West Hell, said to be the hottest and toughest part of that notorious resort, was once the home of Big John de Conqueror, who elop...ed with the Devil's daughter.... The Devil pursued them on his famous jumping bull, and when they met, Big John tore off one of the Devil's arms and almost beat him to death with it. Before Big John left Hell, he passed out ice water to everybody, and even turned down the dampers, remarking that he expected to return to visit his wife's folks pretty soon, and he didn't like the house kept so hot.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
[John] Brough's majority is "glorious to behold." It is worth a big victory in the field. It is decisive as to the disposition of ...the people to prosecute the war to the end. My regiment and brigade were both unanimous for Brough [the Union party candidate for governor of Ohio].LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Except for the beast fables, which are anciently derived from the world's multi-racial heritage, American Negro humor is rooted in... social oppression. And--again excepting the animal fables--it differs from classical Western and white American humor in another respect. It is totally devoid of those myth-making and myth-transmuting elements and symbols that appeal so deeply to the American mind in the works of the tall-tale tellers such as Davy Crockett, Seba Smith, Mike Fink, and Mark Twain. There are no Rip Van Winkles, Johnny Appleseeds, Paul Bunyans, or Calamity Janes--and none bearing the faintest resemblance to them--in Negro American humor. The myth-making figures in the literature of black Americans are the blues-haunted characters. They are Stagolee, John Henry, and Big Boy; they are Mary Lou, Frankie, and Sister Caroline. And they are not funny, least of all to the nameless hundreds of folk-Negroes who created them and the still-living thousands who love them and perpetuate them in song and story.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Still, I am prepared for this voyage, and for anything else you may care to mention. Not that I am not afraid, but there is v...ery little time left. You have probably made travel arrangements, and know the feeling. Suddenly, one morning, the little train arrives in the station, but oh, so big It is! Much bigger and faster than anyone told you.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Mr. [John] Barrymore's smile was the smile of an actor who hates actors, and who knows that he is going to kill two or three befor...e the play is over. I am not an actor-killer, but I like my Hamlets to dislike actors, if you know what I mean, and I think you don't.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Lincoln, six feet one in his stocking feet, The lank man, knotty and tough as a hickory rail,... Whose hands were always too big for white-kid gloves, Whose wit was a coonskin sack of dry, tall tales, Whose weathered face was homely as a plowed field.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I was not at all shocked with this execution at the time. John died seemingly without much pain. He was effectually hanged, the ro...pe having fixed upon his neck very firmly, and he was allowed to hang near three quarters of an hour; so that any attempt to recover him would have been in vain. I comforted myself in thinking that by giving up the scheme I had avoided much anxiety and uneasiness.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »