check of the circuits may show that everything is functionally normal. Yet, the gibberish continues. Often it clears up, with no more reason than it started. Sometimes this happens when the machine ... — The Electronic Mind Reader • John Blaine
... passage. In reply the lecturer said, rather roughly, "If you will speak English I will answer you.'' At this Howell said with the most humble suavity, "Do I understand that the distinguished gentleman does not recognize what I have been reading?'' The preacher answered, "I don't understand any such gibberish; speak English.'' Thereupon Howell threw back his long black hair and launched forth into eloquent denunciation as follows: "Sir, is it possible that you come here to interpret to us the Holy Bible and do not recognize the language in which that blessed book was written? ... — Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... fell to sighing in the most pitiable manner; and he pulled the most extraordinary faces, and ran on with such a string of gibberish that nobody could make either head or tail of it. Master Wacht, however, knew what to make of it, for he shook his head, saying, "Ah! that may be contrived;" and he smiled to himself at the wonderful sympathy of ... — Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... Soapy began to yell drunken gibberish at the top of his harsh voice. He danced, howled, raved and otherwise ... — The Four Million • O. Henry
... the bushes. I've got the man tied back in the still room. I 'low he ain't no revenue but they 'low different. Come back and see if you kin make out his gibberish." ... — The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess
... left to the choice of him who would gain a hearing with the reader—if one can be found who is not already weary of reading what the wags think of his (or her) own peculiar whims—is to fall in with the spirit of the age and compile an "International Library of the World's Greatest Gibberish about Bibliomaniacs." We have the "World's Greatest" everything else in book-lore, and I shall not be surprised if some enterprising publisher gets out a "definitive" de luxe edition of the "World's Greatest Dictionaries." Indeed, the Holy Bible itself has not escaped, for they are now making ... — Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs • Henry H. Harper
... was no blood visible and we could find no broken bones. Apparently there was nothing the matter beyond fear, and of that he was nearly dead. He crawled to the Colonel and clung to his feet chattering an unintelligible gibberish. His eyes rolling wildly in the dim light, showed an uncanny yellow gleam. I could see where ... — The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster
... thee hear soon enough that 'twas I, if I had known I was so near thy lair; but 'tis more than a man's life is worth to creep down moleholes in the dark, and on a night like this. And why I could not get out the gibberish about the Bonaventure sooner, was because I matched my shin to break a stone, and lost the wager and my breath together. And when my wind returned 'tis very like that I was trapped into an oath, which is sad enough ... — Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... land of Games given at Athens Gargettus Garlic, and gallants Genetyllides, the Geres, old fop Gestation, ten months Gibberish uttered by a god Girls, unmarried, ornaments Glaucetes, a glutton Gods, the days of the Gorgos, head of Grasshopper, the, as comparison Greek words, puns on Grudge, bearing ... — The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... tongues' (glossolalhia), which was the favourite exhibition of religious enthusiasm at Corinth. (On this subject Prof. Lake's excursus is the most instructive discussion that has yet appeared. The 'Testament of Job' and the magical papyri show that gibberish uttered in a state of spiritual excitement was supposed to be the language of angels and spirits, understood by them and acting upon them as a charm.) He urges his converts to do all things 'decently and in order.' He is alarmed at signs of moral laxity on the ... — Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge
... with my good old Crebillon; yet my style, which was full of Italianisms, often expressed the very reverse of what I meant to say. But generally my 'quid pro quos' only resulted in curious jokes which made my fortune; and the best of it is that my gibberish did me no harm on the score of wit: on the contrary, ... — The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... was hunting the Black Stone the interest of the problem had helped to keep me going. But now I could see no problem. My mind had nothing to work on but three words of gibberish on a sheet of paper and a mystery of which Sir Walter had been convinced, but to which he couldn't give a name. It was like the story I had read of Saint Teresa setting off at the age of ten with her small brother to convert the Moors. I sat huddled in the taxi with ... — Greenmantle • John Buchan
... and they all twist kangaroo teeth and the bones of fishes more or less in their hair. Every thing small and diminutive they call "Pickaninnie," and any thing very good, "Merri jig." Their language is a queer, rattling, hard-sounding gibberish, incomprehensible to most people; they speak as fast as possible, laugh immoderately at trifles, and are excellent mimics. Their own ... — Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... exclaimed Brace, eager to share Miss Keene's sentiments; "and he's so good to those outlandish niggers in the crew. I don't see how the captain could get on with the crew without him; he's the only one who can talk their gibberish and keep them quiet. I've seen him myself quietly drop down among them when they were wrangling. In my opinion," continued the young fellow, lowering his voice somewhat ostentatiously, "you'll find out when we get to port that he's stopped the beginning ... — The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... gave his bridle reins a shake. Love is sweet, love is brief. Spring, the fair spring, is the year's pleasant King. O! to be in England now that April's there. Men must work and women must weep. The path of duty is the way to glory—" We could listen to no more of this gibberish. ... — Monday or Tuesday • Virginia Woolf
... for gitting drunk and swearing—the dear good man!—but I do wish, for gracious sake, I could only jest change places with 'em—ef jest for five minutes—and I reckon as how they'd be glad to quit their gibberish, and talk like Christian folks, once in thar sneaking lives! Thar, they're done now, I do hope to all marcy's sake! and I reckons as how we'll soon have ... — Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... this book is the worst of all. It is simply this: that if all goes well this book will be unintelligible gibberish. For it is mostly concerned with attacking attitudes which are in their nature accidental and incapable of enduring. Brief as is the career of such a book as this, it may last just twenty minutes longer than most of the philosophies ... — All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... and then some unintelligible gibberish. But she took no more notice of him than if he had been a crow on a branch. In a minute she was beside Will, talking to him, and from over the top of the rise we could hear Fred ... — The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... a dentist and doctor, claiming to come from an eastern city, while sitting at the table last evening, after much insane gibberish, fell back intoxicated upon the floor, and lay insensible for some time. He was finally, when the others had finished eating, dragged off to bed in a most inglorious condition, to suffer later for his dissipation. O, how my heart ached ... — A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... designed as a satire on pedantry, and is as old in Italy as Straparola (sixteenth century). In passionate Sicily a wife disgusted with her husband's pedantry sets the house on fire, and informs her husband of the fact in this unintelligible gibberish; he, not understanding his own lingo, falls a victim to the flames, and she marries the servant who had taken ... — English Fairy Tales • Joseph Jacobs (coll. & ed.)
