"Trill" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... breathless! No, no—I cannot believe it. We folk, so matter-of-fact and so comical. It was of Hansel and Gretel we had been reading hand-in-hand, till we fell asleep in the twilight and fancied this thing.' And then she will trill like a bird at the thought of how solemn Herr Grabenstock, of the Hotel du Mont Blanc, would have stared and edged apart, had we truly recounted to him that which had befallen us between the rising and the setting of a sun. We go forth; ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... attend, and hear a friend Trill forth harmonious ditty: Strange things I'll tell, which late befell In ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... had been the day, how tender the tone of every voice. The road under the moon was white and from a persimmon tree in an old field came the trill of a mockingbird. Two happy men were riding toward ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read
... the gods have heard my prayer; Yes, Lyce! you are growing old, and still You struggle to look fair; You drink, and dance, and trill Your songs to youthful love, in accents weak With wine, and age, and passion. Youthful Love! He dwells in Chia's cheek, And hears her harp-strings move. Rude boy, he flies like lightning o'er the heath Past withered trees like you; you're ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... the whole day long Beside the window-sill, And listen to the joyous song That warbler loves to trill. ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... his food he gave a spiteful chuckle; when pleased to see an old friend he seemed to say: "How do you do?" with a plaintive cooing. In battle his scream was wild and commanding, a succession of five or six notes with a startling trill that was inspiring to the soldiers. Strangers could not approach or touch him with safety, though members of the regiment who treated him with kindness were cordially recognized by him. Old Abe had his particular friends, as well as some whom he regarded as his ...
— Birds, Illustrated by Color Photography [July 1897] - A Monthly Serial designed to Promote Knowledge of Bird-Life • Various
... So they lay still, the four men and the idiot, and the fat woman under the thorn-tree, and the house burned furiously. Then began the known sound of cartouches in the roof—one or two at first; then a trill, and last of all one loud noise and the thatch blew here and there, and the captives would have crawled aside on account of the heat that was withering the thorn-trees, and on account of wood and bricks flying at random. ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... on wood and wold Shone down with softest ray, Beneath the sycamore's red leaf The mavis trill'd her lay, Murmur'd the Tweed afar, as if Complaining ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... also sing, My dear little hillside neighbor! A tender carol of peace to bring To the sunburnt fields of labor, Is better than making a loud ado. Trill on, amid clover and yarrow: There's a heart-beat echoing you, And blessing you, blithe ...
— Voices for the Speechless • Abraham Firth
... North had staid, By stern old Winter undismayed, To see the dainty snow-flakes fall. These kindly greeted, with small head Held on one side, a sparrow said, "To choose a gift for Cecily We've met to-night. What shall it be?" A flute-like trill, in graceful pride, A thrush sang sweetly, then replied, "What better than the gift of song?" "None better," answered ...
— Harper's Young People, December 23, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... the real music lessons, and taught him how to whistle and how to warble and trill. "Good Cheer! Good Cheer!" intoned the king. "Coo Cher! Coo Cher!" imitated the Cardinal. These songs were only studied repetitions, but there was a depth and volume in his voice that gave promise of future greatness, ...
— The Song of the Cardinal • Gene Stratton-Porter
... fust; but when the yard was all ablaze with flowers he used to come and stand in a kind o' maze at the front door, and say, 'Beautiful, beautiful: why, Huldy, I never see any thing like it.' And then when her work was done arternoons, Huldy would sit with her sewin' in the porch, and sing and trill away till she'd draw the meadow-larks and the bobolinks, and the orioles to answer her, and the great big elm-tree overhead would get perfectly rackety with the birds; and the parson, settin' there in his study, would git to kind o' dreamin' about the angels, and ...
— Oldtown Fireside Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... revived when two new physical mediums, with letters of recommendation from Chicago, were introduced, and I expected to see the young gentlemen elongate or float round the room; but nothing of the kind occurred; and a young lady dashed my hopes to the ground by singing "The Nightingale's Trill." Mr. Morse gave an address in the trance state—as I was afterwards informed; but he looked and spoke so like an ordinary mortal that I should not have found out that he ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies
... foot. Sometimes he held the violin between his knees, playing on it as on a cello; then he caught it to his breast again in a sudden fury of improvisation—an arpeggio, light and running, his fingers barely touching the strings—the snatch of a theme—a trill, low and passionate—the rush of a scale. He toyed with the Stradivarius ...
— The Black Cross • Olive M. Briggs
... thou, MUNATIUS, whether Fate ordain The Camp thy home, with glancing javelins bright; Or if the graces of that fair domain, Umbrageous Tivoli, thy steps invite; If trumpets sound the clang that Warriors love, Or round thee trill the choirings of the grove, In flowing bowls drown every vain regret, Enjoy the PRESENT, and the ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward
... Jill can trill and sing With a flute-like voice, Dance as light as bird on wing, Laugh for careless joys: Yet it's I ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... was necessary to him that he should be made to know by some signal from her how it was going with her feelings. As he spoke of his danger, there came a gurgling little trill of wailing from her throat, a soft, almost musical sound of woe, which seemed to add an unaccustomed eloquence to his words. When he spoke of his own hope the sound was somewhat changed, but it was still continued. When he alluded to the disposition of his fortune, she was ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... you heard of the sing-away bird, That sings where the Runaway River Runs down with its rills from the bald-headed hills That stand in the sunshine and shiver? "O sing! sing-away! sing-away!" How the pines and the birches are stirred By the trill ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, May, 1878, No. 7. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... let him take his journey tomorrow; but he began to be pretty well, and after dinner my wife and Barker fell to singing, which pleased me pretty well, my wife taking mighty pains and proud that she shall come to trill, and indeed I think she will. So to the office, and there all the afternoon late doing business, and then home, and find my brother pretty well. So to write a letter to my Lady Sandwich for him to carry, I having not writ to her a great while. Then to ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... not waste time on the rest of the audience. She went direct for that coalheaver, and thereupon ensued a slanging match the memory of which sends a trill of admiration through me even to this day. It was a battle worthy of the gods. He was a heaver of coals, quick and ready beyond his kind. During many years sojourn East and South, in the course of many wanderings from Billingsgate to Limehouse ...
— John Ingerfield and Other Stories • Jerome K. Jerome
... swiftly through the warm incense of the pines. It was hot weather, and insects vexed the ear with an unwearied trill. But the heat of despair was greater in the girl than any such assault. Her cheeks had each a deep red spot. Her eyes were dark with feeling, and on the long black lashes hung fringing drops. She walked lightly, with ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... the crowing of Gildersleeve's rooster, and his hens chant cheerily as they kick the litter about. But it wasn't these cheerful sounds that wakened us with a start. There! Hear that? Hear it? Two or three long-drawn, reedy notes, and an awkward boggle at a trill, but oh, how sweet! How sweet! It is the song-sparrow, blessed bird! It won't be long now; it won't ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... a confused rustle of silks and a hum of voices, and now and then a silvery laugh would ring out above these like the trill of a bird in a breezy grove. Later, light airy music floated through the rooms, followed by the rhythmic cadence of feet. A thinly clad shivering little match-girl stopped on her weary tramp to her cellar and caught glimpses of the scene through the oft-opening door ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... friends of youth are dead; How many visions of fair hope have fled, Since first, my Muse, we met.—So speeds away Life, and its shadows; yet we sit and sing, Stretched in the noontide bower, as if the day Declined not, and we yet might trill our lay Beneath the pleasant morning's purple wing That fans us; while aloft the gay clouds shine! Oh, ere the coming of the long cold night, Religion, may we bless thy purer light, That still shall warm us, when the tints decline O'er earth's dim hemisphere; ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... of the saw, the trill of the plane, the thwack of the hammer, were very pleasant music in his ears. Day by day he watched his dwelling grow with the infinite joy of creating, and night after night he crept with Peter into ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... Trill-ll! It was not a cheer, but a subdued, breathless gasp that rose from the two camps of fans as the opposing lines rushed at each other. Dick could not help a slight groan, for Adams, of Cobber, reached the pigskin first. But Adams kicked it off over the line. Here was ...
— The High School Freshmen - Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports • H. Irving Hancock
... wife adored her native ballads Mr. Cameron, on his part, had a good stock of Scottish songs, and would trill them out in a fine baritone voice, the audience joining with enthusiasm in the choruses of such favorites as "Bonny Dundee," "Charlie is my Darling," and "Over ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... occasionally soaring into the air and descending in loops and spirals. The scarlet tyrant I saw in the orchards and gardens. The male is a fascinating little bird, coal- black above, while his crested head and the body beneath are brilliant scarlet. He utters his rapid, low-voiced musical trill in the air, rising with fluttering wings to a height of a hundred feet, hovering while he sings, and then falling back to earth. The color of the bird and the character of his performance attract the attention of every observer, bird, beast, or man, ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... blow her horn until the echoes answered merrily, merrily; now she would trill her songs, until the wild birds ...
— Stories from the Ballads - Told to the Children • Mary MacGregor
... sweat of roses in a still As that which from chaf'd musk-cat's pores doth trill, As th' almighty balm of th' early East, Such are the sweet drops of my mistress' breast. And on her neck her skin such lustre sets, They seem no sweat-drops, but pearl coronets: Rank sweaty froth thy ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... cried the tire-woman, with a little trill of laughter. "Oh simple, simple!" And she was off down the passage like arrow from bow, while Alleyne stood gazing after her, betwixt hope and doubt, scarce daring to put faith in the meaning which seemed ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... dictionary? If there is to be any difference between the aw and ore sounds either the R must be trilled as it still is in the north, or some vestige of it must be indicated, and such indication would be a lengthening of the o (aw) sound by the vestigial voicing of the lost trill, such as is indicated in the word o'er, and might be roughly shown to the eye by such a spelling as shawer for shore [thus shaw would be [s][o]: and shore would be [s][o]:[e]] and such distinction is still made by our more careful Southern English speakers, and is ...
— Society for Pure English, Tract 2, on English Homophones • Robert Bridges
... child the planet knows And to his joy replies; To the lark's trill unfolds the rose, Clouds flush their ...
— Poems - Household Edition • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... solicitous helpfulness. The girl broke into a little trill of mirth, too liquid for laughter; being rather the sound of a brooklet chuckling musically over its ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... not understand The magic touches of a hand That seemed, beneath her strange control, To smooth the plumage of the soul And calm it, till, with folded wings, It half forgot its flutterings, And, nestled in her palm, did seem To trill a ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... volume of verse; Charlotta the Fourth heard it and was blissfully sure it meant good luck for her adored Miss Shirley. The bird sang until the ceremony was ended and then it wound up with one mad little, glad little trill. Never had the old gray-green house among its enfolding orchards known a blither, merrier afternoon. All the old jests and quips that must have done duty at weddings since Eden were served up, and seemed as new and brilliant ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... The only sound he could hear was the trill and chirp of the insects of the woods. The pursuit, which had lasted only a few minutes, was over. But it might be resumed at any moment. Tom was not safe yet, he thought, ...
— Tom Swift and his Motor-cycle • Victor Appleton
... and birds will trill, And all things display their charms, And, when he's journeyed as far as he will, He'll ...
— A Jolly Jingle-Book • Various
... the clear trill of a canary singing blithely in its cage. Within the tidy, homely little room a pale-faced girl and a youth of slender frame listened intently while the bird sang its song. The girl was the first to ...
— A Ghetto Violet - From "Christian and Leah" • Leopold Kompert
... syllable a wonderfully executed trill, in a very low tone, as if to depict the overflowing affection of her heart by a poetic expression. The old man, suddenly arrested by some memory, remained on the threshold of that secret retreat. In the profound silence we heard the sigh that came forth form his ...
— Sarrasine • Honore de Balzac
... pleasure excursion. Animation of spring clothed the landscape on all sides in its greatest beauty; and our northern forest the voyagers found upon their return was not less charming than "tropic shade" of foreign climes. And the robin sang even a sweeter trill than ever before heard by the crew, for they listened to it now in the country that ...
— Voyage of the Liberdade • Captain Joshua Slocum
... far at sea Cunning fingers fashioned me. There on palace walls I hung While that Consuelo sung; But I heard, though I listened well, Never a note, never a trill, Never a beat of the chiming bell. There I hung and looked, and there In my gray face, faces fair Shone from under shining hair. Well I saw the poising head, But the lips moved and nothing said; And when lights were in the hall, Silent moved ...
— Underwoods • Robert Louis Stevenson
... where'er you be, Though known or all unknown to me; To you, who love the things of God, The dew-begemmed and velvet sod, The birds that trill beside their nest. "Oh, love, sweet love, of life is best;" To you, for whom each sunset glows. ...
