"Musical" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... there are in Russia myriads of people who speak Russian, and a few who can also read and write it. Russian may, for aught I know, be a very beautiful language; it may be as lucid and firm in its constructions as French is, and as musical in sound; I know nothing at all about it. Nor do I claim for French that it was by its own virtues predestined to the primacy that it holds in Europe. Had Italy, not France, been an united and powerful nation when Latin became desuete, that primacy would of course ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... with evident pleasure. Coming forward, he began to speak and at once fascinated every child in the room. His language was beautiful yet simple, his tones were musical, and he ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... a clarinet with a cold in its head, and the bassoon the same with a cold in its chest." The cor anglais suffers slightly from both symptoms. Some ambitious composer, by judicious use of the more diseased instruments, could achieve the most rheumy musical effects, particularly if, a la Scriabin, he should have the atmosphere of the concert hall heavily ...
— The So-called Human Race • Bert Leston Taylor
... people are instinctively anxious to see the performers, thus distracting the purely musical impression, and the reasonable suggestion of Goethe that the performers should be invisible is still seldom carried ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... does not escape in the butler's pantry or fly up the dumb-waiter, because the turkey is a very nervous animal. Once you get the turkey in the kitchen lock the door and prepare the stuffing. The best stuffing for a turkey is chestnuts, which you can obtain from any author who writes musical comedy. Now remove the wishbone carelessly and make a wish. Add twenty-four, multiply by nineteen, and sprinkle with salt. Then rush the turkey over to the gas stove before it has a chance to change its mind. Let it sizzle for four ...
— Skiddoo! • Hugh McHugh
... The musical name echoed and reechoed through the silent woods, but there was no other answer. Austin lighted a match, shielded it from the rain with his hand, and looked at his watch; it was just ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes
... and Lavender, in their mutual musical confidences, had at an early period discovered that each of them knew something of the older English duets, and forthwith they tried a few of them, to Mackenzie's extreme delight. Here, at last, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Volume 11, No. 26, May, 1873 • Various
... retired to a very comfortable couch near the window and sat down to await the termination of the musical. ...
— R. Holmes & Co. • John Kendrick Bangs
... around you. The tent is closed, but through the little cracks you can see that all is still dark. In a few moments a faint grayness steals into the air, and off in the half darkness you hear the Somali gunbearers chanting their morning prayers—soft, musical, and soothing. Then there are more voices murmuring in the air and the camp slowly awakens to life. Some one is heard chopping wood, and by that time day breaks with a crash. All is life, and the birds are singing as though mad with the joy of life and sunshine. A little ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon
... (like many other smaller gaps in Q1), but that probably one or two were 'cuts'—e.g. Emilia's long speech (k). The omission of (i) might be due to the state of the MS.: the words of the song may have been left out of the dialogue, as appearing on a separate page with the musical notes, or may have been inserted in such an illegible way as to baffle ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... yard in the background covered by a tarred roof which had no windows, and this they converted into a smoke-room. Roominess and a covering offered a welcome change from the mud, dirt, and rain of the trenches, and Tommy's spirits kept up, in spite of all shortcomings. Our musical evenings continued as before, and we thoroughly enjoyed being able to stretch our legs. In fact, we had become quite reconciled as well as quite used to our surroundings by the time we were called away. ...
— A Soldier's Sketches Under Fire • Harold Harvey
... dismissed, and the boys and girls came rushing out with merry shouts and laughter. The voices had a musical ring and the intonation peculiar to uncultivated colored lads and lassies. They were a comely, thrifty-looking set, and the instinctive hopefulness of their race looked from the bright eyes and shone in the cheery faces. Life had gone hard with some, but had failed to quench their faith ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 39, No. 03, March, 1885 • Various
... touched him had he pursued the direction in which he was then running. But his evil genius prompted him to turn, and, shaping his course so as to bisect mine at right angles, he raised his head, and, giving vent to one of those musical neighs (?) for which the animal is somewhat famous, rushed on in his mad career. Poor brute! the noose hovered over him a moment, like some bird of prey about to swoop down on its quarry, and then settled over his head ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... too faint to mark the objects distinctly, but enough to guide the steps of one who knew the place. The air was soft and warm, while its sweetness told of the near growth of roses; but a sweeter breath than even the rose was upon the air, the low and musical whisper of youth and of love. Gradually, two graceful forms became outlined on the dark air—the one a noble-looking cavalier, the other Giulietta. Yet the brow of the cavalier was a gloomy one to turn on so fair a listener in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 573, October 27, 1832 • Various
... are musical, and need a piano (in which case, as far as beauty is concerned, we are in a bad way), that is quite all we want: and we can add very little to these necessaries without troubling ourselves, and hindering our work, our thought, ...