... not suppose that there were more than a dozen persons in that hall who understood anything of the language in which he spoke. Certainly it was the merest gibberish to that whole army of listening men. Nevertheless, with every word that he uttered the emotion grew tenser. Cries—little sharp cries like the bark of a puppy—broke out here and there. "Verrno! Verrno! Verrno! (True! True! True!)" ... — The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... During a shorter exile, Gibbon unlearned his native English. Madame D'Arblay had carried a bad style to France. She brought back a style which we are really at a loss to describe. It is a sort of broken Johnsonese, a barbarous patois, bearing the same relation to the language of Rasselas, which the gibberish of the negroes of Jamaica bears to the English of the House of Lords. Sometimes it reminds us of the finest, that is to say, the vilest parts, of Mr. Galt's novels; sometimes of the perorations of Exeter Hall; sometimes of the leading articles of the Morning Post. But it most ... — Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... with so many about my bed. The nonsense I muttered was for a disguise; for I feared if I came suddenly to my senses they would dry up their sympathies, and not think so well of me. But pray, how comes it, sir, that you made such good Latin of my gibberish? Tell me, kind sir, for I see you are a scholar, and it may be that Latin is a natural gift with me; and when you are done I will order up a little brandy, which we will divide between us; for I apprehend it will not embarrass you, ... — The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... long speech which to Bob sounded as gibberish, but which was in truth tolerably good French, a language Mad Jack was fond of using, though he never made known how he had ... — The Nether World • George Gissing
... fixed a spell upon his courage; for somehow the youth had always ranked them as emblems of our nobility, and hearing two exquisite eye-glasses, who had been to front and rear several times, drawl in gibberish generally imputed to lords, that his heroine was a charming little creature, just the size, but had no style,—he was abashed; he did not fly at them and tear them. He became dejected. Beauty's dog is affected by ... — The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... him a little, and he plunged ahead. One of the men told how his bunkie at Base Six in Bordeaux had died of heart failure when under ether. In a somewhat parched voice Tom started to explain how this could come about, but in no time he was talking gibberish. "The aorta," he heard himself saying, "is the big main artery which comes out of one of the ventricles," and then he noticed the dazed look on the men's faces and, floundering hopelessly, managed to laugh it ... — Tutors' Lane • Wilmarth Lewis
... That old woman can follow. I don't want to hear her gibberish. We've lost the game—there 's no reckoning the luck. If there's a chance, it's this way. It smells a trick. He and she—by all the devils! It has been done in my family—might have been done again. Tell the men on the plain they can drive home. There's a hundred-pound weight ... — The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... into his ear, that sounded, indeed, like human language, but was only such gibberish as children may be heard amusing themselves with, by the hour together. At all events, if it involved any secret information in regard to old Roger Chillingworth, it was in a tongue unknown to the erudite clergyman, and did but increase the bewilderment ... — The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... beautiful dark-haired foreign lady, too—she is more fascinating to study than all the rest. She must be a Russian from her colouring, and, besides, she wears those wonderful embroideries. And her servants, too, talk some outlandish gibberish among themselves. Of course she belongs to the nobility, you can see that, even in the ... — High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... negro, for him beauty is a black oily skin, deep-set eyes, a flat nose. Interrogate the devil; he will tell you that beauty is a pair of horns, four claws and a tail. Consult, lastly, the philosophers, they will answer you with gibberish: they have to have something conforming to the arch-type of beauty in essence, ... — Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary • Voltaire
... language under the sun," said Harkaway. "It's my opinion he has got the cheek to talk regular right-down gibberish to us." ... — Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... rate, it took," went on Drysdale. "I thought old Murdock would have wept on his neck. As it was, he scattered snuff enough to fill a pint pot over him out of his mull, and began talking Gaelic. And Blake had the cheek to jabber a lot of gibberish back to him, as if ... — Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... unknown language strange and sweet Of tropic isle remote, and passing hailed The village with the cheers of all their fleet; Or quarrelling together, laughed and railed Like foreign sailors, landed in the street Of seaport town, and with outlandish noise Of oaths and gibberish frightening girls and boys. ... — Tales of a Wayside Inn • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... schooner Thomas Lowder, of St. John, N. B. A little, black, dirty vessel. The coal stowed in the hold, so as to fill the schooner full, and make her a solid mass of black mineral. The master, Best, a likely young man; his mate a fellow jabbering in some strange gibberish, English I believe—or nearer that than anything else—but gushing out all together—whole sentences confounded into one long, unintelligible word. Irishmen shoveling the coal into the two Custom House tubs, to be craned ... — Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... evening, early in February when an Indian, gaunt and wide-eyed from the strain of a forced snow-trail, staggered from the black shadow of the bush into the glare of the blazing night-fires, and in a frenzied gibberish of jargon proclaimed that Bob MacNair had returned to the Northland. And not only that he had returned, but had visited Lac du Mort in company with a ... — The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... enough to screen him. That the loftiest revelations of poetry were not required of the Laureate of George I., who understood little or no English, there can be no question. George II. was equally insensible to the Muses; and had the annual lyrics been a mosaic of the merest gibberish, they would have satisfied his earlier tastes as thoroughly as the odes of Collins or Gray. A court, at which Pope and Swift, Young and Thomson were strangers, had precisely that share of Augustan splendor which enabled such as Eusden ... — Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... quoth Robin Hood testily, "an ye make sport of me by pattering such gibberish, it will be ill for you all, I tell you. I have the best part of a mind to crack the heads of all four of you, and would do so, too, but for the sweet Malmsey ye have given me. Brother, pass the pottle lest it ... — The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... the entrance door. Mr. Blades then delivered the poker to Mr. Verdant Green, who, at first, imagined that he was required to seize it by its red-hot end, but was greatly relieved in his mind when he found that he had merely to take it by the handle, and repeat (as well as he could) a form of gibberish that Mr. Blades dictated. Having done this he was desired to transfer the poker to the Past Grand Hodman ... — The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... once snobs and poets. MacIan might possibly be a gentleman, they felt; the editor manifestly was not. And the editor's fine rational republican appeals to his respect for law, and his ardour to be tried by his fellow citizens, seemed to the police quite as much gibberish as Evan's mysticism could have done. The police were not used to hearing principles, even the ... — The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... mean?" demanded the admiral, more concerned than he remembered ever before to have been, on any similar occasion. "One could wish to serve him as much as possible, but all this about 'nullus,' and 'whole blood,' and 'half,' is so much gibberish to me—can you make any thing ... — The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... blamed for this peculiarity, as it was an invention of the author himself, who had taught it to the player. He seems to have considered it as no ordinary invention, and was so pleased with it that he has most painfully printed the speeches of the lawyer in this singular gibberish; and his reasons, as well as his ... — Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... do it in French or Dutch. What put such nonsense in thy head? I think the French a wicked language anyhow, and I don't see why madam wants thee to jabber any such gibberish." ... — A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... with a whining affected tone, perhaps a corruption of chaunting; some derive it from Andrew Cant, a famous Scotch preacher, who used that whining manner of expression. Also, a kind of gibberish used by thieves and gipseys, called, likewise, ... — The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... art 'ware of," I soliloquised as I watched his retreating figure, whilst lighting my pipe. "As the other philosopher, Tycho Brahe, found inspiration in the gibberish of his idiot companion, so do I find food for reflection in thy casual courtesy, my friend. Possibly I have reached the highest point of all my greatness, and from that full meridian of my glory, I haste now to my setting. From a Deputy-Assistant-Sub-Inspector—with ... — Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... radiation-shattered nervous system. The boy who had had to stay in a therapy chair all his life because his efferent nerves could not control his body. The boy who couldn't speak. Or, rather, wouldn't speak because he was ashamed of the gibberish that resulted. ... — Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... the head of an ibis, and write certain characters on it in the blood of a black ram, and go to a cross-road, or the sea-shore, or a river-bank at midnight: there you recite gibberish and then see a pretty lady riding a donkey, and she will put off her beauty like a mask and assume the appearance of old age, and will promise to ... — Cock Lane and Common-Sense • Andrew Lang
... What gibberish are they talking?" shrilled poor Head-nurse, trying to keep hope alive by being angry. The man who spoke Persian looked at ... — The Adventures of Akbar • Flora Annie Steel
... your meaning," Mazarine said at last. "I never studied Greek. If a woman has a disease, there it is, and you can deal with it or not; but if she hasn't no disease, then it's chicanyery— chicanyery. Doctors talk a lot of gibberish these here days. What I want to know is, has my wife got a disease? I haven't seen any signs. Is it Bright's, or cancer, or the lungs, or the liver, or the kidneys, or the heart, or what's ... — The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... brother, what I have told you; and that does not effect many cures. All the excellency of their art consists in pompous gibberish, in a specious babbling, which gives you words instead of reasons, and promises instead ... — The Imaginary Invalid - Le Malade Imaginaire • Moliere
... when madhouse-inmates crowd around, Make captive any visitor and scream All sorts of stories of their keeper—he's Both dwarf and giant, vulture, wolf, dog, cat, Serpent and scorpion, yet man all the same; Sane people soon see through the gibberish! I just made out, you somehow lived somewhere A life of shame—I can't distinguish more— Married or single—how, don't matter much: Shame which himself had caused—that point was clear, That fact confessed—that thing to hold and ... — Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... it any longer; they are completely mad. (Aloud). Once more, I tell you, I understand nothing of all this gibberish; I will be master, and to cut short all kinds of arguments, either you shall both be married shortly, or, upon my word, you shall be nuns; ... — The Pretentious Young Ladies • Moliere
... they talk Danish, German, Norman French, and sometimes a mixture of all three; back of THEM, they talk Latin, and ancient British, Irish, and Gaelic; and then back of these come billions and billions of pure savages that talk a gibberish that Satan himself couldn't understand. The fact is, where you strike one man in the English settlements that you can understand, you wade through awful swarms that talk something you can't make head nor tail of. You see, every country on earth has been overlaid so often, in the course of a billion ... — Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven • Mark Twain
... own bed, and wrapped him in her woollen shawl, because he shivered sadly; and there he stared about with wondering eyes, and gave great orders—so far as his new nurse could make out—but speaking gibberish, as she said, and flying into a rage because it was out of Christian knowledge. But he seemed to understand some English, although he could only pronounce two words, both short, and in such conjunction quite ... — Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... But, owing to the falling of a number into a wrong line, or the misplacement of a line, one or other—which takes place in all the editions I have examined—Scott has, sad to say, got hold of the wrong words; he has written down the demon of the demons of the moon. Instead of the gibberish above, it should have been Malcha betarsisim hed beruah schenhakim. In p. 253, we have the magic square of the moon, with eighty-one numbers, and the symbol for the Intelligence, which Scott likens to a flying {50} serpent with a turkey-cock's head. ... — A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... attitude of deep devotion, as if oppressed by the presence of the spirit. The voice after ejaculating three 'Oh's,' one rising above the other, in tones very musical, burst into a flow of unintelligible jargon, which, whether it was in English or in gibberish I could not discover. This lasted five or six minutes, and as the voice was silenced, another woman, in more passionate and louder tones, took it up; this last spoke in English, and words, though not sentences, were distinguishable. I had a full view of her sitting exactly ... — The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... Canopus and the far limits of the galaxy was a good Jew like themselves, their peculiar property; He had his earthly headquarters in Jerusalem; spoke, I suppose, only Hebrew, and considered other languages gibberish; of all this earth, was only interested in a tiny corner at the south-east end of the Mediterrancan; and of all the millions of humanity only in the million or two of his Chosen People. I say at once that, considering ... — The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... signs for Chinese sounds unknown to our languages. It was certainly possible to transcribe not only names but Sanskrit prayers and formulae in Chinese characters, and though many writers sneer at the gibberish chanted by Buddhist priests yet I doubt if this ecclesiastical pronunciation, which has changed with that of the spoken language, is further removed from its original than the Latin of Oxford from ... — Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Charles Eliot
... there,' she replied, testily. 'Tell me how far he's off, instead of giving me your gibberish. Is he a two days' journey away? or ... — Cousin Phillis • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... th' sinse to make the furrin' gintleman as could talk the gibberish to question th' Angel choild," said Mrs. O'Malligan indignantly, "sure an' we moight have larned all about her by this toime, entoirely, for there's mony a thing she's tried to tell us an' can't ... — The Angel of the Tenement • George Madden Martin
... meantime, St. Paul, I think, answers your question better than I could, but you wouldn't understand even his words, I fancy. There they are in the Greek," he opened a Testament and showed her a passage. "I believe you would think the English almost as great gibberish as this looks to you in its ... — We Two • Edna Lyall
... the money that he knew she needed. He wanted peace—unity within. So he raved at her because the tag had come off his shoelace, and it was her wifely duty to see that a new lace had been put into the shoe that morning. From that he went on to the usual gibberish of French, the usual accusation against men in the neighbourhood, the usual melange of Chinese tortures and gruesome operations. From Kraill's horrified face Marcella saw that he understood more than she did. She ... — Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... think of Tituba as seated in the old kitchen of Mr. Parris's house during the long winter evenings, telling witchcraft stories to the minister's niece, Elizabeth, nine years old. She draws a circle in the ashes on the hearth, burns a lock of hair, and mutters gibberish. They are incantations to call up the devil and his imps. The girls of the village gather in the old kitchen to hear Tituba's stories, and to mutter words that have no meaning. The girls are Abigail Williams, who is eleven; Anne Putnam, twelve; ... — Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... which aquosity bears to water. Protoplasm can do perfectly well without the one, but water cannot for a moment dispense with the other. Protoplasm, whether living or lifeless, is equally itself; but unaqueous water is unmitigated gibberish. But if protoplasm, although deprived of its vitality, still remains protoplasm, vitality plainly is not indispensable to protoplasm, is not ... — Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... [This tirade of gibberish is literally taken or selected from a mock discourse pronounced by a professed jester, which occurs in an ancient manuscript in the Advocates' Library, the same from which the late ingenious Mr. Weber published the curious comic romance of the "Limiting of the ... — Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... havock amongst the King's game; but by means of a sling, not of a bow; like the Hermit, too, he has his peculiar phrases of compotation, the sign and countersign being Passelodion and Berafriend. One can scarce conceive what humour our ancestors found in this species of gibberish; but "I warrant it proved an excuse for ... — Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... it was a shame to me, then, that I used that secrecy," said his mother, with a flash of new anger. "There is no shame attaching to me. I have no reason to be ashamed. I rid myself of the Jewish tatters and gibberish that make people nudge each other at sight of us, as if we were tattooed under our clothes, though our faces are as whole as theirs. I delivered you from the pelting contempt that pursues Jewish separateness. I am not ashamed that I ... — Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... his notions about men and things, or, for that matter, about women and things, too. I got into a category, in that schooner, that I never expect to see equalled; for I was driven ashore to windward in her, which is gibberish to you, my dear young lady, but which Mr. Powis will very well understand, though he may not be able to ... — Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... very interested in the secret language. At first when they talked this gibberish before him, he listened mystified. But to their great surprise he never asked a question. They went right on talking as if he were not present. In an interval of silence, Billy ... — Maida's Little Shop • Inez Haynes Irwin
