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Shawords

Quote#Humour & Wit

Poets have imagined no utterance of fiends or hobgoblins so fearfully…

Quote byNathaniel Hawthorne · 1804–1864

Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: "" (1850).

English (original)

Poets have imagined no utterance of fiends or hobgoblins so fearfully appropriate as a laugh. And even the obtuse lime-burner felt his nerves shaken, as this strange man looked inward at his own heart, and burst into laughter that rolled away into the night, and was indistinctly reverberated among the hills.

— Nathaniel Hawthorne

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