"Clatter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the instant of my turning to re-enter my library I should see something which would make my brain throb madly and my pulses start. I did not therefore instantly turn, but let the wind blow the door to with a loud clatter, while I walked quickly into my dining -room and drained a glass of cooking-sherry to the dregs. I do not introduce the cooking-sherry here for the purpose of eliciting a laugh from the reader, but in order to be faithful to life as we live it. All our other sherry had been used by the queen of ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... though nothing short of a fit would overtake both. Bedlam is turned loose in every part of the market. Usually a man and his wife are required to conduct the business at a booth. Their bare feet sticking out from the skirts bob up and down, beating time to the clatter ...
— Wealth of the World's Waste Places and Oceania • Jewett Castello Gilson
... keep his counsel and disturb no one. He had blown his candle out before first trying the bar, and had been working by the bright moonlight. Then he fastened his skates round his neck, so that they should neither impede his movements, nor clatter, and put one leg out of window, then the other, turned round, let himself down by the hands, and dropped into the lane. He looked up to see that the scarf was hanging all right; it was within easy reach of both hands; he gave it a pull to try it, and being satisfied, got over into ...
— Dr. Jolliffe's Boys • Lewis Hough
... the tired worn faces, the dusty hair of Mrs. Banks and the rubber collar of Mr. Jenkins, and she heard little Miss Stubb uttering platitudes in her attempt to raise the mental atmosphere. There was a great clatter of knives and forks, a confusion of voices and, in a pause, the sound of the exclusive ...
— THE MISSES MALLETT • E. H. YOUNG
... Of course there is [clatter of knives and glasses as she moves the things on the table]. Here! theres room now beside me. Come ...
— Mrs. Warren's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... A clatter of hoofs sounded above the arroyo and the next instant several horsemen appeared. Without knowing just what he was doing Jimsy, who had a rifle in his hands, pulled the trigger. He was amazed to see the giant form of Red Bill totter and reel in the saddle, and fall with a crash ...
— The Girl Aviators on Golden Wings • Margaret Burnham
... nursing the baby in the corner and telling the little ones to hold still and let their sister Lizzie dress them. Then came blowing the conch-shell for father in the field, the howling of old Lion, the gathering round the table, the blessing, the dull clatter of pewter spoons and pewter basins, the talk about the crop and stock, the inquiry whether Dan'l (the boy) could be spared from the house, and the general arrangements for the day. Breakfast over, my function was to provide the sauce for dinner; in winter, to open ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt
... she delivered her orders to them as fast as she could talk, and they sent them off to their different commands as fast as delivered; wherefore the messengers galloping hither and thither raised a world of clatter and racket in the still streets; and soon were added to this the music of distant bugles and the roll of drums—notes of preparation; for the vanguard would ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... is about sixteen, Number one is sixty and three; And they make such a riot, how he keeps them quiet Is a downright mystery to me. For they clatter and they chaw and they jaw, jaw, jaw, And each has a different desire; It would aid the renown of the best shop in town To supply them ...
— Cowboy Songs - and Other Frontier Ballads • Various
... Not so with the next, however. This was little better than a colt, a creature in training for his master's saddle; and no sooner was it released than it plunged into the yard, then bounded into the field, around which it galloped, until it found the water. The others imitated this bad example; the clatter of hoofs, though beaten on a rich turf, soon resounding in the stillness of the night, until it might be heard across the valley. The captain then ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... does not take an open-eyed onlooker long to discover that social organizations of all kinds are infested with many evils. Social machinery is never perfect in its construction or operation. It is always getting out of gear; there is endless friction and clatter and confusion; it takes a great deal of trouble to keep it moving, and its product is often of poor quality. When men get together and try to cooeperate for any purpose, by orderly methods, they are always sure, because of the imperfection ...
— The Church and Modern Life • Washington Gladden
... to pieces with his foot, and seizing the rooster twisted its neck and flung it on the floor. Then he fled from the hall, followed by peals of laughter from the audience and more terrific clatter from the fowls. The exhibition was opened without further ceremony, and the dissertation on the domestic barn-yard fowl was ordered to be printed in the annual report of ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)
... clatter are excellently depicted by the artist; and we, who have been scoffing at his manner of designing animals, must here make a special exception in favor of the hens and chickens; each has a different action, ...
— George Cruikshank • William Makepeace Thackeray
... ran to the gate, and the troopers were there — The jingle of hobbles came faint on the air — Then loudly she screamed: it was only to drown The treacherous clatter of slip-rails let down. But troopers are sharp, and she saw at a glance That someone ...
— In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses • Henry Lawson
... black as coal, and the gloom was filled with a hubbub of uproar and confusion, above which sounded continually the shrieking of women's voices. Nor had our hero taken above a couple of steps before he pitched headlong over two or three men struggling together upon the deck, falling with a great clatter and the loss of his pistol, which, however, he regained ...
— Stolen Treasure • Howard Pyle
... the hubbub. Under cover of the clamor, men of the Red party and men of the Yellow party challenged one another to the arbitrament of steel, and what with the shouting and counter-shouting and the clatter of weapons, and the stamping of many feet on the cobbles, there was such a din set up as seemed to some of us, in our bewilderment, likely to last forever. Words would speedily have become blows and blows brought blood, and all the ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... the hot air heavy with smells, he had emerged into a small back and front room holding some half-dozen tables, at each of which four people could be seated. Through the open windows the noises of the street below came into collision with the clatter of plates and knives and forks. The heat was intense, the cloths were not clean, neither were the hands of the two waiters who rushed about with a certain litheness and facility of ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward
... and I with it, and upon the third summer there fell a hot night, a night issue, and a strained waiting for something to be telegraphed from the other side of the world, exactly as had happened before. A few great men had died in the past two years, the machines worked with more clatter, and some of the trees in the office garden were a few feet taller. But ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... had not been in his own kitchen for close upon ten years, and he did not know the way about very well. He had adventures and some moments of rigid suspense while the clatter of a kicked coal-scuttle died away in the distance. But when at last he crept noiselessly up-stairs he was assured ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 21, 1914 • Various
... twitching. This was the last thing I saw clearly. The King and his companions were fused in a shifting mass of trunks and faces, the walls raced round, the singing of the sea roared and fretted in my ears. I caught my hand to my brow and staggered; I could not stand, I heard a clatter as though of a sword falling to the floor, arms were stretched out to receive me and I sank into them, hearing a murmur ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope
... the village with more majesty and clatter than the Empire State Express ever assumed, stopping just an instant at the post-office for a bag of mail that the brick-dusty driver caught with his feet, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... giving his sister Mary's hair a violent pull, causing her to scream and look about her for her tormenter each time; and Elizabeth was balancing a spoon on the edge of her cup, and letting it fall with a clatter every moment. Children never mind noise—indeed, they rather like it; and, if the truth must be told, Henry was beginning to think that it would not be unpleasant if his father would let him and his sisters have their own ways, ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... day. Slowly the sun had been dropping down over the Calabrian Mountains, and the glamorous twilight was stealing over the immediate scene. No one seemed to notice the coming of the dark, which stole down on us with an unspeakable mystery. For long we sat still, the clatter of many tongues becoming stilled into the witchery of the scene. Lower the sun sank, till only the ruddiness of the afterglow lit the expanse with rosy light; then this failed in turn, and ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... devotion of any man to any woman therein; but, as nobody liked to interfere too soon in what might only be, after all, a mere business arrangement, Greenfield contented itself with using its eyes, its ears, and its tongues, with one exception to the latter organ's clatter, in favor of Hitty Hyde; to her no one dared as yet approach ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... Central Square the quiet of Plutoria Avenue is exchanged for another atmosphere. There are fountains that splash unendingly and mingle their music with the sound of the motor-horns and the clatter of the cabs. There are real trees and little green benches, with people reading yesterday's newspaper, and grass cut into plots among the asphalt. There is at one end a statue of the first governor of the state, life-size, cut ...
— Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich • Stephen Leacock
... are sae guid yoursel', Sae pious and sae holy, Ye've nought to do but mark and tell Your neebor's fauts and folly:— Whase life is like a weel-gaun mill, Supplied wi' store o' water. The heapet happer's ebbing still, And still the clap plays clatter. ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... might be tolerable enough if it ended here; but, unhappily, it does not. Experiment has shewn that, just as gudgeons will bite at anything when the mud is stirred up at the bottom of their holes, so the ingenuous public will lay out their money with anybody who makes a prodigious noise and clatter about the bargains he has to give. The result of this discovery is, the wholesale daily publication of lies of most enormous calibre, and their circulation, by means which we shall briefly notice, in localities where they are likely to prove ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 434 - Volume 17, New Series, April 24, 1852 • Various
... emptying it over what was, relatively, the only quiet man at the table excepting myself, bringing from him a volley of language which made the others appear dumb by comparison. I soon learned that in all of this clatter of voices and table utensils they were discussing purely ordinary affairs and arguing about mere trifles, and that not the least ill feeling was aroused. It was not long before I enjoyed the spirited chatter and badinage at the table as much ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... fire, or whatever it was, grew larger and larger. Col. Zane thought it might be a light carried by a man on horseback. But if this were true where was the clatter of the horse's hoofs? On that rocky blur no horse could run noiselessly. It could not be a horse. Fascinated and troubled by this new mystery which seemed to presage evil to them the watchers waited with that patience known only to those accustomed to danger. They knew ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... things Is the gratitude of kings; The plaudits of the crowd Are but the clatter of feet At midnight in the street, Hollow and ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... drank 'the Boz' with a delectable clatter, which drew from him a good warm-hearted speech. . . . He looked very well, and had a younger brother along with him. . . . Then we had songs. Barham chanted a Robin Hood ballad, and Cruikshank sang ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... dais by the cashier while he handed the little pile of hardly-earned shillings and coppers to each successive workman as the long procession filed past his table. It was usual with the employees to clatter away the instant that they had been paid, like so many children let out of school; but to-day they waited, forming little groups over the great dreary room, and discussing in subdued voices the misfortune which had come upon their employers, ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... hedge. The bullfinch tossed his head, and asked the goldfinch to come up in the bush and see which was stronger. The greenfinch and the chaffinch shrieked with derision; the wood-pigeon turned his back and said "Pooh!" and went off with a clatter. The sparrow flew to tell his mates on the house, and you could hear the chatter they made about it right down at the brook. But the wren screamed loudest of all, and said that the goldfinch was a painted impostor, and had not got half so much gold as the yellow-hammer. So they ...
— A Book of Natural History - Young Folks' Library Volume XIV. • Various
... the cave. The men there were unaware of the presence of our friends, and were busily engaged. Some attended to the grinding machine, the roar and clatter of which made it possible for Tom and the others to talk and move about without being overheard. Into this machine certain ingredients were put, and they were then pulverized, and taken ...
— Tom Swift Among The Diamond Makers - or The Secret of Phantom Mountain • Victor Appleton
... knowing that he, as a smoker, was never without a supply of matches, we expected to see the glare of a distant fire, by which he would sit up throughout the night, when presently we heard the sound of whistling, and the clatter of a horse's feet among the stones of the brook, within 150 yards of ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... Hearing the clatter the proprietor came out from an inner room, and seeing the Italian standing there, broke into a passionate torrent of speech, ...
— The Boy With the U.S. Census • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... wi' thowt's o' war, He long'd for battles clatter. He grieved to think noa foeman dar To cross a sup o' watter; He owned one spot,—an' nobbut one, Within his heart wor tender, An' as his darlin had it fun, He'd be her ...
— Yorkshire Ditties, Second Series - To which is added The Cream of Wit and Humour - from his Popular Writings • John Hartley
... The saints stood stock-still, smiling from their pedestals and proud in their high day finery. When the singing ceased, one heard through the dreamy murmur of the organ the spluttering of the burning candles and the clatter on the brass dish of the sacristan making the collection. The priest once more mounted the pulpit and, with the same gestures and action, delivered the same admonitions as earlier in the morning. Again the people sat listening and weeping; ...
— The Path of Life • Stijn Streuvels
... also could work wonders as well as his master. It is related of him that he lodged in a street at Cologne, where he was much annoyed by the incessant clatter made by the horses' hoofs, as they were led through it daily to exercise by their grooms. He had entreated the latter to select some other spot, where they might not disturb a philosopher; but the grooms turned a deaf ear to all ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... stopped, the organ droned, and there came a clatter of iron nails on the tiled floor. Boys and men proceeded to the choir stalls and Mr. Shorto-Champernowne fluttered behind, with his sermon in his hand. Like a stately galleon of the olden time he ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... Peggy was making an effort to eat the breakfast the farmer's wife insisted on her sharing, a clatter of hoofs under the window told of ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... not as I have written it, but with many gasping interruptions; and afterwards lay back as one dead. Before I could make head or tail of my wonder, I heard cries and a clatter from the courtyard, and ran out to see what ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... awakened by the clatter made by Madre Dolores as she set down a tray on which was a breakfast of coffee ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... affirmative grunt, and strove to speak, but Burr cut him short. "Look out for that bad place in the road, before you get to the bridge," he said, and went on out of the yard. The road was suddenly full of departing wedding-guests, fluttering along with shrill clatter of persistently individual notes, like ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... had pushed the curtains aside; the crashing of the orchestra had prevented our hearing the clatter of the rings. He had pushed by the man standing there, had come in and—he ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... in consequence his practice of "comical satire." Though Jonson was cited to appear before the Lord Chief Justice to answer certain charges to the effect that he had attacked lawyers and soldiers in "Poetaster," nothing came of this complaint. It may be suspected that much of this furious clatter and give-and-take was pure playing to the gallery. The town was agog with the strife, and on no less an authority than Shakespeare ("Hamlet," ii. 2), we learn that the children's company (acting the plays of Jonson) did "so berattle the common stages... that many, wearing rapiers, are afraid of ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson
... friend's, the aforesaid examining magistrate, we found a numerous company; from the anteroom we could hear bursts of laughter, noisy conversation, accompanied by the clatter of plate and crockery, which was being placed upon the table. I was a little excited; I knew that I was the youngest of the party, and I was afraid of appearing awkward on that night of revelry. I said to myself: "Old boy, you must face the music, ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... devil—and welcome; now I've collared you!" said Roy;—and slept soundly upon that satisfying achievement, through all the rattle and clatter ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... pathway slid past him, and then he stood rooted as by a blast of magic. It is vain to say that he felt as if he had got into a dream; but this time he felt quite certain that he had got into a book. For we human beings are used to inappropriate things; we are accustomed to the clatter of the incongruous; it is a tune to which we can go to sleep. If one appropriate thing happens, it wakes us up like the pang of a perfect chord. Something happened such as would have happened in such a place in ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... city, the cry of a thousand frogs, and the muffled tramp of our advancing footsteps. I thought the enemy, if any were near, must surely hear the cartridges rattle in my cartridge box as we double-quicked to close up, and I put my hand behind me to stop the clatter. If any enemy were near, indeed! There seemed an enemy behind every bush, a rebel in every corner of the worm fence. I am in the rear of the column, I thought, and my heart went thump, bump, and my great central nervous ganglion ached amain. 'Sergeant-major,' ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... were lost in a wild clatter of hoofs, as Felipe swung his pony around and drove home the spurs. Through the night came back ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... gossiping in a distant oak that shaded the "branch," to the quavering strident song of a locust; and she intended, after resting for a few moments, to return to the station-house; but unexpected drowsiness overpowered her. Suddenly aroused from a sound sleep, she heard the clatter of galloping hoofs, and as she sprang up, the horse, startled by her movement, shied and reared within a few feet of the spot where she stood. The moon shone full on the glossy black animal, and upon his powerful rider, and Beryl recognized the massive head, swarthy face and keen eyes ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... said Fergus, 'are the eyes of the warriors from their heads which have shone to you like sparks of fire. The thunder and the din and the noise(?) that you heard, was the whistling of the swords and of the ivory-hilted weapons, the clatter of arms, the creaking of the chariots, the beating of the hoofs of the horses, the strength of the warriors, the roar of the fighting-men, the noise of the soldiers, the great rage and anger and fierceness of the heroes going in madness to the battle, for the greatness of the rage and ...
— The Cattle-Raid of Cualnge (Tain Bo Cualnge) • Unknown
... knocking over both man and beast. The donkey was badly wounded, and the lion was just about to seize the trader, when in some way or other his claws became entangled in a rope by which two empty oil tins were strung across the donkey's neck. The rattle and clatter made by these as he dragged them after him gave him such a fright that he turned tail and bolted off into the jungle, to the intense relief of the terrified bunniah, who quickly made his way up the ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson
... the comforts of ordinary domestic life; but they fail in their effect. Ladies will not make themselves happy in any room, or with ever so much gilded furniture, unless some means of happiness are provided for them. Into these rooms no book is ever brought, no needle-work is introduced; from them no clatter of many tongues is ever heard. On a marble table in the middle of the room always stands a large pitcher of iced water; and from this a cold, damp, uninviting air is spread through the atmosphere of ...
— Volume 2 • Anthony Trollope
... long straight road, the artery of some capital, through which our carriage drives at a fast trot, making a deafening clatter on the pavement. Electric light everywhere. The shops are closing; it must needs ...
— Egypt (La Mort De Philae) • Pierre Loti
... rushed upon the house with wild violence and set everything in the place a-clatter. He lit the lamp. Then he seemed to collect himself and went over and felt the stove. It was ice cold. The blankets were laid out upon the floor in the usual spread of the daytime. They ...
— In the Brooding Wild • Ridgwell Cullum
... feeling discouraged, and on the point of giving it up as a bad job when he tripped over some object that, of course, he had not seen in the pitch dark. In trying to save himself from falling he upset something that made quite a clatter as it struck the rocks; when to Paul's amazement he heard a ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... seemed nothing but a procession of dreary houses, built apparently without thought of order or architecture. He saw stunted men and pale-faced girls with shawls over their heads as if on their way to their work. He heard the clatter of their iron-ringed clogs on the hard paving-stones. Here was a new life indeed, but there was no romance. It was all sordid, grimy. Still he must go on, and presently, when the porter shouted the word, "Brunford," he got out of the ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... a clatter of dishes and spoons. Mrs. Bentley and Mrs. Meade presided over this part ...
— The High School Boys' Canoe Club • H. Irving Hancock
... heroic son Sudarsan. The latter, thereupon, fell down and expired. Within a very short time, the son of Pandu, casting his glances on that car-force caused it by his shafts to fly away in all directions. Then like a herd of deer frightened at the clatter of car-wheels, or a loud shout, thy sons, in that battle, O king, afflicted with the fear of Bhimasena, suddenly broke and fled. The son of Kunti, however, pursued that large force of thy sons, and began, O king, to pierce the Kauravas from every side. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... secret glory of phosphorescent fire, the sky emblazoned with her countless diadems, and then—yap-yap-yap! That is how the pestilent cackle of many people affects me when they rave about the sea. Why do they not keep silent, like the stars? God! These fools, I think, would clatter up the steps of the Great White Throne, talking, talking, talking! When the pearly gates swing wide to let us in, when we pace the burnished vistas towards the Presence, when the measureless music of the Most High God fills ...
— An Ocean Tramp • William McFee
... But nothing came, save, perhaps, an emphatic crack from the old cabinet that was made by Deacon Brodie, or the dry rustle of the coals on the extinguished fire. It was a calm; or I know that I should have heard in the roar and clatter of the storm, as I have not heard it for so many years, the wild career of a horseman, always scouring up from the distance and passing swiftly below the window; yet always returning again from the place whence first he came, as though, baffled by some ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his spasmodic beating With his tail so strong and supple. Tightly held in the indented Beak of the determined parent, He was given to the hopeful Stork-brood, now to be divided; And they held with noisy clatter Solemnly their morning-feast. Nearer to observe this, Werner Had descended to the Rhine-bank, And he seemed in no great hurry To commence his composition. There he sat himself down gently On the insect-covered ...
— The Trumpeter of Saekkingen - A Song from the Upper Rhine. • Joseph Victor von Scheffel
... and shaking their fists at the obdurate Professor. The whole great audience seethed and simmered like a boiling pot. The Professor took a step forward and raised both his hands. There was something so big and arresting and virile in the man that the clatter and shouting died gradually away before his commanding gesture and his masterful eyes. He seemed to have a definite message. They ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
... rattle madly by, whips waving and turbans awry; there are flashes of color from rich men's gowns and the sounds of their clicking oryx-hide sandals as they rapidly strike the stony pavements; there is a continual blunt clatter from the tom-toms in the hands of long-gowned fellows. They are all going to the market where the khat will soon arrive, each one anxious to have first choice and get the best bargain. There they will bicker with the khat traders for an hour sometimes, then in ...
— Around the World in Ten Days • Chelsea Curtis Fraser
... along to the end of the roof. The grapnel was fixed, and Edgar slid down the rope to the next roof, which was some fifteen feet below them. They did not attempt to free the grapnel, fearing that in its fall it might make a clatter; they therefore used another to mount to the next house, which was as high as that which they had left. There was but a difference of four feet in the height of the next, and they had not to use the grapnel again until they reached the sixth ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty
... had returned to the house, and we were about following them, when the clatter of a horse's hoofs was heard without, and the officious voices of the negroes announced the arrival of a visitor or messenger for the Colonel, who stepped forward to meet him. A young man, clad in a coarse homespun gray uniform, scantily trimmed with ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... as he, who hears the tumult wide, And clatter of church-bells, ere he espy The raging fire, concealed from none beside Himself, to him most dangerous, and most nigh; Such was King Charles; who heard, and then descried The new disaster with his very eye. Hence he the choicest of his meiny steers Thither, ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... rippling away eastward over the dimpled country the army motors were pouring by in endless lines, broken now and then by the dark mass of a tramping regiment or the clatter of a train of artillery. In the intervals between these waves of military traffic we had the road to ourselves, except for the flashing past of despatch-bearers on motor-cycles and of hideously hooting little motors carrying goggled ...
— Fighting France - From Dunkerque to Belport • Edith Wharton
... solemn cow, which seemed to take twice as long to get over the ground because she had two pairs of legs instead of one to shuffle across it, dragging her long iron chain with the short stake at the end after her with a gentle clatter over the hard dry road. I accompanied Turkey, helped him to fasten up and bed the cows, went in with him and shared his hasty supper of potatoes and oatcake and milk, and then set out refreshed, and nowise ...
— Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood • George MacDonald
... The clatter was abreast of, and behind me in the road when the imperative "Whoa!" again arrested it. I knew the voice now. A man leaped to the ground; hasty footsteps struck across the turf edging the highway; dry sticks cracked, my bushy ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... Tom with a great clatter, complaining noisily every step of the way. "I told you you'd much better get off to your stateroom, Granddad!" he exclaimed. "Here, I'll help you down there." And he laid a hasty hand ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney
... roar Of the monster guns; And the sharp bark Of the lesser guns; The whine of the shells, The rifles' clatter Where the bullets patter, The rattle, rattle, rattle Of the mitrailleuse in battle, And the yells Of the men who charge through hells Where the poison gas descends. And the bursting shrapnel rends Limb from limb In the dim ...
— The Red Flower - Poems Written in War Time • Henry Van Dyke
... a minute straight before her, then slowly turned her head to one side. When her gaze rested upon her women they rose and, with a clatter of their feet and a rustle of garments, carrying their white sewings and their spinning-wheels stilled, went away down the gallery. The German lord of Overstein, bearded and immense in the then German ...
— Privy Seal - His Last Venture • Ford Madox Ford
... Then Cuvier presented Prince Czartorinski, a Pole, and many compliments passed; and then we went to a table to look at Prince Maximilian de Neufchatel's Journey to Brazil, magnificently printed in Germany, and all tongues began to clatter, and it became wondrously agreeable; and behind me I heard English well spoken, and this was Mr. Trelawny, and I heard from him a panegyric on the Abbe Edgeworth, whom he knew well, and he was the person who took the first letter and news to the Duchesse d'Angouleme at Mittau, after she quitted ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... Caleb," replied the Master, "help me on with my cloak, and hand me my sword-belt. What clatter is ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... a rope of mist along the roof. It was so light now that she could see the sodden carpet of yellow leaves under the maples, and she noticed that the crimson pennons of the sumacs drooped and dripped and clung together. The monotonous clatter of the wheels had fallen into a rhythm, which pounded out steadily and endlessly certain words which were the refrain of her purpose: "Afterward, they will say I had the right to see him." Sometimes she reminded herself, ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... interested Robinson most was the parrot. There were several kinds of them. They flew among the trees with great noise and clatter and shrieking. Robinson determined if possible to secure one for a pet. "I can teach it to talk," he said, "and I will have something to talk to."' As soon as he returned home he set about catching one. He noticed that a number were in the habit of visiting an old tree near the ...
— An American Robinson Crusoe • Samuel B. Allison
... she took me ben, [in] And bade me make nae clatter; 'For our ramgunshoch glum gudeman [surly] Is o'er ayont the water;' [beyond] Whae'er shall say I wanted grace, When I did kiss and daut her, [pet] Let him be planted in my place, Syne say I ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... that, still. He ought to have good advice. Tell me, how can a woman who can't guide herself help a man?—and the most difficult man alive! I'm sure you understand me. I can't drive out in the afternoon for them. They make a crush here, and a clatter of tongues! . . . That's my private grievance. But he's now keeping persons away who have the first social claim . . . I know they can't appear. Don't look confused; no one accuses you. Only I do say it 's getting terribly hot in London for somebody. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Yorick! cried I, what art thou doing here? On the very first onset of all this glittering clatter thou art reduced to an atom;—seek,—seek some winding alley, with a tourniquet at the end of it, where chariot never rolled or flambeau shot its rays;—there thou mayest solace thy soul in converse sweet with some kind ...
— A Sentimental Journey • Laurence Sterne
... now in battle array on the plain before the city walls, began to advance towards each other. The Trojans moved along with great clatter, which Homer compares to the noise of ...
— The Story of Troy • Michael Clarke
... since he cannot see out of it he leaves off looking, and, picking up the lid of one of the tins, peers into it, as if trying to make a companion of his own face. It has grown very nearly dark. Suddenly the lid falls out of his hand with a clatter—the only sound that has broken the silence—and he stands staring intently at the wall where the stuff of the shirt is hanging rather white in the darkness—he seems to be seeing somebody or something there. There is a sharp tap and click; the cell light behind the glass screen has been ...
— Anarchism and Other Essays • Emma Goldman
... in good earnest then. Fortunately there was no pursuit. After a time they slowed down and again became a prey to all their former fears of night noises. A large bird flew close to Bob's head and gave him quite a scare. As they pressed on along the roadway, the clatter of hoof-beats coming toward them sent them to the roadside, where, ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Flying Corps • James R. Driscoll
... cease,—nor do they, it is said, the long year through; for if any accident happens at one of the five great iron-works, there are four others which rest not day nor night. Little, however, is this heeded by the people of Merthyr; they are lulled to repose by the clatter of iron bars and the thumping of trip-hammers, but are instantaneously awakened by the briefest ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... the rows of riflemen nearest to me. The clatter and crashing is tremendous, but even more horrible is this singing and whizzing past of shells, especially when the enemy's machine ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... my foot. But over and above and worse than all this was the conviction strong upon my mind that I should become a subject of merriment to the girls as soon as I entered the room. They would understand the cause of my distress, and probably at this moment were expecting to hear me clatter through the stone hall with ...
— The O'Conors of Castle Conor from Tales from all Countries • Anthony Trollope
... played many bars a clatter of hoofs announced Desmond's return. He flung himself from the saddle, cleared the verandah steps at a bound, and entered the room:—a man of magnetic vitality, with a temperament like a clear flame; a typical officer of that isolated force to whose gallantry and unwearied ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... air; then another, and another, like the smoke of Indian scouts signaling to their tribes. The lights in the windows go out, one by one; the sharp blast of a whistle cuts the air, the clang of a bell peals out, the rumble of a wagon is heard, and the street cars begin their clatter and clang. All this comes floating up to you on the still morning air, until an ever-increasing crescendo of sounds is borne in upon you, telling that the town has awakened from its nap, stretched ...
— Byways Around San Francisco Bay • William E. Hutchinson
... witnessed this superb exhibition of promptly applied strength from the station platform gave a cheer as the train swept by, but their voices were drowned in its clatter, and the two actors in their thrilling drama were unaware that it had been noticed. The rescued youth sat limp and motionless on the swaying platform where he had been placed, dazed by the suddenness ...
— The Copper Princess - A Story of Lake Superior Mines • Kirk Munroe
... her shoulders and shivered as though the boy had cursed at her. She shook her head vehemently and again swung back to the piano. Stumbling awkwardly, her fingers ran over the keys in a swift clatter of broken chords. "No," she ...
— Vera - The Medium • Richard Harding Davis
... gesture, marvellous in its economy of effort, disclosed all the might and insolence of his power. It had the unerring efficacy of an act of instinct. It was instinct. He could not know how he dismayed us by that shake of the finger. The tall girl dropped her candlestick with a clatter, and fled along the gallery like a shadow. La Chica cowered under the wall. The light of her candle just touched dimly the form of a negro boy, waiting passively in the background with O'Brien's saddle-bags ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... the last words that they heard the clatter of hoofs and saw Ned dashing down the narrow street toward the Main Plaza. They heard him trying to shout, but his voice was now so hoarse that he could not ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... said the minister, going back into the dining-room—but no Gibbie was there!—nobody but his wife, sitting in solitary discomposure at the head of her dinner-table. The same instant, he heard a clatter of feet down the steps, and turned quickly into the hall again, where Jane was in the act of shutting ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... parsonage, and raised it. Then they clustered behind the curtains, and watched, and listened. There was plenty to hear! From the parsonage windows came the sound of scampering feet and banging doors. Once there was the unmistakable clatter of a chair overturned. With it all, there was a constant chorus of "Oh, look!" "Oh! Oh!" "Oh, how sweet!" "Oh, papa!" "Oh, Prudence!" "Look, Larkie, look ...
— Prudence of the Parsonage • Ethel Hueston
... hall takes up most of the ground floor of Warren Hall. Eight long, roomy tables are arranged at intervals, with broad aisles between, through which the white-aproned waiters hurry noiselessly about. To-night there was a cheerful clatter of spoons and forks and a loud babel of voices, and Joel found himself hugely enjoying the novelty of eating in the presence of more than a hundred and fifty other lads. Outfield West and his neighbors in Hampton House occupied a far table, and there ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... was jerked around to the compound gates. Amidst a clatter of hoofs and in a cloud of dust Stafford galloped out of sight, not once turning to glance in their direction. The two women stood and stared at each other, even Beatrice for the moment shaken out of her usual ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... collector water with envy. Still scarcely certain whether I was sleeping or waking, I put in my hand and drew out a bag filled with something heavy, and even as I did so the rotten mildewed canvas broke with the strain, and a stream of golden coins descended with a clatter upon the floor. ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... were in the house, baying and barking, and everybody was yelling. Then for a minute the dogs stopped their clamour, and I heard a great clatter of things breaking and of teeth crunching and of ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard
... spoke he was gathering the amazed Ruth and Martha under his wing and kissing them, crying, "Take that one for luck—and that to grow on." Then he let out his laugh. But in vain did Emma Morton try to squirm from his grasp; in vain she tried to quiet his clatter. "Say, girls, cluster around Brother George's knee—or ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... of knowledge rolls over one—one listens to It, to the soft clatter of the endless belt ...
— Crowds - A Moving-Picture of Democracy • Gerald Stanley Lee
... the white goose by the leg, A goose—'twas no great matter. The goose let fall a golden egg With cackle and with clatter. ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... and no one heard. All alone, mamma's baby, who had never been alone before in all her short cherished life. All alone with the croaking frogs and lonesome crickets. Hark! what was that? A roll of wheels and the clatter of ...
— Connor Magan's Luck and Other Stories • M. T. W.
... Couper, how spellest it? Lo! he hath forgotten, ye may see, The first word of his a b c. Hark, fool, hark, I will teach thee, P.a—pa.—t.e.r—ter—do together Tom Couper. Is not this a sore matter? Lo! here you see him proved a fool! He had more need to go to school, Than to come hither to clatter. STU. Certain, this is a solution Meet for such a boy's question. HU. Sensual Appetite, I pray thee Let pass all trifles and vanity For a while, it shall not long be, And depart, I thee require; For I would talk a word or two With this man here, ere he hence go, For to satisfy ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume I. • R. Dodsley
... anxiety for Ruth. Suddenly she sprang to her feet. Surely she had heard the rattle of wheels! Ever so far and indistinct to be sure, but still unmistakably wheels, clattering over some distant cobbles. She raised her voice and shouted; then held her breath to listen. The clatter grew more distinct; it drew nearer and nearer. She clambered up the fence and stood there waving her arms and shouting as madly as if she had been a shipwrecked mariner sighting a sail. She paused a moment to listen. The rattling wheels came nearer. She shouted again and then waited, listening ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... ready for the purpose, and hurled himself recklessly at a dark mass that at that moment came sliding close past what had been our lee side before I luffed the catamaran into the wind. I heard the splashing clatter of his boots as he landed upon certain objects that sounded like loose paddles lying washing about in the bottom of the canoe—for such I now saw the craft to be; saw him stoop, as though making fast the rope he had taken with him; ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... simple, not forgetting the dominie, continued carousing about it until daylight streamed in upon the party. Sir Walter Scott seldom failed, when I saw him in company with his Liddesdale companions, to mimic with infinite humour the sudden outburst of his old host on hearing the clatter of horses' feet, which he knew to indicate the arrival of the keg, the consternation of the dame, and the rueful despair with which the ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... on with my work, but when the stream threatened a group of stanchions, so highly polished that I could not endure the notion of a speck on their brightness, I lifted them out of harm's way, and with the clatter of this movement drew the attention of the plier of ...
— We and the World, Part II. (of II.) - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... made in such a manner that all the readers of that paper will notice it. The campaign should start with what is technically known as a "must be seen" notice. It is the publisher's business to shout loud enough to be heard above the clatter of the small advertisements, "Just out—New book by Donan Coyle, 'The Return from Davy Jones.'" If some piquant description of the book follow, this should be sure to send all those readers of the paper interested in Donan Coyle to the bookshop in ...
— The Building of a Book • Various
... like the strange abode Lira had selected for the seclusion of his daughter, it constantly occurs that one person is in ignorance of the doings of the others; and so it was natural that when Hedwig heard the clatter of hoofs in the courtyard, and the echoing crash of the great doors as they opened and closed, she should think both her father and Benoni had ridden away, and would be gone for the morning. She would not look out, lest she should see them ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... ship shook again, this time strongly. It was something more than a shudder; the sensation was for all the world as though she had scraped over a shoal of rock or shingle. There was a little clatter below, a noise of broken glass. The watch, who had been dozing on deck, sprang to their feet, and their ejaculations of surprise and fear rolled in a growl among them. The captain ran out of the companionway in his ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... the humming clatter of the engine ceased; and the aeroplane swooped down as gracefully as a bird, alighting gently on the ...
— Round the World in Seven Days • Herbert Strang
... troopers dashed by it at a gallop, with a lighted lantern swinging at his side. He raised it as he passed each street crossing, and held it high above his head so that its light fell upon the walls of the houses at the four corners. The clatter of his horse's hoofs had not ceased before another trooper galloped toward them riding more slowly, and throwing the light of his lantern over the trunks of the trees that lined the pavements. As the carriage passed him, he brought his horse ...
— Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... sort of thing, despite its inconvenience. And sometimes the clatter of the pony-rider swept by in the night, carrying letters at five dollars apiece and making the Overland trip in eight days; just a quick beat of hoofs in the distance, a dash, and a hail from the darkness, the beat of hoofs again, ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... arraignment of a whole epoch at the bar of the conscience of a man who is intellectually honest and powerfully intellectual. George Ponderevo transgresses most of the current codes, but he also shatters them. The entire system of sanctions tumbles down with a clatter like the fall of a corrugated iron church. I do not know what is left standing, unless it be George Ponderevo. I would not call him a lovable, but he is an admirable, man. He is too ruthless, rude, and bitter to be anything but solitary. His harshness is his fault, his one real fault; ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... shouldered matchlocks, and matches burning, so as to present a row of fires in the dusk. Their steady march was like the progress of a machine, that would roll irresistibly over everything in its way. Next, moving slowly, with a confused clatter of hoofs on the pavement, rode a party of mounted gentlemen, the central figure being Sir Edmund Andros, elderly, but erect and soldier-like. Those around him were his favorite councilors, and the bitterest foes of New England. At his right rode Edward Randolph, our arch-enemy, that 'blasted ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... a clatter and faced round. For a moment his eyes twinkled and a wintry smile lightened his fine old features. "Well, I declare!" he said, rising. "You must be the stranger the whole town's ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... Clan gento. Clandestine sekreta. Clank resoni. Clap manfrapi. Clarify klarigi. Clarion milita trumpeto. Clarionet klarneto. Clasp (buckle) buko. Clasp preno. Clasp preni. Class klaso. Class ordigi. Classify ordigi. Clatter bruegado. Claw ungego. Clay argilo. Clean purigi. Clean pura. Clean (boots, etc.) senkotigi. Cleanliness pureco. Cleanse purigi. Clear klara. Clear (mental) malkonfuza. Clearness klareco. Cleave (split) ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... morning till night. It was hard labor, as she had to work with her feet as well as her hands, producing slop clothing at the rate of a yard a minute. Never for an instant might her eyes wander from the seam; and all this severe work was done in the midst of an ear-splitting clatter, which alone would have worn out a person not thoroughly ...
— Sue, A Little Heroine • L. T. Meade
... by a wedge-shaped piece of floe, but we put the ice-anchor through it, towed it astern, and proceeded through the gap. Steering under these conditions required muscle as well as nerve. There was a clatter aft during the afternoon, and Hussey, who was at the wheel, explained that "The wheel spun round and threw me over the top of it!" The noon position was lat. 62 13 S., long. 18 53 W., and the run for the preceding twenty-four hours had been 32 miles in a south-westerly direction. We saw ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... deflected the young dog's leap, and kept her merrily outstretched jaws from closing on the bird. As it was, the impact knocked the eagle and the papier-mache stump to the floor; with much clatter and dust. ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... smelt; she advised a cat for the mice, and said she would get one. She used the greatest sympathy with the ladies, recognising a real sufferer in each, and not attempting to deny anything. From the dining-room came at times the sound of voices, which blended in a discord loud above the clatter of crockery, but Mrs. Harmon seemed not to hear them. An excited foreigner of some sort finally rushed from this quarter, and thrust his head into the booth where Lemuel and Mrs. Harmon sat, long enough to explode some formula of renunciation upon her, which left her serenity ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... but was not able to overtake him, for that rascal Pinocchio leaped in front of him like a hare and knocking his wooden feet together against the pavement made as much clatter as twenty ...
— Pinocchio - The Tale of a Puppet • C. Collodi
... matter?" she said, in rallying Yiddish, when they were taking their lunch of bread and cheese and ginger-beer amid the clatter of machines, whose serfs had not ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various
... that Jane discovered that her much-vaunted temper was not one-two-three to that of the red-haired person. He turned a sort of blue-white, shoved Jane out of his way as if she had been a chair, and she heard him clatter down the stairs and slam ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... with gentle hand To fold in shadows all the land, And stars along the sky to scatter, When there arose a hideous clatter, Slaves slanging bargemen, bargemen slaves; 'Ho, haul up here! how now, ye knaves, Inside three hundred people stuff? Already there are quite enough!' Collected were the fares at last, The mule that drew our barge ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... in the afternoon when the last Prussian outpost hailed us. I had been asleep for hours, but was awakened by the clatter of horses, and I opened my eyes to see a dozen Uhlans come cantering up ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... in their shade beautiful women gaze curiously on the scene beneath. Gayly dressed groups throng the balconies, and at the street-corners dark-faced men scowl, mutter deep curses, and clutch their knives. The street resounds with the heavy tramp of infantry, the rattle of gun-carriages, and the clatter of horses' hoofs. "Los Yanquies!" is the cry, and every neck is stretched to obtain a glimpse of the six thousand bemired and begrimed soldiers who are marching proudly to the Grand Plaza. On him especially is every eye intently fixed, whose martial form is half concealed by a splendid staff and ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne
... of the room and there was a clatter of dishes that ably expressed her frame of mind. Above the clatter and down from the children's bedroom floated Lydia's ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... another blind? We should say deaf, I think. The blind always enjoy the merry clatter of tongues. Why did ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... physical and mental inertia that would drive an Englishman mad. A Boer farmer, sitting on his stoep, large and strong, but absolutely lethargic, is the very incarnation of the spirit of the veldt. At the same time, when one remembers the clatter and gabble of our civilisation, it is impossible to deny him a certain dignity, though it may be only the dignity ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... they are flow become no more gratious, pleasant nor gentle, but incivile, monstrous and horrible. Moreover, that marriages are not for any amity, or for love of procreation, but full of envy, discord, and debate. This the curious Gul did clatter in the ears of Venus, reprehending her son. But Venus began to cry and sayd, What hath my sonne gotten any Love? I pray thee gentle bird that doest serve me so faithfully, tell me what she is, and ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius
... Carts clatter by every moment, drawn by swift Maremma nags, gay with brass harness, tinkling bells, and tassels of ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... relative vacantly, opened his mouth, closed it, sighed and turned toward the dining room. By this time most of the congregation were already in the yard and, as Cabot and his companion emerged into the dripping blackness of out-of-doors, from various parts of that blackness came the clatter of tongues and the sound of fervent ejaculations and expressions ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... are great epicures, and somewhat gourmands, for, after dining on thirty dishes, they will sometimes eat a duck by way of a finish. They toss their meat into their mouths to a tune, every man keeping time with his chop-sticks, while we, on the contrary, make anything but harmony with the clatter of our knives and forks. A Chinaman will not drink a drop of milk, but he will devour birds'-nests, snails, and the fins of sharks with a great relish. Our mourning color is black and theirs is white; they mourn for their parents three years, we a much shorter ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke |
