"Viol" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... where they were piled on top of one another; the chairs were arranged in a row along the wall; the floor, newly waxed, shone like glass. A small upright piano manipulated by an elderly female in glasses; a tremendous bass viol in charge of a small man, and a violin played by a large man ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... This was sung, it must be confessed, by a sadly shrunken choir, stoutly supported, however, by the congregation in the body of the meeting-house, without the sound of tabret, or harp, or other musical instruments; for in those days not even the flute or grave bass-viol, those pioneers of the organ, were permitted in the Sanctuary. To the hymn succeeded a long and fervent prayer, in which Mr. Robinson, the minister (the term Reverend had then a slight papistical twang), after bewailing with ingenious particularity the sins and back-slidings ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... took in his gardens, "in the improvement of his grounds, in planting groves and walks and forest-trees." If he was "diligent in his examination of the Scriptures," "he had a great love for music and often diverted himself with a viol, on which he ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green
... know this my ancestor was not only of a a military genius, but fit also for the arts of peace, for he played on the bass-viol as well as any gentleman at court; you see where his viol hangs by his basket-hilt sword. The action at the tilt-yard you may be sure won the fair lady, who was a maid of honour, and the greatest beauty ...
— The Coverley Papers • Various
... He thundered, he roared, he whooped, he howled, he jarred the windows, he sawed the air, he split the horizon with his clarion notes, he tipped over the table, kicked the lamps out of the chandeliers and smashed the big bass viol over the chief ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... retained in use to this day. I was seasoned to that kind of poetry in my early days by the verses of Tate and Brady, which I used to hear "entuned in the nose ful swetely," accompanied by vigorous rasping of a huge bass-viol. No wonder that Scotland welcomed the ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... gone in again, and candles had been lit in his fresh and narrow chamber, seeing a viol upon a chest, I begged a ...
— Henry Brocken - His Travels and Adventures in the Rich, Strange, Scarce-Imaginable Regions of Romance • Walter J. de la Mare
... or ink, if the objects are in alcohol, or on thin pieces of lead marked with a knife. When several plants are put in the same jar, a label, thus marked, should be attached to each. Without this precaution, the collection is useless. Flowers of the different species should not be put in the same viol. If it is ever necessary, a label should be attached to each. Or they should be put in paper pasted together, with the ...
— Movement of the International Literary Exchanges, between France and North America from January 1845 to May, 1846 • Various
... of the Herrings and, since early Jacobean days, of the Williams family. Then comes Monkton, close to Maiden Castle. The church is Norman, much restored. St. Martin follows; a picturesque hamlet with a fine church, the last in the west of England to dispense with clarionet, flute and bass-viol in the village choir. On sign-posts as well as colloquially this hamlet is known as "Martinstown." Steepleton boasts a stone spire, rare for Dorset, and a curious and very ancient figure of an angel on the outside wall ...
— Wanderings in Wessex - An Exploration of the Southern Realm from Itchen to Otter • Edric Holmes
... burn the wold bass-viol that I set such vallie by." Squire.—"You may hold the manse in fee, You may wed my spouse, my children's memory ...
— Wessex Poems and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy
... under his sounding board; he sleeps beneath a brown stone slab in the churchyard. The stout deacon is dead; his wig and his wickedness rest together. The tall chorister sings yet; but they have now a bass-viol—handled by a new schoolmaster—in place of his tuning-fork; and the years have sown ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell
... house (where we now worship) in 1845. He did, indeed, for a time supply a not unacceptable bass in the choir, but, whether on some umbrage (omnibus hoc vitium est cantoribus) taken against the bass-viol, then, and till his decease in 1850, (aet. 77,) under the charge of Mr. Asaph Perley, or, as was reported by others, on account of an imminent subscription for a new bell, he thenceforth, absented himself from all outward and visible communion. Yet he seems to have preserved, (alta ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... bench where he has been mending his viol). Because, Captain, 'tis a property knaves and fools have in common—to stand in their own light, as 'tis of soldiers to talk bad logic. That knave, now—he with the red nose and the black eye—the Duke's colours, loyal man!—you clap an iron on his leg, and ask him why he ...
— The Vigil of Venus and Other Poems by "Q" • Q
... that is Mi, this Do, and that Fa; and that, boys, is a part of what we call a scale." Then turning to a tall, thin, shabby-looking man, very much out at the elbows, whom I had not seen before, he said—"Mr. Smith, how is your base viol? Hav'nt you got it tuned ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... From me you shall not hear The splendid tramplings of insistent drums, The orbed gold of the viol's voice that comes, Heavy with radiance, languorous and clear. Yet, if you hold me close against the ear, A dim, far whisper rises clamorously, The thunderous beat and passion of the sea, The slow surge of the tides that ...
— Young Adventure - A Book of Poems • Stephen Vincent Benet
... was greater than the house would admit of; a small subscription was set on foot, and they removed to the 'Queen's Head' tavern, in Paternoster Row. Here they were joined by Mr. Woolaston and his friends, and also by a Mr. Franckville, a fine performer on the viol de Gamba. And after a few winters, being grown rich enough to hire additional performers, they removed, in the year 1724, to the 'Castle,' in Paternoster Row, which was adorned with a picture of ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... Then he bade the fifth damsel come forward and sing (now she was from the land of Syria and her name was Rayhanah; she was passing of voice and when she appeared in an assembly, all eyes were fixed upon her), so she came forward and taking the viol (for she was used to play upon all instruments) recited and ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... Batulcar, caressing the thick grey beard which hung from his chin. "I already have two who are obedient and faithful, have never left me, and serve me for their nourishment and here they are," added he, holding out his two robust arms, furrowed with veins as large as the strings of a bass-viol. ...
— Around the World in 80 Days • Jules Verne
... and picked up his instrument, carefully trying its pitch. He gave the signal, and the "March of the Pilgrims" began—in the remote distance. The double-bass viol gripped his bow with his stubby twelve-year-old fingers, and hardly breathed as he strove to keep his notes subdued. The 'cello murmured a gentle undertone; the first violin sang as sweetly and delicately as a bird, her legato ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... pursuits, to every other native. Of Art they were absolutely ignorant. They built their temples on the same model as their barns. Poetry meant Psalms sung through their noses to the accompaniment of a bass-viol. Of other musical instruments, they knew only the Jews-harp for home delectation, and the drum and fife for training-days. Doctrinal religion furnished them with a mental relaxation which supplied ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... manly, frank, and engaging manner the beautiful Mrs. Rand and the equally lovely Miss Dandridge, to both of whom he had been presented at an evening entertainment. The church was now filled and the bell ceased ringing. From the gallery came the deeper growl of the bass viol and the preliminary breath of a flute. A moment more and the minister walked up the aisle and, mounting the tall old pulpit, invoked a blessing, then gave out in a fine mellow voice with a strong ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... pleading. That the violin melody of his incomparable song is lost, must be reckoned a great misfortune. We have good reason to believe that the part of Orpheus was taken by Messer Baccio Ugolini, singing to the viol. Here too it may be mentioned that a tondo in monochrome, painted by Signorelli among the arabesques at Orvieto, shows Orpheus at the throne of Plato, habited as a poet with the laurel crown and playing on a violin of antique form. It would be interesting to ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... about a foot long, seal up one end of it hermetically, then put in a very small bubble of Glass, almost of the shape of an Essence-viol with the open mouth towards the sealed end, then draw out the other end of the Pipe very small, and fill the whole Cylinder with water, then set this Tube by the Fire till the Water begin to boyl, and the Air in the bubble be in good part rarified and driven out, then ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... have occasion to consider this matter more fully when we approach the study of the musical apparatus of the first lyric dramas. It may be noted, however, in passing that the Italian word "violino" was used as late as 1597 to designate the tenor viol. This instance of uncertainty in terminology warns us to be careful in accepting ...
— Some Forerunners of Italian Opera • William James Henderson
... Salma any beautiful woman Rabab the viol mostly single stringed: Tan'oumshe who is soft and gentle. These fictitious names are for ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth! (11.) Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them! (12.) And the harp and the viol, and tabret and pipe, and wine are in their feasts; but they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands. (18.) Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart- rope. (20.) Woe ...
— What To Do? - thoughts evoked by the census of Moscow • Count Lyof N. Tolstoi
... Words! Mere words! How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere words! Was there ...
— The Picture of Dorian Gray • Oscar Wilde
... How far away it all seems, and they were the substance of poetry then. Sounds were the important things for Dowson, which is essentially the Swinburne echo. Significant then, that he worshipped "the viol, the violet, and the vine" of Poe. There was little else but singing in his verse however. His love of Horace did less for him than the masters of sound, excepting that the vision comes in the name "Cynara". But it was all struggle for Dowson, ...
— Adventures in the Arts - Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets • Marsden Hartley
... audience of what he himself had done in the way of excavations and reparations. He described himself as the brother of the architect of the work actually going forward (that which has been done since the death of M. Viol- let-le-Duc, I suppose he meant), and this fact was more illustrative than all the others. It reminded me, as one is reminded at every turn, of the democratic con- ditions of French life: a man of the people, with a wife en bonnet, extremely ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... pale brow with a fillet of sable velvet. He saw her first in the dance, sumptuously gowned, regal, yet blithe, yielding as might a goddess to the mortal embrace of Bill Bardin as they fox-trotted to the viol's surge. He was stricken dumb until the dance ended. Then he gripped an arm of Spike Brennon, who had stood by him against the wall, "looking 'em over," as Spike ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... are told, being infirm of body, was comforted through God's goodness by a vision of the joy of the blessed. "Suddenly there appeared to him an angel in a great radiance, which angel held a viol in his left hand and a bow in his right. And while St. Francis remained in stupefaction at the sight, this angel drew the bow once upwards across the viol, and instantly there issued such sweetness of melody as melted the soul of St. Francis, ...
— Renaissance Fancies and Studies - Being a Sequel to Euphorion • Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)
... Rome; and sometimes a Virgin Mary is seen sitting at the door, and still more often a young John the Baptist looks up to you from the pavement. Their own postilion reminded the whole party of the Suonatore di Violino of Raphael—whose fiddlestick, by the way, being that of a bass viol, might at first sight be ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various
... the very tone of Thackeray, when Thackeray is tender; and the world heard it first from this elderly nameless minstrel, strolling with his viol and his singing boys, a blameless D'Assoucy, from castle to castle in the happy poplar land. I think I see him and hear him in the silver twilight, in the court of some chateau of Picardy, while the ladies around sit listening on silken cushions, and their lovers, fettered ...
— Letters on Literature • Andrew Lang
... to lighter sounds give place! Bid thy brisk viol warble measures gay! For see! recall'd by thy resistless lay, Once more the Brownie shews his honest face. Hail, from thy wanderings long, my much lov'd sprite! Thou friend, thou lover of the lowly, hail! Tell, in what realms thou sport'st thy merry night, Trail'st ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... no mind to marry anyone but Aucassin, and she devised how she might get news of her lover. One night she smeared her face with a brown ointment, and dressed herself in minstrel's clothes, and took a viol, and stole out of her father's palace to the seashore. There she found a ship that was bound for Provence, and she sailed in it to Beaucaire. She took her viol, and went playing through the town, and came to the castle. Aucassin was sitting ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... waltzing which disgusted her," he said, "and no wonder, for if ever a man looks like an idiot, it is when he is kicking up his heels to the sound of a viol, and wheeling around some woman whose skirts sweep everything within the circle of a rod, and whose face wears that die-away expression I have so often noticed. I've half a mind to ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... and mother had not come, and he had learned a little Greek and more Latin, could carve a box with the arms of his house on the lid, and make that lid fit; could bow like a courtier and speak like a gentleman, and play a simple air on the viol that hung in the parlor for guests to amuse themselves with while they waited to see the master ...
— Harding's luck • E. [Edith] Nesbit
... faire and visite the Baron. But if yeux dont comme tu us, Ile go to ure house and se oncle, and se houe he does; for mi dame se he bean ill; but deux comme; mi dire yeux canne ly here yeux nos; if yeux love musique, yeux mai have the harp, lutte, or viol heere. Adieu, ...
— Books and Authors - Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches • Anonymous
... years. All my laughing since 1889 has been a strictly intellectual process; but I did have an awful pain because I could not digest his statement with a bouncing laugh. All I could do was to stammer and splutter like a bass viol tuning up, while I sozzled around in my chair trying to break in with something that would count. Why should a man of my temperament take a hand in love, war or diplomacy? As a theoretical manipulator of fathers-in-law, as a text-book writer on the subject, I was in the extra ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... cut-water of his old ship, far excelled the Venus de Medici in beauty of feature and form. 'She must be almighty beautiful; and then, my son, she is as rich as the Rajah of Rangoon, who owns a diamond as big as our viol-block. Did you fall in love pretty ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... humbly To her grower the beauty Wherewith she is comely; If the mine to the miner The jewels that pined in it, Earth to diviner The springs he divined in it; To the grapes the wine-pitcher Their juice that was crushed in it, Viol to its witcher The music lay hushed in it; If the lips may pay Gladness In laughters she wakened, And the heart to its sadness Weeping unslakened, If the hid and sealed coffer, Whose having not his is, To the loosers may proffer Their finding—here this is; Their lives if all livers To the ...
— Poems • Francis Thompson
... lavish feast, The cheery welcome, all are o'er: The music of the viol ceased, The gleesome ring around the floor. No glad communion greets the hour, That welcomes in a Saviour's birth, And Christmas, to a hostile power, Yields all the sway that made ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... chronicles; and they were read before the King." The Rawi would declaim the recitative somewhat in conversational style; he would intone the Saj'a or prose-rhyme and he would chant to the twanging of the Rabab, a one-stringed viol, the poetical parts. Dr. Scott[FN301] borrows from the historian of Aleppo a life-like picture of the Story-teller. "He recites walking to and fro in the middle of the coffee-room, stopping only now and then, when the expression requires some emphatical attitude. He is ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton
... large village about three days away. Arrived there, all the inhabitants of the place sat in a circle round the missionary. They appeared (he says) in so much modesty and silence 'that I seemed to behold statues, and not live Indians.' To awaken their attention he played upon the viol d'amore, and, having thus captured their ears, began to preach to them. The good priest probably believed all that he said, for, after dwelling on the perils of the road, he said: 'My friends, my errand ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham
... her as "a termagant." She was pretty, and had golden hair, which one connects pleasantly with the late sunshine she brought into Milton's life. She sang to his accompaniment on the organ and bass-viol, but is not recorded to have read or written for him; the only direct testimony we have of her care of him is his verbal acknowledgment of her attention to his creature comforts. Yet Aubrey's memoranda show that ...
— Life of John Milton • Richard Garnett
... care to regulate the whole regimen of the patient's life for joy and happiness by promising that he will soon be well, by allowing his relatives and special friends to cheer him and by having someone to tell him jokes, and let him be solaced also by music on the viol or psaltery. The surgeon must forbid anger, hatred, and sadness in the patient, and remind him that the body grows fat from joy and thin from sadness. He must insist on the patient obeying him faithfully in all things." He repeats with approval the expression of Avicenna that "often ...
— Old-Time Makers of Medicine • James J. Walsh
... old parish church in one of the midland counties; the building was in a most deplorable state of dilapidation, and the communion-rail formed a music-stand, while inside were placed an orchestra of two fiddles and a bass-viol. The minister received, for the first three years he officiated, the exorbitant remuneration of thirty pounds a year; since which time he has taken the duties of parish schoolmaster, the salary of which, increased by a small sum from ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... philosophy, and of the little sister Caroline, destined in later years for an illustrious career. William soon learned all that his master could teach him in the ordinary branches of knowledge, and by the age of fourteen he was already a competent performer on the oboe and the viol. He was engaged in the Court orchestra at Hanover, and was also a member of the band of the Hanoverian Guards. Troublous times were soon to break up Herschel's family. The French invaded Hanover, the Hanoverian Guards were overthrown in the battle of Hastenbeck, ...
— The Story of the Heavens • Robert Stawell Ball
... mean, that as early as midnight he did not know whether he was boy or girl, and took the starry firmament for a bass-viol. ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... right," he assured, his voice still low, but so resonant and harsh that it sounded like the thrumming of a viol string. ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... character,' I replied musingly, 'but a most sweet and delicate lady—one who should pass her time in playing upon the clavichord or the viol d'amore. In sympathy of temperament I think she would be ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease
... came Joy's ecstatic trial; He, with viny crown advancing, First to the lively pipe his hand addressed; But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best: They would have thought, who heard the strain, They saw in Tempe's vale her native maids, Amidst the festal-sounding shades, To some unwearied minstrel dancing; While, as his flying ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... lords round about: Saw the leaves and flowers spring, Heard the song-birds carolling; Of his love he thought anew, Nicolette the maiden true, Whom he loved so long a day; Then his tears and sighs had way. When, behold before the stair, Nicolette herself stood there, Lifted viol, lifted bow, Then she told her story so: "Listen, lordlings brave, to me, Ye that low or lofty be! Liketh you to hear a stave, All of Aucassin the brave, And of Nicolette the true? Long they loved and long did rue, Till ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock
... king's daughter. And they would have given her to her lord a king of Paynim, but she had no mind to marry. There dwelt she three days or four. And she considered by what device she might seek for Aucassin. Then she got her a viol, and learned to play on it; till they would have married her one day to a rich king of Paynim, and she stole forth by night, and came to the seaport, and dwelt with a poor woman thereby. Then took she a certain herb, and ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... innocence in their blue and rose-pink and green robes sprigged with gold, with their yellow or red hair, at once aerial and heavy, their chastely downcast eyes, and flesh as white as pith. Grave, but in ecstasy, they play on the harp or the theorbo, on the Viol d'Amore or the rebeck, singing the eternal glory of the most ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... brief note in that wonderful hymn, And to us its Oneness is hazy and dim; We hear the few sounds from the viol we play, But all the full chorus floats far and away: Our poor little pipe of an instant is drown'd In the glorious rush of that ocean of sound; The player hears nothing beyond his own bars, Whilst all ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... his writing-table lay an ivory set: inkstand, pen-tray, blotter, and calendar. Bits of old embroidery, harmonizing with the peacock shades, were spread here and there. A spinet inlaid with ivory formed the center for the arrangement of other musical instruments—a viol, mandolins, and flutes. One tall, closed cabinet was devoted to Doggie's collection of wall-papers. Another held a collection of little dogs in china and porcelain—thousands of them; he got them from dealers ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... a heart now mangled, And waiting its time to go, Whose tendrils were first entangled By my sweet viol ...
— Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy
... hours in the saloon and gambling places for which the vicinity was noted, that the worst passions of the human heart had been exhibited here, and that betimes amid the laughter of the merry throng in midnight revelry and above the strains of the "harp and viol" one could have heard the voices of blasphemy and the sharp, loud reports of pistols in the hands of careless characters, whose deadly bullets had sent many a poor unfortunate wayfarer or unwary miner from the gold fields to his ...
— By the Golden Gate • Joseph Carey
... music, for that all the ladies knew how to dance, as also the young men, and some of them could both play and sing excellent well. Accordingly, by her commandment, Dioneo took a lute and Fiammetta a viol and began softly to sound a dance; whereupon the queen and the other ladies, together with the other two young men, having sent the serving-men to eat, struck up a round and began with a slow pace to dance ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... gone on foot to Nice, where the Duke of Savoy held his court; there he entered the service of the Duke of Moreto, and this lord having been appointed, some years afterwards, to the Scottish embassy, Rizzio followed him to Scotland. As this young man had a very fine voice, and accompanied on the viol and fiddle songs of which both the airs and the words were of his own composition, the ambassador spoke of him to Mary, who wished to see him. Rizzio, full of confidence in himself, and seeing in the queen's desire a road ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... with mirth do seem stark mad, And cannot choose—their hearts are all so glad. Then let's be merry in our God and King, That made us merry, being ill bestead. Southampton, up thy cap to Heaven fling, And on the viol there sweet praises sing, For he is come that grace to all ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... spruce, affecting courtier, one that wears clothes well, and in fashion; practiseth by his glass how to salute; speaks good remnants, notwithstanding the base viol and tobacco; swears tersely and with variety; cares not what lady's favour he belies, or great man's familiarity: a good property to perfume the boot of a coach. He will borrow another man's horse to praise, and backs him as his own. Or, for a need, on foot can post himself into credit with ...
— Every Man Out Of His Humour • Ben Jonson
... went into Leicestershire. He was in that year feoffee collector for twelve poor alms-people living in Clement-Dane's Church-Yard; whose pensions I in his absence paid weekly, to his and the parish's great satisfaction. My master was no sooner gone down, but I bought a bass-viol, and got a master to instruct me; the intervals of time I spent in bowling in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields, with Wat the cobler, Dick the blacksmith, and such like companions: We have sometimes been at our work at six in the morning, and so continued till three or four ...
— William Lilly's History of His Life and Times - From the Year 1602 to 1681 • William Lilly
... the extreme antiquity of the bow is such as almost to justify the quaint statement of Jean Jacques Rousseau that Adam played the viol in Paradise. ...
— The Bow, Its History, Manufacture and Use - 'The Strad' Library, No. III. • Henry Saint-George
... how high a dame she was, so good and pure that he could never enjoy her, his soft thought of love was changed to a great sadness. And because deep thoughts engender melancholy, it was counselled unto him by certain wise men that he should make his study of canzonets for the viol and soft delightful ditties. So made he the most beautiful canzonets and the most delightful and most melodious that at any time were heard." (Histoire des Dues et des Comtes de Champagne, by M. d'Arbois de Jubainville, t. iv. pp. 249, 280; Chroniques de Saint-Denis, in the Recueil des ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... we hush the melancholy fiddlers. If this comedy can stir the croaking bass-viol to any show of mirth, our work tops Falstaff. Glum folk with beards had best withdraw. Only the young in heart will catch the slender meaning of our play. Let's light the candles ...
— Wappin' Wharf - A Frightful Comedy of Pirates • Charles S. Brooks
... land, I know not where, Ere viol's sigh, or organ's swell, Had made the sons of song aware That music is a potent spell, A shepherd to a city came, Play'd on his pipe, and rose to fame. He sang of fields, and at each close Applause ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... between the fore and main masts, serving to stretch a rope, heave upon the jeers, and take the viol to. Very seldom used. It is indeed deemed the spare capstan, and is frequently housed in by sheep-pens ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... with it the full band of music. Tailor Schneck's son, he who had been one of, the cuirassiers at the christening of the crown prince, had arranged and was now conducting the parting ceremonies. Schneck, who was scraping his bass-viol, was the first to see Hansei, and called out in the ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... Instruction in arithmetic, analytical algebra, geometry, fortification, and architecture, was to be given by the Professor of Geometry. A Professor of Music was to impart skill in singing, and music to play upon organ, lute, viol, etc. Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Italian, French, Spanish, and High Dutch were to be taught by the Professor of Languages. In addition, a Professor of Defence inculcated skill at all weapons and wrestling (but not pugilism apparently), and ample instruction was to be afforded in riding, dancing, and behaviour, ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... a little more talk about the gardens, and then they all sang together. The band delighted Nat, for Mrs. Bhaer played the piano, Franz the flute, Mr. Bhaer a bass viol, and he himself the violin. A very simple little concert, but all seemed to enjoy it, and old Asia, sitting in the corner, joined at times with the sweetest voice of any, for in this family, master and servant, old and young, black and white, shared in the Sunday song, ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... before received the company in separate troops, with songs and dances, after the fashion and accompanied by the music of the provinces they represented,—the Poitevins playing on bagpipes; the Provencales on the viol and cymbal; the Burgundians and Champagners on the hautboy, bass viol, and tambourine; in like manner the Bretons and other provincialists. After the collation was served and the feast at an end, a large troop of musicians, habited like satyrs, was seen to come ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... preacher. I have a little faded card in my possession now: "Mrs. Henry W. Beecher." "Will ushers of Plymouth Church please seat the bearer in the Pastor's pew." And in the Pastor's pew I sat, listening to that magnificent bass-viol voice with its persuasive low accent, its torrential scorn! After the sermon I went to the Beechers' home. Mr. Beecher sat with a saucer of uncut gems by him on the table. He ran his hand through them from time to time, held them up to the light, admiring ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... was usual to have a "chest of viols," which consisted of six, viz., two trebles, two tenors, and two basses (see note in North's "Memoirs of Musick," ed. Rimbault, p. 70). The bass viol was also called the 'viola da gamba', because it was held ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... itself, of the moods in which it may be faced, of religion, of man's excellent virtues, of friendship and childhood, of passion, grief, and comfort. But there is no arbitrary isolation of one theme from another; they mingle and inter-penetrate throughout, to the music of Pan's flute, and of Love's viol, and the bugle-call of Endeavour, and the passing-bell ...
— Poems of To-Day: an Anthology • Various
... green groves of Manitou. The breeze stirs the pulse like a tonic; birds, bees, and butterflies dance in the air; the leaves have the gloss of varnish—there is no dust there,—and everything is cleanly, cheerful and reposeful. From the hotel veranda float the strains of harp and viol; at intervals during the day and night music helps us to lift up our hearts; there is nothing like it—except more of it. There is not overmuch dressing among the women, nor the beastly spirit of loudness among the men; the domestic atmosphere is ...
— Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska • Charles Warren Stoddard
... after that, and he told me all his crimes. He said he had lived next door once to a young lady who was learning to play the guitar, while a gentleman who practised on the bass- viol lived opposite. And he, with fiendish cunning, had introduced these two unsuspecting young people to one another, and had persuaded them to elope with each other against their parents' wishes, and take their musical instruments with them; and they had done so, and, before the ...
— Told After Supper • Jerome K. Jerome
... aboard trumpet and drum and viol, and he would have frequent music. Each day toward evening each man was given a cup of wine. And before sunset all were gathered for vesper service, and we sang Salve Regina. At night the great familiar ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... Story in some Authors, that having put Human Seed into a Viol close stopp'd, and plac'd it for some time in a Dunghill that was moderately hot; they observ'd that the Particles drew up themselves in such Order, as to assume the Form of a Child. This (say they) comes to pass after the same manner as the Forming of a Chick ...
— Tractus de Hermaphrodites • Giles Jacob
... lute, archlute[obs3]; mandola[obs3], mandolin, mandoline[obs3]; guitar; zither; cither[obs3], cithern[obs3]; gittern[obs3], rebeck[obs3], bandurria[obs3], bandura, banjo; bina[obs3], vina[obs3]; xanorphica[obs3]. viol, violin; fiddle, kit; viola, viola d'amore[Fr], viola di gamba[It]; tenor, cremona, violoncello, bass; bass viol, base viol; theorbo[obs3], double base, contrabasso[obs3], violone[obs3], *psaltery; bow, fiddlestick[obs3]. piano, pianoforte; harpsichord, clavichord, clarichord[obs3], ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... velvets with the short hoop; my bloo quilted petticot, my green mantel, my laced apron, my French commode, Macklin head and lappets and the litel box with my jowls. Williams may bring over my bum-daffee, and the viol with the easings of Dr Hill's dockwater and Chowder's lacksitif. The poor creature has been terribly stuprated ever since we left huom. Pray take particular care of the house while the family is absent. Let ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... removed, one of the gentlemen who had assisted in his capture accosted him with polite expressions of regret at his want of appetite. During the interchange of courtesies which ensued, one of the bandits took a lute, another a viol, and the party began to amuse themselves with music. The advocate was then invited to walk into a neighboring room, where he perceived a considerable number of mantles ranged in order. He was desired to select his own, and to count out the thirty pistoles agreed upon, together with ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... caught on and clapped like mad, Aunt Mary beat the front of the box with her ear-trumpet, and when Clover suggested that she throw some flowers to the heroine she threw the orchids and came near maiming the bass viol for life. Burnett rushed out between acts and bought her a cane to pound with, Jack rushed out between more acts and bought her a pair of opera glasses, Mitchell rushed out between still further acts and procured her ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... would have known how so soon to win the love of a lady like that? Lucky indeed might they deem themselves, if they did it, those young gallants that go about, day and night, up and down, a strumming on the one-stringed viol, and would not know how to gather a handful of nuts once in a millennium. Mayst thou be by to see when I bring her the rebeck! thou wilt see fine sport. List well what I say: I am not so old as I look; and she ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... here, sir, it behoves me shift my ground, Like him that makes the sprightly viol ring, Who often changes chord and varies sound, And now a graver strikes, now sharper string: Thus I: — who did to good Rinaldo bound My tale, Angelica remembering; Late left, where saved from him by hasty flight, She ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... ecstatic trial: He, with viny crown advancing, First to the lively pipe his hand addressed: But soon he saw the brisk, awakening viol, Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best. They would have thought, who heard the strain, They saw, in Temp's vale, her native maids, Amidst the festal-sounding shades, To some unlearned minstrel dancing; While, ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... head are grouped the stops which imitate the tones of such stringed instruments as the Viola, the Violoncello, the Double Bass, and more especially the old form of Violoncello, called the Viol di Gamba, which had six strings and was more ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller
... Gunning candles. Let me present to your la'ship Sir Edward Walpole, brother to the Baron of Strawberry Hill. A flourish and a sliding bow, and you know one another! Sir Edward, who resembles not Horry in his love for the twittle-twattle of the town, is a passable performer on the bass viol, and a hermit—the Hermit of Pall Mall. But the rules of that Hermitage are not too severe, child. 'Tis known there ...
— The Ladies - A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty • E. Barrington
... broke in an octogenarian treble, that seemed to come from high up in the head of Uncle Issy, the bass-viol player; "But cast your eyes, good friends, 'pon a little slip o' heart's delight down in the nave, and mark the flowers 'pon the bonnet nid-nodding like bees in a ...
— I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... to the style of the Troubadours. In performing their works, they did not, like their western brethren, have recourse to hired accompanists, or Jongleurs, but supported the vocal part by playing on a small viol. The Jongleurs were essentially a French institution, and no class of musicians similar to them existed in Germany. The Minnesingers, like the Troubadours, were amateurs, and aimed to keep free from the taint of professionalism. Men of the ...
— Woman's Work in Music • Arthur Elson
... talk of the viol, and its strings they may try all, For the heart's dance, outvie all, the songs of the dairy! White and red are a-blending, on thy cheeks a-contending, And a smile is descending from thy lips of the cherry; Teeth their ivory disclosing, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... piles; The ladies—"kinder scatterin'"—had gathered in for miles. And yet the place was crowded, as I remember well, 'Twas got for the occasion at "The Morning Star Hotel." The music was a fiddle and a lively tambourine, And a "viol come imported," by stage from Abilene. The room was togged out gorgeous—with mistletoe and shawls, And candles flickered frescoes around the airy walls. The "wimmin folks" looked lovely—the boys looked kinder treed, ...
— Songs of the Cattle Trail and Cow Camp • Various
... Independent church was played by a Mr Clark, who was organist at the Parish church in the morning and at the chapel in the afternoon and evening. Before this time the Independents had contented themselves with violins and a bass viol, and for a ...
— The Evolution Of An English Town • Gordon Home
... sad captivity. Cast a glance on this roaming singer, this houseless rhymer; the last representative of that noble poesy born before Homer. This gentle son of poverty, seeking his bread with the strings of his viol, this Bohemian of the eleventh century, goes to regenerate barbarian society. The influence of music and poesy, which nothing mortal can resist, will win him permission in all places to sing what no one would dare to say. He will publish the sighs of woman for liberty, at a time when her ...
— The Friendships of Women • William Rounseville Alger
... played first viol in the Court minstrelsy. Up and yet higher up he crept, till he could creep no further, as I writ a few leaves back. On the eve of Saint Pancras was crowned the new Queen of France in the Abbey of Saint Denis, which is to France ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... gathered to "see the whi' folks dance." But prominent and conspicuous, in a suit as nearly resembling his master's as might be, and in a position at the immediate right hand of the slave who played the bass viol, stood Caesar, the general's favorite man-servant. He bore himself with the same courtly dignity, the same dignified courtesy, and had stationed himself beside the viol in order to have a more thorough view of the dancers, and above all of his beloved master. He had faithfully ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 21, August, 1891 • Various
... man with horn-rim spectacles sat in a canvas chair, a manuscript in his hand. Scattered about were a dozen men and women, poised tensely, as if they were afraid to move a muscle. To the left was the orchestra, a violin, 'cello and bass viol. Why, thought John, do bass viol players always have that far-away, woebegone look on their faces as ...
— Spring Street - A Story of Los Angeles • James H. Richardson
... rainbow-shimmer of joy, or a sudden lightning-flare of passion, this exquisite mystery we call Amor, comes, to some rapt visionaries at least, not with a song upon the lips that all may hear, or with blithe viol of public music, but as one wrought by ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London
... sacred services with reluctance, continue in them by constraint, and quit them with gladness? And of how many of these persons may it not be affirmed in the spirit of the prophet's language: "The harp, and the viol, the tabret and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts: but they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands?" Are not the youth of one sex often actually committing, and still ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... it, I askt him if he loved Musick. He answered, soe much that it was Miserie for him to hear anie that was not of the beste. I secretlie resolved he should never heare mine. He added, he was come of a musicalle Familie, and that his Father not onlie sang well, but played finely on the Viol and Organ. Then he spake of the sweet Musick in Italy, until I longed to be there; but I tolde him nothing in its Way ever pleased me more than to heare the Choristers of Magdalen College usher in May Day by chaunting a Hymn at the Top of the Church ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... at mass and at mealtimes, now and then to be allowed to bring water from the well for her or feed her pigeons, to see her gray gown go down between the orchard trees and catch the sunlight, to hear the hum of her spinning wheel, the thrum of her viol—this was the uttermost he got of joy in two long years; and how he envied Raffaelle running along the stone floor of the loggia to leap into her arms, to hang upon her skirts, to pick the summer fruit with her, and sort with her the ...
— Bimbi • Louise de la Ramee
... fare, as [3730]Simonides objected to Hieron, he hath all the pleasures of the world, [3731]in lectis eburneis dormit, vinum phialis bibit, optimis unguentis delibuitur, "he knows not the affliction of Joseph, stretching himself on ivory beds, and singing to the sound of the viol." And it troubles him that he hath not the like: there is a difference (he grumbles) between Laplolly and Pheasants, to tumble i' th' straw and lie in a down bed, betwixt wine and water, a cottage and a palace. "He hates nature" (as [3732]Pliny characterised him) "that she hath made him lower ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... return to the conference, observing, that all these parties were sitting down on the deck, and that Jemmy Ducks had his fiddle in his hand, holding it with the body downwards like a bass viol, for he always played it in that way, and that he occasionally fingered the strings, pinching them as you do a guitar, so as to send the sound of it aft, that Mr Vanslyperken might suppose that they were all met for mirth. Two or three had their eyes directed aft, ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... ancient times the banquets, which immediately followed sacrifices, were attended with instrumental music. For we read in Isaiah, v, 12: "And the harp and the viol, the tabret and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts." And in the households of wealthy Roman citizens, instruction was given in the art of carving, to the sound of music, with appropriate gestures, under the direction of the official ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... of objects of interest connected with the old Mission preserved in one room of the monastery. Among other things are two of the chorals; pieces of rawhide used for tying the beams, etc., in the original construction; the head of a bass-viol that used to be played by one of the Indians; a small mortar; and quite a number of books. Perhaps the strangest thing in the whole collection is an old barrel-organ made by Benjamin Dobson, The Minories, London. It has several barrels and on one of them is the following ...
— The Old Franciscan Missions Of California • George Wharton James
... The congregation was always small, and perhaps the three most enthusiastic members were Dick, Elsie, and the Corporal. For the Corporal had inherited a violoncello, or as it was always called in the village, a bass viol, from his father, and played it in the little gallery along with the two violins, flageolet and bassoon that formed the rest of the band. The notes that he could play were few, though sufficient for the humble needs of the church, ...
— The Drummer's Coat • J. W. Fortescue
... nothing new to you," Camors's host said to him. "It is simply Schubert's Serenade, which we have arranged, or deranged, after our own fancy; of which you shall judge. My niece sings, and the curate and I—'Arcades ambo'—respond successively—he on the bass-viol and I on my Stradivarius. Come, my dear Cure, ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... Le viol (says Voltaire) est aussi difficile a faire qu'a prouver. Des Eveques se seroient ils lignes pour une fille? (Hist. Generale, c. xxvi.) His argument is ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... description, celebrated with a joyous heart, and under the canopy of heaven, in a most delightful season of the year. If more exquisite music and more graceful dances accompanied the gathering in of the grapes on the banks of the Cephisus, the tabret and the viol and the harp, which sounded around the walls of the sacred metropolis, were not wanting in sweetness and gayety; and, instead of the frantic riot of satyrs and bacchanals, the rejoicing was chastened by the solemn ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... brain became his most precious treasures. Over and over he dwelt on them. Ever in memory his feet climbed the steps to the Acropolis or walked beneath stately orange-trees, beating a soft rhythm to the sound of flute and viol. For Achilles was by nature one of the lightest-hearted of children. In Athens his laugh had been quick to rise, and fresh as the breath of rustling leaves. It was only here, under the sooty sky of the narrow street, that his face had ...
— Mr. Achilles • Jennette Lee
... you'l say so: he playes o'th Viol-de-gamboys, and speaks three or four languages word for word without booke, & hath all ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... with lance in rest, and bearing her Medusa shield. Aristotle and Plato, Cicero and Virgil, all on horseback, with attendants in antique armor at their back, surrounded the daughter of Jupiter, while the city band, discoursing eloquent music from hautboy and viol, came upon the heels of the allegory. Then followed the mace-bearers and other officials, escorting the orator of the day, the newly-appointed professors and doctors, the magistrates and dignitaries, and the body of the ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... those which give variety to this feeling, by slight and repeated contact, so that the mind is attentive to constantly recurring impressions, and readily learns to discern their variations. This difference is clear in the use of musical instruments. The harsh and painful touch of the 'cello, bass-viol, and even of the violin, hardens the finger-tips, although it gives flexibility to the fingers. The soft and smooth touch of the harpsichord makes the fingers both flexible and sensitive. In this respect the harpsichord is ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... moment the pure, high voice of a singer who entertained the guests, strengthened by the chords of the viol by which she was accompanied, rose above the roar of the storm and penetrated the chamber of death. Don Juan would gladly have shut out this barbarous ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... sallies and to execute their several antics within certain limits of recognized license. But since each vied with the other to produce striking effects, the choir rivaling the orchestra, the tenor competing with the bass, the organ with the viol, it followed that the din of their accumulated efforts was not unjustly compared to that made by a 'sty of grunting pigs,' the builders of the Tower of Babel, or the 'squalling of cats in January.'[206] 'All their happiness,' ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... while consenting Britons praise, These votive measures deign to hear! For thee my Muse awakes her lays, For thee the unequal viol plays, The tribute of a soul sincere. Nor thou, illustrious chief, refuse 200 The incense of a nautic Muse! For ah! to whom shall Neptune's sons complain, But him whose arms unrivall'd rule the main? Deep on my ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... the gentleman you would go to see is very agreeable and good humoured.(1044) He has some very Pretty children, and a sensible, learned man that lives with him, one Dr. Thirlby,(1045) whom, I believe you know. The master of the house plays extremely well on the bass-viol, and has generally other musical people with him. He knows a good deal of the private history of a late ministry; and, my dear George, you love memoires. Indeed, as to personal acquaintance with any of the court beauties, I can't say you will find your account in him ; but, ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... downright misstatement," he continued, "look at this. Here is a Monsieur Kocher, who passes for an authority, and who, describing the Arab marriage customs, talks of the 'brutalite du viol dans le marriage—un drame lugubre.' Now that comes of not examining things with one's own eyes. Since my arrival here I have already seen several Arab weddings and something of their married life, and I must say, candidly, that ...
— Fountains In The Sand - Rambles Among The Oases Of Tunisia • Norman Douglas
... that?" murmured the other, with a sigh of infinite regret. "I am fond of the violincello, the viola da gamba of medieval times. Properly it is not a viol—not a base viol as some suppose, but a violin of extra large size. That ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... the worst of it. The little varlets had a way of jeering at the simple old doctor and his concerts, and mimicking the tones of his bass-viol. "There you go, Paddy-go-donk, Paddy-go-donk- -umph—chunk," some rascal of a boy would shout, while poor old Bullfrog's yellow spectacles would be bedewed with tears of honest indignation. In time, the jeers of these little savages began to tell on the society in the ...
— Queer Little Folks • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... speech and "appropriate instrumental music by the band," which consisted of a drum and a bass-viol, the people dispersed to amuse themselves as they saw fit, till ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, July 1878, No. 9 • Various
... beautiful piece of anapaestic verse whose metre and sentiment alike attract the reader. "Parsifal," by Miss Owen, shows satisfactory depth of thought, but is rather modern in metre. From the conformation of the last line of the first stanza, we are led to believe that the word "viol" is contracted to a monosyllable, or, to make a rather reprehensible pun, that "vi-ol" has here a "vile" pronunciation. "Frailties of Life," by Editor Baxley, shows a remarkable system of extended rhyming, coupled with a noticeable lack of metrical harmony. Mr. ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... Robert Danforth, his strong voice filling the shop as with the sound of a bass viol, "I consider myself equal to anything in the way of my own trade; though I should have made but a poor figure at yours with such a fist as this," added he, laughing, as he laid his vast hand beside the delicate one of Owen. "But what ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the singers' seat of a Sunday is a means o' grace: it's sort o' drawin' to the unregenerate, you know. Why, boys, in them days, I've walked ten miles over to Sherburne of a Sunday mornin', jest to play the bass-viol in the same singers' seat with Huldy. She was very much respected, Huldy was; and, when she went out to tailorin', she was allers bespoke six months ahead, and sent for in waggins up and down for ten miles round; for the young fellers was allers 'mazin' anxious to be ...
— Oldtown Fireside Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... grounds both St. Uincentiusand Senafinus de firmo (as I have seene them quoted) thinke that Aristotle was the viol of Gods wrath, which was powred out upon the waters of Wisedome by the third Angel;[1] But for my part, I thinke the world is much beholden to Aristotle for all its sciences. But yet twere a shame for these later ages to rest our selves meerely upon the labours of our Fore-fathers, as if they ...
— The Discovery of a World in the Moone • John Wilkins
... of Ann, the first he painted, showed her as Saint Cecelia hearkening to music which sounds from Heaven in her ears. Two sweet angel babes floated on thin clouds above her head, singing hymns to a mandoline and viol. Thus had my lord Cardinal commanded, and the work was so excellent that, if the Saint herself vouchsafed to look down on it out of Heaven, of a certainty it ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Tamara, take two ounces of coriander-seed, an ounce of anniseed, an ounce of fennel-seed, two ounces of cloves, and an ounce of cinamon; beat them into a gross powder, with a little powder of winter-savory, and put them into a viol-glass to keep. ...
— The accomplisht cook - or, The art & mystery of cookery • Robert May
... of amber light at their tips. Swift and startling answer came from deep within the heart of the cliff, a mighty note of sonorous beauty like the violent plucking of a string on some colossal bass viol. So powerful was the timbre of the pulsing sound that the entire side of the mountain seemed to ...
— The Cavern of the Shining Ones • Hal K. Wells
... Vitruvius says, amongst other things, that one who wishes to practise that art well must have something of music and good drawing, Giovanni, when he had mastered drawing, began to turn his mind to music, and together with the theory learned to play most excellently on the viol and the flute; and being a person of studious habits, he left his ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... into a small town, when sick o' my roaming, Whare ance play'd the viol, the tabor, and flute; 'Twas the hour loved by labour, the saft smiling gloaming, Yet the green round the ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... transparent-cheeked Madonnas with no limbs beneath their robes; of smooth-faced saints with well-combed beard and placid, vacant gaze, seated in well-ordered masses, holy with the purity of inanity; of divine dolls with pallid flaxen locks, floating between heaven and earth, playing upon lute and viol and psaltery; raised to faint visions of angels and blessed, moving noiseless, feelingless, meaningless, across the flowerets of Paradise; of assemblies of saints seated, arrayed in pure pink, and blue and lilac, in an atmosphere of liquid gold, in glory. And thus ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... said that Billings introduced the bass viol into the services of the Church, and thus began to break down the ancient Puritanical prejudices against musical instruments. He was also the first to use the pitch-pipe in order to ensure some degree of certainty in "striking up ...
— Annals of Music in America - A Chronological Record of Significant Musical Events • Henry Charles Lahee
... has been well brought up by her Aunt Prudence, as was governess in a nobleman's house. She can read and write, and cast accounts; good at her sampler, and can churn and make cheeses, and play of the viol, and lead the psalm in church, and dance a minuet, she can, with any lady in the land. As to her nursing in time of sickness, that I leave ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... had a large garden in the rear and spacious rooms where they entertained a great deal. Not long ago, I saw a fascinating drawing of a party in Georgetown in the fifties. It represented four musicians intent upon playing a bass viol, a cello, a violin, and a flute; a few of the company standing near by with curls and puffed coiffures, and among them a tiny man, side-whiskered, so short that he barely reached the shoulders of the ladies. He must, of course, ...
— A Portrait of Old George Town • Grace Dunlop Ecker
... across the prow and the poop, and spread the sail over it, so as to form a tent; beneath these tents they sing their songs, drinking wine freely, and accompanying their voices with the lyre, or three-stringed viol. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 532. Saturday, February 4, 1832 • Various
... the lid of a boiling pot, and presently sends a boy for his viol. At this, when it came, he snatched, and set to plucking a chord here and a chord there, grinning fearfully all ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... made to the platform at the further end of the hall; when this was reached, a little old man staggered into the hall, bearing on his shoulders a bass viol. ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte
... Accordingly, he sent to tell him, and Minuccio, who was a man of a debonair humour, incontinent came to her and having somedele comforted her with kindly speech, softly played her a fit or two on a viol he had with him and after sang her sundry songs, the which were fire and flame unto the damsel's passion, whereas he thought to solace her. Presently she told him that she would fain speak some words with him alone, wherefore, all else having ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... which violins were allowed in many meetings, if the performers "would play the fiddle wrong end up." Thus did our sanctimonious grandfathers cajole and persuade themselves that an inverted fiddle was not a fiddle at all, but a small bass-viol. An old lady, eighty years old, wrote thus in the middle of this century, of the church of her youth: "After awhile there was a bass-viol Introduced and brought into meeting and did not suit the Old people; one Old Gentleman got up, took his hat off the peg and marched ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... people were much devoted. Reading at sight was at that day, even more than now, a common accomplishment among the educated. The English queen Elizabeth was quite fond of music, and was somewhat accomplished in the art, performing upon the lute, virginals, and viol. She often charmed the attaches of and visitors to her court by her skilful performances. During her reign, and by her encouragement, the cultivation of this noble art received a new and ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter
... ev'ry little Fault, she'd lock me up to get Quarles's Emblems by heart, and threaten I shou'd lie in the great Room that's haunted, and never let one have any other diversion, than to hear the Chaplain play Jumping Joan upon the Base Viol. ...
— The Fine Lady's Airs (1709) • Thomas Baker
... Nights, in its present condition, was intended as a text or handbook for the Rawi or professional story-teller, who would declaim the recitative in quasi-conversational tones, would intone the Saj'a and would chant the metrical portions to the twanging of the Rababah or one-stringed viol. The Reviewer declares that the original has many such passages; but why does he not tell the reader that almost the whole Koran, and indeed all classical Arab prose, is composed in such "jingle"? "Doubtfully pleasing in the Arabic," it may "sound the reverse ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... music, or playing on them. Domenichino, who was in Rome when the sarcophagus of St. Cecilia was opened, and painted numerous pictures of the saint, shows her in one of them as performing on the bass viol. This picture is in the Louvre, where also is Mignard's canvas, representing her accompanying her voice ...
— Among the Great Masters of Music - Scenes in the Lives of Famous Musicians • Walter Rowlands
... not this be actually the case with the Indian bards, we are expressly told that it is so with the Arab story-teller, and that it accounts for much of the ribaldry and filth which have become embedded in the immortal "Nights." A viol having only one string accompanies the passages in verse with which the stories are interlarded; and a similar instrument seems to be used for the like purpose among the orthodox Guslars of Bosnia and Herzegovina.[10] A description given by Sir Richard Burton of a story-teller at the ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... Pipe and viol call the dances, Torch-light through the high halls glances; Waves a mighty shadow in; With manner bland Doth ask the maiden's hand, Doth ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... back of the canvas, between these two rows of houses, rises a great avenue, at the end of which in a dappled sky sits God the Father with Christ on His right, choirs of Seraphim playing on guitar and viol; God the Father immovable under his lofty tiara, His breast covered by His long beard, holds scales which balance exactly, the holy captives expiating precisely by their penances and prayers the blasphemies of ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... said, All the psalm-books at once fluttered open at "York," Sunned their long dotted wings in the words that he read, While the leader leaped into the tune just ahead, And politely picked out the key note with a fork, And the vicious old viol went growling along At the heels of the girls in the rear ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IX (of X) • Various
... screaming hautboy, trumpet shrill, Nor clanging cymbals; but, with skill, Exclude each one that would disturb The fairy architects, or curb The wild creations of their mirth, All that would wake the soul to earth. Choose ye the softly-breathing-flute, The mellow horn, the loving lute; The viol you must not forget, And take the sprightly flageolet And grave bassoon; choose too the fife, Whose warblings in the tuneful strife, Mingling in mystery with the words, May seem like notes ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse
... misspells "Passamezzo" as "Passemezzo" and "viol da gamba" as "viol de gamba." These have ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor
... many a land Flowed smoothly o'er his tongue. Oft with rapt eye, and skill profound, He woke the entrancing viol's sound, Or touched the sweet guitar. For heavenly music deigned to dwell An inmate in his cloistered cell, As beams the solem star, All night, with meditative eyes Where some lone, ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various
... of the Pitti Palace, which depicts a young Augustinian monk as he plays on a keyed instrument, having on one side of him a youthful cavalier in a plumed hat, on the other a bareheaded clerk holding a bass-viol, was, until Morelli arose, almost universally looked upon as one of the most typical Giorgiones.[31] The most gifted of the purely aesthetic critics who have approached the Italian Renaissance, Walter Pater, actually built round this Concert his exquisite study on the School of Giorgione. ...
— The Earlier Work of Titian • Claude Phillips
... what objection he had to the Brethren; but as he called them cannibals and German pickpockets, he cannot have had much respect for their personal character. At their love-feasts, he said, their chief object was to squeeze money from the poor. At some of their services they played the bass viol, and at others they did not, which plainly showed that they were unsteady in their minds. And, therefore, they were a ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... this my Ancestor was not only of a military Genius, but fit also for the Arts of Peace, for he played on the Base-Viol as well as any Gentlemen at Court; you see where his Viol hangs by his Basket-hilt Sword. The Action at the Tilt-yard you may be sure won the fair Lady, who was a Maid of Honour, and the greatest Beauty of her Time; here she stands, the next Picture. You see, Sir, my Great Great Great Grandmother ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... Marsh through the night: an infinity of flutings and tinklings made by tiny amphibia,—like the low blowing of numberless little tin horns, the clanking of billions of little bells;—and, at intervals, profound tones, vibrant and heavy, as of a bass viol—the orchestra of the great frogs! And interweaving with it all, one continuous shrilling,—keen as the steel speech of a ...
— Chita: A Memory of Last Island • Lafcadio Hearn
... on veil of evening The hills across from Cromwell grow dreamy and far; A wood-thrush is singing soft as a viol In the heart of the hollow where the dark pools are; The primrose has opened her pale yellow flowers And heaven ...
— Flame and Shadow • Sara Teasdale
... with the damsels, to viol and flute, So we skipped from the shadows, and mocked their pursuit; But the soft zephyrs chased us, with scents of the morn, As we passed by the hay-fields and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... I know not where, Ere viol's sigh; or organ's swell, Had made the sons of song aware That music! is a potent spell: A shepherd to a city came, Play'd on his pipe, and rose to fame. He sang of fields, and at each close, Applause from ready ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... if this tall, comely trifler, with a voice as musical as some grave-toned viol, were to be seen from time to time to relieve the tedium of life with the offensive Philadelphus. This admission instantly brought a shock to her. She had learned to study herself in these last few days since she had become aware of the ways ...
— The City of Delight - A Love Drama of the Siege and Fall of Jerusalem • Elizabeth Miller
... friend Ferrier's commonplace book, I find three poems from VIOL AND FLUTE copied out in his hand: 'When Flower-time,' 'Love in Winter,' and 'Mistrust.' They are capital too. But I thought the fact would interest you. He was no poetist either; so it means the more. 'Love in W.!' I ...
— The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 1 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... away. Mother sat down. Aunt Clara looked straight ahead, and her old-fashioned bonnet hid her face; but I could discover that something more than usual was working under her cap. I looked at every one of the singers, and then at the players, from the big bass-viol down to the tenor, and not a bit of reason could I perceive for the twitter the heads of our pew had certainly got themselves into. There's a pattern old lady, Prudence Clark, presidentess of the Dorcas Society,—a spinster, just Aunt Clara's age,—a woman who knows everything, and more too. She ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 110, December, 1866 - A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics • Various
... their Party draw, and fight with Fil. and Gal. Marcella ingages on their side; all fight, the Musick confusedly amongst 'em: Gal. loses his Sword, and in the hurry gets a Base Viol, and happens to strike Tickletext, who is getting away—his Head breaks its way quite through, and it hangs about ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... and abandon himself to the delight of reading the Izaak Walton of music. It is a most quaint and curious treatise upon "the Noble Lute, the best of instruments," with a chapter upon "the generous Viol," by Thomas Mace, "one of the clerks of Trinity College in the University of Cambridge." Master Mace deigns not to mention keyed instruments, probably regarding keys as old sailors regard the lubber's hole,—fit only for greenhorns. The "Noble Lute," of which Thomas Mace ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... grew up, above the name, why the name attached itself, in many instances, to the bravest work of other men. The Concert in the Pitti Palace, in which a monk, with cowl and tonsure, touches the keys of a harpsichord, while a clerk, placed behind him, grasps the handle of the viol, and a third, with hat and plume, seems to wait upon the true interval for beginning to sing, is undoubtedly Giorgione's. The outline of the lifted finger, the trace of the plume, the very threads ...
— The Renaissance - Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Pater
... rarer sort so long Drew the rein, to 'scape the din Of the cymbal and the gong, Topers of the classic bin,— Oporto, sherris and tokay, Muscatel, and beaujolais— Conning some old Book of Airs, Lolling in their Queen Anne chairs— Catch or glee or madrigal, Writ for viol or virginal; Or from France some courtly tune, Gavotte, ridotto, rigadoon; (Watteau and the rising moon); Ballade, rondeau, triolet, Villanelle or virelay, Wistful of a statelier day, Gallant, delicate, desire: Where the Sign swings of the Lyre, Garlands droop above the door, Thou, ...
— A Jongleur Strayed - Verses on Love and Other Matters Sacred and Profane • Richard Le Gallienne
... come nearer to this great head it begins to assume different aspects, according to your point of view. If you stand on its summit and look at these two F-shaped spoutholes, you would take the whole head for an enormous bass-viol, and these spiracles, the apertures in its sounding-board. Then, again, if you fix your eye upon this strange, crested, comb-like incrustation on the top of the mass—this green, barnacled thing, which the Greenlanders call the "crown," ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville |
