"Hiss" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... came for'ard with the news that you had met with an accident, and had been carried down into your cabin, and the gale was still blowing as heavy as ever, when some of us on the forecastle thought we heard another sound above the shriek of the wind and the hiss of the sea; and, looking ahead, we presently saw, stretching away on both bows, as far as we could see, an unbroken line of wildly leaping breakers and flying spray. We at once hailed the quarterdeck, shouting: 'Breakers ahead and ...
— The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn • Harry Collingwood
... comes. Think not I fear thine anger: this day, thou, Lord of the silver bow, shalt bring a guest To sit in presence of the equal Gods In your high hall: wheel but thy chariot near, That I may mount beside thee! ——What is this? I hear the crackling hiss of singed plumes! The stench of burning feathers stifles me! My loins are stung with drops of molten wax!— Ai! ai! my ruined ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... at the head of the cobbled street. At that the women in the doorways of the small cottages twisted their gnarled red hands in their aprons, and whispered fearsomely among themselves, so that the sibilant sound of their voices ran up and down the line of houses in a long, quavering hiss. ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... proving an addition to our forces. So 'ere's to you, though 'tis true that at El Teb you cut and ran; You're improvin' from a scuttler to a first-class fighting man; You can 'old your own at present when the bullets hiss and buzz, And in time you may be equal to a ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 14, 1893 • Various
... trailed away with a hiss of wind and a choking, gurgling noise into silence the little dancing girl began to sing in a deep, musical voice—the voice of one who has ...
— At Suvla Bay • John Hargrave
... end of this broad land to the other, but never, sir, never in all my career have I been obliged to play such a diabolical part as I am playing here, and, dammit, sir, I am denied even the tribute of a healthy hiss. This is—" ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... singing at a miserable east-end music-hall so that her father might find some sort of employment," Tavernake said. "The people only forbore to hiss her father's turn for her sake. She goes about the country with him. Heaven knows what they earn, but it must be little enough! Beatrice is shabby and thin and pale. She is devoting the best years of her life to what she imagines to ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... hundred feet farther on, Selim abruptly turned off among the trees. They made their way slowly, cautiously to a point scarcely a hundred feet from the wall and somewhat to the right of the small gate. Here he left them and crept stealthily away. A few minutes later he crept back to them, a soft hiss on ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... of sparks and flame. This lasted for five minutes or less, and then the death-grip seemed to relax, the volleys came brokenly, like a man panting for breath, the bullets ceased to sound with the hiss of escaping steam, and rustled aimlessly by, and from hill-top to hill-top the officers' whistles sounded as though a sportsman were calling off his dogs. The Turks withdrew into the coming night, and the Greeks lay back, panting and sweating, and stared open-eyed at one another, ...
— Notes of a War Correspondent • Richard Harding Davis
... Power House roof. The storm tore at me. It was beginning to rain. I was near the outer edge of the roof, and ten feet away stood the oval tower. I saw windows twenty feet up, with dim lights in them. Mingled with the storm was the hiss of the transmitter in the top of the tower, and the roar of Tugh's magnified voice. He had evidently been there only a brief time. From where I crouched on the roof, I could see overhead, along the top edge of the ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... saddle, I led the horse on pretty smartly in hopes of reaching Koomikoomi before dark. We had not proceeded above a mile, before we heard on our left a noise very much like the barking of a large mastiff, but ending in a hiss like the fuf [Footnote: Thus is Mr. Park's MS] of a cat. I thought it must be some large monkey; and was observing to Mr. Anderson "what a bouncing fellow that must be," when we heard another bark nearer to us, and presently a third still nearer, ...
— The Journal Of A Mission To The Interior Of Africa, In The Year 1805 • Mungo Park
... sledge, with a terrific pull, he drew one of the harpoons out of the ice and with his knife speedily cut it loose from the lashings. Ootah, stunned for a moment, turned upon him. Maisanguaq desperately raised the weapon. Ootah heard it hiss through the air. He reeled backward—the harpoon grazed his arm and ...
— The Eternal Maiden • T. Everett Harre
... with wounds, he began to hiss like a serpent, and springing forwards breathed upon the princess, filling the air with ...
— Fairy Tales of the Slav Peasants and Herdsmen • Alexander Chodsko
... with quiet unconcern. "Here," he continued, pointing to a rock beside him. Mandy took the place indicated. As she seated herself he put up his hand with a sharp hiss. Again the pattering feet could be heard. Suddenly the Indian leaned forward, gazing intently into the gloom beyond the rim of the firelight, then with a swift gliding movement he threw his rifle up and fired. There was a sharp yelp, followed ...
— The Patrol of the Sun Dance Trail • Ralph Connor
... of kinds, though the dirty, sickening-looking, stump-tailed moccasin predominated. There must have been thousands of serpents in the mass which covered a space twenty by thirty feet, from which came the sibilant hiss of puff adders, and ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... water-color or two, the photographs of the family, and the fresh flowers in the vases. But the sun shone in, there was a great sense of peace and stillness, and beside a little wood-fire, which burned gently and did not hiss or crackle as it might have done elsewhere, sat a lovely old lady, whose fresh and peaceful and kindly face seemed the centre from which all the home look and comfort streamed. She was knitting a long silk stocking, a volume of Mudie's lay on her knee, and a skye terrier, blue, fuzzy, and ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... out the word with a prolonged hiss, and then—before I could even guess at his intention—there was the swift gleam of a knife, a splash of the severed painter, and caught by the tide the old boat swung out, ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... was known, and as he stood up on the floor of the court a swift and regular movement like a ripple of water passed through the throng. They leant forward to get a clearer view of him and for a moment there was a hiss of ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... out simultaneously—and Arcot was on his way to the control room. The first shock was but a forerunner of the storm. Suddenly the ship was hurled violently about; the air was shot through with great burning sparks; the snapping hiss of electricity was everywhere, and every pointed metal object was throwing streamers of blue electric flame into the air! The ship rocked, heaved, and cavorted wildly, as though caught in the ...
— Islands of Space • John W Campbell
... suggested words such as everlasting, everpresent, etc., which might have bearing on the subject previously under discussion. The little man spurned them all with vigorous backings and increased hissings. At last, between a discouraged hiss and a triumphant sputter, the ...
— Captain Pott's Minister • Francis L. Cooper
... the pilot's bell—they're off!" exclaimed Maurice, as the line ceased pouring over the guards of the steamboat; then came a loud and hoarse whistle, after which steam began to hiss and the stern wheel to churn the ...
— The House Boat Boys • St. George Rathborne
... sat; each kitten look'd aghast. I, passing swift and inattentive by, At the three kittens cast a careless eye; Not much concern'd to know what they did there, Not deeming kittens worth a Poet's care. But presently a loud and furious hiss Caused me to stop, and to exclaim, 'What's this?' When lo! upon the threshold met my view, With head erect, and eyes of fiery hue, A viper, long as Count de Grasse's queue. Forth from his head his forked tongue he throws, Darting it full against ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... cold and merciless in their viscid hatred. I dipped the nose of my monoplane downwards to escape it. As I did so, as quick as a flash there shot out a long tentacle from this mass of floating blubber, and it fell as light and sinuous as a whip-lash across the front of my machine. There was a loud hiss as it lay for a moment across the hot engine, and it whisked itself into the air again, while the huge, flat body drew itself together as if in sudden pain. I dipped to a vol-pique, but again a tentacle fell over the monoplane and was shorn off by the ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... attack he would be swiftly on his feet, hurling forth fresh accusatory words and ignoring the punishment he had just received—would be himself the scourger of sin. Sometimes he even took to imitating Chamberlain's own methods, and pointing a finger at his distinguished victim, would hiss out his charges word by word with a vibrant slowness. Even the impassive Chamberlain used sometimes to color a little under this mimicry. If ever a man went thoroughly out of his way to be hated it was Lloyd George. But he gained way. Once under ...
— Lloyd George - The Man and His Story • Frank Dilnot
... comes to discover the chief of the plot of the play by the reading of along letter, which was so long and some things (the people being set already to think too long) so unnecessary that they frequently begun to laugh, and to hiss twenty times, that, had it not been for the King's being there, they had certainly hissed it off the stage. But I must confess that, as my Lord Barkeley says behind me, the having of that long letter was a thing so absurd, that ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... happily, looking out now and then at the trees, which tossed like green waves under the roaring August rain. Sometimes a gust drove a shower down the chimney and made the logs hiss. The room was warm and still; in the interval of work it seemed to have paused and be sleeping. The tiger-cat, with his paws folded under him, lay beside the hearth, and Mary on her little bench ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... through Duncan's teeth with a little hiss. One could fancy that he was wishing that his had been the hand to strike the blow. The Baron glanced round casually. He called a waiter and complained of the slow service, sent for another bottle of wine, ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... whispers to the winds: what time the light south-east falls on the pointed leaves, songs of Dindymus give answer in the Gargaric grove. Nature has made nothing dumb; the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth are not silent, the snake has its hiss, the fishes of the sea as they breathe give forth their note.... Have the Basque mountains and the snowy haunts of the Pyrenees taken away thy urbanity?... May he, who advises thee to keep silence, never enjoy the singing of sweet ...
— The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle Ages and - Modern Times • Alfred Biese
... that looks as if it were made of crocheted wire. Sometimes Jehosophat's father opens the gate in the fence and lets the geese wander down to the pond. A silly way they have of stretching out their long white necks and crying, "Hiss, hiss!" This frightens Hepzebiah who always runs away. Then the geese waddle along in single file, that is one by one, like fat old ladies crossing a muddy street on ...
— Seven O'Clock Stories • Robert Gordon Anderson
... drawn inward in a sharp hiss. Then, with startling suddenness, her hand was jerked from under his but not before he had sensed an instant chilling of the warm flesh. Wondering, he turned to see her stepping backward in slow, measured steps while her eyes, fixed immovably ...
— Louisiana Lou • William West Winter
... who could make Michael should make thee. O, foolish Man, meting things low and high By self, that accidental quantity! With this conceit, Philosophy stalks frail As peacock staggering underneath his tail. Who judge of Plays from their own penny gaff, At God's great theatre will hiss and laugh; For what's a Saint to them Brought up in modern virtues brummagem? With garments grimed and lamps gone all to snuff, And counting others for like Virgins queer, To list those others cry, 'Our Bridegroom's near!' Meaning their God, is surely quite enough ...
— The Unknown Eros • Coventry Patmore
... which hiss the two mud-hens veered away a few feet. But Jones was getting himself in hand, ...
— The Red One • Jack London
... hurriedly, we entreated the boatswain to "shove the blamed Finn overboard." Then, all together, we yelled down at the planks:—"Stand from under! Get forward," and listened. We only heard the deep hum and moan of the wind above us, the mingled roar and hiss of the seas. The ship, as if overcome with despair, wallowed lifelessly, and our heads swam with that unnatural motion. Belfast clamoured:—"For the love of God, Jimmy, where are ye?... Knock! Jimmy darlint!... Knock! You bloody black beast! ...
— The Nigger Of The "Narcissus" - A Tale Of The Forecastle • Joseph Conrad
... hermit's fast— That is a doubtful tale from faery land, Hard for the non-elect to understand. Had Lycius liv'd to hand his story down, He might have given the moral a fresh frown, Or clench'd it quite: but too short was their bliss To breed distrust and hate, that make the soft voice hiss. Besides, there, nightly, with terrific glare, Love, jealous grown of so complete a pair, Hover'd and buzz'd his wings, with fearful roar, Above the lintel of their chamber door, And down the passage cast a glow ...
— Lamia • John Keats
... An opening loomed, cool and dark. The fortress entrance. Tolto dashed into it. There was the sharp challenge of a guard, unanswered; the futile hiss ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl
... again, and before they could speak he was gone. The tone of his voice lingering upon their ears was like a hiss. It was a ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... composure, and the whole company was awed into silence with the haggard realism of his narrative. The cabin must have been air-tight—it was as close as possible—yet we heard the shrieking of the wind as it tore through the rigging, and the long hiss of the waves rushing past us with lightning speed. Sometimes an avalanche of foam buried us for a moment, and the Petrel trembled like a living thing stricken with sudden fear: we seemed to be hanging on the crust of a great ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various
... for the sight momentarily stunned them. But then Dave recovered his presence of mind and blazed away with his shotgun, hitting the reptile in the middle, and inflicting several ugly but not mortal wounds. The rattlesnake gave a hiss, glided under some leafy bushes, and there commenced to sound ...
— Dave Porter at Star Ranch - Or, The Cowboy's Secret • Edward Stratemeyer
... hiss right at my elbow. I looked and found that, unbeknownst to myself, I'd taken the steel cube out of my pocket and holding it snuggled between my first and second fingers I'd punched the button with my thumb just as I'd promised myself I would if I ...
— The Night of the Long Knives • Fritz Reuter Leiber
... she. Ahead the tug loomed, a great dark shape; and the pulse of her engines was lost in the roiling water rising from the screw blades and the hiss of it as it raced by the row-boat. There was a dim blur of light from one of the after-cabin portholes and the shadow of figures passing to and fro inside could be seen. The decks were deserted. It was too cold to brave the night wind except ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... a dead calm for a minute. Tiffles was silent, in order that he might not interrupt the quiet admiration of the spectators. The spectators were silent, because they could not exactly understand the scene, and did not know whether to laugh, hiss, or applaud. The silence was broken, by a boy in the ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... On the bridge near by he heard the steady tread of feet, the mysterious words of the officer on watch passing the course to his relief. Bells rang with sharp double clang. Through the open port he could hear the alternate boom and hiss of the sea under the bows. With the stately lift and lean of the ship there mingled a faint ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... have known, that the situation in which I found myself was precisely of the kind most conducive to the darkest deeds. I did but bemoan it, and think of Lear in the hovel on the heath. The wind howled in the chimney, and the rain had begun to sputter right down it, so that the fire was beginning to hiss in a very sinister manner. Suppose the fire went out! It looked as if it meant to. I snatched the pair of bellows that hung beside it. I plied them vigorously. 'Now mind!—not too vigorously. We aren't ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... flashes as it flew. Trees, shrubs were scorched beneath the blast, As onward to its aim it passed. But Rama, watching as it sped Dire as His noose who rules the dead, Cleft it with arrows as it came On rushing with a hiss and flame. Its fury spent and burnt away, Harmless upon the ground it lay Like a great snake in furious mood By ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... they say, hang him, he is a turncoat! he was not true to his profession. I think God has stirred up even his enemies to hiss at him, and make him a proverb, because he hath ...
— The Pilgrim's Progress - From this world to that which is to come. • John Bunyan
... in one and pour their waters into the Caucasian Sea. And through fear young mothers awoke, and round their new-born babes, who were sleeping in their arms, threw their hands in agony, for the small limbs started at that hiss. And as when above a pile of smouldering wood countless eddies of smoke roll up mingled with soot, and one ever springs up quickly after another, rising aloft from beneath in wavering wreaths; so at that ...
— The Argonautica • Apollonius Rhodius
... multitude that could be scraped out of the purlieus of Christendom would blush to do, I think. They assembled by hundreds, and even thousands, in the great Theatre of San Carlo to do—what? Why simply to make fun of an old woman—to deride, to hiss, to jeer at an actress they once worshipped, but whose beauty is faded now, and whose voice has lost its former richness. Everybody spoke of the rare sport there was to be. They said the theatre would be crammed because Frezzolini was going to ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... fresh pipe may both keep and recover wine that hath thus been drawn off; but the mind, receiving but the remembrance only of past pleasure, like a kind of scent, retains that and no more. For as soon as it hath given one hiss in the body, it immediately expires, and that little of it that stays behind in the memory is but flat and like a queasy fume: as if a man should lay up and treasure in his fancy what he either ate or drank yesterday, that he may have ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... stood them bravely too. Idle young actors are fond of applause, but, take my word for it, a clap is a mighty silly, empty thing, and does no more good than a hiss; and, therefore, if any man loves hissing, he may have his three shillings worth at ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding
... "S-s-s-s-si'c!" Paul made a hiss which Bruno understood, and went at Muff more fiercely. It was glorious to see Muff spit fire, and hear her growl low and deep like distant thunder. Paul would not have Muff hurt for anything, but he loved to see ...
— Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No. 1 - An Illustrated Magazine • Various
... your Aunt Amy asked, as the geese continued to hiss angrily without giving any heed to her, and Mrs. Gray Goose ceased her scolding ...
— The Gray Goose's Story • Amy Prentice
... she was sure he nursed an illusion. 'I found them celebrating the betrothal of my sister Lotte with the Austrian Count Walburg; I thought it favourable for us. I spoke of you to my mother. Oh, that scene! What she said I cannot recollect: it was a hiss. Then my father. Your name changed his features and his voice. They treated me as impure for mentioning it. You must have deadly enemies. I was unable to recognize either father or mother—they have become transformed. But you see I am here. Courage! you said; and ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Israel out of the land which I have given them; and this house which I have hallowed for My name, will I cast out of My sight; and Israel shall be a proverb and a byword among all people: 8. And at this house, which is high, every one that passeth by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss; and they shall say, Why hath the Lord done thus unto this land, and to this house? 9. And they shall answer, Because they forsook the Lord their God, who brought forth their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and have taken hold upon other gods, and have worshipped them, ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... the White Lion Inn, for a straggling tail of children bearing home small shoppings and jugs of supper beer, for a flock of gray geese proceeding with suggestively self-righteous demeanour along the very middle of the roadway and lowering long necks to hiss defiance at the passer-by, and for an old black retriever dozing peacefully beneath one of the rustling sycamores in front of Josiah Appleyard, the saddler's shop—all these, as she looked at them, became uncertain in outline, reeled before Honoria's eyes. For the moment she experienced ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... again, Beaching, writhing, rolling far. Sweeping all away to war! While the men that walk beside, Dusty, silent, heavy-eyed, Cannot tell why we or they March and suffer day by day. Children of the Camp are we, Serving each in hiss degree; Children of the yoke and goad, Pack and harness, pad ...
— Songs from Books • Rudyard Kipling
... me, then, To spare thyself a little bashful pain? Paolo, dost thou know what 'tis for me, A woman—nay, a dame of highest rank— To lose my purity? to walk a path Whose slightest slip may fill my ear with sounds That hiss me out to infamy and death? Have I no secret pangs, no self-respect, No husband's look to bear? O! worse than these, I must endure his loathsome touch; be kind When he would dally with his wife, and smile To see him play thy part. Pah! sickening thought! From ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... these on the table and bending over the fire, meritoriously sensible of the trying nature of his duty, he watched the wreaths of steam, until at the special instant of projection he caught up the iron vessel and gave it one delicate twirl, causing it to send forth one gentle hiss. Then he restored the contents to the jug; held over the steam of the jug, each of the three bright glasses in succession; finally filled them all, and with a clear conscience awaited the applause ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... sober sorcerer rise Swift to whose wand a winged volume flies; All sudden, gorgon's hiss and dragon's glare, And ten horned fiends and giants rush to war. Hell rises, heaven descends, and dance on earth, Gods, imps and monsters, music, rage and mirth, A fire, a jig, a battle, and a ball, Till one wide conflagration swallows all; Thence ...
— A History of Pantomime • R. J. Broadbent
... descends from the great hole. Green gauzes rise from the floor; the torches hiss out. The temple is flooded. The water from under the doors rises up the steps, the torches hiss out one by one. The water, finding its own level, just touches the end of the Queen's skirt and stops. She withdraws the skirt with catlike haste ...
— Plays of Gods and Men • Lord Dunsany
... instant there was fierce battle between the old forces and the new. Then, with his eyes upon his father, resuming that hiss that is proper only to ostlers, he ...
— The Golden Scarecrow • Hugh Walpole
... turning slightly to the east, goes racing between the islands of Cebu and Negros. At the narrow entrance between San Sebastian and Ayucatan it breaks up into hundreds of small whirlpools that make the water hiss and bubble for a ...
— Philippine Folklore Stories • John Maurice Miller
... great fires of the American prairies, whose destructive range has been checked by the hand of man. In vain the flames jet out on all sides, seeking fresh element. A wide space has been cleared around them. Soon the crackling of the large trees, and the hiss of the burning grass, cease to be heard; and the whole plain becomes enveloped under a cloud of smoke rising ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... bouquet of flowers. At the proper time, a number of these gentlemen came over to the hotel and escorted the ladies to the polls, where a convenient place for them to vote had been arranged. There was a great crowd inside the hall, eager to see the joke of women voting, and many were ready to jeer and hiss. But when, through the door, the women filed, led by Sarah Grimke and Angelina Weld, the laugh was checked, the intended jeer unuttered, and deafening applause was given instead. The crowd fell back respectfully, nearly every man removing his hat and remaining uncovered while the ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... yet of human wrong Left the unbalanced scale—great Nem'esis! Thou who didst call the Furies from the abyss, And round Orestes bade them howl and hiss For that unnatural retribution—just, Had it but been from hands less near—in this, Thy former realm, I call thee from ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... hiss of unleashed sub-atomic forces somewhere within the metal body. The machine moved in fumbling uncertainty for a moment as the slug fought to get control of mechanism that had lain idle for a thousand centuries! ...
— The Cavern of the Shining Ones • Hal K. Wells
... chop-house feast, And you alone should be the welcome guest. But, dearest Sal! the flames that you impart, Like chop on gridiron, broil my tender heart! Which if thy kindly helping hand be n't nigh, Must like an up-turned chop, hiss, brown, and fry; And must at least, thou scorcher of my soul, Shrink, and become an ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... turret fills with steam, The feed-pipes burst below— You can hear the hiss of the helpless ram, You can hear the twisted runners jam." And he answered, ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... windows; desolation shall be in the thresholds; for he hath laid bare the cedar-work. This is the joyous city that dwelt carelessly, that said in her heart, 'I am, and there is none besides me!' How is she become a desolation, a place for beasts to lie down in! Every one that passeth by her shall hiss, and wag his hand." ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... the air was dark with a swither of foam and spray blown off the waves in the thickness of a fog. The heavy bows of the smack beat into the seas with a thud and a hiss—the thud of a steam-hammer, the hiss of molten iron plunged into water; the waves raced exultingly up to the bows from windward, and roared angrily away in a spume of foam from the ship's keel to lee; and the thrumming and screaming of the storm in the rigging exceeded all that Duncan had ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... May He preserve them, and I not have the power To snatch the loveliest of earth's daughters from A doom which even some serpent, with his mate, Shall 'scape to save his kind to be prolonged, To hiss and sting through some emerging world, 40 Reeking and dank from out the slime, whose ooze Shall slumber o'er the wreck of this, until The salt morass subside into a sphere Beneath the sun, and be the monument, The sole and undistinguished sepulchre, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... under every slate; the Serin-finch, whose downy nest is no bigger than half an apricot, came and chirped in the plane-tree tops; the Scops made a habit of uttering his monotonous, piping note here, of an evening; the bird of Pallas Athene, the Owl, came hurrying along to hoot and hiss. ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... remembered belonged to a set he had bought for a dinner-party in honour of Renee's baptism. He lighted a piece of paper, threw it into the glass, and closed his eyes as he turned the glass over. Renee gave a little hiss of pain, a shudder ran through all the bones down her back, and then ...
— Rene Mauperin • Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt
... "You are courageous indeed, Hiss Elfrida. That is done by a woman who is invited, every where in her proper person, and knows 'tout Paris' like her alphabet I believe she holds stock in Raffini; anyway, they would double her pay rather than lose her. You would have ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... Venice Vulcan's echoes hiss and roar, And idle sits the hapless Gondolier. His Gondola is crumbling on the shore, The Penny Steamer's whistle racks his ear. 'ARRY exults—but Beauty is not here; Trade swells, Arts grow—but Nature seems to die. Hucksters ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 93, September 3, 1887 • Various
... Till fiery flashes in the van Proclaim too sure the robber-clan 590 Have well secured the only way Could now avail the promised prey; Then curled his very beard[96] with ire, And glared his eye with fiercer fire; "Though far and near the bullets hiss, I've scaped a bloodier hour than this." And now the foe their covert quit, And call his vassals to submit; But Hassan's frown and furious word Are dreaded more than hostile sword, 600 Nor of his little band a man Resigned carbine ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... it we hear round us, on all sides and quite close, a terrible pit-pat, and the long low hiss of mown grass. There is a crackling afar in the sky, and they who glance back for a second in the awesome storm see the cloudy ridges catch fire horizontally. It means that the enemy have mounted machine guns on the summit we have just abandoned, and that the place where we are is being ...
— Light • Henri Barbusse
... small as I could, for I knowed that if they fired into sich a crowd with cannon it 'ud just mow 'em down like grass. The next minute I heerd an orficer's voice singin' out, "Halt! front! fire!" But instead of the bang of a cannon there cum a hiss like fifty tea-kettles a-bilin' over, and then a great splash, and the crowd scattered fifty ways at once; and I found myself wringin' wet all in a minute. Then somebody gripped hold o' me and pulled me up, and there was Feodoroff, and beside him Lieutenant Berezinski of the garrison ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... in something like a hiss from between her set lips. And in one short instant all that was best in her and all that was worst became suddenly visible, as turning to her softly chuckling brother, she motioned him gently out of the room, and then turning to me, advanced a step and said: "Will you ...
— The Mill Mystery • Anna Katharine Green
... flipped a switch in the narrow vestibule and the door closed with a soft hiss of air. He inserted a light key into a near-by socket and twisted it gently, completing a circuit that flashed the "go" light in the engineer's cab. Almost immediately, the monorail train eased forward, ...
— The Revolt on Venus • Carey Rockwell
... in my realm of wo, Whose only glory streams From its lost childhood, like the artic glow Which sunless Winter dreams! In the red desert moulders Babylon, And the wild serpent's hiss Echoes in Petra's palaces of ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... of any offence with which his eyes meet his own. Such a look would blunt the very stiletto of a Corsican. What sweetness would there be in vengeance if the avenger, as he plunged the dagger in his victim's bosom, might not hiss in his ear, 'Remember!' As well find satisfaction in torturing an idiot or mutilating a corpse. I am not talking now of brutish fellows, who would kick a stock or stone which they stumbled over, but of men intelligent enough to understand ...
— Dr. Heidenhoff's Process • Edward Bellamy
... all right now, my lady!" fell with a chuckle from her lips. "A vampire, ha!" The chuckle was changed for a kind of hiss. "Well, have it so. There is rich blood in your veins, and it will be no fault of mine if I do not fatten upon it. As for pity, you shall have as much of it as you gave to that helpless baby. Saints don't work in this kind of business, ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... ejaculated. He knew every sound of the foothill country, but this was strange to him. A kind of snort, a sort of hiss; mechanical in its regularity, startling in its strangeness, it came across the valley with the unbroken rhythm of ...
— The Cow Puncher • Robert J. C. Stead
... of duty!" said Zenobia, in a whisper so full of scorn that it penetrated me like the hiss of a serpent. "I have often heard it before, from those who sought to interfere with me, and I know precisely what it signifies. Bigotry; self-conceit; an insolent curiosity; a meddlesome temper; a cold-blooded criticism, founded on a shallow interpretation of half-perceptions; a monstrous ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... A faint hiss, as of warning, issued from the carmine lips of the Chinese woman. Then the window closed noiselessly, and Chinatown, having paid not the slightest heed to the incident, pattered about its multifarious businesses, ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... rodden shape," Mr. Schultz had declared. "Von of hiss angles vos brogen, und he vos cut mid a knive—preddy deeb, but noddings to worry aboud. Der only drouble iss der dooty of navigading der shib falls double on der segond mate ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... lust of ruin! O panting perdition! O splendid devastation! I, I, too, have felt it! To destroy—to destroy! To leave behind me ashes, ashes. [The flame flashes up. Rage! Rage on! Or art thou passion, art thou desire? Ah! terrible kiss! [The flame flashes up. Now hear it, hear it! A hiss as from mighty serpents, The dry, licking, wicked tongues! Wouldst thou sting the earth to death? What a career! To clasp and devour and kill! To dance over the world as a frenzied dancer With whirling skirts of world-wide ...
— Nero • Stephen Phillips
... of ground. The sound of cannons and of arquebusses, the shrieks of agony and fear, the shouts of the Spanish soldiers, the war-cries of the Aztecs, the screams of wounded horses, the wail of women, the hiss of hurtling darts and arrows, and the dull noise of falling blows went up to heaven in one hideous hurly-burly. Like a frightened mob of cattle the long Spanish array swayed this way and that, bellowing as it swayed. Many rolled down ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... hand upon his chin, thinking as well as he might. What did he owe to Douglas Guest, the friend of Emily de Reuss, successful where he had failed? Had he not seen their hands joined? He drew a breath which sounded like a hiss. ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... Tears gush'd again, as from pale Priam's eyes, When the last blaze sent Ilion to the skies. Roused by the light, old Dulness heav'd the head Then snatch'd a sheet of Thule from her bed; Sudden she flies, and whelms it o'er the pyre, Down sink the flames, and with a hiss expire." ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... knew were precious to them. Sometimes to-day, indeed, in reading his books, one comes across some statement in letter, article, or lecture flung out almost venomously; and one steps back mentally as if a spiritual hiss had whipped the air from some inimical sentence which had suddenly lifted its heretical head from amongst an otherwise quiet group ...
— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking
... behave ill, for it is a good Maxim in Politicks as well as War to put & keep the Enemy in the wrong. They behaved tollerably well till the oration was finishd when upon a Motion made for the Appointmt of another orator they began to hiss, which irritated the Assembly to the greatest Degree, and Confusion ensued. They however did not gain their End, which was apparently to break up the Meeting, for order was soon restored & we proceeded regularly ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, vol. III. • Samuel Adams
... loss which must be sold at a given moment Permissible neither to applaud nor to hiss Respectful without servility She awaits your replies without interruption These liars in surplice, in black cassock, or in purple Wish you had the generosity to show, now and again, less wit You know, madame, that he ...
— Widger's Quotations from The Court Memoirs of France • David Widger
... breath with a sharp hiss, and stood rigid. His eyes, burning now with a grim light, flickered over Gerald's person and found nothing in it to entertain them. He saw a slouching figure in shirt-sleeves and the foundations of evening dress, a disgusting, degraded figure with pink eyes and a white face that needed a shave. ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... glance into that Assembly Hall of theirs, it will be found, as is natural, 'most irregular.' As many as 'a hundred members are on their feet at once;' no rule in making motions, or only commencements of a rule; Spectators' Gallery allowed to applaud, and even to hiss; (Arthur Young, i. 111.) President, appointed once a fortnight, raising many times no serene head above the waves. Nevertheless, as in all human Assemblages, like does begin arranging itself to like; the perennial rule, Ubi homines sunt ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... scent the fumes! Are those real men or ghosts? The stillness spreads of Death abroad—down come the temple posts, Their molten bronze is coursing fast and joins with silver waves To leap with hiss of thousand snakes ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... sickness that night by the river. You will find that the name of many a man of my age is in men's mouths because at the outset Defeat became his trophy, the Gorgon's head, despoiled by his first sword of hiss and venom. So there, my friends, you have the rule you ask for—fail once so ignominiously that you wish to die, and you may wrest from fate a brief name and the ...
— Roads from Rome • Anne C. E. Allinson
... was doing the creature appeared again with a glowing mass of fused metal (massam igneam de scoria) in pincers, which he hurled at them. Where it struck the water about a furlong from them, it made the sea boil and hiss. They had only escaped about a mile when they saw beings swarming out upon the shore, throwing about molten masses, some after them and some at one another, and then all went back into the forges and set them blazing, until the whole island seemed one mass of fire. ...
— Brendan's Fabulous Voyage • John Patrick Crichton Stuart Bute
... There was an instant hiss and groan of disapproval. So marked, indeed, that the man rose to shoulder his way to the door. Evidently he ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... envelope from his pocket and dropped into it the precious bit of blue steel he had recovered from the crack beneath the French window; he smoothed down the carpet with a quick sideways flirt of his foot, thrust the envelope into his coat, and had barely time to hiss one further ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... vain,1 Shall rush to the abyss, like Vulcan hurl'd Down into Lemnos through the gate of heav'n. Thou also, with precipitated wheels Phoebus! thy own son's fall shalt imitate, With hideous ruin shalt impress the Deep 30 Suddenly, and the flood shall reek and hiss At the extinction of the Lamp of Day. Then too, shall Haemus cloven to his base Be shattered, and the huge Ceraunian hills,2 Once weapons of Tartarean Dis, immersed In Erebus, shall fill Himself with ...
— Poemata (William Cowper, trans.) • John Milton
... aspiration and attainment. The populace might be blind or dumb, the "rattlesnakes"—the "irresponsible indolent reviewers," who from behind a hedge pelt every wrestler till they found societies for the victor—might still obscurely hiss; but Carlyle was at length safe by the verdict of ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... grasped the child's arm with an iron pressure; the crowd swam before the boy's eyes; the air seemed to stifle him, and become blood-red; only through the hum and the tramp and the roll of the drums he heard a low voice hiss in his ear "Learn how they perish ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... was a rustling of distant palms, the indistinct roar of beasts, and the hiss of serpents. Then all was still again. Only at times the remote sigh of the weary sea, moaning around desolate isles undiscovered; and the howl of winds that had never wafted human voices, but had rung endless changes upon the sound of dashing waters, made the voyage more ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... During the following week hopes were entertained that the Parliament might be induced to vote a peace establishment of thirty thousand men. But these hopes were delusive. The hum with which William's speech had been received, and the hiss which had drowned the voice of Seymour, had been misunderstood. The Commons were indeed warmly attached to the King's person and government, and quick to resent any disrespectful mention of his name. But the members who were disposed ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... He was silent for a moment while a great green rocket rushed upwards with a hiss and burst in a shower of many-coloured stars. Then as they watched them fall he spoke very kindly and earnestly. "But it is worth while all the same—even though one may be turned back from Paradise. ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... the home of secession—from that State where the leaders of—(the balance of the sentence of the speaker was drowned by hisses). Mr. Tillman (resuming): There are only three things in the world that can hiss—a goose, ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... by Jove—I wish anybody in a barrack would say what you do," cried out this uproused British lion. "I should like to hear a man breathe a word against her, by Jupiter. But men don't talk in this way, Ann: it's only women, who get together and hiss, and shriek, and cackle. There, get away—don't begin to cry. I only said you were a couple of geese," Will Dobbin said, perceiving Miss Ann's pink eyes were beginning to moisten as usual. "Well, you're not geese, you're swans—anything you ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... acumen in marketing the output. And this mutual relation had been disturbed by but one difference. When Houghton was disposed to consider a college man for a vacancy, Kaufmann had always been ready with his "practical man dot has vorked hiss vay." And each time, in respect to his wishes, Houghton had given in, reflecting that perhaps (as Kaufmann said) it had been that he, himself, was a good business man in spite of his college training, not because of it; and, after all, college ideals had sunk since his time. And the ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... hoofs upon the hard mountain road sounded suddenly above the hiss of the rain-storm. It was quite dark by this time, night having been hurried on by the lowering skies. A moment later, three horsemen, drenched to the skin, drew up in front of the inn, threw their reins over the posts, and dashed for shelter. They came noisily ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon
... year in Paris. These are beings of the great neuter species: impotent men, parasites, cyphers, who have a little land, a little folly, a little wit; who would be rustics in a drawing-room, and who think themselves gentlemen in the dram-shop; who say, "My fields, my peasants, my woods"; who hiss actresses at the theatre to prove that they are persons of taste; quarrel with the officers of the garrison to prove that they are men of war; hunt, smoke, yawn, drink, smell of tobacco, play billiards, stare at travellers as they descend from the diligence, live at the ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... that he had slept through it. He had been through many stormy nights, but he had never heard the like of this. The wind blew with a steady roar, like a flood of thunder outpoured; in the midst of it, the great waves, hurled upon the rocks, uttered their voices; and between he heard the hiss of the water, as it rushed downwards from the cliff face. In the midst of all came a sharp and sudden wailing cry; and then he began to wonder what the poor ship was doing, which he thought of as riding furiously at ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... Chief the spacious Hall Thick swarm'd, both on the Ground and in the Air, Brush'd with the Hiss of ...
— Letters Concerning Poetical Translations - And Virgil's and Milton's Arts of Verse, &c. • William Benson
... lower down than it should have been. A gasp broke from the breasts of company "A's" friends. The blue and white dropped disconsolately, while a few heartless ones who wore other colors attempted to hiss. Someone had dropped his bayonet. But with muscles unquivering, without a turned head, the company moved on as if nothing had happened, while one of the judges, an army officer, stepped into the wake of the boys and picked ...
— The Upward Path - A Reader For Colored Children • Various
... The hiss was followed by a rattle, and now, flashing the light around, the scout saw upon a flat rock the curled-up form ...
— The Boy Land Boomer - Dick Arbuckle's Adventures in Oklahoma • Ralph Bonehill
... was not gun-shy. He steadied down with a pounding of heavy hoofs. Then Lucy could see again. A thin streak of yellow smoke rose—a little snaky flame—a slight crackling hiss! Then as the wind caught the blaze there came a rushing, low roar. Fire, like magic, raced and spread before ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... stir. He sat there as though made of stone, that awful hiss still sounding in his ears. Miss Grey's voice came to him as from some great distance. He did not seem to realize what she was saying to him. She saw his white face, and the vacant look in his eyes, and she pitied him; but she ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene
... mouth, And sounds as if it should be writ on satin, With syllables which breathe of the sweet South, And gentle liquids gliding all so pat in, That not a single accent seems uncouth, Like our harsh northern whistling, grunting guttural, Which were obliged to hiss, and spit and ...
— A Wanderer in Venice • E.V. Lucas
... magnificently with a wild, full, come-to-the-battle sort of a note, that quite roused you. But he would get more and more piano as he went on, and the last verse generally collapsed in the middle with a splutter and a hiss. ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... driver eased off for a down grade I could hear the hiss of steam through the safety-valve above the back of the black flier, and I could feel the flanges against the ball of the rail, and the little tell-tale semi-quaver of ...
— The Last Spike - And Other Railroad Stories • Cy Warman
... her command that made him look. He knew better than to turn his head at an unseen woman's bidding in the dark. But he heard them hiss, and he turned to see four cobras come toward him, with the front third of their bodies raised from the floor and their hoods extended. He saw that a panel in the wooden wall had slid, and the last snake's tail was yet inside the gap. There ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy
... for water. At last the room grew silent, the tired watchers dozed in their chairs, the doctor nodded and nodded, bringing his eel-skin cue dangerously near the flame of the candle that stood on the table. Suddenly there was heard a sharp explosion, a hiss, a sizzle; and when the smoke cleared, and the terrified occupants of the room collected their senses, the watcher and wife were discovered under the valance of the bed; the doctor stood scorched and bareheaded, looking ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... Volleys are let loose so monstrously resounding that one feels himself annihilated by the mere sound of the downpoured thunder of these great constellations of destruction that form in the sky. One sees and one feels the fragments passing close to one's head with their hiss of red-hot iron plunged in water. The blast of one explosion so burns my hands that I let my rifle fall. I pick it up again, reeling, and set off in the tawny-gleaming tempest with lowered head, lashed by ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... concerts, and especially in M. Chevillard's concerts—a place which Lamoureux would never have given it. Then the younger and more enthusiastic part of the public began to revolt; and very soon, with perfect impartiality and quite indiscriminately, began to hiss famous and obscure virtuosi alike in their performance of any concerto, whether it was splendid or detestable. Nothing found favour with them—neither the playing of Paderewski, nor the music of Saint-Saens and the great masters. The management of the concerts went its own way and tried ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... him an imploring look which pleaded for her better than the words she could not utter. She was rather a favorite with 'old Davis', as, of course, he was called, and it's my private belief that he would have broken his word if the indignation of one irrepressible young lady had not found vent in a hiss. That hiss, faint as it was, irritated the irascible gentleman, and sealed ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... artist. How can I get much satisfaction out of the enthusiasm of a house that likes her atrociously bad performance at the same time that it pretends to like mine? If they like her, then they ought to hiss me off the stage. We stand for things that are irreconcilable, absolutely. You can't try to do things right and not despise the people who do them wrong. How can I be indifferent? If that doesn't matter, then nothing matters. Well, ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... ceased stirring it, came the head and half the body of a huge grey snake. But the witch did not look round. It grew out of the tub, waving itself backwards and forwards with a slow horizontal motion, till it reached the princess, when it laid its head upon her shoulder, and gave a low hiss in her ear. She started—but with joy; and seeing the head resting on her shoulder, drew it towards her and kissed it. Then she drew it all out of the tub, and wound it round her body. It was one of those ...
— Adela Cathcart, Vol. 1 • George MacDonald
... little while we stopped again and hailed loudly. The only sound in answer was the low hiss of a sea, which had begun to make with the breeze, ...
— Mr. Trunnell • T. Jenkins Hains |
