raree

Like puppets were the townsfolk led in that show they call a raree;

Rookwood William Harrison Ainsworth 1843

I produc'd a handful of silver, and spread it before them, which was a kind of raree-show they had not been us'd to, paper being the money of Boston.

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (1994 Edition) 1909

But I was very much astonished at the manner in which the Moors were treated, for they were seated on couches, on one side of the state under which Her Majesty sat, as if they were some kind of raree-show, set there to be looked at.

Oddsfish! Robert Hugh Benson 1892

I am a raree show for this company, she thought resentfully, and they might as well have their coin's worth.

Dearly Beloved 2010

It was startling enough that a great hotel admitted Indians, until I realised that they were used to these occasional delegations passing to and from Washington, and not only tolerated them but made much of them for policy's sake; also, they were a raree show for the other diners.

Isabelle Estelle Bruno 2010

In the days immediately following Pegleg Pete's era, it was lined with stately mansions and fashionable shops; gave way to cheap entertainments, raree shows and hot corn girls; after they were shrouded by an El, the entertainments moved uptown, and the destitute, the desperate and the down-and-out moved in.

Kevin Walsh: The Evolution of Extra Place 2009

And yet, there seems to be a quiet, collective resistance to all the bleating, all the raree.

Steven Weber: Mavericks, Mobs and the Cameras That Love Them 2008

They would have done so, doubt it not, if they belonged to the many who gaze on those very triumphs as on a raree-show to feed their silly wonder, or use and enjoy them without thankfulness or understanding, as the ox eats the clover thrust into his rack, without knowing or caring how it grew.

Westward Ho! 2007

Glad you're enjoying your Monday...that's a raree gift *rubs sleep out of eyes*

Monday, Monday, So Good To Me Mother Jones RN 2007

Wordsworth's poetics, where such despotism was closely linked, in Wordsworth's mind, to the mad assortment of visual technologies thronging the London market, such as panoramas, dioramas, raree shows and phantasmagorias.

Introduction: Gothic Romance as Visual Technology 2005