"Booming" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the carriages were escorted by Drouet and his comrades to the door of a grocer named Sausse, who was the humble mayor of this obscure town. At the same time, some of the party rushed to the church, mounted the belfry, and rang the alarm bell. The solemn booming of that midnight bell roused the affrighted inhabitants from their pillows, and soon the whole population was gathered around the carriages and about the door of the grocer's shop. It was in vain for ...
— Maria Antoinette - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... enemy to be seen and not even a puff of smoke to suggest his whereabouts. But the air was full of the booming of heavy guns and the rising eerie ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 21, 1914 • Various
... across the street, his heart beating furiously. He was feeling, it must be confessed, a good deal like a dynamiter or an assassin. The weather was warm, and the door of the church was open, so that he could hear the booming voice of Dr. Vince. The sound of the organ brought tears into his eyes—he loved the organ, and he was not to be allowed to listen to it! At last came the end; the sounds of the choir receded, and the assassin moved over to a strategic position. ...
— Samuel the Seeker • Upton Sinclair
... at Festubert began, I was wakened one night by a lull in the booming of the guns, and got up to sit by the window. It was one of those still nights in June when every sound carries for miles. The odours of sweet flowers floated up from the garden below, and the splash, splash of frogs hopping into ...
— On the Fringe of the Great Fight • George G. Nasmith
... government program of economic reform and privatization quickened, resulting in a substantial shifting of assets into the private sector. Kazakhstan enjoyed double-digit growth in 2000-01 - 8% or more per year in 2002-07 - thanks largely to its booming energy sector, but also to economic reform, good harvests, and foreign investment. Inflation, however, jumped to more than 10% in 2007. In the energy sector, the opening of the Caspian Consortium pipeline in 2001, from western Kazakhstan's Tengiz oilfield to the Black Sea, substantially raised ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... rounded as close as it was possible under the stern of the Bucentaure and got into position. Then a terrific broadside was let fly from her double-shotted guns, which raked the Bucentaure fore and aft, and the booming of cannon continued until her masts and hull were a complete wreck. Many guns were dismounted and four hundred men killed. The Victory then swung off and left the doomed Bucentaure to be captured by the Conqueror, and Villeneuve was taken prisoner. After clearing the Bucentaure, ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... Nora's heart heaved convulsively. And John went out of the room bewildered, and sat himself down on the landing-place, and wondered whether he was awake or sleeping; and a cold numbness crept over one side of him, and his head felt very heavy, with a loud, booming noise in his ears. Suddenly his wife stood by his side, and said, in ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... brightness all around him. While it burned he looked for her, and when it grew to black cinders and was near to scorching his hand, he made another and looked farther. He laid aside his dignity and called, and while his voice went booming full-lunged through the whispering silence of that empty land, he twisted the third torch, and stamped the embers of the second into the earth that it might not fire ...
— The Uphill Climb • B. M. Bower
... like the serried lines of an army advancing to the charge; while the broad valley around even back to the summits of the far-off hills, was resounding with the deafening din that rose from the extended line of the booming avalanche, with the deep rumblings of an earthquake mingled with the tumultuous ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... ribs, while flames danced in front of his eyes, and there was a roaring in his ears. Gaining the summit at last, he flung himself down, afraid for the moment to look at the obstacles beyond. As he slowly recovered, a real booming disassociated itself from the noises in his head; and he eagerly raised his head. His eyes swept over a far and wide expanse of snow, a dish-like plateau among the hills. His heart leaped; for through the centre of the plateau ran a black fissure, like a crack in the dish; and ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... through the city, myriads of little white puffs, drifting down-wind, showed the profusion of firing. Now came the boom of a cannon from the Citadel—an unshotted gun, used only for calling the Faithful to prayer. Its booming echo across the plain and up against the naked, reddish-yellow hills, still further whipped the blood-frenzy of the ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... from the sides of the Merrimac like so many peas, while the new monster, coming on under steam, rammed her in the side and made a great hole through which the water poured. Even then the commander of the Cumberland would not surrender, but fought his ship till she filled and sank with her guns booming and her flag flying. After sinking the Cumberland, the Merrimac attacked the Congress, forced her to surrender, set her on fire, and, as darkness was then coming on, went back to the ...
— A School History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... Murguia tried to look. But they saw nothing. Except for the booming of the surf, they might have been on a landless sea, alone in the black night. Don Anastasio was shaking at such a rate that his two companions in the dark wheelhouse were conscious of it. He cursed the quartermaster for a pessimist. The skipper, ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... they all took it up for five or ten terrible seconds. The dew from the trees above spattered down like rain on the unseen backs, and a dull booming noise began, not very loud at first, and Little Toomai could not tell what it was. But it grew and grew, and Kala Nag lifted up one forefoot and then the other, and brought them down on the ground—one-two, one-two, as steadily ...
— The Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... dancing-booths, and accordingly went down there. "Now you stay here!" said Karl Johan sternly, and went in to take a survey of the dancers. In there blood burnt hot, and faces were like balls of fire that made red circles in the blue mist of perspiring heat and dust. Dump! Dump! Dump! The measure fell booming like heavy blows; and in the middle of the floor stood a man and wrung the moisture out of ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... bleaching ground on the opposite bank is dotted with white linen, it is a pleasant scene indeed; but when the tide is out—ugh! the River Thames at low water is a paradise to it. The tidal changes are carefully watched, and it is not an unusual occurrence to hear the solemn gun booming through the air as a warning to the inhabitants to block and barricade their cellars and kitchens against the ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... name out in three long booming triumphancies—pausing for it to produce its magical effect. Then he read two more letters, one from a manufacturer of vacuum cleaners and one from the president of ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... and banks of dust on the north-west horizon, and the flashes of lyddite and the booming of artillery told patient Gueldersdorp that the hour of deliverance was near. A few hours later the Relief had lamp-signalled brief details of the battle with Huysmans, ending with "Good-night" and the promise to fight ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... thick, white smoke issued from her starboard bow, followed by a corresponding one from the other side, and repeated alternately, to the number of twenty-one; but the fourth flash was distinctly visible to those on shore, before the roar of the first gun came booming over the water, awakening the thousand echoes that slumbered in the hills and ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... been thinking of the crowd in another aspect. Last year in a merry mood I sat down to write a novel. I meant it to be a comedy, but, having no control over the characters, I found that they insisted in making the story a farce. The result was The Booming of Bunkie. I thought it a very funny book, and I laughed at some of my own jokes and murmured, "Good!" I impatiently awaited the book's appearance, and when the day of publication came I sat down hopefully to await the press notices. The first one ...
