"Cropper" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... many literary gentlemen with that decoration. The Jew with the beard, as you call him, is Herr von Lungen, the eminent hautboy-player. The three next gentlemen are Mr. Smee, of the Royal Academy (who is shaved as you perceive), and Mr. Moyes and Mr. Cropper, who are both very hairy about the chin. At the piano, singing, accompanied by Mademoiselle Lebrun, is Signor Mezzocaldo, the great barytone from Rome. Professor Quartz and Baron Hammerstein, celebrated geologists ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... on official business. I forgot to remove it before starting and that was why not a single gendarme did more than salute as we tore past. Good joke, so long as it ended well, but if we'd come a cropper on the way, there'd have been rather a row and Max would have stood for an official wigging, to say the least. Lucky for us that nothing went wrong. What's done ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... a little apprehensively, found them flushed and laughing, and whirling wildly around to the music of a record played much too fast. Peggy, in an effort to show off heavily before Francis, came a cropper over a stool at his feet, pulling Marjorie down in her fall; both of them laughing like children as they fell, so that they could scarcely disentangle themselves, and had ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer
... elephant. Now Bombay rode much after the fashion of a sailor, trusting more to balance and good-luck than skill in sticking on; and the consequence was, that with the first side-step the donkey made he came to the ground an awkward cropper, falling heavily on the small of the stock of the gun, which snapped short off, the piece being thus irredeemably damaged. At first I rated him heartily, for this was the second of Captain Burton's guns which had been damaged in my hands. I then told Bombay of the circumstances ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... heart they could get away without an upset. The ground was far from being all that might be wished; but then he had known even worse in his experience, and had never yet come a cropper. Besides, Tom would be at the helm, and that stood for a great deal. Jack hastened ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach
... dust with its nose, while the cowboy made a fairly graceful dive through the air, landing on his head and shoulders. The riders directly behind him were obliged to hurdle pony and rider, which they did without mishap to either. Stacy, fortunately was ahead, else he too might have come a cropper. ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Ozarks • Frank Gee Patchin
... who fain would lure your feet To conduct unbecoming in a copper; Once you betrayed us, going off your beat, And now you've nearly come another cropper; If, tempted thrice, you break your trust, You'll have no halo ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, June 11, 1919 • Various
... disapprove of it a mite. Go ahead. Make mistakes. It'll be live and learn. Not the least afraid. I've often noticed that when young fellows of your sort prefer their own haste to the Lord's leisure there's a Lord's haste that hurries on before 'em, so as to be all ready to meet 'em when they come a cropper in the ditch." ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... edge of a cornfield near heavy timber, being far from any house. A large part of the crop is often stolen; the crops of 1911 and 1912 were not so heavy, perhaps 50 to 75 pounds. It usually bears a fair crop, however, but I do not consider it a heavy cropper like the Indiana or Niblack. Its large size and splendid cracking qualities, however, will make it a popular variety and it may prove to bear much better ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Sixth Annual Meeting. Rochester, New York, September 1 and 2, 1915 • Various
... great," Graham said with sparkling eyes. "I've fooled some myself with the critters, when I was a youngster, down in the Argentine. If I'd had beef-blood like that to build on, I mightn't have taken the cropper ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... lot of men, in my line and in others, have come a cropper in their careers, because of some woman. But I'm the first to come such a cropper on account of a woman with a white soul and the eyes of a child,—a woman I scarcely know, and who has no interest in me. But, to-night, I shall telegraph my resignation. Some ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... the second in the same order, Wild Geranium racing neck to neck with Pas de Charge; the King was all athirst to join the duello, but his owner kept him gently back, saving his pace and lifting him over the jumps as easily as a lapwing. The second fence proved a cropper to several, some awkward falls took place over it, and tailing commenced; after the third field, which was heavy plough, all knocked off but eight, and the real struggle began in sharp earnest: a good dozen who had shown a splendid stride over the grass ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... hysterics. She heard the bell toll and ran away with the idea that it was for you, and paid you the compliment of losing her head. I came on her here when she had ridden her horse half to death and they had both come a cropper. Confound women's hysterics! I could do nothing with her. When I left her for a moment she ran away and hid herself. She is concealed somewhere on the place or has limped off on to the marsh. I wish some New York millionairess ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... that she believed, in giving people what they wanted. As for the consequences, there was no mortal lapse or aberration that could trouble her serenity or bring a blush to her enduring candor. If you came a cropper you might be sure that Fanny's judgment of you would be pure from the superstition of morality. She herself had never swerved in affection or fidelity to Will Brocklebank. She took her excitements, lawful or otherwise, vicariously in the doomed and dedicated persons ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... got it all there in you—the immense manner. You, a nineteenth century gentleman, to do this game of Ridley Court, and paddle round the Row? Not you! You're clever, and you're crafty, and you've a way with you. But you'll come a cropper at this as sure as I shall paint two big pictures—if you'll stand to ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... troops, who had started about 9 A.M. Luard had a beast of a pulling pony, and as his double bridle hadn't got a curb chain, it was about as much use as a headache, so I suggested he should let the pony rip, and promised to bury his remains if he came a cropper. He took my advice and ripped; you couldn't see his pony's heels for dust as he disappeared across the plain. We found him all right in ...
— With Kelly to Chitral • William George Laurence Beynon
... book is the sequel. So utterly at variance is destiny with all the little plans of men. I may perhaps mention here that very recently I had come an ugly cropper in certain business enterprises. Sitting now surrounded by all the circumstances of wealth, there is a luxury in admitting my extremity. I can admit, even, that to a certain extent my disasters were conceivably of my own making. It may be there are directions ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... to us in his play of "Abigail," with Miss Grace George, evaporated in a sad farce, or comedy, entitled "A Case of Frenzied Finance." We had been flattering ourselves that we had discovered a new "outlook," and we came a bad cropper. The simian antics of an impossible bell boy, in an impossible hotel, and his maneuvers in the arena of finance, were the "motive" of this extremely invertebrate contribution. There was an "Arizona Copper King"; ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... an hour afterwards, "Royce Pederstone is going to come a terrible cropper over this business. He is mortgaged up to the neck and, singly or with some of the political gang, he is in almost every realty ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... Stock Exchange," explained Cedric. "Clever old chap—shouldn't mind if he would give me the straight tip. I tell you what, Die," and here Cedric lit himself another cigarette, "if I come a cropper in the exam, the Stock Exchange would not be a bad place for me to make my ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... son. Dreamers are our strictly unpaid torch-bearers. They light the path for us; and we murmur 'Poor fools!' with a kind of sneaking self-satisfaction, when they come a cropper." ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... interminable ridge. Towards the end it was uncommonly like running. Magnus would have given worlds to venture to look behind and see how the idiot below was fagging; and Joe would have given a lot to see the lout above come a cropper and smash his leg. It wants a pretty hot friendship to stand the test of ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... the pony will do it, Bates," cried Vixen. "I don't jump. How can I help it if papa has given me a jumping pony? If I didn't let Titmouse take a gate when he was in the humour, he'd kick like old boots, and pitch me a cropper. It's an instinct of self-preservation that makes me let him jump. And as for poor dear, pretty little mamma," continued Vixen, addressing herself to Roderick, and changing her tone to one of patronising tenderness, "if she had her way, I should be brought up in a little ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... disgust. "I'd give Todd his three sovs. back if I could recall that blow. I wish I'd left the fool alone, and anyhow, it's my opinion I don't shine much in our little squabble. Todd has been playing the man since his Perry cropper, and I've been playing the cad just because he was once useful to me and I did not want to let him go." Cotton devoted the next few hours to a little honest unselfish thinking, and the result was that he came pretty near to despising himself. "I'll go and apologize to Gus, and if he shies ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... with his faint, cynical smile. "No," he said, "you certainly don't know everything, my son. You never have come a cropper ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... The best o' baccy, Matt, for lunatics, which we was when we cast anchor on this island. Here, fill your pipe an' fire away. You won't notice the difference if you don't think about it. My! what a cropper you must have come down when you got ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... and fearless to dare. Once I thought "eugenist" "zany," Now I know better and raise high in air Bumpers Falernian, "Looking towards you." Great be the glory the future awards you, You that have given the first-born a cropper, Bay-leaves immortal encircle your topper; Though you're a scientist, you are no dry ass— I take off my hat to you, KARL, for I share Your ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 25, 1914 • Various
... "I hadn't even time to guess wot 'ad 'appened. Got no warnin' wotsomedever. I just felt a tree-mendous shock all of a suddent that struck me motionless—as if Tom Sayers had hit me a double-handed cropper on the top o' my beak an' in the pit o' my bread-basket at one an' the same moment. Then came an 'orrible pressure as if a two-thousand-ton ship 'ad bin let down a-top o' me, an' arter that ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... frightened." Why do people always use this agitating formula? "But the fact is poor Bertie has had an awful cropper. Good gracious, Cecil! don't look like that! Are you going to faint! He is not so very much hurt,—stunned a ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... thought so if there had been only one, but it didn't seem likely that both of you could have come a cropper," ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... Diavolo pursued, "it happened a good while ago, that business, and it's just as likely as not that it was Adam whom the devil first put up to a thing or two, and Eve got it out of him—for I grant you that women are curious—and then they both came a cropper together, and it was a case of six of one and half a dozen of the other. It mostly is, I should think, in a ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... at hand. He selected the dubious spellings that had caught his attention and ran them down one by one. "Oppresor" was wrong. "Defensless" was fearful. "Neighbor" started out brilliantly but came a cropper at the end. And that curious phrase, "Who hast"; what about that? Simon was a trifle hazy over this, so he gave the writer the benefit of the doubt. It sounded queer, though. Anyway, he had established to his satisfaction that the fellow was illiterate—naively ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... out my fist straight towards his bullet head and giving him a cropper on the mouth that sent him tumbling backwards on the deck, all of ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson
... my poor dear," answered the landlady, relenting at the sight of Mary's obvious distress. "He's sailed, my dear—sailed in the John Cropper this very ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... That's the worst of walking carefully all your days: you do come such an awful cropper when you do come one. Two women. The Jasmine lady must have been practising on his poor little heart. Heigh-ho, I wish she could do as much for me! And the other ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... You great owl, you came a cropper that time! [He and PODBURY indulge in a subdued bear-fight up the stairs, after which they enter the Upper Hall in a state of ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, January 16, 1892 • Various
... away, or a growl or sneer. This one, he decided, called for an angered scowl, particularly in view of the tone of voice which only brought home doubly how his planning of a full two years had come a cropper. ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... Colonization Society as odious there as his "Thoughts" had made it in America. The great body of the anti-slavery sentiment in Great Britain promptly condemned the spirit and object of the American Colonization Society. Such leaders as Buxton and Cropper "termed its objects diabolical;" while Zachary Macaulay, father of the historian, did not doubt that "the unchristian prejudice of color (which alone has given birth to the Colonization Society, though varnished over with other more ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... cavernously hollow, he looked like a man in the last stages of consumption. Little life as Sundry Buyers showed, Nancy showed even less life. And these were bosuns!—bosuns of the fine American sailing-ship Elsinore! Never had any illusion of mine taken a more distressing cropper. ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... after the marriage of William York and Mary Brooks, they lived at the Old Coonrod Pile home, and William York worked as a "cropper." Securing the farm that had been given the bride, they modeled into a one-room home the corn-crib of Elijah Pile, that stood across the spring-branch and up the mountainside. It was a log crib, and they chinked it with clay, and using split logs from the walls of the old shed, a puncheon ...
— Sergeant York And His People • Sam Cowan |
