"Hiss" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... not a hiss neither, but a sort of a frantic yell, like a congregation of mad geese, with roaring something like bears, mows and mops like apes, sometimes snakes, that hissed me into madness. 'Twas like St. Anthony's temptations. ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... later a small stream spurted out, and Arnold aimed it right for the piece of blazing paper. The water fell in a small shower on the fire, and then with a hiss and spluttering, and sending up a cloud of smoke, the ...
— The Story of a Lamb on Wheels • Laura Lee Hope
... on the listening spectators by Arlington's words. At the sound of the notorious name some shrank as from the hiss of a coiled serpent. Others drew near, as if eager to manifest partisan sympathy for the renowned leader, whose pistol had ended the life of Alexander Hamilton ten months prior to the time of this visit to Pittsburg. The unfledged lawyers ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... Brendan immediately bid hoist the sail and have out the oars. While this was doing the creature appeared again with a glowing mass of fused metal (massam igneam de scoria) in pincers, which he hurled at them. Where it struck the water about a furlong from them, it made the sea boil and hiss. They had only escaped about a mile when they saw beings swarming out upon the shore, throwing about molten masses, some after them and some at one another, and then all went back into the forges and set them blazing, until ...
— Brendan's Fabulous Voyage • John Patrick Crichton Stuart Bute
... the chamber, the door was closed tightly and then Tom Swift turned the valve that admitted the sea water. With a hiss the Atlantic began rushing in, and in a short time the outer door ...
— Tom Swift and his Undersea Search - or, The Treasure on the Floor of the Atlantic • Victor Appleton
... wind doe blow, And coughing drowns the parson's saw, And birds sit brooding in the snow, And Marian's nose looks red and raw, When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl, Then nightly sings the staring owl, To-whit! To-who!—a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... examine it. It is to be got from several things, and is a part of all chalk, marble, and the shells of eggs or of shell-fish. The easiest way to make it is by pouring muriatic or sulphuric acid on chalk or marble. The marble or chalk begins to hiss or bubble, and you can collect the bubbles in the same way that you can oxygen. The gas made by the candle in burning, and which also is got out of the chalk and marble, is called carbonic acid. It puts out a light in a moment; it kills any animal that breathes ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... He set off, down the slope, stumbling through the darkness. He could hear soldiers behind him, soldiers running and falling. A body collided against him and he struck out. Someplace behind him there was a hiss, and a section of the slope went up in flames. ...
— The Crystal Crypt • Philip Kindred Dick
... was rather a deep one, when measured. The fears were fairly hot. There were no noticeable signs of any tears in the papers, so far, but one could guess there would be a deep extinguishing bath of them ready to hiss presently, if all went well, and our affairs had uninterrupted development under the usual clever guides. And we had the guides. I could see that. The papers were loud with the inspirations of friends of ours who had not missed a single ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson
... the pylon, and Menes put some fuel under a brass kettle. He blew the flame and soon the water was boiling. On the kettle was a perpendicular spout covered with a heavy stone. When the kettle began to hiss, Menes said, ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... a manager we can't but please, Tho' London sent us all her loud O. P.'s,[2] Let them come on, like snakes, all hiss and rattle, Armed with a thousand fans, we'd give them battle; You, on our side, R. P.[3]upon our banners, Soon should we teach the saucy O. P.'s manners: And show that, here—howe'er John Bull may doubt— In all our plays, ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... of birch-bark, the place was warm as an oven. Such an atmosphere was grateful and comforting. Se indeed revelled in the heat too much at first, and pressing over near its source, thrust out a moist black nose, and got the full effect. There followed a hiss and a howl, and a sulky retreat to the farther angle. Then we two bipeds hacked off gobbets from the venison, and taking us sharpened sticks, roasted and charred and toasted the meat in the doorway of the stove and over the gap in its lid. And in time ...
— The Recipe for Diamonds • Charles John Cutcliffe Wright Hyne
... than a spectator; I was an actor. Hiss me—I deserve it. When the terrible news from Sedan reached Paris, in the midst of the general stun and bewilderment I noticed a hesitating timidity among all those who had wares in their shops and a ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... with a roar of voices, shouts and cheers, cries for help, valiant, quickly stifled snatches of "Tipperary," and, over all, the hiss of escaping steam. ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... taste as myself. Still, I accept thankfully, in its sense of two hundred years, the compliment paid to Balzac; but I would add that personally he seems to me to have shown greater wings of mind than any artist that ever lived. I am aware that this last statement will make many cry "fool" and hiss "Shakespeare!" But I am not putting forward these criticisms axiomatically, but only as the expressions of an individual taste, and interesting so far as they reveal to the reader the different ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... King shortly. "I feel as if my beauty is spoiled by a blow one ruffian struck at my face. But he was the one who suffered," he added, with a low hiss suggestive of satisfaction. "But no more selfishness. Though I have left him to the last, it is not that I do not want to thank our gallant English preserver, who has given us the best of proofs that he is ready to welcome strangers to his shores. I don't know by what means ...
— The King's Esquires - The Jewel of France • George Manville Fenn
... is no bigger than half an apricot, came and chirped in the plane-tree tops; the Scops made a habit of uttering his monotonous, piping note here, of an evening; the bird of Pallas Athene, the Owl, came hurrying along to hoot and hiss. ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... wall. One of the soldiers remaining outside acts as overseer and superintendent of construction. At intervals of a minute or two it will strike the wall with its mandibles, making a peculiar sound. This is answered by the workers with a loud hiss and a marked acceleration in their movements. Should these ants again be disturbed, the laborers would vanish, and the warriors would take their places, ready and willing to fight to the death in defence of ...
— The Dawn of Reason - or, Mental Traits in the Lower Animals • James Weir
... almost certainly remain so for ever. I called to the Rongba. He was fast asleep. I summoned up my last atom of vitality to keep my eyes open. The wind blew hard and biting, with a hissing noise. How that hiss still sounds in my ears! It seemed like the whisper of death. The Rongba, crouched with teeth chattering, was moaning, and his sudden shudders bespoke great pain. It seemed only common charity to let him have the blanket, which was in any case too small for both, so I wrapped it tightly ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... jaguar had but just come into view when her mate was killed, and she darted at the serpent with a yell of rage which was answered by an angry hiss. ...
— The Search for the Silver City - A Tale of Adventure in Yucatan • James Otis
... beam of light flashed from the cabins across the way. Legrand gave vent to a hiss of warning and moved off. I could see his shadow for a moment, and then it was swallowed in the blackness. He was waiting and watching outside the cabin. The light streamed out in a fan towards us, and revealed, in the opening of a door, a man's form, and even as it did, Legrand struck. ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson
... curves, through the downs and across the meadow, emptying into the ocean some distance east of the gleaming beach. That its source was far up in the secretive hills was not a matter of conjecture, however; the incessant hiss and roar of a cataract was ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... hands in his pockets and walked up and down the path a few times. "Fizz'll get us hanged yet," he muttered, looking darkly at the door in the wall through which she had disappeared. He pushed his hat to the back of hiss head and stared gloomily at his boots, wondering what would be the consequences of this new mischief. There was ...
— Seven Little Australians • Ethel Sybil Turner
... Barber had known better, and contradicted her violently. "Und so I tells to him over that, 'Goot! Goot! if he runs away! In dis house so much, it ain't healthy for him!' Und I shakes my fingers be-front of hiss big nose!" ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... now and then at the trees, which tossed like green waves under the roaring August rain. Sometimes a gust drove a shower down the chimney and made the logs hiss. The room was warm and still; in the interval of work it seemed to have paused and be sleeping. The tiger-cat, with his paws folded under him, lay beside the hearth, and Mary on her little bench nursed her doll peacefully. Calista began to sing a German hymn; the words were awful, but ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... the shop. Yes, all ready; enter John Barclay. See that iron smile on his face; he has not surrendered. He has been clean-shaven, and entering that door, he is as spick and span as though he were on a wedding journey. Give him a hand or a hiss as you will, ladies and gentlemen, John Barclay has entered at the Right Upper Entrance, and the play ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... remarkable reception from Stewart, who gave a tigerish start; from Stillwell, whose big hands tore at the neck of his shirt, as if he was choking; from Alfred, who now strode hotly forward, to be stopped by the cold and silent Nels; from Monty Price, who uttered a violent "Aw!" which was both a hiss and a roar. ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... Winton heard the hiss of the escaping air above all the industry clamor; heard, and saw the car start backward. Then he had a flitting glimpse of a man in grimy overclothes scrambling terror-frenzied from beneath the Rosemary. The thing done had been ...
— A Fool For Love • Francis Lynde
... balcony he told me about his visit to his old school; how at the dinner on the previous night the Principal had proposed his health, and after the lads had sung "Forty Years On" he had told them yarns about his late expedition until they made the long hiss of indrawn breath which is peculiar to boys when they are excited; how they had followed him to his bedroom as if he had been the Pied Piper of Hamelin and questioned him and clambered over him until driven off by the house-master; and how, finally, before he was out of bed ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... a wan smile: "Do not trouble yourself. God will pardon me. That's his trade." These were the last recorded words spoken by Heine. Another story has it that when the physician put a handglass to the lips of the dying man and said, "Can you hiss (siffler)?" Heine murmured, "No, not even ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... around the wind doth blow, And coughing drowns the parson's saw, And birds sit brooding in the snow, And Marian's nose looks red and raw: When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl— Then nightly sings the staring owl Tuwhoo! Tuwhit! Tuwhoo! A merry note! While greasy Joan ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... Guard of Prussia—and, to the strains of martial music, moving down the Champ Elysees to the Place de la Concorde, was distributed thence over certain sections of the city agreed upon beforehand. Nothing that could be called a disturbance took place during the march; and though there was a hiss now and then and murmurings of discontent, yet the most noteworthy mutterings were directed against the defunct Empire. Indeed, I found everywhere that the national misfortunes were laid at Napoleon's door—he, by ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. II., Part 6 • P. H. Sheridan
... He sat there as though made of stone, that awful hiss still sounding in his ears. Miss Grey's voice came to him as from some great distance. He did not seem to realize what she was saying to him. She saw his white face, and the vacant look in his eyes, and she pitied him; but she had her duty ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene
... features (singularly plain ones) as the sedan swings by. Towards midday business is suspended for a while, and the alleys of the bazaar empty as if by magic. For nearly a whole hour silence, unbroken save by the snarling of some pariah dog, the hiss of the samovar, and gurgle of the kalyan, falls over the place, till 2 p.m., when the noise recommences as suddenly as it ceased, ...
— A Ride to India across Persia and Baluchistan • Harry De Windt
... They stood so, and for a minute had, indeed, the whole world to their two selves, for love as well as death has the power of annihilation; and then there was a stir in the lane, a crisp rustle of petticoats and a hiss of whispering voices; and they started and fell apart. There in the lane before them, their eyes as keen as foxes, with the scent of curiosity and gossip, their cheeks red with the shame of it, and their lips forming ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... was already stripping the searchlight of its cover. When he had swung open the big lens Tommy struck a match, which blew out. His second was blown out by a hiss of air that preceded the flow of gas, and the professor jumbled matters by trying his hand. But these efforts scarcely took more time than the telling, and when the powerful streak of light finally pierced the darkness the ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... carriages, after the fashion of their forefathers? What was to become of coach-makers and harness-makers, coach-masters and coachmen, innkeepers, horse-breeders, and horse-dealers? Was the House aware of the smoke and noise, the hiss and whirl, which locomotive engines, passing at the rate of ten or twelve miles an hour, would occasion? Neither the cattle ploughing in the fields or grazing in the meadows could behold them without dismay. . . . ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... downward to the carpet and pressed the knob cautiously. As he did so there was a sharp hiss and the floor was stained with the liquid which the instrument contained. Just one gush of fluid and no more. T. X. looked down. The bright carpet had already changed colour, and was smoking. The room was filled with a pungent and disagreeable scent. T. X. ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace
... hot! all hot! come buy! Ten a penny is the price, And if you my chestnuts try, You'll declare they're very nice. See how brightly burns my fire! Hear the chestnuts hiss and crack! Better nuts you can't desire Than these beauties, big ...
— London Town • Felix Leigh
... so much, so carelessly, On your far brows a first and phantom kiss, On your far grave a careful elegy. For one who loved all life and poetry, Sorrow in music bleeding, And friendship's last confession. But even as I speak that inner hiss Softly ...
— Georgian Poetry 1920-22 • Various
... but not unmodulated or without considerable variety in it; a long sibilation would be followed by distinctly-heard ticking sounds, as of a husky-ticking clock, and after ten or twenty or thirty ticks another hiss, like a long expiring sigh, sometimes with a tremble in it as of a dry leaf swiftly vibrating in the wind. No sooner would one cease than another would begin; and so it would go on, demand and response, strophe and antistrope; and at intervals several ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... Stopped at the "Crown Inn," upon the road, for refreshments, and on handing a ragged little urchin a shilling for his voluntary service of standing at the door of our barouche, on starting off were saluted by a hiss for our generosity. A greater douceur was expected from the drivers of ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay
... splendidly they looked, with the flames leaping and curling amid the dark green foliage like a golden snake fiercely beautiful. The shriek which the fire gave as it sprang upon its verdant prey made me think of the hiss of some furious reptile about to wrap in its burning folds its ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... circumstance, which may be of great use to disperse our apprehensions, and awaken us from that panick which the reader must necessarily feel, at the first transient view of this dreadful description. These serpents, says the original, are "haud pugnaces," of no fighting race; they will threaten, indeed, and hiss, and terrify the weak, and timorous, and thoughtless, but have no real courage or strength. So that the mischief done by them, their ravages, devastations, and robberies, must be only the consequences of cowardice ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... Everard had a singular dream. He was walking through Brithlow Wood with Lady Louise on his arm, the moonlight sifting through the tall trees as he had seen it last. Suddenly, with a rustle and a hiss, a huge green serpent glided out, reared itself up, and glared at them with eyes of deadly menace. And somehow, though he had not yet seen the lad's face, he knew the hissing serpent and the preserver of his life were one and the same. With horrible hisses the monster encircled him. Its ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming
... grasped the child's arm with an iron pressure; the crowd swam before the boy's eyes; the air seemed to stifle him, and become blood-red; only through the hum and the tramp and the roll of the drums he heard a low voice hiss in his ear "Learn how they perish who ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... in the production of the piece. He had come to the conclusion that the public was a fickle, foolish thing, and no one could tell what it would hiss or applaud. Then he remembered the blackness of the night when only two years before ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... we left. There was a rustling of distant palms, the indistinct roar of beasts, and the hiss of serpents. Then all was still again. Only at times the remote sigh of the weary sea, moaning around desolate isles undiscovered; and the howl of winds that had never wafted human voices, but had rung endless changes upon the sound of dashing waters, made the voyage ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... however, were still stirring in the streets of the camp. Tom led his friends near one of the groups. A warning hiss was heard, and then a man in a remote group, urged by his comrades, rose and staggered toward a shack. Tom was at the man's side in an instant. He proved to be ...
— The Young Engineers on the Gulf - The Dread Mystery of the Million Dollar Breakwater • H. Irving Hancock
... hastily emitting a hiss which must have cost him a heartrending effort, relegated the greatly relieved Dolly to the ranks, and smoothed over the situation by "choosing" my daughter, to ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... of steel lower down than it should have been. A gasp broke from the breasts of company "A's" friends. The blue and white dropped disconsolately, while a few heartless ones who wore other colors attempted to hiss. Someone had dropped his bayonet. But with muscles unquivering, without a turned head, the company moved on as if nothing had happened, while one of the judges, an army officer, stepped into the wake of the boys and picked up ...
— The Upward Path - A Reader For Colored Children • Various
... barriers. Our little boat confronted the gale fearlessly; with sails spread and ropes taut, she seemed to sit upon the wind. Now she swirled in the billows, now she spring upward on a gigantic wave, only to be driven down with angry howl and hiss. Down came the mainsail. Tacking and jibbing, we wrestled with opposing winds that drove us from side to side with impetuous fury. Our hearts beat fast, and our hands trembled with excitement, not fear, for we ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... their heads, and were looking past him into some distance of their own. One of them uttered a little hiss, wagged its tail, turned as if answering to a rudder, and swam away. The other followed. Their white bodies, their stately necks, passed out of his sight, and he went ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... innumerable crowd has gathered, for it is said that a ship is to sail against wind and weather, bidding defiance to the elements; the man who thinks he can solve the problem is named Robert Fulton. The ship begins its passage, but suddenly it stops. The crowd begins to laugh and whistle and hiss—the very father of the ...
— What the Moon Saw: and Other Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... throttle to 5 G's. And with the hiss of power, SF 308 began the deadly, intricate, precarious maneuver called a combat pass—a maneuver inherited from the aerial dogfight—though it often turned into something more like the broadside duels of the old sailing ships—as the best and least suicidal method of killing a ...
— Slingshot • Irving W. Lande
... they near?" asked one big voice. "Silence!" said another; and they were evidently watching for the boat. When it rowed away, one of the smiths flung after them a vast mass of red-hot iron, which he had grasped with the tongs from the furnace. It fell just short, but made the whole sea to hiss and boil around them ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... with fatigue and emotion, but when she woke the sickly gray light of a Russian winter mid-day pouring into her room, and saw her maid's stolid face, back rushed the events of the night, and she drew in her breath with almost a hiss. Yes, nothing could ever be the same again. "Leave me, Johnson," she said, "I am too tired, ...
— His Hour • Elinor Glyn
... them bravely too. Idle young actors are fond of applause, but, take my word for it, a clap is a mighty silly, empty thing, and does no more good than a hiss; and, therefore, if any man loves hissing, he may have his three shillings worth at me whenever ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding
... heh, as the case may be; which that bird—nine foot f'm tip to tip, the white ones—use' to be as common on this riveh as cuckle-burrs in a sheep's tail!" The jester laughed, or, more strictly, exhaled his mirth from the roof of a wide-spread mouth in a long hiss that would have been more like an angered alligator's if alligators used fine-cut tobacco. It was addressed to the commodore; for Hugh, his grandfather's conscious inferior in human charity, had turned ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... might draw profit and instruction. But nothing was so thrilling as this: to wait and struggle among these clanging, rending iron boxes, with the repeated explosions of the shells and the artillery, the noise of the projectiles striking the cars, the hiss as they passed in the air, the grunting and puffing of the engine—poor, tortured thing, hammered by at least a dozen shells, any one of which, by penetrating the boiler, might have made an end of all—the expectation of destruction ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill
... men, shoulders thrown back, bent forward, muscles of arms swelling and slackening, hoes flashing at the same moment against the sky, at the same moment buried with a thud in clods. And he felt reassured as a traveller feels, hearing the continuous hiss and squudge of well oiled engines ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... animal psychology than in pyrotechnical displays, I watch the Epeira's doings, lantern in hand. The hullabaloo of the crowd, the reports of the mortars, the crackle of Roman candles bursting in the sky, the hiss of the rockets, the rain of sparks, the sudden flashes of white, red or blue light: none of this disturbs the worker, who methodically turns and turns again, just as she does in the ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre
... out of the purlieus of Christendom would blush to do, I think. They assembled by hundreds, and even thousands, in the great Theatre of San Carlo to do—what? Why simply to make fun of an old woman—to deride, to hiss, to jeer at an actress they once worshipped, but whose beauty is faded now, and whose voice has lost its former richness. Everybody spoke of the rare sport there was to be. They said the theatre would be crammed because Frezzolini was going to sing. It was said she could ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... not have long to wait. He soon heard the sound of rolling stones. Then came a loud hiss, and immediately afterward he felt the serpent's fiery breath ...
— Bertha • Mary Hazelton Wade
... shall THEY not mourn? And thou who never yet of human wrong Left the unbalanced scale, great Nemesis, Here where the ancients paid their worship long, Thou who didst call the Furies from the abyss, And round Orestes bid them howl and hiss For that unnatural retribution,—just Had it but come from hands less near,—in this Thy former realm I call thee from the dust. Dost thou not hear, my heart? awake thou shalt and must! It is not that I may not have incurred For my ancestral faults and ...
— Lady Byron Vindicated • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... preparing itself to spring upon the Neapolitan—Glaucus caught quickly at one of the half-burned logs upon the hearth—and, as if enraged at the action, the snake came forth from its shelter, and with a loud hiss raised itself on end till its height nearly approached that of ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... Will said again. He was silent for a moment while a great green rocket rushed upwards with a hiss and burst in a shower of many-coloured stars. Then as they watched them fall he spoke very kindly and earnestly. "But it is worth while all the same—even though one may be turned back from Paradise. Remember—always remember—that it's ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... Clearly this is a jardin d'acclimatation. No wonder the colony does not pay, if it goes in for this sort of thing, 206 miles inland, with simply no public to pay gate-money. While contemplating these things, hear awful hiss. Serpents! No, geese. Awful fight. Grand things, good, old-fashioned, long skirts are for Africa! Get through geese and advance in good order, but somewhat rapidly down road, turn sharply round corner of native houses. Turkey cock—terrific turn up. Flight on my part ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... Mamilius, prince of the Latian name; And by the left false Sextus, that wrought the deed of shame. But when the face of Sextus was seen among the foes, A yell that rent the firmament from all the town arose. On the house-tops was no woman but spat towards him and hiss'd, No child but scream'd out curses, and shook its little fist. But the Consul's brow was sad, and the Consul's speech was low, And darkly look'd he at the wall, and darkly at the foe. "Their van will be upon us before the bridge goes down; ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... earth, a low hiss warned him he was trespassing, and clutching Terry's collar, he stood rigid, while the whip-like shadow of death writhed across a strip of moonlight—and disappeared. There was life,—of a sort, in Chitor. So Roy trod warily as he passed from room to room; dread of dark forgotten in the weird ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... succeeded in curving it down into a graceful zigzag, and was going to dive in among the leaves, which she found to be nothing but the tops of the trees under which she had been wandering, when a sharp hiss made her draw back in a hurry: a large pigeon had flown into her face, and was beating her ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... a look of hate, emitted a noise that resembled a hiss, hesitated long enough to suggest violence, then with the air of a bloodhound with his tail between his legs, slunk up ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... on board trailed away with a hiss of wind and a choking, gurgling noise into silence the little dancing girl began to sing in a deep, musical voice—the voice of one who has lived ...
— At Suvla Bay • John Hargrave
... his legions, had been particularly offended with the Roman laws and lawyers. One of the Barbarians, after the effectual precautions of cutting out the tongue of an advocate, and sewing up his mouth, observed, with much satisfaction, that the viper could no longer hiss. Florus, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... wolf not more than ten feet away. Man, I wuz so scared dat I seemed to freeze in my tracks, and couldn't move. I tried to holler but all I could do wuz croak. Den I tried to whistle but de only sound I could make wuz a hiss. After standing for whut seemed hours, wid his ears sticking straight up, de wolf finally turned around and ...
— Slave Narratives: Arkansas Narratives - Arkansas Narratives, Part 6 • Works Projects Administration
... to a paste with a little of the water, gradually add the indigo and the rest of the water. The heat of the water should be not less than 160 deg.F. as it will cool while the lime is being prepared. Slake the lime in a separate vessel by pouring about 5 oz. of water over it. When it begins to hiss and break, add more water little by little. When all the lumps have cracked up stir till a thick even cream is made. Add this to the other ingredients in the stock vat. Stir well. The stock vat should have a temperature of 120-140 deg.F. It should ...
— Vegetable Dyes - Being a Book of Recipes and Other Information Useful to the Dyer • Ethel M. Mairet
... with me, sisters, in my realm of wo, Whose only glory streams From its lost childhood, like the artic glow Which sunless Winter dreams! In the red desert moulders Babylon, And the wild serpent's hiss Echoes in Petra's palaces of stone ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... need a toothsome morsel. If you could see, mon vieux, and had set eyes on her, I should have my doubts of you also, for she is as the fairy light that draws the unwary into the Pit of Death. Can you guess? No! Then I will tell you. What think you of the Demoiselle de Paradis? Yes! Hiss, hiss! Sus, sus! On to the heretics, ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... had been too much disorganized to repel the boarders as well as they might, and the entire horde of wild barbarians had scrambled to her deck, where a perfect inferno now held sway. The air seemed full of flying cutlasses that produced an incessant hiss and clangor. Pistols banged deafeningly at close quarters and there was the constant undertone of groans, cries and bellowed oaths. Above the din came the terrible, clear voice of Stede Bonnet, urging on his seadogs. ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... of shadows. The blind ones are the shadows of things. These are the tame shadows— they love to play on the wall with you and follow you about like cats and dogs. Sometimes they hiss at you softly like snakes that do not bite, or swish like women's dresses, but if you poke a candle at them they pull ...
— Sun-Up and Other Poems • Lola Ridge
... Jordan and Marsh could hear that, or Stewart's in New York, or Wanamaker's in Philadelphia. I never thought of Brother Gerrish once; and I don't presume one out of a hundred did either. I—" The electric light immediately over Gates's head began to hiss and sputter, and to suffer the sort of syncope which overtakes electric lights at such times, and to leave the house in darkness. Gates waited, standing, till it revived, and then added: "I guess I hain't got anything more to say, Mr. Moderator. If I had it's gone from me now. I'm ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... another, her tears would be shed For him who lays far in an ocean bed; In hours that it pains me to think of now, She has twin'd these locks and kiss'd this brow— In this hair she has wreathed shall the sea-snake hiss? The brow she has press'd shall the cold wave kiss? For the sake of that bright one that wails for me, Bury me not in ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... stroke again, coming in on its mighty shoulders at racing speed. The instant our keels touched the beach we all leapt out, and exerting every ounce of strength we possessed, ran the boats up high and dry before the next roller had time to do more than hiss harmlessly around our feet. It was a task of uncommon difficulty, for the shore was wholly composed of loose lava and pumice-stone grit, into which we sank ankle-deep at every step, besides being ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... to the box he sprang in a trice, And roused Mrs. Gobble from bed; She only had time to hiss once or twice, Ere he snapped ...
— The Fox and the Geese; and The Wonderful History of Henny-Penny • Anonymous
... dismal companion came near, Phoebus smiled on them so cheerfully that Hecate's wreath of snakes gave a spiteful hiss and Hecate wished she was back ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... Skinner," Easton said to his comrade, who had come across from his own company to have a chat with him, "that this is more unpleasant than I had expected. This lying here listening to the angry hiss of the bullets is certainly trying; at least I own ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... I trampled on, Ruin'd his fortunes to erect my own: So vipers in the bosom bred begin, To hiss at that hand first which took them in; With eager treach'ry I his fall pursu'd, And my ...
— The True-Born Englishman - A Satire • Daniel Defoe
... the tobacco juice sizzled as it hit. Actually, this was probably imaginary. The stinging unit was not that sensitive to tobacco, though it was sensitive enough. As the drops splattered it, the pile of leaves erupted with a snuffling hiss like an overloaded teakettle into a ...
— Cat and Mouse • Ralph Williams
... Frank and Andy were beside Bob in his boat. Dense smoke was pouring from the Gull, and Frank, dipping up a pailful of water, dashed it into the cockpit. There was a hiss, showing ...
— Frank and Andy Afloat - The Cave on the Island • Vance Barnum
... a low monotone not much louder than the soft hiss of the machine recording his words. Question by question—in Judkins' condition, each query had to be ...
— Take the Reason Prisoner • John Joseph McGuire
... from him the fighters broke apart from clinches on the instant. The audience—a very mixed one, ranging in garb from broadcloths to shoddies—was as quick to approve a telling blow by the less popular fighter as to hiss any suggestion of trickiness or fouling on the part of the favorite. When a contestant in one of the preliminary goes, having been adjudged a loser on points, objected to the decision and insisted on being heard in his own behalf, the crowd, though plainly not in sympathy with his ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... informed of one's stupidity by an ignorant audience that shouts after you like a pack of hounds after a hare. In spite of my pretension of being the least susceptible regarding an author's vanity of all the writers in Paris, it is perfectly impossible to be indifferent to such a thing—a hiss is a hiss. However, vanity aside, there was a question of money which, as I have a bad habit of spending regularly my capital as well as my income, was not without its importance. It meant, according to my calculation, some sixty thousand francs cut ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... can be thrown is truly astonishing. I have seen an Australian stand at one side of Kennington Oval and throw the kangaroo rat completely across it." (Width of Kensington Oval not stated.) "It darts through the air with the sharp and menacing hiss of a rifle-ball, its greatest height from the ground being some seven or eight feet . . . . . . When properly thrown it looks just like a living animal leaping along . . . . . . Its movements have a wonderful resemblance to the long ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... at a miserable east-end music-hall so that her father might find some sort of employment," Tavernake said. "The people only forbore to hiss her father's turn for her sake. She goes about the country with him. Heaven knows what they earn, but it must be little enough! Beatrice is shabby and thin and pale. She is devoting the best years of her life to what she imagines ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... but a very imperfect one, is to light a fire among stones, near a hollow in a rock, that is filled, or can be filled with salt-water. When the stones are red-hot, drop them one by one into it: the water will hiss and give out clouds of vapour, some of which may be collected in a cloth, and wrung or sucked out of it. In the same way a pot on the fire may have a cloth stretched over it ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... Sir Norman looked at her, thinking she had lost her wits. Still she ground it down with a fiercer and stronger force every second; and with her eyes still fixed upon it, and blazing with reddish black flame, she said, in a sort of fiery hiss: ...
— The Midnight Queen • May Agnes Fleming
... Unfaded still their former charms they shew, Around them pleasures wait, and joys for ever new. But cruel virgins meet severer fates; Expell'd and exil'd from the blissful seats, To dismal realms, and regions void of peace, Where furies ever howl, and serpents hiss. O'er the sad plains perpetual tempests sigh, And pois'nous vapours, black'ning all the sky, With livid hue the fairest face o'ercast, And every beauty withers at the blast: Where e'er they fly their lover's ghosts pursue, Inflicting ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... with his hand upon his chin, thinking as well as he might. What did he owe to Douglas Guest, the friend of Emily de Reuss, successful where he had failed? Had he not seen their hands joined? He drew a breath which sounded like a hiss. ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... a nightmare. I have been through one. I have been on a ship torpedoed in mid-ocean. I have stood on the slanting decks of a doomed liner; I have listened to the lowering of the life-boats, heard the hiss of escaping steam and the roar of ascending rockets as they tore lurid rents in the black sky and cast their red ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... other little girls at school and the boys, too, are all the same way. Oh, dear," she sighed, "why will the General Office be so unkind and unjust? Why, I couldn't be happy, with all the money in the world, if I thought that even one little child hated me—hated me so that it would spit and hiss at me. And it's not one child, it's all of them, so Sidney says; and think of all the grown people who hate the road, women and men, the whole county, the whole State, thousands and thousands of people. Don't ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... shall it pass away. Terrors without a cause, disable him And drown his courage. Like a driven leaf Before the whirlwind, shall he hasten down To a dishonor'd tomb. Men shall rejoice, And clap their hands, and hiss him from his place When he departs. Surely, there is a vein For silver, and a secret bed for gold Which man discovers. Where the iron sleeps In darkest chambers of the mine he knows, And how the brass is molten. But a Mind ...
— Man of Uz, and Other Poems • Lydia Howard Sigourney
... only of the most trivial and commonplace remarks. Then the band of harps and violins struck up a lively melody, and the deck was cleared for dancing; the sun dipping beneath the horizon during the proceeding, and the moon showing herself at their stern. The sea was so calm, that the soft hiss produced by the bursting of the innumerable bubbles of foam behind the paddles could be distinctly heard. The passengers who did not dance, including Cytherea and Springrove, lapsed into silence, leaning against the ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... hiss and roar, And idle sits the hapless Gondolier. His Gondola is crumbling on the shore, The Penny Steamer's whistle racks his ear. 'ARRY exults—but Beauty is not here; Trade swells, Arts grow—but Nature seems to die. Hucksters may boast that ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 93, September 3, 1887 • Various
... Adriatic, then, Dressed in her flames, will shine! Devouring flames! Such as shall burn her to the watery bottom, And hiss ...
— Venice Preserved - A Tragedy in Five Acts • Thomas Otway
... calling, "All abawd! All abawd." There was the clang of a bell, a hiss of steam, and in a second the ...
— Behind the Beyond - and Other Contributions to Human Knowledge • Stephen Leacock |