... some time there discharging its cargo and taking in new. Cooper embraced the opportunity to see all the sights he could of the great metropolis. "He had a rum time of it in his sailor rig," said afterward one of his shipmates, "but hoisted in a wonderful deal of gibberish, according to his own account ... — James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... usual forecastle gibberish, but, and it may have been that our partner being born with the wanderer's spirits could give meaning to the immemorial calling that speaks to the hearts of the English through the rude chanteys of the sea, something stirred me when the refrain rose up exultantly, ... — Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... not vulgar. He does not belong to the herd. Nothing real, nothing original, can be vulgar; but I should think an imitator of Cobbett a vulgar man. Emery's Yorkshireman is vulgar, because he is a Yorkshireman. It is the cant and gibberish, the cunning and low life of a particular district; it has 'a stamp exclusive and provincial.' He might 'gabble most brutishly' and yet not fall under the letter of the definition; but 'his speech bewrayeth him,' his dialect (like the jargon of a Bond Street lounger) ... — Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... Judas! Are women really trapped, then, by that gibberish? Madonna, these miaowing troubadours have concocted a world that they themselves will not live in. Have I not sat swigging in tents with great nobles, and heard all the truth about it? Those fellows always have, besides the ... — O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... self-reliance, that came with a pair of mustachios in burnt cork, even when there was none to see. Children are even content to forego what we call the realities, and prefer the shadow to the substance. When they might be speaking intelligibly together, they chatter senseless gibberish by the hour, and are quite happy because they are making believe to speak French. I have said already how even the imperious appetite of hunger suffers itself to be gulled and led by the nose with the fag end of an old song. ... — The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... that?" cried Malaga; "it all sounds like gibberish to me. As you thought the sturgeon so excellent at dinner, let me take out the value of the sauce ... — A Man of Business • Honore de Balzac
... gibberish they've talked to us, the beasts!" Tirette growls at last with a rancor that gathers strength the more we unite and collect ... — Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... confidence, that I never came across more neglected and more utterly absurd little creatures. Good-looking they are—you are a fine-looking man yourself, and your wife was certainly pretty—the children take after you both. I have nothing to say against their appearance; but they talk utter gibberish; and as to that eldest little girl, if she is not given something sensible to occupy her I cannot answer for the consequence. My dear David, I don't want to interfere ... — A Little Mother to the Others • L. T. Meade
... is a way much surer; for we cheat in no language at all, but loll in our own coaches, eloquent in gibberish, and learned in jingle. Pull out the parchment [referring to the will of LORD BRUMPTON], there's the deed; I made it as long as I could. Well, I hope to see the day when the indenture shall be the ... — The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... speak and Elaine, in the highest state of nervous tension, listened, trying to make something of the gibberish mutterings. ... — The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... aback and declared to the public almost with one accord that the writer's eccentricities had developed into mannerisms, that his theories of life were political manifestoes, that his dialects were gibberish, and his defiance of the orthodox canons of autobiography scarcely less than an outrage upon the ... — Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... when I was a young spark, I nearly sang myself into a consumption. How I used to dance! And take my part in a farce, or hold up my end in the barber shops! Who could hold a candle to me except, of course, the one and only Apelles?" He then put his hand to his mouth and hissed out some foul gibberish or other, and said afterwards that it was Greek. Trimalchio himself then favored us with an impersonation of a man blowing a trumpet, and when he had finished, he looked around for his minion, whom he called Croesus, a blear-eyed slave whose teeth were very disagreeably discolored. He was playing ... — The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... mental cuticular absorption, taking in and assimilating much that contributed to the formation of taste and character. My familiar use of language that sounded pedantic because I got it from books, my frequent references to characters I had known in print, were gibberish and vanity of vanities to my new associates. My very plays were unintelligible to girls who had never heard of William Wallace, and Robert Bruce, and Thaddeus of Warsaw, or read, on Sunday afternoons, of Tobias and the Angel, Judith ... — When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... great scientist has endeavoured to speak like other people, preferring, to the harsh consonants of technical phrases which sound "like insults" or have the air of "a magical invocation, which make certain scientific works read like so much gibberish," the "naive and picturesque appellation, the familiar, trivial name, the popular, living term which directly interprets the exact signification of the habits of an insect, or informs us fully of its dominant characteristic, or which, at ... — Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... shame to me, then, that I used that secrecy," said his mother, with a flash of new anger. "There is no shame attaching to me. I have no reason to be ashamed. I rid myself of the Jewish tatters and gibberish that make people nudge each other at sight of us, as if we were tattooed under our clothes, though our faces are as whole as theirs. I delivered you from the pelting contempt that pursues Jewish separateness. I am not ashamed that I did it. ... — Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... field of labor left to the choice of him who would gain a hearing with the reader—if one can be found who is not already weary of reading what the wags think of his (or her) own peculiar whims—is to fall in with the spirit of the age and compile an "International Library of the World's Greatest Gibberish about Bibliomaniacs." We have the "World's Greatest" everything else in book-lore, and I shall not be surprised if some enterprising publisher gets out a "definitive" de luxe edition of the "World's Greatest Dictionaries." Indeed, the Holy Bible ... — Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs • Henry H. Harper
... The two medical men, whose interests were common—for the profession is very close and regardful of its rights and privileges—consulted, communicating by signs and gibberish not understanded of the people. Accompanied by a few of the elders of the camp, they went to Yan-coo's surgery, took out the death-bone, and ... — My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... no more acquainted than with the ancient inhabitants of Otaheite. Your origin of the Piks is most able; but then I cannot remember them with any precise discrimination from any other hyperborean nation; and all the barbarous names at the end of the first volume, and the gibberish in the Appendix, was to me as unintelligible as if Repeated Abracadabra; and made no impression on me but to raise respect of your patience, and admire a sagacity that could extract meaning and suite from what seemed ... — Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... the watches of that haunted night passed over the lonely camp, crying startled sentences, and fragments of sentences, into the folds of his blanket. A quantity of gibberish about speed and height and fire mingled oddly with biblical memories of the classroom. "People with broken faces all on fire are coming at a most awful, awful, pace towards the camp!" he would moan one minute; and the next would sit up and ... — The Wendigo • Algernon Blackwood
... sea, very little thought was wasted on other matters. The captain of the vessel, said that there was "no sea on," or some such gibberish, and talked as if we were becalmed, at the very time that his tipsy old boat was bobbing about like a green rider on a trotting horse. It is a matter of indifference, what sort of metal encased the hearts of those who first tempted ... — History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... sleep with so many about my bed. The nonsense I muttered was for a disguise; for I feared if I came suddenly to my senses they would dry up their sympathies, and not think so well of me. But pray, how comes it, sir, that you made such good Latin of my gibberish? Tell me, kind sir, for I see you are a scholar, and it may be that Latin is a natural gift with me; and when you are done I will order up a little brandy, which we will divide between us; for I apprehend it will not embarrass you, since you are a ... — The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... suppose that there were more than a dozen persons in that hall who understood anything of the language in which he spoke. Certainly it was the merest gibberish to that whole army of listening men. Nevertheless, with every word that he uttered the emotion grew tenser. Cries—little sharp cries like the bark of a puppy—broke out here and there. "Verrno! Verrno! Verrno! (True! True! True!)" Movements, like the swift finger of the ... — The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... they could lay hands on between the Tower of London, into which they put orators, and the pillory, into which they put writers. Anne spoke a little Danish in her private chats with her husband, and a little French in her private chats with Bolingbroke. Wretched gibberish; but the height of English fashion, especially at court, was to talk French. There was never a bon mot but in French. Anne paid a deal of attention to her coins, especially to copper coins, which are the low and popular ones; she wanted to cut a great figure on them. Six farthings ... — The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... raved on, while sentence by sentence a scribe wrote down her gibberish, causing her at last to make her mark to it, all of which took a very long time. At the end she begged that she might be pardoned and not burnt, but this, she was informed, was impossible. Thereon she became enraged and asked why then had she been led to tell so many ... — The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... a hand and grasped the back of a chair for support. His lips parted. No sound came from them. Average Jones carefully folded the paper of "gibberish" and tucked it away in his ... — Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... rituals, beliefs repudiated by a progressive moral religion, plagiarisms and forgeries of literary or liturgic texts, incantations in which the gods of all barbarous nations are invoked in unintelligible gibberish, odd and disconcerting ceremonies—all these form a chaos in which the imagination loses itself, a potpourri in which an arbitrary syncretism seems to have attempted to create an ... — The Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism • Franz Cumont
... Pixie crossly. "What's the use of it? I can talk as well as I want to without bothering about grammar, and I don't understand it either! Silly gibberish!" ... — Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... they're called out o' their names. Put 'em in Sunday clothes, and you know 'em, but in their work-a-day English you never know nought about 'em. I've met wi' many o' your kidney; and if I'd ha' known it, I'd ha' christened poor Jack's mermaid wi' some grand gibberish of a name. Mermaidicus Jack Harrisensis; that's just like their new-fangled words. D'ye believe there's such a thing as the Mermaidicus, master?" asked Will, enjoying his own joke ... — Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... written you a philosophical, moral, and political letter, and beg you will score up my attempt to write rationally against the loads of gibberish I have from time to time discoursed to you. Good bless you, dearest H——! Three thousand miles away, I ... — Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... Malaga; "it all sounds like gibberish to me. As you thought the sturgeon so excellent at dinner, let me take out the value of the sauce in lessons ... — A Man of Business • Honore de Balzac
... French lessons with my good old Crebillon; yet my style, which was full of Italianisms, often expressed the very reverse of what I meant to say. But generally my 'quid pro quos' only resulted in curious jokes which made my fortune; and the best of it is that my gibberish did me no harm on the score of wit: on the contrary, it ... — The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... swallowin' your meaning," Mazarine said at last. "I never studied Greek. If a woman has a disease, there it is, and you can deal with it or not; but if she hasn't no disease, then it's chicanyery— chicanyery. Doctors talk a lot of gibberish these here days. What I want to know is, has my wife got a disease? I haven't seen any signs. Is it Bright's, or cancer, or the lungs, or the liver, or the kidneys, or the heart, ... — The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... would you believe it? I once asked one of those fellows what he called the foremast in his language, and what d'ye think he said? Why, I'm blowed if he didn't call it a 'Mar-darty-marng' (and that's the only bit of French I know); but how is it possible to work a ship in such gibberish?" ... — Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... looked like an organ-grinder, and had been once actually on the stage. Well, do you know she allowed him to be introduced to her, and talked to him with as much deference as if he had been a prince, when she ought not have spoken to him at all, you know; and in that gibberish, too, that no one can understand. One evening, after entertaining him for about an hour, she walked with him the whole length of the room, not noticing any one, though every eye was upon her. He sat down at the piano which stood in a corner, struck a few chords, ... — Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various
... absolute monotony, the island of Raza, off Rio Janeiro, was descried, and we slowly entered the harbor, passing a fort on our right hand, from which came a hail, in the Portuguese language, from a huge speaking-trumpet, and our officer of the deck answered back in gibberish, according to a well-understood custom of the place. Sugar-loaf Mountain, on the south of the entrance, is very remarkable and well named; is almost conical, with a slight lean. The man-of-war ... — The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... roughly, "If you will speak English I will answer you.'' At this Howell said with the most humble suavity, "Do I understand that the distinguished gentleman does not recognize what I have been reading?'' The preacher answered, "I don't understand any such gibberish; speak English.'' Thereupon Howell threw back his long black hair and launched forth into eloquent denunciation as follows: "Sir, is it possible that you come here to interpret to us the Holy Bible and do not recognize the language ... — Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... beans in every room of the house and cry, "In, with good luck; and out with you, Onis!" Yet they laugh merrily all the time. The Onis cannot speak, but they can chatter like monkeys. They often seem to be talking to each other in gibberish. ... — Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks • William Elliot Griffis
... at the drive, there was found an old man, half-surgeon, half-conjurer, who applied hot fomentations, muttering all the time of the operation such gibberish ... — Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... he said, "to write under the dictation of a great merchant, conducting a vast correspondence by which thousands of pounds change hands in due course of post. And it's another thing to take down the gibberish of a maundering mad monster who ought to be kept in a cage. Your good father, Valeria, would never have asked ... — The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins
... was the usual forecastle gibberish, but, and it may have been that our partner being born with the wanderer's spirits could give meaning to the immemorial calling that speaks to the hearts of the English through the rude chanteys of the sea, something stirred ... — Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... machine did that over at the Whiteside Morning Record. It was typing out clear copy, then suddenly there wasn't anything but gibberish." ... — The Electronic Mind Reader • John Blaine
... to spend the August vacation. I am thinking of Lake George, the Saguenay, Sea Girt, the White Mountains, when all at once I begin to yield drowsily to the influence of long conversations about nothing which take possession of my mind—mere gibberish, strings of words without sense. Thank Heaven, I am off! I am actually going to sleep. ... — Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... days—and discovering a shabbily bright foreign quarter, shops displaying Hebrew placards and weird, unfamiliar commodities and a concourse of bright-eyed, eagle-nosed people talking some incomprehensible gibberish between the shops and the barrows. And soon I became quite familiar with the devious, vicious, dirtily-pleasant eroticism of Soho. I found those crowded streets a vast relief from the dull grey exterior of Brompton where I lodged and ... — Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... vacancy, fixed on the bulkhead that divided the cabin from the captain's, which was just beyond; and he was very much excited, sitting up in the cot and, gesticulating violently with both his hands, and waving his arms about as he repeated some unintelligible gibberish over and over again, that I ... — The Ghost Ship - A Mystery of the Sea • John C. Hutcheson
... blamed Indian girl. And old Paloma was squatting at the girl's feet and rubbing the girl's knees and legs like for rheumatism, which I knew the girl didn't have from the way I'd sized up the walk of her, and keeping time to the rubbing with a funny sort of gibberish chant. And I let loose right there and then. As Sarah knows, I never could a-bear women around the house—young, unmarried women, I mean. But it was no go! Old Paloma sided with the girl, and said if the girl went she went, too. Also, she called me more kinds of a ... — The Red One • Jack London
... Margrave's fingers rushed over the keys, and there was a general start, the prelude was so unlike any known combination of harmonious sounds. Then he began a chant—song I can scarcely call it—words certainly not in Italian, perhaps in some uncivilized tongue, perhaps in impromptu gibberish. And the torture of the instrument now commenced in good earnest: it shrieked, it groaned, wilder and noisier. Beethoven's Storm, roused by the fell touch of a German pianist, were mild in comparison; and the mighty voice, dominating the anguish of the cracking keys, had the full diapason ... — A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... shawl over her head, she ran across the snowy fields to the old tumble-down house on the next road, where the new family lived. The children were at play in the yard—seven in all, and none of them larger than Hope—but at sight of her they came forward hand in hand, jabbering such queer gibberish that Peace could not ... — At the Little Brown House • Ruth Alberta Brown
... but ours is a way much surer; for we cheat in no language at all, but loll in our own coaches, eloquent in gibberish, and learned in jingle. Pull out the parchment [referring to the will of LORD BRUMPTON], there's the deed; I made it as long as I could. Well, I hope to see the day when the indenture shall be the exact measure ... — The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... power, nor a smooth path always favourable. Obstacles may be of a kind to stimulate one person and to annihilate another. It is not a question of relative strength between character and circumstance, as people are so fond of asserting. That is mere gibberish. It means nothing. The two things cannot be compared, for they are not of the same nature. They can't be ... — The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... feet and call it vulgar. Cobbett is coarse enough, but he is not vulgar. He does not belong to the herd. Nothing real, nothing original, can be vulgar; but I should think an imitator of Cobbett a vulgar man. Emery's Yorkshireman is vulgar, because he is a Yorkshireman. It is the cant and gibberish, the cunning and low life of a particular district; it has 'a stamp exclusive and provincial.' He might 'gabble most brutishly' and yet not fall under the letter of the definition; but 'his speech ... — Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... Jill, pointing to the rug. "You went to sleep there after the long walk, and talked in your sleep about 'Bob' and 'All right, old boy,' and ever so much gibberish. I didn't think about it then, but when I heard that Bob was up there I thought may be he knew something about it, and last night I wrote and asked him, and that's the answer, and now it is all right, and you are the best boy that ever was, and ... — Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... "Memoria Technica" is a modification of Gray's; but, whereas he used both consonants and vowels to represent digits, and had to content himself with a syllable of gibberish to represent the date or whatever other number was required, I use only consonants, and fill in with vowels ad libitum, and thus can always manage to make a real word of whatever has ... — The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll • Stuart Dodgson Collingwood
... exerted a profound influence upon education. The language of the monks and schoolmen seemed little better than gibberish to scholars fresh from Vergil and Cicero, and the study of Latin was placed upon a new foundation. Moreover, Latin itself ceased to afford the sole key to knowledge. The student who sought the highest thought of antiquity found only a second-hand reflection of it ... — Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... withdraws from them and remains humbly reticent in a state of enomatophobia; or, if he be more tough-minded, he may be amused by, or contemptuous of, what he refers to as "psychiatric jargon" or "pseudoscientific gibberish." There is, furthermore, a dearth of concise, authoritative, well-written text-books on psychiatry, and the general medical journals rarely print psychiatric papers designed to interest the average practitioner. ... — A Psychiatric Milestone - Bloomingdale Hospital Centenary, 1821-1921 • Various
... me in a tongue to which I was a stranger, after a time he stopped, added something with a smile, and then began to talk to me in a lingo to which, in a manner of speaking, I was even stranger, for this time I had not the faintest notion what it was,—it might have been gibberish for all that I could tell. Quickly perceiving that he had succeeded no better than before, ... — The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... with a whining, affected tone, perhaps a corruption of chaunting; some derive it from Andrew Cant, a famous Scotch preacher, who used that whining manner of expression. Also a kind of gibberish used by thieves and gypsies, called likewise pedlar's French, the ... — 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... to which they fix the rinds of scooped oranges . . . ; particularly while dangling the censers they keep shaking them in derision, and letting the ashes fly about their heads and faces, one against the other. In this equipage they neither sing hymns nor psalms nor masses, but mumble a certain gibberish as shrill and squeaking as a herd of pigs whipped on to market. The nonsense verses they ... — Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler
... above whilst I was in the cabin with the others, approached and stared at me, but not insolently—merely with curiosity. They seemed a vile lot, one and all. With some of them every other word was an oath; their talk was almost gibberish to my ears with thieves' slang. I wondered to find not one of them dressed in felon's garb; but on reflection I concluded that they had plundered the crew and the people who had had charge of them and of the Cyprus, and had forced ... — The Honour of the Flag • W. Clark Russell
... mountains of Nubia, or the plains of Romania, have conversed for centuries in a dialect precisely similar to that spoken at this day, by, the obscure, despised, and wretched people in England, whose language has been considered as a fabricated gibberish, and confounded with a cant in use among thieves and beggars; and whose persons have been, till within the period of a year, an object of the persecution, instead of the protection of ... — A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland
... As this was only gibberish to the listeners, no answer was made, but all prepared to follow Ben, who was soon ready to change his ground. The bee-hunter took his way across the open ground to a point fully a hundred rods distant from his first position, where ... — Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... likewise O. Crispum! I only wish that your Godmother, Flora, Would insist upon shorter and more intelligible names for her modern offspring. By bright Aurora, I can't go on worshipping at your floral shrine if the ritual is polyglot gibberish, and what's more, I won't, Ma'am. In the word (queerly spelt) of which you seem very fond, I earnestly say, ... — Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 18, 1892 • Various
... planet Kandar became a gigantic ball which filled an enormous part of the firmament. Then there were cracklings of communicators, and orders flittered through emptiness in scrambled and re-scrambled broadcasts of gibberish which came out as lucid commands in the control-rooms of the ships. Then, first, the point, then the advanced flankers, and then the main fleet, line by line and rank by rank—every ship drove on ... — Talents, Incorporated • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... Juan was a fool, and his mother never tired of scolding him and emphasizing her words by a beating. When Juan went to school he made more noise at his study than anybody else, but his reading was only gibberish. ... — Philippine Folk-Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss, Berton L. Maxfield, W. H. Millington,
... I cannot doubt it any longer; they are completely mad. (Aloud). Once more, I tell you, I understand nothing of all this gibberish; I will be master, and to cut short all kinds of arguments, either you shall both be married shortly, or, upon my word, you shall be nuns; ... — The Pretentious Young Ladies • Moliere
... detractors who could see nothing but nonsense in his matter. He will now have judges. Posterity will pronounce its calm and impartial decision; and that decision will, we firmly believe, place in the same rank with Galileo, and with Locke, the man who found jurisprudence a gibberish and left it a science. Never was there a literary partnership so fortunate as that of Mr Bentham and M. Dumont. The raw material which Mr Bentham furnished was most precious; but it was unmarketable. He was, assuredly, ... — The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... demanded the admiral, more concerned than he remembered ever before to have been, on any similar occasion. "One could wish to serve him as much as possible, but all this about 'nullus,' and 'whole blood,' and 'half,' is so much gibberish to me—can you make any ... — The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... stayed for some time there discharging its cargo and taking in new. Cooper embraced the opportunity to see all the sights he could of the great metropolis. "He had a rum time of it in his sailor rig," said afterward one of his shipmates, "but hoisted in a wonderful deal of gibberish, according to his own ... — James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... the meantime, St. Paul, I think, answers your question better than I could, but you wouldn't understand even his words, I fancy. There they are in the Greek," he opened a Testament and showed her a passage. "I believe you would think the English almost as great gibberish as this looks to ... — We Two • Edna Lyall
... moving slowly, almost invisibly forwards and upwards. Where the apex was today the second segment is tomorrow; what today can be understood only by the apex and to the rest of the triangle is an incomprehensible gibberish, forms tomorrow the true thought and feeling of the ... — Concerning the Spiritual in Art • Wassily Kandinsky
... sticking amen to the end of your prayers little knowing when you do so, that you are consigning yourselves to the repose of Buddh? Oh, what hearty laughs our missionaries have had when comparing the eternally sounding Eastern gibberish of Omani batsikhom, Omani batsikhom, and the Ave Maria and Amen Jesus ... — The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... the praters who appeal to it will be hanged in one rope. The good Talbot will shower commissions on his countrymen, and will cut the throats of the English. These verses, which were in no respect above the ordinary standard of street poetry, had for burden some gibberish which was said to have been used as a watchword by the insurgents of Ulster in 1641. The verses and the tune caught the fancy of the nation. From one end of England to the other all classes were constantly singing ... — The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... a struggle. I always felt as if I were undergoing an anesthetic, but of late years I have slipped easily into the condition, leaning the head forward. On coming out of it I felt stupid and dazed. At first I said disconnected things. It was all a gibberish, nothing but gibberish. Then I began to speak some broken French phrases. I had studied French two years, but did ... — Complete Hypnotism: Mesmerism, Mind-Reading and Spiritualism • A. Alpheus
... arose swiftly, and began folding his blankets. The other one, however,—the one who had wakened uttering gibberish— crossed his hands over his knees, and said: "I don't ... — The Voyage of the Hoppergrass • Edmund Lester Pearson
... sidewalk Soapy began to yell drunken gibberish at the top of his harsh voice. He danced, howled, raved and otherwise disturbed ... — The Four Million • O. Henry
... quack medicines (De Medicamentis Empiricis), written probably near the end of the fourth century. This work contains, amongst other things, a number of word-charms, or superstitious cure-formulas, that were, till lately, regarded—like Cato's word-cure for fractures of the bones—as mere unmeaning gibberish. Joseph Grimm and M. Pictet, however, think that they have found in these word-charms of Marcellus, specimens of the Gaulish or Celtic language several centuries older than any that were previously known to exist—none of the earliest glosses used ... — Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson
... my dear, for pity's sake! I never could understand that gibberish. My poor father paid extra for me to learn under a native, but it seemed as if I always turned against it. Well, I don't understand about the cabbages; Gertrude certainly said they were quite sour, and mixed with all manner of ... — More about Pixie • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... every day winning the king's money! You have fallen into the wrong box, for I neither like nor wish to have anything to do with such fellows.' Pimentello got warm. 'Go about your business,' said Sully, giving him a shove; 'your infernal gibberish will ... — The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... evening...." [PATRICIA controls a smile, and he goes on with overwhelming enthusiasm.] Well, conjurers are just the same. It takes some time to prepare an impromptu. A man like that walks about the woods and fields doing all his tricks beforehand, and talking all sorts of gibberish because he thinks he is alone. One evening this man found he was not alone. He found a very beautiful ... — Magic - A Fantastic Comedy • G.K. Chesterton
