The 126 occurrences of half-wit
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~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,961 ~ ~ ~
There he began to think less about the half-wit, with his livid face and mouth like a fish.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 326 ~ ~ ~
It was pitiful to think that this big, handsome young man, for whose return to the throne all Lutha had prayed for ten long years, was only a silly half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 544 ~ ~ ~
"You shall die for that, you half-wit," he cried.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,503 ~ ~ ~
"The fool priest will upset the whole work to which I have devoted near twenty years," he muttered, "if I find not the means to quiet his half-wit tongue.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,047 ~ ~ ~
Who is the half-wit who could make Your Majesty believe that a knight exists who can even compare to him in glory, honor and virtue?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,338 ~ ~ ~
Mook the half-wit lived happily.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,367 ~ ~ ~
"He don't know but I know," he shouted, stopping to gaze down into the dumb, unresponsive face of the half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,399 ~ ~ ~
Elmer Cowley ran out of the woods leaving the half-wit sitting on the log before the fire.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,710 ~ ~ ~
As it chanced, I couldn't keep Peter with me, but had to send him to one of the barges, and I had time for no more than five words with him, when I told him to hold his tongue and live up to his reputation as a half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,412 ~ ~ ~
It was even more ridiculous than the social performance of that other half-wit, Little Billee, in Carrel's atelier.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,416 ~ ~ ~
I do not blame Du Maurier for drawing her as he found--or imagined--her, nor can I blame popular preachers, "able editors" and half-wit women for worshiping the freckled and faulty grisette as a goddess; for does not Carlyle truly tell us that "what we see, and can not see over, is good as Infinity?"
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,525 ~ ~ ~
If he ever hired half-starved courtesans a la Parkhurst--to dance the can-can, then hastened into court to file complaint against the very bawds he had filled with booze and dandled naked on his knee; if he called the ladies of his congregation "old sows" after the manner of Sam Jones; if he got himself tried on a charge of heresy or became entangled with some half-wit sister whose religious fervor led her to mistake Levite for the Lord, no record of the shameful circumstance has been preserved.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,653 ~ ~ ~
Not long ago a little Duke who owes his title to the fact that his great-grand-aunt was the paramour of a half-wit prince, kindly condescended to marry an American girl to recoup his failing fortunes.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,117 ~ ~ ~
"His pedigree," answered the half-wit, gravely, "goes back for three hundred years.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,125 ~ ~ ~
"To Newgate I s'pose," said the half-wit, his eyes twinkling.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,700 ~ ~ ~
How did he get that quantity of half-wit, that sort of stupid cunning, into his little brain, and yet get no more?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 553 ~ ~ ~
"Yea, this shall be the sign of them, The sign of the dying fire; And Man made like a half-wit, That knows not of his sire.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 219 ~ ~ ~
Once upon a time, writing a little piece on another subject, I advanced the claim that the champion half-wit of all poetic anthology was Sweet Alice, who, as described by Mr. English, wept with delight when you gave her a smile, and trembled in fear at your frown.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 274 ~ ~ ~
This Grey Dick," he added to the Count, "is a wild, homeless half-wit whom they call Hugh de Cressi's shadow, but the finest archer in Suffolk, with Norfolk thrown in; one who can put a shaft through every button on your doublet at fifty paces--ay, and bring down wild geese on the wing twice out of four times, for I have seen him do it with that black bow of his."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,055 ~ ~ ~
And you--they have tamed you and made you their servant, their cattle-herd, the strong fellow to fetch and carry, the half-wit, as they call you, who can still be trusted to run an errand and hold his tongue, the Abbey mule that does not dare to kick, the grieve of your own stolen lands--you, whose father was almost a gentleman.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,277 ~ ~ ~
"It was a near thing, a very near thing, but I'm not the half-wit I've feigned to be for years.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 486 ~ ~ ~
'He is but, so to speak, a half-wit; and yet he has got a wife and children.'
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,659 ~ ~ ~
But Timothy is but a half-wit; and he has a wife and children.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,879 ~ ~ ~
I reckon yo're no better nor a half-wit yoursel'.'