— The California Birthday Book • Various
... as the sun threw its first beams over the earth. Birds of all kinds vied with each other, as they sang their joy on that beautiful morning. The priest stood listening. Suddenly, off at one side, he heard a trill that rose higher and clearer than all the rest. He moved toward the place whence the song came, that he might see what manner of bird it was that could send farther than all the others its happy, laughing notes. As he came near, ...
— Indian Story and Song - from North America • Alice C. Fletcher
... thy lustrous eye, Azure-melting westerly, The raptures of thy face unfold, And welcome in thy robes of gold! Tho' the nightingale broods—'sweet-chuck-sweet' - And the ouzel flutes so chill, Tho' the throstle gives but one shrilly trill To the nightingale's 'sweet-sweet.' ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... colt's-foot on the edge of the ditch was in bloom. All the weeds that grew in among the stones were brown and shiny. The beech-woods in the distance seemed to swell and grow thicker with every second. The skies were high—and a clear blue. The cottage door stood ajar, and the lark's trill could be heard in the room. The hens and geese pattered about in the yard, and the cows, who felt the spring air away in their stalls, lowed their approval every ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof
... its crowning reward. The noise of it reaches august ears. An act of gracious condescension follows. Her Ladyship has the supreme delight of leading a scion of Royalty to a chair of state in her drawing-room, to hear Sir Raucisonous bleat and Miss Quaver trill. ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... little trill of laughter. After all, there were some good points about being grown-up. At that moment she had no hankering whatever for the days of pigtails ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... not prohibitive . . . Hi, Smiles! Approach, Smiles, and be introduced to Thespis. His charge is three shillings. At the price of three shillings behold, Smiles, the golden age returned! Comedy carted home through leafy ways shall trill her ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... busy day. No, indeed! He would not stay in box or basket, or anywhere but cradled close in my neck. There he wished to remain, twittering happily, giving now and then a sweet, little, tremulous trill, indicative of content, warmth, and drowsiness; if I dared to move ever so little, showing by a sharp scratch from his claws that he preferred absolute quiet. One night, when all worn out, I rose and put him in a hat box and covered ...
— Adopting An Abandoned Farm • Kate Sanborn
... without fail, Rusty sang his dawn song right under Farmer Green's window. His musical trill, sounding very much like the brook that rippled its way down the side of Blue Mountain, always made Farmer Green feel glad that another ...
— The Tale of Rusty Wren • Arthur Scott Bailey
... emotion:—"John was singing like a lark, with a lark's spontaneous delight in singing; with an ease and self-abandonment which charmed eye almost as much as ear. Higher and higher rose the clear, sexless notes, till two of them met and mingled in a triumphant trill. To Desmond, that trill was the answer to the quavering, troubled cadences of the first verse; the vindication of the spirit soaring upwards unfettered by the flesh—the pure spirit, not released from the human clay without a fierce struggle. At that moment Desmond loved the ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... went out, for the fire-flies fled in every direction; but in the darkness Twinkle thought she could still hear the drone of the big bass fiddle and the flute-like trill ...
— Twinkle and Chubbins - Their Astonishing Adventures in Nature-Fairyland • L. Frank (Lyman Frank) Baum
... universe—a rapture of love awakened by a morning in spring, by the blue infinity of the sky, by the eternal loneliness and sublimity of the sea. Or, in some moment of susceptibility, the smiles of dear home faces, the tender trill of a voice, a surge of solemn music, may have power over the young heart to change its entire future. And again, it is some vivid experience of temptation and suffering that shapes the great hereafter. For the Divinity that maketh and ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... lonely bird singing in the wilderness! A lonely bird that sings with glee! Sunny and sweet, and light and clear, its airy notes float through the sky, and trill with innocent revelry. ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli
... so long as we're together," sang Patty with a little trill, as she danced about the room. Then she seated herself at the old, square piano, and began to ...
— Patty's Social Season • Carolyn Wells
... of the grove, little birds live at ease, I wish not to wander from you; I'll still dwell beneath the deep roar of your trees, For I know that my Joe will be true. The trill of the robin, the coo of the dove, Are charms that I'll never forego; But resting through life on the bosom of love, Will remember ...
— Wild Flowers - Or, Pastoral and Local Poetry • Robert Bloomfield
... very ancient music, from the time of Lully, one finds constantly a little cross marked over the notes. Often this certainly indicates a trill, but it seems difficult to take it always to mean such. However, perhaps fashion desired that trills should thus be made out of place. I have never been able to find an explanation of this sign, not even in the musical dictionary of J. J. Rousseau. This dictionary ...
— On the Execution of Music, and Principally of Ancient Music • Camille Saint-Saens
... herself disengaged and alone, revolved with the utmost displeasure her present situation. "How happy," cried she, "are the virgins of the vale! To them every hour is winged with tranquility and pleasure. They laugh at sorrow; they trill the wild, unfettered lay, or wander, chearful and happy, with the faithful swain beneath the woodland shade. They fear no coming mischief; they know not the very meaning of an enemy. Innocent themselves, they apprehend not guilt and treachery in those around them. Nor have they reason. ...
— Imogen - A Pastoral Romance • William Godwin
... look came in her hardened face— She had not wept for years; But the robin's trill, as some sounds will, Jarred open the door of tears. She thought of the old home far away; She heard the whr-r-r of the mill; She heard the turtle's wild, sweet call, And the wail of the ...
— The Kingdom of Love - and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... trill of a laugh,—it was so evident that he had been going to say "carriage." "Thank you, with the greatest of pleasure. Indeed, it is rather a relief to me, for they generally keep me waiting. And I ...
— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... expected home. The roses were blossoming and the pinks were sweet, in the old-fashioned flower garden in front of the house; and the smell of the hay came from the fields where mowers were busy, and the trill of a bob-o'-link sounded in the meadow. It was evening when Pitt made his way from his father's house over to the colonel's; and he found Esther sitting in the verandah, with all this sweetness about her. The house was ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... flower white, and cheek ruddy bright with rosy light; whereupon the mother rejoiced, as did the eunuchs and attendants and all the company; and Sophia was delivered of the after birth whilst all in the palace sent forth the trill of joy.[FN148] The rest of the concubines heard it and envied her lot; and the tidings reached Omar son of Al- Nu'uman, who was glad and rejoiced at the excellent news. Then he rose and went to her and kissed her head, after which he looked at the boy; and, bending ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... how much snap and go there was to it until I heard Miss Hampton trill it out. Why, she just tosses up that perky chin of hers and turns loose the catchy melody until you felt the warm waves splashin' and saw the moonlight dancin' across the bay! I don't know where or what ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford
... they ploughed through the gray mists—a strange and terrible sight for the Nascopees lurking in the underbrush along the shore. And while the men smoked and sang "Die Wacht am Rhein," listening to the trill of the ripples against the ...
— The Man Who Rocked the Earth • Arthur Train
... silences in woody aisles wherethrough Cool paths go loitering, and where the trill Of best-remembered birds hath something new In cadence for the hearing—lingering still Through all the open day that lies beyond; Reaches of pasture-lands, vine-wreathen oaks, Majestic still in pathos of decay,— The road—the wayside pond Wherein the dragonfly ...
— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley
... He stood without moving and made no effort to answer her. Just before they had started on that thrilling adventure into the forest, which had ended with his carrying her in his arms, she had gone to the piano and had played for him. Now her fingers touched softly the same notes. A little humming trill came in her throat, and it seemed to David that she was deliberately recalling his thoughts to the things that had happened before the coming of St. Pierre. He had not lighted the lamp over the piano, and for a flash her dark eyes smiled at him out of the half shadow. ...
— The Flaming Forest • James Oliver Curwood
... fell like lead against Mrs. Whately's door, and mechanically I gave the low signal whistle I had been wont to give to Marjie. Like a mockery came the clear trill from within. But there was no mockery in the quick opening of the casement above me, where a dim light now gleamed, nor in the flinging up of the curtain, and it was not a spirit but a real face with a crown of curly hair that was outlined in the gloom. And a voice, ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter
... a common ancient practice; the very words "thrall," "thralldom," are etymologically connected with the roots "thrill," "trill," "drill," (Compare Exod. xxi. 6; Deut. xv. 17; Plut. Cic. 26; and ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar
... caught by a clarionet, [1] And a wild heart, throbbing in the reed, Should thrill its joy and trill its fret, And utter its ...
— Select Poems of Sidney Lanier • Sidney Lanier
... after which quoth Gharib, "How is it with my wives Fakhr Taj[FN53] and Mahdiyah?" Al-Damigh answered, "They are both well and in good case." Then the eunuch went in and acquainted the women of the Harim with Gharib's coming, whereat they rejoiced and raised the trill of joy and gave him the reward for good news. Presently in came King Gharib, and they rose and saluting him, conversed with him, till Al- Damigh entered, when Gharib related to them all that had befallen him in the land of the Jinn, whereat they all ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 7 • Richard F. Burton
... flute, The melancholy lute, Were night-owl's hoot To my low-whispered coo - Were I thy bride! The skylark's trill Were but discordance shrill To the soft thrill Of wooing as I'd woo - Were ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... with a long breath. "My sister Solly is married." Smiles broke all over her little face. She hid it in Sally's skirts, and a little peal of laughter like a bird-trill came ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... over TINTERN'S roofless pile! Then, as the sun regain'd his power, When the last breeze from hawthorn bower, Or Druid oak, had shook away The rain-drops 'midst the gleaming day, Perhaps the sigh of hope return'd And love in some chaste bosom burn'd, And softly trill'd the stream along, Some rustic ...
— The Banks of Wye • Robert Bloomfield
... rustle of a bird as it flew from the thinning branches, the soft sigh of a faint breeze as it whispered its message of decay to the trees, the gentle trill of a robin at intervals, were the only sounds that fell upon the ear as Lady Pembroke and Sir Fulke Greville spoke of him who ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... laborious loom, Such as by Euxine or Ionian shores Carpets the dim seraglio's scented gloom. Each morn renewed, the garden's flowery stores Blushed in fair vases, ochre and peach-bloom, And little birds through wicker doors left wide Flew in to trill a space from the ...
— Poems • Alan Seeger
... up to the furioso than to remain quietly behind with the Comodo. The old masters also had a species of composition with the superscription "Furia," but their fury was not to be taken very seriously, for the furia was a dance. The French in former times considered the very slow trill to be especially beautiful. This kind of trill sounds to us amateurishly ridiculous, while, on the contrary, the most admired rapid trills of our best singers of today would probably have been called "false shakes" a hundred and fifty years ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... to HANDEL'S ear.— YOU with soft breath attune the vernal gale, When breezy evening broods the listening vale; Or wake the loud tumultuous sounds, that dwell In Echo's many-toned diurnal shell. 245 YOU melt in dulcet chords, when Zephyr rings The Eolian Harp, and mingle all its strings; Or trill in air the soft symphonious chime, When rapt CECILIA lifts her eye sublime, Swell, as she breathes, her bosoms rising snow, 250 O'er her white teeth in tuneful accents slow, Through her fair lips on whispering pinions move, And ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... Time-trenched on cheek and brow, Whom I once heard as a maid From Keinton Mandeville Of matchless scope and skill Sing, with smile and swell and trill, "Should he upbraid!" ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... flower-border near, Amy would hear such a vigorous scratching among the leaves that she might well believe that a motherly hen was at work, but presently one of these little sober-coated creatures that Thoreau well calls a "ground-bird" would fly to the top of a plum-tree and trill out a song as sweet as the perfume that came from the blossoming willows not far away. The busy plows made it a high festival for the robins, for with a confidence not misplaced they followed near in the furrows that Leonard was making in the garden, ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... in the orchard lot And pears come thumping, falling; When sweet and clear, far off and near, The bobwhite's voice is calling; When crickets trill out on the hill, And dusk comes quick and cool; When all at once, in midst of play, You can't remember what's the way To multiply—you stop ...
— Zodiac Town - The Rhymes of Amos and Ann • Nancy Byrd Turner
... pasture outside my window was still obscure with the shadows of night, but the sky had begun to kindle with the splendors of day. In a group of darksome trees beside a little stream two hundred paces distant a song thrush was wont to trill forth the holy soul of awakening nature in such a paean of deathless Pan as inspired John Keats to utter the melodies of his magic ode. It consecrated the footsteps of the approaching sun, and the hearer was borne back on its swelling current to those pure early aeons of the human race, when love ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... "class-merits"—of the poems in general are very high indeed: and when the best of the other lyrics—aubades, debats, and what not—are joined to them, they supply the materials of an anthology of hardly surpassed interest, as well for the bubbling music of their refrains and the trill of their metre, as for the fresh mirth and joy of living in their matter. The "German paste in our composition," as another Arnold had it, and not only that, may make us prefer the German examples; but it must never be forgotten that but for these it ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... performance. It persevered with undiminished ardour; but the Cricket took first fiddle and kept it. Good Heaven, how it chirped! Its shrill, sharp, piercing voice resounded through the house, and seemed to twinkle in the outer darkness like a star. There was an indescribable little trill and tremble in it, at its loudest, which suggested its being carried off its legs, and made to leap again, by its own intense enthusiasm. Yet they went very well together, the Cricket and the kettle. The burden of the song was still the same; and louder, louder, louder still, they sang ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... a skip of a third and back came to be noted [Crenellation], and if the note came down on a second instead of the original note it became [Podium] [G: g' b' a']. The quilisma ([Upper Mordent]) indicated a repetition of two notes, one above the other, and we still use much the same sign for our trill. Also the two forms of the circumflex, [Over-slur] [Under-slur], were joined ([Turn]) and thus we have the modern turn, ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell
... drear, November's leaf is red and sear: Late, gazing down the steepy linn, That hems our little garden in, Low in its dark and narrow glen, 5 You scarce the rivulet might ken, So thick the tangled greenwood grew, So feeble trill'd the streamlet through: Now, murmuring hoarse, and frequent seen Through bush and brier, no longer green, 10 An angry brook, it sweeps the glade, Brawls over rock and wild cascade, And, foaming brown with double speed, Hurries ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott
... in the bright moonlight our ears were suddenly greeted by the sound of sweet music—wild, unearthly melody that seemed to rise from the very depths of the ocean just below our feet. At first it was only a soft trill or a subdued hum, as of a single voice: then followed what seemed a full chorus of voices of enchanting sweetness. Presently the melody died away in the distance, only, however, to burst forth anew after a brief interval. All the time we were ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... Knight soliloquizes and drinks his sack the orchestra takes part in a trill given out by piccolo, and gradually taken by one instrument after the other, until the whole orchestra is in a hearty laugh and shaking with string, brass, and wood wind glee. Then enters Dame Quickly, mischief-maker, and ...
— The Standard Operas (12th edition) • George P. Upton
... I sat and listened still, I could not have my fill. 'How comes,' I said, 'such music to his bill? Tell me for whom he sings so beautiful a trill.' ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
... I put vim into it, I can tell you! And bad as my playing was, I had from the start an absorption of attention from my audience that Paderewski himself might have envied. I wound up with a lively trill in the high notes and took my whistle from my lips with a hearty laugh, for the whole thing had been downright good fun, the playing itself, the make-believe which went with it, the surprise and interest in the children's faces, the slow-breaking smile of the little ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker
... adding whole branches of trees sacred to the seven sister-goddesses. Slowly and evenly they all jumped from one leg to another to a tune of a single monotonous musical phrase, which they repeated in chorus, accompanied by several local drums and tambourines. The hushed trill of the latter mingled with the forest echoes and the hysterical moans of two little girls, who lay under a heap of leaves by the fire. The poor children were brought here by their mothers, in the hope that the goddesses would ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... not to entertain us, nor to distract the pining lover[1]—it must have some personal purpose of its own. But, sadly enough, that purpose never seems to get fulfilled. Yet it is not down-hearted, and its Coo-oo! Coo-oo! keeps going, with now and then an ultra-fervent trill. ...
— Glimpses of Bengal • Sir Rabindranath Tagore
... along in the direction of Upton Wood, thoroughly enjoying their walk. Occasionally, they stopped to gather a few wild flowers, or listen to the joyous trill of a bird. They were at the edge of the wood, when Grace suddenly put ...
— Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School • Jessie Graham Flower
... bloom, and the fragrance of the waxen- white flowers clung heavily to the air, breathing forth delicate suggestions of languor and sleep. The measured rush of the near waterfall alone disturbed the deep silence, with now and then the subdued and plaintive trill of a nightingale soothing itself to rest with its own song in some deep shadowed copse. Here, on a couch of heaped-up, stemless roses, such as might have been prepared for the repose of Titania, Lysia seated herself, while Theos stood gazing at her in fascinated ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... that my method of playing the trill could be greatly improved and I also knew that I lacked force and endurance in certain passages. Fortunately, although a comparatively young man, I was not deceived by the flattery of well-meaning, but incapable critics, who were quite willing ...
— Great Pianists on Piano Playing • James Francis Cooke
... bluebirds already flying about, and I hear much chirping and twittering and two or three real songs, sustain'd quite awhile, in the mid-day brilliance and warmth. (There! that is a true carol, coming out boldly and repeatedly, as if the singer meant it.) Then as the noon strengthens, the reedy trill of the robin—to my ear the most cheering of bird-notes. At intervals, like bars and breaks (out of the low murmur that in any scene, however quiet, is never entirely absent to a delicate ear,) the occasional crunch and cracking of the ice-glare congeal'd ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... suddenly playing a noisy waltz of Strauss, opening with such a loud and rapid trill that Gedeonovsky was quite startled. In the very middle of the waltz she suddenly passed into a pathetic motive, and finished up with an air from "Lucia" Fra poco... She reflected that lively music ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... conducted into his little garden, sloping down to the very brink of the Tweed, and embosomed amid natural hazel wood, the lingering remains of a once goodly forest, to see some favourite flower, or to hear him trill, with a skill and execution which would have done little dishonour to Picus himself, some simple native melody upon his Scotch flute. The in-door entertainment consisted of varied conversation, embracing the subjects of literature, politics, and theology, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... is but a broken bubble, Trill the carol, troll the catch; Sooth, we'll cry, "A truce to trouble!" Mirth and mistletoe ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various
... stalked along, more or less conscious that a pair of dark blue eyes were regarding them, and they thought they heard a trill of laughter, but it might have been one of the maids. They need not have felt embarrassed for there was the grace in their movements that goes with strength and ...
— Frontier Boys on the Coast - or in the Pirate's Power • Capt. Wyn Roosevelt
... idea is an old silver trill copied from the bubbling spring. [He imitates in grotesque fashion the singing of ...
— Chantecler - Play in Four Acts • Edmond Rostand
... rim of a young rising moon Hung in the west as you leaned on the bar And spun a thread of some sweet April tune, And wished a wish and named the falling star. We heard a brook trill in the fields afar; The air wrapped round us that entrancing fold Of vanishing sweet stuff that mortal hold Can never grasp—the mist of dreams—as down The street we went in that fair ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... flute-notes with a boyish delight. But this evening they fell on deaf ears, and when the garish sunlight gave place to gloom, and drops of rain began to patter on the new leaf, the gathering storm, and the dark silence of the wood, after the nightingale had given her last trill, were welcome to a man struggling with a recurrent ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... tiny girl, the other girls used to say, 'Evey, dear, do make that funny noise in your throat,' and that was my trill. But since mother's death everything went wrong; it seemed that I would never get out of Dulwich. I never should have if it had not been for you. I had ceased to believe that I ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... his swinging spray of ivy on to the top of the wall and he opened his beak and sang a loud, lovely trill, merely to show off. Nothing in the world is quite as adorably lovely as a robin when he shows off—and they are ...
— The Secret Garden • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... grew somewhat belligerent, refused to let any one alight in his chosen places, and even drove others away from his side of the room. Now, too, he added to his already melting song an indescribable trill, something so spiritual, so charged with the wildness of the woods, that no words—even of a poet—can do it justice. Now, too, he began to turn longing glances out of the window, and evidently his heart was no longer with us. So, on the first ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller
... wring All the sweetness to the lees Of all the kisses clustering In juicy Used-to-bes, To dip his rhymes therein and sing The blossoms on the trees—, "O Blossoms on the Trees," He would twitter, trill, and coo, "However sweet, such songs as these Are not as sweet as you—: For you are blooming melodies The eyes ...
— Afterwhiles • James Whitcomb Riley
... the platform, bought him the Graphic, the Athenaeum, and a paper-cutter, and stood on the step conversing till the whistle sounded. Then she put her head into the carriage. "Black face and shining eye!" she whispered, and instantly leaped down upon the platform, with a trill of gay and musical laughter. As the train steamed out of the great arch of glass, the sound of that laughter still rang in the young ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... its full splendor upon the quiet city. Through the haze the convent on La Popa sparkled like an enchanted castle, with a pavement of soft moonbeams leading up to its doors. The trill of a distant nightingale rippled the scented air; and from the llanos were borne on the warm land breeze low feral sounds, broken now and then by the plaintive piping of a lonely toucan. The cocoa palms throughout the city stirred dreamily in the tempered moonlight; and the banana trees, ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... dimpled, and, in spite of herself, burst into a trill of laughter which was so merry and contagious that the grave stranger beside him looked up at her with an interested and amused smile as though seeing her ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart |
