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Tremulous   /trˈɛmjələs/   Listen
Tremulous

adjective
1.
(of the voice) quivering as from weakness or fear.  Synonym: quavering.  "Spoke timidly in a tremulous voice"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Tremulous" Quotes from Famous Books



... some former periods of the history of their love. Perhaps it was that which had made her look paler than usual for some little time. Something was evidently preying on her. Her only delight seemed to be in listening to Gifted as he read, sometimes with fine declamatory emphasis, sometimes in low, tremulous tones, the various poems enshrined in his manuscript. At other times she was sad, and more than once Mrs. Hopkins had seen a tear steal down her innocent cheek, when there seemed to be no special cause for grief. She ventured to speak of it to ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... now; you two are of no age, no experience of life separates you; it is the boy's hour, and you have come up for judgment. "Have I done well to-day, my son?" You have got to say it, and nothing may you hide from him; he knows all. How like your voice has grown to his, but more tremulous, and both so solemn, so unlike the voice of either of you ...
— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie

... sister, who sat white and motionless opposite him. There was no light but the fire-light; and the atmosphere of the room had that singular sensitiveness that is apparent enough when the spiritual body is on the alert. It felt full of "presence;" was tremulous, as if stirred by wings; and seemed to press heavily, and to make ...
— The Hallam Succession • Amelia Edith Barr

... turned to me, with hollow eyes, still preserving her tragic calm. "I am afraid of it, too," she said, her drawn lips tremulous. "Dr. Cumberledge, we must get him back! We must induce ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen

... trunk of a tree; but it was Rudy. He slept not and still less was he dead; but as the most important events of this earth, as well as affairs of vital moment for individuals pass over the wires, without their giving out a tone or a tremulous movement, even so flashed through Rudy, thoughts—powerful, overwhelming, speaking of the happiness of his life; his, henceforth, "constant thought." His eyes were fixed upon a point in the trellis-work, and this was a light in ...
— The Ice-Maiden: and Other Tales. • Hans Christian Andersen

... eloquence and religious fervour had already given the earnest of high eminence in his profession. He was a person of very striking aspect, with a white, lofty, and impending brow; large, brown, melancholy eyes, and a mouth which, unless when he forcibly compressed it, was apt to be tremulous, expressing both nervous sensibility and a vast power of self restraint. Notwithstanding his high native gifts and scholar-like attainments, there was an air about this young minister—an apprehensive, a startled, a half-frightened look—as of a being who ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... opened on the verandah, was at this moment imperfectly closed, and from the spot where I stood, I could hear every word that was spoken in that recess. I heard Julia complaining to her mother of my unkindness, in a voice broken by sobs, and tremulous with passion. The child's statement of the facts that had led to my interference, was totally false; for an instant I felt inclined to follow her, in order to contradict it, but the bane of my nature, pride, which always made me ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton

... roused him somewhat from his abyss of terror. He opened his eyes wide enough to see what was going on. He could not see the old woman's face, but he saw her kneeling, and he saw her thin hands clasped before her, like one in prayer, and tremulous. ...
— Among the Brigands • James de Mille

... temper was greatly improved, and she was patient. A tremulous uncertainty of the action of all her limbs soon became a part of her regular state, and afterwards, at intervals of two or three months, she would often put her hands to her head, and would then remain for about a week at a time in some gloomy aberration of mind. We ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... her a sort of eagle—soaring, striving—always with an eye upon the hills, and fighting with the sunbeams. I have subdued her. She is now like a timid fawn that trembles at the very falling of a leaf in the forests. She pants with hope to see me, and pants with tremulous delight when I come. Still, she shows every now and then, a glimmering of that eagle spirit which she had at first. She flashes up suddenly, but soon sinks again. Fancy a creature, an idolater of fame before, suddenly ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms

... Once more she relapsed into thought, while he sat contemplating her profile. She turned to him again with a tremulous smile. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... name," said he, at last, in an altered and tremulous tone; "tell me, now, all that you ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume II. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... upon the southern border of the moon, and in the direction followed by the projectile, a few brilliant points outlined against the dark screen of the sky. They looked like a succession of sharp peaks with profiles in a tremulous line. They were rather brilliant. The terminal line of the moon looks the same when she is in one ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne

... was tremulous with indignation or grief, and all at once Amy remembered. Then she sprang from her cosy nest, wide-awake and ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond

... was a blur, a texture of conscious and unconscious misery till a night came when the woof broke and trailed away from him, and he lifted himself on his elbow and after he had drunk a long draft from the spring, found tremulous strength to get to his feet. He tried some steps in the open space, where the light of the full moon fell, and found that he could walk. He reached the tangled entrance to his covert, and stealthily put the vines aside. He peered ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells

... a hundred ships were in the deep roadstead, a cable's length from each other—their hulls, spars, and rigging magnified to gigantic proportions under the deceptive and tremulous moonbeam. They were motionless as if the sea had been frozen around them into a solid crystal. Their flags drooped listlessly down, trailing along the masts, or warped ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid

... life a pilgrimage, And that, a brief one. True!—Of two short spans This side of earth to two short spans below. I will recline upon the middle path. The man who bears his head erect today No later than tomorrow on his breast Bows it, all tremulous. Another dawn, And, lo, it lies a skull beside his heel! Indeed, there is a sun, they say, that shines On fields beyond e'en brighter than these fields. I do believe it; only pity 'tis The eye, that shall perceive the ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... sweethearts near only to separate them again into distant and strange lands; but to love is the great amulet which makes the world a garden; and 'hope, which comes to all,' outwears the accidents of life, and reaches with tremulous hand beyond the grave and death. Easy to say: yea, but also, by God's mercy, both ...
— The Pocket R.L.S. - Being Favourite Passages from the Works of Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson

... something white was visible. It was Militona's answer. Andres called a sereno, or watchman, who just then passed, with his lantern at the end of his halbert, and begging him to lower the light, read the following words, written in a tremulous hand, and in large ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various

... dark pines she sees the silver moon, And in the west, all tremulous, a star; And soothing sweet she hears the mellow tune Of cow-bells jangled in ...
— Songs of a Sourdough • Robert W. Service

... a tremulous little laugh. "That was the day I caught you eavesdropping and ordered you off your ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell

... palace with his dolorous cries Echo again. Oh, well do I remember! Electra swiftly bore me through this hall Thither where Strophius in his pitying arms Received me—Strophius, less by far thy father Than mine, thereafter—and fled onward with me By yonder postern-gate, all tremulous; And after me there ran upon the air Long a wild clamor and a lamentation That made me weep and shudder and lament, I knew not why, and weeping Strophius ran, Preventing with his hand my outcries shrill, Clasping me close, and sprinkling all my face With bitter tears; and to the lonely coast, ...
— Modern Italian Poets • W. D. Howells

... a fragrant, steaming bowl, the old crone made her slow entrance upon the scene, peering with dim eyes, and dropping tremulous curtseys every two ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... troubles that He sends have the light terribly muffled in darkness, and it needs strong faith and insight to pierce through the cloud to see the gleam of anything bright beneath. But when we turn to this other region, and think of what comes to every poor, tremulous, human heart, that likes to take it through that Divine Spirit—the forgiveness of sins, the rectification of errors, the purification of lusts and passions, the gleams of hope on the future, and ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren

... homeward in the balmy evenings of his first summer at Barbie, no eye had he for the large evening star, tremulous above the woods, or for the dreaming sprays against the yellow west. It wasn't his business; he had other things to mind. Yet Wilson was a dreamer too. His close, musing eye, peering at the dusky-brown nodge ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... thief saw that he had drawn the attention of the visitors, he thrust his arm out and beckoned to the colonel. "Mister, I want to ask you to do me a little turn of a favor," he begged in a voice new to Joe, so full of anguish, so tremulous and weak. "I want you to carry out to the world and put in the papers the last ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden

... not just now, because there is still money to be made out of his ludicrous appearance, with an incidental dance or song on their own part. Vaguely perturbing, these negro melodies and thrummings; their reiteration of monotony awakens tremulous echoes on the human diaphragm and stirs ...
— Fountains In The Sand - Rambles Among The Oases Of Tunisia • Norman Douglas

... believe that it was she, Elsie Maxwell, who stood there on the tremulous island of the ship amidst a stormy ocean the like of which she had never seen before. She seemed to possess an entity apart from herself, to be a passive witness of events as in a dream; presently, she would awake and find that she was back in her pleasant room at the Morrisons' hacienda, ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy

... Fort St. John was jealous of such dying as the song ceased and he lifted his hand to signal his executioners. Father Jogues turned away praying with tremulous lips. The Capuchin strode toward the hall. But Van Corlaer and Lady Dorinda and Antonia held with the strength of all three that broken-hearted woman who struggled like a giantess with her arms stretched ...
— The Lady of Fort St. John • Mary Hartwell Catherwood

... stage, a mere trifle in advance of others in the scene, and proceeded to remove his long leggings. He drew a great coloured handkerchief and brushed away some clinging snow; then leaning forward, with slightly tremulous fingers, he began to unfasten a top buckle. Suddenly the trembling ceased, the fingers clenched hard upon the buckle, the whole body became still, then rigid—it seemed not to breathe! The one sign of life in the man was the agonisingly ...
— [19th Century Actor] Autobiographies • George Iles

... tremulous muscles, and lamentable voice and manner, confirmed to me the truth of the assertion that she had been frightened ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth

... standing in the hall when Joan appeared. A faintly tremulous smile was on her lips, but she came steadily up to him and held ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile

... squirrel would do when closely pressed, I climbed the tree. As I drew near he took refuge in the topmost branch, and then, as I came on, he boldly leaped into the air, spread himself out upon it, and, with a quick, tremulous motion of his tail and legs, descended quite slowly and landed upon the ground thirty feet below me, apparently none the worse for the leap, for he ran with great speed and eluding the dog took refuge ...
— Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers • John Burroughs

... tempestuous moment they looked at each other. Something perilously sweet and magnetic drew her. Even as she rose Gregg was at her side. She felt his arms close about her with eager tenderness. She stood against him within his hold, tremulous, thrilling to his nearness, yet even in the ecstasy of it, realizing that their separation was ...
— Where the Sun Swings North • Barrett Willoughby

... look! With tremulous points of fire, The sun, red-sinking lights yon distant spire O'er leafy hill and blossoming meadows, Spreads wide and level his departing beams, Then sinks to rest, as one sure of sweet dreams, 'Mid pillowing clouds and curtaining shadows. Night draws her ...
— The World As I Have Found It - Sequel to Incidents in the Life of a Blind Girl • Mary L. Day Arms

... be that Lord Vernon had been so fortunate as to find a topic of conversation equally absorbing; at any rate, Nell entered the hotel with her sister rather subdued and tremulous, and they mounted to their rooms in silence. A week before, they would probably have thrown themselves into each other's arms and kissed each other and cuddled each other and cried over each other, without precisely knowing why, or, at ...
— Affairs of State • Burton E. Stevenson

... weak and unstrung, and while a tremulous smile hovered about his mouth, his eyes so moistened that he turned toward the wall. After a moment he said, "Miss Walton, I am not worthy ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe

... the solemn request of the deacons and elders of the church in Boston that the Rev. Mr. Dimmesdale went to Roger Chillingworth for professional advice. The young minister's health was failing, his cheek was paler and thinner, and his voice more tremulous with every ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... against him an instant, all one quivering, surrendered body; and then lifting a white face, true in its radiance to her honest and supreme purpose to give him one fleeting glimpse of the beauty and tenderness and soul of love, she put warm and tremulous ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey

... companion a glance of terrible intensity, moving his hands the while in a weird, sinuous rhythm, until presently, satisfied with the vacant expression which had replaced the eager look of the moment before in the eyes of the tremulous Raikes, the Sepoy began, with an indescribably easy, somnolent modulation, the following ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder

... defile, filled from end to end with orchards of peaches and figs, through which the river Gyndes foamed down to meet him; over the broad rice-fields, where the autumnal vapours spread their deathly mists; following along the course of the river, under tremulous shadows of poplar and tamarind, among the lower hills; and out upon the flat plain, where the road ran straight as an arrow through the stubble-fields and parched meadows; past the city of Ctesiphon, where the Parthian emperors reigned, ...
— The Story of the Other Wise Man • Henry Van Dyke

... made her plea,—rapid, girlish, rather incoherent, but understandable enough. They would go away together and be married. She had it all planned and some of it arranged. And then they would hide somewhere, and—"And always be together," she finished, tremulous with anxiety. ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... this man was less to be endured than to look upon the face of an avenging deity. I was determined to avoid this interview, and, for this end, to execute my fatal purpose within the hour. My papers were collected with a tremulous hand, and consigned to the flames. I then bade my landlord inform all visitants that I should not return till the next day, and once ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown

... sable colour; all was propitious for his work. Then suddenly, the air being to all seeming quite still, the grey-green leaves began to shake and quiver, until each olive tree was like a silver bonfire, tremulous with a thousand waves of white flame flowing and following along the branches. It was a revelation and swift effluence of life, perplexing and full of charm. The brush was laid down, the moment of ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith

... signalling, and after Woodford had gone half way to the river he paused among the shadows and listened. He had been startled by the report of the gun, but everything was now still. Placing his thumb and forefinger between his lips, he emitted a sharp, tremulous whistle, which was instantly answered by a similar call from some point not far off. A few minutes later he and Miller, after a few precautions, came together ...
— The Launch Boys' Adventures in Northern Waters • Edward S. Ellis

... thin winnow through the woods With tremulous noise, that bids, at every breath, Some sickly cankered leaf Let go its hold ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry

... nothing—nothing," burst out Dare at last, in a tremulous voice, "to the one thing I think of all night, all day—how I love Miss Deyncourt, and how," with a simplicity which touched Mr. Alwynn, "she does not ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley

... particoloured stains against the darker rags and tatters of other buildings; while blinking in the sunlight I could discern clatter-emitting, windows which looked to me like watchful eyes. Only on the nearer side of the wall was a sparse strip of turf dotted over with ragged, withered, tremulous stems, and beyond this, again, lay the site of a burnt building which constituted a black patch of earth-heaps, broken stoves, dull grey ashes, and coal dust. To heaven gaped the black, noisome mouths of burning-pits wherein the ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky

... Francesco," says Aurelia in a twitter, "I am glad to see you again." She was tremulous, beautiful; she had her old wayward, ardent ways, her childish bloom and roundness had not left her, nor her sumptuousness, nor her allure—and yet I could look calmly into her face and know that she had no ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett

... did not say for whom," I said quickly, noticing the sudden shadow on her face and the tremulous voice. ...
— The Empty House And Other Ghost Stories • Algernon Blackwood

... of the car before a gentle breeze. The doctor got out almost precipitately, followed by a gaunt madman, mouthing vileness, who had only a minute or so before been a decent British citizen. He made some blind lunges at the tremulous but obdurate car, but rather as if he looked for offences and accusations than for displacements to adjust. Quivering and refusing, the little car was extraordinarily like some recalcitrant little old aristocratic lady in the hands of ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells

... 'seems,'—you don't know anything about it!" the earnest, tremulous voice went on. "How can anyone know who ...
— Judith Lynn - A Story of the Sea • Annie Hamilton Donnell

... extent was very different at different times, but it was never less than eight or ten points of the compass: Through and out of this passed rays of light of a brighter colour, which vanished, and were renewed nearly in the same time as those of the aurora borealis, but had no degree of the tremulous or vibratory motion which is observed in that phaenomenon: The body of it bore S.S.E. from the ship, and it continued, without any diminution of its brightness, till twelve o'clock, when we retired to sleep, but how long ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr

... for death suddenly claimed him before the aged Pope whom he had hoped to succeed. Tasso's tragedy culminated, as Goethe tells us, at another villa, that of Belriguardo. The pastoral of Villa d'Este ends in a chorus or envoy expressive of that tremulous hope which flutters so deliciously in every line of ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney

... it," said Dexter, in a low, tremulous whisper. "It's too horrid to get in there and ...
— Quicksilver - The Boy With No Skid To His Wheel • George Manville Fenn

... bring Beauty out of Chaos, and to establish a fresh order of things upon the surface of our Earth. And, as the first step thereto, "the SPIRIT of GOD moved upon the face of the waters." The Hebrew phrase implies no less than the tremulous brooding as of a bird,—causing the dreary waste to heave and swell with coming life. "And GOD said, Let there be Light. And there was Light." "He spake and it was done[285]." From Himself, who is "the true Light," (not from the Sun, which,—like the rest ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon

... manner, the resources of his own ingenuity, from the overwhelming difficulties with which he was surrounded. Wretched client! unhappy advocate! what a combination do you form! But such is the condition of guilt—its commission mean and tremulous—its defence artificial and insincere—its prosecution candid and simple—its condemnation dignified and austere. Such has been the defendant's guilt—such his defence—such shall be my address to you—and such, I trust, your verdict. The learned counsel has told you that this unfortunate woman ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous

... the river below. Through the opening in the trees, they would see the slow running Souris, on which the sunshine glinted, making its easy way to join its elder brother, the Assiniboine, on the long, long march to the sea. Across the river plumy willows, pale green and tremulous, grew paler still as a wind passed ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung

... destruction toward which he was rushing with all the feverish haste of slavish appetite? Ah, yes, but only when it was too late. In his clenched hand, as he lay dead, was found a crumpled paper containing the following, in lines barely legible so tremulous were the nerves of the writer: "Wife, children, and over forty thousand dollars all gone! I alone am responsible. All has gone down my throat. When I was twenty-one I had a fortune. I am not yet thirty-five years old. I have killed my ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden

... heard an improvised song with the accompaniment of the soroz (violin) only. This time—an exception in my experience—the song was given in a deep, low, nasal voice, each note being tremulous and held on for several minutes in a most ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... again, and then said, lifting a tremulous glance to his face: "That makes his offer all ...
— Sanctuary • Edith Wharton

... Without sign of recognition she glanced from one to another, until her eyes fell upon good Parson Shurtleff watching her with a gentle wonder in his face. It was for him that she had been looking. She went up to him immediately, and laid a tremulous hand upon his arm. She tried to smile, but the effort was so plain and her face so pale that an anxiety diffused itself through the assembly; it was felt that her presence here alone showed that something had happened, and her expression, that it was ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume II. No. 4, January, 1885 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various

... soul would utter itself. She went to the piano as in a dream. Soft, low notes, faint and sweet, breathed of tender questionings and tremulous doubts; then a higher, more triumphant strain of victory swelled the notes that lingered but a moment, ere a tone of sadness and regret struck the keys, whispering of sacred duty and solemn responsibility.... Again the ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson

... she kissed him and laid her head on his breast. And he could only repeat what was nearest, the credo of his love, and while his arms were about her they were strong, but when he tried to take them away, they were as tremulous as the veriest aspen. ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford

... up this gallant hero and a kind fortune had placed him within his very hands. Another voice broke the ensuing silence, one that had a great effect on Guy, for he could only remember the familiar strains of his uncle's voice by its ruins, it was weak and tremulous and uncertain, its ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera

... disk held to his ear in the closet of his bedroom a voice, tremulous with nervous fatigue, was giving Lanstron news that all his aircraft and cavalry and spies could not have gained; news worth more than a score of regiments; news fresh from the lips of the chief of staff of the enemy. ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer

... in less esteem than those of the doctor, lawyer, and minister. In her judgment, the kernel of the matter was not alluded to, so she arose and said: "Mr. President." She records that "at length President Davies stepped to the front and said in a tremulous, mocking tone," "What will the lady have?" "I wish, sir," she said, "to speak to the question." "What is the pleasure of the convention?" asked Mr. Davies. A gentleman moved that she be heard; another seconded the motion; whereupon, she records, ...
— Woman and the Republic • Helen Kendrick Johnson

... he saved Tegakwita from the perils of the hunt. Tegakwita has not forgotten. When the White Chief became a captive, he had not forgotten. He has lost his brave name as a warrior because he believed in the White Chief. He has lost—" his voice grew tremulous with the emotion that lay underneath the words—"He has lost his sister, whom he sent to be a sister to the white man ...
— The Road to Frontenac • Samuel Merwin

... moved by pity for that castaway (she was as much of a castaway as any one ever wrecked on a desert island), but as if beguiled by some extraordinary promise. Nothing more unworthy could be imagined. The recollection of that tremulous whisper when I gripped her shoulder with one hand and held a plate of chicken with the other was enough to make me break all my ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad

... Air, impregnated, and made Sonorous by the impressed Character of the Life, or is such, as whilst it is in breathing forth, doth smite upon the Organs of the Voice, so, as they tremble thereupon; for indeed, without this tremulous Motion, no Voice is made: Yea, not only the Larynx, or Wind-pipe, doth thereupon tremble, but the whole Skull also; yea, and sometimes all the Bones of the whole Body, which any one may easily find in himself, by his applying his Hand to his Throat, and laying it on ...
— The Talking Deaf Man - A Method Proposed, Whereby He Who is Born Deaf, May Learn to Speak, 1692 • John Conrade Amman

... rosy glamor lingered in the air. William rested an elbow upon the gate-post, and with his chin reposing in his hand gazed long in the direction in which the unknown had vanished. And his soul was tremulous, for she had done her work but ...
— Seventeen - A Tale Of Youth And Summer Time And The Baxter Family Especially William • Booth Tarkington

... organ, now tremulous and low, now strong and deep, caused a profound silence to fall upon the square; but, as the last note died away, there was a great scrambling for places to see the procession ...
— Prince Zilah, Complete • Jules Claretie

... perfumes, came at last; and in the early morning, when I used to ramble through the stretches of flowers and shrubbery, and under the trees, tremulous with bird song, I wondered how the owner of all this beauty could willingly banish himself from it. Thomas permitted me to gather flowers at will—a favor I used to the utmost, among others sending Mrs. Le Grande ...
— Medoline Selwyn's Work • Mrs. J. J. Colter

... behind her with that inimitable lightness of hers which of late she had seemed to have lost. She went from him to wait upon Guy with the tremulous laugh upon her lips, and when she returned she had fully recovered her self-control, and talked with him upon many matters connected with the farm which he had not heard her mention during all the period of her nursing. She ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell

... is you, leaf plucked from Love's tree, You mayhap, that stirs my affection. There's a tremulous glance of the eye, The thought she might chance yet to come: 5 But who then would greet her with song? Your day has flown, your vision of her— A time this for gnawing the heart. I've plunged just now in deep waters: Oh the strife and vexation ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... towered above her and even above Gallito. She was a colossal Venus, with a face pink and white as a may-blossom. Tremulous smiles played about her soft, babyish mouth and a joyous excitement shone in her wide, blue eyes. Upon her head was a small, lop-sided bonnet, from which depended a rusty crepe veil of which she seemed inordinately conscious, ...
— The Black Pearl • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow

... love you, Hollingsworth!" I could not have been more certain of what it meant. They then walked onward, as before. But, methought, as the declining sun threw Zenobia's magnified shadow along the path, I beheld it tremulous; and the delicate stem of the flower which she wore in her hair was likewise responsive ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... Como lies, a swarm of lights, behind us; the hills and shadows gloom around; the lake is a sheet of tremulous silver. There is no telling how we get back to our hotel, or with what satisfied hearts we fall asleep in our room there. The steamer starts for the head of the lake at eight o'clock in the morning, and we go on board at ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells

... around it in a sort of ivy-tendril fashion, came first. Her two daughters, in blue gowns, with pretty, agitated faces, followed; then the young son, fairly teetering with excitement; then the grandmother, a little, tremulous old lady in an ...
— The Jamesons • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... shepherd folded his hands, and a silent prayer arose from his heart for his absent sons. He then rose from his lowly seat, and whistled to his faithful Phylax to follow. The flock arrived at the village, and were driven by the dog into the sheep-pen, from which was heard the tremulous bleating of the lambs, who were rejoicing over their dams' arrival. Father Buschman waited impatiently until the last sheep had entered, and then hastened toward the large farm house to the ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach

... them. Ah! child, the words of Asclepiodorus have a sinister meaning. The calmness and pride, with which you look at me make me fear for you, and yet, as you know, I am not one of the timid and tremulous. Certainly what they propose to you is repulsive enough, but submit to it; it is to be hoped it will not be for long. Do it for my sake and for that of poor Irene, for though you might know how to assert your dignity and take care of yourself outside these walls in the rough and greedy world, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... now. I shall cross the Channel by the mail to-night, and see how a few weeks' change will help me.' He took her hand. 'Is there anything in the world that I can do for you?' he asked very earnestly. She thanked him, and tried to release her hand. He held it with a tremulous lingering grasp. 'God bless you, Agnes!' he said in faltering tones, with his eyes on the ground. Her face flushed again, and the next instant turned paler than ever; she knew his heart as well as he knew it himself—she was too ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins

... as to be unable to rise when we entered, saluted us with the usual "Glad to see you, strangers," his spouse at the same time advancing towards us to shake hands. He was evidently used to such intrusions; for, after inquiry where we came from and whither bound, he began, in a tremulous voice, which, from his extreme age, was scarcely intelligible, to narrate his early adventures. It was absolutely shocking, as he became more animated by the subject, to hear the coolness with which the veteran related some of his bloody combats; so much so, indeed, ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell

... but a little over sixteen, her head filled with the bright stuff of romance, and he was a forceful man who for his own purposes had long studied her. She came to the tryst, albeit half in trembling, a dozen tremulous times ...
— The Bells of San Juan • Jackson Gregory

... hand, holding her Lover's letter, had lost its somewhat tremulous look. The fingers of the other hand had tightened about the pen, hovering over that unwritten page. And, in short, she seemed ready to write the answer—what will it be? The heart of the Youth was full ...
— The Story of a Picture • Douglass Sherley

... friends sitting with Johnson. Mr. Burke said to him, "I am afraid, Sir, such a number of us may be oppressive to you." "No, Sir, (said Johnson,) it is not so; and I must be in a wretched state, indeed, when your company would not be a delight to me." Mr. Burke, in a tremulous voice, expressive of being very tenderly affected, replied, "My dear Sir, you have always been too good to me." Immediately afterwards he went away. This was the last circumstance in the acquaintance of ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell

... is in closest, most immediate understanding with its own unchangeable root, God himself. Such faith may not at once remove the physical cause, if such there be, but it will be more potent still; in the presence of both the cause and the effect, its very atmosphere will be a peace tremulous with unborn gladness. This gained, the medicine, the regimen, or the change of air may be resorted to without sense of degradation, with cheerful hope and some indifference. Such is perhaps the final victory ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald

... could a boy imagine it?) Miss Faringfield would not have it that his yielding should be due to her mother, if it could be achieved as a victory for herself. So she stopped him with a sudden tremulous "Oh, Phil!" and, raising her forearm to the door-post, hid her face against it, and wept as if her heart ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens

... old manner. "'Skipper Tommy,' says the Lard," he whispered, "'Skipper Tommy,' says He, 'leave you an' Me,' says He, 'be friends. You'll never regret it, b'y,' says He, 'an you make friends with Me.' Blessed," he said, his last, low voice tremulous with deep gratitude, "oh, blessed be ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan

... and then the gentlest possible breath of night-wind disturbed the branches overhead; but nothing else caught his notice. To prevent the feeling of utter loneliness from gaining possession of him, Fred occasionally emitted a low, soft, tremulous whistle, which was instantly responded to from the direction of Mickey. It was the old familiar signal which they had used many a time when off on their little hunting expeditions, and either, hearing it, could not mistake ...
— In the Pecos Country • Edward Sylvester Ellis (AKA Lieutenant R.H. Jayne)

... to come back upon Tom, a thought which my unexpected appearance on the scene had driven from his drunken brain. The look of virtuous indignation returned, and staring at the little girl through glazed eyes, he said with the tremulous and tearful voice of a ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton

... list was forgotten and Susan Jenks coming up for it was made a party to that tremulous secret, and the fate of the dinner was threatened until Mary, coming back to realities, kissed her sister and went to her desk, and held herself sternly to the five following courses of the family dinner which was to please the palates of those fresh from Paris and London and from castles ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey

... "Go forth, my children, and live!" of its Alma Mater. T, Haviland Hicks, Jr., and timorous little Theophilus had jointly delivered the Valedictory, eight other Seniors, including Butch, Scoop, and the lengthy Ichabod, had swayed the crowd with oratory. Kindly old Prexy, his voice tremulous, had talked to them, as students, for the last time. The Class Ode had been sung, the Class Shield unveiled, and then—Hicks and his comrades ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice

... expected to appear in Grand Opera in London, but, alas! her voice broke down, and serious throat troubles manifested themselves. She had lost all the upper notes of her voice from C in alt. down to D in the stave, and what was left of it was thin, reedy, and tremulous, like that of an old woman instead of a girl of 24. Her master had insisted on clavicular breathing, the result being that when her lung capacity was tested it registered only 80 cubic inches instead of 240. In addition to faulty breathing, she had been allowed to force up the registers ...
— The Mechanism of the Human Voice • Emil Behnke

... friends," he said, in a tremulous voice, "that all is well with our brother and commander. His last words ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 8 • Various

... threatened to overmaster him—he wandered to the stables, which he found empty of men and nearly so of horses, half-involuntarily sought the stall of the mare his father had given him on his last birthday, laid his head on the neck bent round to greet him, and sighed a sore response to her soft, low, tremulous whinny. ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald

... towards the grate. The fire had long been out, but the wood was still unconsumed, and I managed, inexpertly enough, to relight it. When a long blue flame sprang up, he drew his chair near the hearth and stretched towards the blaze his still tremulous hands. ...
— Cecilia de Noel • Lanoe Falconer

... were in the act of emerging from the front door, Mrs. Bumble was dropping the second of three tremulous curtsies, and Mr. Bumble was offering the stirrup-cup of humble duty, when the terrier emerged from some laurels and, recognizing Valerie, rushed delightedly to her side. Before she was aware of his presence, he was leaping to ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates

... felt reassured. She touched the clammy wall on each side of her, and essayed a tremulous whistle. It was a brave little tune; she knew not whence it came till it suddenly flashed upon her that she had heard it on Bertrand's lips on the day that he had drawn his pictures in the sand. ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell

... His hands were tremulous and his eyes glowing as he put the note down and faced himself in the glass. The pleasure of meeting her again under such conditions made him forget, for the moment, the role she was to play—a part he particularly detested. ...
— The Light of the Star - A Novel • Hamlin Garland

... and stood gazing up into the window, but whether he saw something or heard something I could not tell. Apparently he was not sure himself, for presently, a little tremulous, he added ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle

... Edward Forster's voice was tremulous at the close of his appeal, and his brother appeared to be affected. There was a silence of a minute, when the customary "humph!" was ejaculated, and John Forster then continued: "A very foolish business, brother—very foolish, indeed. When Nicholas and his son ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat

... In long-drawn, tremulous notes he voiced the beautiful plea for aid in the hour of man's supreme need, which finds expression in the first two lines. Then, with his bow gripping the strings in a great sweeping crescendo, he poured forth in full strong chords ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor

... their united diadems illumined space like the fires of the sky at dawn upon the mountains. Waves of light flowed from their hair, and their movements created tremulous undulations in space like the billows of a ...
— Seraphita • Honore de Balzac

... thus the origin, not only of all broad, mighty, and calm conception, but of all that is divided, delicate, and tremulous; "variable as the shade, by the light quivering aspen made." To them, as first leaders of ornamental design, belongs, of right, the praise of glistenings in gold, piercings in ivory, stainings in purple, ...
— Aratra Pentelici, Seven Lectures on the Elements of Sculpture - Given before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1870 • John Ruskin

... human heart; but from time to time a good man held out a helping hand to one of them, and gave him the shelter of his roof, and tried to reclaim him. Then the boys saw him going about the streets, pale and tremulous, in a second-hand suit of his benefactor's clothes, and fighting hard against the tempter that beset him on every side in that town; and then some day they saw him dead drunk in a fence corner; and they did not understand how seven devils worse ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells

... because of the unfamiliar solitary dark, to his loved elms. There, for the first time, he beheld London by night. It seemed to him then more wonderful and appalling than all the host of stars. There was something ominous in that heavy pulsating breath: visible, in a waning and waxing of the tremulous, ruddy glow above the black enmassed leagues of masonry; audible, in the low inarticulate moaning borne eastward across the crests of Norwood. It was then and there that the tragic significance of ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp

... tragedy of her life was fusing. Lawless could not bear to look long, for the fire that consumes a body and sets free a soul is not for the sight of the quick. At last she rose, her body steady, but her hands having that tremulous ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... village until eight o'clock. It was now very dark and had begun to rain, not real rain, but a thin drizzle which mixed up with the flashes of guns, the glow of star-shells and the long tremulous glimmer of flashlights. The blood-red blaze of haystacks afire near Givenchy, threw a sombre haze over our line of march. Even through the haze, star-shells showed brilliant in their many different colours, red, ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill

... another revelation of thebeauty and excellence of the female character and intellect; not wholly new to him, yet now renewed and fortified. It was from the lips of Mary Ashburton, that the revelation came. Her form arose, like a tremulous evening star, in the firmament of his soul. He conversed with her; and with her alone; and knew not when to go. All others were to him as if they were not there. He saw their forms, but saw them as the forms of inanimate things. At length her mother came; and Flemming beheld ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... see her in her chamber, the influence she had at first exerted returned upon him with double force. In her helplessness, she appealed powerfully to the chivalric sentiment which man feels towards the dependent; her tones, softened by affection and tremulous from weakness, thrilled his soul; and the touch of her hand was electric. When he returned to his studio, as he thought of the trustful, unsuspecting, generous heart of Alice, he was smitten with a pang of remorse too keen to be borne. He tried to look at her picture, ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various

... false, unmanly. Oh, Belinda, is this the being you prefer to me? Gamester—wretch, as I am, my soul never stooped to falsehood! Treachery I abhor; courage, honour, and a heart worthy of Belinda, I possess. I beseech you, sir," continued he, addressing himself, in a tremulous tone of contempt, to Mr. Hervey, "I beseech you, sir, to leave me to ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth

... mysterious veil had fallen between her wistful spirit and the outer world. Her vision was dimmer and her spirit at times withdrawn, remote. She laughed in response to my jesting, but there was an absent-minded sweetness in her smile, a tremulous quality in ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland

... the women, until Baby Brainard's fatal illness, when he watched by the little sufferer's side and brought her flowers and luscious fruit from town, and would sit at her mother's piano and play soft, sweet melodies and sing in low tremulous tone until the wearied eyelids closed and the sleep no potion could bring to that fever-racked brain would come at last for him to whom child-love was incense and music at once a passion and a prayer. ...
— Waring's Peril • Charles King

... looked away. It was very hard to say what she intended, with him so close to her. His eloquent eyes, his tremulous lips ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice

... a shawl over her mother's knees. "My mother's limb troubles her," she explained to visitors (in point of modesty, Mary North did not leave her mother a leg to stand on); then she added, breathlessly, with her tremulous smile, that she wished they would please not talk too much. "Conversation tires her," she explained. At which the little, pretty old lady opened and closed her hands, and protested that she was not tired at all. But the callers departed. ...
— An Encore • Margaret Deland

... did think of Miss Tuttle—that woman of resolute will. Without attempting to imaging the reason for her presence, I stood my ground and harkened till the heavy mahogany door at the other end of the room began to swing in by jerks under the faint and tremulous push of a terrified hand. Then there came silence—a long silence—followed by a moan so agonized that I realized that whatever was the cause of this panting woman's presence here, it was due to no mere errand of curiosity. This whetted my purpose. Anything ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green

... large hexameter rolls out after another—the strong, awkward, ugly boy, unblushingly pouring forth his energetic lines—cheered by the sight of the relaxing gravity of his teachers' looks—while around, you see the bashful tremulous figure of poor Cowper, the small thin shape and bright eye of Warren Hastings, and the waggish countenance of Colman—all eagerly watching the reciter—and all, at last, distended and brightened with joy at his ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... that flame, which announces the presence of the Dead," said Hilda, with a tremulous voice; "though seldom, uncompelled by the seid and the rune, does the spectre itself warn the ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... through trust in God than by any other means, on the other hand it is true that, in order to receive the full blessed effects of trust into our characters and lives, we must persistently and doggedly keep on in the attitude of confidence. If a man holds out to God a tremulous hand with a shaking cup in it, which Le sometimes presents and sometimes twitches back, it is not to be expected that God will pour the treasure of His grace into such a vessel, with the risk of most of it being spilt upon the ground. There must be ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren

... houses, and the warm-lit cottages. There was odour of the harvest yet in the air and the distant chiming of bells from the Gothic tower which rose above the hamlet and the knoll of green. Each little town we passed cast from its windows bright rays upon the tremulous twilight; a great bar of fiery redness cut the lower black of the coming night, showing me in shadow the rising of land towards Chatham and towards London. Yet it was the peace of the scene that came to me with the greatest power; the many tokens of home—above all, the thought "I am in England." ...
— The Iron Pirate - A Plain Tale of Strange Happenings on the Sea • Max Pemberton

... BIRCH.) Leaves triangular, very taper-pointed, and usually truncate or nearly so at the broad base, irregularly twice-serrate; both sides smooth and shining, when young glutinous with resinous glands; leafstalks half as long as the blades and slender, so as to make the leaves tremulous, like those of the Aspen. Fruit brown, cylindrical, more or less pendulous on slender peduncles. A small (15 to 30 ft. high), slender tree with an ascending rather than an erect trunk. Bark chalky or grayish white, with triangular dusky spaces below the branches; recent shoots brown, closely ...
— Trees of the Northern United States - Their Study, Description and Determination • Austin C. Apgar

... said; the voice was faint and tremulous like a birdling's note—but Angus heard it and stood still. He turned towards the pew whence it came, and a face met his own, a woman's face, blanched and pale, except for two burning spots upon her cheeks where the heart had unfurled its banners. It was a woman's voice, I say, and the eyes that ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles

... I felt rather than heard the tremulous push she gave to the door, and the quick drawing in of her breath as she put her foot across the threshold. These sapped my courage. This fear, this almost hesitation, drew me from thoughts of myself to thoughts of her, and it was in a daze of ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green

... recently, and after securing permission from the head keeper, entered the snake-house. The violinist began by playing a few most sympathetic chords, first delicate and soft, then sad, then gay, slow or tremulous. Near us, coiled in his immense cage, was a large cobra—the snake which all legend claims is most easily influenced by music. Almost immediately after the music began, the cobra raised himself in a listening attitude, steadily gazed at us as though ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon

... took the pen, she retreated in quiet swiftness to her little room; but came back as he finished the few freshly hopeful lines; then going to the door with him, looked up with the same sweet tremulous smile. 'Thank you! What thankfulness it is! What a merciful rain this is! If you knew the relief it is to send this report to Felix! You cannot guess what this dear little ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge

... expressed by different tones of the voice. Love, by a soft, smooth, languishing voice; anger, by a strong, vehement, and elevated voice; joy, by a quick, sweet, and clear voice; sorrow, by a low, flexible, interrupted voice; fear, by a dejected, tremulous, hesitating voice; courage, by a full, bold, and loud voice; and perplexity, by a grave and earnest voice. In exordiums, the voice should be low, yet clear; in narrations, distinct; in reasoning, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... it really is. That hot and fevered youth who stands in the betting-ring and nervously pencils his race-card never thinks that the time of weakness and sadness and weariness is coming on; that gray and tremulous old man who bends over the roulette-table never thinks that he will speedily drop into a profundity deeper than ever plummet sounded. The gliding ball does not swing round in its groove faster than the old man's ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman

... look of sorrowful perplexity, the young man's face eloquent with tender meaning. Dora Macmahon's colour went and came as she looked at that earnest countenance, and the fingers which were absently turning the leaves of her book were faintly tremulous. ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon

... good in that Gus Martin," said she, in earnest, tremulous tones, nodding her head in the direction of the departing Gus. "I may be dead, my son, but you will see that the devil will be to pay this side of hearing the last of him," ...
— The Hindered Hand - or, The Reign of the Repressionist • Sutton E. Griggs

... was too much for these two Wollastons who sat now with dry throats and tremulous hands over the mockery of breakfast! Mary, although she knew, asked her father whether he wanted his coffee clear or with cream in it and having thus broken the spell, went ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster

... his lips with passionate tenderness on his son's head. "Well, sire," he said, in a voice tremulous with love, "I believe your wishes will have to be complied with. As soon as your palace is completed I shall live with you. Do you accept your palace on ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach

... not move, although he felt the quick blood fly to his face, and the voice of the first speaker had suffused him with a strange and delicious anticipation. He restrained himself, though the words she had naively dropped were filling him with new and tremulous suggestion. He was motionless, even while he felt that the vague longing and yearning which had possessed him hitherto was now mysteriously taking ...
— A Drift from Redwood Camp • Bret Harte

... shy, tremulous glance and luminous face, that Thanked and pleased Campbell most, and he lifted the book and went away, almost as much under the spell of the poet, as the two simple souls who had heard his music for ...
— A Daughter of Fife • Amelia Edith Barr

... that grew tremulous with anger, the host read the details, point by point, and as the seriousness of the thing broke upon the hearers, even the very lightest tongues were ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter

... so little practical household knowledge of each other to be in love. Never till then had Kenelm's eyes rested upon Lily's handwriting. And he now gazed at the formal address on the envelope with a sort of awe. Unknown handwriting coming to him from an unknown world,—delicate, tremulous handwriting,—handwriting not of one grown up, yet not of a child who had long ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... son-in-law had expected. For the first time, he saw him weep. His gay and robust old age had suddenly fallen from him, the news having clapped ten years on to his four score. Like a child, whimpering and tremulous, he threw his arms around Desnoyers, moistening his neck ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... Bridge they passed. Sunlight all, and flashing water, and gleaming oars, and gay boats, and endless motion! out of which rose calm, solemn, reposeful, the resting yet hovering dome of St Paul's, with its satellite spires, glittering in the tremulous hot air that swathed in multitudinous ripples the ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald

... she looked up; and then sought to veil her luminous eyes by dropping her forehead on her hands. Again, stepping nearer, he besought her with another tremulous eager call upon ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell



Words linked to "Tremulous" :   unsteady



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