"Musical" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... dwelt his dark-eyed daughter, Wayward as the Minnehaha, With her moods of shade and sunshine, Eyes that smiled and frowned alternate, Feet as rapid as the river, Tresses flowing like the water, And as musical a laughter: And he named her from the river, From the water-fall he named ...
— The Song Of Hiawatha • Henry W. Longfellow
... simultaneously made by both dancers, accompanied by the same eccentric gestures. At each successful pass, the screams of delight uttered by the spectators, and their shouts of applause, rang through the room, exciting the performers to fresh exertions; the noise increased by the loud clang of the musical instruments, as the musicians, excited by the scene, ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston
... appropriately it might have been named Memoria Barbarica, for the dreadful violence done to the most beautiful, rhythmical, and melodious names would, at any rate, have remained as a repulsive expression of barbarism to all musical ears, had the practical benefits of this machinery been all that they profess to be. Meantime these benefits are really none at all. They offer us a mere mockery, defeating with one hand what they accomplish ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... Hebrews were fighting for existence life in their little villages and towns had been anything but pleasant. Not only was there constant danger from human enemies and from famine, there was also a lack of the comforts and pleasures of civilized life. There were no books to read, no musical instruments to play on, and few opportunities for any kind of recreation. They had only coarse, rough clothing to wear, and coarse, ugly ...
— Hebrew Life and Times • Harold B. Hunting
... the deep holes; but the boys never stayed long in the deep holes, and they preferred the shallow places, where the river broke into a long ripple (they called it riffle) on its gravelly bed, and where they could at once soak and bask in the musical rush of the sunlit waters. I have heard people in New England blame all the Western rivers for being yellow and turbid; but I know that after the spring floods, when the Miami had settled down to its summer ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells
... especial fitness to raise it above sense to the love of heavenly things."[1] In like manner the Saint's illustrious son, Cardinal Newman, has spoken of "the emotion which some gentle, peaceful strain excites in us," and "how soul and body are rapt and carried away captive by the concord of musical sounds where the ear is open to their power;"[2] how, too, "music is the expression of ideas greater and more profound than any in the visible world, ideas which centre, indeed, in Him whom Catholicism manifests, who is the seat of all beauty, order, and perfection whatever."[3] ...
— Cardinal Newman as a Musician • Edward Bellasis
... said Langholm, grimly, as the champagne made an opportune appearance; "and now tell me who that fellow is who's opening the piano, and since when you've started a musical dinner." ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung
... her progress and entered the apartments wherein she was to prepare for her evening meal, there resounded through the palace the ringing notes of trumpets and the musical booming of a kettle-drum. ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... complacent with the knowledge that her daughter daily devoted four hours to her music, looked up from her knitting to say, "If I had had your opportunities when I was young, my dear, I should have been a very happy girl. I always had musical talent, but such training as I had, foolish little songs and waltzes and not time for half an hour's practice ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... impression on her world to hang on by the tips of her fingers until she dropped into the outstretched arms of Mr. Godfrey Vandeford, who was prowling around Weehawken and the vicinity for just such ripe fruit as she when he was casting his first musical girl-show for the purpose of some violent excitement after a snowed-in winter in ...
— Blue-grass and Broadway • Maria Thompson Daviess
... the class, I am sure, if she realizes that her humming is a source of annoyance," she said, her own really musical voice fluting ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther
... story in his quiet way, the daughters enjoyed it, and declared that the piano was placed upon a firm foothold by this proceeding. The news spread abroad, and several other young Quaker girls eagerly seized the occasion to gratify their musical longings in the same direction. [Footnote: It is pleasant to note that this objection to music among Friends is a thing of the past, and that the Friends' School at Providence, R.I., which is under the control ...
— Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals • Maria Mitchell
... parallelisms for responsive reading—a use which at once found acceptance in many churches, and has become general in all parts of the country. Sporadic experiments followed in various individual congregations, looking toward greater variety or greater dignity or greater musical attractiveness in the services of public worship, or toward more active participation therein on the part of the people. But these experiments, conducted without concert or mutual counsel, often without serious study of the subject, and with a feebly esthetic purpose, ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... could not be sure, if the chaperons were all like that old English lady one evening at the opera in the Casino, who came in charge of her niece, or possibly some friend's daughter. She remained dutifully enough beside the girl through the first act of the stupid musical comedy, and even through the ensuing ballet, and when a flaunting female, in a hat of cart-wheel circumference, came in and shut out the whole stage from the hapless stranger behind, this good old lady authorized her charge to ask him to take the seat next them where he could ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells
... but the words would not leave her throat. The water rose. They were lying half-covered with it. Tibbie broke out singing. Annie had never heard her sing, and it was not very musical. ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... death of Cowley was his last, and, among his shorter works, his best performance: the numbers are musical, and the ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... also be true that Starr King's clear, penetrating, musical voice, answering to the moods of the soul as a loved instrument to the hand of the player, was in itself a kind of gospel of good will ...
— Starr King in California • William Day Simonds
... ordinance. There was too much civilization. I yearned for something more primitive, something more purely Japanese; and tramping into the country I should find it. I should eat Japanese food—profanely dubbed "chow-chow;" sleep in Japanese beds—on the floor; talk Japanese—as musical as Italian; and live so much like an old-time native that I should feel as one born on the soil. By that time, returning to Yeddo as a Japanese of the period, I should of course burn to adopt railways, telegraphs and balloons, codify the laws, improve upon ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 29. August, 1873. • Various
... day I was present at a musical evening at the Casino, given by a remarkable artist, Madame Masson, who sings in a truly delightful manner. I took the opportunity of applauding the admirable Coquelin, as well as two charming boarders of the Vaudeville, M—— and Meillet. I was able, on ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... lyrist of Lesbos, lived chiefly at the court of Periander, Corinth; returning in a ship from a musical contest in Sicily laden with prizes, the sailors plotted to kill him, when he begged permission to play one strain on his lute, which being conceded, dolphins crowded round the ship, whereupon he leapt over the bulwarks, was received on the back of one of them, and carried to Corinth, arriving ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... as you drift along the shore in your canoe, sifting the night sounds and smells of the wilderness, when all harsher cries are hushed and the silence grows tense and musical, like a great stretched chord over which the wind is thrumming low suggestive melodies, a sudden rush and flapping in the grasses beside you breaks noisily into the gamut of half-heard primary tones and rising, vanishing harmonics. Then, as you listen, ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... breeze, fragrance of flowers, and sense of repose to raise one's thoughts heavenward; and just enough amateur piano music to keep him reminded of the other place. There are many venerable pianos in Hamilton, and they all play at twilight. Age enlarges and enriches the powers of some musical instruments—notably those of the violin—but it seems to set a piano's teeth on edge. Most of the music in vogue there is the same that those pianos prattled in their innocent infancy; and there is something very pathetic about it when they go ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... preface to this translation has informed us, that he had not an ear capable of distinguishing one note in music, which, were there no other, was a sufficient objection against his attempting the most musical ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... accents of the most silvery and musical cadence, "you are no doubt vastly surprised to find yourself thus unexpectedly, and almost as by violence, introduced into the house of one who is such an entire stranger to you as myself. But though I am unknown to ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... of England to races of Snobs yet undescribed. 'Where are your Theatrical Snobs; your Commercial Snobs; your Medical and Chirurgical Snobs; your Official Snobs; your Legal Snobs; your Artistical Snobs; your Musical Snobs; your Sporting Snobs?' write my esteemed correspondents. 'Surely you are not going to miss the Cambridge Chancellor election, and omit showing up your Don Snobs, who are coming, cap in hand, to a young Prince of six-and-twenty, and ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray
... 've got some tickets for you. People are always sending me such things, and as I don't care for them, I 'm glad to make them over to you young and giddy infants. There are passes for the statuary exhibition, Becky shall have those, here are the concert tickets for you, my musical girl; and that is for a course of lectures on literature, which I 'll ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... up the bright Meuse river, and across the monotony of the plains, then green with wheat a foot high, and musical with the many bells of the Easter kermesses in the quaint ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... the MIRROR, I saw an account of an ancient musical instrument, the virginal, stating it to have been an instrument much in use in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. That such was the case there can be no doubt, for the musical world can still furnish many compositions, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... his little joke. But where do you dine? I have brought a new song with me, a march out of the last musical thing on. ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... no sound of firing. No birds were singing, although it was spring. All was quiet except for the frogs that uttered raucous musical croaks in a pond near by and puffed out the bladders at the corners of their mouths, so as to produce long-drawn ...
— Combed Out • Fritz August Voigt
... with great caution. When a dog snaps savagely at an imaginary object, it is almost a certain indication of madness; and when it exhibits a terror of fluids, it is confirmed hydrophobia. Some dogs exhibit a great dislike of musical sounds, and when this is the case they are too frequently made sport of. But it is a dangerous sport, as dogs have sometimes been driven mad ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... receiver to his ear, and waited again. At length came a softer, more musical greeting. It was Dorothy. His heart was instantly leaping at the ...
— A Husband by Proxy • Jack Steele
... obtain release from their duties as entertainers. Eleven o'clock came before the last of the ladies departed, and then Mr. Ferris lingered for a tete-a-tete with Miss Sanford, and poor Grace found herself compelled to sit and talk with Mr. Barnard, who was a musical devotee and afflicted with a conviction that they ought to sing duets, and Mrs. Truscott could not be induced to sing duets with any man, unless ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... rung, and mount to the belfry. He could see the shrouded figure standing beneath the gloomy mouths of metal. It extended its bony hands to the tongues of the bells and swung them from side to side, but while they appeared to strike vigorously they seemed as if muffled, and sent out only a low, musical roar, as if they were rung by the wind. Was the murderer abroad on those nights? Did he, too, see that black shadow of his victim in the belfry sounding an alarm to the sleeping town and appealing to be avenged? It may be. At ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner
... diverted from the thread of his own reminiscences by the fact that the little flax-wheel of Peninnah Penelope Anne had ceased to whirl, and the low musical monody of its whir that was wont to bear a pleasant accompaniment to the burden of his thoughts was suddenly silent. He lifted his eyes and saw that she was gazing dreamily into the flare of the great fire, the spinning-wheel still, the ...
— The Frontiersmen • Charles Egbert Craddock
... be autumn, mellow, mystical; You can be winter with a cheerful hearth; You can be March, bitter, bright and hard, Pouring sharp sleet, and showering cutting hail; You can be April of the flying cloud, And intermittent sun and musical air. I am not you while being you, While finding in myself so much of you. It tears my other self, which is not you. My tragedy is this: I do not love you. Your tragedy is this: my other self Which triumphs over you, you hate at heart. ...
— Toward the Gulf • Edgar Lee Masters
... mellower and mellower it grew. He had never before heard anyone whistle so beautifully. It was like a song, but it was evident that someone was entering their happy valley, and in that wilderness who could come but an enemy? Nearer and nearer the whistler drew and the musical note of the whistling and its ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... out, bareheaded, with a spade in his hands. In front of the door there was a small cultivated patch containing potatoes, peas and other forms of green stuff, and here he proceeded to busy himself, trimming, weeding and arranging, singing the while in a powerful though not very musical voice. He was all engrossed in his work, with his back to the cottage, when there emerged from the half-open door the same attenuated creature whom I had seen in the morning. I could perceive now that he was a man of sixty, wrinkled, bent, and feeble, with sparse, grizzled hair, and long, ...
— Danger! and Other Stories • Arthur Conan Doyle
... being absorbed in the contemplation of his own splendid future. At last he seemed to recollect her presence at his side, glanced at her, made as though to say something, checked himself, and began humming snatches from an old opera. But either his musical memory did not serve him, or his humour changed all at once, for he suddenly was silent again, and after glancing once more at Vjera's downcast face his ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... The objectification of musical forms is due to their fixity and complexity: like words, they are thought of as existing in a social medium, and can be beautiful without being spatial. But tastes have never been so accurately or universally classified and distinguished; the instrument of sensation does not allow such nice and ...
— The Sense of Beauty - Being the Outlines of Aesthetic Theory • George Santayana
... understand why. Surely, she was no longer fearful of him. She leaned closer to her young mistress, seated at a low writing table, and whispered in her ear. Rafaela threw back her head and laughed—a low, musical laugh that sounded fascinatingly pleasant in Jack's ...
— The Radio Boys on the Mexican Border • Gerald Breckenridge
... a glimpse of this young Mistress Doreen, for whom lances are already being shattered in the lists of youth. The O'Lones regard themselves as the landed aristocracy of the Elk-trail District. And Doreen O'Lone impresses me as a very musical appellative. Yet I prefer to keep my kin free from all entangling alliances, even though they have to do ...
— The Prairie Child • Arthur Stringer
... her mother would throw the window open, letting in the delicious perfume from the strawberry bed next door, and the joyous morning hymns of the little birds, and then, if Lillie had come all at once, 'midst the songs of the birds, a small clear musical voice would be heard, singing (for she made a little song of it)—"Al—lie! Al—lie!" Then Alice would give a jump, and answer, imitating her song, "What—ee! What—ee!" and then the bird outside ...
— Baby Nightcaps • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... men compete with one another. There the compensation is the same for equal work. In the highest forms of work women compete on equal terms. In literature women are paid, for books or articles, the same prices that men receive. In art this is true. It is the picture or statue or musical ability that counts. Singers receive as much for the soprano as for the tenor voice. Actresses are paid according to "drawing" power, and woman dancers and acrobats, alas! command ...
— Woman and the Republic • Helen Kendrick Johnson
... had been admitted to the Musical Academy. The Directors of the Industrial School at Stockholm had attempted to form a class, and Professor Quarnstromm had opened his classes at the Academy of Fine Arts to women. Cheered by her sympathy, a female surgeon had sustained herself in Stockholm, and Bishop Argardh indorsed ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... given last evening by Mr. James W. Moore, in the rooms of the Lincoln Literary Musical Association, 132 West Twenty-seventh Street, to Lieutenant H. O. Flipper, of Georgia, the colored cadet who has just graduated at West Point. Mr. Moore has had charge of the sick room of Commodore Garrison since his illness. The chandeliers were decorated with small flags. On a table on ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... vista of apartments and officials. While I waited, a couple of men were attended to so near me that I heard their business. It consisted in obtaining official permission to print the bills and programmes of a musical and variety entertainment. To this end they had brought not only the list of performers and proposed selections, but also the pictures for advertisement, and the music which was to be given. As the rare traveler who can read Russian is already ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... do, and this has been done. But history lends no countenance to such representations. The chroniclers, who refer again and again to his fondness for music, tell us that it showed itself in him under very different associations. "He delighted (as Stowe records) in songs, metres, and musical instruments; insomuch that in his chapel, among his private prayers he used our Lord's prayer, certain psalms of David, with divers hymns and canticles, all which I have seen translated into English metre ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... contact of the bodies meeting and grazing each other at every step. Of all Nature there existed for them only the dying light of the afternoon, which permitted them to behold each other, and the rather warm breeze which, murmuring among the cacti and the palms, seemed to serve as the musical accompaniment to their conversation. At their right rumbled the far-off roar of the sea striking against the rocks. On their left reigned pastoral peace,—the melodious calm of the pines, broken from time ...
— Luna Benamor • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... was clear," he whistled softly in such perfect imitation of a golden plover, that the Harrisons, waiting for that same signal, were not quite sure that it was Yaspard, and no bird. But when the wild musical notes had been repeated three distinct times, they knew that ...
— Viking Boys • Jessie Margaret Edmondston Saxby
... Huntingdonian Professor of Divinity, and one of the acutest, if not soundest academical thinkers of the day. He was a little, prim, smirking, be-spectacled man, bald in front, with curly black hair behind, somewhat pompous in his manner, with a clear musical utterance, which enabled one to listen to him without effort. As a divine, he seemed never to have had any difficulty on any subject; he was so clear or so shallow, that he saw to the bottom of all his thoughts: or, since Dr. Johnson tells us that "all shallows are clear," ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman
... metre of the original, the musical movement and modulation, has, as far as the translator's ear enabled him to judge, been followed with minute exactness, and at no inconsiderable expense, in some cases, of time and labour. It would be superfluous, therefore, to state, that the number of lines in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... thus, three soldiers, and then six captives, and so on, observing always the same order. Then followed the citizens, and, after them, all the religious orders. The procession was enlivened by a great variety of dances and similar exhibitions, accompanied by various musical instruments and two portable organs. Toward the end of the procession came four floats, so made as to form a sort of doubly-sloping roof. On the float were placed [the sacred things] which the Mindanaos had plundered: on each slope lay the chasuble, choristers' mantles, frontals, and other sacred ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 27 of 55) • Various
... old. There are many modern contrivances that are of as early date as the first man, if not thousands of centuries older. Everybody knows how all the arrangements of our telescopes and microscopes are anticipated in the eye, and how our best musical instruments are surpassed by the larynx. But there are some very odd things any anatomist can tell, showing how our recent contrivances are anticipated in the human body. In the alimentary canal are certain pointed eminences called villi, and certain ridges called valvuloe conniventes. ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... few words, the meaning which it gives them may be better divined by us according to the tone and the rapidity or slowness of its utterance. This permits us to discover the feelings that move it, for we can better judge from an articulate sound than from one that is merely musical. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various
... and looked straight in front of her. For some time they had been seated on a bench in a retired part of the gardens, and the laughter of playing children, the music of the band playing the merriest airs from the last musical comedy, came faintly to their ears. "I think it does matter," said the girl, seriously; "for some reason my father wants to keep himself as quiet as possible. He talks ...
— The Opal Serpent • Fergus Hume
... home, her instincts—all had kept her apart. Her knowledge of young lovers was but literary, and this particular young lover presented a side which soon laid deep hold on her confidence. They studied Italian together. He was musical, she was poetic, and he gracefully fitted her sonnets to melodies. Finally, it seemed that the great Song of Life had brought them together to complete one of its harmonies. Her confidence grew to ...
— Our Nervous Friends - Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness • Robert S. Carroll
... the remarkable female figure intently watching him from under a corner of the gallery, and occasionally shaking a fist at him, Mr. BUMSTEAD attends to the musical part of the service with as much artistic accuracy as a hasty head-bath and a glass of soda-water are capable of securing. The worshippers are too busy with risings, kneelings, bowings, and miscellaneous devout gymnastics, to heed his casual imperfections, and his headache makes ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2, No. 29, October 15, 1870 • Various
... on the Centipede Ranch that housed the treasure, and in company with Willie, made his way to the ponies. Two other figures joined them, one humming in a musical baritone the strains of the song ...
— Going Some • Rex Beach
... gentlemanly and pleasant and had a nice voice. I knew his frank manner and evident affection for Uncle Max prepossessed me in his favour; he had been very athletic in his college days, and was passionately fond of boating and cricket, and he was very musical and sang splendidly. ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... bright and soft colours. Let not these occupy my soul; let God rather occupy it, who made these things, very good indeed, yet is He my good, not they. And these affect me, waking, the whole day, nor is any rest given me from them, as there is from musical, sometimes in silence, from all voices. For this queen of colours, the light, bathing all which we behold, wherever I am through the day, gliding by me in varied forms, soothes me when engaged on other things, and not observing it. And so strongly doth it entwine itself, that if ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... this he alleged the following example:—"Let us suppose," said he, "that any one would be thought a good musician, without being so in reality; what course must he take? He must be careful to imitate the great masters in everything that is not of their art; he must, like them, have fine musical instruments; he must, like them, be followed by a great number of persons wherever he goes, who must be always talking in his praise. And yet he must not venture to sing in public: for then all men would immediately perceive ...
— The Memorable Thoughts of Socrates • Xenophon
... on the other side of him he heard a voice, a sweet and rather high voice, with a musical intensity of inflection that was as English as ...
— The Palace of Darkened Windows • Mary Hastings Bradley
... time the "bridge of lights" was used on any stage. Lighting has always been to me more than mere illumination. It is a revelation of the heart and soul of the story. It points the way. Lights should be to the play what the musical accompaniment is to the singer. A wordless story could be told by lights. Lights should be mixed as a painter mixes his colours—a bit of pink here, of blue there; a touch of red, a lavender or a deep purple, with shadows intervening to give the desired effect. Instead ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm • David Belasco
... soul, repellant and ugly and immoral. On the contrary, all the great works of literature have shown us dark shades of life beside the light ones. They have spoken of unhappiness and pain as often as of joy. We have suffered with our poets, and in so far as the musical composer expresses the emotions of life the great symphonies have been full of pathos and tragedy. True art has always been selection, but never selection of the ...
— The Photoplay - A Psychological Study • Hugo Muensterberg
... Table Rock, formerly one of the most celebrated points about Niagara, that Mrs. Lydia Huntley Sigourney wrote her spirited eulogy on Niagara, which commences with the musical rhymes: ...
— By Water to the Columbian Exposition • Johanna S. Wisthaler
... felt that from the first,"—replied Manuel in his soft musical voice, "I was all alone when my lord the Cardinal found me,- -but with him the ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... sestet, played alone, may be a maddening torture to a person whose musical imagination is not equal to supplying the other four. Perhaps you have heard Haydn, Op. 1704, and rejoiced in the logical consecutiveness of its fugues, the indisputableness of its well-classified statements, the swift pertinence of the repartees of the first violin to the second, the apt resume ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... policy formulated by the first secretary of the institution. He was the author of that provision in the act establishing the Smithsonian Institution, which called for the presentation of one copy of every copyrighted book, map, and musical composition, to the Institution and to the Congressional Library.[594] He became a member of the board of regents and retained the office until ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... Story with a musical atmosphere. A picturesque, old German virtuoso is the reverent possessor of a genuine Cremona. He consents to take as his pupil a handsome youth who proves to have an aptitude for technique, but not the soul of ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... the thunder of its drumming on the tin roof. The onslaughts were as fierce and abrupt as those of Cossacks, and swept by as suddenly. The roar died away in the distance, and we could then hear the steady musical dripping of waters. ...
— The Land of Footprints • Stewart Edward White
... was as musical as a band of troubadours, and while that brought them into constant requisition and gave them an importance in the town, it yet caused them to be held with a certain cheapness. Music as an end of existence and means of livelihood was lightly estimated by the followers ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... churchwarden with a dignity and confidence that would have become the Old Guard. But no fierce passage of arms followed; there was a pause, and if a dignified ending were desired the interview should here have ended. But to ordinary mortals the sound of their own voices is so musical as to deaden any sense of anticlimax; talking is continued for talking's sake, and heroics tail off into desultory conversation. Both sides were conscious that they had overstated their sentiments, and were content to ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... it was written in a blind rage, which he now regretted. All this shows how carefully he looked after the young man's welfare. It was the same with his music, which was intrusted to Czerny. The youth inherited some musical talent and under favoring conditions might have achieved something as a musician. When the instruction began, Beethoven was in the habit of calling at Czerny's house nearly every day with his nephew. On these occasions ...
— Beethoven • George Alexander Fischer
... was by no means the end of the matter. The agent-in-advance of one of the touring musical-comedy companies of Lionel Belmont, the famous Anglo-American manager, was in Hanbridge during that week, and after seeing Milly in the piece he telegraphed to Liverpool, where his company was, and the next day the manager visited Hanbridge ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... pillows, covered with choice embroidered cloths of Calabria, soft ottomans and easy couches, tables loaded with implements of female luxury, musical instruments, drawings, and splendidly illuminated rolls of the amatory bards and poetesses of the Egean islands, completed the picture of the boudoir of ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... lovelier day of all the years of days for Florence than May-day. On that day everybody is or seems to be happy; on that day the streets of the city are as musical as the courses of the spheres. Youths and maidens, garlanded and gayly raimented, go about fifing and piping, and trolling the chosen songs of spring. I think if a stranger should chance to visit Florence for the first time on a ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... hated Tigellius, the flattering musical buffoon so well described by Horace, thus lashes his country in a letter to Fabius Gallus: ‘Id ego in lucris pono non ferre hominem pestilentiorem putriâ suâ.’ Again, writing to his brother: ‘Remember,’ says he, ‘though in perfect health, you are in Sardinia.’ ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... PIANOFORTES, at 25 Guineas each. Every instrument warranted. The peculiar advantages of these pianofortes are best described in the following professional testimonial, signed by the majority of leading musicians of the age:—"We, the undersigned members of the musical profession, having carefully examined the Royal Pianofortes manufactured by MESSRS. D'ALMAINE & CO., have great pleasure in bearing testimony to their merits and capabilities. It appears to us impossible to produce ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 234, April 22, 1854 • Various
... at the speech. The mutilated Anglo-Saxon caused her almost physical pain, yet the voice was musical enough and deep ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... best in the diocese. The choirmaster and organist, John Richardson, was a distinguished composer of Catholic church music, and held in such high esteem that, for any important celebration, he could always secure the services of the chief members of the musical profession in and about Liverpool. In this way, on one occasion Miss Santley came to help us. She was accompanied by her brother, then a boy, who has since risen to the highest position in the musical world—the eminent ...
— The Life Story of an Old Rebel • John Denvir
... low, musical little laugh. "I don' think he no hurt you anyway," she said. "Now he know ...
— The Oakdale Affair • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... with a degree of indignation and awe, to the service. She felt her heart swelling with grief at the sight of this other woman being made her father's wife and put in the place of her own mother, and yet, as a musical refrain is the haunting and ever-recurrent part of a composition, so was her own charming appearance. She felt so sure that people were observing her, that she blushed and dared not look around. She was, in reality, much observed, and ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... a stone, its colour, light, quality, he enjoyed like a poet. Many with a child's delight in pure colours, have no feeling for the melodies of their arrangement, or the harmonies of their mingling. So are there some capable of delight in a single musical tone, who have but little reception for melody or complicate harmony. Whether a condition analogical might not be found in the moral world, and contribute to the explanation of such as Mr. Burns, I may ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... to answer. Of course you received my answer. I rejoice that you have persevered, and succeeded in finding the object I have so long sought. Not hearing from you for so many weeks, I had begun to fear she had gone forever," says the lady, in a soft, musical voice, raising her white, delicate hand to her cheek, ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... right off yere, when I think about it," and he laid his hand on his heart, "but I'd better be shufflin' off home, an' I'll tell you a heap more sometime," and as he went through the yard, I heard him singing "dat New Je-ru-sa-lem," prolonging the last word, as if it was too musical to lose. ...
— The Harvest of Years • Martha Lewis Beckwith Ewell
... had changed. There was a remarkable darkness of colour on it, and the brow was more contracted. 'Madame, madame,' said Rigaud, tapping her on the arm, as if his cruel hand were sounding a musical instrument, 'I perceive I interest you. I perceive I awaken your ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... Gallery.—This is the most beautiful gallery of its kind to be found in England, its twelve decorated niches containing figures of musicians. The musical instruments represented include the cittern, bagpipe, hautboy, crowth, harp, trumpet, organ, guitar, tambour, and cymbals, with two others which are uncertain. The tinted figures of the angels, standing ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Exeter - A Description of Its Fabric and a Brief History of the Episcopal See • Percy Addleshaw
... is in the best preservation, but the northern one is of greatest interest because for ages it was believed to give forth musical notes when the first rays of the rising sun fell on its lips. The Greeks called it the Statue of Memnon, and invented the fable that Memnon, who was slain at Troy by Achilles, appeared on the Nile as a stone image and ...
— The Critic in the Orient • George Hamlin Fitch
... right." He sought in the pockets of the coat he carried slung across his shoulder and brought out a packet of food. "I laid in some fuel when I thought I might get the chance to run my own engine across the mountains," he told the girl, opening his bundle and dividing evenly. He uttered a few musical words ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... of the foreign display the American visitor returned proudly to the display made by his own land. Textiles, metal work, arms and tools, musical instruments, watches, carriages, cutlery, books, and furniture—a bewildering array of all things useful and ornamental—made Americans realize as never before the wealth, intelligence, and enterprise of their native country ...
— History of the United States, Volume 4 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... shop of your best apartment. An ink-stand, as large as a show twelfth-cake, is just and lawful; ditto, an ornamental escrutoire; and a necessaire for the work-table is, if there be meaning in language, perfectly necessary. These, with an adequate contingent of musical snuff-boxes, or molu clocks, China figures, alabaster vases and flower-pots, together with a discreet superfluity of cut-paper nondescripts, albums, screens, toys, prints, caricatures, duodecimo classics, new novels ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 382, July 25, 1829 • Various
... student, though closer acquaintance proved him wholly unmoral and rattle-brained. Mr. Higgins possessed a distorted sense of humor and a crooked outlook upon life; while, so far as had been discovered, he owned but two ambitions: one to whip a policeman, the other to write a musical comedy. Neither seemed likely of realization. As for the first, he was narrow-chested and gangling, while a brief, disastrous experience on the college paper had furnished a sad commentary ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... sits, with his face alone visible, his entire person being concealed by black muslin. The screen is stretched across a corner of a room to about the height of the back of the Medium's head, as he sits in front of it. The lights are lowered, and in a few minutes various instruments, musical and otherwise, which had been previously placed on a small table in the corner enclosed by the screen, are heard to sound, a drum is beaten, a guitar is played, etc. The music is interspersed with flashes of hand darting ...
— Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University • The Seybert Commission
... garden in the country all to himself. His idea is somewhere near half an acre of ground. He would like a piano in the best room; it has always been his dream to have a piano. The youngest girl, he is convinced, is musical. As a man who has knocked about the world and has thought, he quite appreciates the argument that by co-operation the material side of life can be greatly improved. He quite sees that by combining a dozen families together in one large house better practical ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... the spirit houses, rice drying frames, and granaries were similar to those seen to-day in all the villages. Likewise the house furnishings, the musical instruments, and even the games of the children were such as are to be found at present, while our picture of the village life given on page 9 still fits nearly any Tinguian settlement in Abra. The animals mentioned are all familiar to the present people, but it ...
— Traditions of the Tinguian: A Study in Philippine Folk-Lore • Fay-Cooper Cole
... of considerable length and of great importance, owing principally to their exquisite versification and diction. Pulci and Boiardo both undertook to depict Roland as a prey to the tender passion in epics entitled Orlando Innamorato, while Ariosto, the most accomplished and musical poet of the three, spent more than ten years of his life composing Orlando Furioso (1516), wherein he depicts this famous hero driven insane by his passion ...
— The Book of the Epic • Helene A. Guerber
... noises when they wish to excite the attention of those who have not the gift of seeing them. These noises consist of sounds in the air, sometimes sudden and sharp, and causing a shock. Sometimes the sounds are plaintive and musical; at other times they resemble the rustling of silk, the falling of sand, or the rolling of a ball. The better spirits are brighter than the bad ones, and their voice is not so strong. Many, particularly ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... Manisty's voice beside her. The tones of it were grave and musical; they expressed an enwrapping kindness, a 'human softness' that still ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... for him at the window, ran up to her room (she could run when alone) and allowed him to be shown into the drawing-room by himself. Aunt William resented automobiles as much as she disliked picture postcards, week-ends, musical comedies, and bridge. ...
— The Twelfth Hour • Ada Leverson
... Hook was born in Charlotte Street, Bedford Square, on the 22d of September, 1788. His father was an eminent musical composer, who "enjoyed in his time success and celebrity"; his elder brother James became Dean of Windsor, whose son is the present learned and eloquent Dean of Chichester; the mother of both was an accomplished lady, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... regretfully. The song of adventure was musical to his ears, but he could not leave with Kahn Meng in the morning. ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... cases there are added all sorts of extraordinary antics in the way of dancings and crowings. Again, in the case of all song-birds, the object of the singing is to please the females; and for this purpose the males rival one another to the best of their musical ability. ...
— Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) • George John Romanes
... "We were always in the habit," wrote Her Majesty, "of conversing with the Highlanders—with whom one comes so much in contact in the Highlands." She loved everything about them—their customs, their dress, their dances, even their musical instruments. "There were nine pipers at the castle," she wrote after staying with Lord Breadalbane; "sometimes one and sometimes three played. They always played about breakfast-time, again during the morning, at luncheon, and also ...
— Queen Victoria • Lytton Strachey
... a leather bag, with a strap fastened round it. "The keys are inside," he explained. "I wore them loose this morning: and they made a fine jingle. Quite musical to my ear. But Mistress thought the noise likely to be a nuisance in the long run. So I strapped them up in a bag to keep them quiet. And when I move about, the bag hangs from my shoulder, like this, by another strap. ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... from Nevers, on the right bank; from Lere, Vailly, Argent, Blancafort, and Aubigny, on the left bank, to be introduced to Madame de la Baudraye, as they used in Switzerland, to be introduced to Madame de Stael. Those who only once heard the round of tunes emitted by this musical snuff-box went away amazed, and told such wonders of Dinah as made all the women jealous for ten ...
— The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... too exciting to let the children fall asleep early. Fires were kept briskly burning, and some of the wagoners feeling in a musical humor, shouted songs or hummed melancholy tunes which sounded like a droning accompaniment to the rain. The rain fell with a continuous murmur, and evidently in slender threads, for it scarcely pattered on the tent. It was no beating, boisterous, ...
— Old Caravan Days • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... intellectual, but without the power of sight, brought up in darkness, receiving impressions solely by hearing and touch. Suppose him introduced into a room such as mine, and endeavouring to form an impression of the kind of creature who inhabited it. Chairs, tables, even a musical instrument he could interpret; but what would he make of a writing-table and its apparatus? How would he guess at the use of a picture? Strangest of all, what would he think of books? He would find in my room hundreds of curious oblong objects, opening with a sort of hinge, and containing ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... that tones and overtones, which should assist each other, mingle in jarring confusion. Indeed, when the parlor is large and high, a genuine pipe-organ built in a recess and harmonizing in finish with the woodwork of the room is not only the finest decoration possible, but the most appropriate musical instrument. Those families who possess an old-fashioned piano, such as thin and tinkly "square," are advised to have it overhauled and refinished by a competent piano-repairer, and preserved, if only for practice by the children. In case such an instrument has "overstrung" wires, it can be ...
— Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife • Marion Mills Miller
... that are human and not personal, with emotions that do not belong to periods in the development of individual minds, but to all men in all years, wins the gratitude and love of whoever can read the language which he makes musical with solace and aspiration. The present volume, while it will confirm Mr. Longfellow's claim to the high rank he has won among lyric poets, deserves attention also as proving him to possess that faculty of epic narration which is rarer ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... venerable men whom he had met in the house of Justinus, and who sang the praises of his intelligence and eagerness to learn. As a boy he had been a diligent scholar, and here he let no opportunity slip. Not least had he cultivated his musical talents in the Imperial city, and had acquired a rare mastery in singing and playing ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... in the singing of German hymns. The portions of the Liturgy, however, which were sung partly by the priests and partly by the choir, were still conducted in Latin. Luther now introduced a complete service in German, changing here and there the old form. To assist him in the musical alterations required, the Elector sent him two musicians from Torgau. With one of these in particular, John Walter, Luther worked with diligence, and continued afterwards on terms of friendly intercourse. He himself composed a few pieces ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... (1816-1876), Austrian composer and historian of music, was born at Mauth near Prague. His father was a cultured man, and his mother was the sister of R. G. Kiesewetter (1773-1850), the musical archaeologist and collector. Ambros was well educated in music and the arts, which were his abiding passion: but he was destined for the law and an official career in the Austrian civil service, and he occupied various important posts under the ministry of justice, music being the employment ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... as he knew it would, for he had kept his secret well. Thorn laid his hand involuntarily upon his rifle, Dick drew off a little, and Flint illustrated one of his own expressions, for he "gawped." Phil laughed that musical laugh of his, and looked up at them with his dark face waking into sudden life as ...
— On Picket Duty and Other Tales • Louisa May Alcott
... Figs., 25-28, in Plate I., sufficiently express themselves. The last belongs to one of the Charterhouse boys, the others respectively to a musical critic, to a clergyman, and to a gentleman who is, I believe, now ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... The musical intonation of her voice, chiming in with the melodious images that then filled the goldsmith's busy brain, impressed him so pleasantly that he turned, and saw that the damsel was holding a cow by a tether, ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... wasted on me. I liked some of the familiar airs and choruses, but all opera needs far more make-believe than I am capable of. It is a pity that I am so insensible to the youngest and the most progressive of the fine arts. I am, however, in the good company of Mrs. Oliphant, who, speaking of the musical parties in Eton, where she lived so long, for the education of tier boys, writes in words that suit me perfectly: "In one of these friends' houses a family quartet played what were rather new and ...
— An Autobiography • Catherine Helen Spence
... Miss Magruder is always sure of its welcome and When Half-Gods Go will find for her even a wider audience than she has hitherto enjoyed. It is a fascinating story of social and musical life in New York, full of human interest and those happy touches Miss Magruder can do so well. The title is from Emerson's lines "When half-gods go the gods arrive." In addition to its charm as a story the publishers think this book will be presented in the handsomest dress ever bestowed upon ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... around was this cradle of snow, and there was firm snow underfoot, that struck with heavy cold through her boot-soles. It was night, and silence. She imagined she could hear the stars. She imagined distinctly she could hear the celestial, musical motion of the stars, quite near at hand. She seemed like a bird flying ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... half-grown boy—with two canoes and armed with rifles. The Indians gave us the hearty welcome of the wilderness and received us like old friends. First, the chief, whose name was Toma, shook our hand, then the others, laughing and all talking at once in their musical Indian tongue. It was a welcome that said: "You are our brothers. You have come far to see us, and we are glad ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... marked with underscores. Text in bold is marked with equal signs. The musical flat symbols on the cover page ...
— Twelve Preludes for the Pianoforte Op. 25 - I. Prelude in F Major • N. Louise Wright
... was molting for the musical comedy lost his last feather and the company broke up. The ponies trotted away and I was left in the window ownerless. The janitor gave me to a refined comedy team on the eighth floor, and in six weeks I had been set in the window of five different flats I ...
— Waifs and Strays - Part 1 • O. Henry
... a pity that a larger audience could not have been there to enjoy this skilful duet, for it held me hanging on every musical word of it. There, at the far back end of the long room, I sat alone at my table, pretending to be engaged over a sandwich that was no more in existence—external, I mean—and a totally empty cup of chocolate. I lifted the cup, and bowed over the plate, and used the paper Japanese napkin, and generally ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... All men seem'd mad to him, 85 Their actions noisome folly, and their talk— A goose's gabble was more musical. Nature had made him for some other planet, And press'd his soul into a human shape By accident or malice. In this world 90 ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... offered by Abbot Academy were very superior to anything in the region, and the building was considered commodious and elegant." French and German were taught by Dr. William Gottlieb Schauffler, whose romantic history and extraordinary musical gifts had already attracted much personal interest, and whose after career has made his name a household word from the shores of the German Ocean to the Stairs of the Bosphorus. Who wonders that he was a hero to ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, February, 1886. - The Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 2, February, 1886. • Various
... good news," Natalie said in a low voice. Her tones were soft, musical; her manner caressing. Happiness was in her whole bearing, tenderness in her eyes. Dread oppressed me. "Herbert is ...
— The Crack of Doom • Robert Cromie
... placing the covered body of the king with that of his queen on that excellent bier decked out so brightly, they caused it to be carried on human shoulders. With the white umbrella (of state) held over the hearse with waving yak-tails and sounds of various musical instruments, the whole scene looked bright and grand. Hundreds of people began to distribute gems among the crowd on the occasion of the funeral rites of the king. At length some beautiful robes, and white umbrellas and larger yak-tails, were brought for the great ceremony. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... happier sounds: ducks are quacking; geese are honking; waveys are cackling as they fly northward; squirrels among the spruce trees chatter noisily; on sandy ridges woodchucks whistle excitedly; back deep in the birch thicket partridges are drumming, and all the woodland is musical with the song ...
— The Drama of the Forests - Romance and Adventure • Arthur Heming
... more beautiful and acceptable are its results. For example, sounds proceeding from vibrations wherein the strokes and pauses are in invariable relation are such sounds as we denominate musical. Accordingly all sounds are musical at a sufficient distance, since the most irregular undulations are, in a long journey through the air, wrought to an equality, and made subject to exact law,—as in this universe all irregularities are sure to be in the end. Thus, the thunder, which near at hand ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various
... musical chords are tensioned To sentiments they should express, And touched by a master artist Whose deft hand gives the proper stress, The effect is so ecstatic When vibrations fall on the ear, The soul stands in silent rapture, And our ...
— Our Profession and Other Poems • Jared Barhite
... Richard Carvel himself. Well," says he, "I know one who will sleep easier o' nights now,—one Clapsaddle. The gray hairs are forgot, Daniel. We had more to-do over your disappearance than when Mr. Worthington lost his musical nigger. Where a deuce ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Autolycus Club and sat down to lunch. Everything else in Joseph's life was arranged with similar preciseness, so far as was possible with the duties of a City editor. Monday evening Joseph spent with musical friends at Brixton. Friday was Joseph's theatre night. On Tuesdays and Thursdays he was open to receive invitations out to dinner; on Wednesdays and Saturdays he invited four friends to dine with him at Regent's Park. On Sundays, whatever the season, Joseph Loveredge took ...
— Tommy and Co. • Jerome K. Jerome
... bowings and scrapings that are truly comical. He spreads his tail, he puffs out his breast, he throws back his head and then bends his body to the right and to the left, uttering all the while a curious musical hiccough. The female confronts him unmoved, but whether her attitude is critical or defensive, I cannot tell. Presently she flies away, followed by her suitor or suitors, and the little comedy is enacted on another stump or tree. Among all the woodpeckers the drum plays an ...
— Bird Stories from Burroughs - Sketches of Bird Life Taken from the Works of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... a man, let us say, who is writing a musical selection. He works in a veritable frenzy, and all else seems negligible for the time. He well-nigh disdains food and sleep in the intensity of his interest. Is this particular episode in his life merely happening, or does some ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson
... musical science is to be effected by indecent tableaux vivans—by rattling peas against sieves, and putting out the lights (appropriately enough) when Beethoven is being murdered—by the most contemptible class ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... one to the other of the little party with keen eyes. "It is well," he said, in his clear, musical voice. "All here, none missing, not even the little one with a face like night. The Little Tiger's heart was heavy with fear lest he should come too late. But neither the jackal's tribe nor the spirits of the night have ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... in low, musical tones, but they could not discover the least trace of feeling, the least idea in the sweet sounds that they had ...
— Farewell • Honore de Balzac
... perhaps, Mason is justified in looking upon the great inventor as "an epitome of the genius of the world." To develop a Krag-Joergensen from a bow and arrow, a "velvet-tipped" lucifer match from the primitive fire-stick, or a modern piano from the first crude, stringed, musical instrument has involved much the same intellectual processes as have been operative in transforming fetishism and magic into religion and philosophy, or scattered ...
— The Measurement of Intelligence • Lewis Madison Terman
... are apt to describe the rural scenes among which their characters play their parts, but seldom leave any impression of the places described. Even in poetry how often does this occur? The words used are pretty, well chosen, perhaps musical to the ear, and in that way befitting; but unless the spot has violent characteristics of its own, such as Burley's cave or the waterfall of Lodore, no striking portrait is left. Nor are we disappointed as we read, because we have not been taught to expect it to be otherwise. So it is with those ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope
... certainly was, as Hannah said, "musical to hear 'em." Joe had a cornstalk fiddle, and Eben an old singing book, which Diana read over his shoulder while she kept on knitting her blue sock; and the three youngsters—Sam, Obed, and Betty—with wide mouths and intent eyes, followed Diana's "lining ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... musical and clear, her mouth small and smiling, her body round and vigorous. Removing her wraps, she rubbed her ruddy cheeks briskly with her little hands, red with the cold, and walking lightly and quickly she passed into the room, the heels of her shoes ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... the husband, wrapped in white muslin, lies upon the funeral pile. At the moment that the victim throws herself upon the corpse, the wood is lighted on all sides. At the same time, a deafening noise is commenced with musical instruments, and every one begins to shout and sing, in order to smother the howling of the poor woman. After the burning, the bones are collected, placed in an urn, and interred upon some eminence under a small monument. Only the wives (and of these ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... musical ripple of laughter. So pretty Minnehaha must have laughed when Longfellow caught the sound in his charmed brain. She put up her dagger. She raised Jeanne, wondering, but no longer afraid. This was the miracle she had prayed for and it ...
— A Little Girl in Old Detroit • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... around cast over the surface of that young life an abiding gloom. A melancholy child! What an anomaly among the harmonies of the universe; something as incongruous as a bird drooping in a cage, or a flower in a sepulchre. The musical laughter muffled and broken; the spontaneous smile transformed to a sad suspicion; and the austerities of mature life, the fearful speculation, and forecast of evil, fixed and frozen on a boy's face! And then the sorrow of a child is so absorbing—for he lives only in the present. In the afflictions ...
— Humanity in the City • E. H. Chapin
... answer in which (being earnestly questioned) she unrolled before their eyes a Divine Perspective,—as an organ fills a church with sonorous sound and reveals a musical universe, its solemn tones rising to the loftiest arches and playing, like light, upon their foliated capitals,—Wilfrid returned to his own room, awed by the sight of a world in ruins, and on those ruins the brilliance of mysterious lights ...
— Seraphita • Honore de Balzac
... there once stood a gold clock, which, ever since the invention of clocks, had been the measure of time for the people of that village. They were proud of its beauty, its workmanship, its musical stroke, and the unfailing regularity with which it heralded the passing hours. This clock had been endeared to all the inhabitants of the village by the hallowed associations with which it was identified. Generation after generation it had called the children from far and wide to attend the ...
— American Eloquence, Volume IV. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various
... say in conclusion: Consult the revised version of the Bible for meaning, but read the old one for style. It is a treasury of musical and vigorous Saxon, a well of strong English undefiled; although Hebrew is a poor language, and the Greek of the New Testament is perhaps the worst ever written. But do not think, as Macaulay pretended, that the language of the Bible is sufficient for every purpose. It sustained ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (First Series) • George W. Foote
... resorted to, many more, in fact, than landsmen have any idea of; a vast amount of reading is done; there are sure to be one or two on board who know how to spin a yarn with due effect; some are musical, and others can sing. Concerts, lectures, theatricals, and dances are got up; while, as there is generally a due admixture of the sexes, not a little flirting and downright courting is carried on; and, lastly, if there is any quarrelling and bickering, the differences of those who engage ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... Frau B., she told me to write myself. She tells all her pupils to do that. I would rather have had Hella's music mistress. But she has no time to spare and I think she charges more. At least she wouldn't always be holding me up "Fraulein Dora" as a model. We are not all so musical as Fraulein Dora. In the evening Inspee was reading a great fat book until 10 or 12 o clock and she simply howled over it. She said she had not, but I heard her and she could hardly speak. She says ...
— A Young Girl's Diary • An Anonymous Young Girl
... roving-eyed matrons in kolinsky capes are wont to congregate to sip pale amber drinks. Actors grew to recognize the semi-bald head and the shining, round, good-natured face looming out at them from the dim well of the parquet, and sometimes, in a musical show, they directed a quip at him, and he liked it. He could pick out the critics as they came down the aisle, and even had a nodding acquaintance with two ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... the next that she should have the mind of an angel; the third that she should be perfectly graceful; the fourth that she should dance admirably well; the fifth, that she should sing like a nightingale; the sixth, that she should play charmingly upon every musical instrument. The turn of the old fairy had now come, and she declared, while her head shook with malice, that the princess should pierce her hand with a spindle and die of the wound. This dreadful fate threw all the company into tears of dismay, when the young fairy who had ...
— Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... Somersetshire about 1562. After being organist in Hereford cathedral, he joined the Chapel Royal in 1585, and in the next year became a Mus. Bac. of Oxford. In 1591 he was appointed organist in Queen Elizabeth's chapel in succession to Blitheman, from whom he had received his musical education. In 1592 he received the degree of doctor of music at Cambridge University; and in 1596 he was made music professor at Gresham College, London. As he was unable to lecture in Latin according to the foundation-rules ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... next room my mother asked me to show her what I could play on the piano, wisely hoping to divert my father's thoughts by the sound. I played Ueb' immer Treu und Redlichkeit, and my father said to her, 'Is it possible he has musical talent?' ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... of noise at the Front!" said her husband. "Possibly I've got used to artillery preparation; anyhow, it strikes me as a small thing compared to my trio when they get going with assorted musical instruments. How is your small ...
— Captain Jim • Mary Grant Bruce
... policeman is said to have written two successful musical comedies. If we remember rightly it was an English policeman who first composed the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Dec. 26, 1917 • Various
... choreography he turned to look at his crew. And at the turning, as if on signal, on musical cue, Tom and Frank began the pantomime of urging Louie to his feet. Louie looked at the two standing men alternately. With bloodless lips he tried to grin wryly, apologetically, for what his nervous system was doing to his body against ...
— Eight Keys to Eden • Mark Irvin Clifton
... one of which proceeds to battle at a time, all the rest waiting the result of this charge before they proceed to join battle. While marching to give battle, it passes all imagination to conceive the prodigious noise made by innumerable musical instruments after their fashion, which fill the ears of their soldiers and encourage them to fight; while in the mean time a great number of men run before with artificial fireworks[114]. At last they give the onset with ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... dim light I could just distinguish in the background, reclining against the wall, a youth with a guitar, from which two chords—always the same two chords—were strummed. The boy seemed in a trance over this musical composition, and even our appearance had not disturbed his efforts. He had taken no notice whatever of us. Dinner was prepared—it took a long time—the musician all the time delighting his admiring family with the ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... soon forget her. Her name was Rita Sohlberg. She was the wife of Harold Sohlberg, a Danish violinist who was then living in Chicago, a very young man; but she was not a Dane, and he was by no means a remarkable violinist, though he had unquestionably the musical temperament. ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... though with a little nervousness. "Be just a wee bit careful with the flashlight—about turning it toward the window, I mean—and read in your nice low voice. I always like poetry best when it's almost whispered. I think it sounds more musical that ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... gown. Brutus says, "Give me the gown," and asks where his (Lucius's) musical instrument is, and Lucius replies that it's here in the tent. Brutus notices that he speaks drowsily. "Poor knave, I blame thee not, thou are o'er-watched." He tells him to call Claudius and some other of his men: "I'd have them sleep on cushions in my ...
— The Rising of the Court • Henry Lawson
... outlines of mountain tops covered with snow; pretty villages which from time to time showed themselves at the mountain's foot; the crystalline sheet of water; pure and peculiarly agreeable air, which I breathed with exhilaration; the musical carols of an infinity of birds; a sky of extraordinary purity; behind me the plash of water stirred by the round-ended paddle which was wielded with ease by a superb woman (with marvellous eyes and a complexion browned by the ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch
... the past Triennial Musical Festivals for which Birmingham is so famous, the performances, and the many great artistes who have taken part therein, will ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell
... music, mingled with talk perhaps about the Bridgewater family, while Mrs. Milton sat by and listened? And would not the old Scrivener come down from his room to see Mr. Lawes, and bring out his choicest old music-books, and almost set aside his son in managing the visit for musical delight? So one fancies, and therefore keeps to the interrogative form as the safest; but the fancy here is really the most exact possible apprehension of the facts as they are on record. Lawes's friendship with ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... time," I said. "I shall have lots of good hermiting before that happens. I shall have my breakfasts quite alone and nobody will ask me to go to Mrs. Latimer's musical afternoon in London, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 18, 1914 • Various
... his door open a little way, and the boys could see him quite plainly. They saw him take off the wrapper, and disclose a small white box. This he opened and, as he took the cover off, there dropped out something that gave a musical clang. ...
— Jack Ranger's Western Trip - From Boarding School to Ranch and Range • Clarence Young
... hive, twenty or thirty thousand bees each striving to get out first; it is as when the dam gives way and lets the waters loose; it is a flood of bees which breaks upward into the air, and becomes a maze of whirling black lines to the eye and a soft chorus of myriad musical sounds to the ear. This way and that way they drift, now contracting, now expanding, rising, sinking, growing thick about some branch or bush, then dispersing and massing at some other point, till finally they ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs
... the gentleman you would go to see is very agreeable and good humoured.(1044) He has some very Pretty children, and a sensible, learned man that lives with him, one Dr. Thirlby,(1045) whom, I believe you know. The master of the house plays extremely well on the bass-viol, and has generally other musical people with him. He knows a good deal of the private history of a late ministry; and, my dear George, you love memoires. Indeed, as to personal acquaintance with any of the court beauties, I can't say you will find your account in him ; but, to make amends, he is perfectly master of all ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... eight beautiful damsels, and a splendid furious elephant, golden and silver jars, filled with water, covered with Udumbara branches and various lotus flowers, besides a white jewelled chourie, a white splendid parasol, a white bull, a white horse, all manner of musical instruments and bards.{HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS} In the preceding chapter {HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS} there are mentioned two white chouries instead of one, and all kinds of seeds, perfumes and jewels, a scimitar, ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI |
