"Shrill" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the hands of his readers and of critics better treatment than has been measured out to him in the contemptuous estimate of Macaulay, and, still worse, in the shrill attack of the smaller brood 'whose sails were never to the tempest given,' but who have, by the easy repetition of a few phrases and an imperfect acquaintance with the writings and character of the man they decry, come to the complacent depreciation which, as Niebuhr ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... to the front of the platform, an elephant gun swinging easily at his side, an easy grin radiating from his confident, rugged face. The cheers rose to a shrill fortissimo, but the grin did not vanish. What a great actor he really was, he told himself, to be able to pretend ...
— The Hunters • William Morrison
... does my wounded heart Hope, alas, to heal; Seeking, to allay its smart, Things that cannot feel. Better should my pain Bitterly complain, Crying shrill, To thee who dost constrain My spirit ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... shrill and clamoring, but powerless to disturb Ivy who, seated beside the window with her blue goblet beside her and a pad of writing paper on her lap, was ...
— Peggy-Alone • Mary Agnes Byrne
... the waves was gloomy and fearsome. Here is the harbor. . . From behind its stone wall, comes the sound of human voices, the plashing of water, singing and shrill whistling." ...
— Twenty-six and One and Other Stories • Maksim Gorky
... his own breath, white as become all creatures who dwell there. So cold at night and dreary of heart, so lost by day and blinded by the light was he that he wept, and died of heart and became transformed as are the gods. Yet his lips called continually and his voice grew shrill and dry-sounding, like the voice of far-flying water-fowl. As he cried, wandering blindly, the water birds flocking around him peered curiously at him, calling meanwhile to their comrades. But wise though he was of all speeches, and their meanings plain ...
— Myths and Legends of California and the Old Southwest • Katharine Berry Judson
... seemed to sound in Abel Keeling's ears, and, as if something in the mechanism of his brain had slipped, another picture rose in his fancy—the scene when the Mary of the Tower had put out, to a bravery of swinging bells and shrill fifes and valiant trumpets. She had not been a leper-white galleon then. The scroll-work on her prow had twinkled with gilding; her belfry and stern-galleries and elaborate lanterns had flashed in the sun with gold; and her fighting-tops and the war-pavesse about her waist had ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions
... glassware, ironware, boots and shoes, china and crockery, women's tawdry finery, children's toys, furniture, pictures, succeeding one another indiscriminately, old and new, and cried off with an incessant jargon of bargaining, pierced with shrill screams of extortion and expostulation. A few mild, slim, young London policemen sauntered, apparently unseeing, unhearing, among the fevered, nervous Semitic crowd, in which the Oriental types were by no means so marked as ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... familiar sound halted Slone, as if he had been struck. The wild, shrill, high-pitched, piercing whistle of a stallion! Nagger neighed a blast in reply and pounded the rock with his iron-shod hoofs. With ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... lute, Were night-owl's hoot To my low-whispered coo - Were I thy bride! The skylark's trill Were but discordance shrill To the soft thrill Of wooing as I'd woo ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... dusty road which led to the Pays de Gex, and he bade the men wait. Afar off a traveller could be seen hurrying two donkeys towards the gate, with now a blow on this side, and now on that, and now a shrill cry. The sergeant knew him for Jehan Brosse, the bandy-legged tailor of the passage off the Corraterie, a sound burgher and a good man whom it were a shame to exclude. Jehan had gone out that morning to fetch his grapes from Moeens; and the sergeant ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... bend in the path, a number of children appeared in evident high glee. They stopped when they reached the men and explained, all speaking at once, that they were going to see La Grand' Querrue. Perrin, who loved children, listened patiently to the shrill little voices and patted ...
— Where Deep Seas Moan • E. Gallienne-Robin
... especially if they indulge in giggles. Winnie and Hattie, moreover, could never be together without chattering incessantly. For the moment they had forgotten every principle of scouting. In that quiet, secluded spot their shrill voices rang out with extreme clearness. A rabbit or two scuttled away, and a pheasant flew off with a whirr. Presently another and heavier pair of boots might be heard tramping towards them, the bushes parted, and a dour-looking ...
— For the Sake of the School • Angela Brazil
... a shrill chorus of whimpering cries, and then, in a marvelous white cloud of spread wings and hovering breasts, they settled down over the ...
— Stories to Tell to Children • Sara Cone Bryant
... courtyard, in process of killing a chicken; by its desperate and quite natural resistance, which Francoise, beside herself with rage as she attempted to slit its throat beneath the ear, accompanied with shrill cries of "Filthy creature! Filthy creature!" it made the saintly kindness and unction of our servant rather less prominent than it would do, next day at dinner, when it made its appearance in a skin gold-embroidered like a chasuble, and its precious juice ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... watchman the midnight Had told with shrill cry, When through the deep silence What sounded on high, With a terrible roar, Like the thunders sublime, Whose voices shall herald The passing ...
— Indian Legends and Other Poems • Mary Gardiner Horsford
... the loud, shrill crowing of a cock startled Peter; and at the same time he saw Jesus, who was being dragged through the hall from Annas to the council-room of Caiphas, the other high-priest. And the Lord turned as he was passing ...
— The Wonder Book of Bible Stories • Compiled by Logan Marshall
... unborn. The crowd fell strangely silent, and the square-browed judge leaned head on hand and pondered his soul and the soul of his race. Only was heard the deep tones of Imber, rhythmically alternating with the shrill voice of the interpreter, and now and again, like the bell of the Lord, the wondering and meditative "Hell" of ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... low at first, being full of tears, But as it cleared, it grew full loud and shrill, Growing a windy ...
— The Defence of Guenevere and Other Poems • William Morris
... party of hideously painted savages skulked silently in ambush. Suddenly to their strained ears was borne the sound of horses' hoofs; and then, all at once, a woman's voice rang out in a single shrill, ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... Snap's shrill voice was bringing help. The whine of a street guard's alarm whistle nearby sounded. The figure was making off! My pencil-ray was in my hand and I pressed its switch. The tiny heat-ray stabbed through the glare, but I missed. The figure stumbled, but did not fall. I saw a ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various
... may hear Apollo's soothfast rede Of stiff debate, heroic challenge ringing Shrill, and each headpiece lined with fence of proof. Alternate clack the strokes in whirling strife; Sore buffeted, quakes and shivers heart of oak. But when grasshopper feels the vulture's talons, Then the storm-boding ravens croak ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... such creatures as are in the mud, straining out mud and water, but swallowing the rest. All these birds are "waders" and delight in mud and cold salt water. They are usually quiet, or make only strange, shrill cries. ...
— Stories of California • Ella M. Sexton
... you folks," said Amzi, his voice clearing and rising to a shrill pipe, "that in my judgment the First National Bank can pay all its claims. In fact—in fact, I'm dead ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... darted at him, sudden and sweet and shrill, and it cut him to the heart. His gravity ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair
... rate. The ear's sensibility to pitch extends over about seven octaves. The seven-octave piano goes down to 27-1/2 vibrations and reaches up to 3,500 vibrations. Notes of nearly 50,000 vibrations can be heard by an average ear, however, though these are too painfully shrill to be musical. Taking into account this upper limit, the range of the ear is about eleven octaves. The ear, having given us loudness of tones, which depends on the amplitude of the vibrations, pitch, which depends on the rapidity of the vibrations, and timbre, or quality, which ...
— The Mind and Its Education • George Herbert Betts
... The shrill cries of this legion, drowning the sound of the motor, and increasing as the contingent was swelled from each side street, roused the town. Families left their tables and rushed to the door, their supper in their hands. Bakers with white ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... yee list to exercise your Vayne, Or in the Sock, or in the Buskin'd Strayne, 50 Let Art and Nature goe One with the other; Yet so, that Art may show Nature her Mother; The thick-brayn'd Audience liuely to awake, Till with shrill ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton
... life Of other worlds I cannot tell Flashes that screeching strife; Yet the shrill colour and shrill crying Sing through my blood and set my heart replying And jangling like ...
— Georgian Poetry 1918-19 • Various
... for class, woman does her share of the world's work. Among the poor, of the two it is she who labours the longer. There is a many- versed ballad popular in country districts. Often I have heard it sung in shrill, piping voice at harvest supper or barn dance. The ...
— Tea-table Talk • Jerome K. Jerome
... Cavor sat with a cylinder of compressed oxygen at hand to restore our pressure. We looked at one another in silence, and then at the fantastic vegetation that swayed and grew visibly and noiselessly without. And ever that shrill piping continued. ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... with the messenger in the next cabin was a long one, and apparently a stormy one on the part of the newcomer. Hurlstone could hear his excited foreign voice, shrill with the small vehemence of a shallow character; but there was no change in the slow, measured tones of the Senor. He listlessly began to turn over the papers on the table. Presently he paused. He had taken up ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... justice"—that is, appeared in person before the parlement, and from their seat of cushions and pillows declared their will regarding the new edict and directed that it be promulgated. There were amusing scenes when the boy-king, at the direction of Mazarin, gave orders in his shrill treble to the learned lawyers and ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... listened, but the wind, growing boisterous, shook the door and rattled the windows to distract his attention. He waited until the wind was tired and then, still listening, he heard once more the shrill ...
— The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus • L. Frank Baum
... lines. The earth was a vivid red, contrasting with the blue sky and the sombre olives, gnarled and fantastically twisted, like evil spirits metamorphosed: in places they had sown corn, and the young green enhanced the shrill diversity of colour. With its clear, brilliant outlines and its lack of shadow, the scene reminded one of a prim pattern, such as in Jane Austen's day young gentlewomen worked in worsted. Sometimes I saw women among ...
— The Land of The Blessed Virgin; Sketches and Impressions in Andalusia • William Somerset Maugham
... that it startled him, not one voice, but two—three—and one of them the shrill agonized cry of a woman. They came toward him as he continued to shout, until a few feet away he could make out a gray blur moving through the gloom. He went to it, staggering under the weight of the man he had found in the snow. The blur ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... discussing him. He was still comparatively young. Yet he looked like animated waste matter. His face seemed to hang on him. His mouth was loose and void of expression. His eyes were bleared and ever on the move. He spoke mostly in a toneless drawl, that sometimes turned into a shrill whine, but also at rare intervals could change into a soft, heart-winning purr. His clothing was poorer and coarser than that of any other person seen by Keith. Once or twice it seemed to the boy like a repulsive uniform, and he heard ...
— The Soul of a Child • Edwin Bjorkman
... the race of winged birds who need no cloak in winter! Neither do I fear the relentless rays of the fiery dog-days; when the divine grasshopper, intoxicated with the sunlight, when noon is burning the ground, is breaking out into shrill melody, my home is beneath the foliage in the flowery meadows. I winter in deep caverns, where I frolic with the mountain nymphs, while in spring I despoil the gardens of the Graces and gather the white, virgin berry on ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... of the unknown troublemaker, sneeringly shrill, the senseless, passion-provoking common, human fife of the mob spirit, persistently present and consistently cowardly in concealment. "Of course you don't promise anything to the people! Dudes stand together! ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... side, and on the other was the shadow of the woods all riven with great golden rifts of sunshine. A little faint talk of waves upon the beach; the wild strange crying of seagulls over the sea; and the hoarse wood-pigeons and shrill, sweet robins full of their autumn love-making among the trees, made up a delectable concerto of peaceful noises. I spent the whole afternoon among these sights and sounds with Simpson. And we came home from Queensferry on the outside of the coach and four, along a beautiful ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... timid advances made to a climate whose churlishness we are trying to temper by an ostentation of confidence. Ridiculous as this spectacle is at all seasons, it is never more so than in that bleak interval between sunset and dark, when the shrill scream of the factory whistle seems to have concentrated all the hard, unsympathetic quality of the climate into one vocal expression. Add to this the appearance of one or two pedestrians, manifestly too late for their dinners, ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... the anteroom she was not alone. Nancy, from within, heard another voice—a shrill and unpleasant voice which ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe
... the black vapour hanging like a murky curtain outside the great windows, and I noticed the stifled sound of wheels on the straw or tan that was littered in the street; also, the hum of the people gathered there, which a shrill whistle, or a louder song or hail than the rest, occasionally pierced. Soon afterwards the Judges, two in number, entered, and took their seats. The buzz in the Court was awfully hushed. The direction was given to put the Murderer to the bar. He appeared there. And in that same ...
— The Signal-Man #33 • Charles Dickens
... bowl to him, with a little mocking laugh on her lips. "Sail on, sail on, my guid Scots lords," she cried, and her sweet, false voice rose clear and shrill above the tumult of the waves, "for I warrant ye'll ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... you talk to me like that, you fool!" he cried to me in a thin, shrill voice. "You scoundrel!" And he struck me quickly and dexterously with a familiar movement; ...
— The House with the Mezzanine and Other Stories • Anton Tchekoff
... friezes. The cherubs who upheld the heavy columns shook out their wings. I felt myself uplifted by some divine power that steeped me in infinite joy, in a sweet and languid rapture. I would have given my life, I think, to have prolonged these phantasmagoria for a little, but suddenly a shrill ...
— Christ in Flanders • Honore de Balzac
... ranks closed in on her; a shrill roar rose from them, but the soldiers and sailors, cheering and laughing, broke into the enraged ranks, tearing off red rosettes, cuffing and kicking the infuriated Terrorists, seizing every seditious banner, flag, emblem and ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... There was only room for one on the sand, and the other two, for they walked abreast, waded ankle-deep in the water. From the little city below them they could hear the hum of a myriad of tiny voices—thin, shrill and faint. Suddenly the Big Business Man laughed. There was no hysteria in his voice now—just amusement ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings
... children gathered about her, as they sometimes did, Pearl would grow positively terrible in her puny wrath, snatching up stones to fling at them, with shrill, incoherent exclamations, that made her mother tremble because they had so much the sound ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... doubled, making the floating establishment tremble. The men took off their hats, the women waved their handkerchiefs, and all voices, shrill or ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... billows surged, They foamed and murmured, The sun poured down, as in haste, Flickering ripples of rosy light; Long strings of frightened sea-gulls Flutter away shrill screaming; War-horses trample, and shields clash loudly, And far resounds the ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... the midst of the crowd there came a strange shrill cry and a distracted looking woman began beating and fighting ...
— The Motor Maids in Fair Japan • Katherine Stokes
... house was quiet as the grave, sure enough the silver whistle sounded as sharp and shrill as if Sir Robert was blowing it; and up got the twa auld serving-men, and tottered into the room where the dead man lay. Hutcheon saw aneugh at the first glance; for there were torches in the room, which showed him the foul fiend, in his ain shape, sitting on the laird's ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various
... anon," etc., etc., is in the same exquisite measure. This appears to us neither more nor less than an imitation of such minstrelsy as soothed our cries in the cradle, with the shrill ditty of ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... absorbed in a problem as to Electricity (that thing which to us is only a name and of which we know nothing), forgets home, wife, child, supper; and midnight finds him in his laboratory, where he has been since sunrise—just imagine, if you please, the shrill greeting that is in cold storage for him when he stumbles home, haggard and worn, at dawn. How can he explain why he did this thing and answer the questions as to who was there, and what good ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... faces of the men, the renewed comradeship, the quick beat of the hearts that remember, the tenderness of those who think upon old sorrows,—all these make the day a lovelier and a sadder festival. So men's hearts were stirred, they knew not why, when they heard the shrill fife and the incessant drum along the quiet Barlow road, and saw the handful of old soldiers marching by. Nobody thought of them as familiar men and neighbors alone,—they were a part of that army which had saved its country. They had taken ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... the sky, And swept the plain, and stripped the woodlands bare, And shook the firmament. We closed our eyes And waited till the heaven-sent plague should pass. At last it ceased, and lo! there stood this maid. A piercing cry she uttered, sad and shrill, As when the mother bird beholds her nest Robbed of its nestlings; even so the maid Wailed as she saw the body stripped and bare, And cursed the ruffians who had done this deed. Anon she gathered handfuls of dry dust, Then, holding high a well-wrought ...
— The Oedipus Trilogy • Sophocles
... Polly, walking about her perch very fast indeed, and ruffling up her feathers as she walked. "No bird I ever had the pleasure of living beside could say I was unreasonable; so please state your case, state your case—I'm all attention, at-ten-tion;" and she lengthened out the last word with a shrill ...
— The Cockatoo's Story • Mrs. George Cupples
... honour, that thou wert not with me in this action. But, sweet Ned,—to sweeten which name of Ned, I give thee this pennyworth of sugar, clapp'd even now into my hand by an under-skinker; one that never spake other English in his life than Eight shillings and sixpence, and You are welcome; with this shrill addition, Anon, anon, sir! Score a pint of bastard in the Half-moon,—or so. But, Ned, to drive away the time till Falstaff come, I pr'ythee, do thou stand in some by-room, while I question my puny ...
— King Henry IV, The First Part • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... Neither had anything to report, and in this way they kept up the night watch for an hour or more. They had met for the sixth time by the tents containing their sleeping comrades, when from the opposite side of the mesa came a shrill neigh of terror, followed by sounds of wild galloping ...
— The Border Boys Across the Frontier • Fremont B. Deering
... fainter onward, like wild birds that change Their season in the night and wail their way From cloud to cloud, down the long wind the dream Shrill'd." ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... blowing winds but keep the rockers swinging, And deepen slumber in the shut blue eyes, And the shrill cadences of her high singing Are to the babe ...
— Verses • Susan Coolidge
... evening. "The western sky was all aflame" with the gorgeous hues of the sunset; the air was like amber mist, and the shrill-voiced Canadian birds, with their gaudy plumage, sang their vesper laudates high in the green gloom of the ...
— Kate Danton, or, Captain Danton's Daughters - A Novel • May Agnes Fleming
... be a thunderous cloud of dust, from the midst of which came strange, shrill sounds, punctuated with sharp cries, that did not appear ...
— Cowboy Dave • Frank V. Webster
... her tenderly, then, turning his head, remained silent for a while. The sullen roar of the great city invaded the quiet room through the open windows, the heavy regular tread of a policeman on his beat, a shrill whistle hailing a hansom from a house some few doors distant up the square, and then an answering rumble of wheels and clatter of hoofs. Richard's face had grown fierce again, and his breath came quick. He turned on his side, and ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... shouted Josey, in his loudest voice, which, being more shrill than that of Jonas, was perhaps ...
— Jonas on a Farm in Winter • Jacob Abbott
... been gradually growing darker. Objects can no longer be distinguished at the distance of twenty feet. The huge pile of the Presidio, looming against the leaden sky, looks black and gloomy. The sentinel cannot be seen upon the turrets, but at intervals his shrill voice uttering the "Centinela alerte!" tells that he is at his post. His call is answered by the sentinel at the gate below, and then all is silent. The garrison sleeps secure—even the night-guard ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... the whole street joined in, and they gave long, shrill, ear-piercing shrieks and strange calls, that rung down the ...
— Liza of Lambeth • W. Somerset Maugham
... Having summoned the astonished garrison by a terrific blast from the trumpet of the long-winded Van Corlear, he demanded, in a tone of thunder, an instant surrender of the fort. To this demand, Suen Skytte, the wind-dried commandant, replied in a shrill, whiffling voice, which, by reason of his extreme spareness, sounded like the wind whistling through a broken bellows—"that he had no very strong reason for refusing, except that the demand was particularly ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... followed by a glorious burst of shrill sounds, 'long drawn out,' are hailed with a murmur of delight by many a hungry tar and many a jolly marine. The merry notes are nearly drowned the next instant in the rattle of tubs and kettles, the voices of the ship's cook ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... wonderful rapidity, and the flow of assertion increased with the captain, and that of assentation with his lieutenant. At length, the little man with the epaulet commenced a very prurient tale. Mr Farmer cast a look full of meaning upon myself, when Captain Reud addressed me thus, in a sharp, shrill tone, that I thought impossible to a person who told such pleasant stories, and who could spin so prettily upon a quart bottle. "Do you hear, younker, you'll ship your traps in a wherry the first thing to-morrow morning, and get on board early enough to be victualled that day. Tell ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... Craig had died away, and after all the hats had come down, Baptiste, who had never taken his eyes from that radiant face, should suddenly have swept the crowd into a perfect storm of cheers by excitedly seizing his tuque, and calling out in his shrill voice— ...
— Black Rock • Ralph Connor
... nonce we had forgotten the other man. But now I noticed that the pseudo-bandits wore a watchful and not unhopeful air. And suddenly one of them whistled—a thin, shrill note that had, as Tish later remarked, great penetrative ...
— Tish, The Chronicle of Her Escapades and Excursions • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... their knees and to say the Athanasian Creed, which is one of the specifics resorted to in such a case. He drawled it out with his eyes shut, and the women screamed the responses. This would not do, so they fell to abuse and entreaties with a vehemence and volubility, and a shrill clamour, which was at once a proof of their sincerity and their folly. Such noise, such gesticulations. One woman I never shall forget, with outstretched arm, distorted visage, and voice of piercing sharpness. In the meantime the priest handed about the phial to be kissed, and talked the matter over ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... a mountain, marked the old hill-village of Roquebrune. Kindly enveloping nature was so sane and wholesome in her vast wisdom and stillness that the sugar-cake Casino and all its attendant artificialities struck into the brooding peace a shrill note of challenging incongruity. The little sparkling patch of light and colour that was Monte Carlo proclaimed that it was there for some extraordinary and powerful purpose, that its bizarre beauty was dedicated to exceptional uses; and it occurred to Mary that the temple of Chance must ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... clump of bushes afforded wood enough for camp-fires. The carts were ranged in a circle with the trains outward. Sentries were posted; the horses were secured; the kettles put on; pipes lighted; and noise, laughter, song and story, mingled with the shrill voices of children, were heard ...
— The Buffalo Runners - A Tale of the Red River Plains • R.M. Ballantyne
... behind him; but, in spite of the loud 'gare!' of the guide, Aime, or his horse,—for each was equally senseless with alarm,—were making inwards; the horse was trying to tread on the sandbank, which gave way like the water itself, under its frantic struggles—there was a loud cry—a shrill, unmistakable woman's shriek—the horse was sinking—a white face and helpless form were being carried out on the waves, but not before Berenger had flung himself from his horse, thrown off his cloak and sword, and ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... sang gaily. Robins called; bluejays screeched in the tall, white oaks; wood-peckers hammered in the dead hard-woods, and crows cawed overhead. Squirrels chattered everywhere. Ruffed grouse rose with great bustle and a whirr, flitting like brown flakes through the leaves. From far above came the shrill cry of a hawk, followed by the wilder scream ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... the railroad station he narrowly escaped being run over by a swiftly moving engine. Its shrill whistle and the objurgations of the fireman as it passed, startled him not ...
— Ralph Granger's Fortunes • William Perry Brown
... scarcely be remarked, due more to the vigour of the chorus and the enthusiasm of the audience than to intrinsic merit. Even Robin Wright was carried off his legs for the moment, and, modest though he was, broke in at the chorus with such effect—his voice being shrill and clear—that, he unintentionally outyelled all the rest, and would have fled in consternation from the saloon if he had not been caught and forcibly detained by the sporting electrician, who demanded what right he had to raise his ...
— The Battery and the Boiler - Adventures in Laying of Submarine Electric Cables • R.M. Ballantyne
... Madam!" she said, in a high shrill voice—not one of those which are proverbially "an excellent ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt
... he spoke the boy stepped out of the bushes, and a loud, shrill whistle echoed across ...
— Frank, the Young Naturalist • Harry Castlemon
... but had that feature provided for them without being first consulted; though even upon that branch of the subject she had great doubts whether certain noses were redder than other noses, or indeed half as red as some. This remark being received with a shrill titter by the two sisters of the speaker, Miss Charity Pecksniff begged with much politeness to be informed whether any of those very low observations were levelled at her; and receiving no more explanatory answer than ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... cattle, and horses, and hogs were allowed to roam at pleasure. As the cock crowed from the midst of his attendant party of hens and chickens, the ex-governor in passing would smile sadly, his thoughts reverting to the time when its predecessor raised its shrill notes on the naked ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper
... rail of the low gate idly watching a group of Pratts, Turners, Mosbeys, Hoovers and Pikes playing a mysterious game, which necessitated wild dashes across a line drawn down the middle of the Road in the white dust, shrill cries of capture and frequent change of base. The day had been a long sunshiny one, full of absorbing interests, and as she stood drinking in the perfume from a spray of lilac she had broken to choose ...
— The Road to Providence • Maria Thompson Daviess
... figures which, lying on their bellies, stretched out two paws in front of them and lifted huge human heads high in the air. He saw the triangular form of the pyramids rise against the yellow background. Strange odours filled the air, as well as shrill noises made by fantastic figures, and every sound struck hard and sharp on the ear. Joseph's heart was heavy. His home was abandoned, and they were in a strange land in which ...
— I.N.R.I. - A prisoner's Story of the Cross • Peter Rosegger
... a sudden change. Spitefulness leaped into his eyes; the wail of misery left his voice and in its place came shrill blasphemy. After he had cursed Dick and David Jenison to his heart's content he came to a standstill in front of his unhappy brother. Sticking out his lower jaw angrily ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon
... in the gardens by the lake The sleeping peacocks suddenly wake; Out in the gardens, moonlit and forlorn, Each of them sounds his mournful horn: Shrill peals that waver and crack and break. What can have made ...
— The Defeat of Youth and Other Poems • Aldous Huxley
... from a bluff above us, on the Georgia side, a mingling of shout and roar and rattle as of a tornado let loose; and as a storm of bullets came pelting against the sides of the vessel, and through a window, there went up a shrill answering shout from our own men. It took but an instant for me to reach the gun-deck. After all my efforts the men had swarmed once more from below, and already, crowding at both ends of the boat, were loading and firing with inconceivable ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... that he would put a boat hook he held in his hand, into the first man who attempted to fly. 'If we run away one by one in this way,' cried he, 'some of us will most assuredly be torn to pieces, but if we stand still and raise a shrill cry all together, the bears will be frightened and retreat.' We followed his advice, and it turned out exactly as he predicted, so that whilst the bears stood stupified, we regained our boat. This shows how good a thing presence of mind is; fear always rushes into danger ...
— Hair Breadth Escapes - Perilous incidents in the lives of sailors and travelers - in Japan, Cuba, East Indies, etc., etc. • T. S. Arthur
... splendid to a wonder, in spite of finance considerations. Which circumstance should little concern us, were it not that Wilhelmina, hearing the great news (though in a dim ill-dated state), decided to be there and see; did go;—and has recorded her experiences there, in a shrill human manner. Wishful to see our fellow-creatures (especially if bound to look at them), even when they are fallen phantasmal, and to make persons of them again, we will give this Piece; sorry that it is the last we have of that fine hand. How welcome, in the murky puddle of Dryasdust, is any ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... on the seashore and framed into wind instruments called quiquiztli and tecciztli, whose hoarse notes could be heard for long distances, and whistles of wood, bone and earthenware added their shrill notes to the noise of the chanting of the singers. The shell of the tortoise, ayotl, dried and suspended, was beaten in ...
— Ancient Nahuatl Poetry - Brinton's Library of Aboriginal American Literature Number VII. • Daniel G. Brinton
... blazing. "This thing is—" The "Bertha" came suddenly down to an easy keel, rocking in that glassy sea as if in a tide rip. The deck was awash with oil. Far out in the bay the ripples widening from the schooner blurred the reflections of the stars. The Chinamen swarmed up the hatch-way, voluble and shrill. Again the "Bertha Millner" lifted and sank, the tubs sliding on the deck, the masts quivering like reeds, the timbers groaning aloud with the strain. In the stern something cracked and smashed. Then the trouble died away, the ripples faded into ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... of the wind, the light dropping of pine-cones, the near and distant bark of squirrels, the deep gobble of a turkey close at hand and the challenge from a rival far away, the cracking of twigs in the thickets, the murmur of running water, the scream of an eagle and the shrill cry of a hawk, and always the soft, dull, steady pads of the hoofs of ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... sounding words, but he makes up by the details of knowledge and by a scrupulous correctness of statement for what he wants in originality of thought, or impetuous declamation. The tones of Mr. Coleridge's voice are eloquence: those of Mr. Southey are meagre, shrill, and dry. Mr. Coleridge's forte is conversation, and he is conscious of this: Mr. Southey evidently considers writing as his stronghold, and if gravelled in an argument, or at a loss for an explanation, refers to something he has written on the subject, ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... made them give back, but a shrill, faint cry of triumph from the sick man toward which they turned. Pierre slipped past them and stood above Martin Ryder. He was wasted beyond belief—only the monster hand showed ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand
... God!" their spears are all agleam, And I can see their eyes with blood-lust shine; Their snarling voices shrill into a scream, And, mad to slay, they quiver for the sign. Deny my God! yes, I could do it well; Yet if I did, what of my race, my name? How they would spit on me, these dogs of hell! Spurn me, and put on me the brand ...
— Rhymes of a Rolling Stone • Robert W. Service
... expression. Life is a movement outward, an unfolding, a development. To be tied down, pinned to a task that is repugnant, and to have the shrill voice of Necessity whistling eternally in your ears, "Do this or starve," is to starve; for it starves the heart, the soul, and all the higher aspirations of your ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard
... used to trains as he had pretended, started as the 3.25 a.m. south-bound roared in. The sleepers sprang to life, and the station filled with clamour and shoutings, cries of water and sweetmeat vendors, shouts of native policemen, and shrill yells of women gathering up their baskets, their ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... of life, (For what but chimes within immortall eares) Within her selfe kindles a home-bred strife, And for those words the Surgions doomes day swears. With that, her charg'd peece (Atropos keene knife,) Againe she takes, and leueld with dispairs, Sent a shrill bullet through the Surgions head, Which thence, through Grinuils temples ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, v. 7 - England's Naval Exploits Against Spain • Richard Hakluyt
... man looked at the boy, with keen gray eyes which seemed to light up the pinched look of his face, and answered in a shrill voice:— ...
— Tiger and Tom and Other Stories for Boys • Various
... contrived for better choice. Still the puzzle persists, all because the one precisely right way might seem—shall we say intense, high keyed, clamorous? Yet if one way is the only right way, why pause? Courage! Slightly dazed, though certain, let us be on, into the shrill thick of ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... glanced nervously over her shoulder, picturing the male inhabitants of Emerald Avenue and Cornelian Crescent and Sapphire Terrace, hastily flinging on trousers and boots to see what the matter was, while their wives made shrill-voiced ejaculations from the bed. She saw it all quite plainly on the darkness as the noise reverberated through the still night. Suddenly she lost her nerve. That kiss at the gate still hovered in the back of her consciousness, waiting ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose
... of firing. No birds were singing, although it was spring. All was quiet except for the frogs that uttered raucous musical croaks in a pond near by and puffed out the bladders at the corners of their mouths, so as to produce long-drawn shrill vibrations. ...
— Combed Out • Fritz August Voigt
... where the Singing Mouse lives. No man can tell what journeys it may make such times as it is absent from the room that holds the pine table, and the book, and the candle, and the open fire. But last night when the faint, shrill sweetness of its little voice grew apart from the lonely silence of the room, and I turned and saw the Singing Mouse sitting on the corner of the book, the light of the candle shining pink through its tiny paws, almost the first word it said was of ...
— The Singing Mouse Stories • Emerson Hough
... boys doing?" called the shrill voice. They dropped over into the other yard, and John started ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... through the stillness came the whistling of the morning trains leaving the suburbs. The church towers were beginning to clang with the first calls to the mass of sunrise, some of the bells droning and indistinct like the voices of old women, others shrill and high pitched like the chirping of children. From roof to roof—their city quarters—cocks were exchanging strident ...
— Mayflower (Flor de mayo) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... shrill ecstasies of joy declare The favouring goddess present to the prayer; The suitors heard, and deem'd the mirthful voice A signal of her hymeneal choice; Whilst one most ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... sensation, Evelyn lost count of time, nor did she know of what she was thinking. She was suddenly awakened by a sound of shuffling. The nuns had risen to their feet, and in the middle of the floor a sister began the lessons in a shrill voice, keeping always on the same note, never letting her voice fall at the close of the sentences. Evelyn grew more interested; the rite was full of a penetrating mystery. She viewed the lines of grey nuns and heard the Latin syllables. These poor nuns whom she was just ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... shrill, spoke the dry soul of the old man, the lifelong hope that his clinging ownership of those barren acres would bring him from the ...
— Great Possessions • David Grayson
... him he left a scene of indescribable horror, and the shrill screaming of a little child told him when that horror began. For as the sluice gates opened a sullen roar sounded; on one side the diverted millstream, and on the other the river, rose as two solid walls of water, rushed forward and—met; and in the twinkling of an eye ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... closed the door carefully behind him, he heard a burst of laughter coming from the kitchen, where the guests apparently had assembled—raucous animal laughter—and, rising shrill and noisy above it, Phyllis's ...
— The Venus Trap • Evelyn E. Smith
... I must of course kill the old one, for I perceived that it had large teeth. I considered it advisable to get between them and the water, that they might not escape me, and I contrived so to do before I made my appearance. As soon as the old one perceived me running to them, it gave a shrill cry, and then floundered towards the water; as we came close together, it showed its teeth, and rose upon its flappers to defend itself and its young one, which kept close to its side; but a blow on its nose with the axe rendered it motionless, and apparently ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat
... the wing of a Bee is less in proportion to its body, then the other wing to the body of a Fly; so that for ought I know, it may be one of the quickest vibrating spontaneous motions of any in the world; and though perhaps there may be many Flies in other places that afford a yet more shrill note with their wings, yet 'tis most probable that the quickest vibrating spontaneous motion is to be found in the wing of some creature. Now, if we consider the exceeding quickness of these Animal spirits that must cause these motions, we ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... of heaven? There remained my fellow-travellers—they at least were on the first floor, so to speak; but as I wavered a striking apparition rose, stalked down the carriage, and, leaning far out into the night, seized the door and shut it with a bang. Then arose a shrill protest from beneath me: "Oh, Mommer, how could you be so careless! You might have fallen out, and I should have been left quite alone in ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... of course chattered to us all. It was his way, and after a very brief experience of it one trained oneself to regard it as an inevitable background, like the jerking and smoke of the train, the dust, the shrill Russian voices in the next compartment, the blowing of paper to and fro in the corridor. I very quickly discovered that he was intensely conscious of Nikitin, who scarcely throughout the day moved from his upper ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... guided the ladies hurriedly in the direction of the office, when suddenly the shrill voice of Charlie ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx
... that followed, a shrill whistle was heard; and before any of the mounted men could ride forward, a horse was seen shooting out from the copse and meeting the man upon the open meadow! Quick as thought the latter vaulted into the saddle, and after uttering a wild and ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... set of blunt features, quick sparkling little eyes, a ruddy complexion, and a broad low brow, over which was set, with a somewhat jaunty air, a blue bonnet. Both were evidently Scotch; the younger disputant, by his high shrill tone and peculiar pronunciation, a ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... and alacrity. He now went in the morning to the forest glade to hunt the red deer, and his toils were not thought of, because, when they were ended, when the woods, made dark by the coming shades of night, rang shrill with the lay of the fire-bird, and his shafts were all spent, he could bear home the spoils they had won, and be rejoiced by the smiles ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 2 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... in a ring Before his palace gates do make The water with their echoes quake, Like the great thunder sounding: The sea-nymphs chant their accents shrill, And the sirens, taught to kill With their sweet voice, Make ev'ry echoing rock reply Unto their gentle murmuring noise The praise of Neptune's ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... the king himself—my husband's close friend and companion. My waking has brought a different scene before me; this castle in the wilderness, a solitude where from an upper window I look upon leagues of forest, a haunt of wild animals. I see great birds soaring in the sky and listen to the shrill screams of kite and buzzard; and sometimes when lying awake on a still night the distant long howl of a wolf. Also, it is said, there are great stags, and roe-deer, and wild boars, and it is Athelwold's joy ...
— Dead Man's Plack and an Old Thorn • William Henry Hudson
... were kept carefully shaved. His hair was short and naturally scanty, falling off toward the end of his life and leaving him partially bald. His voice, especially when he spoke in public, was high and shrill. His health was uniformly strong until his last year, when he became subject to epileptic fits. He was a great bather, and scrupulously clean in all his habits, abstemious in his food, and careless in what it consisted, rarely or never touching wine, and ...
— Caesar: A Sketch • James Anthony Froude
... necessary that some should show that there was a God in heaven, and that divine worship was due alone to him (Dan 3:10-12). But they run the hazard of being turned to ashes, in a burning fiery furnace, for so doing. But necessity has a loud voice, and shrill in the ears of a tender conscience: this voice will awake jealousy and kindle a burning fire within, for the name, and cause, and way, and people, of ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... earthquakes included, and Japan has many of these unruly visitors. One night we had three shocks at Tokio, one sufficiently strong to wake me from sleep. My bed shook violently, and the house threatened to fall upon us. The same night we had a large fire in the city, and a hundred shrill, tinkling bells, like so many cows in the woods, were rung to give the alarm. The clapping of the night watchmen about our street assured me, however, that it was all right with us, and I lay still. The night watchmen here use ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... the astounded crew of the Sea Gull. It was a swift, short fight, the assailants having every advantage. I saw the Lieutenant, bare-handed, dash into the group, striking out left and right, his men at his heels. There was a volley of oaths, a thud of falling bodies, a sharp command, and the shrill pipe of a boatswain's whistle. Two men rushed forward, the first disappearing behind the chart-house. The second encountered Broussard stepping off the bridge ladder, and hurled the fellow to the deck with one ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish
... Jesus!' cried a shrill voice; 'Holy Father, how you gripe me! I protest that I meant ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... a hand at each panel, with the torpedoes poised viciously in the tubes, when he heard Donna's shout, shrill with excitement, over ...
— This World Must Die! • Horace Brown Fyfe
... gave but little heed to our dull manner of ambling through the service; to the brisk clerk's manner of encouraging us to try a note or two at psalm time; to the gallery congregation's manner of enjoying a shrill duet, without a notion of time or tune; to the whity-brown man's manner of shutting the minister into the pulpit, and being very particular with the lock of the door, as if he were ...
— Charles Dickens and Music • James T. Lightwood
... was nothing to be got out of her, I went down to the stream, washed my face, dried it with my pocket-handkerchief, and then looked after Peck. He gave a shrill whinny of recognition, and, I thought, seemed to be a little restless. A fresh feed of corn was in the old basket, and presently the man came into the stable with a bunch of hay, and commenced rubbing off the marks of Peck's ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various
... A shrill cry of awful terror interrupted the words, and Mr. Carlyle made one bound out again. Barbara followed; the least she thought was that Wilson had dropped the ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... bellows, blowing up the sparks of excess already kindled, make my lord scornfully call Sir Philip by the name of puppy. In which progress of heat, as the tempest grew more and more vehement within, so did their hearts breathe out their perturbations in a more loud and shrill accent;" and so on; but the impending duel was the next day forbidden by express command of her Majesty. Sidney, not feeling the full force of the royal homily upon the necessity of great deference from gentlemen to their superiors in rank, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... valley now, and John noticed that along its right ran a dense wood, fresh and green despite the lateness of the season. But as he looked he heard the shrill snarling of many trumpets, and, for a moment or two, his heart stood still, as a vast body of German cavalry burst from the screen of the wood and ...
— The Forest of Swords - A Story of Paris and the Marne • Joseph A. Altsheler
... to the words in which they occur, and the significance of those words, whatever it may be, is thereby intensified; but whether the words are 'a team of little atomies' or 'a triumphant terrible Titan,' it is not the sound of the consonants that makes the significance. When Tennyson speaks of the shrill-edged shriek of a mother, his words suggest with peculiar vividness the idea of a shriek; but when you speak of stars that shyly shimmer, the same sounds only intensify the idea of shy shimmering." This is refreshing, and yet it is to be noted that "Titan" and "tittle" and "shrill-edged ...
— A Study of Poetry • Bliss Perry
... laughter, and out jumped—not a lady—but Kooshy Ram, who immediately ran and joined the merchant in the middle of the road and danced as madly as he. Beeka Mull stood and stared stupidly at them; then, with a shrill cackle of laughter, he flung off his turban, bounced out into the road with the other two, and fell to dancing and snapping his fingers until he was out ...
— The Olive Fairy Book • Various
... his feelings were of a mixed kind. He shuddered at the calmness with which, in his letters to the provincial committees, he advocated wholesale executions of prisoners. He wondered at the violence with which, in his shrill, high-pitched voice, he declaimed in favour of the most revolutionary measures. He admired the simplicity of his life, his affection for his sister and his birds, his kindness of heart in all matters in ...
— In the Reign of Terror - The Adventures of a Westminster Boy • G. A. Henty
... my eyes and I laid down the book. The bridge party was going home. I could hear them shouting good-bys in the front hall and my wife's shrill voice answering Good night! From outside came the toot of horns and the whir of the motors as they drew up at the curb. One by one the doors slammed, the glass rattled and they thundered off. The noise got on my nerves and, taking my book, I crossed to the deserted drawing room, the scene of the ...
— The "Goldfish" • Arthur Train
... The shrill notes of a bugle were heard sounding a military call to breakfast. It was the special privilege of an old servitor of the family, who had been a trumpeter in the troop of the Seigneur of Tilly, to summon the ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... The most beautiful specimen of all, which is as rich in color and "sun-sparkle" as the most polished gem to which he owes his name, the Ruby-throated Humming Bird, cannot sing at all, uttering only a shrill mouse-like squeak. The humming sound made by his wings is far more agreeable than his voice, for "when the mild gold stars flower out" it announces ...
— Birds, Illustrated by Color Photography, Vol. II, No 3, September 1897 • Various
... floor Johnson and a fellow-seaman, their arms clasped about each other's bodies, somewhat heavily danced. The room was both cold and close; a jet of gas, which continually menaced the heads of the performers, shed a coarse illumination; the mouth-organ sounded shrill and dismal; and the faces of all concerned were church-like in their gravity. It were, of course, indelicate to interrupt these solemn frolics; so we edged ourselves to chairs, for all the world like belated comers in a concert-room, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... important division of this army of homeless children. You see them everywhere, in all parts of the city, but they are most numerous in and about Printing House Square, near the offices of the great dailies. They rend the air and deafen you with their shrill cries. They surround you on the sidewalk, and almost force you to buy their papers. They climb up the steps of the stage, thrust their grim little faces into the windows, and bring nervous passengers to their feet with their shrill yells; or, scrambling into a street ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... more was said. Miss Lavinia went monotonously on with her knitting. Natalie pursued her own anxious thoughts over the unread pages of the book in her lap. Suddenly the deep silence out of doors and in was broken by a shrill whistle, sounding from the direction of the church-yard. Natalie started with a faint cry of alarm. Miss Lavinia ...
— Miss or Mrs.? • Wilkie Collins
... carriage window to talk to her, and there was a loud explosion of mirth and laughter in the midst of the village people, and the children with their baskets of flowers who were already gathered. Lady Mariamne's voice burst out so shrill that it overmastered the church bells. "Here I am," she cried, "out in the wilderness. And Algy has come with me to take care of me. And how are you, dear boys; and how is poor Phil?" "Phil is all ready to be turned off, with the halter round his neck," said Dick Bolsover; and Harry Compton ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant |
