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Examples

  • I have tracked the tufted pocolunas to his lair; I have slain the eight-legged galliwampus; I have bearded the wallipaloova in his noisome den, and gazed into the glaring eyeballs of the fierce Numidian liar; and I'll try everything once -- except this.

    Copper Streak Trail Eugene Manlove Rhodes 1901

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  • "It's a galliwampus, Poky," said Mustang. "It's the thing that hollers 'willi-walloo' up in ellum trees in the low grounds of nights. I don't know if it bites."

    "No, it ain't, Mustang," volunteered Long Collins. "Them galliwampuses has fins on their backs and eighteen toes. This here is a hicklesnifter. It lives under the ground and eats cherries. Don't stand so close to it. It wipes out villages with one stroke of its prehensile tail."

    --O. Henry, 1904, Heart of the West, p. 146

    September 10, 2008