"Hobo" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sighted the Major and promptly rose in swarms to settle upon his ears and in the edges of his hair. He fanned them away automatically and without audible comment. Perhaps they served as a counter-irritant; at any rate, the sting of the indignity put upon him by what he termed a "hobo lunch" was finally ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... to say nowhere," came the reply. "You need only to look at me to tell what I am—a happy-go-lucky individual, a tramp, a hobo, and yet I am willing to work when the spirit is on me. I never stole a dollar or a dollar's worth in all my life. I have harmed neither man, woman or child. I am my own worst enemy, and I am—frankly—hungry! If you will give ...
— The Boy Ranchers Among the Indians - or, Trailing the Yaquis • Willard F. Baker
... along, 'nough ter galley ebery whale clean eout ob dere skin, dey war plenty whaleships fill up in twelve, fifteen, twenty monf' after leabin' home. 'N er man bed his pick er places, too—didn' hab ter go moseyin erroun' like some ol' hobo lookin' fer day's work, 'n prayin' de good Lord not ter let um fine it. No, sah; roun yer China Sea, coas' Japan, on de line, off shore, Vasquez, 'mong de islan's, ohmos' anywhar, you couldn' hardly git way from 'em. Neow, I clar ter glory I kaint imagine WAR dey all gone ter, dough we bin ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... that paper again," resumed Paul. "The writing was done with a fountain pen, I should say. That seems to tell that the owner was no common hobo. And the writing is as clear as the print in our copybooks at school. The man who did that was a penman, believe me. 'Leave this island at once!' Just like that, short and crisp. Not a threat about what will happen if we don't, you see; we're expected to just imagine all sorts ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren
... to go home because of the papers; but who should turn up while they were eating supper but his father, accompanied by Mr. Norris and Chief Billings, proving that the hobo had not made a mistake when he said he felt sure he had seen the latter on the way to the mountain ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... be meaning to break into the building, to sleep there to-night. I wouldn't put it past a hobo to steal anything he could find left in the lockers. Hugh, it's up to us to put a kink in his rope. Let's chase after him before ...
— The Chums of Scranton High on the Cinder Path • Donald Ferguson
... author had many experiences as a flyer; a list of his activities while knocking around the country includes postal clerk, hobo, actor, writer, mutton chop salesman, preacher, roughneck in the oil fields, newspaper man, flyer, scenario writer in Hollywood and synthetic clown with the Sells Floto Circus. Having lived an active, daring life, and possessing ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... is the happiest vagrant's life in the world. He is usually regarded as a bona fide seeker for work, and food is readily given him for the asking. Unlike the American hobo, he is given his food raw, and is expected to cook it himself. So he carries what he calls a "tucker bag" to hold his provisions; also, almost more important—his "billy can" ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... place, because the old man is poor as Job's turkey; leastways he makes out to be, though some folks say he's a sort of miser. But there are farmers that keep quite a sum of money around, and it might be this hobo is waiting to get a chance at a ...
— Fred Fenton Marathon Runner - The Great Race at Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... Well, play with your hobo brides if you like, Honora, but don't look for gratitude ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie
... Feng demanded. "Wantee glub? Injun all time hiyu eat, all same hobo tlamp. S'pose you hungly me catch some muckamuck. Catch piecee blead, catch ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... he not only wasn't a hobo but wasn't even a poet," she presently murmured, and smoked again. Then: "That Ben Sutton, now, he's a case. Comes from Alaska and don't like fresh eggs for breakfast because he says they ain't got any kick ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... was at last relieved of the plague of Carol's intrusions and they settled down to the question of whether the justice of the peace had sent that hobo drunk to jail for ten days or twelve. It was a matter not readily determined. Then Dave Dyer communicated his carefree adventures on the ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... Mr. William Wrenn, "and I thought I was getting this hobo business down pat.... Gee! I wonder if Pete was ...
— Our Mr. Wrenn - The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man • Sinclair Lewis
... though your money has gone in a queer way, sir," replied the young scoutmaster, "but honestly now, I find it hard to believe that a common hobo would be able to find it so quick, if you had it hidden away up in a corner of the garret, and hadn't ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... because of the weakness of the thirst that is coming over me. Some time I'll go down to those hell-holes at the mills and never come back—the stuff they sell to me is destructive as fire—it is poison! You're a man of substance, I can see that—you're no hobo like most of the fellows out here—that's why I'm talking to you. You remind me of some one I know. There's something familiar ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... bad bargain," commented the rancher, with unruffled good humor. "I was figuring that I might help you. I thought you were a hobo after my chickens, or trying to bluff me into a free meal this morning. If you'd asked straight for it, I'd ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... "That hobo, or whoever he was," I said, "must have been a better fighter than Andrew. I see he landed on your ...
— Parnassus on Wheels • Christopher Morley
... didn't seem the least bit disturbed, when he found out who I really was. He said there was a time card rule, that forbade him allowing any unauthorized person in his office; he thought I was some semi-respectable "hobo," who wanted a place to stay all night; how in the world was he to know? Suppose some one else had come out and said he was the chief despatcher, was he going to let them in the office without some proof? ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... your telegraphic address. This paper," he went on, "was taken from a drunken tramp—'hobo' you call 'em, ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace
... no-good hobo," replied Bill. "If I catch him, I'll teach him to come snooping around folks' ...
— The Boy Aviators' Treasure Quest • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... Slapsticks whacked the dome and Shin Of Swami, Serious Thinker, Ghost and Goat. From soup to nuts, from Nut to Super Freak, From clams to coffee, all the Clans were there. The groggy Soul Mate groping for its Twin, The burgling free verse Blear, the Hobo Pote, ...
— Hermione and Her Little Group of Serious Thinkers • Don Marquis
... exclaimed Lil Artha, "I don't see how you can stand it, Elmer. Talk to me about tramps, and the way they hate water, here's the rank evidence of it. Wow, ain't I sorry for poor Nat if he's got to associate with this hobo crowd for long!" ...
— Pathfinder - or, The Missing Tenderfoot • Alan Douglas
... mammy done tol' me a long time ago To always try fer to be a good boy; To lay on my pallet an' to waller on de fl[o]'; An' to never leave my daddy's house. I hain't never gwineter hobo no m[o]'. By George! I hain't ...
— Negro Folk Rhymes - Wise and Otherwise: With a Study • Thomas W. Talley
... has been down to th' corner playin' a game iv spoil-five with his old frind Coalsack, an' has paid no attintion to th' Sons iv Rest. 'Well,' he says, 'gintlemen, I'm in favor iv doin' ivrything in reason f'r th' hoboes,' he says. 'Th' protection iv th' home hobo again th' pauper can trade iv Europe,' he says, 'has been wan iv th' principal wurruks iv me life,' he says; an' he gives thim each a hand out, an' bows ...
— Mr. Dooley: In the Hearts of His Countrymen • Finley Peter Dunne
... and blankets were piled up at the ferry landing and the most stupendous amount of luggage ever carried by a hobo was then, one after another, piled on the backs of footmen. The footman would stand within a step of the boat and, after his luggage was piled on his back, would make a step on to the boat, and drop his load. Often two ...
— Reminiscences of a Pioneer • Colonel William Thompson
... hobo. The coffee boiling in a discarded tin can would have been proof positive of this without other evidence; but there seemed plenty more. Yes, the man was a hobo. Billy ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... a pair of high-heeled cowpuncher's boots. "Try these on, son. They belong to Dusty. The lazy hobo wasn't up yet. If they fit you, he'll ride back to the ranch in ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... of fact, nothing could be more slothful or slow, more given up to a life of ease and degeneracy, than the "reef-building polypifer"—to give him his scientific name. He is the hobo of the animal world, but, unlike the hobo, he does not even tramp for a living. He exists as a sluggish and gelatinous worm; he attracts to himself calcareous elements from the water to make himself a house—mark you, the ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... who came boldly forward certainly had a hobo look. Their clothes were tattered and torn, as though they might only be fit for scarecrows in the newly planted corn field; while their faces were unkempt with beards of a week's growth; which helped to make them look uglier than might ...
— Afloat on the Flood • Lawrence J. Leslie
... your meeting, if you are speaking in hobo-dom you may well despair. There are so many drunks, that interruptions are constant and irrepressible, and every interruption breaks your grip on the audience. Moral: ...
— The Art of Lecturing - Revised Edition • Arthur M. (Arthur Morrow) Lewis
... meantime material was being gathered for a new outbreak in the United States. The casual laborers had greatly increased in numbers, especially in the West. These migratory workingmen—the "hobo miners," the "hobo lumberjacks," the "blanket stiffs," of colloquial speech—wander about the country in search of work. They rarely have ties of family and seldom ties of locality. About one-half of these wanderers are American born. They are to be described with precision ...
— The Armies of Labor - Volume 40 in The Chronicles Of America Series • Samuel P. Orth
... that I could and must question my guest. So far he had volunteered no information beyond the curt statement that his name was John Flint and he was a hobo because he liked the trade. He had been stealing a ride and he had slipped—and when he woke up we had him and he hadn't his leg. And if some people knew how to be obliging they'd make a noise like a hoop ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler
... guess I sized you up all wrong. You don't act like a bum at all; I guess you and me might rent a farm round here somewhere and make some money out of it next year. You're the first hobo I ever saw who could do ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... bluffed off Fletcher and the other ruffian there, the prisoner Gorst. She was alone, but she scared the pair of them with an empty rifle. Suppose you left your sister alone, and came back to find a half-drunk hobo ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... story is furnished by the foot of a bartender in St. Louis. His discerning eye fell upon the form of Chicken Ruggles as he pecked with avidity at the free lunch. Chicken was a "hobo." He had a long nose like the bill of a fowl, an inordinate appetite for poultry, and a habit of gratifying it without expense, which accounts for the name given him by his ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... standpoint of national stability, most valuable, steadiness in employment. Good farming, by fixing the labourer on the soil, improves the general condition of rural life, by ridding the countryside of the worst of its present pests. Those wandering dervishes of the industrial world, the hobo, the tramp—the entire family of Weary Willies and Tired Timothys—will no longer have even an imaginary excuse for their troubled and troublesome existence. But the farmer who was the prey of these ...
— The Rural Life Problem of the United States - Notes of an Irish Observer • Horace Curzon Plunkett
... said; and then his face lighted. "But I'll tell you what I did find. I found a drunken hobo at Atlantic City who was the ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... stairs, carrying Hugenberg in his arms.) This thing has a royal police-captain for a father and not as much courage in his body as the raggedest hobo! ...
— Erdgeist (Earth-Spirit) - A Tragedy in Four Acts • Frank Wedekind |
