"Crackling" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and chestnut and cypress and hickory and limetree and cottonwood and tuliptree and cactus and wildvine and tamarind and persimmon ... and tangles as tangled as any canebrake or swamp ... and forests coated with transparent ice, and icicles hanging from boughs and crackling in the wind ... and sides and peaks of mountains ... and pasturage sweet and free as savannah or upland or prairie ... with flights and songs and screams that answer those of the wild pigeon and high-hold and orchard-oriole ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... the doctor laughing. "Perhaps it would go better, my boy, if the dampers were not shut up tight. All it needs is a little draught,—see?" And in a moment there was a comfortable crackling sound going on ...
— Half a Dozen Girls • Anna Chapin Ray
... be the weight of this bracelet?" P'ing Erh observed. "It was once our lady Secunda's. She says that this is called the 'shrimp-feeler'-bracelet. But it's the pearl, which increases its weight. That minx Ch'ing Wen is as fiery as a piece of crackling charcoal, so were anything to be told her, she may, so little able is she to curb her temper, flare up suddenly into a huff, and beat or scold her, and kick up as much fuss as she ever has done ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... indicate a water pool, and amid which they may seek refuge. None appears. On they rush, urging their horses by whip and spur—their steeds seeming to know their danger. Already they see the bright glare of the flames below the dark mass of smoke. Already the bursting and crackling of the leaves, as the threatening column rushes on, reaches their ears. A fearful death is following them. At length the sharp eyes of one of the guides discover a slight eminence; towards this, though almost ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... darker smile, and the rest grinned sheepishly Grandeur and riches had not spoiled their prince. He was theirs still and he had wanted them. He had sent for them. They gained courage to look around on the spotlessly clean room, on the nurse in her crackling dignity; on the dish of oranges which she promptly handed to them and of which each in awe partook a golden sphere; on the handful of bright flowers that Morton had brought but a few minutes before and placed on a little stand by the bed; on the pictures ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... were having a good time with their toys in front of the fireplace in the sitting room. On the hearth blazed a snapping, crackling warm fire ...
— The Story of a Lamb on Wheels • Laura Lee Hope
... reckoned without my host. On tiptoe I stole into the kitchen, where my sweetheart was frying ham and eggs. I thought I might snatch a kiss. Above the noise of the sizzling frying-pan and the crackling wood, I plainly heard the voice of my—well, let us say it—bride, weeping and complaining to an old house servant: 'It's a shame and a sin to enter matrimony with a lie. I can't wed this Michael: not because he is ugly; that doesn't matter in a man, but he comes too late! My heart belongs ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... mother. The woman seemed more bewildered than ever. Evidently she could not understand why a total stranger should risk his life for her child when so many of her neighbors stood around; unless it might be the old fever still burned in Smith's veins, and he could not resist the lure of the crackling flames that seemed to be ...
— Jack Winters' Baseball Team - Or, The Rivals of the Diamond • Mark Overton
... and crackling flames got towards him he started up and began to trot off, coughing and roaring till all the ...
— Crusoes of the Frozen North • Gordon Stables
... Pole Star ever twisting and turning and coming before them again, until the sky seemed lit up with wonderful colours, and great bands of light were shooting up and sinking down only to shoot up again with a crackling like packs of ...
— Tommy Trots Visit to Santa Claus • Thomas Nelson Page
... did not forget me. At first, not knowing what to do, she had remained watching the progress of events, hoping probably that the enemy would be driven back. When, however, the fire surrounded her house, she saw that it was time to fly. Seizing me in her arms she was about to do so, when the crackling and hissing flames burst forth around us. At that moment a man leaped up the steps. Though so long a time had passed since we had parted, I at once recognised my friend Jack. Snatching me from the woman's arms, he sprang down to the ground, telling ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... past him. In the din he had not heard it. He turned as he crouched, and saw that it was a hen-pheasant, with blood on her breast and one wing trailing alongside. And in the same instant he was aware of a man—an under-keeper—crackling about in the hedge only ten yards ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... of the revelation was almost unendurable. She felt as if he had caught her quivering soul and was thrusting it into an inferno from which it could never rise again. Through and above that awful laughter she seemed to hear the crackling of the flames, to feel the blistering heat that had consumed so many, to see the red glare of the furnace gaping ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... Pro-Consul at the Cape, Lucknow might have fallen, before there were forces to relieve it. That would have lit, for our rule in India, a bonfire in which Bombay would only have been a crackling twig. ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... to stern among the nipping masses. Water oozed in through her dry seams. Any moment a rougher touch or a sharper edge might cut her through. But that was a risk they had accepted. They did not take time to think of it, nor to listen to the crunching and crackling of the hungry ice around. They urged straight on, steadily, eagerly, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... the discordant voice of Mariana la Mursiana, crackling in strident protest. My door was still open; I turned to look and saw her, hot-faced, tousle-haired, insufficiently wrapped, striving to ascend the gallery steps, but valiantly opposed by Madame Brossard, who stood ...
— The Guest of Quesnay • Booth Tarkington
... death had banished all other thoughts. A few minutes more, and Ujarak, standing up in his eagerness, flourishing the great whip, and shouting at the pitch of his voice, drove the yelling dogs off the crackling sheet of ice to a place of safety on ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne
... into father's den in the midst of a scene of great moment. I paused and listened with profound respect. Tradition was on trial and the result I felt would be momentous. Father sat in his huge chair before a small crackling fire in the wide chimney, and Martha's boy stood before him with a large, profusely illustrated volume of Hans Christian Andersen clasped passionately to his little ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... came in sight of it, and they thrilled with excitement and joyful alarm. Suppose 'Lias's dreadful stepfather should come out and yell at them! They came forward on tiptoe, making a great deal of noise by stepping on twigs, rustling bushes, crackling gravel under their feet and doing all the other things that make such a noise at night and never do in the daytime. But nobody stirred inside the room with the lighted window. They crept forward and peeped cautiously inside ... ...
— Understood Betsy • Dorothy Canfield
... good fortune to be taken into a boat belonging to the Aklerney sloop. The hull of the ship, masts, and rigging, were now in a blaze, bursting tremendously in several parts through horrid clouds of smoke; nothing was heard but the crackling of the flames, mingled with the dismal cries of terror and distraction; nothing was seen but acts of frenzy and desperation. The miserable wretches, affrighted at the horrors of such a conflagration, sought a fate less dreadful by plunging into the sea, and about three hundred men were preserved ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... and ten minutes afterward Uncle Chirgwin was opening his cash-box and handing Thomasin the snowy, crackling ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... again, and dead silence reigned except for the crackling of the fire and the clicking of Aunty ...
— What Two Children Did • Charlotte E. Chittenden
... the wagon was in a blaze, and from the straw and rushes with which it was laden on the top, the yellow flames rose crackling, while firebrands flew in all directions. The house was suddenly illuminated: masses of smoke ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... sometimes typify nationalities better even than variants of language or clothing. Take the lowly corn meal, for instance. We find that Italian polenti, Spanish tamale, Philadelphia scrapple and Southern Darkey crackling corn bread are but variants of the preparation of corn meal in delectable foods. It is a long step from plain corn meal mush to scrapple, which we consider the highest and best form of preparing this sort of dish, but all the intermediate steps come from a desire to please ...
— Bohemian San Francisco - Its restaurants and their most famous recipes—The elegant art of dining. • Clarence E. Edwords
... wandered from the crackling heat of his Nott stove, has taken it into his poetical imagination to liken this bay to that of Naples," said John Effingham; "and his fellow-citizens greedily swallow the absurdity, although there is scarcely a single feature in common to give the ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... his fire was crackling and blazing up, and his kettle beginning to sing, he felt more cheerful already. What, after all, if it did take some time to get his ring again? He must make some excuse or other; and, should the worst come to the worst, "I suppose," ...
— The Tinted Venus - A Farcical Romance • F. Anstey
... care That young men have to shoe the Mare; Of Twelfth-tide cake, of peas and beans, Wherewith ye make those merry scenes, When as ye choose your king and queen, And cry out, 'Hey for our town green.' Of ash-heaps in the which ye use Husbands and wives by streaks to choose: Of crackling laurel, which fore-sounds A plenteous harvest to your grounds; Of these, and such like things, for shift, We send instead of New-year's gift. Read then, and when your faces shine With bucksome meat and cap'ring wine, Remember us in cups full crowned, And let ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... an infinite number of churches, for in the glare countless minarets and small cupolas were visible. There was no crowd, no voices, and no shouting; only a long line of low, blazing wooden houses. The place was deserted and silent save for the crackling blaze. Then down the street a short, fat man on horseback rode towards us. He was riding a white horse. He wore a grey overcoat and a cocked hat. I became aware of a rhythmical tramping: a noise of hundreds and hundreds of hoofs, a champing of bits, and the tramp of innumerable ...
— Orpheus in Mayfair and Other Stories and Sketches • Maurice Baring
... that I walked along the passage to see what it meant. I thought perhaps the young man had fallen asleep with the window open and left the gas flaring in the wind. I stood for a moment outside the door wondering what I ought to do. Then I heard a crackling sound, and smelt something burning. That alarmed me still more, because I knew no fire had been lit in the room that day. I wondered if the bedroom was on fire, and I knelt down and tried to see through ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees
... heard from our camp. Every day saw new phalanxes of splendid primeval trees fallen, or half suspended in their rigging of lianas. The leaves withered, the flower petals fell and we heard no more the crackling of bamboos in the wind. Then the pitiful survivors of the destruction were brought to us; now a baby flying lemur, flung from its hole by the falling of some tree; young tupaias, nestling birds; a few out ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... over yonder, and a most astonishing way of making you laugh only by talking about ordinary things. And when he joked anybody would laugh, even the Predikant, who was always preaching about the crackling of thorns under a pot. With him, in a black box like a little coffin, he had a machine he called a banjo, upon which he would play lewd and idolatrous music which was most pleasing to the ear; and he would sing songs while he played, which all ended with a yell. He was good at ...
— Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases - Seventeen Short Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... and listened also. He cursed suddenly under his breath, and turned his eyes upon Graham with an unfriendly expression. It was a surge of many voices, rising and falling, shouting and screaming, and once came a sound like blows and sharp cries, and then a snapping like the crackling of dry sticks. Graham strained his ears to draw some single thread of sound from the ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... form of shares, script, bonds, promissory notes, it is a flea-bite. But when it has to be produced in the raw, in flat, hard lumps of gold or in crackling bank-notes, it's more like a bite from a hippopotamus. I can't raise it, and that's all about it. ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill
... have some light on the subject. At the crackling of his match the negro uttered a low whine, and began to struggle slightly again, possibly fearing that he was about to ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne
... westerly wind this morning, and it is well that my banana clump has all the shelter of the gunyah, or its graceful leaves would suffer. The big cabbage palm outside the verandah makes a curious, dry, parchment-like crackling in the wind. But the three silver tree-ferns have a cool, swishing note, very pleasing to the ear; while for the bush trees beyond, theirs is the steady music of the sea on a sandy beach. I fancy this wind must be a shade too boisterous ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson
... they could do to make any progress forward, or even to keep themselves upon their feet. While struggling and plunging blindly through the storm, amid the rushing of the wind and the rattling of the hail, and the crackling and creaking of the dry trees in the forest, and the rush of waters, and all the din of the tempest, Marian's ear caught the sound of a child wailing and sobbing. A pang shot through her heart. She listened breathlessly—and ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... at Obbo the grass was not sufficiently dry to burn, in this country it was reduced to a crisp straw, and I immediately set fire to the prairies; the wind was strong, and we had a grand blaze, the flames crackling and leaping about thirty feet high, and sweeping along with so mad a fury that within an hour the entire country was a continuous line of fire. Not a trace of vegetation remained behind; the country appeared as though ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... He halted his team near the pyre, arena-slaves dragged away Hector's corpse, one brought a lighted torch and Palus himself kindled the pyre at each of its four corners, walking twice round it. When it was enveloped in crackling flames, he mounted the chariot and Narcissus drove him out; drove him out, to the horror of all beholders by ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... spit grease; but in it she somehow looked as trim as a trout fly. Even the hole in her stocking gave her piquancy; and she had wonderful black hair, which probably had not been combed properly for a month, and big, crackling black eyes. They told us that one day, a week or two before we came, she had been particularly cheerful—so cheerful that one of her patrons was moved to inquire the ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... the baby, he put a yellow paper bag down on Thea's coverlid and winked at her. They had a code of winks and grimaces. When he went in to chat with her mother, Thea opened the bag cautiously, trying to keep it from crackling. She drew out a long bunch of white grapes, with a little of the sawdust in which they had been packed still clinging to them. They were called Malaga grapes in Moonstone, and once or twice during the winter the leading grocer got a keg of them. They were used mainly for ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... which (also in broad daylight) I heard a strange crackling sound like the rustling of a large sheet of stiff paper or parchment turned slowly in the reader's hands. This noise also was one of frequent occurrence. Among the things seen by other members of the family was a light that glided ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 29. August, 1873. • Various
... of men. His miracles are mostly works of mercy and gentleness, relieving wants and sicknesses, drying tears and giving back dear ones to mourners. He is as complete a contrast to his stern, solitary, forceful predecessor, as the 'still small voice' was to the roar of the wind or the crackling ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... communicating with other juntas of the same sort to unite their little wars, or guerrillas, into a great combined and vigorous effort wherever the opportunity offered. Under the surface throughout all Spain the fires of resistance began to kindle; the crackling could be heard even while the assembly at Bayonne was adopting ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... together with some other subtleties of thought transplanted hither not without advantage, the distinction between the Fancy and the Imagination, made much also of the cognate distinction between Wit and Humour, between that unreal and transitory mirth, which is as the crackling of thorns under the pot, and the laughter which blends with tears and even with the sublimities of the imagination, and which, in its most exquisite motives, is one with pity—the laughter of the comedies of Shakespeare, hardly less expressive than his moods of seriousness ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater
... hand and holding its roof on with the other. The sea was such a sight as I have not seen on shipboard, and while I luxuriously shuddered at it, I had the advantage of a mellow log-fire at my back, purring and softly crackling in a ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... feathers of the flaming bird were of steel, copper, brass, Corinthian bronze, silver, and gold. Especially resplendent was the bird's head, with its gleaming red circle around the brightly shining eye. This eye glowed and sparkled in the flickering light of the crackling wood fire until it seemed fairly endowed with ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... left for our inspection. A mere suicide would not have caused him to send for me. As to the release of the lady, it would appear that she has been locked in her room during the tragedy. We are moving in high life, Watson; crackling paper, 'E.B.' monogram, coat-of-arms, picturesque address. I think that friend Hopkins will live up to his reputation and that we shall have an interesting morning. The crime was ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... softly back in her chair, her eyes shining under the stimulus of the laugh that ran through her circle. The Dean joined in it uneasily, conscious, no doubt, of the sharp, crackling movements by which in the distance Lady Grosville was dumbly expressing herself—through the Times. Cliffe looked at the small figure a moment, then seized a chair and sat down in front ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... The crackling of a rifle on the hill Rang in his ears: and stung to headlong flight, He started to his feet; and through the brake He plunged in panic, heedless of the sun That burned his cropped head to a red-hot ache Still racked with ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... answer to his soliloquy, there rose above the crackling of the fire, the muffled distant thud of galloping hoofs. A few moments later a well-built, sturdy lad astride a mettlesome pony dashed ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... a curious whistling crackling noise, tightening against the fisherman's foot; and the knot would have jumped off but for his precaution. Then it stopped with a jerk, and ...
— Menhardoc • George Manville Fenn
... door wide. 'Twas a long room, wainscoted half up the wall in some dark wood, and in daytime lit by one window only, which now was hung with red curtains. By the fireplace, where a brisk wood fire was crackling, lean'd the young gentlewoman I had met at Hungerford, who, as she now turn'd her eyes upon me, ceas'd fingering the guitar or mandoline that she held against her waist, and raised her pretty head ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch
... well educated, and told what they had to tell in a very interesting way. Every once in a while those about the fire would leave to replace some of their companions who had been watching some time, and the men thus relieved would have a new batch of stories to relate. Around the crackling, roaring fire it was very warm and comfortable, and time flew by faster than the boys realized. They had never felt more wide awake in their lives, and they were much surprised when the first faint streaks of dawn in the eastern sky ...
— Bert Wilson on the Gridiron • J. W. Duffield
... of magnetism, of od, of electricity. As for electricity, Frederick just then had a peculiar experience of it. He was trying to find composure in front of the open fireplace; and whenever he touched metal with the tongs, crackling little sparks shot out. Everything in the room seemed to be charged. If he merely ran his finger tips lightly over the rug before the hearth, there were little flashes and reports, like the ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... shriek assails his heart,— A female shriek, so piercing wild, As makes his very life-blood start:— "My child! Almighty God, my child!" He hears, And 'gainst the tottering wall The ponderous ladder rears: While blazing fragments round him fall, And crackling sounds assail his ears, His sinewy arm, with one rude crash, Hurls to the earth the opposing sash; And, heedless of the startling din, Though smoky volumes round him roll, The mother's shriek has ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... he cried, and there was a little explosion; a cork spurted out and struck the ceiling; there was smoke and the crackling of glass. He turned round and faced me, a smudge of ink on one of his cheeks, and that customary nervous ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... shouted, in order to make himself heard over the crackling flames and the greater noise of the pounding hoofs. "If we're not safe behind a curtain of flame, there is no other place near where ...
— The High School Boys in Summer Camp • H. Irving Hancock
... hiding-place she had chosen, and walked slowly back to the cottage she had left full of the signs of her shame. When she entered, she saw the wise woman on her knees, building up the fire with fir-cones. Already the flame was climbing through the heap in all directions, crackling gently, and sending a sweet aromatic odor through the ...
— A Double Story • George MacDonald
... perpetually exploring the pockets of her apron. Francine, who wore a roundabout apron of a white and crackling nature, adorned her conversation by attending to the hem of hers. When she asked about my last interview with her father, she ironed that hem with the nail of her rosy little thumb; when she fell into reminiscences of her mother, she smoothed the apron respectfully ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... many cars lay in heaps along the curve, and the trackmen like firebugs ran in and out of them. A tongue of flame leaped from the middle of a pile of stock cars. In five minutes the wreck was burning; in ten minutes the flames were crackling fiercely; then in another instant the wreck burst into a conflagration that rose hissing and seething a hundred feet ...
— Whispering Smith • Frank H. Spearman
... that crackling note in my hand at once restored my courage. Covering the lovely creature beside me with a protecting arm, I replied boldly to the ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... given to decide, THOU ART THE MAN! The scales are in THY hand. Think well, and say,—Shall it be Peace or War? As thou, shalt say so shall it be with thee." But, ere the answer came, all vanished like A scrap of paper in a fire of coals. Then, with a crackling peal, the thick black vail That hangs before the face of men was rent, And in the ...
— Bees in Amber - A Little Book Of Thoughtful Verse • John Oxenham
... Joshua was a farmer's son, And a pondering he sat One night when the fagots crackling burned, ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... friend forever. There was nothing unmaidenly in that. Mark would understand her. Mark had always understood her. And so she cheered her heavy heart through the breakfast hour, and the foolish jesting of the two that sounded to her anxious ears, in the language of scripture, like the "crackling ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... his arms, he crossed himself. The devil was speaking from the hilltop. On two other occasions he had heard the crackling of the flames near the old sheep-herder's shack on the crest of the hill. He had taken the wrong trail. Had gone too far. Worming his way down the path he fled from the flashes ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton
... no need to tell anyone who lives in the country what happens on the fifth of November, for they are sure to know well. The beautiful fireworks, with their streams of coloured fire; the crackling of the squibs; the gorgeous catherine-wheels and the coloured Roman candles; the great rockets that shoot up into the air with a swish, leaving behind them a long tail of golden fire, and then burst ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton
... granite, the narrow passage of the ugly wild-looking little harbour, supposed to be full of the skeletons of men and carcasses of ships. It looked like the mouth of a cavern, rather than the entrance of a port. They could hear the crackling of the pile on high within the iron grating. A ghastly purple illuminated the storm; the collision of the rain and hail disturbed the mist. The black cloud and the red flame fought, serpent against serpent; live ashes, reft by the wind, flew ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... looked large and his voice vibrated in the quiet room; Aunt Polly seemed dwindling, physically, while something about her—the light playing on her knitting needles and spectacles, probably—radiated. The crackling logs were like claps of thunder. Northrup pulled himself to an upright position as one does ...
— At the Crossroads • Harriet T. Comstock
... like a strong crate. By some chance or other I had not before put my hands upon it. I now moved them all over it, and at one place came to a space into which I could thrust my fingers. The board seemed loose. I tugged and tugged away till off it came with a crackling sound, and down I came. I picked myself up, happily not the worse for my tumble, and eagerly inserted my hand into the crate. There appeared to be several articles within, but what they were I could not ...
— Dick Cheveley - His Adventures and Misadventures • W. H. G. Kingston
... to place them, but I scarcely know how I answered them, although I was aware that everything—both my husband's luggage and mine—was being taken into the large bedroom. A maid asked if she ought to put a light to the fire, and I said "Yes . . . no . . . yes," and presently I heard the fire crackling. ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... the ear, and a loud sound proceeded from it whenever the other slip was touched with the other hand. The strips of brass were next held one in each hand. The induced currents occasioned a muscular tremor in the fingers. Upon placing my forefinger to my ear a loud crackling noise was audible, seemingly proceeding from the finger itself. A friend who was present placed my finger to his ear, but heard nothing. I requested him to hold the strips himself. He was then distinctly conscious of a noise (which I was ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various
... match for the story-teller of the present day, when he begins to lie, with a tongue as though he had had nothing to eat for three days, so that you snatch your cap and flee from the house. As I now recall it,—my old mother was alive then,—in the long winter evenings when the frost was crackling out of doors, and had so sealed up hermetically the narrow panes of our cottage, she used to sit before the hackling-comb, drawing out a long thread in her hand, rocking the cradle with her foot, and humming a song, which I seem ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various
... stream before us, or heard the sound of a rill emptying in, swollen by the recent rain. About a mile below the island, when the solitude seemed to be growing more complete every moment, we suddenly saw the light and heard the crackling of a fire on the bank, and discovered the camp of the two explorers; they standing before it in their red shirts, and talking aloud of the adventures and profits of the day. They were just then speaking of a bargain, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... into the apartment in stately fashion, her black silk gown crackling pleasantly as she walked, and seated herself very primly, as befitted her ancestry and bringing-up, in one of the stiff, high-backed chairs. And presently the parson, his garden clothes off and his best coat on, came in hurriedly to know his ...
— Five Little Peppers and their Friends • Margaret Sidney
... others went to the stake actually rejoicing, the spectators wondering at the smile of ineffable peace which illumined their faces above the fierce glare of the flames, at the hymns of praise and thanksgiving heard amid the roar of crackling fagots. ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... scant soil that covered the rocks, and held fast, despite the Arctic blasts that swept across the Bay to rake the island during the long winters. Here the tent was pitched, and everything carried up from the boat and stowed within to dry. Fifteen minutes later the tent stove was crackling cheerily and sending forth comfort to the drenched young mariners. "There'll be no hurry in the marnin'," said David when they had eaten supper and lighted a candle. "We'll stay up to-night till we gets the outfit all dried, and if we're late about un we'll sleep a bit later in ...
— Troop One of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... "Betty, dear," she said, "don't be unreasonable. You can't dislike me as much as you imagine you do! Why should you go on in this fashion?" As Fanny spoke she knelt down by the guard, put a match to the already well-laid fire, and soon it was crackling and ...
— Betty Vivian - A Story of Haddo Court School • L. T. Meade
... was at its height about midnight, and had reached a large tree in a line with our house, when the wind from the lake caught and drove it back. The underbrush soon burnt out, but the trees were like pillars of flame, crackling and roaring in the silent night, till they fell with a crash to the ground. Half roused by the noise, old Cahill would mutter something about keeping watch until the master came home. The old fellow had wrapped himself in his great-coat, and was sitting on a chair in the yard sound asleep. ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... mountain, shepherds overcome with sleep, Near to Bethlem's holy tower, kept at dead of night their sheep; Round about the trunk they nodded of a huge ignited oak, Whence the crackling flame ascending bright and ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... were hurrying about on deck, was only shown by the somber figures who now and then passed in front of a single lantern. From out the engine room, already under water, arose the pound of heavy pounding and the weird crackling of the engines, as they were ...
— The Boy Allies Under Two Flags • Ensign Robert L. Drake
... was under the covers, and all the shades were down, Jane stepped into the school-room, leaving the door slightly ajar. She snapped on the lights above the school-room table. Then Gwendolyn heard the crackling of a news-paper. ...
— The Poor Little Rich Girl • Eleanor Gates
... stork's nest into the air and borne it quickly off, there would have been an end of the King and his daughter, and of our story too. However fortunately they were just in time: and still from afar off the aerial travellers saw the fireworks fly into the air, whizzing and fizzing, and crackling and sparkling, from the tower of the Townhouse, which was certainly all very splendid at a distance, but close by would have been certain death. So the King and his daughter returned safe and ...
— The King of Root Valley - and his curious daughter • R. Reinick
... off the wounded man to Wieltje with one of the stretcher-bearers who was to return with a bearer party. The other one and I watched by Duffy. It was an awful and wonderful time. Our field batteries never slackened their fire and the wood echoed back the crackling sound of the guns. The flare lights all round gave a lurid background to the scene. At the foot of the long slope, down which the brave lads had gone to the attack, I saw the black outline of the trees. Over all fell the soft light of the moon. A great storm of emotion swept ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... pedestal ornamented with precious bronzes, the marble bust of some princess royal disguised as Diana appeared about to fly out of her turbulent drapery, while on the ceiling a figure of Night, powdered like a marquise and surrounded by cupids, sowed flowers. Everything was asleep, and only the crackling of the logs and the light rattle of ...
— The Red Lily, Complete • Anatole France
... pleasure in adding a few bits of lace to the bed, and in filling the vases on the chimney-piece with bunches of roses. Gentle warmth and pleasant fragrance reigned over all, and not a sound broke the silence, save the crackling and little sharp reports of the wood ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... hero: trees on trees o'erthrown Fall crackling round him, and the forests groan: Sudden, full twenty on the plain are strow'd, And lopp'd and lighten'd of their branchy load. At equal angles these disposed to join, He smooth'd and squared them by the rule and line, (The wimbles for the work Calypso found) With those he pierced them and with ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... room upstairs she assigned him, opening from that she had given the elder man. Cheerful fires burned in old-fashioned, open-hearthed Franklin stoves, in both rooms, and the atmosphere was fragrant with the mingled breath of crackling apple-wood, and lavender from the fine old linen with which both beds ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond
... a weird and lurid fire-light Suddenly in fitful flashes Fell upon the group assembled. For the embers on the hearth-stone Had ignited the old pine-tree. Flaming fiery tongues now glided Through the branches full of resin; And the sparks flew crackling upward Wildly to ...
— The Trumpeter of Saekkingen - A Song from the Upper Rhine. • Joseph Victor von Scheffel
... satisfaction of a thousand wants and the cure of a thousand ills. There it is and always has been in the life of man, and yet until a century ago it worked unsuspected, was known only for a disregarded oddity of amber, a crackling in frost-dry ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... right, Billy, my lad," said the boatswain good-humouredly. "He thinks if we waits for pork till I brings down a pig with a six-shooter the crackling won't burn and the ...
— Mother Carey's Chicken - Her Voyage to the Unknown Isle • George Manville Fenn
... climb a bulrush, to which he clings like a sailor to a mast, and send forth his shrill call. There is a Southern species, heard when you have reached the Potomac, whose note is far more harsh and crackling. To stand on the verge of a swamp vocal with these, pains and stuns the ear. The call of the Northern species is far more tender and musical. [Footnote: The Southern species is called the green hyla. I have since heard them in ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... down the poop-ladders; pell-mell they raced amidships past that yawning open furnace; the pitch was boiling through the seams of the crackling deck; they slipped and fell upon it, one over another, and the wonder is that none plunged headlong into the flames. A handful remained on the poop, cowering and undone with terror. Upon these turned Captain Harris, as Ready and I, stemming the torrent of maddened ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... as the whispered words fell from his lips a low, crackling sound caught his ear. Louder it grew, and, looking suddenly to the left, he saw a thin curl of smoke rising through the branches and gaining every instant in volume. Louder, louder snapped the blazing twigs. Denser, heavier grew the smoke. Then tiny darts ...
— Sunset Pass - or Running the Gauntlet Through Apache Land • Charles King
... sudden, she heard the sound of a woodman's ax, and the crackling of the branches as they fell to ...
— The Iceberg Express • David Magie Cory
... gleam, and supposed they had kindled it to search for her. Her pulse beat wildly; yet, still she hoped to escape. It was not probable that they would search a tree so near the cabin; they would rather suppose she had fled to a distance. Presently a crackling noise was heard in the cabin, and a bright light, as of flame, flashed from the door and window. Presently the Indians rushed out, and, raising their wild yell, danced around the cabin with their usual demonstrations of joy, when they have accomplished ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 3 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... already working at capacity, transmitting the light and heat that filtered through the mirror-tone hull into stored, useful energy. Batteries were already overcharged and the voltage regulators snapped on and off like a crackling barrage of ...
— Master of the Moondog • Stanley Mullen
... hills came the sound of baying hounds, followed by a quick, springy step through the crackling underbrush, as a young man in close-fitting velvet hunting-suit and jaunty velvet cap emerged from the ...
— Daisy Brooks - A Perilous Love • Laura Jean Libbey
... ball hit me, and down I went. At the moment a Sepoy fell dead across me, hiding me partly from sight. The fight lasted a minute or two longer. I fancy a few fellows escaped, for I heard shots outside. Then the place became quiet. In another minute I heard a crackling, and saw that the devils had set the mess room on fire. One of our men, who was lying close by me, got up and crawled to the window, but he was shot down the moment he showed himself. I was hesitating whether to do the same or to lie still ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... his way eagerly across the street; slipping and sliding on the glassy surface, head bent against the driving sleet, clothes crackling where particles of ice had formed. Spike reached the door of the eating-house, opened it, and almost staggered as the warmth of the place smote him like ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... regal-looking gown that became her aristocratic old countenance as a rich setting becomes an antique cameo. Her stately rooms were aglow with immense fire-places, each holding a small cart-load of hissing and crackling wood, the reflected light gleaming brightly from the shining fire-irons, while a number of brass sconces—the picturesque chandeliers of the past—polished to the similitude of gold, were softly shimmering overhead. The beautiful English furniture of the last century, ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... Vane. She had an invalid cap on, and a thick woolen invalid shawl, and she shook and shivered perpetually; though she had drawn so close to the wood fire that there was a danger of her petticoats igniting, and the attendant had frequently to spring up and interpose between them and the crackling logs. Little did it seem to matter to Lady Isabel; she sat in one position, her countenance the ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... and a rocky precipice towers up on the west shore, something like a thousand feet high. The crackling of fire-crackers innumerable and the report of larger and noisier explosions attract my attention as we gradually crawl up toward it; and coming nearer, flocks of pigeons are observed flying uneasily in and out of caves in the lower ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... hear the crackling of the shrubbery as the horses of the outlaws pushed their way through to the higher ground, and it was not long before he caught sight of them, riding in single file, the captain ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... Pot boiled and bubbled over the crackling flames. Fat and lean, sweet and bitter, had gone to fill it, and all seethed merrily together. "Hubble bubble!" said ...
— The Silver Crown - Another Book of Fables • Laura E. Richards
... length the crackling noise and dreadful blaze Call'd up some waking lover to the sight; And long it was ere he the rest could raise, Whose heavy eyelids yet were full ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... short of their opponents. The Long Toms laid at an angle of forty-five plumped their huge shells into the British guns at a range where the latter would not dream of unlimbering. And then gradually the rifle fire died away also, crackling more faintly as White withdrew to Ladysmith. At eleven o'clock Carleton's column recognised that it had been left to its fate. As early as nine a heliogram had been sent to them to retire as the opportunity served, but to leave the hill was ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... that adventurous journey to Bremen—recalled it all as some half-forgotten, misty dream. She could feel now the crisp crackling of those Bank of England notes which she had carried secreted in her cheap little dressing-case with its electro-plated fittings. She remembered, too, the face of the stranger, the fat, sandy-haired German, whom she had met ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... electrical sea. The slope was free from snow, and as the electrical waves swept in close succession, about thirty seconds apart, they snapped, hummed, and buzzed in such a manner that their advance and retreat could be plainly heard. In passing by me, the noise was more of a crackling and humming nature, while a million faint sparks flashed from the stones (porphyry and rhyolite) as the wave passed over. But the effect on me became constant. Every muscle was almost immovable. I could climb only a few steps without weakening to the stopping-point. I ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills
... which met his eyes was Mademoiselle de Corandeuil stretched out in her armchair, head thrown back, arms drooping and letting escape by way of accompaniment a whistling, crackling, nasal melody. The old maid's spectacles hanging on the end of her nose had singularly compromised the harmony of her false front. The 'Gazette de France' had fallen from her hands and decorated the back of Constance, who, as usual, was lying ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... chlorate of potash. If a crystal of this is examined under a magnifying glass till its crystalline form and structure are familiar, and it is then placed in a test-tube and gently heated, cleavage will at once be evident. With a little crackling, the chlorate splits itself into many crystals along its chief lines of cleavage (called the cleavage planes), every one of which crystals showing under the microscope the identical form and characteristics of the larger crystal ...
— The Chemistry, Properties and Tests of Precious Stones • John Mastin
... was said, and not one of the three stirred, until a sharp crackling of the wood above told its own tale. The soldier still held up his brand till the place was well alight. Then withdrawing it, and beckoning to his companion, he began to retreat towards the mouth of the cave, saying as he did so, with a ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... from Berks, Oxford, and Bucks, possess a decided superiority over the eastern, of Essex, Sussex, and Norfolk; not to forget another qualification of the former, at which some readers may smile, a thickness of the skin; whence the crackling of the roasted pork is a fine gelatinous substance, which may be easily masticated; while the crackling of the thin-skinned breeds is roasted into good block tin, the reduction of which would almost require teeth of iron."—MOUBRAY on Poultry, ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner
... silence in the bush. Even the pigeons ceased to say they were afraid, but hopped silently from bough to bough, following the movements of the Kangaroo with eager little eyes. The Brush Turkey and the Mound-Builder left their heaped-up nests and joined the other thirsty creatures, and only by the crackling of the dry scrub, or the falling of a few leaves, could one tell that so many live creatures were ...
— Dot and the Kangaroo • Ethel C. Pedley
... refunding to General Jackson the fine of one thousand dollars that had been imposed upon him by a New Orleans judge. Richardson's opening sentence was this: "I rise, Mr. Speaker, and throw myself into the crackling embers of this debate,"—from which, in the judgment of the House, ...
— Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs, Vol. 1 • George Boutwell
... crackling the Prince turned, and, when he saw what had happened, he was furiously angry, more angry, in fact, than he had been when, as a serpent, he had reflected on the unreliability of the promises of kings. Then, with a sad look at the Princess, he turned ...
— Edmund Dulac's Fairy-Book - Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations • Edmund Dulac
... and the crackling of matches as Durand and Chauvenet sought to grasp the unexpected situation that confronted them. The big servant, Armitage knew, would hardly be able to clear matters for them at once, and he hurriedly ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... off with his ugly old mouth open. Worth Gilbert, the son of divorced parents, with a childhood that had divided time between a mother in the East and a California father, surveyed the parchment-like countenance leisurely after the crackling old voice was hushed. Finally he grunted inarticulately (I'm sorry I can't find a more imposing word for a returned hero); and answered ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... a new geographical discovery as odd as the second trail. I had ridden over the trail a dozen times, and seen no communication between the ledge and trail. Nevertheless, I went on a hundred yards or so, when there was a sharp crackling in the underbrush, a shower of stones on the trail, and my friend plunged through the bushes to my side, down a grade that I should scarcely have dared to lead my horse. There was no doubt he was an accomplished rider,—another fact ...
— Drift from Two Shores • Bret Harte
... in around the crack in the door and the air was hot and suffocating. Somewhere the sound of crackling, snapping wood, ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Army Service - Doing Their Bit for the Soldier Boys • Laura Lee Hope
... the dried grass took fire, the flames crackling and roaring as they spread with great rapidity, fortunately away from the broken-down seaplane. Through the whirling clouds of smoke could be faintly discerned the backs of the fugitives, many of whom dropped as they ran with ...
— Wilmshurst of the Frontier Force • Percy F. Westerman
... minute. I knew if I said anything the Chief would laugh at me, so I stayed behind him and looked after my own safety. We reached a little mesa at the head of the coulee and found Indians of all shapes and sizes assembled there. Two or three huge campfires were crackling, and a pot of mutton stewed over one of them. Several young braves were playing cards, watched by a bevy of giggling native belles. The lads never raised their eyes to the girls, but they were quite conscious of ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... A cheerful fire was crackling in a large kitchen range, suggesting, by its brightness and snapping, pine-knots full of pitch and resin. The front doors of the stove were open and the firelight danced across the room, filling it with cheer. It was one of those homelike kitchens where everything ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes
... high devotion was the service made, And all the rites of pagan honour paid: So lofty was the pile, a Parthian bow, With vigour drawn, must send the shaft below. The bottom was full twenty fathom broad, With crackling straw, beneath in due proportion strowed. The fabric seemed a wood of rising green, With sulphur and bitumen cast between To feed the flames: the trees were unctuous fir, And mountain-ash, the mother of the spear; The mourner-yew ...
— Palamon and Arcite • John Dryden
... a faintly crackling little pile of twigs, his face turned inquiringly toward Casey. Casey, glancing guiltily over his shoulder, felt the chill hand of discovery reaching for his very soul. It was as if a dead man were hidden away beneath that tarp. It seemed to him that the eyes of the stranger were ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... catch up a bag, and hold it open, while two more stuff in the crackling leaves. Then I come along with my big feet, and pack the leaves in tight, and on to the rig ...
— The Hills of Hingham • Dallas Lore Sharp
... was positively crackling with an excitement which even her best friend could not have called suppressed. There was ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... go. Thou hast won great glory by thy death. For us, Fortune still tosses us to and fro in weltering labour and forbids us to see what chance the future hath in store.' So spake the Libyan, and straightway from the crackling flame the exulting spirit ...
— Post-Augustan Poetry - From Seneca to Juvenal • H.E. Butler
... petulantly, "I want fire and shelter; and there's your great fire there blazing, crackling, and dancing on the walls, with nobody to feel it. Let me in, I say; I only want ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various
... glass with which the room was full, on the little tray of tea-things which the nurse held, and on his sister's face of greeting as she lay back smiling among her pillows. There was such a cheerful home peace and brightness in the whole scene—in the crackling wood fire, in the sparkle of the tea-things and the fragrance of the tea, and in the fresh white surroundings of the invalid; it seemed to him incredible that under all this familiar household detail there should be lying in wait that last awful ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... entrance to the marsh. At the path where Jinnie had so many times brought forth her load of wood, he paused again and glanced about. As far north as he could see, the marsh stretched out in misty greenness. The place seemed to be without a human being, until Jordan suddenly heard the crackling of branches, and there appeared before him a young man with deep-set, evil eyes, and large, pouting mouth. Upon his ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... descent became so toilsome that conversation ceased, and nothing was heard but the crackling of twigs, the breaking off of branches, and the sharp, rustling noise that followed as the travellers forced their ...
— The Silver Canyon - A Tale of the Western Plains • George Manville Fenn
... crackling sounds followed, like exploding Chinese crackers, and then the thunderous roars and a vast volume of smoke rolled over the bay and enveloped the warships that were pouring their deadly fire into the Spanish vessels. The American ships, in order to disconcert the aim of the batteries of ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... soared into the sky. It illuminated a wide area of the bay, and revealed a number of crowded canoes darting in on the ship from all sides. Courtenay grasped the lines connected with the remaining mines and hauled for dear life. Already the Indian rifle fire was crackling with vivid spurts of flame, and stones and arrows were beginning to patter on the deck and bang against the steel plates. Two of the dynamite bombs exploded with the usual din, but it was impossible to ascertain their effect owing to the ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... start convulsively, as if she would go to him; then controlling herself, she stood silent. He had not seen the movement,—or, if he saw, did not heed it. He did not care to tame her now. The firelight flashed and darkened, the crackling wood breaking the dead ...
— Margret Howth, A Story of To-day • Rebecca Harding Davis
... girl, which led him to remember that he had no hired man, and that there was a good deal to be done. He decided that it might be well to wait until the afternoon before he called on them, and for several hours he drove his team through the crackling stubble. His doubts and irritation grew weaker as he did so, and when at length he drove into sight of Hastings's homestead, his buoyant temperament was commencing to reassert itself. Clear sunshine streamed down upon the prairie out of a vault of cloudless blue, and he felt that ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... had finished the tinker had a firm grip of her arm. "Hang it! If no one will take us in, we'll break in. Cheer up, lass; I'll have you by a crackling good fire if I have ...
— Seven Miles to Arden • Ruth Sawyer
... they read the closely-written pages. There was silence in the room as they did so, broken only by the crackling of the paper, while Max Wyndham kept a motionless watch, his ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... Mare; Of twelf-tide cakes, of pease and beans, Wherewith ye make those merry scenes, Whenas ye chuse your king and queen, And cry out, 'Hey for our town green!'— Of ash-heaps, in the which ye use Husbands and wives by streaks to chuse; Of crackling laurel, which fore-sounds A plenteous harvest to your grounds; Of these, and such like things, for shift, We send instead of New-year's gift. —Read then, and when your faces shine With buxom meat and cap'ring wine, Remember us in cups ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... rear, where the big tree, which overshadowed it with its drooping branches, was most easily approachable. As he and Toko crept on, bending low, through that dense tropical scrub, in deathly silence, they were aware all the time of a low, crackling sound that rang ever some paces in the rear on their trail through the forest. It was Tu-Kila-Kila's Eyes, following them stealthily from afar, footstep for footstep, through the dense undergrowth of ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... arms of a wind-mill revolved imperturbably. Mr. Brady, followed by the boys, went on around to the further side of the burning building. It was a huge hip-roofed structure. One end, that nearest the house, was already falling, and the tons of crackling hay in the mows glowed like a furnace. The heat, even at the foot of the wind-mill, a hundred feet or more away, was almost intolerable. A row of one-story buildings ran along one side of the barn, so near that the flying sparks blew over rather than on to them. Several other ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... weasel... No, it's my father running with my papers. Here he is!... Here he is! Must go; the moon is shining. Must go, look for my papers.... Ah! A flower, a crimson flower—there's Sophia.... Oh, the bells are ringing, the frost is crackling.... Ah, no; it's the stupid bullfinches hopping in the bushes, whistling.... See, the redthroats! Cold.... Ah! here's Asanov.... Oh yes, of course, he's a cannon, a copper cannon, and his gun-carriage is green. ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... never have moved from his chair since the day she had last seen him, thought Trix. The only difference in the surroundings was a crackling wood fire now ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore
... shamed, humiliated, agonized radical—thus made a mark for gibes instead of winning honor as a martyr for the cause—began to wail and plead the men who were nearest the scene of flagellation started to laugh. The laughter spread like a fire through dry brambles. It ran crackling from side to side of the great square. It mounted into higher bursts of merriment. It became hilarity that was expended by a swelling roar that split wide the night silence and came beating back in ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... complex modern civilization," he said, "and the most difficult to deal with. It is a melancholy thought that the noblest of games should have produced such a scourge. I have frequently marked Herbert Pobsley in action. As the crackling of thorns under a pot.... He is almost as bad as poor George Mackintosh in his worst period. Did I ever ...
— The Clicking of Cuthbert • P. G. Wodehouse
... I felt every moment that the soul of Summer was passing. I scented the ascending incense of smoking and crackling boughs. What a requiem was being chanted by all the tremulous and broken voices of Nature! Would I, could I, longer forbear to join the passionate and tumultuous miserere? It seemed that I could not, for gathering about me the voluminous furs of Siberia, I bade adieu to friends, not without ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... withering under the growing domination of the Yankees. They abandoned our hearths when the old Dutch tiles were superseded by marble chimney-pieces; when brass andirons made way for polished grates, and the crackling and blazing fire of nut-wood gave place to the smoke and stench of Liverpool coal; and on the downfall of the last gable-end house, their requiem was tolled from the tower of the Dutch church in Nassau-street by the old bell that came from Holland. But poetry and romance ...
— Wolfert's Roost and Miscellanies • Washington Irving
... a great disposition to fall asunder into smaller pieces without any perceptible cause. It is full of cavities, containing compressed air, which, when the ice melts, bursts its attenuated envelope with a crackling sound like that of the electric spark. It thus behaves in this respect in the same way as some mineral salts which dissolve in water with slight explosions. Barents relates that on the 20/10th August ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... At the present moment a howitzer is going strong behind this, and the concussion is tremendous. The noise is like dropping a traction-engine on a huge tin tray. A shell passing away from you over your head is like the loud crackling of a newspaper close to your ear. It makes a sort of deep reverberating crackle in the air, gradually lessening, until there is a dull boom, and a mile or so away you see a thick little cloud of white smoke in the air or a pear-shaped cloud of grey-black smoke on ...
— Adventures of a Despatch Rider • W. H. L. Watson
... stuck, crackling under the pull of the forceps, blood and puss leaping forward from the cavities as the steady hand of the doctor pulled inch after inch of the gauze to the light. And when one hole was emptied there was another, ...
— A Diary Without Dates • Enid Bagnold
... were mostly rain at a temperature of thirty-five or forty degrees, with strong winds which sometimes roughly lash the shores and carry scud far into the woods. The long nights are then gloomy enough and the value of snug homes with crackling yellow cedar fires may be finely appreciated. Snow falls frequently, but never to any great depth or to lie long. It is said that only once since the settlement of Fort Wrangell has the ground been covered to a depth of four feet. The mercury seldom falls more than five or six degrees below ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir
... in a moment, had thrown off his nightshirt and was in his bath. Sausages! He was translated into a world of excitement and splendour. They had sausages so seldom, not always even on birthdays, and to-day, on a cold morning, with a crackling fire and marmalade, perhaps—and then all ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole
... Becky, very late one night, as a party of gentlemen were seated round her crackling drawing-room fire (for the men came to her house to finish the night; and she had ice and coffee for them, the best in London): "I must have ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... green lane that led from the village street, and were soon in the forests. The half-muffled sunlight stole down sweetly and tenderly through the chaos of naked branches overhead; and there was a light crisp, crackling sound running through the dry fallen leaves, as though they had become tired of their position, and were striving to turn over. So quiet was the air that even this faint sound was distinctly audible. Hark! whang! whang! there rings the woodman's axe—crack! crash! b-o-o-m!—Hurrah! ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... of arriving before that hour. The people poured in a steady stream through the portals. Groups of English and American students in their irreproachable evening attire, groups of French students in someone else's doubtful evening attire, crowds of rustling silken dominoes, herds of crackling muslin dominoes, countless sad-faced Pierrots, fewer sad-faced Capuchins, now and then a slim Mephistopheles, now and then a fat, stolid Turk, 'Arry, Tom, and Billy, redolent of plum pudding and Seven Dials, Gontran, Gaston and Achille, ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... tossing in thorn sprays, and stirring about the blazing mass with a long-handled, three-pronged Beelzebub kind of fork, the heat shining out upon his streaming face and making his eyes like furnaces, the thorns crackling and sputtering; while Creedle, having ranged the pastry dishes in a row on the table till the oven should be ready, was pressing out the crust of a final apple-pie with a rolling-pin. A great pot boiled on the fire, and through the open door of the back kitchen a boy was seen seated ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... which lay near, and blew thereon three shrill notes that echoed against the trees. A moment of silence ensued, and then was heard the rustling of leaves and crackling of twigs like the coming of many men; and forth from the glade burst a score or two of stalwart yeomen, all clad in Lincoln green, like Robin, with good Will Stutely and the widow's three sons ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... crackling underbrush, now near, now far away in the depths of the forest; then sudden silence, ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers
... they would have taken him away, or torn him in pieces. At some times they seemed to belch flame, at other times a continuous smoke, with horrible noises and roaring. Once he dreamed he saw the face of the heavens, as it were, all on fire; the firmament crackling and shivering with the noise of mighty thunders, and an archangel flew in the midst of heaven, sounding a trumpet, and a glorious throne was seated in the east, whereon sat one in brightness, like the morning star, upon which he, thinking it was the end of the world, fell upon his knees, and, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... there's another, right on the edge of the horizon, just like a tiny star. Peasants are seated round it, keeping their night-watch, cooking potatoes and chatting. The fire yonder is blazing up and crackling merrily, while the horses stand, snorting, beside it. But at this distance it's only a little spark that ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... burning house. They won't forget that sight, I'll bet a sovereign, not even when they grow up. We rode away and left them, a forlorn little group, standing among their household goods—beds, furniture, and gimcracks strewn about the veldt; the crackling of the fire in their ears, and smoke and flame streaming overhead. The worst moment is when you first come to the house. The people thought we had called for refreshments, and one of the women went to get milk. Then ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... we were well within the ravine which has already been described, and the old soldier had hardly ceased speaking when from amid the foliage ahead and on every side came a circle of fire like unto the lightning's flash, followed by the crackling of firearms, which served to drown the death-cries from every ...
— The Minute Boys of the Mohawk Valley • James Otis
... an answer. A startled voice whipped back at him through crackling static: "Cosmos XII, this is Traffic. Who did you say ...
— Next Door, Next World • Robert Donald Locke
... dead wood lying about. As the blaze grew I rose to my feet and, dragging larger wood, piled it on. A sort of joyful mania took possession of me as I watched the great tongues of flames shooting skyward and listened to the crackling of the burning wood, and I stood back and laughed. I had triumphed over fate and the elements. Our arms, our clothing, nearly all our food, our axes and our paddles, and even the means of making new paddles were gone, but for the present we were safe. Life, no matter how uncertain, is ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace
... onward: where to-day the martyr stands, On the morrow crouches Judas with the silver in his hands; Far in front the cross stands ready and the crackling fagots burn, While the hooting mob of yesterday in silent awe return To glean up the scattered ashes ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... in his irritable manner—he always seemed to keep his hands ready for action—he pulled another sheet of paper from his pocket, unfolded it. The paper made a crackling noise. He handed ...
— Sons and Lovers • David Herbert Lawrence |