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,843 ~ ~ ~
But I'd be a half-wit to sit in one room and count the sunflowers on the wall-paper while I waited for you.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,843 ~ ~ ~
But I'd be a half-wit to sit in one room and count the sunflowers on the wall-paper while I waited for you.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,263 ~ ~ ~
The site of the old half-wit's cell was now the heart of a standing forest of fire--the flames as thick and yellow as a cornfield.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,224 ~ ~ ~
"I saw the two at Nelson House," continued Jan. "One of them is a half-wit, and the other"--he hunched his shoulders--"is worse.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 519 ~ ~ ~
The law has always behaved as if a woman became a half-wit the moment she married.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 575 ~ ~ ~
Allie Mulberry the half-wit was one of the highlights of life in the town.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 577 ~ ~ ~
Beside being a half-wit he had something the matter with his legs.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,503 ~ ~ ~
No one but the half-wit and Steve Hunter were admitted to the society of the telegraph operator.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,609 ~ ~ ~
When the first small model of Hugh McVey's plant-setting machine had been whittled out by the half-wit Allie Mulberry, it replaced the famous ship, floating in the bottle, that for two or three years had been lying in the window of Hunter's jewelry store.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,613 ~ ~ ~
Allie tried valiantly to follow the instructions given him and to understand what his master was trying to do, and Hugh, finding himself unembarrassed by the presence of the half-wit, sometimes spent hours trying to explain the workings of some intricate part of the proposed machine.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,617 ~ ~ ~
One day when a part Hugh had fashioned would not work the half-wit himself made the model of a part that worked perfectly.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,952 ~ ~ ~
One evening after dark and without saying anything to his wife, he went down along Turner's Pike to the old factory at Pickleville where Hugh with the half-wit Allie Mulberry, and the two mechanics from the city, were striving to correct the faults in the plant-setting machine.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 994 ~ ~ ~
In an adjoining town to Cleveland there was a snake charmer who called himself Artemus Ward, an ignorant witling or half-wit, the laughing stock of the countryside.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 995 ~ ~ ~
In an adjoining town to Cleveland there was a snake charmer who called himself Artemus Ward, an ignorant witling or half-wit, the laughing stock of the countryside.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 610 ~ ~ ~
"The man hath departed as he came," said Eben Dudley, who stood shaking his head in open doubt, before an empty stall; "here is no beast, though with these eyes did I see the half-wit bring hither a well-filled measure of speckled oats, to feed the nag.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,965 ~ ~ ~
and must Master Jemmy Harlowe, with his half-wit, pretend to plot, and contrive mischief, yet rail at Lovelace for the same things?--A witty villain deserves hanging at once (and without ceremony, if you please): but a half-witted one deserves broken bones first, and hanging afterwards.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,062 ~ ~ ~
"Among the rest of the idle diversions of the town," he says, "one musician was famous for acting a changeling [idiot or half-wit], which indeed he personated strangely."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,062 ~ ~ ~
"Among the rest of the idle diversions of the town," he says, "one musician was famous for acting a changeling [idiot or half-wit], which indeed he personated strangely."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,230 ~ ~ ~
I been putting this Bull Hunter down for a half-wit, pretty near.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,279 ~ ~ ~
I've lost the horse, haven't I, and that half-wit has him?"
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,563 ~ ~ ~
"He's not a half-wit by any means, Hal.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 581 ~ ~ ~
Bertie._ I append the comeback: _I mean come at once, you maddening half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,497 ~ ~ ~
But it seems, _ex abundanti_, to yield this moral--viz., that as, in England, the idiot and the half-wit are held to be under the guardianship of chancery, so the man making love, who is often but a variety of the same imbecile class, ought to be made a ward of the General Post-Office, whose severe course of _timing_ and periodical interruption might intercept many a foolish declaration, such as lays a solid foundation for fifty years' repentance.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,083 ~ ~ ~
There was the husband, a big lubberly Fleming who apparently did not count for much in the economic and domestic scheme of the establishment; his wife, a large, commanding woman who ran the business and the house as well; his wife's mother, an old sickly woman in her seventies; and his wife's sister, a poor, palsied half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,682 ~ ~ ~
His son, a virtual half-wit, who took advantage of every opportunity to rifle the old man's pockets and spend the money in Valencia with bull-fighters, gamblers and horse-dealers, went barefoot in those days, scampering about the roads with the children of the gipsies encamped in _El Alborchi_.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 774 ~ ~ ~
A fall from his horse upon the ground had injured his head when he was a boy, and since that time he had been what his mother called a little queer, while the neighbors spoke of him as simple Andy, or Mrs. Markham's half-wit, who did the work of a girl and knit all his own socks.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 372 ~ ~ ~
"Oh, occasionally one of our bright young men digs up a half-wit who's willing to try anything once.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 460 ~ ~ ~
Crane was a harmless half-wit who lived alone in a shanty at the back of Deacon Gramps' field.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,194 ~ ~ ~
If she hadn't been on her guard or had been born a half-wit she could have easily believed in love and bliss at every turn.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 766 ~ ~ ~
That was before he was married upon the wife he took later--" Here Mr. Saul nudged me, and whispered: "The old Laird--had her married to that daunderin' old half-wit Duncan, to cover things up.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,665 ~ ~ ~
"When the feller had robbed Half-wit Stenens of nigh on to twenty dollars?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,717 ~ ~ ~
[Illustration: THE UBIQUITOUS WATER CARRIER Drawing the water and hewing the wood are daily chores in China, mostly carried out by womenthough this is a picture of a man, a half-wit.]
~ ~ ~ Sentence 835 ~ ~ ~
On the other hand to say needlessly "What an ugly girl!" or "What a half-wit that boy is!" can be of no value except in drawing attention to your own tactlessness.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 896 ~ ~ ~
To say you have read a book and then seemingly to understand nothing of what you have read, proves you a half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,972 ~ ~ ~
"Get the half-wit out of my sight, then," growled John, returning to his seat.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,474 ~ ~ ~
But I know enough to sabez that bunch even if I am a half-wit."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,475 ~ ~ ~
"I'm not so sure you are a half-wit, Johnny," said Douglas sincerely.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,956 ~ ~ ~
Since you seen there was something to me beside a old half-wit, they've all been horning round, jealous like, to get me."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,970 ~ ~ ~
And Judith, she sure-gawd don't apregate Doug like I do, even if I am a half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,986 ~ ~ ~
Was there, he thought, something obvious here, or was it only the half-wit's curiously sharp but confused intuition at work?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 426 ~ ~ ~
"Nothin'--let be I can't keep a grown woman in the house unless she's a half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,778 ~ ~ ~
"She wrote and sent the letter long of--of Bill Trim, a half-wit--but trusty.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,125 ~ ~ ~
Bill was a half-wit but as strong as an ox; and, once set upon a task, managed it in a way that had given him a secure position in the community.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,778 ~ ~ ~
Willie, the half-wit, one of the sheep outfit, had readily taken the oath of allegiance; beyond that, however, there had been a hitch in the proceedings.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,123 ~ ~ ~
"Nay," returned the leering half-wit, "I was but a-thinking, that if he does, may be _his_ master too will want a heriot."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,947 ~ ~ ~
retailed to me the practical jokes they had played on each other since I had been gone from among them ... on big Sam, the chocolate-coloured shoemaker who had his shop next door ... and an obscene one on a half-wit named Elmer, who was one of Frank's helpers ... that, though it was pretty raw, made me choke and gasp with merriment ... and they told me how, one night, they had wired the iron roof in the back, so that about ten cats that were mewling and quarrelling there, received a severe electric shock ... how funny and surprised they'd acted.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,666 ~ ~ ~
Good Lord, if a man so much as bows to me in the street without asking a favour, I begin to think that he is either a half-wit or a ne'er-do-well."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 6,680 ~ ~ ~
If there had been any such word in our language, _to which we had attached passion_, as lack-wit, half-wit, witless, &c., I should have certainly employed it in preference; but there is no such word.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 868 ~ ~ ~
Policy in the hands of a diplomat is like a sharp sword in the grasp of an able fencer, but policy in the hands of fools, is like a good knife wielded by a half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,447 ~ ~ ~
And you accept the word of that half-wit?"
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,074 ~ ~ ~
"That half-wit!
~ ~ ~ Sentence 314 ~ ~ ~
This gave him a keen sense of the poverty of the land, and he bought of the boys who came aboard such abundance of wild red raspberries, in all manner of birch-bark canoes and goblets and cornucopias, that he was obliged to make presents of them to the very dealers whose stock he had exhausted, and he was in treaty with the local half-wit--very fine, with a hunchback, and a massive wen on one side of his head--to take charity in the wild fruits of his native province, when the crowd about him was gently opened by a person who advanced with a flourishing bow and a sprightly "Good morning, good morning, sir!"
~ ~ ~ Sentence 7,261 ~ ~ ~
The police of M---- all knew that Peter, a half-wit, or "Silly Peter" as he was called, was perfectly harmless; even though at times he would litter the streets and market-place with bread crumbs.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 681 ~ ~ ~
With huge satisfaction he looked upon the sparkling sea, the little vessel which _scooned_ across it, his traveling mate, the big negro and the half-wit Philippine cabin boy.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 676 ~ ~ ~
"But I think Sonny's the village half-wit."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 828 ~ ~ ~
So Lillian and Anna thought he was the village half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 963 ~ ~ ~
"So he isn't a half-wit, after all."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,732 ~ ~ ~
One may at least speak of "Die Walküre" without being laughed at as a half-wit, and read Stirner without being confused with Castro and Raisuli, and argue that Huxley got the better of Gladstone without being challenged at the polls.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 279 ~ ~ ~
He might have been commenting on the antics of the village half-wit, from his tone.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 59 ~ ~ ~
You probably saved my life, for you can't tell what a half-wit will do, when in a tantrum and armed with a knife.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,698 ~ ~ ~
Awed and afraid, Greeley tiptoed from the house, and all the way back to the waiting County Club he muttered like a half-wit: "Fighting a worm!
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,798 ~ ~ ~
"An' I reckon I wouldn' ha' let my po' lil' half-wit chile go--if I could ha' helped it.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 17,861 ~ ~ ~
Half-wit, n. [jáf-wit] Bobo, tonto, necio.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,321 ~ ~ ~
These were thoughts suited to a homicidal half-wit.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,438 ~ ~ ~
I had money back of me, I thought, and position, and a mind--well, not much of a mind, but when you think what that Italian woman does with half-wit children--surely the right educators could have made something quite showy out of me.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 161 ~ ~ ~
Touting for German trade, always for his advantage, he twists the poor half-wit of the Winter Palace like a piece of straw.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,920 ~ ~ ~
Is a man never to be rid of half-wit boys in this place!"
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,773 ~ ~ ~
"She'll be in Dalness yet, perhaps better off than scouring the wilds, for after all even the MacDonalds are human, and a half-wit widow woman would be sure of their clemency.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,870 ~ ~ ~
For even if one calls him a half-wit, it still makes a difference that he keeps the right half of his wits.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,897 ~ ~ ~
"She is almost a half-wit," he had said to himself, "but she can cook and clean and seems to have the kindest heart in the world.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,900 ~ ~ ~
At that very moment the so-called half-wit was boarding a train for the village in Indiana where a certain sanitarium was situated.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,708 ~ ~ ~
It is certain that William Longstreet knew that steam could be used as a motive power long before it was so applied; and because he employed a good deal of his time in trying to discover the principle, he was ridiculed by his neighbors and friends, and the more thoughtless among them didn't know whether he was a crank, a half-wit, or a "luny."
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,382 ~ ~ ~
For a moment it occurred to Seaton that the cunning half-wit, apprehensive lest too great a share of the savoury victuals should fall to their lot, had contrived to forbid this appropriation.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,361 ~ ~ ~
Pick out some harmless lad that was saucy to Rackham in the _Revenge_, a half-wit like that Robinson younker that was the sailing-master's own cabin boy.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,363 ~ ~ ~
"No half-wit about you," admiringly quoth the carpenter's mate.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,864 ~ ~ ~
One must not be like the half-wit described by Col. George F. Baltzell to his trainees during World War I. Joe had attached himself to the Confederate command of the Colonel's father, whose last chore before turning in was to post the boy.