... old Gipsy man, 'Meg's true-bred; she's the last in the gang that will start; but she has some queer ways, and often cuts queer words.' With more of this gibberish, they continued the conversation, rendering it thus, even to each other, a dark, obscure dialect, eked out by significant nods and signs, but never expressing distinctly or in plain language the subject on ... — Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... respectable enough to screen him. That the loftiest revelations of poetry were not required of the Laureate of George I., who understood little or no English, there can be no question. George II. was equally insensible to the Muses; and had the annual lyrics been a mosaic of the merest gibberish, they would have satisfied his earlier tastes as thoroughly as the odes of Collins or Gray. A court, at which Pope and Swift, Young and Thomson were strangers, had precisely that share of Augustan splendor which enabled such as Eusden ... — Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... all her keenness, could make nothing of it. It sounded, however, so quite like a dictum which she herself would have liked to make, that she cross-questioned Sylvia afterwards as to its meaning; but Sylvia lied fluently, asserting that it was just some of Professor Kennedy's mathematical gibberish which ... — The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... whom many are prone erroneously to classify very low in the human scale and not far above the ape. Sir Lucien usually spoke to Sin Sin Wa in English, and the other replied in that weird jargon known as "pidgin." But the silly Sin Wa who murmured gibberish and the Sin Sin Wa who could converse upon many and curious subjects in his own language were two different beings—as Sir Lucien was aware. Now, as the one-eyed Chinaman resumed his seat and the one-eyed raven sank into slumber, Pyne suddenly spoke in Chinese, a tongue which ... — Dope • Sax Rohmer
... out the beans, and Murphy went back to his smoking and his meditations. He made so little of Mike's outburst about the spies that he did not trouble to connect it with any one in the basin. Mike was always talking what Murphy called fool gibberish, that no man of sense would listen to it if he could help it. So Murphy fell to calculating how much of the money he had earned might justly be spent upon a few days' spree without endangering the grubstake he planned to take into the farther mountains in the spring. ... — The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... sit quiet in the place where he should stow him; and if he was discovered, to say that he was one of the house, and leave him to make it good. "You will hear what the gallants say," he added; "but I think thou wilt carry away but little on it; for when it is not French, it is Court gibberish; and that is as hard ... — Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... and I could earn nothing, for fear you would die while my face was turned, oh! I tried then! I smoothed his hair and whispered to him soft as a kitten, about the money—where it was, who had it? Alack! He would pick at my sleeve and whisper gibberish till my blood ran cold. At last, while Gretel lay whiter than snow, and you were raving on the bed, I screamed to him—it seemed as if he MUST hear me—'Raff, where is our money? Do you know aught of the money, Raff? The money ... — Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... displeasure, perceived Camilla still listening to Liancourt. He stalked up to her, and as Liancourt, seeing her rise, rose also and moved away, he said peevishly, "You will never learn to conduct yourself properly; you are to be left here to nurse and comfort your uncle, and not to listen to the gibberish of every French adventurer. Well, Heaven be praised, I have a ... — Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... his little handle, and tries to keep his feet. And Brown! he is magnificent! His long lash sends out a volley of rifle reports, down, up, ahead, back; his cracked voice roars out an unending stream of apparent gibberish. Back and forth along the line of the team he skips nimbly, the sweat streaming from his face. And the oxen plod along, unhasting, unexcited, their eyes dreamy, chewing the cud of yesterday's philosophic reflections. The situation conveys the ... — African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... presses, holes, stains, and oldness in their Stuffs, and make them shop-rid: May they keep Whores and Horses, and break; and live mued up with necks of Beef and Turnips: May they have many children, and none like the Father: May they know no language but that gibberish they prattle to their Parcels, unless it be the goarish Latine they write in their bonds, and may they write that false, and ... — Philaster - Love Lies a Bleeding • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... drily. "We know one another when we meet," he said. He drew his waxed thread between his finger and thumb, held it up to the light, then looked askance at the gossoons about him, to whom what he said was gibberish. They ... — The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman
... to learn that eyes are bearable, but eye-glasses an abomination. They fixed a spell upon his courage; for somehow the youth had always ranked them as emblems of our nobility, and hearing two exquisite eye-glasses, who had been to front and rear several times, drawl in gibberish generally imputed to lords, that his heroine was a charming little creature, just the size, but had no style,—he was abashed; he did not fly at them and tear them. He became dejected. Beauty's dog is affected ... — The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... idolator at heart, he yet lived among these Christians, wore their clothes, and tried to talk their gibberish. Hence the queer ways about him, though now some ... — Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... a moment to the newcomer and Adams, Barbara took Deston by the arm and led him away. "Just a little bit of that gibberish is a bountiful sufficiency, husband mine. So I think we'd better take Captain ... — Subspace Survivors • E. E. Smith
... get his breakfast of mealy porridge, but he won't admit that it is to be called "paniche," preferring his own word "scoff;" so he shakes his head violently and says, "Nay, nay, paniche." Then, with many nods, "Scoff, ja;" and so in this strange gibberish of three languages he and the Frenchman carry on quite a pretty quarrel. Charlie also "mocks himself" of the other servants, I am informed, and asserts that he is the "indema" or headman. He freely boxes the ears of Jack, the ... — Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... best where there is the most need of it, surprise the audience, and cast a mist upon their understandings; not unlike the cunning of a juggler, who is always staring us in the face, and over-whelming us with gibberish, only that he may gain the opportunity of making the cleaner conveyance of his trick. But these false beauties of the stage are no more lasting than a rainbow; when the actor ceases to shine upon them, when he gilds them no longer with his reflection, ... — The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... of our services is English in all the vigour and suppleness of early youth. To the great Latin writers, to Terence and Lucretius, to Cicero and Caesar, to Tacitus and Quintilian, the noblest compositions of Ambrose and Gregory would have seemed to be, not merely bad writing, but senseless gibberish, [493] The diction of our Book of Common Prayer, on the other hand, has directly or indirectly contributed to form the diction of almost every great English writer, and has extorted the admiration of the most accomplished infidels ... — The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... reached inside it, opened a small sliding panel, and took out an object the size and shape of an aspirin tablet—the sealed unit that permitted him to understand the conversation over the police wave band. Without it, the police calls would have been gibberish. ... — Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... have heard nothing," murmured Fritz. "I opened my ears as wide as possible, but it was all in vain. Is it not base and vile to come to Germany and speak this gibberish, not a word of which can be understood? In Germany men should be obliged to ... — Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... was wanted too at the Baha and Sohrai nor her mother who had reared her in childhood. The witch girl said that if she refused she would die; and she said that she would rather die than do what was required of her. Then the witch did something and the girl began to rave and talk gibberish and from that time was quite out of her senses. Ojhas tried to cure her in vain until at last one suggested that she should be taken to another village as the madness must be the work of witches living in her own village. ... — Folklore of the Santal Parganas • Cecil Henry Bompas
... a place of asylum, and frequented by sharpers, of whose gibberish there are several specimens in Shadwell's comedy, "The Squire ... — The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... did. What's the use o' tryin' to scare a body with gibberish? This place is creepy ... — The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... a long pause the old woman lifted up her hand and said something in gibberish to her partner. It was a long time coming, for they both coughed and groaned violently during the recital. At length, however, the old man turned ... — Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... gone a little farther, and completed the passage, he would have seen that the context completely altered the sense. He would prove it to the House, he said, and forthwith rolled forth a grand string of majestic gibberish so well imitated that the whole assembly cried, 'Hear, hear!' Lord Belgrave rose again, and frankly admitted that the passage had the meaning ascribed to it by the honourable gentleman, and that he had overlooked it at the ... — The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... neare me; Feele my pulse once again and tell me, Doctor, Tell me in tearmes that I may understand,— I doe not love your gibberish,—tell me honestly Where the Cause lies, and give a Remedy, And that with speed; or in despight of Art, Of Nature, you and all your heavenly motions, Ile recollect so much of life into me As shall give space ... — Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... faces, rapid vociferations, all come in play, and the element of pantomime performs its part in assisting the human voice as naturally as among the Italians of Syracuse. To the uninitiated the biddings here are as unintelligible as elsewhere, sounding to ordinary ears like the gibberish of Victor Hugo's Compachinos. But the comparative quietude of this Board renders it easier to follow the course of the market, to detect the shades of difference in the running offers, and generally ... — Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... not know when the Greek calends are, nor do I want to; my mother spent her time, I thank God, in teaching me to speak the truth, and to be true to my country, and not in teaching me outlandish gibberish." ... — Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... in reverse position: ruoj ud ebua'l a. The translation was gibberish. Then he wrote the first and last letters, the second and next to last, the third and the third from last, and so on. The result, too, was gibberish. Next he dropped the first word, 'a' and tried the rest—still gibberish. He dropped also the 'l'—still ... — The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... gracefully mourned over, or wittily laughed at, in classic words and cultured voice by one's superiors in knowledge, wisdom and power; but to hear the rights of woman scorned in foreign tongue and native gibberish by everything in manhood's form, is enough to fire the souls of those who think and feel, and rouse ... — History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... people for its lawful prey, while we, caring little for the displeasure of the elements, sat comfortably talking. There was now an attempt to open the door, succeeded by a voice uttering some strange, unintelligible gibberish which my companions mistook for Greek and I suspected to be thieves' Latin. However, the showman stepped forward and gave admittance to a figure which made me imagine either that our wagon had rolled back two hundred years into past ages or that the forest and its old inhabitants ... — Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... learnt it," said Gerda; "but my grandmother understands it, and she can speak gibberish too. I ... — Andersen's Fairy Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... last alternating flicker of rationality, the miser fell back, sputtering, into his previous gibberish, but it took now an arithmetical turn. Eyes closed, he lay muttering ... — The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... your painter's gibberish. Give him a crayon and a bit of white bark and see can he make my picture. I'll lean my head back and fold my ... — Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... is the beautiful dark-haired foreign lady, too—she is more fascinating to study than all the rest. She must be a Russian from her colouring, and, besides, she wears those wonderful embroideries. And her servants, too, talk some outlandish gibberish among themselves. Of course she belongs to the nobility, you can see that, even in the ... — High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... mammy sho' was healthy. Her name was Silvey an' her mammy come over to dis country in a big ship. Somebody give her de name o' Betty, but twant her right name. Folks couldn' un'erstan' a word she say. It was some sort o' gibberish dey called gulluh-talk, an' it soun' dat funny. My ... — Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Mississippi Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... surprised. How do we know? The man Kirski has been twice examined—once in Venice, once this morning, when you went down to the Luisa; the reports the same. What! To have a maniac blundering about the gates, attracting every one's notice by his gibberish; then he is arrested with a pistol or a knife in his hand; he talks nonsense about some Madonna; he is frightened into a confession, and we become the laughing-stock of Europe! Impossible, impossible, my Calabressa: where were your wits? No wonder ... — Sunrise • William Black
... but his Irish gibberish is as Greek to me. All that I can make out is what seems to be ... — Live to be Useful - or, The Story of Annie Lee and her Irish Nurse • Anonymous
... sir,' I tells him: 'we did not steal it.' 'Shall I tell you what it is, my good woman?' says the Poknees. 'I would thank you, sir,' says I, 'for 'tis often we are asked about it.' 'Well, then,' says the Poknees, 'it is no language at all, merely a made-up gibberish.' 'Oh, bless your wisdom,' says I with a curtsey, 'you can tell us what our language is without understanding it!' Another time we meet a parson. 'Good woman,' says he, 'what's that you are talking? Is it broken language?' 'Of course, your reverence,' ... — Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... distinguished besides. My sister was sixteen when I left; she must be eighteen now. She was pretty, and she ought to be beautiful. Then there is my brother Edouard, a delightful youngster of twelve, who will let off fireworks between your legs and chatter a gibberish of English with you. At the end of the fortnight we ... — The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... he is now trying guile. He understands perfectly well some of the things I say to him; but when I told him that we wanted a guide to lead us to the river, he professed to be unable to understand me clearly, and replied by gabbling what I believe to be simply a lot of gibberish, ending up with the statement that we shall be able to have a guide to-morrow. The fact is that I rather suspect him of entertaining a desire to possess himself of our rifles, and believe him to be capable to going to considerable lengths ... — With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... I'm not mathematical, and to hell with the gibberish you talk. I tell you and I tell you again that when it comes to lighting a fire, I'm there, but to light it again when it's gone out, I'm no good. I can't speak any ... — Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... die Poeten und Oratorn vorzeiten haben gesagt in ihren Spruchen und Sentenzen, dasz die gedechtniss des Elends und Armuth vorlangst erlitten ist eine grosse Lust.' My friend, said Pantagruel, I have no skill in that gibberish of yours; therefore, if you would have us to understand you, speak to us in some other language. Then did the droll ... — Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... they understood, not your words," answered the interpreter. "Our speech now is gibberish to them, as unintelligible in itself as the growling of animals; but they know what we are saying, because they know our thoughts. You must know that these are ... — To Whom This May Come - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... the unaffected people in every town and village into isolated barracks and stockades. For half a day Tiger tried to explain ways to prevent the spread of a bacteria or virus-borne disease. The people had stared at him as if he were talking gibberish; finally he gave up trying to explain, and just laid down rules which the people were instructed to follow. Together they had collected standard testing specimens of body fluids and tissue from both healthy and afflicted Bruckians, and come back ... — Star Surgeon • Alan Nourse
... my awakening curiosity. I could see figures moving in an unusual manner, and desired to know what they were doing. I began to walk towards them, and Hans, for his part, began to try to drag me in an opposite direction, uttering all sorts of gibberish as to the necessity of my running away. But I would not be dragged; indeed, I struck at him, until at last, with an exclamation of despair, he let go of me ... — Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard
... instinctive, for even as he uttered it, he knew it could not be understood. A thousand years of rapid degeneration had long wiped all traces of English speech from the brute-men, who now, at most, chattered some bestial gibberish. Yet the warning echoed loudly through Madison ... — Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... done!—as Preacher Allprayer said, when they turned him out o' meeting for gitting drunk and swearing—the dear good man!—but I do wish, for gracious sake, I could only jest change places with 'em—ef jest for five minutes—and I reckon as how they'd be glad to quit their gibberish, and talk like Christian folks, once in thar sneaking lives! Thar, they're done now, I do hope to all marcy's sake! and I reckons as how we'll soon have ... — Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... out with a face the color of wet laundry soap. She had crying fits; at times her voice would change, and she'd speak a gibberish that Mr. Meeker declared was Russian; and after a trance she would eat for six. There was nothing about the senior Meeker Lizzie could describe, but she disliked Mrs. Meeker intensely. She made the preposterous ... — The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... right, ain't you, Heiny, so long as I give you a bit of sugar now and then?" he said to his decrepit old guardian in his German gibberish. ... — The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... pierced through the thin part of the nose; and they all twist kangaroo teeth and the bones of fishes more or less in their hair. Every thing small and diminutive they call "Pickaninnie," and any thing very good, "Merri jig." Their language is a queer, rattling, hard-sounding gibberish, incomprehensible to most people; they speak as fast as possible, laugh immoderately at trifles, and are excellent mimics. Their own children ... — Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... with his fingers on the table and his face projecting. "That's what I have been talking to you, sir—scientific gibberish! Did you think you could match cunning with me—you with your walnut of a brain? You think you are omnipotent, you infernal scribblers, don't you? That your praise can make a man and your blame can break him? We must all bow to you, and try to get a favorable ... — The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
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