"Quaver" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in Mrs. Markham's drawing-room, except the hiss of a light, quick breath and the intake and outgo of a heavier, slower one. And so suddenly, with such smothered intensity, that Norcross started in his seat, Mrs. Markham's voice emitted the first quaver of a musical note. She held it for a moment, before she began to hum over and over three bars of an old tune—"Wild roamed an Indian maid, bright Alfaretta." Thrice she hummed it, still sitting with her hand over her ...
— The House of Mystery • William Henry Irwin
... cut-throats by shooting down their comrades and leaders, and never offering to hide or fly, Slade showed that he was a man of peerless bravery. No coward would dare that. Many a notorious coward, many a chicken-livered poltroon, coarse, brutal, degraded, has made his dying speech without a quaver in his voice and been swung into eternity with what looked liked the calmest fortitude, and so we are justified in believing, from the low intellect of such a creature, that it was not moral courage that enabled him to do it. Then, if moral courage is not the requisite ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... when brought home to Cornelia, never failed to affect her. If she had been planning the destruction of an enemy, she would have wept bitterly at the sight of that enemy's dead body; nay, even at a vivid account of his death. Sophie's words brought tears to her eyes at once, and a quaver into her voice. ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... quaver in my voice, "the only families that I know are dining with friends of their own, whom I do not know. I feel more homesick to-day than ever before in my life and the idea of eating my Christmas dinner alone fills ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... attempt to describe the service in detail. There was a discouraging droop and quaver in the singing, and the mournful-looking deacon who passed the collection-plate seemed inured to disappointment. The prayer had in it a note of despairing appeal which fell like a cold hand upon one's living soul. It gave one the ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker
... Quarrel malpaco. Quarrel malpaci. Quarry sxtonejo. Quarter (1/4) kvarono. Quarter (district) kvartalo. Quarterly trimonata. Quartern kvarono, kvaronujo. Quartet kvarteto. Quartz kvarco. Quash (repress) premegi. Quash (annul) senigi, nuligi. Quaver trilo. Quay surbordo, bordmarsxejo. Queen regxino. Queer stranga. Quell trankviligi. Quench (extinguish) estingi. Quench (thirst) kvietigi. Querulous malkontenta. Query demando. Query cxu? Quest ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... it?" he laughed, with a little quaver of excitement in his voice, which he had been careful to master in the announcement to the bank president. "We live, pappy; we live and win! Get word to the men to come up here at three o'clock ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... me," said the girl, quietly, with a quaver in her voice. "Give them back to me. Would ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... the other. Its glimmer fell across the bed upon Nick's tousled hair; and when the master-player saw the boy's head upon the pillow he started eagerly, with brightening eyes. "My soul!" he whispered to himself, a little quaver in his tone, "I would have sworn my own desire lied to me, and that he had not come at all! It cannot be—yet, verily, I am not blind. Ma foil it passeth understanding—a freed skylark come back to its cage! I thought we had ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... degree. However in this particular Fortune stood my friend, which does not always happen to the virtuous. For presently I heard a voice which I recognized as that of Mr. Savage, asking, not without a certain quaver ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... the bull fiddle—they umpah ump along. Underneath the quaver and whine of the jazz they beat the time, they make the tuneless rhythm. The feet dancing on the crowded cabaret floor listen cautiously for the trombone, the bassoon and the bull fiddle. They have a liaison with the umpah umps—the ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... help every woman he loves to the exercise of all the rights which hold dignity and happiness for her. He would fight that she might have those rights, if necessary; but he would rather have her lose her voice entirely, than to hear her sound a bass note so long as a demi-semi-quaver. ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb
... with a quaver of comic regret. "Our civilization has so narrowed the times that murder is inexpressibly inconvenient. One thing I might ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... off and sent about to the cafes to earn their keep by singing ragtime songs and dancing buck dances. These two were desperately, pathetically homesick. One of them blinked back the tears when he told us, with the plaintive African quaver in his voice, how long they had been away from their own country and how happy they would be to get ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... wild dwellers were as familiar to him as were the voices of his fellow men; and something in the first hoot of that owl had awakened his suspicions. It did not sound exactly right. There was a false quaver at the end. In a minute the hoot was repeated, still with that ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil
... Your poets are entirely at the disposal of your famous musicians; one declares that he cannot sing without there is in his air the word felicita; the tenor must have tomba; while a third singer can only quaver upon the word catene. The poor bard must make these different whims agree with dramatic situation as well as he can. This is not all; there are actors who will not appear immediately treading the boards of the stage; they must first ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... I mean"—her voice ran into a little laugh with a beatific quaver in it—"I mean Colonel Flitcroft and Mr. Bradbury and Mr. Buckalew, too—we were hemmed in together when Mr. Ladew found us—and, oh, Joe, when that cowardly rush started toward you, those three—I've heard wonderful things in Paris and Naples, cabmen quarrelling and disappointed ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington
... ambled up, with awkward motion, And put his talents to the proof; Upraised his bruised and batter'd hoof, And, with an amiable mien, His master patted on the chin, The action gracing with a word— The fondest bray that e'er was heard! O, such caressing was there ever? Or melody with such a quaver? 'Ho! Martin![6] here! a club, a club bring!' Out cried the master, sore offended. So Martin gave the ass a drubbing,— And so the comedy ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... this, miracles might happen? When the whole earth is vibrant with life, does it not seem to you, Octavie, that heaven might for once relent and give us back our dead?" He spoke very low, advisedly, and impressively. In his voice was an old quaver which was not habitual and there was agitation in every line of his visage. She gazed at him with eyes that were full of supplication and ...
— The Awakening and Selected Short Stories • Kate Chopin
... Postmaster General, is that one resents it in oneself, that in an important opening for a man like being called foolish, one stops all one's thinking-works, and slumps ingloriously, automatically and without a quaver into self-defense. ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... knack of expressing himself clearly. Those concluding words rang like a knell. They even called Watts back from the slumber of unconsciousness; the "chief" stirred himself where he lay on the floor of the cavern, and began to quaver. ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... roof, and so on, changing his place every few minutes, but never losing a note. His favorite perch is the top spire of a pointed tree, low cedar or young pine, where he can bound into the air as already described, spread his wings, and float down, never omitting a quaver. It seems like pure ecstasy; and however critical one may be, he cannot help feeling deep sympathy with the joyous soul that thus expresses itself. With all the wonderful power and variety, the bewitching charm, there is not the "feeling," the ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller
... last time I heard his voice, Captain Marlow. These are the last words he spoke in the hearing of any living human being, sir." At this point the old chap's voice got quite unsteady. "He was afraid the poor brute would jump after him, don't you see?" he pursued with a quaver. "Yes, Captain Marlow. He set the log for me; he—would you believe it?—he put a drop of oil in it too. There was the oil-feeder where he left it near by. The boat-swain's mate got the hose along aft to wash down at half-past ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... little," she admitted. "You see, I—we did not expect you. And"—she laughed the laugh he had heard in his dreams, though it had not always been so tremulous, so like the flutelike quaver of this laugh—"and even now I am not quite ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... a most pathetic quaver in the rendering, and then big Captain Sartell broke down, with a helpless gulp in his voice, and I, who believed myself of too superior and refined a nature to be moved by such tawdry sentiment, was further dismayed to feel the tears gathering ...
— Cape Cod Folks • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... street, where a few startled women and old men had rushed at the first roll of the cannon. As she stood among them, straining her eyes from end to end of the little village, her heart beat in her throat and she could only quaver out ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... never-failing enchantment. Through the pleasant harmonious give-and-take of the other instruments, the voice of his violin vibrated with the throbbing passion of a living thing. His dirty old hand might shake and quaver, but once the neck of the fiddle rested between thumb and forefinger, the seraph who made his odd abiding-place in old Reinhardt's soul sang out in swelling tones and spoke of heavenly things, and of the Paradise where we might live, if we were ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... Aladdin, with a quaver. "Please make me think that if you can, for, God help me, I think I ...
— Aladdin O'Brien • Gouverneur Morris
... was more intensity in Dolly's accents than perhaps anybody knew but Mr. Copley; he had the key; and the low quaver in Dolly's voice did not escape him. He answered without letting himself ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... late before he went to the room allotted him, knowing that he could not hope for sleep. Seated there by his open window he heard the owl's tremolo rise, quaver, and die away in the moonlight; he heard the murmuring plaint of marsh-fowl, and the sea-breeze ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers
... first acquaintance, which he later ceases to deserve; but in the case of Mime I think it is never wholly withdrawn, even when he is shown to be an unmitigated wretch; he is, to begin with, so little, and he has a funny, fetching twist or quaver in his voice, indicated by the notes themselves of his rather mean little sing-song melodies. Alberich's nominal reason for indulging his present passion for hurting—he is haling Mime by the ear—is that the ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... driftwood from the storm of war, in '65. Some of the "boys" had heard him, in a great prayer-meeting in Washington—a city which he always spoke of as his "namesake"—at the time of the great review, say, in his strong voice, with that pathetic quaver in it: "Like as de parched an' weary traveller hangs his harp upon de winder, an' sighs for oysters in de desert, so I longs to res' my soul an' my foot in Mass'chusetts;" and they were so delighted with him that ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 9 • Various
... under his daughter's eye he collected his wits, and, doing his best to assume an agreeable smile, he executed her commands. "Would it please you to receive instruction in our beautiful language?" he inquired, with an appealing quaver. ...
— The American • Henry James
... of her father's room and Grannie's she called, with a quaver in her voice, and a sleepy grunt came out to her. She reached one hand through the door, which was ajar, and took the burning candle. Then she blew out the light with a trembling puff, that had to be twice repeated, and made for ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... to me!" said Mr. Brand, with a little quaver in his voice. "If you have the advantage of ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... with the same large drooping moustache—decidedly worn. He turned pale. This meeting was terrible after all those years, for nothing in the world was so terrible as a scene. They met and crossed hands without a word. Then, with a quaver in his ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... she resumed bravely, trying to clear the quaver in her voice, "and it's so hard for me to explain—and I want you to understand—about—mother, I mean. Mother is dreadfully rude to people at times—she is that way to nearly everyone whom she does not consider smart people." Her young voice grew steadier. "I mean whom ...
— The Lady of Big Shanty • Frank Berkeley Smith
... like a flute, and she and her mother led the little choir. Amy chirped like a cricket, and Jo wandered through the airs at her own sweet will, always coming out at the wrong place with a croak or a quaver that spoiled the most pensive tune. They had always done this from the time they ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... "not unless she should ever want a little antidote for ennui. By the way, mademoiselle, do you thank me for the quaver ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... I know,' she cried, with a little quaver in her voice; 'and there is nothing more terrible on earth than lack of money. If there was a single really civilized country in existence, it would make provision for its women. Every woman should be assured enough to live on, ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... Marcolina from the window. She had turned round; her face betrayed nothing, but there was a slight quaver in her voice which no one ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler
... slipped out before she saw its significance. She might not have perceived it so quickly even then had it not been for the second of hesitation before Drusilla answered and the quaver in ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... the steps; the three witnesses were hidden quite out of his view; so that there was nothing to alarm an honest man in his own house. For all that, he studied his visitor awhile in silence, and when he spoke his voice had a quaver ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... bright-coloured gowns, and the little negroes on the green. Then Mr. Carvel would make them a little speech of thanks and of good-will, and white-haired Johnson of the senior quarters, who had been with my great-grandfather, would start the carol in a quaver. How clear and sweet the melody of those negro voices comes back to me through the generations! And the picture of the hall, loaded with holly and mistletoe even to the great arch that spanned it, with the generous bowls of egg-nog and punch on the mahogany by ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... anything than that Geoffrey was badly hurt," he exclaimed with a quaver in his voice. To the Chinaman, who brought the stranger in, he gave the order, "Get him some supper and tell Fontaine ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... voice was always low and gentle, with a quaver and hesitancy in the utterance; now it was tender and comforting with the comprehension of one in suffering, the extraordinary tact, which the old of his race nearly all come to possess. "Li'l chicken-wing on piece brown ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington
... now," he said to Butler, with a perceptible quaver in his voice. "Just you wait while I go in and tell her ...
— What's-His-Name • George Barr McCutcheon
... same time that she struggled, however, she also surrendered; there was a moment at which she almost dropped the form of stating, of explaining, and threw herself, without violence, only with a supreme pointless quaver that had turned, the next instant, to an intensity of interrogative stillness, upon his general goodwill. His large, settled face, though firm, was not, as she had thought at first, hard; he looked, in the oddest ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume 1 of 2 • Henry James
... time that Tom had ever heard a quaver in his wife's voice. He looked away uneasily. "If you made a promise you can't keep, that's your lookout. You might as well stop nagging me, Sairy. My mind ...
— Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance • Frances Cavanah
... and over his sudden quaver, robbed of all the confidence which had been there only moments ...
— Voodoo Planet • Andrew North
... whirling and dancing their war-dance, clashing together their hatchets and war-clubs, waving above them the scalps of their foemen, went the barbarians merry as demons. And strong and clear, with never a quaver, still was heard above the confusion the hymning voice of the smoke-hid victim. But louder and higher than all, it is coming, ringing from far like the blast of a trumpet—a voice so stern, abrupt, and ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... and over again in our mind, for we were speechless with pain, the 148th psalm, which we had just chanced to hear sung, in Brady and Tate's version, to a new and somewhat peculiar tune. Oh, how those "dreadful whales" and "glittering scales" did quaver and quiver in our poor head! Lying like a log—for pain neither permitted us to stir nor groan—still rattled on, hard and quick, the rumbling bass and shrill tenor of that most inappropriately jubilant composition—"cherubim and seraphim," "fire, hail, and snow," succeeding each other with ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... Mildred's well-tutored voice, though modulated and repressed even in her present emotion, nevertheless had a tendency to quaver. "It's true. Frank Dowling was going to see her one evening and he saw Arthur sitting on the stoop with her, and didn't go in. And Ella used to go to school with a girl who lives across the street from here. She ...
— Alice Adams • Booth Tarkington
... the others. There we slipped but seldom, and by assisting one another, we could walk erect and more quickly. Bohren the younger, who was one of our porters and the youngest of the company, continued his merry song. In moments of peril his voice acquired a decided quaver, but he never paused in his march or in his cadences, and never fell back ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams
... canna be I sud ever forget yon face ye shawed me i' the coffin, the bonniest, sairest sicht I ever saw," returned Malcolm, with a quaver in his voice. ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... the murmur of the talk inside the hut, and he could distinguish the voices but not the words. Abdulla spoke in deep tones, and now and then this flowing monotone was interrupted by a querulous exclamation, a weak moan or a plaintive quaver of the old man. Yes. It was annoying not to be able to make out what they were saying, thought Babalatchi, as he sat gazing fixedly at the unsteady glow of the fire. But it will be right. All will be right. Abdulla inspired him ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... grew the voice, still fainter, Sinking almost to a whisper, With a hesitating quaver, As the picture came before her Of her disappearing people. Then I rose and piled more branches Of the redwood on the campfire, And the flames and sparks leaped upward, Lighting up the mournful forest, Driving back ...
— The Legends of San Francisco • George W. Caldwell
... Leaves." There must be quite a lot of people scattered about the country who sung out of that when they were little. I wish a few of us old codgers might get together some time and with many a hummed and prefatory, "Do, mi, Sol, do; Sol, mi... mi-i-i-i," finally manage to quaver out the sweet old tunes we learned when we were little tads, each with a penny in his fat, warm hand: "Shall we Gather at the River?" and "Work, for the Night is Coming"; and what was the name ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... pressed among them, the rise and fall of his own breathing, somewhat quicker than its wont, served to render appreciable to Persimmon Sneed the fact that he possessed nerves which were more susceptible to a quaver of doubt than that redoubtable ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... as well as our father did us, if he had wanted to work, for we had the biggest family of the neighbourhood. So we children made fun of him and we had to hold our mouths shut when he got up all tired and teary-like, and began to quaver: ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... heard you make that insinuation several times before, Fred. It is not merely silly, it is disgraceful. I keep you from church? Don't you know," she exclaimed, with a quaver of emotion, "that your refusal to go is a source of genuine grief to me, and that I just hate to go alone? Don't you know that I should like nothing better than to go with you every Sunday, and that I am ready to go to any church ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... wrestle as he would, Piggy could not escape the picture that rose in his mind of a boy wearing his features and using his body, writing the note that he had written. When dismembered words and phrases from that note came to his mind on the play-ground, the quaver of terror that rose in Piggy's whoop was not dissembled. Sometimes fear froze his vitals, then a flush of self-abasement burned him with its flames. And all the time he knew that the Pratt girl had that note. He almost hoped that an earthquake would swallow ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... Coffin?" he repeated, in a voice that, as it lost its wondering quaver, grew tense and ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... Denner said, with an eager quaver in his voice. "Gifford, do you think—would you have any objection, Gifford, to permitting me to see your aunt? That is, if she would be so obliging and kind as to step in for ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... mendicancy, the element of cheapness has, per force, been studied in the manufacture of the instrument. The barrels of some are so villainously pricked that the time is altogether broken, the ear is assailed with a minim in the place of a quaver, and vice versa—and occasionally, as a matter of convenience, a bar is left out, or even one is repeated, in utter disregard of suffering humanity. But what is worse still, these metal reeds, which are the ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 430 - Volume 17, New Series, March 27, 1852 • Various
... old parlor organ with the quaver in its tongue, Seemed to tremble in its fervor as the sacred songs were sung, As we sang the homely anthems, sang the glad revival hymns Of the glory of the story and the light ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... an odd little quaver. "Why, so far as I know, I guess it's all right. Damn queer, though. I wish we'd got here in daytime.... But maybe ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... "weighed anchor" and I went on deck to take a last look at Dixie with the rest of the party. Every heart was full. Each left brothers, sisters, husband, children, or dear friends behind. We sang, "Farewell dear land," with a slight quaver in our voices, looked at the beautiful starlight shining on the last boundary of our glorious land, and, fervently and silently praying, ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... an impassioned quaver, "is that not life? To all of us there is the unattainable—to you, ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... Liberation War of Humanity. But my Thirty Years' War is over, and I die 'with sword unbroken, and a broken heart.'" His head fell back in ineffable hopelessness. "Ah," he murmured, "it was ever my prayer, 'Lord, let me grow old in body, but let my soul stay young; let my voice quaver and falter, but never my hope.' And this is ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... They would laugh at some cake that had not come out right. And my great aunts who were Huguenots, rigid but happy, with long chains of gold about their necks, would interpret the revelations of the Prophets to one another. And five and seventy years would quaver in each of their cracked voices. And my maternal grandsire at nineteen, with the green coat of ...
— Romance of the Rabbit • Francis Jammes
... fourth section (fifteen bars) passes by means of broken chords (in imitation of the last bar of the previous section) through various keys, ending in the same fashion as the first section, only, by way probably of intensification at the end, there are seven instead of four quaver chords; the section, of course, ends in F. This movement in the matter of form offers an interesting link between Kuhnau and E. Bach. The second movement is a minuet, with variations; it certainly has a beginning, but seems endless. The 3rd Sonata, in A, resembles No. 1 in form, also in ...
— The Pianoforte Sonata - Its Origin and Development • J.S. Shedlock
... plaintive quaver in her voice, "won't you drive about a little with me? I must talk to some one. I must have advice and—and the sympathy that I know your generous heart will be only too ready to give. It may be unconventional to ask you, and I may be taking up far too much ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... he nodded, his voice all of a quaver. "It's all right, now,—I've found the fortune I've prayed for,—gold, you know, an' banknotes—in a sack. Everything will be all right again now." And, while he spoke, he rose to his feet, and lifting the sack with an effort, swung it across his shoulder, ...
— The Money Moon - A Romance • Jeffery Farnol
... loses her mother she's sure lost her best friend. It's up to her paw to see she gets a square deal." There was a quaver of emotion in Tolliver's voice. "I don't reckon he can make ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine
... librate[obs3]; alternate, undulate, wave; rock, swing; pulsate, beat; wag, waggle; nod, bob, courtesy, curtsy; tick; play; wamble[obs3], wabble[obs3]; dangle, swag. fluctuate, dance, curvet, reel, quake; quiver, quaver; shake, flicker; wriggle; roll, toss, pitch; flounder, stagger, totter; move up and down, bob up and down &c. Adv.; pass and repass, ebb and flow, come and go; vacillate &c. 605; teeter [U.S.]. brandish, shake, flourish. Adj. oscillating &c. v.; oscillatory, undulatory, pulsatory[obs3], ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... step towards the successful accomplishment of what was to come after. Miles was a minute later in coming, because he had been attending to a customer. "What is the matter; is Father very bad?" he asked, with a quaver of fear in his tone. Accidents, or sickness of any kind, always seemed so much worse in winter, and then death and disaster had already worked havoc ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... like that," Maraton replied. "These are just the words which you yourself cannot fail to understand. Neither you nor I hold life so dearly that the thought of losing it need make us quaver. I am here only to say this one word—to tell you that the heavens have never opened more surely to let out the lightning, than will your death be a charge upon me if you should vary even a hair's-breadth from our contract. If Maxendorf, the people's man, hides himself for only a moment ...
— A People's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... over the straps of the rifle-case with unnecessary care, but there was a quaver in his voice that was not ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... quaver of laughter, "now who'd have thought it?" and smiled a consciously American smile ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... remembrance was too much. Hester wiped away two large tears onto a dear little handkerchief just large enough to receive them, and went on with a quaver in her voice. ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley
... all this?" Marianne heard him say in a voice which he tried to make an angered roar but which was only a shrill quaver from his weakness. "Maybe I'm a lady? Maybe I've fainted or something? Not by a damned sight! Maybe I been licked by that boiled-down bit of hell, Rickety, but I ain't licked so bad I can't walk home. Hey, Perris, shake on it! You trimmed me, all right, ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... striking the church, to drive its whole force into the building. As a loud crash burst over the village in the midst of his sermon, and showed how frightfully near the storm was, his voice broke into a shrill quaver, as he faltered out, "Yes, my brethren, let us be calm under all circumstances, and ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... and hearty aspect, altogether he seemed—not young, indeed—but a kind of new contrivance of Mother Nature in the shape of man, whom age and infirmity had no business to touch. His voice and laugh, which perpetually re-echoed through the Custom-House, had nothing of the tremulous quaver and cackle of an old man's utterance; they came strutting out of his lungs, like the crow of a cock, or the blast of a clarion. Looking at him merely as an animal—and there was very little else to look at—he was a most satisfactory object, ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... know, Fan, that he reminds me constantly of champagne. If there's anything on earth or in a cellar that I do detest, its champagne; such smiling, brilliant-looking impudence, that comes out fizz—bang! and that's the end of it; there's not so much as the quaver of an echo. You drink it, and instead of seeing cool vineyards and purple waters and cataracts of icicles in your glass, you find a pale, gaunt spectre, or a poor, half-drowned Bacchus, staring at you. It's just so with your Landon Snowe. You, and other people, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... hard, bitter words that she intended to speak, she said, with a little quaver in her voice. "Mr. Hemstead, I almost believe that you feel as bad ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... that fruit-gathering is described with extraordinary grimness and force in the abrupt language of verse 3. The merry songs sung in the palace (this rendering seems more appropriate here than 'temple') will be broken off, and the singers' voices will quaver into shrill shrieks, so suddenly will the judgment be. Then comes a picture as abrupt in its condensed terribleness as anything in Tacitus—'Many the corpses; everywhere they fling them; hush!' We see the ghastly masses of dead ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... in mid-quaver stops, Just ere he sweeps o'er rapture's tremulous brink, And 'twixt the winrows most demurely drops, A decorous bird of business, who provides For his brown mate and fledglings six besides, And looks from right to left, ...
— A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller
... While the mob of Constables kept cowering in the bar-room down-stairs, crying out to us to surrender in the King's name,—I believe that one poor creature, the Justice of Peace, after getting himself well walled up in a corner with chairs and tables, began to quaver out the King's Proclamation against the Blacks,—the plaguy Soldiers came blundering up both pair of stairs, and fell upon us Billy Boys tooth and nail. 'Slid! my blood simmers when I think of it. Over went the tables ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... should fly from the bowstring like a bird, without quaver or flutter. All depends upon ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... responded Theron, as they shook hands and walked on together. He added, with a quaver in his voice, "I am still far from strong. I really ought not to be out at all. But—but the longing for—for—well, I COULDN'T stay in any longer. Even if it kills me, I shall be glad ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... showing a white face, whose expression matched the quaver in her voice, as she said breathlessly: "But how if I meet a man and feel I cannot live without him, and he is already—" she brought it out squarely in the sunny peace,—"if he is already as good ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various
... stop another hour in the blasted hole!" roared his guest, in a fierce quaver. Out of my way you fool! Where's Joan? Tell her to get up and come directly. I'm off, tell her. I'd as soon go to bed in the drifts as stop another hour in ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... prophet who had foretold that almost the whole orthodoxy of the Non-conformists would he retained and preserved by the Independent congregations in England, after the Presbyterian had almost without exception become, first, Arian, then Socinian, and finally Unitarian: that is, the 'demi-semi-quaver' of Christianity, Arminianism being taken ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... pouring water from one vessel into another. Sometimes the teacher of literature strives to engender appreciation in a pupil by rhapsodizing over some passage. She reads the passage in a frenzy of simulated enthusiasm, with a quaver in her voice and moisture in her eyes, only to find, at the end, that her patient has fallen asleep. Appreciation cannot be generated in such fashion. The boy cannot light his torch of appreciation at a mere phosphorescent glow. There must be heat ...
— The Reconstructed School • Francis B. Pearson
... closed eyes to the reading, the quiet rhythm of the sentences, and the calm, deep music of his voice, sounding ineffably soothing, when a quaver, then a break in his voice, just as he repeated the last words, made me look toward him. The calm, strong man was weeping silently; and just then he broke into a paroxysm of sobs that shook his strong ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... little quaver in her voice as she dismounted and, going in front of Texas, took his head between her hands. There was no longer any doubt that the horse was sick, and very sick. His eyes closed sleepily, and his head dropped low. Then he suddenly began to sway ...
— Southern Stories - Retold from St. Nicholas • Various
... stand still I'll shoot," she said, a quaver in her voice despite all her efforts to speak calmly. "I've got this thing aimed at just about where your heart ...
— Billie Bradley at Three Towers Hall - or, Leading a Needed Rebellion • Janet D. Wheeler
... The old lady leaned toward him with a mist in her eyes and a quaver in her voice, and asked softly, "Got ary friend that ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... way to St. Paul now?" Griswold said to the newspaper man. Broffin, whose ears were skilfully attuned to all the tone variations in the voice of evasion, thought he detected a quaver of anxious ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... once one was dead what horrid people thought of one did not matter. It was said with infinite contempt; but something like a suppressed quaver in the voice made me look at her again. I perceived then that her thick eyelashes were wet. This surprising discovery silenced me as you may guess. She looked unhappy. And—I don't know how to say it—well—it suited her. The clouded brow, ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... master the strings, but both his ear and his voice were not of the best, so that it was well perhaps that there was so small and so unprejudiced an audience to the Norman-French chanson, which he sang in a high reedy voice with great earnestness of feeling, but with many a slip and quaver, waving his yellow head ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... last word in a long-drawn quaver which gave it a horrid sound—especially in the woods, after dark. And Turkey Proudfoot felt chills a-running up ...
— The Tale of Turkey Proudfoot - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... song to "Saw ye my Father;" and in English, as you will see. That there is a syllable too much for the expression of the air, is true; but allow me to say, that the mere dividing of a dotted crotchet into a crotchet and a quaver is not a great matter; however, in that, I have no pretensions to cope in judgment with you. Of the poetry I speak with confidence; but the music is a business where I hint my ideas ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... put a faint quaver in Philon's voice but he went on. "However, I've brought you an idea that's worth more than ...
— The House from Nowhere • Arthur G. Stangland
... requires some familiarity with the customs of the country to distinguish one from the other. The music to-night is much better than the ordinary baile music. A native harpist adds the music of his many strings; and not bad music either, though he does not know a quaver from a semibreve, and his harp is of his own manufacture. The sameness, however, caused by playing always and everything in the same key is perceptible. But dancing critics are not disposed to ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... time, Tithonus grew old and decrepid, and lost all the beauty which had won her admiration, Eos became disgusted with his infirmities, and at last shut him up in a chamber, where soon little else was left of him but his voice, which had now sunk into a weak, feeble quaver. According to some of the later poets, he became so weary of his cheerless and miserable existence, that he entreated to be allowed to die. This was, however, impossible; but Eos, pitying his unhappy condition, exerted her divine power, and changed him into a grasshopper, which is, as it were, all ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens
... long silence, so long that I tried to find an explanation of it, she said, "You refer to my father?" There was a quaver in her voice which all her bravery ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... the jubilant patentee told me that it was the quickest scheme for extinguishing life ever invented—patented Anno Christi Eighteen Hundred Ninety-five. Verily we live in the age of the Push-Button! And as I sat there I heard a laugh that was a quaver, and the sound of a stout cane emphasizing a jest struck against ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... especially what I'm not! There's a name for it, a hideous, cruel name. It's not my fault! Others have known, I've had to speak of it—it has made a great difference in my life. Surely you must have guessed!" she went on, with the thinnest quaver of irony, letting him now take her hand, which felt as cold as her hard duty. "Don't you see I've no belongings, no relations, no friends, nothing at all, in all the world, of my own? I was ...
— Sir Dominick Ferrand • Henry James
... you the score and the piano arrangement (for two pianofortes) for convenience in looking it over. If the concluding figure (Letter M., Moderato pomposo) seems to make a better effect in the instrumentation by following the piano arrangement with the simple quaver figure [Liszt illustrates with a brief musical score excerpt] instead of the triplets, according to the score, I have not the slightest objection to it, and beg you altogether, dear friend, to feel quite free to do as you like in the ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... something tangible, and the old man proceeded to secrete them in the fallen leaves. Squatted upon the ground, he was too busily engaged to note the sound of approaching footsteps, and started violently when a rough voice accosted him. He mustered courage, however, to quaver:— ...
— Plantation Sketches • Margaret Devereux
... Shy at first, then somewhat bolder, And up-eyed; Till she, with a timid quaver, Yielded to the kiss I gave ...
— Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy
... back on the arm-rack deliberately, - the men were at the far end of the room, - and took out his rifle and packet of ammunition. "Don't go playing the goat, Sim!" said Losson. "Put it down," but there was a quaver in his voice. Another man stooped, slipped his boot, and hurled it at Simmons's head. The prompt answer was a shot which, fired at random, found its billet in Losson's throat. Losson fell forward without a ...
— This is "Part II" of Soldiers Three, we don't have "Part I" • Rudyard Kipling
... lovely?" cried Dodo, "I want to pick everything." She began to fill her hands with dandelions. "Only I wish that mother was here"—and a little quaver shook the merry voice. ...
— Citizen Bird • Mabel Osgood Wright and Elliott Coues
... the midst of my investigations the tin horn would blow a great blast from the farmhouse, which would send a cold chill down my back in the hottest days. I knew what it meant. It had a frightfully impatient quaver in it, not at all like the sweet note that called us to dinner from the hay-field. It said, "Why on earth does n't that boy come home? It is almost dark, and the cows ain't milked!" And that was the time the ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... a tremulous movement to her breast, a quaver in her voice, of which she seemed slightly ashamed, for she turned suddenly and left ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... you remember a letter you once wrote to a woman, asking her to elope with you—a married woman, Mr. Hendricks?" There was a pause for a reply, and again the voice asked, "Do you hear, Mr. Hendricks?" and Mr. Hendricks heard; heard in his soul and was afraid, but his voice did not quaver as he replied, "Yes, I hear perfectly." Then the voice went on, "Well, they have that letter—a little note—not over one hundred words, and with no date on it, and the man who has it also has a photograph of page ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... There was a suspicious quaver in her voice that made Arthur's thoughts turn longingly to the safe shelter of his own room. What if he should have a weeping girl on his hands! He turned cold at the thought. "Oh, I'm sure you'll get some word from your father before morning," he said ...
— Glenloch Girls • Grace M. Remick
... representative of the cat family. Early settlers in the Eastern States record the existence of this treacherous beast in their conquest of the forests. The cry of the "painter," as he was called, rang through the dark woods and caused many hearts to quaver and little children to run to mother's side. Once in a while stories came of human beings having met their doom at the swift stealthy leap of this dreaded beast. He was bolder then than now. Today he is not less courageous, but more cautious. He has ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... "don't be hasty." Jerkline Jo had seen many a fight between big men of the outdoor life. It was no new experience, and there was not a quaver in her tones. She had been brought up where men settled matters with fists or guns or pick handles. "Listen, Hiram," she continued, "Mr. Drummond is telling the truth, I think, up to a certain point. When you boys were way ahead of me yesterday I heard a rumble behind me. Evidently ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... had last seen him. He seemed older and more shriveled, and there was a querulous, pinched expression in place of the firmness and almost nobility Dave had come to expect. His old eyes bored into the younger man, and he nodded. His voice had a faint quaver now. "All right. You're not much to look at, but you're the best we could find in the Ways we can reach. Come here, ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... now red and shamefaced because of his wet lashes, stood up, and squaring himself, looked before him with winking eyes, nor would answer until he could speak without a quaver. Then: "He sits in the north chamber, Master Arden. This side o' the house the sun shines." Despite his boyish will the tears again filled his eyes. "'Tis May-time now, and there's been none but him above the salt ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston
... Voltaire naturally enough danced with rage, screamed all manner of unpleasant things about robbery and the like, cashiered the secretary, and was, we see no reason to doubt, really afraid of a pirated edition. This time his cry of wolf must have had a quaver of sincerity in it. Herr Stahr, who can never keep separate the Lessing as he then was and the Lessing as he afterwards became, takes fire at what he chooses to consider an unworthy suspicion of the Frenchman, and treats himself to ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... Jacqueline's from the rest. He had taken the precaution to open both doors of the cabin wide, after his hosts were safely asleep, letting in the moonlight and a little breeze that smelled keenly of pine woods. Now and then a faint bird-note broke the hush, or the mournful quaver of a screech-owl. The situation was not without picturesque piquancy for ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... company of black soldiers marched into that cold ocean water, dreading it with all their souls but soldiers to the core, without a quaver, eyes to the front, heads up, chests out, unflinchingly, up to their knees, up to their waists, up to their chins, when the captain shouted "As you were!" and such a hilarious, shouting, laughing, splashing, jumping, yelling, fun-filled hour as followed the world never saw. The gleaming ...
— Soldier Silhouettes on our Front • William L. Stidger
... noticed a right-smart change in Samson?" inquired old Caleb Wiley of a neighbor, in his octogenarian quaver. "The boy hes done got es quiet an' pious es ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... with voice a-quaver He called the East Wind, and the black East ran, Roofing the sky with iron, and in the darkness Winter crept out and chilled the ...
— Poems New and Old • John Freeman
... for these words about my brother," she said very gently, and with a little pathetic quaver in her voice. "They have given me a comforting association with that awful day. Oh, I thank God for the thought. Remembering what Mrs. Yocomb said, it reconciles me to it all, as I never thought I could be reconciled. If Herbert believed that it was ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe
... They spoke of Majorca as a place of joy; they recalled the provinces on the mainland, of which many of them were sons, as paradises to which they were eager to return. Women! It was a longing, a desire which made their voices quaver and brought a glow of madness into their eyes. The chaste Ivizan virtue, the exclusive islander, suspicious of foreigners, weighed upon them like the chain of an insufferable prison. There was no trifling with love here; no time ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... disinclination, it had occurred to him that he might make one, and return to his study in a virtuous frame of mind over a slight and unimportant, but bothersome duty performed. If he had had his wits about him he might have seen the feminine heads at the windows, he might have heard the quaver of Miss Bessy Dicky's voice over the club report; but he saw and heard nothing, and now he was seated in the midst of the feminine throng, and Miss Bessy Dicky's voice quavered more, and she assumed a slightly mincing attitude. Her thin hands trembled more, the hot, ...
— The Butterfly House • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... Scudder!—that silk must be cut exactly on the bias"; and Miss Prissy, hastily finishing her last quaver, caught the silk and the scissors out of Mrs. Scudder's hand, and fell down at once from the Millennium into a discourse on her own particular ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various
... madrigals still sound in praise of Oriana and of Phyllis and the country life. What are called 'waits' are but a poor travesty of those well-sung Elizabethan carols. We turn in our beds half pitying, half angered by harsh voices that quaver senseless ditties in the fog, or by tuneless fiddles playing popular airs without ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... quaver came into Ben's voice as he spoke, and a sudden motion made his hat-brim hide his eyes, for the thought of the happy times that would never come any more was almost too ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... home of the great dead, And their great thoughts. Who can mistake great thoughts They seize upon the mind; arrest and search, And shake it; bow the tall soul as by wind; Rush over it like a river over reeds, Which quaver in the current; turn us cold, And pale, and voiceless; leaving in the brain A rocking and a ringing; glorious, But momentary, madness might it last, And close the soul with heaven as with a seal! In lieu of all these ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... with hurried, unequal, and objectless step. The pallor of his countenance had assumed, if possible, a more ghastly hue—but the luminousness of his eye had utterly gone out. The once occasional huskiness of his tone was heard no more; and a tremulous quaver, as if of extreme terror, habitually characterized his utterance. There were times, indeed, when I thought his unceasingly agitated mind was laboring with some oppressive secret, to divulge which he struggled ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... to the house without further words, and Mrs. Forbes called to her son in a voice that had a wrathful quaver. ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... the tenant breathlessly. Straight into the big young man's ready arms she dived, and the petrified and stricken occupant of the dizzy plank heard her muffled voice quaver: ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... the wall beside the window, letting her hand drop in a hopeless gesture. The sample answer had hurt her, who could never see, by its mere thoughtlessness and by the joy that made her sister's voice quaver. The music grew louder and louder, and now there came with it the sound of a great multitude, cheering, singing the march with the trumpets, shouting for Don John; and all at once as the throng burst from the street to the open avenue the voices drowned the clarions for a moment, and ...
— In The Palace Of The King - A Love Story Of Old Madrid • F. Marion Crawford
... and, putting her hand over her eyes, shouted "Annie!" But, apparently startled at the sound of her own voice where the unhearing dead had so lately passed, she let the end of the call die away in a quaver, and, without repeating it, set off to find the missing child by the use of her eyes alone. First she went into the barn, and then through the barn into the stack-yard, and then round the ricks one after another, and then into the corn-loft; ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... has come to life again," said Martin with a slight quaver in his voice, for Martin was terribly ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... on an audioceiver in my home," answered the man, a slight quaver in his voice. "I have ...
— The Revolt on Venus • Carey Rockwell
... spectacle, and he still wore his white beard and turban and his long blue and red robes. Yet he wasn't in the least fussed; he simply made a bow, said what he had to say, made another bow, with never a blush or a quaver or giggle. His mother was there, and she was so happy—she is a widow, and sews in the neighborhood, plain sewing, and they ...
— Mistress Anne • Temple Bailey
... boy dear!" she said, with a forlorn little quaver in her voice, "how could you be so foolish? Didn't you know there was something better in the world than grubbing after musty old tribes and customs and folk-songs? Oh, precious ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell
... vial and poured the liquid into a glass without a quaver of his hand. He mixed a little water with it and raised it to his lips. There he paused, for once again he seemed to see the big, calm eyes of the girl now staring at him as though in surprise. But this time he smiled, and with a little lift of the glass towards ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... these city-builders is most unusual; the males frequently utter the most varied and astonishing cries. They are jarring in the extreme, and are produced in the most leisurely manner, growing louder and louder and finally ending with a slow quaver. At other times, they grunt like small pigs. Hudson says that any quick noise, like the report of a gun, produces a most startling effect among these little animals. As soon as the report is broken on the stillness of the night a perfect ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... cowardly act, or betrayed a friend, or knowingly violated a trust, or broken his word, or forgotten a debt. He was always so entirely certain that he, Andrew Jackson, was in the right, his conviction on this point was so free from the least quaver of doubt, that he could always convince other men that he was right, and carry the multitude with him. His honesty, courage, and inflexible resolution, joined to his ignorance, narrowness, intensity, and liability to prejudice, rendered him at once the idol of ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... I could see the glow of the great camp fire burning warmly through the shore-side trees. Someone was singing a dull, old droning sailor's song, with a droop and a quaver at the end of every verse, and seemingly no end to it at all but the patience of the singer. I had heard it on the voyage more than once, and remembered ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... in silence till the last little quaver had died away, and then said: "Whew! That was purty, anyhow. Where is the piper, I wonder!" He looked about for the musician, but could see no one. He was the only ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. V, August, 1878, No 10. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... down so well as a little of your sol, fa, and long quaver; therefore let us be in our airs—and for better assurance I ...
— A Fairy Tale in Two Acts Taken from Shakespeare (1763) • William Shakespeare
... little birds quaver, Dugperler bade Pearls from night's weeping; Blomsterblade, The flowers are steeping Som Vindene gynge; In the winds which waver; Og med svaevende Fjed To the meadows, fleet En Mo hendandser A maiden boundeth; Til Marken afsted. Violet fillet neat Violer hende krandser, ...
— The Gold Horns • Adam Gottlob Oehlenschlager
... time. His grandmother did not seem to notice that he was in a forbidden place, but asked, with an anxious quaver in her voice, ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... superiority and of a rugged English accent, "You may retire; I will have the honor of conducting monsieur." In spite of this combination, however, it appeared to Newman that her voice had a slight quaver, as if the tone of command were not habitual to it. The man gave her an impertinent stare, but he walked slowly away, and she led Newman up-stairs. At half its course the staircase gave a bend, forming a little platform. In the angle of the wall stood an indifferent statue of ...
— The American • Henry James
... do I speak. Do you forget how your own countryman, Pericleidas, once came hither suppliant Before our altars, pale in his purple robes, Praying for an army when in Messenia Danger growled, and the Sea-god made earth quaver. Then with four thousand hoplites Cimon marched And saved all Sparta. Yet base ingrates now, You are ravaging the ...
— Lysistrata • Aristophanes
... carols in which the other voices joined—Porter's and Barry's and Leila's; General Dick's breathy tenor, Aunt Isabelle's quaver, Aunt Frances' dominant note—with Susan Jenks and the colored maid who helped her on such occasions, piping up like two melodious ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... notes float away over the city toward all four quarters of the sky, and quaver into silence. We come out from the gloom of the staircase into the dazzling light of the balcony which runs around the top of the minaret. For a few moments we can see little; but when the first bewilderment passes, we are conscious that all the charm ...
— Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land - Impressions of Travel in Body and Spirit • Henry Van Dyke
... my song to "Saw ye my father?" and in English, as you will see. That there is a syllable too much for the expression of the air, is true; but, allow me to say, that the mere dividing of a dotted crotchet into a crotchet and a quaver, is not a great matter: however, in that I have no pretensions to cope in judgment with you. Of the poetry I speak with confidence; but the music is a business where I hint my ideas ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... Mrs. Glynde had been going about the world with a bright red patch on either cheek; and it would seem that on the third day, namely, the Sunday, things came to a crisis in her disturbed mind. At morning service her fervour was something astonishing—the quaver in her voice was more noticeable in the hymns than ever, and the space devoted to silent prayer after the blessing was so abnormally long that Stark, the sexton, had to rattle the keys twice, with all due respect and for the sake ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... fatal corners were passed, and then other well-remembered spots where former bumps had been made, and still Miller made no sign; on the contrary, he looked gloomy and savage. The St. Ambrosian shouts from the shore too changed from the usual exultant peals into something like a quaver of consternation, while the air was rent with the name and ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... you think to tantalize me by talking like that, you are much mistaken! Let him be as late as he will—or stay away altogether—I don't care,' said Sally. But a tender, minute quaver in the negation showed that there was something forced in ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy
... do I'll blow a hole through you as big as the south door of hell," said Hamilton, in a voice fairly shaken to a husky quaver with rage. "You may do a great many insulting things; ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... voice of mine to quaver in the way it did? Those few words, I was convinced, would tell more against me than the most circumstantial narrative. I clutched hold of the back of a chair near me, and made a desperate effort to steady myself as I proceeded. I gave an exact account ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... admit it) his heart had begun to pound so violently, (not from emotion, he told himself,—from a mere ridiculous sort of nervous excitement: what was there in the woman that should excite a sane man like that?) he was afraid to trust his voice, lest it should quaver and betray him. But fortunately this pounding of the heart lasted only a few seconds. The short business of getting the gate open, and of closing it afterwards, gave it time to pass. So that now, as they set forwards towards the house, ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... of," said Myrtle, in a weak quaver. She rose and, keeping her tear-stained face aloof, lifted the lid off ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... with a celerity as unusual as the quaver in his voice. "Indeed thy words are white, O mightiest of magicians. What are indeed the evil eyes of savages against the power of thy magic, ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... for his nominal betters which English cabmen never part with except in a dispute about fares and distances. We stayed him as well as we could with some grapes and pears, which we found we did not want after our lunch, and which we handed him up through his little trap-door, but a plaintive quaver grew into his voice, and he let his horse lag in the misgiving which it probably shared with him. Nothing of signal interest occurred in our progress except at one point, near a Methodist chapel, where we caught sight of a gayly painted blue van, lettered over with many texts and mottoes, ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells
... and, though his words were seemingly irrelevant, they were to the point. His voice had a note of martyrdom running through its senile quaver. ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... her voice to do this? A single quaver in her tones would betray her consciousness of their presence to the lurking robbers and prove ...
— Hidden Hand • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth |
