"Syllable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... all the ways in which you have sought to stand between me and distress. Until to-day you have, under fire, proven true to your code of knighthood, and to-day I could forget—but could you? Of all the things I have ever said to you, of love, I have no syllable to retract. Even now I repeat it. I love you absolutely. When I suggested your leaving for a time I did a desperately hard thing—and you misunderstood it. Unless you can understand it, dear, it would do no good to come back, it would only mean other humiliating ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... manner. The child had been treated as a young woman; the budding maiden was treated precisely as if she were a small child or a small savage to be entertained by mere sight of the wonders all about her in Pilchester Square and by having them explained to her in words of one syllable. ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson
... made up my mind.' 'Look here; I want to consult you—are you listening?' 'No; I'm sketching.' He burst into a horrid scream. I asked if he felt himself taken ill. 'Ill?' he said—'I'm laughing.' It was a diabolical laugh, in one syllable—not 'ha! ha! ha!' only 'ha!'—and it made him look wonderfully like that eminent person, whom I persist in thinking he resembles. 'You're an impudent dog,' he said; 'where are you living?' He was so delighted when he heard of my uncomfortable ...
— I Say No • Wilkie Collins
... with your desire, we have at the second performance of Lohengrin not omitted a single syllable, for after your letter it would, in my opinion, have been a crime to venture upon the slightest cut. As I took occasion to tell those of my friends who were here on August 28th, the performance of your works, as long as you entrust me with their absolute direction, is with me a question of ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 1 • Francis Hueffer (translator)
... She was a trim little craft, painted all blue and white like the water she sailed. Captain McTavish, who was also her owner, had named her after his birthplace. He loved the little steamer, and pronounced her name with a tender lingering on the last syllable, and a softening of the consonants, that no mere Sassenach ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... The possibilities of reform exist in every case, and the probabilities are never to be denied. None can gainsay this statement nor can it be termed extravagant, for with the imperfect machinery now in use results are being attained which justify every syllable of it. Yet in the face of these results, the "exterminators" still proclaim their policy. They bid us be deaf to the voice of prejudice and follow the true light of science, ever remembering that we are passing through a wonderful stage in social evolution! But the ...
— A Plea for the Criminal • James Leslie Allan Kayll
... Mur—" The radioman broke off in mid-syllable and listened for a moment. "I hear you, doctor, go ahead." Then, a moment later "What's ...
— Uller Uprising • Henry Beam Piper, John D. Clark and John F. Carr
... text, Greek has been transliterated and placed between marks. Hebrew text is similarly marked. E: and O: (always capitalized) represent Eta and Omega. e: at the end of some names represents dieresis (separate syllable). [ae] or [Ae] represents the "ae" or "AE" ligature. a or o with tilde has been silently unpacked to am, ...
— Hypnerotomachia - The Strife of Loue in a Dreame • Francesco Colonna
... lounging advances now and then, and as suddenly steering off; hate causing her to act not unlike a wheeling cock about a hen, when stirred by the contrary passion. Meantime, though within easy speaking distance, no further syllable was exchanged; but an incessant cannonade was ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... hearing me!—then there's an end of every thing, for here I stand, once a barrister,—since a country gentleman, and now a peer; and, though I have made twenty attempts to speak, I can't be heard a syllable,—mercy! what will this world come to! A peer, and ...
— The Dramatist; or Stop Him Who Can! - A Comedy, in Five Acts • Frederick Reynolds
... out the simplicity of this code. There is special pleasure in their working it out for themselves. It is simple and unweaves itself once you have the key. For those who do not wish to decipher the code, they can use the following method. The first syllable of any word of more than one syllable is attached to the third word following. Of one syllable words the first letter is found by itself after the second word. In no case is a single ...
— Ted Marsh on an Important Mission • Elmer Sherwood
... There is no Welsh monosyllable that contains, like the Saxon strength, seven consonants with only one vowel. There is no Welsh proper name, like Rentzsch, the watchmaker of Regent Street, that contains six consonants in succession in one syllable; and yet the Welsh have never accused their younger sister with the use of consonants which "cracked and cracked, and ground and exploded." But if the Welsh language, with "its variety, copiousness, and even harmony, to be equalled by few, perhaps ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 238, May 20, 1854 • Various
... Whitney. I have read it twice, and read it to pure and gentle and intellectual women. I say to-day it ought to be in every household in this broad land. It ought to be the domestic gospel of every true, gentle, loving, virtuous woman upon all this continent. There is not one line or syllable in it that is not written in letters of gold. I shall not read it, for my strength does not suffice, nor will the patience of the Senate permit, but from beginning to end it breathes the womanly sentiment which has made pure and great men ...
— Debate On Woman Suffrage In The Senate Of The United States, - 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, And January 25, 1887 • Henry W. Blair, J.E. Brown, J.N. Dolph, G.G. Vest, Geo. F. Hoar.
... although not, I am afraid, much taste. He had at least great fondness for singing hymns, in the manner then popular with the Evangelicals, very loudly, and so slowly that I used to count how many words I could read silently, between one syllable of the singing and another. My lack of skill did not prevent me from being zealous at these vocal exercises, and my Father and I used to sing lustily together. The Wesleys, Charlotte Elliott ('Just as I am, without one plea'), and James Montgomery ('Forever with the Lord') represented his predilection ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... agreed to by all, and, to the credit of these honest smugglers, and of Mrs Hicks, be it said, that not a syllable about the incident was ever heard of in the parish of St. Just ...
— Deep Down, a Tale of the Cornish Mines • R.M. Ballantyne
... details but for that desire of truth which has guided us all through this veracious history and as in this scene, in particular, we feel ourselves sure to be held seriously responsible for every word, we are determined to be accurate to a nicety, and set down every syllable with ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover
... in its train; Through speaking truth, no evils rise; Truth, precious syllable!—Refrain From hiding truth in ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka
... message of condolence, Gaston was suddenly announced; who, after having paid his respects to their Majesties, stepped back to receive the compliments of the courtiers. At this moment he was accosted by the Cardinal, but before the latter had time to utter a syllable, Monsieur abruptly turned his back upon him, and entered into conversation with the nobles who stood near. Enraged by this public affront, Richelieu immediately approached the Queen-mother, and bitterly complained of the insult to which he had been subjected; but Marie, ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... very wicked of them," exclaimed Thekla, "when the Marquis of Rotherwood himself said that Hubert Delrio is a very superior young man" (each syllable triumphantly ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... the last syllable a wonderfully executed trill, in a very low tone, as if to depict the overflowing affection of her heart by a poetic expression. The old man, suddenly arrested by some memory, remained on the threshold of that ...
— Sarrasine • Honore de Balzac
... no thought of anything but a victory.' The dauphin," continues Montluc, "went on more and more smiling, and making signs to me, which gave me still greater boldness in speaking. All the rest spoke and said that the king must not place any reliance upon my words. Admiral d'Annebaut said not a syllable, but smiled; I suppose he had seen the signs the dauphin was making to me. M. de St. Pol turns to speak to the king, and says, 'How, sir! You seem disposed to change your opinion, and listen to the words of this rabid madman!' To whom the king replied, 'On my ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... Pet. i. 23. Luke viii. 4, 11, 15. Here the whole process of conversion is described, and the grand instrumentality is the word or seed, but not a syllable is said of ...
— American Lutheranism Vindicated; or, Examination of the Lutheran Symbols, on Certain Disputed Topics • Samuel Simon Schmucker
... of the shower was over, a guessing contest was played, each answer being a word in which the syllable "cat" figured. This very jolly afternoon ended with a really hilarious game ...
— Entertaining Made Easy • Emily Rose Burt
... cringed back as if a stinging blow had been delivered between his eyes. As he met Craig's fixed glare he knew there was no hope. Slowly, as if the words were being wrung from him syllable by syllable, he said in a ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... Dumont apportioned to him. He felt that that would have been about his just share in the new concern merely in exchange for his stock in the old. When he found Dumont obdurate, and grew frank and spoke such words as "dishonor" and "dishonesty" and got into the first syllable of "swindling," Dumont cut ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips
... can be surmounted, the act of conveyance itself is generally burdened with a perfect load of ceremony, in which not one iota can be safely neglected. Ancient law uniformly refuses to dispense with a single gesture, however grotesque; with a single syllable, however its meaning may have been forgotten; with a single witness, however superfluous may be his testimony. The entire solemnities must be scrupulously completed by persons legally entitled to ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine
... strength of all other human desires. We see then how far the monuments of wit and learning are more durable than the monuments of power, or of the hands. For have not the verses of Homer continued twenty-five hundred years, or more, without the loss of a syllable or letter; during which time, infinite palaces, temples, castles, cities, have been decayed and demolished? It is not possible to have the true pictures or statues of Cyrus, Alexander, Caesar; no, nor of the kings or great personages ...
— Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher • S. T. Coleridge
... or Rome. No man can make a fortune or a figure in this country, without speaking, and speaking well in public. If you will persuade, you must first please; and if you will please, you must tune your voice to harmony, you must articulate every syllable distinctly, your emphasis and cadences must be strongly and properly marked; and the whole together must be graceful and engaging: If you do not speak in that manner, you had much better not speak at all. ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... perhaps the reader may. I think he ought. He should not be less grateful for summer rain, or see less beauty in the clouds of morning, because they come to prove him with hard questions; to which perhaps, if we look close at the heavenly scroll, we may find also a syllable or two of answer, illuminated here ...
— Frondes Agrestes - Readings in 'Modern Painters' • John Ruskin
... lean heavily on sticks, their bodies are twisted and maimed, but their faces are shining with pride and joy. The French General draws his sword and addresses them. One catches words like 'honneur' and 'patrie.' They lean forward on their crutches, hanging on every syllable which comes hissing and rasping from under that heavy white moustache. Then the medals are pinned on. One poor lad is terribly wounded and needs two sticks. A little girl runs out with some flowers. He leans forward and tries to kiss her, but the ...
— A Visit to Three Fronts • Arthur Conan Doyle
... your regard to one remarkable fact, that at the very point of the paper, at which the motives, and design of the writer present themselves to the reader; at that very point this indictment stops. It has not, as you will presently see, the candour to proceed a single syllable farther. I will now read the passage, "Reform," it says, "will be obtained when the existing authorities have no longer the power to withhold it, and not before, we shall gain it as early without petitioning as with it; and I would again put forward my ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... the Atharva-veda, in the section containing the question asked by Satyakma, read as follows: 'He again who meditates with this syllable Aum of three Mtrs on the highest Person, he comes to light and to the sun. As a snake frees itself from its skin, so he frees himself from evil. He is led up by the Sman verses to the Brahma- world; he sees the person dwelling in the castle who is higher than ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... of the call. And supposing the silence to continue, the lady, if not of a very even temper, will show her irritation at Mary's seemingly intentional negligence by finally calling her in tones still more widely contrasted—the first syllable being higher and the ...
— Essays on Education and Kindred Subjects - Everyman's Library • Herbert Spencer
... is a slaveholder still—the every hour violator of the just and inalienable rights of man; and he is, therefore, every hour silently whetting the knife of vengeance for his own throat. He never lisps a syllable in commendation of the fathers of this republic, nor denounces any attempted oppression of himself, without inviting the knife to his own throat, and asserting the rights of ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... unable to make a syllable of reply. He looked hard at the old man as if to fathom his inmost thoughts. But the latter did not flinch. His countenance wore that expression of utter blankness and conscious unconsciousness which is an attribute of resolute men, and which only ...
— The Bastonnais - Tale of the American Invasion of Canada in 1775-76 • John Lesperance
... Mr. Webb softly and glanced again at the window. An intense irritation flared up in Weldon: this man flicked him on the raw with every syllable. ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... softly to his brother. Then he added a syllable and called again, "O-e!" Little Sebastiano woke, sat up and looked about him, rubbing his eyes ...
— The Children of the King • F. Marion Crawford
... for tying the yoke to the poles, and the creatures about him the traces of the steed. And Maheswara made the four Vedas his four steeds. And that lord of the three worlds made the supplementary Vedas the bridle-bits. And Mahadeva made Gayatri and Savitri the reins, the syllable Om the whip, and Brahma the driver. And making the Mandara mountains the bow, Vasuki the bowstring, Vishnu his excellent shaft, Agni the arrow-head, and Vayu the two wings of that shafts, Yama the feathers in its tail, lightning the whetting stone, and Meru ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... for they criticised each other sharply and wisely; and the criticism was taken in good part by all concerned. When Ellis wrote a sort of treatise to Scott in epistolary form, and complained of the poet's monotonous use of the eight-syllable line, Scott replied with equanimity, and took as much pains to convince his friend as though he were discussing a thesis for some valuable prize. On one occasion a few of the really great men found themselves in the midst of a society where the practice ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... quitting the Court of Chancery this morning, and admirable it is—not a syllable about himself, but with reference to the appointment of Pepys, brief, dignified, and appropriate. Si sic omnia, what a man he ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... of speaking by changing the forms of words. It is of various kinds. Some speak by changing the beginning and end of words, others by adding unnecessary letters between every syllable of a word, ...
— The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana - Translated From The Sanscrit In Seven Parts With Preface, - Introduction and Concluding Remarks • Vatsyayana
... "I'm not chicken-livered, Raffles, but I'm mighty glad my lines are cast in less strenuous scenes. When a book-agent comes in here, for instance, and holds me up for nineteen dollars a volume for a set of Kipling in words of one syllable, illustrated by his aunt, and every volume autographed by his uncle's step-sister, it's a game of wits between us as to whether I shall buy or not buy, and if he gets away with my signature to a contract ...
— R. Holmes & Co. • John Kendrick Bangs
... Dar al Salem. Urbs pacis, or, as it is more neatly compounded by the Byzantine writers, (Irenopolis.) There is some dispute concerning the etymology of Bagdad, but the first syllable is allowed to signify a garden in the Persian tongue; the garden of Dad, a Christian hermit, whose cell had been the ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... beg of you," said Dr. Pendegrast throwing a glance across the quadrangle, "not to breathe a syllable of this; do not even think of it. It has been kept from every one—from even the most intimate friends of the family; Ruth herself is not ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... poor child, whose courage had all disappeared, sang in a fresh, trembling little voice, a romance revised and corrected at her boarding-school. The word love had been replaced by that of friendship, and to repair this slight fault of prosody, the extra syllable disappeared in a hiatus which would have made Boileau's blond wig stand on end. But the Sacred Heart has a system of versification of its own which, rather than allow the dangerous expression to be used, let ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... version, as, for example, I tried to do in the most important parts of Gluck's "Iphigenia". The result has been in the course of time that the singers got into the way of neglecting altogether the connection between word and tone, of pronouncing an unimportant syllable to an accentuated note of the melody, and of putting the important word to a weak part of the bar. In this way they gradually became accustomed to the most absolute nonsense, to such an extent that ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 1 • Francis Hueffer (translator)
... number of their subdivision into quavers and semiquavers. This kind of musical time is analogous to the dactyle verses of our language, the most popular instances of which are in Mr. Anstie's Bath-Guide. In this kind of verse the bar does not begin till after the first or second syllable; and where the verse is quite complete, and written by a good ear, these first syllables added to the last complete the bar, exactly in this also corresponding with many ...
— The Botanic Garden. Part II. - Containing The Loves of the Plants. A Poem. - With Philosophical Notes. • Erasmus Darwin
... on the part of most women; but it was a sign of Mrs. Leath's quality that every movement, every syllable, told with her. Even in the old days, as an intent grave-eyed girl, she had seldom misplaced her light strokes; and Darrow, on meeting her again, had immediately felt how much finer and surer an instrument of expression she ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... this polysyllabical echo with great exactness, and found the distance to fall very short of Dr. Plot's rule for distinct articulation: for the Doctor, in his history of Oxfordshire, allows 120 feet for the return of each syllable distinctly: hence this echo, which gives ten distinct syllables, ought to measure 400 yards, or 120 feet to each syllable; whereas our distance is only 258 yards, or near 75 feet, to each syllable. Thus our measure falls short of the Doctor's, ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... did no wrong and was active in every way in our behalf, so much so that he was entrusted by us with guarding the city against those very men, and not only did this remarkable orator not oppose it (he was there) but even approved it. Else let him show what syllable he uttered on seeing the licentious and accursed fellow (to quote from his abuse), besides doing nothing that the occasion required, securing also so great authority from you. He will have nothing to show. So it looks as if not a word of what he ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. III • Cassius Dio
... only one word appears from its having only one accent, viz. the udatta on the last syllable, which udatta becomes anudatta according to the rules laid down in the Bhashika Sutra for the accentuation ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut
... the act of serving a writ, and the bailiff was murdered on the spot, while one of the murderers was killed by a shot from the police. Mr. O'Connell and the association demanded justice for the death of the latter; but not a word was said on the heinousness of his crime, or a syllable of regret was uttered concerning the death ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... James Wolfe. [Footnote: There are various accounts extant of this closing scene in Wolfe's life, all professing to come more or less directly from eye-witnesses. No two of them agree in all points, and one of them states that the General never uttered a syllable after he was carried to the rear. The above is the version generally accepted by historians, and is supported by the testimony of the most trustworthy of those who were ...
— Canadian Notabilities, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... a more modern one—to a period, in fact, to which they could affix no date. And, although a perfect unity of expression suggested that the utterance of the Thing was the utterance of one being only, a certain variation in its tones, a rising and falling from syllable to syllable, led them to infer that the voice was not the voice of one ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell
... passage of arms in that charming battle which heralds a first night of love; but she utters not a word, and when he tries to raise her garment, only just to glance at the charms that have cost him so dear, she gives him a slap that makes his bones rattle, and refuses to utter a syllable. ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... tenacity in Placidia's smiling impuissance. She did not know one syllable of French. A new-born babe could not have revealed itself more utterly incompetent. I verily believe that, despite our haste, we would have ended by escorting Placidia across Paris, and ensconcing her in the Marseilles ...
— A Versailles Christmas-Tide • Mary Stuart Boyd
... yesterday, and, after reading your description of his sadness, my letter lies like a stone on my conscience, for, like a heartless egotist, I mocked his pain by describing my happiness, and in five pages did not refer to his mourning by even a syllable, speaking of myself again and again, and using him as father-confessor. He is an awkward comforter who does not himself feel pain sympathetically, or not vividly enough. My first grief was the passionate, selfish one at the loss I had sustained; for Marie,[11] so far ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... his horse, he went to Rustem, then asleep, and struck his staff violently on the ground, and having thus awakened the hero, he asked him, devil that he was, why he had allowed his horse to feed upon the green corn-field. Angry at these words, Rustem, without uttering a syllable, seized hold of the keeper by the ears, and wrung them off. The mutilated wretch, gathering up his severed ears, hurried away, covered with blood, to his master, Aulad, and told him of the injury he had sustained from ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... but the old gentleman took very kindly to the noble stranger. Indeed, Tom plainly heard the waiting-woman say of her master, that so far from being able to read the stars as he pretended, she didn't believe he knew his letters in 'em, or at best that he had got further than words in one syllable; but Tom, not minding this (for he was in spirits after the Madeira), looks with an agreeable air towards the young ladies, and, kissing his hand to both, says to the ...
— The Lamplighter • Charles Dickens
... to the reading classes for scores of years. Conceive Noah, aroused by the grating of the Ark upon the summit of Mount Ararat, looking out of the window and exclaiming, "Why, it's been raining!" Then imagine Mrs. Noah, catching an odd syllable of her husband's remark, writing a love story to prove that the barometer portended showers. Finally, picture the world looking in alarm for its umbrella, and you have an image of the inception and effect of the ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... very wise remark, she walked back across the ridge-pole and climbed in the window. There was nothing for Tom to do but follow; which he did slowly and reluctantly. Something would have to be said now, at any rate. But not a syllable said Gypsy. She went to the looking-glass, and began to brush her hair as unconcernedly as if everything were just as she left it and ...
— Gypsy Breynton • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... enunciating every word with studied seriousness; and from time to time he paused and looked across the sea of fixed and almost adoring faces turned in his direction. It was as if, by strength of will, he had determined that no point, no syllable, of this, his last reading, should be lost upon his hearers. More than once, Bale-Corphew moved uneasily and shot a glance at Norov; but the Prophet was unconscious ...
— The Mystics - A Novel • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... to the everlasting ones at their birth, and their wisdom has come down to him through the generations as a priceless secret. But it is not sufficient to murmur the name to one's self, or be able to write it down. Every syllable has its special meaning like every member of the human frame. It depends, too, on how it is pronounced and where the emphasis lies; and this true name, containing in itself the spiritual essence of the immortals, and the outward ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... meaning to the reporting parties for many hundreds of years. Briefly, a great mysterious word is spelt as it were by the whole sum of the scriptural books—every separate book forming a letter or syllable in that secret and that unfinished word, as it was for so many ages. This cooperation of ages, not able to communicate or concert arrangements with each other, is neither more nor less an argument of an overruling inspiration, than if the separation of the contributing parties were by space, and ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... just where they were, each negro and negress suspended in his or her posture, exactly as the word had found them—for a few seconds continuing so—while, as between the responsive posts of a telegraph, an unknown syllable ran from man to man among the perched oakum-pickers. While the visitor's attention was fixed by this scene, suddenly the hatchet-polishers half rose, and a rapid ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... this style, coming at last to vile words, the abominable words which, in moments of anger, always ended by returning to her innocent-looking lips. The Baron, who well knew that a syllable from him would only increase the foulness of the overflow, vainly turned an imploring glance on the Count to solicit his intervention. Gerard, with his keen desire for peace and quietness, often brought about ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... to wear off, his face assumed an expression of intense thought. In about five minutes he leaped from his chair, dashed out of the office with a shouted syllable or two for his secretary, and got his car out of the parking lot. At home, he tossed clothes into a travelling bag and barged toward the door, giving his wife a quick kiss and an equally quick explanation. He didn't bother to call the airport. He meant to be on the next ...
— And All the Earth a Grave • Carroll M. Capps (AKA C.C. MacApp)
... silence, for I kept my resolution and refused to catch another syllable; yet those words had set me thinking hard. If Eagle were telling Di that he was now certain to come in for his aunt's fortune, she might look upon him as a bird in the hand, whereas a notorious flirt like Major Vandyke might be worth no more ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... well says, "to say what she likes, to utter her innermost thoughts in her own way, to cast aside the traditional conventions that gall her and repress her, to have someone near her with whom she can be quite frank, and yet to know that not a syllable of what she says will be misinterpreted or mistaken, but rather felt just as she feels it all—how wonderfully sweet is this to every woman, and how few men are there who can give ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... about the look of her that I didn't like. I've seen a whole lot of trouble come from less than a horsehair bracelet. This here quail was mebbe seventeen; she was slim and shy, and she had big black eyes and a skin like velvet. I spoke to Mike in words of one syllable, and I drug him away with me ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... and upon honour what it is that has changed his views, making him discover the leer of Baal-Zeboub where he once saw the smile of the spiritual Eos, he turns Trappist at once, and goes into retreat with M. Huysman; there is not a syllable of information in all his beau volume as to any intellectual process through which he passed on the way, and I suspect that his conversion partook of the nature of a "penetration," to speak his own language, and was not an intellectual operation, ...
— Devil-Worship in France - or The Question of Lucifer • Arthur Edward Waite
... saying one syllable in answer to his mother's communication; he threw his manuscripts and the sheets which he had written into a desk; he locked it with a nervous, trembling hand, and then turned to leave the room. His face was ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... with it. Perhaps the most important evidence is that of Pini, which exactly corroborates Mather's statement, and certainly there is not a single syllable, from first to last, at variance with it." Thus speaks Giovanni Pini, the important witness of the scene of blood and outrage:—"On the day in question, about twelve o'clock, more or less, I was in the Via Martelli, about half way down, when I heard coming towards me the Austrian ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... heaved a deep sigh; but the black dog, who had overheard every syllable, sneaked away with a low growling noise, and knocked down a chair on ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... of the stressed syllables in each half-line must be in alliteration with one in the other half-line; and most often the alliteration includes both stressed syllables in the first halfline and the first stressed syllable in the second, occasionally all four stressed syllables. (All vowels are held to alliterate with each other.) It will be seen therefore that (1) emphatic stress and (2) alliteration are the basal principles of the system. To a present-day reader the ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... colonel watched Delphise, a husky specimen, load. With a grunt he swung up a canvas U.S. mailbag stuffed with butin, which includes clothes and books and shoes and tobacco and cartridges and more. With a half-syllable Delphise indicated to Laurent a bag of potatoes weighing eighty pounds, a box of tinned biscuit, a wooden package of cans of condensed milk, a rod case, and a raincoat. These Laurent added to the spine ...
— Joy in the Morning • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... words in regard to the pronunciation of "gladiolus" may be timely in the beginning of a treatise devoted exclusively to that subject. Fifty years ago the popular pronunciation was "glad-i-o'-lus," accent on the third syllable, but gradually a change crept in, as it was noticed that scholars said "gla-di'-o-lus," accent on the second syllable. Observing this, people began to consult dictionaries, and it was found that Webster and others gave "gla-di'-o-lus" only, and that all authorities placed this ...
— The Gladiolus - A Practical Treatise on the Culture of the Gladiolus (2nd Edition) • Matthew Crawford
... Never another syllable did that officer say to the Commissioner, but turned away to his men. The Commissioner buttoned his Diplomatic coat to the chin, said, "Mr. Kitten, attend me!" gasped, half choked himself, ...
— The Perils of Certain English Prisoners • Charles Dickens
... "Mirza" is a title which placed before a proper name signifies "scribe"—after a name it designates a prince. Thus, Mirza-Schaff[^y] means "Scribe Schaffy," but Schaffy-Mirza would mean "Prince Schaffy." Each word, when pronounced separately, has the accent on the last syllable, but together they are pronounced as one word, with the accent on ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. XVII, No. 99, March, 1876 • Various
... of his own talents, the effect upon the mind and character of such an experience as Hadria's, was beyond the range of his conceptions. He understood subtly, and misunderstood completely, at one and the same time. But to Hadria, every syllable which revealed how much he did understand, seemed to prove, by implication, that he understood the whole. It never occurred to her that he was blinder than Henriette herself, to the real centre ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... perceptible in his voice. His wife did not utter a syllable. She remained so quiet that it might have been thought she did not even hear him, but for the convulsive movement of her lips, and of the fingers of her ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... veins. He heard that a mission was about to depart for Zanzibar and East Africa. A knowledge of English was a necessary part of the equipment of the chief officer. Francqui wanted this job but he did not know a syllable of English. He went to a friend and ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... of Mr. John Morley in 1886. A word in it here or there is inapplicable to the details of the present Bill; but in principle every syllable cited by me from his Newcastle address forms part of the Unionist argument against summoning as much as a single Irish member to Westminster. His language is admirable, it cannot be improved. All that any one who agrees with Mr. Morley can do in order to force his ...
— A Leap in the Dark - A Criticism of the Principles of Home Rule as Illustrated by the - Bill of 1893 • A.V. Dicey
... manifests Himself, to be called manifestation, to me. I am driven in sheer desperation to believe such testimonies and attainments as those of Teresa, if only to support my failing faith in the words of my Master. I had rather believe every syllable of Teresa's so-staggering locutions and visions than be left to this, that ever since Paul and John went home to heaven our Lord's greatest promises have been so many idle words. It is open to any man to scoff and sneer at Teresa's extraordinary ...
— Santa Teresa - an Appreciation: with some of the best passages of the Saint's Writings • Alexander Whyte
... Dagonet, with his reedy staccato voice, that gave polish and relief to every syllable, tried to come to her aid by questioning her affably about her family and the friends she had made in New York. But the caryatid-parent, who exists simply as a filial prop, is not a fruitful theme, and Undine, ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... Caroline, and prevent her doing a more foolish thing, even if it were to be ultimately broken off by unforeseen circumstances. Caroline was as much absorbed by her own thoughts as I was during the ride, and not a syllable was exchanged between us till we were roused by ...
— Valerie • Frederick Marryat
... a stranger in Paris, listen to the words of Titmarsh.—If you cannot speak a syllable of French, and love English comfort, clean rooms, breakfasts, and waiters; if you would have plentiful dinners, and are not particular (as how should you be?) concerning wine; if, in this foreign country, you WILL have your English companions, your porter, your friend, and your ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... corrected the Pronunciation, let him take Care that the Words be uttered in such a Manner, without any Affectation that they be distinctly understood, and no one Syllable be lost; for if they are not distinguished, the Singer deprives the Hearer of the greatest Part of that Delight which vocal Musick conveys by Means of the Words. For, if the Words are not heard so as to be understood, there will be ...
— Observations on the Florid Song - or Sentiments on the Ancient and Modern Singers • Pier Francesco Tosi
... should, and sometimes exceeding the measure of the number; as in carpenter the middle sillable being used short in speache, when it shall be read long in verse, seemeth like a lame gosling that draweth one legge after hir. And heaven being used shorte as one syllable, when it is in verse stretched with a Diastole is like a lame dogge, that holdes up one legge.'{6} His ear was far too fine and sensitive to endure the fearful sounds uttered by the poets of this Procrust{ae}an creed. The language seemed to groan and shriek at the agonies ...
— A Biography of Edmund Spenser • John W. Hales
... from that of the African, and is oriental in itself. His language has the richness and sententious fullness of the Chinese. He will express a phrase in a word, and he will qualify the meaning of an entire sentence by a syllable; he will even convey different significations by the simplest inflections ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... help fancying that we were attacking a mere unsubstantial phantom. It was only from the large size she appeared to be, that one could judge of her nearness to us. For some minutes we ran on without a syllable being uttered, except the necessary words of command for loading and ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... lacqueys so far apart from the rest of mankind. Full of respect for power, and admiration for conventional greatness, he never pronounced the name of king, prince, or even baron, without emphasis and unction. He mouthed every aristocratic syllable, and the single word "Monseigneur" seemed to him like a mouthful of well-spiced soup. Examples of this disposition are not rare in Germany, and are even occasionally found elsewhere. If they could be transported to a country where all men are equal, homesickness ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... beauty was anyhow so spick and span, and possessed besides a few charms sufficient to touch the heart. From shame, her face was red and her ears purple, while she lowered her head and uttered not a syllable. ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... slavery, and with that noble pride and spirit, which arises from conscious virtue? The sublime, says Longinus, is often nothing but the echo or image of magnanimity; and where this quality appears in any one, even though a syllable be not uttered, it excites our applause and admiration; as may be observed of the famous silence of Ajax in the Odyssey, which expresses more noble disdain and resolute indignation than any language can convey [Footnote: ...
— An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals • David Hume
... lessons, she had no other instruction than that her mistress gave her in the evenings, when a heavy day's play and the natural influences of the hour conspired with original causes to render her powerless before words of one syllable. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... than do troops under sudden fire. Indeed, there were the same extravagant gestures and contortions as attend wounds and deaths in war; the very same uncanny cessations of speech—for the trombone was cut off at midslide, even as a man drops with a syllable on his tongue. They clawed, they slapped, they fled, leaving behind them a trophy of banners and brasses crudely arranged round the big drum. Then that end of the street also shut its windows, and the village, stripped of life, lay round me like a reef at low tide. Though ...
— A Diversity of Creatures • Rudyard Kipling
... he, "you will believe, on the word of a gentleman, that I had no idea before whom I was speaking, and it seems that my acquaintance, Monsieur de Poellnitz, knew you no better than myself. Had I known you, believe me that I should have been the last man in the world to utter a syllable that should give you annoyance; and I tender you my regrets and apologies, before my Lord March and ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... sentence: "And then did we, the seven, start from our seats in horror, and stand trembling and aghast, for the tones in the voice of the shadow were not the tones of any one being, but of a multitude of beings, and, varying in their cadences from syllable to syllable, fell duskily upon our ears in the well-remembered and familiar accents of many ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... with an emphasis of blighting contempt on the last syllable. 'More like a professional singer with the hydrophobia, than a man in your station ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... heart and home. Those happy days seem a misty dream to me now, I have so utterly outgrown the faith that lent a glory to that early time. Cuthbert assured me of his affection, swore undying allegiance to me; and like many other silly, trusting, inexperienced, doomed young fools, I believed every syllable that he whispered ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er, But whose velvet violet lining with the ...
— Poets of the South • F.V.N. Painter
... common, indistinct noise,—the clatter of the salesman crying off his qualifications in French and English, the quick fire of French and English bids; and almost in a moment came the final thump of the hammer, and the clear ring on the last syllable of the word "dollars," as the auctioneer announced his price, and Tom was made ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... level—though you allow it a certain pre-eminence—with other refining influences. You spoke of art and poetry as if they could bring men to God, and that in spite of the fact that, as I reminded you, there is not a syllable in our Lord's words that could be construed into the least sympathy with art or poetry at all. You called yourself a Christian, and I have no doubt that you sincerely believe yourself to be one; but to me you seemed to be ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... his conduct can neither be justified nor qualified." And with that word, the deputy for the Seine went his way; he would not hear another syllable. ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... board to dinner he found the very people who had told him the story on shore, and pointed them out to me. I enquired about the affair, and endeavoured to come at the truth by every method I could think of. All I could get from them was, "Caurey," (no); and they not only denied every syllable of what they had said on shore, but seemed wholly ignorant of the matter; so that I began to think our people had misunderstood them, and that the story referred to some of their ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... 'let this be settled in one word. I will not hear a syllable against my husband from you or any one else. I am delighted to see you,—I cannot tell you how delighted. Oh, if papa would come,—or mamma! Dear, dear mamma! You don't suppose but what ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... birds of a kind at the same time is to observe the talk between them, which has great interest for me. This pair were exceedingly talkative at first, uttering not only the usual musical three-syllable warble or call, which Lanier aptly calls the "heavenly word," but often soft twittering prattle, of varying inflection and irregular length, which was certainly the most interesting bird-talk I ever heard. When they could not see me they indulged in it more freely, with changing ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller
... point calls for notice. The word Himalaya has been accented on the second syllable wherever it occurs. This accent is historically correct, and has some foothold in English usage; besides, it is more euphonious and better adapted to the needs ...
— Translations of Shakuntala and Other Works • Kaalidaasa
... one syllable?" Then he shrugged. How did he know what these people could pack into one syllable? He picked up the hand-phone and said, "Fwoonk," into it. The pattern, a little deeper in color and with longer lines, was recognizably like hers, and ...
— Naudsonce • H. Beam Piper
... which may be compared to the Garden of Eden before the tempter entered, are the choicest flowers of rhetoric. I hear a voice as from the far-off past, and I wonder will that be the voice which will utter the "last syllable of recorded time?" ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... exultantly. "I never missed a syllable that time. Oh, boy! it seems as if it's O K, ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach
... each letter-sound by a glyph or symbol. On the contrary, he thinks a symbol, probably derived in most cases from an older method of picture writing, was selected because the name or word it represented had as its chief phonetic element a certain consonant sound or syllable. If this consonant element were b, the symbol would be used where b was the prominent consonant element of the word to be indicated, no reference, however, to its original signification being necessarily retained. Thus the symbol for cab, "earth," might ...
— Day Symbols of the Maya Year • Cyrus Thomas
... voice ringing through the night, chanting in a tone of singular sweetness words of which each syllable comes through my open window like a wavelet of flute-sound. My Japanese servant, who speaks a little English. has told me what ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn
... twelve. The majority of our side against the second reading of Burke's Bill,(153) and in fact, by a following question of rejecting it, was of 43, if I mistook not. I was not in the House to hear anybody speak a syllable, nor do I ever wish it. I believe there is no actor upon the stage of either theatre who, repeating what the author has wrote, does not, at the same time, recite his own private sentiments oftener, than ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... pronounced it with the accent on the first syllable.) "Indeed, I never will. I'll never be married, as long as ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... scan poetry? If you have, you know that the rules which tell you that a foot is composed of one long syllable and one short one, two short syllables and one long one, or whatever else it may be, are frequently disregarded. You know, too, that some lines are cut off short at the end, and others are made a little too long. Why is this permitted? In his ...
— Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, • Sherwin Cody
... according to Las Casas, I. 291, with the accent on the last syllable. Guanahani is now generally accepted to have been Watling Island. See Markham, Christopher Columbus, pp. 89-107, for a lucid ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various
... miscellaneous beggars that pervade our places of business he is not accessible. The last years of many a good old soul, whom he knew in his youth, have been made happy by a pension from him. But of all this not a syllable ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... combination of practical and speculative investigations, grasped, if I may so express myself, firmly and inexcusably, in the hands of physiognomical empiricism." The Cambrian visitors listened with profound attention, not comprehending a single syllable he said, but concluding he would finish his speech by proposing the health of Squire Headlong. The gentlemen accordingly tossed off their heeltaps, and Mr Cranium proceeded: "Ardently desirous, to the extent of my feeble capacity, of disseminating as much ...
— Headlong Hall • Thomas Love Peacock
... observe, Mr Trapwit, how nicely you have opposed squire Tankard to colonel Promise; neither of whom have yet uttered one syllable. ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding
... his eyes flashing fire. "I will burn them! Not a scorched syllable shall escape! Would you have me a damned author?—To undergo sneers, taunts, abuse, and cold neglect, and faint praise, bestowed, for pity's sake, against the giver's conscience! A hissing and a laughing-stock to my own traitorous thoughts! An outlaw ...
— The Snow Image • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... their bottles of whiskey several of them forgot the lessons of caution that had been impressed upon them by their officers, and became very talkative as to their organization and intentions. Our ears were strained to catch every syllable, and we gathered considerable desired information that otherwise would not have leaked out. On arrival at Dunkirk our travelling companion (the Fenian Sergeant) left the train with about twenty men, bidding us a friendly farewell ...
— Troublous Times in Canada - A History of the Fenian Raids of 1866 and 1870 • John A. Macdonald
... complicated. And here I had been in the district nearly four hours without having guessed that the district was quivering in the tense excitement of gigantic issues! And here was this Scotch doctor, at whose word the great Myatt would have declined to play, never saying a syllable about the affair, until a chance remark from Buchanan loosened his tongue. But all doctors are strangely secretive. Secretiveness is one ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett
... between the dialects of these two places are, 1st, that at King George's Sound the terminating syllable of all names is dropped; and 2nd, that all verbs, with a very few exceptions, end in gur, instead of the varying termination which is given to them at Perth. Any person who can speak the Perth dialect will, by observing these two rules, be able ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey
... as so much Greek to the juvenile members of the audience; possibly, though, they were made aware of the meaning of them by the look upon the face of Nephew Percival Dwyer and the look upon the face of Nephew Percival Dwyer's attorney. At any rate, His Honor hardly had uttered the last syllable of his decision before, from the rear of the courtroom and from the gallery above, there arose a shrill, vehement, sincere sound of yelling—exultant, triumphant, and deafening. It continued for upward of a minute before the ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various |