— A Dominie in Doubt • A. S. Neill
... "What is that?" he asked with more than usual animation as the dull sound of distant booming interrupted them. ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton
... ask? Why, your grandfather wrote it! John Marshall Glenarm, the cleverest, grandest old man that ever lived, wrote it!” declaimed Larry, his voice booming loudly in the room. “It’s all a great big game, fixed up to try you and Pickering,—but principally you, you blockhead! Oh, it’s grand, perfectly, deliciously grand,—and to think it should be my good luck to share ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... Wagner had abused Meyerbeer for doing what he did himself—writing operas stuffed with spectacular effects. This man of the foot-lights destroyed all musical imagination with his puppet shows, magic lanterns, Turkish bazaars, where, to the booming of mystic bells, the listener was ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... stood close in to shore on the northeast side, where it fell calm and remained so all night. I saw the twinkling of a small light farther along in a cove, and fired a gun, but got no answer, and soon the light disappeared altogether. I heard the sea booming against the cliffs all night, and realized that the ocean swell was still great, although from the deck of my little ship it was apparently small. From the cry of animals in the hills, which sounded fainter and fainter through the night, I judged that a light ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... been getting up into the snow, and ever and anon a muffled roar comes booming and echoing over the mountains like the sound of distant artillery. It is the sullen noise of monster snow-slides among the deep, dark caons of the mountains, though a wicked person at Gold Run winked at another man and tried to make me believe it was ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... fell in a long, heavy, oily roll, sweeping slowly landward, and breaking sullenly with a dull, monotonous booming upon the rock-girt shore. To the inexperienced all seemed calm and peaceful, but to those who are accustomed to read Nature's warnings there was a dark menace in air ...
— The Mystery of Cloomber • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the great bells of Montsalvat are now heard booming solemnly—the air darkens, the light fades out, the slow motion of all the scenery recommences. Again I hear the wild cave music, strange and hollow sounding—the three move on as in a dream, and are soon lost in the deep shadows; and through all, ...
— Parsifal - Story and Analysis of Wagner's Great Opera • H. R. Haweis
... In the early morning they came to an old barn and walked inside with the horse. They were hungry and ate well, a few drops of brandy revived them, some loose hay was given to the horse. A low booming sound was heard, an artillery duel, it continued the greater part of the day. At nightfall Alan mounted his horse and bade good-bye to ...
— The Rider in Khaki - A Novel • Nat Gould
... final assurances. Yet he knew when closing-time came, that he had exhausted every farthing he possessed in the world—it seemed hopeless to imagine that he could survive another day. But with the morning came a booming cable from Bekwando. There had been a great find of gold before ever a shaft had been sunk; an expert, from whom as yet nothing had been heard, wired an excited and wonderful report. Then the men who ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... not to pay any attention to disagreeable things that are not any of your business," he said in his wonderful voice that was as big and booming and comforting as any anthem sung in church where a sinner goes for help. That's what it sounded ...
— Phyllis • Maria Thompson Daviess
... Did seaward round the castle go. Sometimes in dizzy steps descending, Sometimes in narrow circuit bending, Sometimes in platform broad extending, Its varying circle did combine Bulwark, and bartisan, and line, And bastion, tower, and vantage-coign: Above the booming ocean leant The far projecting battlement; The billows burst in ceaseless flow Upon the precipice below. Where'er Tantallon faced the land, Gateworks and walls were strongly manned; No need upon the sea-girt side; The steepy ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott
... wide acquaintance among desirable patrons of the theatre, he had peculiar facilities for obtaining free private boxes and orchestra chairs not only at his own theatre, but often at Wallack's in Broome Street and the old Bowery. Simmons was almost always sure to have tickets when the new piece needed booming, or when an old play failed to amuse and the audiences had begun to shrink. Indeed, the mystery of Mrs. Schuyler Van Tassell's frequent appearance in the left-hand proscenium box at the Winter Garden on Friday nights—a mystery unexplained among the immediate friends in Tarrytown, ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Saucer' craze first started. Or when Fantafilm put on their big publicity stunt for the improved 3-D movie, 'The Outsiders', and people saw the aliens over Broadway and heard them address the populace in weird, booming tones. ...
— The Fourth Invasion • Henry Josephs
... on Carter. At the moment, he was listening respectfully to van Manderpootz, and I sensed clearly his respect for the great man, a respect that had in it a distinct element of fear. I could hear Carter's impression of the booming voice of the professor, sounding somewhat like the modulated thunder of a god, which was not far from the little man's actual opinion of his master. I perceived Carter's opinion of himself, and his self-picture was an even ...
— The Point of View • Stanley Grauman Weinbaum
... like passing away, took hold of her. Far off, down the corridors, she heard the gong booming five o'clock. She must go. Yet she ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... difference to the herd. Hillyard pictured them below by the water's edge, their heads lifted, their tails stiffened, waiting in the darkness. Once the lone, earth-shaking roar of a lion spread from far away, booming over the dark country. But the herd below never stirred. It no more feared the lion than it feared the four men on the river bank above. An hour passed before at last the river water plashed under the ...
— The Summons • A.E.W. Mason
... mine or claim going! That man!—why, that's the man whose opinion's worth thousands, for it carries millions with it—and can't be bought. That's him who knocked the bottom outer El Dorado last year, and next day sent Eureka up booming! Ye remember that, sure?" ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... Choking back a sob he staggered down the hall, shouting to Ann as he went down the stairs, redoubling his speed as he heard the purr of autojets in the driveway. In a moment he was in his own car, frantically stamping on the starter. It started immediately, the motor booming, and the powerful jet engines forced the heavy car ahead dangerously, taking the corner on two of its three wheels. He knew that Ann would call Security, and he raced to gain on the tail lights that were disappearing down the winding residential road to the main highway. Throwing ...
— Infinite Intruder • Alan Edward Nourse
... Frederick Bruce, who, either from character or experience, or both, took a conservative view of everything—even of trifles. I know Robert Hart afterwards attributed some of his own caution to his friend's example. "In all things go slowly," Bruce was wont to say in his booming, bell-like tone. "Never be in a hurry—-especially don't be in a hurry about answering letters. If you leave things long enough and quiet enough they answer themselves, whereas if you hurry matters balanced on the edge of a precipice, they often topple over instead of settling ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon
... cast us off and Mrs. Verplanck waved from the end of the float as the Streamline quickly shot out into the night, a buzzing, throbbing shape of mahogany and brass, with her exhausts sticking out like funnels and booming like a pipe organ. It took her only seconds to ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... the great tabernacle in Salt Lake City, January 6, "Utah completing the trinity of true Republics at the summit of the Rockies." Gov. Heber M. Wells took the oath administered by Chief Justice Charles S. Zane, and at a given signal the booming of artillery was heard from Capitol Hill. Secretary-of-State Hammond read the Governor's first proclamation convening the Legislature at 3 o'clock that day. Mrs. Pardee was elected clerk of the Senate and entered upon the duties ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... West Grafton on an errand and Diana had to keep an engagement at home. Anne and Charlotta had come back to put things in order and lock up the little stone house. The garden was a pool of late golden sunshine, with butterflies hovering and bees booming; but the little house had already that indefinable air of desolation which always follows ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... breeze to the far-off hills and valleys. One might well imagine the scene a very inferno; so terrible was the conflict. Stern, dark, and resolute, Defiance stood for hours-not a gun dismounted, not a man dismayed. But the day grew late, and still the booming cannons roared. The heavens above were overcast, as though nature were ready with a flood of tears to weep over the deeds of humanity. The lightning flashed, and the guns flashed, and here and there and everywhere the dreadful ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... retained large numbers of watchmen and guards who were also armed and always on duty. In addition to these opposing forces there was, as the Governor reported, an unusually large number of the violent and criminal element, always attracted to a new and booming mining camp. Under such conditions the civil authorities were practically powerless, and the Governor, being helpless to avert civil war, called on me to keep order. I accordingly threw in a body of regular troops under General Funston. These kept order completely, and the ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... safe. A hollow, booming noise greeted them as they came close. Andy bent forward and ...
— Light O' The Morning • L. T. Meade
... but the wagon settled slowly down—inch by inch. Death grinned us in the teeth. Then I heard Mrs. Skenk say, quite collectedly: "'Tis my fault, and my weight." Then Ajax roared out: "For God's sake, sit down, ma'am, sit down. SIT DOWN!" he screamed, his voice shrill above the bellowing, booming waters. A crash behind told me that he had flung her back into her seat. At the same moment the near horse found a footing; there was a mighty pull from both the terrified animals, the harness held, and the danger was over. When we reached the bank I looked round. Mrs. Skenk was smiling; Ajax ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... tho' richly fraught, And think the hopes of life are cheaply bought With gems and gold; but oh, the storm so high! Nor gems nor gold the hopes of life can buy. The trembling prophet then, themselves to save, They headlong plunge into the briny wave; Down he descends, and, booming o'er his head, The billows close; he's number'd with the dead. (Hear, O ye just! attend, ye virtuous few! And the bright paths of piety pursue) Lo! the great Ruler of the world, from high, Looks smiling down with a propitious eye, Covers his servant ...
— The Poetical Works of Edward Young, Volume 2 • Edward Young
... impossible to make peace with the foreigners and our country will be divided up amongst them." His pleadings, however, were disregarded, and after the meeting was over, he had to return to his little island, where for eight weeks he was compelled to sit listening to the rattling guns, booming cannons and bursting firecrackers, for the Boxers seemed to hope to exterminate the foreigners by noise. He must have felt from the books he had studied that it could only result in disaster to his ...
— Court Life in China • Isaac Taylor Headland
... The pompously booming voice, with its stilted diction, ceased. All eyes were upon Link Ferris. The mountaineer, stung to life by the silence and the multiple gaze, came out of ...
— His Dog • Albert Payson Terhune
... commanding the spirit of his ancestor to appear, till at last he found himself in the deepest cellars of all. Down there he could hear but faintly the sound of the fighting; yet it seemed to him that through the stone he could hear the slow booming of the sea, and as he went deeper into the castle's foundations the louder had grown its note. "Does the sea come in all the way under the castle?" he wondered. "Oh that it would sap the foundations and sink castle and all, rather than let them give up old Jarl's stronghold ...
— The Blue Moon • Laurence Housman
... orient as they moan through the shell-riven wrecks at Cavite, the booming waves of the Caribbean as fathoms deep it sweeps over Pluton and Furor and breaks into spray on the shapeless and fire-distorted steel of Vizcaya and Oquendo, tell how the navy has paid our debt to Spain. Nor is the ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead
... lifeboat, in the teeth of the tempest's roar, And he stood like a man at the rudder, with an eye on his boys at the oar, Out to the wreck went the father! out to the wreck went the sons! Leaving the weeping of women, and booming of signal guns; Leaving the mother who loved them, and the girls that the sailors love; Going to death for duty, and trusting to God above! Do you murmur a prayer, my brothers, when cozy and safe in ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... pastureless land, and, though introduced by the earliest colonists, is still spoken of as "the Dutch goat," no other term existing for it in Malay parlance. Monkeys chatter and rustle in forest trees, gorgeous birds flit past on jewelled wings, and frogs in this rainy season make a deep booming like the tuning of numerous violoncellos. At length the little town of Garoet appears in a green valley, encircled by a diadem of peaks which suggest a tropical Engadine. Volcanic mountains replace Alpine crests, but the ...
— Through the Malay Archipelago • Emily Richings
... peaceful summer's morning, when the first thing gave us warning Was the booming of the cannon from the river and the shore: "Child," says grandma, "what's the matter, what is all this noise and clatter? Have those scalping Indian devils come to murder us once more?" Poor old soul! my sides were shaking in the midst of ...
— Poems of American Patriotism • Brander Matthews (Editor)
... gloom of those dark days in Washington, when the suspense was breathless and the heart of the nation responded in muffled beats to the dull booming of the cannon of Meade and Lee at Gettysburg, an episode occurred, with Lincoln as the central figure, which reveals perhaps more poignantly than any other in his whole career the depths of feeling in that tender and reverential soul. On Sunday evening, July 4,—the fourth day of that terrible battle, ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... wind began to blow a perfect hurricane and the rain came down in sheets while one peal of thunder followed another in such quick succession that one would hardly have time to die away before another was upon it; rolling and booming like heavy pieces of artillery. The lightning was so vivid and bright that it made Billy wink ...
— Billy Whiskers - The Autobiography of a Goat • Frances Trego Montgomery
... on the corner, overlooking the junction of three great highways of humanity: Twenty-third Street, with its booming crosstown cars, stretching away into the darkness on either hand; Broadway, forking off to the left, its distances merging into a hot glow of yellow radiance; Fifth Avenue, branching into the north with ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... by what we do at home than by what we preach abroad. Nothing we could do to help the developing countries would help them half as much as a booming U.S. economy. And nothing our opponents could do to encourage their own ambitions would encourage them half as much as a chronic, lagging U.S. economy. These domestic tasks do not divert energy from our security—they provide the very ...
— State of the Union Addresses of John F. Kennedy • John F. Kennedy
... still lay hot. The booming plunge of the tideless sea, breaking upon the rocks below, quivered in the quiet air. Henrietta Frayling withdrew her hands from her muff, unfastened the collar of her sable cape. The change from the shadowed ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... strokes of the ship's bell. Meanwhile the stress of the day's anxiety, combined with my continuous and monotonous perambulation of the deck, and no doubt assisted by the soft coolness of the offshore breeze, laden with the odours of earth and vegetation, and the constant booming sound of the distant surf, was beginning to tell upon me; my jarred nerves had become steady, my breathing had become deep and regular, my limbs were growing weary, and my eyelids began occasionally ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... on my nerves that I had to get out and do something. With a British intelligence officer, formerly of Sir John French's staff, I wandered down to the southern quarter of the city known as Berchem. As usual, the guns at the outer forts had been booming throughout the evening. From the city's ramparts you could not only feel the shudder of the earth, but you could see occasional splashes of flame from the Belgian batteries, answered, in the dim distance to the south, by smaller, less vivid splashes issuing ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... Dawes, at the point of the pistol, gave themselves up. Their business on the road at that hour was demanded by the officer, who was told in return to listen. Then, through the still morning air, the distant booming of the alarm bell's peal on peal was borne to ...
— The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees • Mary Caroline Crawford
... the party last night was, as I have said, disguised by firing, drumming, and shouting from the fleet and forts; and, in the deep stillness of the fine night, the booming of the guns, the clamor of the gongs, and the outcries raised from time to time, came on our ears like the spirit of discord breaking loose on a fair and peaceful paradise. About one o'clock the noises died away, and I enjoyed as quiet a slumber till ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... through that fog like lost wild things, like the ducks and geese bewildered of a stormy night, which mangle themselves against the wire nettings of light houses. Now and then the land abeam would give forth response to the booming of our whistle. The old man Sammy had taken the wheel and his grim face was frozen into an expression of desperate energy, as his keen little grey eyes peered through the murk. By this time there was a heavy roll and our tall spars were slashing ...
— Sweetapple Cove • George van Schaick
... do something that was important on the other side of the world, and the paper was to be held open till the latest possible minute in order to catch the telegram. It was a pitchy black night, as stifling as a June night can be, and the loo, the red-hot wind from the westward, was booming among the tinder-dry trees and pretending that the rain was on its heels. Now and again a spot of almost boiling water would fall on the dust with the flop of a frog, but all our weary world knew that was only pretence. It was a shade cooler in the press-room than ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... be obtained. The formation is limestone, in which are found "blowholes"—that is to say, circular holes two to four feet in diameter, which go down vertically to a depth never yet ascertained. They derive their name from the curious booming noise which they emit, probably caused by the wind. Judging from the growth of saltbush and other herbage it would seem likely that the rainfall on these elevated plains is considerable, and apparently runs to waste down blow-holes and cracks in the limestone. No doubt when other ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... point called St. Catherine's Hill. We did not obtain so fine a prospect from the road, but the view far surpassed anything we had yet seen in Europe. Putting my head out of the window, when about half way up the ascent, I saw an object booming down upon us, at the rate of six or eight miles the hour, that resembled in magnitude at least a moving house. It was a diligence, and being the first we had met, it caused a general sensation in our party. Our heads were in each other's way, and finding it ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Lafayette and his followers have placed themselves at the head of the people. This rumour has quieted the fears of many, for his name exercises a great influence. The fighting is still going on, and the report of the guns comes booming on the ear continually. ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... of course," continued the doctor, "but he's putting it over. The town council has granted him a ninety-nine- year lease covering every street; the road-bed is started, and things are booming. Lots have been staked all over the flats, property values are somersaulting, everybody is out of his head, and Gordon is a god. All he does is organize new companies. He has bought a sawmill, a wharf, a machine shop, acres of real estate. He has started ...
— The Iron Trail • Rex Beach
... silk and satin gowns, with filmy mantillas thrown over their heads and shoulders, and the men not less gorgeous in lace-trimmed velvet suits and elaborate serapes. I can almost hear the applause and the booming of the cannon that followed General Vallejo's glowing tribute to Washington, and see the graceful Spanish dancers as they assembled for the evening ball. It was doubtless at this time that Leese met General Vallejo's ...
— The Lure of San Francisco - A Romance Amid Old Landmarks • Elizabeth Gray Potter and Mabel Thayer Gray
... the hopes of Uncle Ben. When the Constitution had been adopted by a majority of the States, the event was celebrated by a grand festival in Philadelphia. There were a long procession of the trades, an oration, the booming of cannon, and the ringing of bells. Some twenty thousand people joined in the festivities. They wanted a poet for the joyful occasion. Poets were not many in those days. Who should appear? It was Silence Dogood, the Poor ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... about.] Well! Here in the fourth court the drums that maiden fingers beat are booming like the thunder; the cymbals are falling, as the stars fall from heaven when their merit is exhausted;[54] the pipe is discoursing music as sweet as the humming of bees. And here, again, is a lute that somebody is holding on his lap like a girl who is excited by jealousy ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka
... hear a powerful voice indistinctly booming at the top of the stairs. "Two callers on one afternoon!" G.J. reflected. And yet she had told him she went out for the first time only the day before yesterday! He scarcely liked it, but his reason rescued him from the puerility of a grievance against her on this ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett
... made some real advance in art, even he played only on one pipe or one trumpet. Hyagnis was the first to separate his hands when he played, the first to fill two pipes with one breath, the first to finger stops with either hand and make sweet harmony of shrill treble and booming bass. Marsyas was his son, and though he possessed his father's skill upon the pipe, he was in all else a barbarous Phrygian, with a filthy beard and the grim and shaggy face of a wild beast. All his body was covered with hair and bristles, and yet—good heavens! he is said ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius
... noises had run across the shivering surface of the ice. Through the foggy nights, a muffled intermittent booming went on under the wild scurrying stars. Now and then a staccato crackling ran up the icy reaches of the river, like the sequent bickering of Krags down a firing line. Long seams opened in the disturbed surface, and from them came a harsh sibilance ...
— The River and I • John G. Neihardt
... in a timid inarticulate gabble, above which rose Deacon Bradley's loud voice,—"Our soul is escaped even as a bird out of the snare of the fowler. The snare is broken and we are escaped." He read the responses in a slow, booming roar, at least half a sentence behind the rest, but the minister always waited for him. As he finished, he saw the sexton standing in the open door. "A little more steam, Jehiel," he added commandingly, running the words on to the ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... Harvey, "The Boy Orator of Zepata City," as he was called, was very dear to the people of that booming town. In their eyes he was one of the most promising young men in the whole great unwieldy State of Texas, and the boy orator thought they were probably right, but he was far too clever to let them see it. He was clever ...
— The Exiles and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... watched he half closed his wings and shot down with such speed that Peter actually held his breath. It looked very, very much as if Boomer would dash himself to pieces. Just before he reached the earth he suddenly opened those wings and turned upward. At the instant he turned, the booming sound which had so startled Peter was heard. It was made by the rushing of the wind through the larger feathers of his wings as he ...
— The Burgess Bird Book for Children • Thornton W. Burgess
... shoes, hardware, soda-water, and sofa-pillows to myriads was nothing; that they pulled your teeth, took your photograph, kept your bank account, was little more. For they supplied the public with ideas and ideals. They determined the public's reading by booming this book and barring that; their pianos clanged all day with the kind of music people ought to like and to buy; and the display in their fifteen great windows (during the Christmas season people came from the remotest suburbs expressly to see them) solidified and confirmed ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... swooped down on them suddenly, bringing with it black night, a roaring, booming, hideous thing. Sand rained on the blankets, covering the girls of the Overland Riders, and now and then some heavier object, they knew not what, struck one or more of them, adding to the terror ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders on the Great American Desert • Jessie Graham Flower
... accompanied him to the parlor they heard the heavy booming of cannon off on the east side, and it was repeated again ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... bell on South Church steeple, striking the hour of midnight. The festivities were at an end and, oppressed by a nameless fear, the spectators of this strange pageant made ready for departure; but before they left the booming of cannon at the southward announced that Washington had advanced. The glories of Province House were over. When the last of the royal governors left it he paused on the threshold, beat his foot on the stone, and flung up his hands in an ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner
... and more below them the sea was washing into innumerable rocky fissures with a hollow booming sound. The cliff-line was broken into all sorts of bold forms,—buttresses and parapets and sharp inclines, with here and there a shallow cave or a bit of shingly beach. Every moment the color of the water seemed to change, and the soft duns and purples of the horizon ...
— A Little Country Girl • Susan Coolidge
... stood amid that howling darkness, my back propped by the bank, my face lifted to the tempest, I was aware of a strange sound, very shrill and fitful, that reached me 'twixt the booming wind-gusts, a sound that came and went, now loud and clear, anon faint and remote, and I wondered what it might be. Then the rushing dark was split asunder by a jagged lightning-flash, and I saw. Stark against the glare rose black shaft and crossbeam, wherefrom swung ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... Tuesday, April 30th.—At daylight this morning, we were all attracted on deck by the loud report of cannon, which came booming down the Hellespont, announcing the commencement of the Bairam, or grand religious festival of the Turks, when they play the same "antics before high Heaven," which Catholics do at their carnival. The guns were shotted, and we could distinctly see the splash of the marble balls ...
— Journal of a Visit to Constantinople and Some of the Greek Islands in the Spring and Summer of 1833 • John Auldjo
... two men standing face to face in the dark suddenly found themselves in a blaze of blinding steel-blue light, and at the very same instant the thunder-roar crackled and shook all around them like the firing of a thousand cannon. How the wild echoes went booming over the sea! ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... divinely guided, for as in a trance he saw and heard marvellous things. For the war-steeds of the Ultonians neighed loudly in their stables, and from the Tec Brac, the Speckled House of the Red Branch, rose a clangour of brass, the roar of the shield called Ocean, and the booming of the Gate-of-Battle, and the singing of swords long silent, and the brazen thunder of the revolution of wheels; and he saw strange forms and faces in the air, and the steady sun dancing in the heavens, and a man standing beside the stranger whose face was like the sun. The son ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... glow of a bloody sunset. Smoke and dust blacken the scene. Even before the cloud breaks to reveal the valley for a moment, the low roar is suddenly broken by the rattle of musketry, followed by the booming of artillery and the drumming sound of the machine guns. A trumpet sounds the charge. The dust cloud breaks. A thickly crowded mass of men is vaguely seen through the twilight charging with cries and curses. The rear ranks press over the fallen, waver, shout and fall back. The rattle ...
— Makers of Madness - A Play in One Act and Three Scenes • Hermann Hagedorn
... centuries. The beginning of republicanism is not of American origin nor of any one country or nation of the world. The beginning of republicanism was not upon this soil but upon the soil trodden by the Lord. It was not first announced by the booming of the cannon and the pealing of the liberty bell, but when the star of Bethlehem shone over the place where the new-born babe was in the manger and the songs of the angels told of "Peace on earth, good will ...
— Standard Selections • Various
... Civilly dead; in the Caves of Saint-Emilion; to be devoured of dogs. And Robespierre, who rode along with him on the shoulders of the people, is in Committee of Salut; civilly alive: not to live always. So giddy-swift whirls and spins this immeasurable tormentum of a Revolution; wild-booming; not to be followed by the eye. Barnave, on the Scaffold, stamped his foot; and looking upwards was heard to ejaculate, "This then is ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... Markheim, the one displeasing circumstance. It carried him back, upon the instant, to a certain fair day in a fishers' village: a gray day, a piping wind, a crowd upon the street, the blare of brasses, the booming of drums, the nasal voice of a ballad singer; and a boy going to and fro, buried over head in the crowd and divided between interest and fear, until, coming out upon the chief place of concourse, he beheld a booth and a great screen with pictures, dismally designed, garishly[9] colored: ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... emus come near enough, I do not think that Hector and I could have resisted the temptation to use our rifles. Not a sound was heard, except when an emu uttered its hollow, booming note, as if carrying on a conversation with its mate. At length one of the noble birds came stalking up directly towards where we lay hid. It was fully seven feet in height, with powerful, stout legs, while its wings were so small that they could not be distinguished from its lightish brown and ...
— Adventures in Australia • W.H.G. Kingston
... rehearsing in the darkness the momentous declaration that was to work a miracle in his solitary life. Like an actor committing his lines, he would repeat the words, hurling them upon the blackness of the night where, to the accompaniment of the booming surf, they echoed with a majesty and dignity astonishingly impressive. But in the light of day and Sarah Libbie's presence, his sonorous philippic would dwindle away into a jargon of garbled phrases too disjointed and meaningless to ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... prayer, and a short address; while all the pomp and circumstance which the government could command was employed to give a fitting escort from the White House to the Capitol, where the body of the President was to lie in state. The vast procession moved amid the booming of minute-guns, and the tolling of all the bells in Washington Georgetown, and Alexandria; and to associate the pomp of the day with the greatest work of Lincoln's life, a detachment of colored troops marched at the head ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... said the church clock from the ancient tower, booming out the note, and Lavendar started, and rubbed his hands across his dazzled eyes. "Luncheon is a late meal in that awful house, if I remember," he said, "but it must be over by this time. I really must go in. Let me collect my thoughts; ...
— Robinetta • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... line there crept news of big doings down south. There was a new sound in the air—a distant continued thunder that was different from any previous sound—the big drums of the devil's orchestra were booming an accompaniment that was the motif of hell's cantata. Up the line ran the rumor of a battle intenser than any yet fought—more guns being massed in a few miles than the world had ever seen before. Into every heart crept the dread of what ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... up for cotton, and an overflow now would mean the loss of many thousands of dollars to the submerged communities. The February rains had begun in the upper country, with a persistency and volume that bade fair to compensate for the long-continued drought, and thus the river was already booming; the bayous that drew off a vast surplusage of its waters were overcharged, and gradually would spread out in murky shallows, heavily laden with river detritus, over the ...
— The Crucial Moment - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... Minister, "that we should exercise a sort of control over the Serbian Catholics by having them under the jurisdiction of an Austrian Bishop." When Strossmayer visited Belgrade, for the purpose of conducting confirmations, he was driven at once, amid the booming of cannon, to the royal palace. And if the negotiations were allowed to drag it was obviously not due to any Orthodox fanaticism. Talking of fanaticism, one had instances in Bosnia and in Slavonia, not long ago, ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 1 • Henry Baerlein
... Madonna room, cheerfulness had forsaken the party. The languor produced by the heat and the heavily-laden atmosphere, solicitude felt for the dwellers in the forest, through which the fire was now sweeping, a hoarse rumbling noise like distant thunder, occasionally booming on their ears, and gloomy forebodings of impending calamity, all weighed upon the ...
— Adele Dubois - A Story of the Lovely Miramichi Valley in New Brunswick • Mrs. William T. Savage
... upon the skirmish line, forcibly recalls that impetuous prince, the Roland of Napoleon's Army. Upon the battle line he was brave almost to rashness, and never seemed to be more in his element or at ease than amidst the booming cannon, the roar of musketry, or the whirl of combat. Colonel Wallace was a soldier born and a leader of men. He depended not so much upon tactics or discipline, but more upon the cool, stern courage that was in ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... of the captain's chair being pushed back. From far off he heard Lund's big voice booming, "Here, what's this?" and the doctor's cutting in, low and eager; then he collapsed, his head falling forward on ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... night fell, and the boy's hair began to stir. A wolf was "yapping" on a swell, and a far-off heron was uttering his booming cry. Over the ridges, which cut sharply into the fleckless dull-yellow sky, lay unknown lands out of which almost any variety of fierce marauder might ride. Surely this was the wild country of which he had read, where ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... edition would be as perfect as he could make it. He secured a berth on the Geranium, sailing from Liverpool, and cabled Brant to that effect. The day before he sailed he got a cablegram that bewildered him. It was simply, "She's a-booming." He regretted that he had never learned the ...
— One Day's Courtship - The Heralds Of Fame • Robert Barr
... that he grew afraid, made an end of doubt and, grasping a point with both hands, swung himself down his own length and more. Now for many minutes he climbed down Sheep-saddle, and the task was hard, for he was bewildered with the booming of the waters that bent out on either side of him like the arc of a bow, and the rock was very steep and slippery. Still, he came down all those fifteen fathoms and fell not, though twice he was near to falling, and the watchers below marvelled ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... all other sounds, then lagoon and forest and cypress branch awoke; and through the steadily sustained tumult of woodland voices I could hear the dry bark of the fox-squirrel, the whistle of the raccoon, ducks softly quacking or whimpering as they prepared for sleep among the reeds, the soft booming of bitterns, the clattering gossip of the heronry, ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... pigeons that built their nests under the eaves have descended to the empty chapels, and in swift, graceful circles sweep under the ruined arches. Above the dripping of the rain, and the surly booming of the cannon, their contented cooing was the only sound of comfort. It seemed to hold out a promise for the better days ...
— With the French in France and Salonika • Richard Harding Davis
... wonders, our ears were constantly saluted by dull, thundering, booming sounds, resembling the reports of distant artillery. As we approached the spot whence they proceeded, the ground beneath us shook and trembled as from successive shocks of an earthquake. Ascending a small hillock, the cause of the uproar was found to be a mud volcano—the ...
— The Discovery of Yellowstone Park • Nathaniel Pitt Langford
... his head. "After that supper, there wasn't any need; I turned back to the glacier. And before I reached the landing, I heard Weatherbee's voice booming out on the thick silence like a siren at sea; piloting me straight to that ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... North. And on the lowest abyss of space there was spread a thick and mighty gloom, from which, as from a caldron, rose columns of wreathing smoke; and still, when the great winds rested for an instant on their paths, voices of woe and laughter, mingled with shrieks, were heard booming from the abyss ...
— The Fallen Star; and, A Dissertation on the Origin of Evil • E. L. Bulwer; and, Lord Brougham
... used when he was overbearing or dogmatic, that could unman her—and that was only visible when it came unexpectedly. That was because the bad dreams that the blessed saints allowed her to have for her sins always seemed to her to herald themselves by the booming sound of her father's voice. It was that sound that had always preceded his entrance for the terrible lunches of her ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford
... surprise; for, at present, though we disposed of our produce readily enough, it could not be said that there was a booming market. ...
— The Boys of Crawford's Basin - The Story of a Mountain Ranch in the Early Days of Colorado • Sidford F. Hamp
... than cleared my throat before I began to read, but to me it seemed that I stood petrified for an age, an awful silence booming in my ears. My voice, when at last I began, sounded far away. I thought that nobody could hear me. But I kept on, mechanically; for I had rehearsed many times. And as I read I gradually forgot myself, forgot the ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... act of knocking out the ashes of his pipe upon the grate; in the refilling and lighting of it; in the numberless little gestures which seemed to indicate an entire possession of himself And all the while something was booming in his mind as if the word 'lost 'were only half articulated there—a scarcely uttered word ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... gone for several months, and the year was drawing to a close without any tidings of him. A deeper gloom had settled over the little colony at Biloxi, when, on December 7th, some signal-guns were heard at sea, and the grateful sound came booming over the waters, spreading joy in every breast.... It was Iberville returning with the news that, on his representations, Sauvolle had been appointed by the King governor of Louisiana; Bienville, lieutenant-governor; and Boisbriant, commander ...
— Great Epochs in American History, Vol. II - The Planting Of The First Colonies: 1562—1733 • Various
... suppose he must be. It's a good while since you went West. Well, what sort of a country have they got out Swan River way? Booming ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... sonatas. The violin sonata is something of an attempt to exhaust all the possibilities of color-contrast contained in the little brown box. In the first "Impression de Notre-Dame," the piano is metallic with the booming bells. In the second, it is stony, heavy with the congested, peering, menacing forms of gargoyles. In the accompaniment to the song "Waldseligkeit," it seems to give the musical equivalent for the substance of wood. No doubt, to one who, like Ornstein, ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... He joined the hunting of the wolf in Navarre; and finally he had plunged into the fight between the French and Flemings, with such intensity of reality that it scarcely surprised him to hear the booming ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... a confused and unceasing mutter. The spires of churches, numerous, scattered haphazard, uprose like beacons on a maze of shoals without a channel; the driving rain mingled with the falling dusk of a winter's evening; and the booming of a big clock on a tower, striking the hour, rolled past in voluminous, austere bursts of sound, with a shrill vibrating cry at the core. He ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... surprised, fought in their great-coats; although otherwise imperfectly dressed, and some without shoes or shakos. Evans, who would have been at the head of his second division, was ill on board ship at Balaklava, and his place was nobly filled by General Pennefather. At the sound of the cannon booming heavily over the plateau of Balaklava, Evans rose from his sick bed and hurried to the front of battle, where he remained during the terrible morning of conflict which opened that eventful day. The English were all but overpowered, although ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... Somehow, with the piano pounding out that deep tum-tum, like waves booming up on the rocks, she began to feel strangely confused, as if she were the heroine on the films; as if she were kneeling there on the shore in that tragic moment of parting from her dead lover. She was sure that she knew exactly how ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... enemies like hawks driven by kingfishers through the sky. Day after day this most extraordinary contest, half flight and half battle continued, every promontory on the shores covered all the time with spectators, who listened to the distant booming of the guns, and watched the smokes which arose from the cannonading and the conflagrations. One great galleon after another fell a prey. Some were burned, some taken as prizes, some driven ashore; and ...
— Queen Elizabeth - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... crackers, canned corned beef, and a ten-cent bottle of French mustard. (We were keen on French mustard in those days.) Then, late in the afternoon, we hoisted our small spritsail and started. We sailed all night, and next morning, on the first of a glorious flood-tide, a fair wind behind us, we came booming up the Carquinez Straits to Port Costa. There lay the stolen boat, not twenty-five feet from the wharf. We ran alongside and doused our little spritsail. I sent Nickey forward to lift the anchor, while I began ...
— The Road • Jack London
... could look at it and estimate with fair accuracy how fast and how high the river was rising. When a rotting stump beside the basin of the spring had water around its roots it meant that the arteries of the hills were booming into torrential fury. When the basin overflowed, the previous maximum of the river's rise had been equaled. ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... next morning, Saturday, June 17th, he was awakened by the booming of guns. He was soon up and out. It was a beautiful day. People were on the eminences and roofs, looking northward, across the mouth of the Charles, towards Charlestown and the hill beyond. On that hill were seen rough earthworks, six feet high, which had not been there the day before. The ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens
... suddenly there was a burst of hearty cheering from the deck, and then the crash of a gun above his head, and then the answering booming of guns from far over the water. Craddock sat up and strained his ears. Was the ship in action? Only the one gun had been fired, and though many had answered, there were none of the crashings which told of a shot coming ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... mellow tones of the bell were booming out their landing signal as the steamer shot into the shadow of a high, rocky cliff. Far aloft on the overhanging piazzas of a big hotel, fluttering handkerchiefs greeted the passengers on the decks below. Many eyes were turned thither in recognition ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... of fight are booming, And the barren blood is spilt; Still the banners are up-looming, And the hands are on the hilt; But the old world waxes wiser, From behind the bolted visor It descries at last the horror ...
— Alcyone • Archibald Lampman
... calm, just heaving softly, and from a distance came at intervals the deep booming roar of the breakers on a reef; but there was hardly a breath of air, for the ...
— King o' the Beach - A Tropic Tale • George Manville Fenn
... as a rushing noise was heard somewhere high up among the dense mists. This rapidly increased to a terrific roar, followed by a deep booming crash; and so tremendous was the sound, that the noise of the falling waters seemed for the moment to be hushed. Then the thunderous crash rolled right away among the mountains, dying in faint echoes, and the rush of the waterfalls filled the ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... the stove, warm and comfortable after the drenching, and safe from the storm, which was now raging with increased fury outside, Larry heard the deep booming of the signal guns coming to him from across ...
— Larry Dexter's Great Search - or, The Hunt for the Missing Millionaire • Howard R. Garis
... Sea was booming on the rocks of the harbor; and from its hazy surface a cold east wind swept over the flat, bleak coast of Crail; a star peeped at times between the flying clouds, and even the moon looked forth once, but immediately veiled her face ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... this morning, in Padua, Verona, Milan, Chioggia, or wherever it was, whips were cracking, hoofs clattering, motor horns booming, wheels endangering your life. Farewell now to all!—there is not a wheel in Venice save those that steer rudders, or ring bells; but instead, as you discern in time when the brightness and unfamiliarity of it all no longer bemuse your ...
— A Wanderer in Venice • E.V. Lucas
... sight was so sudden and so unexpected that, for the moment, he was paralysed. Perhaps he thought it was a dream. Before he could recover presence of mind to seize his rifle, the breast of the animal had touched the fatal line; the trigger was drawn; the stout bamboo straightened with a booming sound, and the spear—or, rather, the giant arrow—was shot ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... certain hour in the evening one of the great guns was discharged from the forecastle, a ceremony only observed in a flag-ship. And always at the precise moment you might behold him blowing his match, then applying it; and with that booming thunder in his ear, and the smell of the powder in his hair, he retired to his hammock for the night. What dreams he ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... the Common, Botaurus stellaris, Y. ii. 571. In the spring, and during the breeding season, the Bittern makes a loud booming or bellowing noise, whence, probably, the generic term Botaurus was selected for it; but when roused at other times, the bird makes a sharp, harsh cry on rising, not unlike that of a Wild Goose. Yarrell, ii. 573. The Bittern was formerly in some estimation as an article ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various
... whose mildness of the last question had been merely the cover for a bursting wrath that now sent his voice booming, "maybe you know a whole pile, boy—I hear Jasper has give you consid'able education—but what you know is plumb wasted on me. Understand? As for lookin' up another blacksmith, you ought to know they ain't another shop in ten miles. You'll do ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... air was abroad, and the Sound lay silent as a lake. In answer to the booming of our guns, from the town of Helsingborg, five miles off, on the opposite coast of Sweden, we could hear the sound of human tongues, and the bay of dogs, come echoing over the sea, so calm was the day. A thousand vessels ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... booming drums of the regiment, Little souls who thirst for fight, These men were born to drill and die. The unexplained glory flies above them, Great is the battle-god, and his kingdom— A field where a ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... skinny hands upon his shining breeches, "thou hast gone the same fools' track as the rest; even as spy Stickles went, and all his precious troopers. Landing of arms at Glenthorne, and Lynmouth, wagons escorted across the moor, sounds of metal and booming noises! Ah, but we managed it cleverly, to cheat even those so near to us. Disaffection at Taunton, signs of insurrection at Dulverton, revolutionary tanner at Dunster! We set it all abroad, right well. And not even you to suspect our work; though we thought at one time that ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... tragedy, with such devilish deceit are the shoots laid up against the openings. First the teamster teeters and cajoles the box to the edge of the dray, then, with a sudden push, he throws it off down the shoot, from which it disappears with a booming sound. As I recall it was by some such treachery that Amy Robsart met her death. Be that as it may, all day long great drays go by with Earls of Leicester on their lofty seats, prevailing on their horses with stout, Elizabethan ...
— Journeys to Bagdad • Charles S. Brooks
... said the Queen, and even as she spoke, there came to her ears a sound of shouting as loud as the booming of cannon. "Oh, my child," cried Marie Antoinette, "the sound is like the thundering of a storm at sea! But such storms lie in God's hand and He protects those who trust Him. Think of that, little Louis, and ...
— Ten Boys from History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser |
