"Thud" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... quickly. She was still, listening. All the doors in the house seemed to be open. The house was alive with soft, quick steps and running voices. The green baize door that led to the kitchen regions swung open and shut with a muffled thud. And now there came a long, chuckling absurd sound. It was the heavy piano being moved on its stiff castors. But the air! If you stopped to notice, was the air always like this? Little faint winds were ...
— The Garden Party • Katherine Mansfield
... revolver and Tierney followed his example. Then Morgan gave the door a quick push and stood back. It swung back against the wall with a resounding thud, but outside of that sound everything remained silent. The three men then moved warily into the doorway, with Tierney and Morgan in the lead. While Marsh remained in the entrance hall, Tierney stepped into the living room and Morgan crept cautiously through the ...
— The Sheridan Road Mystery • Paul Thorne
... sudden thud, as if something had fallen somewhere in the house; then silence, except for the loud beating of my heart, that threatened to suffocate me. "Nonsense," I said to myself, "I am foolishly nervous to-night. It is nothing here, or Bogie would bark;" so I tried again to sleep. ...
— J. Cole • Emma Gellibrand
... not thus to be cheated. At the order of the Magistrate the executioner thrust a sword into the criminal's bowels, then, unbinding the body, let it fall upon the ground with a thud: it rolled over on its back, and lay still for a moment, the white, emaciated face staring at the sky. Then the executioner seized an axe and quartered the corpse. Some sickened and turned away, but ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... there," thundered "Poker" John, and Jacky heard a thud as of a fist falling upon the table. "You've taken the unwarrantable liberty of poking your nose into my affairs, and, because of our old acquaintance, I have allowed it. But now let me tell you this is no d——d business of ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... wound at a rapid pace for nearly an hour. The leaves were still green, mellowing to golden; but the fruit was ripe and heavy, ready at all points to fall. In the still October air the husks above our heads would loosen, and the brown nuts rustle through the foliage, and with a dull short thud, like drops of thunder-rain, break down upon the sod. At the foot of this rich forest, wedged in between huge buttresses, we found Pontremoli, and changed our horses here for the last time. It was Sunday, and the little town was alive with country-folk; tall stalwart fellows wearing peacock's ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... the tiger spring and have it over? Why does—but look, look, the brute has let go the branch and fallen down, down with a crash, and Archie hears the dull thud of the ...
— Our Home in the Silver West - A Story of Struggle and Adventure • Gordon Stables
... morning, and Gloria and the cat were occupying the broad piazza. At last Abou Ben Adhem slid with a soft thud to the piazza floor. It was his signal that no more petting was desired for the time. Gloria, too, got out of the big rocker and went into ...
— Gloria and Treeless Street • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... became still more cyclonic. He had a left arm which seemed to open out in joints like a telescope. Several times when the Kid appeared well out of distance there was a thud as a brown glove ripped in over his guard and jerked his head back. But always he kept boring in, delivering an occasional right to the body with the pleased smile of an infant destroying a Noah's ark with a tack-hammer. Despite these efforts, however, he was plainly getting ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse
... man raised his staff and smote twice upon the ground, once to the right and once to the left. The one gave a dull thud, ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... some distance after a sudden shock had cut the gaff halliards and let the jaws of the gaff free; so now the sail would neither haul up nor come down. Like a cat Bob sprang up the remaining rings, and hacked at the gear; the sail fell—and so did Bob, with a dull thud. ...
— A Dream of the North Sea • James Runciman
... Everything was against him, for a heavy rain was falling, and there was no chance of Bryda coming out for a Sunday walk. But he went boldly up the steps before Mr Lambert's house and gave a heavy thud on ...
— Bristol Bells - A Story of the Eighteenth Century • Emma Marshall
... rug tells me that a breeze has blown my papers off the table. A round thump is a signal that a pencil has rolled on the floor. If a book falls, it gives a flat thud. A wooden rap on the balustrade announces that dinner is ready. Many of these vibrations are obliterated out of doors. On a lawn or the road, I can feel only running, stamping, ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... side of this door. Howard and Graham passed in, and Graham, glancing back, saw the white-robed Council still standing in a close group and looking at him. Then the door closed behind him with a heavy thud, and for the first time since his awakening he was in silence. The floor, even, was noiseless ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... the gray mists of morning came soldiers, six or eight, with ring of weapons and shuffling thud of feet; and with them was a centurion in command. These overtook Nicanor where he went slowly back toward Thorney; and the centurion laid a rough hand upon him and bade him halt. Nicanor turned; but before he could ask angrily why they had stopped him, his wrists were fast in handcuffs ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... the two great giants meet; and when they do, all the world knows it for a mile around, without it being seen. The crashing of the antlers as they close, the roars of hate, the squeals of combat, the cracking of breaking branches as they charge and charge, and push and strive, and—sometimes the thud of a heavy ...
— Wild Animals at Home • Ernest Thompson Seton
... graze his arm, and heard a heavy thud at his side. It was a ripe Durian which had fallen from an immense height and ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... before I was clear of the window, he had hold of me and half drew me back, holding to me tightly, and not without need, for there was a dull thud, the house quivered from the tremendous blow, and I felt the water leap over me, deluging me from head to foot, and making me gasp for breath as I ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn
... a thud and took off his hat as he gazed at this astonishing woman. She was giving him advice in a most superior manner; and yet she ...
— Rimrock Jones • Dane Coolidge
... destroyed our sails, consumed more stores than the crew, affably shared our beds and our dangers, and now, when the ship was made seaworthy, concluded to clear out. I called Mahon to enjoy the spectacle. Rat after rat appeared on our rail, took a last look over his shoulder, and leaped with a hollow thud into the empty hulk. We tried to count them, but soon lost the tale. Mahon said: 'Well, well! don't talk to me about the intelligence of rats. They ought to have left before, when we had that narrow squeak from foundering. ...
— Youth • Joseph Conrad
... little singer. Nothing but starvation or scientific research could justify the slaughter of one of these innocents. I believe I shut my eyes when I pulled the trigger of my gun, and I know my heart gave a regretful thump when I heard the thud of its poor, bleeding body upon the ground. When we started for Franklin Point the next day, Lieutenant Schwatka concluded to follow Toolooah's advice, and keep upon the smooth ice near the shore, even ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... a thud and a grunt, and rebounded with a numbed shoulder. But it looked so easy for ...
— Industrial Revolution • Poul William Anderson
... the spell-bound multitude in the streets, for in a moment more the fate of the doomed adventurers must be decided. Suddenly two human forms dropped from the loosened basket and struck with a fearful thud against the elevated railway, then rebounded to the street below a mass of mangled flesh. Death was instantaneous. With one impulse the throng surged about the bodies; but Dr. Gardner's eyes were still fixed upon the balloon, for as if relieved by the rapid lightening of its burden ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... invisible behind the lights of his cabin; and the thud of oars, the voluble noises of the water, and the crackling of the cresset overhead had, too, the quality of impersonal and supernatural ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... it did not produce the ringing sound it would have done in an empty gun, but went home with a soft thud, I sung out, "Stand clear, sir. By Jupiter, the ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... resounded with the thunderous racket of heavy wings as the flock burst into flight, clattering away through leafy obscurity; but under the uproar of shot and clapping wings sounded the thud and splash of something heavy crashing earthward; and the Indian, springing from root to tussock, vanished into ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... was nearer than either of them dreamed. At that very moment the soft thud of the closing housedoor sounded through the house. It brought her sharply to her feet, and loose from his coiling arms, with quickened breath and blanching face. A moment she hung there, tense, then sped to the door of the room, set it ajar ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... Horse waited in the hall. Soon he heard a little thud on the carpet. That was the Sawdust Doll sliding down out of Dorothy's bed to the floor. A moment later she stood beside the Rocking Horse in ...
— The Story of a White Rocking Horse • Laura Lee Hope
... roof. Down into its valleys and up over its ridges the little fugitive slid and scrambled. She reached the sheer edge, the lady at the window hid her face in her hands, there came a dull, jarring thud in the paved court beneath, and the lady, looking down, saw the child lifted from the ground and borne out ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... out again close behind them. The pheasants poured over the top of a belt of tall firs. They could see young Mr. Meyer, in his new yellow gaiters, very busy and excited at the end of the line, and they could hear the thud of the ...
— Puck of Pook's Hill • Rudyard Kipling
... bell was being rung he distinctly heard the window flung wide open, and a soft thud on the pavement. Sylvia had thrown her purse into the street. From his own room next to the schoolroom, he saw the man pick it up and go away. The doors were closed now, but he imagined the governess's anger. The incident had afterwards seemed ...
— The Twelfth Hour • Ada Leverson
... attempts to inspect a redstart's nest containing young, the female drops from the nest a dead weight and falls from branch to branch of any tree in the way, striking the ground with a dull thud. Her next move is to trail a helpless wing along the ground. At another time she flies from the nest and alights on the ground with spread wings and tail. The yellow markings on the wing and tail show conspicuously as the bird moves forward by the wings, as if her legs were too weak ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... and she mechanically drew the folds of her scarf around her shoulders, her eyes fixed on vacancy, her thoughts wandering. Did she not hear the violins of her ball, which reached their ears in the intervals of silence, like bursts of savage irony, with the heavy thud of the dancers shaking the floors? An iron hand, falling upon her, aroused her abruptly from her torpor. Risler had taken her by the arm, and, leading her before ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... close to his feet. This shell, Kirk explained afterwards, had arrived a few minutes before, and striking the parapet of the communication trench some distance away, had ricocheted and landed with a thud and a cloud of dust beside him. He was still in the state of being uncertain whether he was alive or not and was very glad, when spoken to, to find that he was able ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... door swung back on its rawhide hinges and ten men, with a revolver in each hand, filed quietly in. Sims and Larkin remained outside on guard. Presently there was a sound of muttering and cursing that grew louder. Then one yell, and the solid thud of a revolver butt coming in contact with a human skull. After that there was ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... trying to show him that she could run away from him if she chose; and with a quiet smile on his lips and a firm hand on his tugging horse, he kept behind her until she was a good way up the field. Then he gave his horse its head and it sprang forward. She heard the eager thud of the heavy hoofs drawing up behind, and in a few seconds he was level with her. For a minute they galloped neck and neck, though at a little distance from each other. Then she saw him ahead, riding with a seat looser than most Englishmen's, yet with an assurance, a grace of ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... hells that batter a coastal town, Or grimly die in a hail of shells when the walls come crashing down. And many a pink-white baby girl, the queen of her home to-day, Shall see the wings of the tempest whirl the mist of our dawn away — Shall live to shudder and stop her ears to the thud of the distant gun, And know the sorrow that has no tears when a battle is lost and won, — As a mother or wife in the years to come, will kneel, wild-eyed and white, And pray to God in her darkened home for the ...
— An Anthology of Australian Verse • Bertram Stevens
... instinct warned him of danger, but I knew I could not get up the rough bank with my lame foot, and drove him past. As I limped by his side with the whip, I thought I heard the current gurgle under the ice, but we went on, the dogs snuffing and treading cautiously. Then there was a soft thud and a splash, the team was jerked back and I saw that the sledge had vanished. I suppose it had broken through a snow-bridge that our ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... beside her flew into one, and the stones of the parapet between them stormed into the cistern. Had her presence been the attraction to that thunderbolt? Often after this, while she watched the engine below in the workshop, she would hear the dull thud of an iron ball against the body of the tower; but although it knocked the parapet into showers of stones, their artillery could not make the ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... a council of war, which overruled the plan for an immediate return to France. Presently a thud, followed by groans of mortal agony, was heard in the new commander's cabin. The door was burst open, and he was found dying from the thrust of his own sword. La Jonquiere, afterwards governor-general of Canada, ...
— The Great Fortress - A Chronicle of Louisbourg 1720-1760 • William Wood
... in the thick of the battle of Tamai with Davis's square, and at Abu Klea, the smoke cloud that hung like a curtain before our eyes was a source of danger. Save for the erratic, occasional whizzing of the enemy's bullets, the thud of a hit and the dropping, weltering in his blood, of a man here and there, watched from our firing lines the combat enlisted and fascinated the attention with barely a suggestion of danger to the onlooker. Few will ever see again so great and brave a show. A vast army, with a front ...
— Khartoum Campaign, 1898 - or the Re-Conquest of the Soudan • Bennet Burleigh
... for very fear I dared not refuse. And when I had handed it in by a chink in the open door, first there was a sound like drinking, then an awful cry, "Potash again!" and then a heavy soft thud, as if you had knocked over a bolster stuffed with ...
— HE • Andrew Lang
... leaped and seemed to stand still. Jim could not have locked more terrible if he were really a murderer. He opened his coat. Then he flung a black object upon the table and it fell with a soft, heavy, sodden thud. It was a ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... sickening thud, and the bookmaker went over like a shot rabbit. His legs twitched for a moment—a little moan that was scarcely audible broke from his lips. Then he lay quite still. Sir Richard bent over him with the life ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... to move the adjournment, although he and his friends were joined by some of the Scotch and Irish malcontents, the total muster was only thirty-three, and the motion accordingly came to earth with a thud. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Nov 21, 1917 • Various
... one, and he brought up with a painful thud at the bottom of a deer pit—a covered trap which the natives dig to catch their ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... again, and she could hear the wet sack thud, thud upon the ground. Other sacks and blankets went thud, thud, and down here at close range the fire was not so beautiful as it had been from the hilltop. Down here the glamour was gone. She climbed up to the high wagon seat and took ...
— Her Prairie Knight • B.M. Sinclair, AKA B. M. Bower
... gold and glare, and flowers planted in fire, with trees that seemed to be dropping golden fruit, in which all the crowd of beautiful girls were lying on banks and under trees, and perched like splendid birds up in the air. Then the curtain came down with a thud, smothering up the fire, and hiding everything. The storm of music broke off with a crash, and the crowd began to shout and yell, and stamp their feet ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... of his knife. In another second of time he would have driven the blade through me; but that second was all I now required. Straight from my waist, and from under my poncho, I fired. His knife fell ringing on to the floor; he swerved, then fell back, coming to the ground with a heavy thud. Over his falling body I leaped, and almost before he had touched the ground was several yards away, then, wheeling round, I found the other two ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson
... I tried to imagine the entire animal from the little of it that I saw, aimed for the spot among the grass which I pictured as being just behind the shoulder, and pulled the trigger. The sharp crack of the rifle broke in upon the stillness of the night with startling effect. I heard the thud of the bullet, instantly followed by a savage snarl that ended in a moan, and as the smoke drifted away I caught a momentary glimpse of a great, tawny, black-spotted form writhing convulsively in the air from its death spring and then collapsing ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... the weather side of the Cape, he could hear the seas thud and the surf growl like the distant booming of heavy batteries. Over his head the wind whistled and whined in the firs with a whistle and a whine like machine-gun bullets that have missed their mark. But neither ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... feeling toward this place was like that about a ruin, only this seemed older than a ruin. I could not hear my horse's foot-falls, and an apple startled me when it fell with a soft thud, and I watched it roll a foot or two and then stop, as if it knew it never would have anything more to do in the world. I remembered the Enchanted Palace and the Sleeping Beauty in the Wood, and it seemed as if I were on the way to it, and this was a corner of ...
— Deephaven and Selected Stories & Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... this conclusion—which disappointed Susan a little, I think—my spade struck with a heavy thud against a piece of wood. Clearing the earth away, I disclosed some fragments of rotten plank, and beneath these I saw something that glittered! Susan, standing beside me on the edge of the hole, saw the glitter too. She did not say ...
— Our Pirate Hoard - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... bright red streaks, rushed into the captain's cabin, broke open the closet beside the desk with a bayonet and seized the keys of the ammunition rooms. Now down the stairs and through the narrow openings in the bulkheads, where the thud of the hostile projectiles sounds more and more hollow, and here, at last, is the door of the shell-chamber containing the shells for the 8-inch guns in ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... castle on patrol, with Haddan at his side. Dreamily the watchers in the cool balcony looked down upon the somber park and its occasional guardsman. Neither was in the mood to talk. As they rose at last to go to their rooms, something whizzed through the air and dropped with a slight thud in the center of the balcony. The two young women started back in alarm. A faint light from Beverly's window filtered ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... Dunbar. Men began to say that he 'jawed' too much and would not let them go to bed, little knowing how he used to try to prolong a conversation so that he might not be left alone with a horrible fear always ready to pounce upon him when night fell, and when only the thud of the engines playing some maddening tune broke ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... virago's—broke in from the passage behind, demanding to know if the door was being kept open to invite the whole town. The child stood her ground on the doorstep. An instant later a hand reached out, clutched her—it seemed by the hair— and dragged her inside. Then followed a strangling sob and the thud ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... a shrubbery that led to the training-field, and there came the quick thud of hoofs galloping on short turf as ...
— Charles Rex • Ethel M. Dell
... the ceaseless thud, the chopping, pounding of the machinery, the long soughing of ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... lighted with a few lamps—the walls black as night or reflecting slender rays from the polished watery surface. Distinctly Dantesque was the gulf between the huge mountain sides which threatened every moment to fall. One heard the click and thud of hammers, the wild chants of the borers, the slush of water. Being like gnomes and kobolds glided hither and thither—half naked figures muffled up by the mist. Here dark bodies, gleaming with beaded heat drops, hung in what seemed frightful positions; "they ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... already landed on the further side of the wall when thud! thud! thud! other members of the flock came thumping down upon the ledge beside him. He moved aside a little way, because he didn't want to ...
— The Tale of Snowball Lamb • Arthur Bailey
... he thought his lungs would burst. But he was making progress. Now, he dared back off a trifle and take a long breath of air from the burrow he had made. Then a sound stirred him to renewed effort. It was the thud and jar of an impact. The tiger, having made his first leap, had missed. How many more times would he do this? The boy once more jamming his head against the snow renewed his swimming motions. Again he was obliged ...
— Lost In The Air • Roy J. Snell
... he did not come down. She could not imagine that he had turned into bed and gone to sleep—that he did not know she was sitting here waiting for him in the dawn. For a moment she thought of going up and knocking at his door—then she heard a thud of footsteps and creaking of boards, which announced that Mene Tekel and Nan Gregory of Windpumps were stirring in their bedroom. In an incredibly short time they were coming downstairs, tying apron-strings and screwing ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... scarcely regained his balance after being almost knocked over in this humiliating way, and the horrible, as it were, sodden, thud of the blow in the face had scarcely died away in the room when he seized Shatov by the shoulders with both hands, but at once, almost at the same instant, pulled both hands away and clasped them behind his back. He did not speak, but ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... swung smartly around the bend into the narrow wagon-road that stretched its aimless way through the scrubby bottom-lands and over the ridge to the open sweep of the plains beyond. Presently he urged the mare to a rhythmic lope, and all the while his ears were alert for the thud of galloping horses behind. It was not until he reached the table-land to the south that he drove the rowels into the flanks of the swift four-year-old and leaned forward in the saddle to meet the rush of the wind. Full well he knew ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... a bang, a scuffle, and then a dull thud; but the first to follow was only in time to see eight finger-tips clinging for a moment outside to the ledge of one of the narrow windows, which ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... in progress. The members of the other houses who had come to look on at the match stood in knots, and gazed with approval at the efforts of Kay's and Blackburn's juniors to wipe each other off the face of the earth. The air was full of shrill battle-cries, varied now and then by a smack or a thud, as some young but strenuous fist found a billet. The fortune of war seemed to be distributed equally so far, and the combatants were ...
— The Head of Kay's • P. G. Wodehouse
... There was a metallic thud as they let down a burden, which I knew must be a sack of gold. I lay quiet for a minute, and then began to wriggle through the brush to get a glimpse of them, and, in case it proved to be the camp, learn what might be the most ...
— The Devil's Admiral • Frederick Ferdinand Moore
... a study, as, with compressed lips, and eyes that appeared to fairly flash fire, he bent so low in his saddle as to almost touch his horse's mane. On, on, we sped! Not a word was spoken—not a sound could be heard, save the dull, heavy thud of our horses' feet upon ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens
... A crashing thud, from a heavy beam, snapped the bolt from its screws, another blow tore loose the door. Through the opening and over the debris sprang a short, broad-shouldered man in a gray suit, while three other heavily built men entered, barring ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith
... much inclined that, way" agreed Anne ruefully. "When I think something nice is going to happen I seem to fly right up on the wings of anticipation; and then the first thing I realize I drop down to earth with a thud. But really, Marilla, the flying part IS glorious as long as it lasts . . . it's like soaring through a sunset. I think it ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... creaking of the boom, the singing of the ropes, the banging of the blocks as they put the vessel about, all fell in with the roaring of the wind above, the surge of the waves past her sides, and the thud with which every now and then one would strike her; while through it all Diamond could hear the gurgling, rippling, talking flow of the water against her planks, as she slipped through it, lying now on this side, now on that—like a subdued air running ...
— At the Back of the North Wind • George MacDonald
... into which had been poured, as was supposed, the ill-gotten gain of all the pirates, from Captain Kidd down to the last outlaw of the ocean. Twenty-seven years the sound of the hammer and the drill and the thud of blasting-powder echoed through the leafy forests, and then all ...
— The Bay State Monthly - Volume 1, Issue 4 - April, 1884 • Various
... driving. Try them on and see," and he tossed them through the door on to Eustace's bed, and went on with his unpacking. A minute later he heard a shrill cry of terror. "Oh, Lord," he heard, "it's in the glove! Quick, Saunders, quick!" Then came a smacking thud. Eustace had thrown it from him. "I've chucked it into the bathroom," he gasped, "it's hit the wall and fallen into the bath. Come now if you want to help." Saunders, with a lighted candle in his hand, looked over the edge of the bath. There it was, old ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... alive with the dances, and the dull thud of the Indian drum was continually in the air. The council had agreed that Antelope was entitled to wear a war-bonnet of eagles' feathers. He was accordingly summoned before the aboriginal parliament, and from the wise men of ...
— Old Indian Days • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... hand; he heard it fall with a thud upon the carpet; and then he heard nothing else except the beating of his own arteries in his ears. Time seemed to stop suddenly and then to whirl madly forward while he stood rooted to his square of carpet, with ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow
... apple dropped suddenly upon his upturned face and, having struck him smartly between the eyes, fell with a thud ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... every demonstration of joy, and for some weeks he and dyspepsia had it all their own way on Piccadilly. (Report says that he drank! Several times while under the influence of liquor he abdicated the throne with a dull thud, but ...
— Comic History of England • Bill Nye
... down on us, and past us, and I watched the prophet. His eyes were wide, his whole face expressing anguish. "Oh God, my Father!" he whispered, and seemed to quiver with each thud of the tramping feet on the pavement. After the storm had passed, he stood motionless, the pain still in his face "It is Rome! It is Rome!" ...
— They Call Me Carpenter • Upton Sinclair
... holding them up before the child, who was laughing and trying to grasp them. Then she forgot them, and dropped them in the bottom of the boat, for something had struck the keel with a thud, and the ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... The governor refused a pardon, and Dr. Schoeppe heard the hammer driving the nails into his scaffold beneath the prison-window. He was measured for his coffin, but at the last moment was reprieved, and listened to the heavy thud as the drop fell and a man whose companion he was to have been on the scaffold was launched into eternity. Finally, moved by the incessant pleadings of Mr. Hepburn, the junior counsel, by the urgings of the public press, led ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... heard something crash through the window of the barn and fall with a dull, sickening thud on the outside. The neighbors came to see what it was that caused the noise. They found that I had done it in ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... the Edgeworth eleven. Never was such confusion! I was already starting for the second run, whilst my stout fellow batsman was halfway through the first, when the ball came down like a meteor, and, narrowly shaving the luckless "Podder's" head, hit the ground with a loud thud about five yards distant from the outstretched hands of the anxious bowler, who collided with his ally, the wicket-keeper, in the middle of the pitch. Half stunned by the shock, and disappointed at his want ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... upon me that tremor of passionate misery which, at the time, often made me ill. The senseless routine of mechanic exercise was in itself all but unendurable to me; I hated the standing in line, the thrusting-out of arms and legs at a signal, the thud of feet stamping in constrained unison. The loss of individuality seemed to me sheer disgrace. And when, as often happened, the drill-sergeant rebuked me for some inefficiency as I stood in line, when he addressed me as "Number Seven!" I burned with shame and ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... and leaped to his feet, hoping for a shot at a stray otter. The next instant the rifle slipped from his nerveless fingers and struck upon the ground with a muffled thud. ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx
... cause the sand to fall in; we had therefore to start a new vertical shaft from the surface. After a considerable amount of digging we reached water level, and were preparing to bail the water, when with a thud the whole thing caved in, and our labour had to be recommenced. At the time the wedge of ground fell in Godfrey was working below and narrowly escaped being buried. A timely rope fortunately saved him. I never saw a man come quicker out of a hole! Now we were a bit puzzled. Our position was this: ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... the way!" cried he; and while we ran off and hid behind convenient trees, Tom struck a match and lighted the fuse. The dull thud of an explosion shortly followed; but on walking back to the spot we were all greatly surprised to see that the rock had remained intact—it ...
— The Boys of Crawford's Basin - The Story of a Mountain Ranch in the Early Days of Colorado • Sidford F. Hamp
... his foe, gripping him by the throat until every vein in his forehead stood out in blue knots. The action was so unexpected and so rapid that Dixon found it impossible to free himself. The men swayed to and fro in each other's embrace, finally falling heavily together with a sickening thud upon the road. Tom was uppermost, and picked himself up with a rather ghastly smile, but Dixon lay there ...
— The Village by the River • H. Louisa Bedford
... isn't anything!" But as Bet switched on the light and reached the top step she was just in time to see a figure in bright clothes go out the window. She heard the sound of a thud on the veranda of the second floor and running feet ...
— The Merriweather Girls and the Mystery of the Queen's Fan • Lizette M. Edholm
... exactly what I felt in No. 3 when I slept there on March 1st. Well, it is rather difficult to describe! I never felt frightened out of my wits at nothing before, if it was nothing. I certainly saw no shadows or figures, and the only noise I heard was the thud twice, which sounded as if it came from the storey below. If I shut my eyes for a minute I felt as if I was struggling with something invisible (not indigestion, as I never have it!). I was so paralysed that I dare not call out to Miss Langton, ...
— The Alleged Haunting of B—— House • Various
... against the rocky defences of Gravelotte, only for them to fall back impotently, like the broken foam and spent wash of billows which have assailed in vain the precipitous peaks of some cliff-defended coast that repels their every attack; when the sharp clash of steel met opposing steel and galloping thud of flying squadrons, urged on with savage oath and triumphant cheer, filled the air; when the gurgling groan of the death-agony and moan of painless pain, made the treble of the devil-music, to the thundering sustained bass of the cannon roar, and the growling arpeggio accompaniment ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson
... the moment I discovered this apparition, upon which the wild stare of the Judge in life and in death had rested, I ran forward. I thought as I did so that I heard the scrape of clothing on the iron balcony rail and the thud of a heavy object dropping on the grass below. Flinging open the glass doors, through which a torrent of wind poured into the room, and leaning out under the twisted branches of the vine, I tried in vain to penetrate the ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child
... far down the street (Ah me, and alack a day.) And I heard the thud of his horse's feet Beating a roundelay. And I felt a little song coming, coming Over my lips as humming, humming, I turned my eyes ...
— Yesterdays • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... went down the library corridor. I knocked on the library door. There was no reply. Then I heard a shot and a sort of thud." ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... nothing; you press your hands on your wound and take two reeling steps forward; you call feebly for help and stumble against the sofa which you fall upon, and finally, still groping wildly, you roll off on the floor, where you kick out once or twice; your clinched hand comes down with a thud on the boards, ...
— McClure's Magazine, March, 1896, Vol. VI., No. 4. • Various
... ever I hard. But I'll tell ye what I hae hard: I hae hard the flails gaein' thud, ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... and after he was downed under a mass of players, a fist would thud against his jaw or hard knuckles would be rubbed across his nose. Once when an opposing player had fallen across Robertson's right leg, another of his opponents seized his ankle and turned it. Though he fought against it, his temper was slowly ...
— The Upward Path - A Reader For Colored Children • Various
... order he had acknowledged and executed, as I discovered, the moment I tumbled out of my hammock; for the boat was kicking up her heels more madly than ever, while every few seconds there resounded a heavy thud on the deck overhead, and the craft shivered from stem to stern as she drove her sharp nose into the heart of a great comber, throwing the water in tons over herself. This was the rough side of work aboard a destroyer, with a vengeance, and I spent four miserable ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood
... and were all six falling asleep as they sat round the table. Every now and then a forehead fell with a thud on the board, and the man, awakened suddenly, ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... were appalled. At a signal from the King the first unfortunate wretch was instantly seized by two executioners and held over the bowl, while a third lifted his keen sword, and with a dull, sickening thud brought it down upon the poor fellow's neck, hacking into his spine until the head was severed. Then there arose a loud shout of triumph. The offering to the fetish was the signal for the most enthusiastic rejoicing, and the shouts ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... sensibility can help feeling proudly stirred when a Cavalry regiment goes by. The clean, alert, upright men, with their sure seat; the massive war-horses champing their bits and shaking their accoutrements: the rhythmic thud of hoofs, the keen glitter of steel, and the general air of power, all combine to form a spectacle that sets the pulses beating faster. Then, again, observe the strange elastic rhythm of the march as a battalion of tall Highlanders ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... rising in the east when she found herself again looking out upon the water, the stone still clutched tightly. She gazed at the river, then at the stone, and again at the river. The stone dropped with a thud at her feet. The savage in her had not abated in the least; only her body was terribly worn and wearied and the robe, muddied and torn, enveloped her like a veil of ice. Above her the lonely yellow sky; below her the sickly ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath
... about the time when Dickens was writing that thundering and thrilling and highly unlikely scene in Nicholas Nickleby, the scene where Nicholas hopelessly denounces the atrocious Gride in his hour of grinning triumph, and a thud upon the floor above tells them that the heroine's tyrannical father has died just in time to set her free. That is the apotheosis of the pure heroic as Dickens found it, and as Dickens in some sense ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... commotion behind him, a swift rush of feet, a muffled thud, and a gasping, agonized grunt. The next instant the huge acetelyne lamp that lighted the room fell to the floor with a crash and the place ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... that he failed to hear the light thud of hoofs along the sand-cushioned and half-obliterated road which skirted his dilapidated fence line, and he straightened up at length to see a horseman who had drawn rein there and who now sat sidewise gazing at him with one leg thrown across ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... by the perfect stillness of the night, I pursued my occupation, until I felt disposed for sleep. On the following night, while engaged in the same way, and at the same midnight hour, came the same heavy, sharp, distinct thud upon the floor directly above my head. I was disposed to philosophize on the subject, and, though the coincidence was certainly peculiar, I still conceived that this unusual sound, at such an unusual hour, might be attributed to some natural cause. ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous
... up and looked out of the window; below, in the race, there was a jam of logs, and the air was keen with the pungent smell of sawdust and new boards. The whir and thud of the machinery down-stairs sent a faint quiver through the planks under his feet. "The mill will net a good profit this year," he said to himself, absently. "'Thalia can have pretty nearly anything she wants." And even as he said it he had ...
— The Way to Peace • Margaret Deland
... forward, too, will you?" said Steve. Neil joined Phil and for some minutes the Adventurer stole quietly along through the grey void with little sound save the slow working of the engine below deck and the lazy thud of the propeller. It was so quiet that when Perry suddenly worked the fog-horn Han almost fell over the wet rail on which he was sitting. It was Ossie who broke the ...
— The Adventure Club Afloat • Ralph Henry Barbour
... seeing Storch crumple over, but he felt a thud shake the cluttered room to its foundations... He went over quietly and closed the open door. Then he put on his hat. Storch lay quite still and an ugly red pool was already luring flies to a crimson ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... himself round as closely as he could in his great coat, he heard a thud just in front of him, and the man lying there gave a gasp and straightened his limbs. Strachan rose and went to ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... with a steel-like grip that speedily convinced the younger man he would have to give way or a bone would break. He gave way accordingly, and the next thing he knew he came down on his back with a thud that seemed ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... cheeping thud of the axe was immediately heard, accompanied by a sharp twang as the tautly strained line parted; then followed the sound of the shores falling to the ground; there was a gentle jar, and the ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... she implored once more, extending her hands to secure her treasured book, "oh, uncle." In reply all I heard was a dull thud, and I saw Paula fall to the ground. Beside himself, my father had given her a tremendous blow on the ...
— Paula the Waldensian • Eva Lecomte
... it must be known, are gifted with insatiable curiosity, and they are not troubled much with the fear of man, or, indeed, of anything else. Hearing the thud of the coils on the ground, this monster grizzly walked up to and smelt them. He was proceeding to taste them, when, happening to cast his little eyes upwards, he beheld Little Tim sitting within a few feet ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... minister were just argle-bargling some few words on the doctrine of the camel and the eye of the needle, when, in the midst of our discourse, as all was wheesht and attentive, an awful thud was heard in the closet, which gave the minister, who thought the house had fallen down, such a start, that his very wig louped for a full three-eighths off his crown. I say we were needcessitated to let the cat out of ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... consulted nervously. The new turn of affairs was not at all to their liking. The clamors of the mob continued. Once a fanatic pushed against a soldier. There was a thud, a howl, and a mouth masked with liquid red gasped to the sun ...
— Mary Magdalen • Edgar Saltus
... the grave was filled and the turf laid down, a trying quarter of an hour. Ah me! the thud of the spade on your mother's grave! None gave any sign of what he felt save Drumsheugh, whose sordid slough had slipped off from a tender heart, and Chalmers, who went behind a tombstone and sobbed aloud. Not even Posty asked the reason so much as by a look, and Drumtochty, as it ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren
... the stranger's hug was so close that at last stout William's muscles softened under his grip, and he gave a sob. Then the youth put forth all his strength and gave a sudden trip with his heel and a cast over his right hip, and down stout William went, with a sickening thud, and lay as though he would never ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... leg. He pushed the little dog rather roughly away and stepped back to the arcade. The priest looked puzzled and slightly hurt. At this moment the soft thud of horse's hoofs was audible on the road and Domini came cantering back to the hotel. Her eyes were sparkling, her face was radiant. She bowed to the priest and reined up before the hotel ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... steward had left me I was on the upper deck and looking out to sea. I saw all at once the wash of a torpedo, indicated by a snake-like churn of the surface of the water. It may have been about thirty feet away. And then came a thud." ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... terrible yell the powerful savage wrenched his arm free; in a last superhuman effort he swung his knife upward as Rod's blade sank to the hilt in his breast, and the blow fell with a sickening thud under Rod's arm. With a sharp cry the young hunter staggered to his feet, and the Indian's knife fell from him, red with blood. Making an effort to control himself he picked up the knife and loosed ...
— The Gold Hunters - A Story of Life and Adventure in the Hudson Bay Wilds • James Oliver Curwood
... thing burst among the 13th Battery, which stands under shelter of Tunnel Hill, in a straight line with my road, less than 300 yards away. I was just mounting my horse and stopped to see the burst, when a fragment came sauntering high through the air and fell with a thud in the garden just behind me. It was a jagged bit of outer casing about three inches thick, and weighing over 6 lbs. The extraordinary thing about it was that it had flung off exactly at right angles from the line of fire. Gunners say that melinite ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... The thud of hoofs smote his ear sharply, so close was he to the ground. Slowly Pablo raised his head. Over the hog's back which separated the draw in which Pablo lay concealed from the draw down which Don Miguel had ridden, the gray horse ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne |
