Meaning of smoke wagon | Babel Free

Definitions

1. A vehicle that generates smoke; specifically, an automobile or a train.
   US, archaic, slang
2. A handgun, especially a revolver.
   US, archaic, slang

Examples

“If you gwine afoot, it'll take you about a day; if you gwine in de stage or de homneybuss, you make it in half a day; but if you get in one ob dese smoke-waggons, you be almost dar now!”

“The village priests were seen to go to and fro by train, and the simple country folk thought that what they did could not be wrong. By degrees the peasants themselves began to try the "smoke-wagons" too, […]”

“Indians of Idaho are losing their superstitious feeling about the "smoke wagon," as they call an automobile, and the rush to get machines has started among the more intelligent and wealthy tribesmen.”

“I am not old enough to remember those one- and two-cylinder primitives that first chugged on the scene around the turn of the century. But those who can remember attest to the fact that they came in with billowing plumes of smoke in their wake. Indeed, "smoke-wagon" was commonly their derisive designation. You can still see why, if you witness a demonstration of antique cars restored to their prime by proud owners today.”

“[T]he President said nothing on how to protect our lungs from the some 70 million smoke wagons currently on the road.”

“[…] Bourcey, the blacksmith, who was fitting on a mule's shoe, returned with the shoe at the end of the tongs, and, thrusting it into the fire, began blowing the bellows. It was laughable to see the stampede among the redskins when they saw this ominous maneuver—they thought he was going to fire the "smoke wagon."”

“The boss of construction across the river is a little sawed off individual named Nelson, and to see him standing like Napoleon, on the huge fill which issues above the river, with a great big smoke wagon, pointed forward, strapped to his leg and pulling him over sideways from its weight; is a picture which would surely make angels weep.”

“But come morning, we agreed to forgive and forget. Bain he says he was sure glad to hear that, but he'd take our guns away with him any how. Bain says we could have our smoke wagons after a week, by which time he figured we got this worm out of our brains.”

“[page 650] The following list of hobo words, presented in glossary form, was collected by me during twenty years of experience with hobo cases in my profession of attorney-at-law. I have consulted no books or records in compiling it but made it directly from experience. […] [page 653] Smoke wagon—pistol.”

“Go ahead. Skin it. Skin that smoke wagon and see what happens. […] I'm getting tired of your gas. Jerk that pistol and go to work.”

“I soon heard two smoke-wagons [pistols] banging. […] There they lay both shot and dying.”

“Culhane turned up his palms in a vague gesture of surrender that brought both hands an inch closer to the smoke wagons slung in his holsters.”

CEFR level