"Ticking" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... following. He counted the different footprints, and announced to the horsemen that seven dingoes had followed the trail they were following at that moment. "Five and two," the black-fellow called it, ticking the number off on the fingers of one hand. He explained that these dingoes, led by the "blurry big warrigal" aforesaid, must have been terribly badly in want of food; and that he did not think much of the chances of the man ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... greater the effect produced, while the colouring should be of a vivid tone, but excluding the bright aniline dyes already once referred to as being unsuitable to blend with other shades. A strong piece of ticking is required for the foundation, and on this the pieces are arranged. They should be pinned on while the amalgamation of colouring is being tried, and, when that is settled, basted on to the lining, the edges of soft materials being turned under and secured ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 353, October 2, 1886. • Various
... again, but mildly shake it in the hope that something will happen to set it going, we are merely fumbling. But if, on moving the clock gently so as to set the pendulum in motion, we hear it wobbling about irregularly, and at the same time observe that there is no ticking of any kind, we come to the conclusion that the pendulum has somehow or other escaped the little catch that connects it with the mechanism, we have been really thinking. From the fact that the pendulum wobbles irregularly, we infer that it has lost its proper catch. From the fact that ...
— How to Use Your Mind • Harry D. Kitson
... Peter could feel her heart beating. Clutched against her breast he looked up at the white, beautiful face, the trembling throat, the wide-open blue eyes staring at the one black window between them and the outside night. A lull had come in the storm. It was quiet and ominous stillness, and the ticking of a clock, old and gray like the Missioner himself, filled the room. And Nada, seated on the edge of Father John's bed, no longer looked like the young girl of "seventeen goin' on eighteen." That afternoon, in the hidden jackpine open, with its sweet-scented jasmines, its ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... said T. B. drawing up a chair to the table, and ticking off his fact on the first finger of his hand, "is that Gregory Farrington is alive. The man whose body was picked up in the Thames is undoubtedly the gentleman who was shot in the raid upon the Custom House. The inference is, that Gregory ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace
... sang the man, "This song I hear. It first began Before the hurrying race Of ticking, and of tearing pages Deafened the breathless ages: It is the happy singing Of wind among the rigging Of ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... Newfoundland dog at some stray passer by; and, at length, even that had ceased; Mona's needle was laid aside, the domestics, obedient to the early habits of country life, were abed, Mona herself had now retired, and Amanda being left alone, nothing was heard but the measured ticking of the old clock on the corner of the stairs. The lamp had been taken away by the departing Mona, and in the obscurity, the moonbeams fell in grey streaks adown the damask curtains; and after a brief meditation on the subject of ...
— The Advocate • Charles Heavysege
... sound? I declare, I'd think it was one of those death-watch beetles had got in here. Sounds like a big watch ticking. ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Locomotive - or, Two Miles a Minute on the Rails • Victor Appleton
... detail, the sound the gears made changing, the feel of the seat, the way the hood went up. And, above all, the little clock, ticking its warning by day, regular and relentless, while at night its bright prying eyes reminded her of all the things she wanted to forget. "It is my conscience," she would say, "and fate and mortality. It symbolises all the limitations of life. It is ...
— Balloons • Elizabeth Bibesco
... did not come, so the two went in, leaving the fire to flare itself out. Neither did Dr. Willett and Mr. Barlow return. It was quiet anxious work, sitting there by the log-fire, hearkening to the ticking of the old clock, waiting for someone who did not come—someone up to mischief, as Mrs. Grant said. Out she went again, with her apron over ...
— The Heiress of Wyvern Court • Emilie Searchfield
... faint light that filtered through the windows. Seemingly, he was in luck. There was absolutely nothing to make him doubt that he was alone in the house. Everything was still. There was not even the ticking of a clock, the one sound he might reasonably have expected to hear even in a temporarily deserted house. But he waited for quite a minute, to make sure that no one was about. He felt certain that, had anyone been there, he would have heard breathing, no matter how anxious ...
— The Belgians to the Front • Colonel James Fiske
... that he could go no farther. I did not even remember to bid him farewell when I went on my way alone through the darkness and sand. Just after midnight I sank down by a tamarisk. The stars twinkled as usual, and not a sound was audible. Only the beat of my heart and the ticking of my watch broke the awful silence. Then I heard a rustling sound in the sand. "Is that you, Kasim?" I asked. "Yes, sir," he whispered back. "Let us go a little farther," I said, and he followed me with ...
— From Pole to Pole - A Book for Young People • Sven Anders Hedin
... in a heart that for an enemy was black with hate, red with revenge, though for the stranger, white and kind; that in an eagle's isolation had kept strung hard and fast to God, country, home; that ticking clock- like for a century without hurry or pause was beginning to quicken at last to the march-rhythm of the world—the heart of the Southern hills. Now the prophecy from the flaming tongue of that red-headed orator was coming ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... this afternoon," she said, "and I was lying here, eyes wide open, seeming to feel the bed sway like the ship, I fell to counting the ticking of the stair-clock below, and thinking how each second was recording the eternity of my love for you. And as I lay a-listening and thinking, came one by the window singing 'John O'Bail', and I heard voices in the tap-room and the clatter of pewter flagons. ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... noiselessly to the head of the steps and listened. Everything was so quiet that they heard the ticking of the clock on the ...
— The Launch Boys' Adventures in Northern Waters • Edward S. Ellis
... course was mapped out. "Why, it's nearly twelve o'clock," he said. "And mother has not come to bid me 'Good-night.' I wonder why." He left the room, and found that the house was in absolute silence. All the lights were turned out; the ticking of an eight-day clock in the hall sounded clearly in the silence of the night. "I'll go up into her room," he said. Forthwith he went noiselessly up the thickly carpeted stairway, and knocked at her bedroom door. There was no answer. "Mother," he said, ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... over as everything of that sort in Winnipeg is so fearfully dear I do not like buying anything there. We sent for some unbleached calico the other day, worth twopence-halfpenny; was charged twelve cents or sixpence a yard. Besides the four yards of calico there were ten of bed-ticking, also ten of American cloth; and the bill was six dollars seventy cents, nearly seven-and-twenty shillings. Everything is equally dear, the demand is so much greater than the supply. Beef is tenpence to thirteenpence a pound, mutton about the same, bacon tenpence, pork tenpence, chickens four ...
— A Lady's Life on a Farm in Manitoba • Mrs. Cecil Hall
... through expectation, the return each evening a delight through memory. The vestibule in which he waited his lord's pleasure, with its marble pavement and its painted walls, a few cane chairs and tables, and a great clock ticking steadily, became the entrance-hall of paradise. Of nights the thought of sitting there next morning caused his pulse to quicken. The sons of Musa and the negro doorkeeper shared in the radiance of ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... saw a slit in the wall that had been shoved in. Kennedy was busy adjusting the apparatus, and paused only to remark that the boxes contained two sensitive selenium surfaces balanced against two carbon resistances. There was also in the box a clockwork mechanism which Craig wound up and set ticking ever so softly. Then he moved a rod that seemed to cover the slit, until the apparatus was adjusted to his satisfaction, a delicate operation, judging by the care he took. Several of these boxes were installed, and by that time it ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... this exciting period that attention was at once transferred from Ireland to the Continent of Europe. There it seemed that every moment was ticking to drive us towards the greatest war that the world ever saw. And though matters grew hourly more serious, it did not then occur to the writer, a stranger then of only six weeks in London, that after seeing the capital of the Empire under conditions of peace, he ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... Pain Make their own measure of all things that be. No clock's slow ticking marks their deathless strain; The life they own is not the life we see; Love's ...
— Leaves of Life - For Daily Inspiration • Margaret Bird Steinmetz
... on duty lay down on their trestle-beds to sleep, and I sat at the desk reading the reports of recent fires. The place was very quiet—the sounds of the great city were hushed—the night was calm, and nothing was heard but the soft breathing of the sleepers and the ticking of the clock as I sat there waiting for a fire. I often looked at the telegraph needles and, (I am half ashamed to say it), longed for them to move and give us "a call." At last, when I had begun to ...
— Personal Reminiscences in Book Making - and Some Short Stories • R.M. Ballantyne
... thoughts were loud as the clock which ticked out the last minutes she was to remain at home, and trying not to hear them, she turned to the Monna Lisa, wondering what Owen meant when he had said that the hesitating smile in the picture was like her smile. Her thoughts ran on ticking in her brain like the clock in the corner of a room, and though she would have given anything to stop thinking, ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... heart was left in the wretched little brute, holding on to him for bare life, with my arms and legs straight out in front of me. The gray wall and the blinding road rushed by me like a river—I scarcely knew what happened—I couldn't think of anything but the ticking of the clock that I was somehow trying to count, till there came the bang of a pistol over ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... by those who have thus struggled upward to success is not their only, or indeed their chief reward. When, after years of toil, of opposition, of ridicule, of repeated failure, Cyrus W. Field placed his hand upon the telegraph instrument ticking a message under the sea, think you that the electric thrill passed no further than the tips of his fingers? When Thomas A. Edison demonstrated in Menlo Park that the electric light had at last been ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... demented; men thought the judgment had come. The earth opened in thousands of places, the roads in Hilo cracked open; horses and their riders, and people afoot, were thrown violently to the ground. At Kilauea the shocks were as frequent as the ticking of a watch. In Kau, south of Hilo, 300 shocks were counted during the day. An avalanche of red earth, supposed to be lava, burst from the mountain side, throwing rocks high into the air, swallowing up houses, trees, men and animals, and traveling three miles ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum
... air of cheerfulness and home-comfort to their new dwelling-place. Adolphus whitewashed, according to promise; Pauline scrubbed, according to nature; they arranged and rearranged their little stock of furniture,—set the loud-ticking day-clock on the mantel-shelf, and displayed around it the china cups, the flower-vase, and the little picture of their native town which Adolphus cut from a sheet of letter-paper some old friend ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... the back and begging him repeatedly to brace up and not behave like that, I did nothing. At last his sobs ceased and he was silent. I had risen from my chair and now I stood there with a hand on his shoulder; the ticking of the ancient eight-sided clock on the wall ...
— The Rise of Roscoe Paine • Joseph C. Lincoln
... paid so much simply because they are women; they are having tea too. They seem to be very fond of shrimp-paste, which they spread on their bread-and-butter instead of jam. In every room there is always a loud noise like the wash of waves; that is made up of hundreds of busy little instruments ticking away hard all at once. It seems wonderfully quiet when we leave it behind, and step out into the street again where the lamps are ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton
... sound, for any sound, the creaking of a board, the snapping of a twig, the ticking of an insect—there was none—the silence was the silence of stone. I thought of worms; I imagined countless legions of them making their way to me from the surrounding mouldering coffins. Every now and then I uttered a shriek as something cold and slimy touched my skin, and my stomach heaved ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell
... to do all you can for your mother," said he, while he held her in his lap, and Doctor Sennar counted her mother's pulse by the ticking ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... inaptitude, I know not, certain it is that my young friend could never be induced to any further essays in this kind. He affirmed that it was to him like writing in a foreign tongue,—that Mr. Pope's versification was like the regular ticking of one of Willard's clocks, in which one could fancy, after long listening, a certain kind of rhythm or tune, but which yet was only a poverty-stricken tick, tick after all,—and that he had never seen a sweet-water on ...
— The Biglow Papers • James Russell Lowell
... heard her tongue ticking away, like the little clock she was; she had her Bohm, she had her nautical costume and her Remsen cooler. These, with the lunch that would come in ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... pale, composed face turned towards Mr. Tredgold. Her eyes were scornful and her lips slightly parted. Before these signs his courage flickered out and left him speechless. Even commonplace statements of fact were denied him. At last in sheer desperation he referred to the loudness of the clock's ticking. ...
— Dialstone Lane, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... of small square panes, its black fireplace, lifeless without the flames, and its dark, grim mahogany bar stretching halfway across the south side of the room. The white floor, well sanded and polished, seemed only to accentuate the general gloom, and the great clock, ticking solemnly behind the bar, seemed to be marking time for a funeral dirge. But suddenly all changed to brightness when Betty entered. Pickering was talking to me, standing between me and the girl, so that she did not see me when she ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... minutes more she stood and contemplated her kitchen, with the fire shining on the round oaken stand in the centre, and the large wooden-bottomed chairs, and the loud-ticking clock, with its tall case, the inside of which, with its pendulum and weights, had been a perpetual mystery and delight, first to Hilary's and then to Ascott's childhood. Then there was the sofa, large ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... tense silence while they waited for Langham to speak. Moxlow heard the ticking of ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester
... of the horses beat the night away as regularly as the ticking of a clock. It grew darker as the night wore on, and sometimes a coyote would yelp from the fringe of willows that bordered a creek in a way that made Mary recall tales of banshees. And once, when the first pale streak of dawn ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... through Caldew's head there was silence in the room, broken only by the clock on the mantelpiece ticking loudly, with pert indifference to human affairs. Merrington, after dragging the hidden and forgotten tragedy to light, remained quiet, watchfully noting the effect on mother and daughter. The mother stood without a word or gesture, her hand stiffened in arrested protest, like ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... to her that the most curious little silence followed this speech of hers, and yet she knew that in actual time it was nothing, and felt that it existed probably only in her own heart. She heard the clock on the mantelpiece across the room ticking; far off, the rattle of a taxicab. The air coming through the open window bore the damp, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... few old, damaged, straw-seated chairs mended with bits of rope. The great business had been to close two of the three windows with boards, whilst the third one and the door were screened with some old mattress ticking studded with stains ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... other actors in the morning's drama—leaned far back in his chair. The room was suddenly deathly still. The faint ticking of the desk clock was loud and rasping. There was heavy breathing audible in the room beyond. The last noonday chime had ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... heels, not at all to his liking, The terrible clock keeps on ticking and striking, Till, exhausted and sore, He can't run any more, But falls as he reaches Miss Davis's door, And screams when they rush out, alarm'd at his knock, "Oh! Look at the Clock!—Do!—Look at ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... interval, he was informed that a visitor was asking for him in the parlour; the news filled him with delight, for he was very young and still counted on the possibilities of the unknown. In the parlour he found Monsieur Tudesco, wearing his waistcoat of ticking and holding a peaked ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... low bed opposite the fire, a confusion of dirty patchwork, lean-ribbed ticking, and coarse sacking, the lawyer, hesitating just within the doorway, sees a man. He lies there, dressed in shirt and trousers, with bare feet. He has a yellow look in the spectral darkness of a candle that has guttered down until the whole length of its wick (still burning) has doubled over ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... miserable chamber, Dim with flick'ring candlelight, Lies a man on bed of sickness. Fiercely but a moment past Did he wage with Death the battle; Worn he sinks back into sleep. Save the clock's persistent ticking Not a sound invades the room, Where the gruesome quiet warns us Of the neighborhood of Death. O'er the pale, distended features Plays a melancholy smile. Is he dreaming at life's border Of his childhood ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp
... planes on September the 11th were trained in Afghanistan's camps, and so were tens of thousands of others. Thousands of dangerous killers, schooled in the methods of murder, often supported by outlaw regimes, are now spread throughout the world like ticking time bombs, set ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... another breaking up, in which Europe will be involved; now for the conscription, Joseph, the abolition of all permits and all the other things that we read of in the gazettes. In the place of quiet, we must be plunged in confusion; instead of listening to the ticking of clocks, we must hear the thunder of cannon; instead of talking of convents, we must talk of arsenals; instead of smelling flowers and incense, we must smell powder. Great God! will this never come ...
— Waterloo - A sequel to The Conscript of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... Moneta, since you will go, I must tell you a secret; for you remember I have seen the world, and know all about it. Mortals are a higher race than ourselves, it is true; but that is only because they live atop o' the earth, while we are under their feet. They make a great parade about their little ticking jewel they call Conscience; but, after all, they will any of them sell it for one of our ear-rings! I assure you they love money better than their own souls; and I would advise you, as a friend that has seen the world, ...
— Fairy Book • Sophie May
... they roared with laughter, put out their tongues, admired their sooty faces and began to pull out their bristles, for they all wore their upper lips shaved. Naturally, they confused right and left, and became entirely bewildered. A watch did not impress them; the ticking seemed mysterious and not quite innocent, and they put the instrument away at a safe distance. They asked to see some money, but were much disappointed, having imagined it would look bigger and more imposing. They preferred a ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... of her feet in the grass, the rustle of her skirts, became prominent sounds. She missed the company of her watch; she wound it up and got it to ticking; anything to ward off the solitude. The thought of camping out she did not like to entertain; but thoughts are unavoidable. Once she stood quite still to make a little trial of it, but her pause was not long; she soon got her feet to going ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... said in France that no German could resist a clock, and that the dearth of clocks after the war is quite noticeable. To prove the contrary, and to applaud the officers who had lived in Petit Val (and there had been many hundreds of them), my clock was ticking away as of ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... reason, but this bridal has to me the semblance of a funeral. God shield us all from evil! there is a cold deathlike chill throughout the house. I heard—(though, my lady, I do not believe in such superstitions,) but I heard the death-watch tick—tick—ticking, as plain as I hear the old clock now chime seven! And I saw—I was wide awake—yet I saw a thin misty countenance, formed as of the white spray of the salt-sea wave, so sparkling, so shadowy, yet so clear, come between me and the moonbeams, and raise ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... liberty, and a great dash of that fear with which honest people regard serious interests, kept himself back from the straightforward course of life among certain selected activities. And now, all of a sudden, he is unhorsed, like St. Paul, from his infidel affectation. His heart, which has been ticking accurate seconds for the last year, gives a bound and begins to beat high and irregularly in his breast. It seems as if he had never heard or felt or seen until that moment; and by the report of his memory, he must have lived his past life between sleep and waking, or with the preoccupied ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... silence that could be felt in the little kitchen; a silence only broken by the ticking of the tall clock and the beating of Rebecca's heart, which, it seemed to her, almost drowned the voice of the clock. The rain ceased, a sudden rosy light filled the room, and through the window a rainbow arch ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... married Blair Maitland.... Take it like a man, and be thankful you are rid of her." He wheeled about and stood with his back to his niece's lover. He had guided the inevitable sword, but he could not witness the agony of the wound. There was complete stillness in the room; the ticking of the clock suddenly hammered in Robert Ferguson's ears; a cinder fell softly from the grate. Then ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... but it is safe to dwell Where ordered duties are; No doubt the cherubs earn their wage Who wind each ticking star; ...
— Dreams and Dust • Don Marquis
... hand, and they walked cautiously down the hall. At the top of the stairs Highboy paused and leaned over the bannisters. Somebody was walking to and fro in the hall beneath with soft regular footfalls like the ticking of a clock. ...
— The Cat in Grandfather's House • Carl Henry Grabo
... throbbing quiet of her room she heard the fingers of the prying rain busy at her windows; the ticking of the small French clock, very dull, very far away—or was it her heart? And, faintly ringing in the receiver pressed against her ear, millions of tiny stirrings, sounds like instruments of an elfin orchestra tuning, echoes ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... superstitious terror through every fiber. He heard the stir of the mouse in the pile of walnuts, the hissing of the flame above the embers, and the sudden breaking of the smoked chimney of the lamp. Then as he leaned down he heard something else—the steady ticking of the big silver watch ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... man, with an exaggerated sense of the ridiculous, would see nothing ridiculous in ticking off a number of different objects as they were successively achieved. If for example it was part of his scheme to learn various foreign languages, he would know that he could only succeed by regular application of the brain, by concentration of thought daily; he would also know that he could never ...
— The Feast of St. Friend • Arnold Bennett
... which followed, the ticking of the clock in the hall seemed to grow loud; and he turned a little aside to remove the mask. She breathlessly awaited the operation, which was one of some tediousness, watching him one moment, averting her face the next; and when it was done she shut her eyes at the hideous ...
— A Group of Noble Dames • Thomas Hardy
... throughout the house, all, with the exception of Sir Jasper, had retired to rest, and there was no sound, save the ticking of the old-fashioned time-piece, with its monotonous and never varying tick, tick, and the scratching noise made by the quill as it traced its inky characters on the yet incomplete codicil the Baronet was preparing. The candles had burned low in their sockets, and the fire ...
— Vellenaux - A Novel • Edmund William Forrest
... power and anatomical skill. Each jaw was furnished with a row of diamonds, and two rubies flashed from the deep eye-sockets. On the forehead was engraved, Ruit Hora; and on the occiput Tibi, Hippolyta. It opened like a box, the hinging being almost imperceptible, and the ticking inside lent an indescribable air of life to the diminutive skull. This sepulchral jewel, the offering of some unknown artist to his mistress, had doubtless marked many an hour of rapture, and served as a warning ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... evening meal, an incident occurs which causes considerable amusement. Everything being unusually quiet, one sharp-eared youth happens to hear the obtrusive ticking of my Waterbury, and strikes a listening attitude, at which everybody else likewise begins listening; the tick, tick is plainly discernible to everybody in the compartment and they become highly interested and ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... he felt a thump against the side of the car, but the impression faded before it was fully born. In a remote corner of his mind the ticking of his watch sounded as a cold, measured rhythm, a metronome with delusions of syncopation. He sat motionless, his forearm resting on the steering wheel, the spray of blossoms caressing his cheek, his ...
— The Short Life • Francis Donovan
... effect of these timed impulses ever described was that observed by a watchmaker, named Ellicott, in the year 1741. He left two clocks leaning against the same rail; one of them, which we may call A, was set going; the other, B, not. Some time afterwards he found, to his surprise, that B was ticking also. The pendulums being of the same length, the shocks imparted by the ticking of A to the rail against which both clocks rested were propagated to B, and were so timed as to set B going. Other curious effects were ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... could hear a far-off house-dog barking, and the nearer clanking of the chains by which the cows were fastened to their mangers, and the loud ticking of the old clock in the kitchen below. It would very soon be midnight. She felt the chill of the keen air, and she shivered as she huddled her shawl closer about her; but it was not the cold that made her lips tremble and her ...
— The Christmas Child • Hesba Stretton
... The hours seemed as if they would never creep by. The very ticking of the clock became irksome. At length the stillness of the house was interrupted by the ringing of a bell. Shortly after, I heard the voice of a waiter at the bar: "The stout gentleman in No. 13 wants his breakfast. Tea and bread and butter ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... stopped ticking, and outside, in mysterious accord, the pigeons rose with a great fluttering of wings, and flew off'. Mr. Treffry made a startled, heavy movement. He tried to get on to his feet and reach the bell, but could not, and ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... "Ticking tuppences away like the very dickens, too!" returned Nan, emerging from her room dressed for ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... the Cottage in a state of hurry and excitement; but the empty kitchen seemed to act on it like a sort of emotional cold douche. The varnished walls, the neatly set chairs, the clock ticking so loudly above the mantel-shelf, all seemed somehow unnatural, with the unnaturalness of empty houses where steps go echoing—echoing—though ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose
... the clocks' ticking was like the voice of many ripples washing the shore of the Infinite. A new life had begun for Trove, and they were cutting it into seconds. He looked up at them and rose quickly and stood a moment, his thumb on the door-latch. Outside they could hear the ...
— Darrel of the Blessed Isles • Irving Bacheller
... the machine steadily ticking. He would not give up hoping that Harvey was there, although his heart beat fast with nervous anxiety. So far, he had not thought that his family might be frightened about him. He knew he was ...
— What Might Have Been Expected • Frank R. Stockton
... which all could hear the ticking of the clock on the table, and the three pairs eyes were fixed on Jewel with such varying expressions of amazement and disapproval that the child's breath ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... disclosed an elderly, narrow-faced man seated at a large table and surrounded by manuscripts and books. The sunlight flowing through curtains of Turkey red fell sanguinely upon the bust of dead-eyed Pericles on the mantle. A little clock was ticking, hidden somewhere among the countless leaves of writing, the maps and broad heavy tomes that swarmed ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... Norman were dining with one of their county acquaintance, and Dr. May had undertaken to admit them on their return. The fire shone red and bright, as it sank calmly away, and the timepiece and clock on the stairs had begun their nightly duet of ticking, the crickets chirped in the kitchen, and the doctor sat alone. His book lay with unturned pages, as he sat musing, with eyes fixed on the fire, living over again his own life, the easy bright days of ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... bedroom. Vassily cautiously sat down by Olga, kissed and chafed her hands, comforted her in whispers. She listened to him, and silently, faintly, shuddered. In the doorway stood Palashka, stealthily wiping her eyes. In the next room they heard the heavy, even ticking of the clock, and the breathing of some one asleep. Olga Ivanovna's numbness dissolved at last into tears and stifled sobs. Tears are like a storm; after them one is always calmer. When Olga Ivanovna had quieted down a little, and only sobbed convulsively at intervals, like a child, ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... removed the coffee things and placed whisky and soda, although there was no one to want it. His quiet step, the ticking of the buhl clock, the very roses on the Aubusson carpet gave her gross suspicions ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... into the car, and attempted to look like a rug. In the silence, while the sentry evidently examined a passport and flashed a lantern over the chauffeur, Nikky cursed the ticking of his watch, the beating of ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... be the sole cause of the stoppage; and I am willing, for the general satisfaction, to assign my 15 reasons. The truth is, that I am tired of ticking." Upon hearing this the old clock became so enraged that it was on ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... choked her utterance. For once Lady Winsleigh's conscience smote her—for once she felt ashamed, and dared not offer consolation to the innocent soul she had so wantonly stricken. For a minute or two there was silence—broken only by the monotonous ticking of the clock and the ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... The loud ticking of the clock, and the lamentations of the hound without, were not the only sounds that disturbed the night. Before the empty fireplace, in a high-backed, cane-bottomed chair, slept an old negress, with head bowed, moaning and muttering ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice
... drawing near for our departure and at last word was sent round that General Hughes wished to meet all the chaplains on the verandah of his bungalow. The time set was the cheerful hour of five a.m. I lay awake all night with a loud ticking alarm clock beside me, till about half an hour before the wretched thing was to go off. With great expedition I rose and shaved and making myself as smart as possible in the private's uniform, hurried off to the General's camp home. There the other chaplains ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... realize its having been stopped at all. A tiny arm holds the wheel firmly, and then lets it escape. Therefore, the fifth wheel and its accompaniments are called the "escapement." This catching and letting go is what makes the ticking. ...
— Makers of Many Things • Eva March Tappan
... ensuing hours of that summer evening, seated in the arm-chair, barely moving, listening to the ticking of the clock, and the thunder of the streets, and at times hearkening to the sounds in the inner chamber, the wanderings feebler and more rare, but the fearful convulsions more frequent, seeming, as it were, to be tearing away the last remnant of life. These moments of horror-struck suspense were ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... impenetrably dark, and the Northern Lights were flashing like aerial searchlights in the sky. The five of them were singularly quiet, deep in their own thoughts. Bill heard his watch ticking loudly ...
— The Snowshoe Trail • Edison Marshall
... Peacock, That sat on a wall. Q was the Quarrel 'Tween Pompey and Pug. R is the Rose In our small china jug. S stands for Syllabub, T for my Toys. U my kind Uncle, Who loves good girls and boys. V is the Vulture, Whom little birds dread. W a Watch That hangs ticking o'erhead. X you may make By two keys when they're crossed. Y is a Youth Whose time should not be lost. The Alphabet now I nearly have said, Zoological Gardens begin with ...
— Rhymes Old and New • M.E.S. Wright
... before me. I could imagine Miss Jackson writing her letters, reading her book, eating her small meals, making the same humble and grateful remarks, entertaining her old friends. Year after year it had gone on, just the same, the clock ticking loud in the hall, the sun creeping round the old rooms, the birds singing in the garden, the faint footsteps in the road. It had begun, that gentle routine, long before I had been born into the world; and it was strange to me to think that, as I passed ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... illuminated missals, dinner services of silver and gold, Dresden and Sevres, and even Royal Worcester; splendid crystal cases of spoons and jewellery; watches old and new; weapons of many countries, and an astonishing array of clocks, all ticking, and pointing to different hours. But the inner room, which only the intimate friends of Sidi Mohammed ever saw, was littered with no such incongruous collection. On the walls were a few fine pictures by ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... the windows, ticking and crying in the rooms, was the same message; till, in a terror of the walls, she would flee into the wider prison of the woods, and oppressed by them in turn, would escape with a beating heart into the honest daylight of the ...
— The Worshipper of the Image • Richard Le Gallienne
... baggage truck under the awning, and as Beryl peeped into the telegraph office, she heard the snoring of the operator, whose head rested upon the table close to the silent instrument. She listened to the ticking of a clock in the ticket office, but could not see its face; wondered how late it was, and how long she had been absent. Feeling very lonely and restless she closed the door, and sat down in the deserted waiting-room, glad of the ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... watch kept ticking on; just like God's will, that never changes or alters, you may do ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner
... hum rose, somewhere in the ship, and Bart grabbed ticking as he felt the slow surge. Then a violent sense of pressure popped his ear drums, weight crowded down on him like an elephant sitting on his chest, and there was a horrible squashed sensation dragging his limbs out of shape. It grew and grew. Bart lay still and sweated, trying to ease ...
— The Colors of Space • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... ticking off the telegram upon his machine. "It will go in the morning at eight," ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad
... and ideas amid which he lives. Now, in a living machine, the machine and the maker are one. The watch is perpetually self-wound and self-regulated and self-repaired. It is made up of millions of other little watches, the cells, all working together for one common end and ticking out the seconds and minutes of life with unfailing regularity. Unlike the watch we carry in our pockets, if we take it apart so as to stop its ticking, it can never be put together again. It has not merely stopped; ...
— The Breath of Life • John Burroughs
... Rogers had been in the telegraph office and had telegraphed your father that the experiment night before last was a success. Tony is ambitious as a Scout should always be and has learned to read the ticking of ...
— Phyllis • Maria Thompson Daviess
... pulse-beats of its second century. The featured moon on its dial had lifted one eye, as if to watch the child, as it had watched so many generations of children, while the swinging pendulum ticked them along into youth, maturity, gray hairs, deathbeds,—ticking through the prayer at the funeral, ticking without grief through all the still or noisy woe of mourning,—ticking without joy when the smiles and gayety of comforted heirs had come back again. She looked at herself in the tall, bevelled mirror in the best chamber. ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... only sound the drone of the bandage-machine as Sidney steadily turned it, Dr. Max passed the door on his way to the surgical ward beyond, and gave her a cheery greeting. At these times Sidney's heart beat almost in time with the ticking ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... sufficient to keep off the excess of cold or heat. The roofs of all the buildings shed from the front, except two of which are of gable shape. The roofs are to be made of solid, close-fitting planks, covered with fine ticking and coated with the patent indestructible fire-proof paint, and applications which our citizens have just begun to use here, and which ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower
... not speak; there was no sound in the caravan but the ticking of the little clock which was fastened to a nail in the corner, and the occasional falling of the cinders in the ashpan. Augustus' reflections were not pleasant as he sat by his wife's dying bed. For the doctor had told him ...
— A Peep Behind the Scenes • Mrs. O. F. Walton
... don't believe that any one should have a lot of money, so that a taxicab could remain ticking away fabulous sums while a charming young lady dines at her ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... his mouth. Presently he got up and stole out of the room. He was back again in a trice, a flask in one hand, a soda siphon in the other, and a small glass balanced on his thumb. When Burns, at the sound of a clock ticking somewhere, rubbed his eyes with his fists striking in and reluctantly opened them, ...
— Red Pepper Burns • Grace S. Richmond
... Adrian. Nothing is to be heard save the carol of a bird, the rippling of a clear stream flowing swiftly through the valley, and at intervals the distinct notes of the little bells and cymbals upon the clocks which his Majesty brought with him. Even their ticking is often audible. At certain hours the ringing of the monastery bells blends solemnly and softly with the silence. The Hieronymites in the monastery are pious monks. His Majesty sometimes listens to their choir. Its music is very ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... remarkably tremendous about this strange Barbara, who having lived a very quiet life, blushed very much and was quite as embarrassed and uncertain what she ought to say or do, as Kit could possibly be. When he had sat for some little time, attentive to the ticking of the sober clock, he ventured to glance curiously at the dresser, and there, among the plates and dishes, were Barbara's little work-box with a sliding lid to shut in the balls of cotton, and Barbara's prayer-book, and Barbara's hymn-book, and Barbara's Bible. ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... a good quiet game for the schoolroom. A loud ticking clock is necessary for the game. All of the pupils are sent from the room. One of their number is selected to hide the clock. The others, upon coming back, try to locate it by its ticking. The one succeeding has the privilege of next ...
— School, Church, and Home Games • George O. Draper
... Jackson and make sure," said Sam, and led the way to the telegraph office. The telegraph receiver was ticking away at a lively rate, and Jackson, who had charge of the office, was taking down a message on ...
— The Rover Boys on Treasure Isle - or The Strange Cruise of the Steam Yacht. • Edward Stratemeyer (AKA Arthur M. Winfield)
... upon the busily ticking little clock on the table. As she looked, her gaze became fixed and she sat up in ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... to touch it, and afraid to touch the book. He felt that he had obtruded an unwelcome presence upon these two mute evidences of passion which seemed now to be drawn momentarily apart for breath before re-engaging in the fray. In this strained expectancy the measured ticking of the old clock in the corner was startlingly loud. One might have counted a hundred, and then, as quietly as he came, he tiptoed out, crossed the porch and passed on ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... a "waker," as the country-people call it. Between the hours at which the last toss-pot went by and the first sparrow shook himself, the silence in Casterbridge—barring the rare sound of the watchman—was broken in Elizabeth's ear only by the time-piece in the bedroom ticking frantically against the clock on the stairs; ticking harder and harder till it seemed to clang like a gong; and all this while the subtle-souled girl asking herself why she was born, why sitting in a room, and blinking at the candle; why things ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... enough for what I want—to talk to you. After that, I will be as quiet as you like, for as long as you like. Only I have been keeping myself for this all these last few days that I have lain here like a log, listening to the ticking of that merciless clock. They thought I was sleeping, unconscious, very likely. I have been collecting myself, thinking immensely, waiting ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... between its forepaws in the posture assumed by the domestic cat when in a state of semi-watchfulness, approaching to a doze. The senses of the matron were strung to an almost painful acuteness. The moonlight streaming in at the window was to her eyes like the glare of the sun at noonday: the ticking of the clock on the wall fell on her ears, each tick like a sharply pointed hammer seeming to bruise the nerve. A keen thrill ran like a knife through her tense frame when the infant stirred and moaned ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... ticking of the watch by my bedside; silent as the stars which gleam down from the blue sky above the cross-crowned crag, which stands like some giant sentinel keeping watch over the village, at its foot. Herod, our host, sleeps soundly, and Johannes, wearied by his double ...
— King of the Jews - A story of Christ's last days on Earth • William T. Stead
... the school thought the days quite long enough, and in fact some happy souls had already counted up the number of hours until the holidays began and were ticking them off ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett
... watched with a researcher's interest as the bright purple juice swept across the table towards the busily ticking doster. Momma, of course, wasn't here, or she would have been gruff about it. She'd just ...
— Poppa Needs Shorts • Leigh Richmond
... hear the clicking Of the pencil and the pen, And the solemn, ceaseless ticking Of the timepiece ticking then; And we note the watchful master, As he waves the warning rod, With our own heart beating faster Than the ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... other teachers know a good deal of English, and we chat together sometimes between classes. But more often no one speaks. All are tired after the teaching hour, and prefer to smoke in silence. At such times the only sounds within the room are the ticking of the clock, and the sharp clang of the little pipes being rapped upon the edges of the hibachi to empty ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn |
