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"You hurt me by such words, Barney," he protested. "Close-fisted! My boy, do you know I've given away nearly all my ready money in the last six months to the needy and suffering? I've seen big, fat-stomached, overfed men lolling in their parlor-car seats while weak invalids, wretched and faint from the strain of trouble, have sat in the common cars.
He was standing by the lip of the pit, clenching and unclenching his fists, shivering, sweating, and periodically groaning. A thought struck me, and I promptly gave him the benefit of it without reserve. "We're in a nice pickle, Mr. Weems, aren't we? You've spent a lot of the money you're so close-fisted about, and will have to travel cheap if you mean getting home again.
Her cousin she did like, and Lord George. She hardly knew which was her real love; though, no doubt, she gave the preference greatly to her cousin, because she could trust him. And then Lord Fawn was very poor. The other two men were poor also; but their poverty was not so objectionable in Lizzie's eyes as were the respectable, close-fisted economies of Lord Fawn.
He had the reputation of being close-fisted and penurious; but that this was not so I knew from many circumstances, though it is quite true he would not allow himself to be defrauded of a penny. He became a Catholic in his later days.
When a monk, levite, close-fisted usurer, or lawyer owes a grudge to some neighbouring gentleman, he sends to him one of those catchpoles or apparitors, who nabs, or at least cites him, serves a writ or warrant upon him, thumps, abuses, and affronts him impudently by natural instinct, and according to his pious instructions; insomuch, that if the gentleman hath but any guts in his brains, and is not more stupid than a gyrin frog, he will find himself obliged either to apply a faggot-stick or his sword to the rascal's jobbernowl, give him the gentle lash, or make him cut a caper out at the window, by way of correction.
It will be remembered what he had formerly suffered from his father; since that time he had married, and the close-fisted old man had left him, with his wife and children, to languish in poverty. Guerra's house was selected to meet in and concert matters. Giacomo hired a sbirro named Marzio, and Guerra a second named Olympio.
Otherwise he could not acquit the Baron of being avaricious, or at any rate insufferably close-fisted, seeing that, even though rolling in money and even when gloating over the old Fredericks d'or, he could not help bursting out with the peevish grumble, "I know the old rascal has concealed from us the greatest part of his wealth, but next spring I will have the ruins of the tower turned over under my own eyes."
The skipper readily promised to ship him as an extra hand, if the owner chose to send the `Coffin' to sea without repairs, "which," observed Haco, "is not unlikely, for he's a close-fisted customer." "Who is he?" inquired Gaff. "Stuart of Seaside Villa," said Haco. "Ha! he is a tough un," observed Gaff, with a significant grin. "I knows him well.
"Skipped!" said Bill Bates, sententiously, after a quick search had been made. "It's all plain enough now. I never liked the close-fisted critter." "Nor I, either!" growled Skid. "Never chipped in with the boys, but was laying low just the same." "You won't catch him, either," said Bates. "They're sharp that kind. The critter knew 'twould snow and hide his tracks."
They count, not by fingers, it is tedious, but by hands; they put a part for the whole, and call themselves hands, for they are paid for the use of them, and not their heads. "Though they are two-handed they are not close-fisted fellows. They despise science, but are fond of practical knowledge.
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