— Hopes and Fears for Art • William Morris
... is one musical echo and aspiration. He finds his theme and illustration constantly in music. His amorous descant never fails him: his lute is always by his side. Following the "Steps of the Temple," a graceful tribute to Herbert, we have the congenial title, "The Delights of the ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various
... night, to the most noisy demonstrations of joy. Numerous parties of men and women perambulate the streets, singing couplets, called villancicos, which are exclusively applicable to this feast, and playing on two species of musical instruments, having the most abominable sound, called raveles and zambombas, which are never used but on this occasion. The churches are filled with people, who are far from conducting themselves with that decorum and moderation ...
— Roman Catholicism in Spain • Anonymous
... ridicules this habit unmercifully in "Martin Chuckle." Words so mispronounced are ter'-ri-to'-ry, ex'-act'-ly, isn't-best, big-cle, etc. In the latter word this secondary accent is made to lengthen the y, and so causes a double error. The habit interferes materially with the musical character of easy speech and destroys the desirable musical rhythm which prose as well as ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... crouched there in the darkness against the safe. At times, in strange, ghostly flashes, the nickel dial with the ray upon it seemed to leap out and glisten through the surrounding blackness; at times, the quick intake of breath, as from great exertion; at times, faint, musical little clicks, as, after abortive effort, the dial whirled, preparatory to a fresh attempt. And then, at ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... irritated, felt somewhat as a maestro would feel who, having finished that musical obstacle race The Grand Polonnaise, finds himself requested ...
— The Man Who Lost Himself • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... calls or "pipes" are very difficult to reduce to a musical scale, because the pitch of the instrument depends entirely on the amount of energy expended by the blower. The novice, after a few trials, would probably assert that the primitive little whistle had only one note—and not very much of ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... the consequences, she lifted up the lid, and instantly there jumped out a number of little men and little women, carrying little tables and chairs, little dishes, and little musical instruments. The whole company were so small, that the biggest giant among them was scarcely the height of a finger. They leaped into the green meadow, separated into various bands, and began dancing ...
— The Fairy Book - The Best Popular Stories Selected and Rendered Anew • Dinah Maria Mulock (AKA Miss Mulock)
... study it deeply. Yet with what interest and lucidity has Fabre succeeded in expounding the complex morphoses of the obscure and miserable larva of the Sitaris, the curious intestine of the Scarabaeus, the secret of the spawning of the weevil, and the ingenious mechanisms of the musical instruments of the Decticus and the Cicada. With what subtle art he explains the song of the cricket, how the five hundred prisms of the serrated bow set the four tympana in vibration; and how the song is sometimes muffled by a ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... charm;—she was graceful, and she was aware of her grace;—she was bright and intelligent in the prettily 'surface' way of women,— she evidently possessed a kind heart, and she seemed thoughtful of other people's feelings,—she had a sweet voice and a delightfully musical laugh,—and—and—that was about all. It was not much, strictly speaking;—yet he found himself considerably interested in weighing the pros and cons of her nature, and wondering how she had managed to retain, in the worldly and social surroundings to which she had been so long accustomed, the child-like ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... other cities also had considerable latent music among their amateurs; happily not then brought to the surface by the fierce friction of poverty. And what was the musical talent of the Capital, has elsewhere been hinted. When the tireless daughters of Richmond had worked in every other way, for the soldiers themselves, they organized a system of concerts and dramatic evenings for benefit of their families. At these were shown evidences ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... good singers among the boys and a number of them had musical instruments, banjos, guitars and mandolins, so that it was an easy matter to get up a concert at any time, the boys whiling away many ...
— The Hilltop Boys on the River • Cyril Burleigh
... either for literature or the arts; and he jumbled together in one large magazine the beautiful pictures, clocks, and musical instruments accumulated by his ancestors. To explain and repair these, there had always been Europeans, chiefly Portuguese, in attendance; and to some of these we have been indebted in times past for memoirs of the court of Peking; but Taou-Kwang dismissed the last of them. It is believed ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 433 - Volume 17, New Series, April 17, 1852 • Various
... Story of the means by which he modulated his voice when speaking.] He was, in fact, so carried away by his feelings that he had to resort to a curious device in order to keep his voice under control. A man with a musical instrument used, it is said, to stand near him, and warn him by a note at times if he was pitching his voice too high or too low. It was now that he told his stories of the flogging of the magistrate ...
— The Gracchi Marius and Sulla - Epochs Of Ancient History • A.H. Beesley
... colours. Let not these occupy my soul; let God rather occupy it, who made these things, very good indeed, yet is He my good, not they. And these affect me, waking, the whole day, nor is any rest given me from them, as there is from musical, sometimes in silence, from all voices. For this queen of colours, the light, bathing all which we behold, wherever I am through the day, gliding by me in varied forms, soothes me when engaged on other things, and not observing it. And so strongly doth it entwine itself, that ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... and fragrant smells of sweet gums and pleasant notes of musical birds, which other countries in more temperate zones do yield, we tasted the most boisterous Boreal blasts, mixed with snow and hail, in the months of June and July, nothing inferior to our untemperate winter: a sudden alteration, and especially in a place of parallel, where the ...
— Voyages in Search of the North-West Passage • Richard Hakluyt
... the question of the establishment of an order of aristocracy among us were put to vote, we should find more women than men who would go for it; and they would flout at the consequences to society with the lively wit and the musical laugh which make feminine selfishness ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... gave a musical laugh. He could have but one reason, and she felt she knew that reason! What a handsome dear he was, and how she loved ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... invited to pass an evening in a family remarkable for its musical talent, and I remember distinctly the evident pleasure with which Percival listened to the chorus of organ tones and rich cultivated voices. In general, however, his appreciation of music was subordinate to his study of syllabic movement in versification; and it ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... Lady Booby's cast-off livery, is, I think, to the full as polite as Tom Jones in his fustian suit, or Captain Booth in regimentals. He has, like those heroes, large calves, broad shoulders, a high courage, and a handsome face. The accounts of Joseph's bravery and good qualities; his voice, too musical to halloo to the dogs; his bravery in riding races for the gentlemen of the county, and his constancy in refusing bribes and temptation, have something affecting in their naivete and freshness, and prepossess one in favour of that handsome young ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... to Cincinnati, where he enlisted in another newspaper speculation. The result of that attempt was equally unpropitious. Dissolving their interests, Mr. Kelly then removed with his family to New York. Here he commenced a journal devoted to theatrical and musical criticism, and intelligence, entitled "The Archer." Mr. J. W. Taylor was a partner with him in the publication. The twain also engaged in the fancy business, having a store in Broadway, above Grand street. The adventure there not being very successful, ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... and that the girl took it all in the easiest possible way. He noticed that Mrs. Brockett dealt with each of her company in turn—one remark apiece, and always in that stern, deep voice with the strangely beautiful musical note in it. To himself she said: "Well, Mr. Westcott, I'm pleased, I'm sure, that everything is to your satisfaction," and listened gravely to his assurance. To Miss Dall: "Well, Miss Ball, I looked ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... is certainly based on a primary liking for tones and their combinations, as well as for rhythm. Novel effects also appeal to curiosity, musical performance is a means of display to the performer, and the problem set by a piece of music to the performer in the {183} way of execution, and to the listener in the way of understanding and appreciation, gives plenty of play to the mastery impulse. ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... Indian waiter and accepted without question the explanation of the lady. It was she who was spokesman throughout. She said that she and her companion were play-actors and that their baggage was detained by a cruel manager of a Munich musical beer-hall; this was a wise admission as the man might have seen her at the Harmonista, or, at least, her photograph in the doorway. But they were compelled to reach Lucerne without delay or lose a profitable ...
— The Son of Clemenceau • Alexandre (fils) Dumas
... further enacted, that each slave, at entering the said ship, is to receive some present, not exceeding in value ——, to be provided according to the instructions aforesaid; and musical instruments, according to the fashion of the country, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... of friends, referring to an exquisite musical composition, said: "That song always carries me away when I hear it."—"Can anybody ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... himself in the midst of that quiet musical party, wild with terror, scarcely able ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... used in preference to several other compositions of Wagner because the four operas included in it are the fullest both of musical and story wonders, and are at the same time ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon
... up again behind them. Ford and George argued for the traditional rendering of music. Nellie and Arty battled for the musical zeit-geist, the national sense that sees through mere notation to the spirit that breathes behind. They waxed warm and threw authorities and quotations about, hardly waiting for each other to finish what they wished to say. Connie turned round to the disputants and threw herself ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller
... whose verse is in sympathy with moods that are human and not personal, with emotions that do not belong to periods in the development of individual minds, but to all men in all years, wins the gratitude and love of whoever can read the language which he makes musical with solace and aspiration. The present volume, while it will confirm Mr. Longfellow's claim to the high rank he has won among lyric poets, deserves attention also as proving him to possess that faculty of epic narration which is rarer than all others ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... in nature which has its spiritual parallels. There is no music so heavenly as an Aeolian harp, and the Aeolian harp is nothing but a set of musical cords arranged in harmony, and then left to be touched by the unseen fingers of the wandering winds. And as the breath of heaven floats over the chords, it is said that notes almost divine float out upon the air, as ...
— Days of Heaven Upon Earth • Rev. A. B. Simpson
... had natural courage. She felt that it could be stubborn to resist a softness. Now she cared no more for the hackneyed musical word; friendship was her desire. If it is not life's poetry, it is a credible prose; a land of low undulations instead of Alps; beyond the terrors and the deceptions. And she could trust her friend: he who was a singular constancy. His mother had told ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... instincts underlying and preceding the utilitarian preoccupations. History indeed was first poetry, as we had Homer before Thucydides, and as in all countries the traditions of the past take the form of metrical, and generally musical, recitation. An excellent and polished school of prose writers is the product of a tendency in national life of later origin than that which calls out the bards and ballad-singers, and is proof of a more advanced culture. The Renaissance in Italy was but ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... she had ever shed, coursed down Mme. Fauvel's cheeks, as she listened to the musical tones of ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... is a proof," Mr. Darwin says, "that we realized and conceived the idea of the texture and nature of a musical sound before we had a word for it, that we had to borrow the expressive word "timbre" ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... iron tongs to lift fire with, but the idea of a fig-leaf has never entered the mind. They cultivate largely have had enormous crops of grain, work well in iron, and show taste in their dwellings, stools, baskets, and musical instruments. They are very hospitable, too, and appreciate our motives; but shame has been unaccountably left out of the question. They can give no reason for it except that all their ancestors went exactly as they do. Can you explain ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... to profit further by its popularity: he determined to publish it. Mr. W. C. Peters, afterwards of Cincinnati, and well known as a composer and publisher, was at that time a music-dealer on Market Street in Pittsburg. Rice, ignorant himself of the simplest elements of musical science, waited upon Mr. Peters, and solicited his co-operation in the preparation of his song for the press. Some difficulty was experienced before Rice could be induced to consent to the correction of certain trifling informalities, rhythmical mainly, in his melody; but, yielding finally, the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... am afraid, with too much justice, that there is not a single new thought in the pastorals; and, with equal reason, declares, that their chief beauty consists in their correct and musical versification, which has so influenced the English ear, as to render every moderate ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... amazement, and glorified him with laudatory words, saying, 'Thou art our protector, and the Providence itself for men,—and also the creator of the worlds. By thy favour the universe with its gods may possibly be saved from havoc.' And the magnanimous one, glorified by the gods—while the musical instruments of celestial choristers were playing all round, and while celestial blossoms were showered upon him—rendered waterless the wide ocean. And seeing the wide ocean rendered devoid of water, the host of gods was exceedingly glad; and taking up choice weapons ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... holding thousands spellbound while she sang. She had the real lyric artist's temperament, for that breathless silence of the many while her voice rang out alone, and trilled and died away to a delicate musical echo, was more to her than the roar of applause that could be heard through the walls and closed doors in the street outside. To such a moment as that Faustus himself would have cried 'Stay!' though the price ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... He started on hearing musical sounds roll down through the air from above, but grew calm again when he found they were only the soft notes of some bugles, travelling along with a pleasant murmur over the shrubs and through the park, and dying away on the distant hills. Roderick had placed the musicians in the ...
— The Old Man of the Mountain, The Lovecharm and Pietro of Abano - Tales from the German of Tieck • Ludwig Tieck
... [^u] u with circumflex [:u] u with diaeresis [)u] u with breve [u] u with macron [:U] U with diaeresis [asterism] triangle of 3 asterisks, two at the top, one at the bottom [degrees] degree sign [pounds] pounds sign [1] upside down 1 [6] upside down 6 [b] musical flat symbol ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... The letter, it is unnecessary to state, was voluminous,—for a woman can tell her love, or other matter of interest, over and over again in as many forms as another poet, not G. H., found for his grief in ringing the musical changes ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... though a more "temperate joy" than "the scenes of the common comedy," were still a "most delicious" one.'[177] "They do not make us laugh so loud, but they make us smile more frequently." And he held the strongest opinion that music was always on virtue's side, for he says the only musical passions are the good ones, the bad and unsocial passions being, in his view, essentially unmelodious. But he thought scenery was much abused on the French operatic stage. "In the French operas not only thunder and lightning, storms and tempests, are commonly ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... thin Southerner said in his musical voice, "I respect your character and your motives and I wish you well—every good wish possible consistent with ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... the beauty that has existed in idea for us is realized? When I spoke to her, she answered simply, without shyness or eagerness; she did not know the pleasure it was to me to see her, to hear the musical sounds of her voice. All these angels are revealed to our hearts by the same signs; by the sweetness of their tongues, the tenderness in their eyes, by their fair, pale faces, and their gracious ways. All these things are so blended and mingled that we feel the ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... not prevent him from following his natural bent for intellectual pursuits. He was a man of brilliant parts and of refined and artistic tastes. Acquainted with many languages and literatures, an accomplished musician and musical composer, a generous patron of letters and of art, his poetical efforts are eminently characteristic of the personality of the man. His volumes of short poems—Hofwijck, Cluijswerck, Voorhout and Zeestraet—contain exquisite and witty pictures of life at the Hague—"the ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson
... aristocratic to make use of any other light) and cast their reflection upon stands of arms of all kinds, among which double-barrelled muskets and pistols held first place. Foils and masks were hanging here and there upon the walls; several musical instruments were lying about, and a few mirrors in gilt frames proclaimed the fact that dress was a pastime by no means unappreciated by the strange inhabitants of ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... Those who are musical should take a note on the piano enunciating the vowels in their natural order ([a], ay, ee, o, oo) on this note. Then proceed to the next note; the whole of the octave may thus be gone over. Choose an octave most consonant with the ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... those who waited and were anxious to trust their care to Him and seek repose. It was all this, and much more, to many people: and yet, when it spread in another direction over the fields, it meant nothing to the yawning ploughman, either musical or poetical, had no significance whatever for him if it were not of the time of day, gathered, however, with the help of sundry other sensations of which hunger and fatigue were chief. It probably conveyed as much, and neither more nor less, ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... amuse himself a little by scraping catgut, even let him scrape away!" It will be seen that Mr. Cape did not assign to music the high rank in education which has been attributed to it by some famous thinkers in ancient and modern times. Few musical sensations experienced during my whole life have equalled in intensity the sensation of hearing our dancing-master play upon a full-sized violin, after the weak and thin tones that our ears had been accustomed to by his kit. I ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... is your face ordinarily expressionless? Are you frank, kindly, cordial, respectful, courteous in word and actions? Do you look people frankly in the eye? Are your inflections natural, courteous, modest, musical, or aggressive, conceited, pessimistic, repellent? What are your powers of attention, observation, memory, reason, imagination, inventiveness, thoughtfulness, receptiveness, quickness, analytical power, constructiveness, breadth, grasp? Can you manage people well? Do you know a fine picture ...
— Psychology and Industrial Efficiency • Hugo Muensterberg
... fine, but not as an abiding place; as an arena—yes, an arena gorgeously curtained with sea and sky, mountains and broad prospects, decorated with all the delicate magnificence of leaf tracery and flower petal and feather, soft fur and the shining wonder of living skin, musical with thunder and the singing of birds; but an arena nevertheless, an arena which offers no seats for idle spectators, in which one must will and do, decide, strike and strike ...
— New Worlds For Old - A Plain Account of Modern Socialism • Herbert George Wells
... the banker's garden. It was agreed that for fifteen years he should not be free to cross the threshold of the lodge, to see human beings, to hear the human voice, or to receive letters and newspapers. He was allowed to have a musical instrument and books, and was allowed to write letters, to drink wine, and to smoke. By the terms of the agreement, the only relations he could have with the outer world were by a little window made purposely for that object. He might have anything he wanted—books, music, wine, ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... service begins. The blue smoke curls up from the censer and plays in the slanting sunbeams, the lighted candles faintly splutter. The singing, at first harsh and deafening, soon becomes quiet and musical as the choir gradually adapt themselves to the acoustic conditions of the rooms. . . . The tunes are all mournful and sad. . . . The guests are gradually brought to a melancholy mood and grow pensive. Thoughts of the brevity of ...
— The Schoolmaster and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... of the laws governing the effective interpretation of instrumental music exist. Some of them, by acknowledged and competent authorities, have thrown valuable light on a most important element of musical art. Had I not believed that a similar need existed in connection with singing, this addition to vocal literature would not have ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... that during his two years residence at Harissa and in the mountain, he never heard any kind of music. The Christians are too devout to occupy themselves with such worldly pleasures, and the Druses have no sort of musical instruments. ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... air fanned his face and the sun smiled upon him, a loose piece of canvas of an awning near him flapped backwards and forwards with a monotonous musical sound, the plash and gurgle of the tumbling waves fell soothingly on his ears. Gradually sleep came over him gently, and enwrapped his strained, wearied ...
— A Girl of the Klondike • Victoria Cross
... not only an eloquent talker, but also a poet. A strong intellect was associated with delicate feelings. He had the gift of musical utterance; and the following verses from his poem, To Time —the Old Traveler, were pronounced by Washington Irving equal to any lyric ...
— Poets of the South • F.V.N. Painter
... nothing striking but a pair of enormous black eyebrows. The figure is dressed in a dirty brown surtout, blue plush trousers, and dirty top-boots. It begins to speak. The voice is loud and clear, and marches on with academic stateliness and gravity, and even something of musical softness mixes with its notes. Suddenly the speaker turns to a side. It is to spit, which act is repeated every second sentence. You now see in his hands a twisted pen, which is gradually stripped of every hair and then torn to pieces in the course of ...
— Principal Cairns • John Cairns
... attractiveness to the females; and in many cases there are added all sorts of extraordinary antics in the way of dancings and crowings. Again, in the case of all song-birds, the object of the singing is to please the females; and for this purpose the males rival one another to the best of their musical ability. ...
— Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) • George John Romanes
... introduced them. Architecture flourished, through the elegant taste of Vitruvius, and the patronage of the emperor. Painting, statuary, and music, were cultivated, but not with that degree of perfection which they had obtained in the Grecian states. The musical instruments of this period were the flute and the lyre, to which may be added the sistrum, lately imported from Egypt. But the chief glory of the period is its literature, of which we proceed to ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... of Lola (or perhaps to the musical jingle of the Cornet's cash bags), a very loose watch was kept on the pair. Hence the reason why the Countess of Landsfeld (as she still insisted on being called) had not kept her second appointment at Marlborough Street was ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... George Liversedge, of Branksome, who, with the view of developing his pine-woods in the neighbourhood of Bournemouth, had placed the formation of the company necessary to the scheme in Soames's hands. Mrs. Liversedge, with a sense of the fitness of things, had given a musical tea in his honour. Later in the course of this function, which Soames, no musician, had regarded as an unmitigated bore, his eye had been caught by the face of a girl dressed in mourning, standing ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... time the patients felt the magnetic influence. The women, being the most easily affected, were almost at once seized with fits of yawning and stretching; their eyes closed, their legs gave way and they seemed to suffocate. In vain did musical glasses and harmonicas resound, the piano and voices re-echo; these supposed aids only seemed to increase the patients' convulsive movements. Sardonic laughter, piteous moans and torrents of tears burst forth on ...
— Complete Hypnotism: Mesmerism, Mind-Reading and Spiritualism • A. Alpheus
... continued her way, and at last became curious to know what was in the box she was carrying. So she opened it, and a great quantity of little puppets came out; some danced, some sang, and some played on musical instruments. She amused herself some time with them; but when she was ready to go on, the little figures would not return to the box. Night approached, and she exclaimed, as ...
— Italian Popular Tales • Thomas Frederick Crane
... GEORGE has known intimately the romantic stream, named, for some unexplained reason, the Dwyfor river. To its musical murmur may be traced the mellifluous cadences of the statesman's voice employed so effectually in his appeals to Labour and the Paris Conference. Who can say what influences this little Welsh river, with its bubbling merriment, the flashing forceful leap of its cascades, its adroit ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, April 14, 1920 • Various
... replied Adelaide, with her usual sweetness; and placidity, as she replaced a ringlet in its proper position; "but I have unluckily an engagement at this time. You will, however, be at no loss for amusement; you will find musical instruments there," pointing to an adjacent apartment; "and here are new publications, and portefeuilles of drawings you will perhaps like to look over;" and so ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... wit, and skilled in the making of new musical instruments, was ordered by Louis XI., king of France, more in jest than earnest, to procure him a concert of swines' voices. The abbot said that the thing could doubtless be done, but it would cost a good deal of money. The king ...
— Anecdotes of Animals • Unknown
... himself pulling one of the two stroke oars, began to sing, and then the men behind him, gathering courage, joined in an octave lower, their voices being even more uncertain and lugubrious than his own. These poor fishermen had not had the musical education of Clan-Alpine's warriors. The performance was not enlivening, and as the monotonous and melancholy sing-song that kept time to the oars told its story in Gaelic, all that the English strangers could make out was an occasional reference to Jura or Scarba or Isla. It was, indeed, the song ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... repose, while in the evenings they danced gayly in their fragrant groves with songs or the rude music of their drums. After the coming of the Spaniards the clear tinkle of the hawk's bells as they danced gave them the deepest delight, and for those musical toys they were ready to ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... reaction, to use a modern phrase, began to set in. The master, while thus engaged in dispensing justice, first received a rather vigorous thwack on the ear from behind, by an anonymous contributor, who gifted him with what is called a musical ear, for it sang during five minutes afterwards. The monarch, when turning round to ascertain the traitor, received another insult on the most indefensible side, and that with a cordiality of manner, that induced him to send his right ...
— The Poor Scholar - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... may be shown that the departments in which women have equalled men have been the departments in which they have had equal training, equal encouragement, and equal compensation,—as, for instance, the theatre. Madame Lagrange, the prima donna, after years of costly musical instruction, wins the zenith of professional success; she receives, the newspapers affirm, sixty thousand dollars a year, travelling-expenses for ten persons, country-houses, stables, and liveries, besides ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... describes his "lines as of slow motion, clogged and impeded with clusters of consonants." Even this verbal criticism, though it appeals to the eye, and not to the ear, is false criticism, since Collins is certainly the most musical of poets. How could that lyrist be harsh in his diction, who almost draws tears from our eyes, while his melodious lines and picturing epithets are remembered by his readers? He is devoured with as much enthusiasm by one party ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... future state, they practice a sort of religious worship, and they bury or burn their dead. They call their chiefs be-a-na, or "father," but unless compelled by fear to obedience they treat them with little respect or affection. Their language has a musical sound, but the vocabulary is scanty; and thus far the origin of these people and their language remains a matter of doubt, though in many particulars they bear a decided resemblance to the negroes of Guinea. In regard to dress their habits ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... had a musical ear, suddenly bellowed, 'In the Bays of Biscay, O!' which so affected the good Captain, as an appropriate tribute to departed worth, that he shook him by the hand in acknowledgment, and was ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... a word of warning and raises the cry, "Great is God, and Mohammed is his prophet! Allah! Allah!" At first three distinct musical notes are heard in the echo; I mean different notes upon the musical scale, as distinct from each other as "do, sol, do." These reverberate round the dome and ascend until they reach the smaller dome, where ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... were chattering gayly in a low, melodious tone with each other, and with the gentlemen of the party filling the room with a musical ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... tiresome sonatas in the world, and I have at last consented to give her a box at the Bouffons. I have thus gained three quiet evenings out of the seven which God has created in the week. I am the mainstay of the music shops. At Paris there are drawing-rooms which exactly resemble the musical snuff-boxes of Germany. They are a sort of continuous orchestra to which I regularly go in search of that surfeit of harmony which my wife calls a concert. But most part of the time my wife keeps herself ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part II. • Honore de Balzac
... From Old Fr. tabour, Fr. tambour. Compare Eng. tambourine. Originally from the root tap, Gr. tup, to strike lightly. An ancient musical instrument,—a small one-ended drum having a handle projecting from the frame, by which it was held in the left hand, while it was beaten with a stick ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... Mrs. Bonnifay; "only a girl whom Rose met when she was studying music in Germany. I fancy she spent her last cent on her musical education, which, I fear, won't do her much good, after all; for, as you must notice, she is utterly lacking in style. She is dreadfully poor now, and earns a living by singing in private houses—all ...
— The Copper Princess - A Story of Lake Superior Mines • Kirk Munroe
... glee, which peculiarly denoted their art (the minstrels'), continues still in our own language ... it is to this day used in a musical sense, and applied to a peculiar ...
— Beowulf • James A. Harrison and Robert Sharp, eds.
... too, to an incredible extent, in a prince who, although of intellect beneath mediocrity, was not utterly without sense, and who had had some experience. Without voice or musical knowledge, he used to sing, in private, the passages of the opera prologues that were ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... soldiers carried at the belt a tin quart-pail, in which the coffee was crushed as well as boiled. The pail was set upon a flat stone like a cobbler's lapstone, and the coffee berries were broken by using the butt of the bayonet as a pestle. At break of day every camp was musical with the clangor of these primitive coffee-mills. The coffee was fed to the mill a few berries at a time, and the veterans had the skill of gourmands in getting just the degree of fineness in crushing which would give the best strength and flavor. The cheering beverage was ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... an artist that he could not do the thing ill. Any one of these stories will prove his capacity: the first, for instance, about that princess on the "bare, brown, lonely moor" who was "as sweet and as fresh as an opening rosebud, and her voice was as musical as the whisper of a stream in the woods in the hot days of summer." There is not a flaw in it. It is so filled with simple beauty and tenderness, and there is so much of the genuine word-magic in its language, that one is carried away as by the spell ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... of musicians and "inventor of the organ." The legend says that an angel fell in love with Cecilia for her musical skill, and nightly brought her roses from paradise. Her husband saw the angel visitant, who gave to both a ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... man. His fine head, with abundant iron-gray hair, tossed carelessly back from his forehead, his keen eyes and expressive mouth, shaded by a black moustache, made up a very noticeable portrait, and his voice was so musical and penetrating that it lent a charm to the merest trifle that he uttered. Judge Jeremiah S. Black was a tall, broad-shouldered man, with a clean-shaven, rugged face, a bright-brown wig, and a sharp pair of eyes that flashed from under snow-white ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... next room my mother asked me to show her what I could play on the piano, wisely hoping to divert my father's thoughts by the sound. I played Ueb' immer Treu und Redlichkeit, and my father said to her, 'Is it possible he has musical talent?' ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... suddenly Mr. Gladstone raised his hand, and it was almost as if a miracle had happened. In an instant there was a deathlike silence in the hall, and every man in it seemed to be holding his breath. The speaker's voice rang out, clear and musical as of old, and it reached to the furthest corners of the mighty apartment. But he had not got further than the conventional opening words when his audience seemed to go mad with delight. A frenzied burst of cheering, far exceeding that which had welcomed him on his first ...
— Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 • Stuart J. Reid, ed.
... of voices interrupted to tell me what the manager evidently could not. "I am going there myself to-morrow," he said. "You can ride behind. The pony can carry both of us." I looked at my new-found friend. He had deep blue eyes, a noble face, a musical and kindly voice. He looked like the people I had known in England. I was drawn to him at once in confidence and friendship. He went on to tell me later that he had been in the Black Hawk War; that he had been spending some time in Chicago trying to decide whether he would locate ...
— Children of the Market Place • Edgar Lee Masters
... there is a view backward as well as forward, and, we may look back for a moment on this last period of Christopher's life in Spain, inwardly to him so full of trouble and difficulty and disappointment, outwardly so brave and glittering, musical with high-sounding names and the clash of arms; gay with sun and shine and colour. The brilliant Court moving from camp to camp with its gorgeous retinues and silken pavilions and uniforms and dresses and armours; the excitement of war, the intrigues of ...
— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young
... saying, if I remember rightly, that the sixty years old choristers of Dionysus were to be specially quick in their perceptions of rhythm and musical composition, that they might be able to distinguish good and bad imitation, that is to say, the imitation of the good or bad soul when under the influence of passion, rejecting the one and displaying the other in hymns and songs, charming the souls of youth, ...
— Laws • Plato
... who weep, to sympathize with those who were distressed, to administer consolation to the torn heart of affliction. When by the bedside of the dying, or in the homes of bereavement and sorrow, her hand was gentle and her voice mild and musical. There was a sweet and unobtrusive kindness of manner, a mild and touching sympathy, which won the heart of the sufferer and introduced her at once to the inner ...
— Daughters of the Cross: or Woman's Mission • Daniel C. Eddy
... the musician was complete. Like all scholars, he nurtured an ingrained distrust when it came to the supernatural influence of art. For the great musical compositions which, in the course of time and as a result of the homage of succeeding generations, had come to be regarded as exemplary and incontestable, he had a feeling of reverence. For the creations of his contemporaries he had ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... the cabman, we stood in the road, with our mountain of luggage heaped about us, waiting for something to happen. A moment later a window in the administration building was thrown open and we were greeted with a loud and not over-musical chorus of ...
— High Adventure - A Narrative of Air Fighting in France • James Norman Hall
... uproar. At this juncture, the young gentleman who has already been described, stepping on one side of the street where the pavement was highest, took off his hat. "Silence, I pray you, dear friends; I would speak a few words," he said, in a rich musical voice. "We came here purposing to enter yonder house, where we might worship God according to the dictates of our consciences, and exhort and strengthen one another; but it seemeth to me that those in authority have resolved to prevent our thus ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... he also lacked the faculty of musical adaptation. He had a liking for certain ballads and songs, and while he memorized and recited their lines, someone else did the singing. Lincoln often recited for the delectation of his friends, the following, the authorship of which ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure
... me for trying to overdo things," she was thinking, half sadly. Gradually her body relaxed and her eyelids dropped. Through the mists of half consciousness she heard the musical rattle of the tea things, and presently there came the catchy, rather nasal tones of Adele's voice over the clatter ...
— Molly Brown's Senior Days • Nell Speed
... Venice a certain number of children received a musical education at the expense of the state, and it was Porpora, the great musician—then a soured and disappointed man—who trained the voices of the girls. They were not equally poor, these young ladies, and among them were the daughters of needy artists, whose wandering existence ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... much more musical than on the occasion of the first visit of Bunny and Sue. Several banjos were playing and also a mouth organ here and there, while snatches of songs could be heard all ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue in the Sunny South • Laura Lee Hope
... Americus, as he was called. He was born in London, I believe, and was only four years old when his father brought him to this country, less than three years ago. Since that time he has appeared in concerts and various entertainments in many of our principal cities, attracting unusual attention by his musical skill. I confess, however, that I had not heard of him until last month, though it seems he had previously given two or three public performances in the city where I live. I had not heard of him, I say, until last month; ...
— The Little Violinist • Thomas Bailey Aldrich |
