O. Henry Quotes

Turn up the lights. I don't want to go home in the dark.

Where the smoke cleared, the crystal air, with some of the efficacy of faith, seemed to remove the mountains almost to the sea, bringing them so near that one might count the scarred glades on their wooded sides.

John Perkins was not accustomed to analyzing his emotions. But as he sat in his Katy-bereft 10×12 parlor he hit unerringly upon the keynote of his discomfort. He knew now that Katy was necessary to his happiness. His feeling for her, lulled into unconsciousness by the dull round of domesticity, had been sharply stirred by the loss of her presence. Has it not been dinned into us by proverb and sermon and fable that we never prize the music till the sweet-voiced bird has flown — or in other no less florid and true utterances?

But when a sick person begins to feel that he’s going to die, half my work is useless.

Единственное, что тут можно было сделать, это хлопнуться на старенькую кушетку и зареветь. Именно так Делла и поступила. Откуда напрашивается философский вывод, что жизнь состоит из слез, вздохов и улыбок, причем вздохи преобладают.

Up with the other one,” ordered the burglar. “You might be amphibious and shoot with your left. You can count two, can’t you? Hurry up, now.

If man knew how women pass the time when they are alone, they’d never marry.

"Some nice quotes:
"that in all my illegitimate inroads against the legal letter of the law the article sold must be existent, visible, producible. In that way and by a careful study of city ordinances and train schedules I have kept out of all trouble with the police that a five dollar bill and a cigar could not square.

That sounds self-indulgent and gratifying without vulgar ostentation,” says I; “and I don’t see how money could be better invested. Give me a cuckoo clock and a Sep Winner’s Self-Instructor for the Banjo, and I’ll join you.

The bottle, with its impotent message, was gone out to sea, and the problem that it had provoked was reduced to a simple sum in addition — one and one make two, by the rule of arithmetic; one by the rule of romance.

Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.

But Elsie thought she could find it. She had heard that policemen, when politely addressed, or thumbscrewed by an investigation committee, will give up information and addresses.

"We often hear "shop-girls" spoken of. No such persons exist. There are girls who work in shops. They make their living that way. But why turn their occupation into an adjective? Let us be fair. We do not refer to the girls who live on Fifth Avenue as "marriage-girls.

Then it's not,' says I, 'and we're after having a pleasant evening, Miss Flynn. Have ye seen the sights of this new Coney Island, then? I presume ye have come here for that purpose,' says I.

The true adventurer goes forth aimless and uncalculating to meet and greet unknown fate. A fine example was the Prodigal Son — when he started back home.