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More "Undertone" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the front window!" returned Phyllis, in a hushed undertone. "There's something queer going ...
— The Dragon's Secret • Augusta Huiell Seaman
... awful, the Ponsonby girls giggled aloud, and finally got into such gales of laughter that I was ashamed. The organ had dropped into the customary groaning undertone that is meant, I suppose, to give courage to the nervous ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... waited a moment before looking up at me. "And I'm afraid Mr. Evers will never forgive me," she added after her look, in the rich undertone that had impressed me overnight, before ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung
... duke replied in an undertone, touching his son's arm with the point of the forefinger of his left hand, and pointing up to the panel with the stick he held in his right: "Dawne, if it were not for what that panel conceals—" he ended by folding his hands on the top of his stick, looking down ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... on the sixth day after parting company from the Spaniards, the vessel was hove to to take a pilot aboard. Captain S—— took him aside as soon as he boarded, and asked him in an undertone if he ever did anything in the contraband line. He held up his hands as though he were horrified at the ...
— Looking Seaward Again • Walter Runciman
... sullen undertone in his voice. His eyes still dwelt darkly on her. "If he raises an objection, I will ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman
... an undertone of intimacy. "Genius.... A great irresponsible genius.... Difficult to help.... I wish I could do ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells
... approach of a city magistrate, now acquired the habit of alluding to mandarins in casual conversation by names of affectionate abbreviation. Also, being advised of the expediency by a voice speaking in an undertone, he sought still further to extend beyond himself by suffering his nails to grow long and obliterating his name from the public announcements upon ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... moment that he did so he was conscious of an insufferable light. A sound was in his ears like the low, rhythmic thunder of a distant sea breaking in successive waves upon the beach, and out of this noise, seeming a part of it, or possibly coming from beyond it, and intermingled with its ceaseless undertone, came the articulate words: "Jerome Searing, you are caught like a rat in a trap— in a trap, ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... poor father till the speech of the evening had been made. So Dickens made his speech, and a brilliant one it was—it is brilliant even as one reads it now, in the coldness of print, without the glamour of the speaker's voice, and presence, and yet brilliant with an undertone of sadness, which the recent death of the speaker's father would fully explain. And Forster, who knew of the yet later blow impending on his friend, had to sit by and listen as that dear friend, all unconscious of the dread application of the ...
— Life of Charles Dickens • Frank Marzials
... always fascinating. It was full of glancing allusion, wit, sparkle, and with that constant undertone of significance that may be serious or gay, but which always lingers with a certain impressiveness to haunt the mind of the listener. Dr. Hiram Corson, who may perhaps be regarded as Browning's greatest interpreter, speaks of one of his visits to the poet, in London, where the ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... coming," affirmed Judy in an undertone for the twentieth time, "but I think it will be after ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... Coombe said and spoke in an undertone rapidly. "She thinks you mean to turn her out of the house as if she were ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... had whispered spoke in an undertone to his fellows. One of them went out swiftly; the others threw wide the three doors and then gathered up the fallen gold. It was replaced in its box and gravely presented to Kendric. He threw back the lid, thrust into his pocket without counting what he deemed equal to the ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... could not be expressed by signs, in a gentle, soft, and private way. Two and two were in general to live together, so that one might watch the other. After departing from the supper hall to bed it was not permitted them to speak again in public, except upon urgent necessity, and then only in an undertone. All scurrility, jests, and idle words were to be avoided; and after any foolish saying, the repetition of the Lord's Prayer was enjoined. All professed knights were to wear white garments, both in summer and winter, as emblems of chastity. The esquires and retainers ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... somewhat apart, talking in an animated undertone to each other. They did not even approach the fire to roast their food; and Mr. Hardy's attention being attracted by this circumstance, he asked what they were talking ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... my wand first thing I do," she said in an awed undertone. "It is useless to try to do ...
— The Shape of Fear • Elia W. Peattie
... of the fall hardly pierced the confused uproar, and Carrie, shielding her scorched face with her hand, was appalled by the din. Green wood split with detonating cracks, the snapping of branches was like musketry, and the flames roared in a deep undertone. Her dress fluttered, for eddying draughts swept the rocks. She was dazzled but fascinated, unconscious of heat and fear, for she had not seen or imagined a ...
— Partners of the Out-Trail • Harold Bindloss
... sees a human fight, while they are trying to make a political squabble. He may win them over to-night, but this is only the beginning. The real fight is against individual self-interest." He laughed in an undertone. "I remember he told me once that the only trouble with Christianity was the Christians. 'You can't have Christianity', he said, 'until Christians are different'. That's just as true, of course, of politics. The only trouble with ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... greens and purples that you saw those grown-up children in the Village joyously splashing on their wooden toys or the walls of their absurd and charming "shops" will somehow get into the grey fabric of your life; and a certain eager urging undertone of idealism and hope and sturdy aspiration will make you restless as you follow your common round. Perhaps you will go back. Perhaps you will keep it as a rainbow memory, a visualisation of the make-believe country where ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... for yourselves the characters, and can follow the simple action which owes its slight interest only to the constant effort of the dreamer to attain his ideal,—the Rose,—and owes its charm chiefly to the constant disappointment and final defeat. An undertone of sadness runs through it, felt already in the picture of Time which foreshadows the end of Love—the Rose—and her court, and with it the ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... had been whistling at the window, said to Drake in a cynical undertone: "The man is hipped and sore. He has lost his challenge, and we ought to make allowances ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... one is my favorite, but the off one is the best goer, though she's dreadfully hard bitted," answered Ben the younger, with such a comical assumption of a jockey's important air that his father laughed as he said in an undertone: ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... called that he would return in two days. Of his possible reception by Telly he was a good deal in doubt. She had written to him in reply to his letters, but between each of the simple, unaffected lines all he could read was an undertone of sadness. That, with a vivid recollection of what Uncle Terry had disclosed, led him to believe there was some burden on her mind and that he had or was no part ...
— Uncle Terry - A Story of the Maine Coast • Charles Clark Munn
... the means of leading me to think about this thing." Why should she care, though, whether people thought about this thing or not? Yesterday she didn't. During all the talk she kept up this little undertone of thought, this running commentary on her sudden change of views and feelings, and wondered, and wondered, could it be possible that she was utterly changed? And yet, when she came to think of it, wasn't she? Didn't she love Christ? And then it struck her as the strangest ...
— Four Girls at Chautauqua • Pansy
... roof o 'the cabin. An' when I thinks of it all, as think of it I does, meanderin' along with my friendly ol' flute, of an evenin' in the fall o' the year, when trade's done an' the shelves is all put t' rights, I hears that undertone o' patter an' splash an' sigh. There was that in the lad's face t' stir an ache in the heart of a sentimental ol' codger like me; an' when I seed the grim lines an' gray color of it, an' when I caught the sorrow an' pride ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan
... he cried, clearing a space around them with the point of his sword. "His Majesty has committed him to my custody, and I am responsible for him. Pardon me if I disarm you, Sir," he added in an undertone to the prisoner. ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... is the word." He spoke in an undertone—a voice of acquiescence, or rather obedience. "Perhaps it will not be so bad when I remember more." They ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... floated up to them, the daily toil, the noise of it, its bartering, its going and coming. Men and women must live, even in a revolution, and to live, work. Underneath it all there was something unnatural, a murmur, a growl, the sound of an undertone, secret, cruel, deadly; yet the woman's pointing finger was all Lucien was conscious of ...
— The Light That Lures • Percy Brebner
... became apparent to the crowd on the green that they were not likely to be vouchsafed any information unless they asked for it, a brisk disputation, conducted in an undertone, so that it might not reach the ears of the gentlemen, arose as to ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... George," asked Billie in an undertone, "if we side-step the Amber Drawing-Room? I'm wild to get into that garden. There's a man working among those roses. Maybe he ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... quoting oddly in undertone, "'And Beauty drew him, by a single hair,'" and the words ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley
... years of age as he was at any later time. His early sermons, delivered to his first charge in Philadelphia, displayed the same individuality, the same force and completeness and clearness of construction, the same deep, strong undertone of religious thought, as his great discourses preached in Westminster Abbey six months before his death. His sentences are sonorous; his style was characterized by a noble simplicity, impressive, but without a touch showing that dramatic ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... Bedouins preparing to pass the Great Desert. Arrived in the forest about nightfall, and well and duly shut up in their Gibraltar of wood, the sportsmen may eat, drink, and smoke, and converse in an undertone; but a heavy fine is invariably inflicted on those who make the least noise. No one is permitted to sneeze, talk loud, or laugh; as to blowing one's nasal organ vigorously, the thing is absolutely forbidden; no one is allowed to have a cold, much less an influenza, for at least eight hours, ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... tell me again that the Austrians are tyrants," said Mrs. Vervain in undertone to ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... or wrong-doer, now brooding tender as a mother-bird over some fledgling soul, now broken with sobs as she mourns over the sins of Church and world, and again chanting high prophecy of restoration and renewal, or telling in awestruck undertone sacred mysteries of the interior life. Dante's Angel of Purity welcomes wayfarers upon the Pilgrim Mount "in voce assai piu che la nostra, viva." The saintly voice, like the angelic, is more living than ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... truce to child's play," replied the count's evil genius, in an undertone; "you know as well as I do what I mean. Besides, you must have observed how the princess's glance softens as she looks at you;—you can tell, by the very inflection of her voice, what pleasure she takes in listening to you, and can ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... princes 'by the grace of God' live here very pleasantly," muttered Napoleon in an undertone; "they know better how to build and furnish their residences than to preserve them to their children. Well, I am a good architect, and have come to reconstruct the royal palace of Prussia. Do you think, Duroc, those ingrates will thank ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... accompany me to the stable?" suggested his host, when the meal was over, the mild words being backed by an undertone of considerable authority. Stuart would have liked to protest, for he was feeling chipper and lively, but, just as he was about to speak, he remembered Andy's remark, on board the motor boat, about "food for fishes." Probably Cecil's allies were ready for any kind of bloodshed, ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... she picked out the very largest oysters she had, to stew for us. When we had finished our supper and had paid for it, and were going down to take our little boat again,—for we had rowed up the river,—Euphemia stopped and looked around her. Then she clasped her hands and exclaimed in an ecstatic undertone: ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton
... still, we would have been travelling some hidden side-path, where doubtless Joseph and Innocentina, chaperoned by les animaux, were happily straying at this moment. I could almost hear the donkey-girl's mechanically constant, warning cry, "Fanny-anny, Fanny-anny! Souris-ouris!" like a low undertone of accompaniment to the ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... down solicitously, murmured in a melancholy undertone, shook her head; then disappeared from the window, and, after a moment or two, ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... then went on to describe her failure. She told it to them with laughter between her sentences, but among her listeners was one at least who caught the undertone of sadness in ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... important preparations of the mind, she (Miss Bertram) was complete, being prepared for matrimony by a hatred of home, restraint and tranquillity, by the misery of disappointed affection and contempt of the man she was to marry; the rest might wait." This is not the touch of Gerard Douw. An undertone of irony, never obtrusive but everywhere perceptible, shows that the artist herself knew very well that she was not painting gods and Titans, and keeps everything on ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... attempting to express my appreciation and thanks to Admiral Sampson for the courtesy of allowing us to precede him into Santiago, Admiral Schley, with that naivete and apt turn of expression so characteristic of him, in a half undertone side-remark, cautioned me with "Don't give him too much credit, Miss Barton; he was not quite sure how clear the channel might be. Remember ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton
... my stomach. "But you are better," he murmurs; "the stomach is not so hard." I protest—he seems astonished, the interne then says to him in an undertone: ...
— Sac-Au-Dos - 1907 • Joris Karl Huysmans
... insignificant remarks about the crops; all the unimportant words about the spelling-school. Not for the sake of the remarks. Not for the sake of the weather. Not for the sake of the crops. Not for the sake of the spelling-school. But for the sake of the undertone. And then she traveled back over the three years of her bondage and forward over the three years to come, and fed her heart on the dim hope of rebuilding in some form the home that had been so happy. And she prayed, with more faith than ever before, for deliverance. For love brings faith. Somewhere ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston
... call to Nell. I am afraid the case must have been desperate, for I am seldom the victim," I said in an undertone to our host, who acquiesced with a laugh. "Harriet Henderson must be dead, for Nell usually sends the worse one to her," I added under ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... said Mrs. Carroll, in an undertone, as the tall fellow leaped to the ground, slipped the bridle over his arm, and ...
— A Tar-Heel Baron • Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton
... straight at Tom with a look as sure and steady as his rifle. "Slade's Hole isn't known outside of Barrell Alley, Tom," he said impressively, although in the same cautious undertone, "but Tom Slade is known from one end of this sector ...
— Tom Slade Motorcycle Dispatch Bearer • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... be sure I will," said Jonas; then with a laugh out of the side of his mouth, he added in an undertone, "Don't seem to want that I should set a net; she runs right into ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... thanking the captain for his courtesy, descended to the cabin along with him, and sat down on a sofa in the darkest corner of it. Here he smoked vehemently, while his companion, assuming rather a mysterious air, said, in an undertone: ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... of the crowding, jostling, kicking, squealing band, mingled with the merry voices of the men, with now and then a shout of anger or warning as the cowboys moved here and there among their restless four-footed companions; and always, like a deep undertone, came the sound ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... who is but a Buffalo, and, of course, has not the great Wolf wisdom, may be mistaken. You who are an eater of grasses when you are ill, eat of this Fur Flower, as you name it; then also I will eat in great faith—after a little," he added in an undertone. ...
— The Outcasts • W. A. Fraser
... the rear, Labiskwee spoke in an undertone to Smoke. "He is eating," she said. "It is ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... standing at the edge of the ravine, and looking down on them, uttered a soft but thrilling amen to every prayer. When it was over, and the men prepared to fill in the grave, she spoke to Welch in an undertone, and begged leave to pay her tribute first; and, with this, she detached her apron and held it out to them. Hazel easily climbed up to her, and found her apron was full of sweet-smelling bark and aromatic leaves, whose fragrance ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... ours was, from outlying farms. And when they and we had passed in through the gateways—where the townsfolk of old lashed out against their robber Infidel and robber Christian enemies—all the black little narrow streets were filled with an undertone of murmuring voices and an overtone of ...
— The Christmas Kalends of Provence - And Some Other Provencal Festivals • Thomas A. Janvier
... he said, in an undertone, "I didn't get out at Warnworth after all. It would have been dreadful if you'd been left all alone in ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... crossed a great bridge and set his foot within the smiling city that has crushed or crowned more poets than all the rest of the world. His breath came quickly as Paris sang to him in a little undertone her vital chant of greeting—the hum of ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... all I require. You see, I have so much health and superfluous heat that I like to be cool; and then I have the—" he stopped short here, for he could not quite deviate from the truth so far as to say he actually had the asthma, so he added, in an undertone, "If I had the asthma I could not breathe, you know, in this small room, pretty as it is, and upon my word it is lovely. Have you no larger chamber which I ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... SISTERHOOD OF SHAME AND DEATH.—Whenever we pass the sisterhood of death, and hear the undertone of song, which is one of the harlot's methods of advertising, let us recall the words, that these represent the "pestilence which walketh in darkness, the destruction that wasteth at noonday." The allusion, of course, is to the fact that the great majority of these harlots are ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... heard the slight grating sound of small cakes of ice, floating with various speed, full of content and promise, and where the water gurgles under a natural bridge, you may hear these hasty rafts hold conversation in an undertone. Every rill is a channel for the juices of the meadow. In the ponds the ice cracks with a merry and inspiriting din, and down the larger streams is whirled grating hoarsely, and crashing its way along, which was so ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... her, Bran?' said Raphael, in an undertone. 'I must really emancipate myself from your instructions if you require a similar simplicity in me. Stay! there wanders a mule without a rider; we may as ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... see," growled Hank in an undertone to his brother, "why we would take any risk riding under ...
— Bart Stirling's Road to Success - Or; The Young Express Agent • Allen Chapman
... of low whispering in my vicinity. This thoroughly aroused me, and without stirring my body I slowly turned my head, when to my astonishment I beheld Kouaga, standing erect with arms folded beneath his white burnouse, talking in an undertone to a dark-bearded stranger who also wore flowing Arab garments and bore in his hand a long-barrelled flint-lock gun with quaintly-inlaid stock. The man seemed older than the Grand Vizier of Mo, for his beard was tinged with grey, and the brown hand that held ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... where gray Belerium fronts the spray Smiting the bastion'd crags through centuries flown, While, 'neath the hissing surge, Ocean sends up a deep, deep undertone, ...
— The Visions of England - Lyrics on leading men and events in English History • Francis T. Palgrave
... Carl in an undertone. "Don't go rowing at Ma now. If you do she may get her back up and not take you to the party at all. I hate to be scrubbed within an inch of my life as much as you do, but I'm not saying so to-day. I'd be boiled in oil sooner than not go to ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett
... above orchestral undertone, The plaining wail of muted violin, The hushed oboe and the distant din, Of muffled drum or viol's raucous groan— Sudden arises one pure voice-like tone, A silver trumpet's tongue that stirs the soul To feel the theme, and the harmonious whole A sonant setting seems for that alone; So, ...
— The Path of Dreams - Poems • Leigh Gordon Giltner
... Finisher of faith and prayer, who watches over our praying, and sees to it that in all who trust Him for it their education in the school of prayer shall be carried on to perfection. Let but the deep undertone of all our prayer be the teachableness that comes from a sense of ignorance, and from faith in Him as a perfect teacher, and we may be sure we shall be taught, we shall learn to pray in power. Yes, we may depend upon it, HE teaches ...
— Lord, Teach Us To Pray • Andrew Murray
... of you agree with me," Lois said; "and I do not know much poetry; but there seems to me to run an undertone of lament and weariness through most of what I know. Now take the 'Death of the Flowers,'—that you were reading ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner
... did not mean to walk home with John; but on the other hand she did not mean to walk with the squire. She revolved the matter in her mind as she sat in the library talking in an undertone with Mr. Juxon. She liked the great room, the air of luxury, the squire's tea and the squire's conversation. It is worth noticing that his flow of talk was more abundant to-day than it had been for some time; whether it was John's presence which stimulated Mr. Juxon's imagination, ...
— A Tale of a Lonely Parish • F. Marion Crawford
... spread rich carpets, and half a dozen enormous cushions of soft-coloured silk were thrown negligently one upon the other. Three doors, hung with curtains, opened upon the balcony,—and near to the middle one, two slave-girls, clad in white, crouched upon their heels and talked in an undertone. ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... undertone, and still she muffled the light, while steadily the weight of his arms increased. Suddenly he crowded her to the earth. "Arthur," she murmured, "Arthur, what are you going to do? Don't kill me ...
— Bylow Hill • George Washington Cable
... for the sake of deafness, and found convenient as a sort of flying chaperon. The countess could not hear much of the music, but she was fond of the world and liked to be seen, and she could not hear at all what Del Ferice said in an undertone to Madame Mayer. Sufficient to her were the good things of the day; the rest was in no way her business. There was Valdarno in the club-box, with a knot of other men of his own stamp. There were the ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... kennel-door, Towser bounded forth to meet him As he oft had done before. And the farmer stooped and loosed him From the dog-chain short and stout; To himself he softly chuckled, "Bessie's feller must look out." But the maiden at the window Saw the cruel teeth show white; In an undertone she murmured,— "Towser must ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... along," said Bertha; and then added, in an undertone, "you know what I promised to show you, Lizzie. Come with me; let them make up the game ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... words Asher caught the undertone of courage, and he knew that a battle for supremacy was on, a struggle between physical outcry and ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... morality or money. I wished to hurl myself and my theories to the test, and gauntlet my defiance to a withered world. It was a happy time, looked back on now as a dream, in which, however, there was an undertone of nightmare. We had three little rooms up many mild flights of unbalustered stairs. Our main furniture consisted of mattresses which, like morning clouds, were rolled away when the ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... hermit in an undertone, as if the remark were made half to himself and half to Ivor, whose head appeared at the window, and whose old countenance was wrinkled with a grin of delight at this unexpected display of prowess; "mine ancient skill, it would seem, has not deserted me, for which I am thankful, for ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... his respects to the ladies in his usual free and easy manner, expressed some surprise, but no regret, at hearing that he was late, and never deigning any notice of Matthew or myself, took his place beside Miss Dashwood, with whom he conversed in a low undertone. ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... von Balderdash gave some orders in an undertone; the troops opened on the left, and disclosed a row of prisoners, including several women, standing bound and blindfolded against a wall, each one at a distance of several yards from his neighbor. The captain ordered ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... cigarette, blew out the lamp and said the Lord's Prayer in an undertone, but he got no farther than the fifth petition. Then ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... a gloomy dinner for the Freshman, baked funeral meats and he the corpse. Mrs. Perkins gave him a motherly smile and told him in a careful undertone that she was glad he was going to be one of her boys, after which he felt childishly close to tears. He sat out-doors with the others and smoked and joined weakly in the singing. The roses clinging to the porch had never been so sweet; the Rho dog had never nosed so affectionately against ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field
... About this time, or a little later, in the still spring morning, the prairie hens or prairie cocks set up that low, musical cooing or crowing that defies the ear to trace or locate. The air is filled with that soft, mysterious undertone; and, save that a bird is seen here and there flitting low over the ground, the sportsman walks for hours without coming any nearer the source of the ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... knights of Malta, and a few ecclesiastics. I told the Queen it was probably an assemblage of persons residing in the neighbourhood who wished to see her. She rose, opened the window, and appeared in the balcony; immediately all these worthy people said to her, in an undertone: "Courage, Madame; good Frenchmen suffer for you, and with you; they pray for you. Heaven will hear their prayers; we love you, we respect you, we will continue to venerate our virtuous King." The Queen burst into tears, and held her handkerchief ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... well, and recalled in fancy old, youthful Christmases, and pledged mentally many an old friend, and my melancholy was mellowing into a low, sad undertone, when, just as I was raising a glass of wine to my lips, I was startled by a picture at the window-pane. It was a pale, wild, haggard face, in a great cloud of black hair, pressed against the glass. As I looked, it vanished. With a strange thrill ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various
... generally consist of four paragraphs, corresponding to four steps in the medical ceremony. In this case there are five, the last being addressed to the terrapin instead of to a dog. The prayers are recited in an undertone hardly audible at the distance of a few feet, with the exception of the frequent ha, which seems to be used as an interjection to attract attention and is always uttered in a louder tone. The beads—which are here white, symbolic of relief—are of common use in connection ...
— Seventh Annual Report • Various
... piled with papers, some of which were dusty and worn-looking. Carroll instantly conceived the idea that these were Dr. West's property. He took his letter quietly from his pocket; and, when the attention of the others was diverted, laid it on the table, with the remark, in an undertone, audible only ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte
... lounging near her, trying hard not to look bored, elevated his eyebrows as his ear caught the sentence, and addressed her in undertone: "Is Foster hard up? If he is, you are not on his hands yet, Sis; and I'm inclined to think father is good for all the finery you may ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... clerk (who prided himself upon being well read) occupied his seat below the old "three-decker" pulpit, and whenever a quotation or an extract from the classics was introduced into the sermon he, in an undertone, muttered its source, much to the annoyance of the preacher and amusement of the congregation. Despite all protests in private, the thing continued, until one day, the vicar's patience being exhausted, he leant over the pulpit side and immediately exclaimed, "Drat ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... overpowered laughter, for Frank was young and handsome, and full of what he said. It was quite romantic to be talked to like that. She would like to see the men threaten each other. But then—the scandal— father might never get over it. And if he married again? Speaking slowly, and in an undertone so as not to betray herself, she said: "O Frank, I'm sure you would not do ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... Inferno. There was almost no conversation; only once in a while was heard a remark, in a whisper or an undertone, addressed by a player to his neighbor; the only sound was that short, dry rustle of the cards and the crackling of new bank notes, or the tinkle of gold coins making their way round the table from the bank to the players, and from the ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... had given them for Tom, and now they forced a dose of this down the lad's throat. Then they rubbed his hands and wrists. Gradually they saw a change in Tom. He began to breath a little deeper and muttered something in an undertone. ...
— The Rover Boys in Alaska - or Lost in the Fields of Ice • Arthur M. Winfield
... cameo against the shadow of the cut-banks. At his feet another half-breed is wrapped in his blanket, and from here to the bow the boat is strewn with these human cocoons. The reclining friend breaks the silence with a word or two of Cree in an undertone to the steersman, a screech-owl cries, from high overhead drops down that sound which never fails to stir vagrant blood—the "unseen flight of strong hosts prophesying as they go." It is the wild geese feeling the old spring fret even as we feel it. In imagination ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... has become clear, we will set to music pitched in the joyous major our Lord's own words, "I do always the things that are pleasing to Him." And then we will set our lives to that joyous music with its rare undertone of the exquisite minor. It may mean Africa for you, or China for this other one. It may mean a plainer home at home, a simpler wardrobe, a more careful use of money. It may mean a new dominant note in your preaching, and all the ...
— Quiet Talks on Following the Christ • S. D. Gordon
... 'as gawn, sir," said the porter, with a note of reproach in his confidential undertone. The man was a favorite with Raffles, who used him and tipped him with consummate tact, and he knew me ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... Christmas services was 'bout As cold and wuthless kind o' love To offer up as he knowed of; And, as fer him, he railly thought 'At the Good Bein' up above Would think more of us—as he ought— A-stayin' home on sich a day And thankin' of him thataway. And jawed on in an undertone, 'Bout leavin' Lide and Jane alone There on the place, and me not there To oversee 'em, and p'pare The stuffin' for the turkey, and The sass and all, ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow—Book 3 - Christmas Poems from 'round the World • Various
... nave. The choir rose in a body, the nave huddled; Isoult, as she believed, saw Prosper, spear, crest, and shield. Her heart gave a great leap, then stood still. Perhaps there was a flicker in the Abbot's undertone; his lips may have been dry; but his courage was beyond proof. ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett
... her millions that she was placed before me," she said in an undertone to her husband, as soon as the guests had returned to the drawing-room. And, giving orders that her carriage should be summoned immediately, she left the house without speaking to any one, and with the air of a peeress of England outraged in ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa
... sat alway thro' the long day Spinning the weary thread away; And ever said in undertone: "Come, that I be no ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various
... sky seemed to shed approval. Godefroid, struck with reverence, looked from the old man to Doctor Sigier; they were talking together in an undertone. ...
— The Exiles • Honore de Balzac
... sick woman, who appeared to be slowly dying of that anomalous disease called decline, in which the mind is the chief agent of the body's decay. Meanwhile, Miss Vanbrugh talked in an undertone to little Christal, who, her hunger satisfied, stood, finger in mouth, watching the two ladies with her fierce black eyes—the very image of a half-tamed gipsy. Indeed, Miss Meliora seemed rather uneasy, and ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... voices of the leaders chant clear and high in vibrant unison, the multitude of the priestly choir recite in profoundest undertone the mighty verses; and the sound of their recitation is ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... lower away," directed Mr. Aiken in a harsh undertone; and the blocks creaked and we were in ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... in silence and with some contempt. The trainmaster had broken in on the superintendent for a moment and the two were conferring in an undertone. "What might your name be, mister?" growled Dancing, addressing with some condescension the man ...
— Whispering Smith • Frank H. Spearman
... the sorrow of the undertone; The wail of hopeless weeping in the dawn From lips that smiled ...
— The Englishman and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... raised his eyes for a moment, however, he caught sight of a man talking to the one sitting back of the cash counter. They were evidently arguing about something in an undertone and a minute later the newcomer took a seat with his back to ...
— The Broncho Rider Boys with Funston at Vera Cruz - Or, Upholding the Honor of the Stars and Stripes • Frank Fowler
... before. And the farmer stooped and loosed him From the dog-chain short and stout; To himself he softly chuckled, "Bessie's feller must look out." But the maiden at the window Saw the cruel teeth show white; In an undertone she murmured,— "Towser must be ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... course, from its being communicated in an undertone, was not proper for all the company to hear," replied the elder Miss Ossulton; "but if Mrs Lascelles is now ready," continued she, bridling up, as she rose ...
— The Three Cutters • Captain Frederick Marryat
... minor undertone of unrest sounding ominously through every line; the same illogical, unhappy attitude which implied so much and said so little, leaving him uneasy and disconcerted, conscious of the vague recklessness and ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... the sermon had throughout a meaning for her, entirely apart from its indistinguishable words. These, perhaps, if more distinctly heard, might have been only a grosser medium, and have clogged the spiritual sense. Now she caught the low undertone, as of the wind sinking down to repose itself; then ascended with it, as it rose through progressive gradations of sweetness and power, until its volume seemed to envelop her with an atmosphere of awe and solemn grandeur. ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... am amazed at your blindness and obstinacy. It is now from three to five years since I began to speak—though in a kind of indistinct undertone at first—against this bloody traffic. I have reasoned, I have remonstrated, and latterly I have threatened and implored with increasing earnestness. At times you have listened, and been convinced that the course which you are pursuing, in this day of light, is infamous, ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... Ellen, coming close, that her undertone might be heard, 'Harold and I would never mind ...
— Friarswood Post-Office • Charlotte M. Yonge
... had taken place in an undertone, while Rigolette and Mrs. Pipelet held themselves discreetly at ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... it," he replied in an undertone. "That run of '17' might happen—yes. But it is improbable. They let me win because I was a new player—new players always win at first. It is proverbial, but the man who is running this game has made it look like ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... red and upset, had to proceed to give in a loud voice the explanation he had been giving in an undertone to Fernanda. That little act of treason was a bond between them; it established a peculiar relation which the count did not dare to define in his thoughts, for he trembled as though an abyss yawned at his feet. He continued paying attention to ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... was deathly pale, with shadows and lines about his eyes, and his head trembled a little. There were one or two exclamations of pity, for all knew what had caused the change; and Anthony heard an undertone moan of sorrow and anger from some one in ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... branch of the wild grape-vine, with its pale and delicately fragrant blooms, along the snowy board. "Are the cheese-cakes a success, Mrs. McLean? I didn't dine, and am famished.—I see that you have at last heard from your cousin," she added, in an undertone. ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... could almost hate the four sages," Paula broke out in an undertone to Graham, who had ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... figure, in a shrill undertone; and, arising quickly from the bed, he made a single step toward our hero, while an iron lamp that depended over-head swung convulsively ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... speaking in an undertone, as they tramped rapidly onwards under the threat of the ...
— On Land And Sea At The Dardanelles • Thomas Charles Bridges
... glance in Malcolm's direction. But afterward, when she came out of the dressing-room, wrapped in her long party-cloak, she saw him standing by the door. "Good night!" he said, waving his plumed helmet. Then, with a mischievous smile, he sang in an undertone: ...
— The Little Colonel's Hero • Annie Fellows Johnston
... with one chapter had spread to several. In talking about the matter to Vanbrugh Neal in the salon after dinner he broke out into some expression of disgust as to the waste of time involved in much of his work of the winter. The two friends were in a corner of the vast room; and Manisty spoke in an undertone. But his voice had the carrying and ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... a sour and yet philosophic vaudevillian, who was mostly out of a job and hung about the place for what free meals he could obtain, once remarked to me in a heavy and morose undertone. "If I had that many women crazy ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser
... o'er the rime-crusted sea— Plod his lone exile-path—Fate is severe. Mindful of slaughter, his kinsman friends' death, Mindful of hardships, the wanderer saith:— Oft must I lonely, when dawn doth appear, Wail o'er my sorrow—since living is none Whom I may whisper my heart's undertone. Know I full well that in man it is noble Fast in his bosom his sorrow to bind. Weary at heart, yet his Fate is unyielding— Help cometh not to his suffering mind. Therefore do those who are thirsting ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... so well disguised that if she had spoken any other language I should never have recognised her. She sprang off her mule, and talked some time in an undertone with El Dancaire and Garcia. Then ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee
... in a mirthful undertone. "How can I go in and win, as you say? What am I to do? I can't go up to that window and speak to her,—she might take me ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... of the four, in a low undertone, gave the "jhirni" (signal),[12] the handkerchiefs were thrown over their necks, and in a few minutes all three—the Mogul and his servants— were dead, and lying in the grave in the usual manner, the head of one at the feet of the one below him. All the parties they had met on the road belonged ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... small boy, but a big thinker, and he would have liked to be a big talker, but grown-up people were not interested in what he had to say. So he talked in a rapid undertone to 'Nobbles,' who always understood, and who smiled perpetually into the earnest little face of his master. 'Nobbles' had been given to him a very long time ago by a sailor-brother of Nurse's, who came to tea at certain periods, and who related the most wonderful stories of foreign parts. Jane, ...
— 'Me and Nobbles' • Amy Le Feuvre
... and panting with his own violence, he searched her brutally and without mercy — flung her down and tore off her spiral puttees and even her shoes and stockings, now apparently beside himself with fury, puffing, gasping, always with a fierce, nasal sort of whining undertone like an animal ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert Chambers
... Orientals. He desired to enter the city to the shrilling of reeds and the booming of tom-toms; to impress upon this unruly populace that he, Durga Ram, was a man of his word, that when he set out to accomplish a thing it was as good as done. His arrival was greeted with cheers, but there was an undertone of groans that was not pleasant to his keen ears. Deep in his heart he cursed, for by these sounds he knew that only the froth was his, the froth and scum of the town. The iron heel; so they would have it in preference to his friendship. ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath
... as a witty and delightful talker grew from week to week, even his marriage did not stifle the undertone of dislike and disgust. Now indignantly, now with contempt, men spoke of him as abandoned, a creature of unnatural viciousness. There were certain houses in the best set of London society the doors of which were ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 1 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... through adventitious circumstances, pushed in our country to a sudden and not wholly merited prominence, Sir. Spencer's republished essays may be named,—while they acknowledge some progress in details, disclose an undertone of growing conviction of the incompetency and unsatisfactoriness of our present modes of teaching and training. The Oswego School Report, speaking of primary education, tells us 'There has been too much teaching by formulas;' and that 'We are quite too apt, in the education of children, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... were shuddering. By itself it has no place in organ music. It is not intended to be struck alone. It is used only as a foundation upon which to build other tones. In combination it adds majesty to the music, rumbling in a gigantic undertone ...
— The Jewel City • Ben Macomber
... and came forward whispering. "She's asleep," she said very sibilantly. "I have read her to sleep, and she's sleeping beautifully. Have you ever read it?" she asked, with hoarse breaks from her undertone, as she held up one of those cheap library-editions of a ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... little plain-looking agriculturist, who appears to be watching them. He is in the careless and ever-admitted picturesque position of leaning over a garden fence; but whether the invariables are aware of the little gentleman, and are consequently conversing in an undertone, we leave every beholder to speculate and settle for himself. Behind the worthy small farmer, and coming from the door of his residence, most cleverly introduced, is his wife (we know it to represent the wife, from the clear fact of the lady's appearance being typical of the gentleman's), ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... that darkened eyes and hair, was bliss unspeakable for Mr. Hawkehurst. The lovers talked the prettiest nonsense to each other, while Mrs. Sheldon dozed placidly behind the friendly shelter of a banner-screen hooked on to the chimney-piece, or conversed with Diana in a monotonous undertone, solemnly debating the relative wisdom of dyeing or turning in relation to a ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... when the butcher, instead of sending over the boy, brought the meat for supper himself: "They're locked up," he said in a terse undertone, as he handed his package to Belle. "There was a big bunch up there when they was put in. Some of 'em talked pretty loud about a jail delivery. Laramie stood right there to see they went into their cells and ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... and, striking a light from her private tinder-box, she held the paper, and curl of hair it contained, in the candle till they were burnt. Then she put on her hat and followed her mother and the rest of them across the moist grey fields, cheerfully singing in an undertone as she went, to assure herself ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... Macdonald the fight was not yet over, for as he sat beside his brother, listening to his groans, his men could see him wreathing his hands and chanting in an undertone the words, "Vengeance is mine saith the Lord." And as he sat by the camp-fire that night listening to Yankee's account of the beginning of the trouble, and heard how his brother had kept himself in hand, and how at last he had been foully smitten, Macdonald's ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor
... injunction to the letter, and on the following morning he was awakened by hearing one of the crew ask in an undertone of the steward. ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... submission. As he concluded his address, he turned to the gratified but yet trembling manager, and (in allusion to the large share in the slave-trade then imputed to Liverpool) with that peculiarity of undertone he possessed, which could be distinctly heard throughout the largest theatre although pronounced as a whisper, exclaimed, "There's not a stone in the walls of Liverpool which has not been cemented by the bluid of Africans." Then, casting ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 268, August 11, 1827 • Various
... roadside. But their commander permitted himself no repose. For more than an hour, without a cloak to protect him from the chilling dews, listening to every sound that came from the front, he stood like a sentinel over the prostrate ranks. As the dawn rose, in a quiet undertone he gave the word to march. The order was passed down the column, and, in the dim grey light, the men, rising from their short slumbers, stiff, cold, and ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... were the most natural thing in the world. She did not heed, if she heard, the busy and wondering gossip of relations and acquaintances, gossip that has no less currency among the Friends than elsewhere because it is whispered slyly and creeps about in an undertone. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Allen as he sat there in the sunlight. In a soft undertone he called, "I'm going, too, just to watch. May I?" Mr. Allen nodded, and in a few moments the two were quietly sneaking off through ...
— Buffalo Roost • F. H. Cheley
... Equatorial Africa the simple bands of velvet black, against the spangled brightnesses that make up the visual night world, must give way in interest to the other world of sound. The air hums with an undertone of insects; the plain and hill and jungle are populous with voices furtive or bold. In daytime one sees animals enough, in all conscience, but only at night does he sense the almost oppressive feeling of the teeming life about ...
— The Land of Footprints • Stewart Edward White
... for there isn't a poorer needlewoman in Killamet. There's the queer thing about that woman—she can't really do one thing well, yet her satisfaction is complete." All this in an undertone, entirely covered by the scraping of chairs, rustling of dresses, and wagging of tongues, as the company drew up to their positions around the masterpiece; and still thus protected, Sara ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... across the gulch. As he heard Judith's bantering cry, Blatch pulled up his team with a muttered curse. He looked down at her through narrowed eyes, jerking his mules savagely and swearing at them in an undertone. He was a well-made fellow with a certain slouching grace about him as he sat on his load of corn; but there were evil promising bumps on either side of his jaws that spoke of obstinacy, even of ferocity; and there was something menacing in his surly passivity of attitude. He looked ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... off, and, in an undertone, gave vent to certain exclamations which indistinctly reached the ears ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... forgotten how a lady with no great musical skill or education sang a verse of a hymn for me one night. It was at a little party, so she could not raise her voice above the softest undertone; but she sang that verse just to let me hear the tune, which I did not ...
— Tired Church Members • Anne Warner
... in weary abandon on her childhood's bed. The monotonous tick of the old clock, the simmering of the kettle on the hob, and the deep undertone of the ocean soothed her like a familiar, unforgotten lullaby. In a few minutes she had fallen ...
— A Singer from the Sea • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... this remark, he promptly crossed over with Pao-yue into the garden of Concentrated Fragrance, while lady Feng went on both to cheer her up for a time, and to impart to her, in an undertone, a good ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... Hutchinson Port. It was sorely against Mrs. Smith's will that Mr. Hutchinson Port was included in her list, for he had the reputation of being the most objectionable diner-out in Philadelphia. His conversation at table invariably consisted solely of disparaging remarks, delivered in an undertone to his immediate neighbors, upon the character and quality of the food. However, in the present case, as Miss Grace Winthrop's uncle, ...
— A Border Ruffian - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... Bessie!" What dreadful words! I bade him sharply hold his tongue and mind his horses, but he went on muttering in an undertone, "Yo'll see, yo'll see! You're druv' pretty hard, young man, I expect, so I won't think nothing of your ha'sh words, and we'll get her ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 31. October, 1873. • Various
... a buzz of agreement and an undertone of anger which to an experienced speaker would have been ominous. But Genevieve blundered on: "We only want ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... darkness in front of me, a strange figure advanced to my side. He glanced at me intently; then, seeing that I was evidently not the man he sought, he turned to Drake. I heard a whispered greeting and an undertone of conversation. Then, quietly, Drake stepped ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... grieeeved with you." But the announcement begets no sign of responsive grief on the face of the stolid child before her. She never whipped a child in her life. If she had, and it had but roused some positive anger in the child, instead of that undertone of complaint which is always oozing out of every one of them, I think It would have been a gain. But the poor lady is one of the whiny-piny people, and must be in preparation for a development of which I have ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... Oldbuck himself. But it was upon Mrs. Carlyle that public interest fastened. The delineation of her was most beautiful, and most pathetic. There were few expressions of actual remorse, and Carlyle was not the first man to feel that the value of a blessing is enhanced by loss. But there was an undertone of something more than regret, a suspicion or suggestion of penitence, which set people talking. It is always pleasant to discover that a preacher of righteousness has not been a good example himself, and "poor Mrs. Carlyle" received much posthumous sympathy, as cheap as it was useless. ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... upon the guitar, a pleasant undertone to the voices. And because he said very little, he saw and thought the more; seeing glances and smiles between a strange man and the maid whom he loved desirefully, bred the thought which culminated in a sudden burst of speech against the gringos who had come ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... penela chi min chaboro," said the black Callee to me, in an undertone; "sin un balicho de los chineles {4};" then looking up to the interrogator she said aloud, "he is one of our people from Portugal, come on the smuggling lay, and to see ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... dare to write as ill As some whose voices haunt us still, Even we, perchance, might call our own Their deep enchanting undertone. ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... who fly to convents, write bitter books, sing songs full of heartbreak, act splendidly the passion they have lost or never won. Who smile, and try to lead brave uncomplaining lives, but whose tragic eyes betray them, whose voices, however sweet or gay, contain an undertone of hopelessness, whose faces sometimes startle one with an expression which haunts the observer long ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... second in rank among the flowers; the third in magnitude and adorning was the wild honeysuckle, with all her tints of beauty. These encircled the snow-white sands upon its beautiful shores, whilst the low undertone of its waves kept time to the ...
— The Forest King - Wild Hunter of the Adaca • Hervey Keyes
... the passage when Rayne's pretty daughter Lola came out of the room I had first entered. She must have come out expressly to meet me, because when close to me she stopped abruptly, glanced to right and left, and then asked me quickly in an undertone: ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... At their feet he sat and drank in great draughts of knowledge, going away satisfied. There were other professors, some of them brilliant in the extreme, whose whole attitude toward the Bible and Christ seemed to have an undertone of flippancy, and who fairly delighted to find an unauthentic portion over which they might haggle away the precious hours of the class-room. They lacked the reverent attitude toward their subject which only could save the ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... desire she sang the ballads she so loved, and in her girlish voice there was an undertone of deeper melody than when I heard them first among her native hills; for the child's heart was ripening fast into ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Van Brunt," said Ellen, coming close up to him, and speaking in an undertone "you don't know what a present I have had! What do you think, Mr. Marshman ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... was still gazing, hoping and dreading the appearance of the craft, when her friend pressed her arm and asked in a hurried undertone: ...
— Up the Forked River - Or, Adventures in South America • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... presented Miss Carl. Her Majesty's first impression of Miss Carl was a good one, as Miss Carl was smiling very pleasantly, and Her Majesty, who always liked to see a pleasant smile, exclaimed to me in an undertone: "She seems to be a very pleasant person," to which I replied that I was very glad she thought so, as I was very anxious about the impression Miss Carl would make on Her Majesty. Her Majesty watched ...
— Two Years in the Forbidden City • The Princess Der Ling
... magnitude of this assembly and did not falter just when I would be most eloquent. But the old saying is true, that heaven never blesses any man with unmixed and flawless prosperity; even in the keenest joys there is ever some slight undertone of grief, some blend of gall and honey; there is no rose without a thorn. I have often experienced the truth of this, and never more than at the present moment. For the more I realize how ready you are to praise me, the more exaggerated becomes the awe ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius
... "he had never lost his identity.... He had never violated the innermost man, but had carried his conscience along with him." There speaks the local accent of Puritanism, but the voice insisting upon the moral integrity of the individual is the undertone ...
— The American Mind - The E. T. Earl Lectures • Bliss Perry
... he read, in an undertone. "I've been engaged in investigating that poison which probably surrounds the wound in the Mendoza case, but as yet have nothing to report. It is certainly none of the things which we ordinarily run up against. Enclosed you will find a slip of paper and the envelope which it came ...
— The Gold of the Gods • Arthur B. Reeve
... said to me in a fierce undertone. "Wait outside and I will see you later!" Still, from the desk, resounded that harsh, strident voice, running on in an ascending scale, pouring forth a foaming torrent ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... drunk," cried Josh to the little crowd of people that had assembled. Margaret, overwhelmed with mortification, tugged at his sleeve. "The man's not overcharging much—if any," she said in an undertone. ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... in a low undertone full of annoyance. "Did any one ever hear such nonsense! All that is past history now, Janey," she reminded her young daughter, in her usual hopeful voice. "Dad sent a cheque, like the dear, helpful daddy he is, and ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... Scott, smiled as he followed Stanley out upon the platform and up the narrow stairway leading to the division offices. But Bob Scott was conservative. He never spoke above an undertone and naturally took the conservative side: "If he only doesn't make them go too fast, Colonel," was ...
— The Mountain Divide • Frank H. Spearman
... very kind. A great reaction from his first prejudice against the speaker swept over Max. Beneath this one voice which questioned him and waited for an answer, he heard as a deep, thrilling undertone the voice of the Legion which had called to him through the music to come and share its bath of fire. A sudden purpose awoke in Max Doran, and he knew then that it had been in the background of his mind for days, waiting ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson
... Oh, thank goodness!" (he said those few words in an undertone, but I happened to hear them). "Smith," he said, "I forgot there was a sentry there. You saw me talking to ...
— Begumbagh - A Tale of the Indian Mutiny • George Manville Fenn
... spaceman had heard Rip's comment. He spoke in an undertone to the man nearest. His voice was pitched low enough that Rip couldn't object officially, but loud and clear enough to ...
— Rip Foster in Ride the Gray Planet • Harold Leland Goodwin
... bridge across the road over which the lumbering carts went sometimes, and the heavy carriages still more seldom. On the other hand, looking up the stream, were the hills from among which this little river slipped out rippling along with its musical undertone, as if they had sent it as a messenger to express their delight in summer. In the distance the Piscataqua broadened out to the sea, and beyond the river the city was outlined against the sky. To the left of this, and in great sweeps along the horizon stretched the forests. As one looked ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1 • Various
... one minute, papa, till we get our work," said the girls, who, to say the truth, always exhibit a flattering interest in anything their papa writes, and who have the good taste never to interrupt his readings with any conversations in an undertone on cross-stitch and floss-silks, as the manner of some is. Hence the little feminine bustle of arranging all these matters beforehand. Jane, or Jenny, as I call her in my good-natured moods, put on a fresh clear stick of hickory, of that species denominated ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... fact, the only friend who was to see her give herself to Will. Will had no best man. But what of that? His heart did feel light this morning, and the gay notes which he sang as he hurried along the streets had an undertone of thanksgiving running through them. He was glad the day had really arrived, and thought to himself how relieved his poor girl would be, and how he could laugh at the unreasonable fear which she had shown two nights ago. He had certainly never ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade
... and wished each other good morning.... Verdict for plaintiff with costs... Next case!... "You mustn't take up the time of the court, my good woman.".. "Now, constable!".."Arder in the court!"... "Now, my good woman," said the policeman in an undertone, "you must go out; there's another case on-come now." And he steered her—but ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... in the tent an aged crone Upbraided her full harshly more and more, But sunk her chiding to an undertone When she beheld him standing at the door, And calmed her voice, and dropped her lifted hand, And answered him with accent soft ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... not until she asked in a faltering undertone, "When are you going to begin?" that it came to him. And then he looked at her so long that Pete began to notice, and she had to touch his foot with hers under the table to get him to turn away. He had forgotten all about the vacation ...
— Calumet "K" • Samuel Merwin and Henry Kitchell Webster
... There was an undertone of jealousy in Lady Howel's voice—-jealousy excited not altogether without a motive. She had left it to Beaucourt's sense of honor to own the truth, if there had been any love affair in his past life which ought to make him hesitates ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... what tha deserved, owd lad," he said in an undertone. "An' tha'st getten no more. I'st owe th' Lunnon chap one fro' this on. He's done a bit o' work as I'd ha' takken i' hond mysen long ago, if I'd ha' been thirty years younger, an' a bit less stiff ...
— That Lass O' Lowrie's - 1877 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... delighted Chatelet was convinced that the whole town was agog, he went off to Mme. de Bargeton's, where, alas! there was but one game of whist that night, and diplomatically asked Nais for a little talk in the boudoir. They sat down on the sofa, and Chatelet began in an undertone— ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... Judge Priest in an undertone, when the worthy sheriff had drawn near, "the circuit clerk tells me there's an indictment fur malicious mischief ag'in this here Perce Dwyer knockin' round amongst the records somewheres—an indictment the grand jury returned several sessions back, but which was never pressed, owin' to the ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... Mrs. Haviland said, eying Rachael hopefully for a wifely denial. As this was not forthcoming, she went on briskly: "However, my dear, Clarence isn't the only one! They say Fred Bowditch is actually"—her voice sank to a discreet undertone as she added the word—"violent; and poor Lucy Pickering needed a rest cure the moment she got her divorce, she was in such a nervous state. I'm ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... was uttered by every one in a low undertone that sounded like a groan, as the old boatswain stopped short, raised the ring of rope, holding one end tightly in his hand, ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... Jordan, contains an elusive hint of the terrible and the supernatural which gives it high rank as poetry. Mrs. Jordan has two distinct, yet related, styles in verse. One of these mirrors all the joy and buoyant happiness of life, whilst the other reflects that undertone of grimness which is sometimes felt through the exterior of things. The kinship betwixt these styles lies in their essentially fanciful character, as distinguished from the tiresomely commonplace realism of the average modern ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: ...
— A Hero of Our Time • M. Y. Lermontov
... specialist, in an undertone, to his colleague. 'Well, I don't think we need go into any more details. There's no doubt about it, you know. That curious look in his eyes, and the smile—the smile's quite typical. It all clearly points to insanity. And then that ...
— Orientations • William Somerset Maugham
... whispering in my vicinity. This thoroughly aroused me, and without stirring my body I slowly turned my head, when to my astonishment I beheld Kouaga, standing erect with arms folded beneath his white burnouse, talking in an undertone to a dark-bearded stranger who also wore flowing Arab garments and bore in his hand a long-barrelled flint-lock gun with quaintly-inlaid stock. The man seemed older than the Grand Vizier of Mo, for his beard was tinged with grey, and the brown hand that held the gun was ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... been flogged," said Bramble, in a most sepulchral undertone, "I've a good mind to fight every one ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... She walked back a few paces, stopped again; then returned and sat upon a wooden bench. The moon was in the trees; a few clouds floated among the pale stars; the sea murmured to the shadows in an undertone. ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... one, and the two men walked slowly up and down, Mr. Smith leaning all the time upon his colleague's shoulder. They spoke in an undertone, and what they said was inaudible to Mr. Coulson. During his period of waiting he drew another cigar from his pocket, and lit it from the stump of the old one. Then he made himself a little more comfortable in his chair, and looked around at the walls of the handsomely ...
— The Illustrious Prince • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... to the famished gang. Ito was in the lowest of spirits; had just given his mistress warning that he could not stay. The affair of the letter had wounded his susceptibilities; he must go where he would be better understood. All this in a soft, respectful undertone, his mistress trying to comfort him, and incidentally hasten his response to the requisition from outside. At eleven o'clock Mr. Thorne sent in a pencil message on a card: "I shall not be home to lunch. Does she want ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... the coach,' interposed Arkady in an undertone. 'You must not stand on ceremony with him, please. He's a splendid fellow, so ...
— Fathers and Children • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... Basque, he betook himself to the buttery; and there, in an undertone of great terror, began to mutter to his friend and ally, Tristan de la Fleche, "It is all over with us! He is a wizard! Sir Leonard Ashton was right—oaf as he was; I never believed him before; but what, save enchantment, could have enabled him to recognize me under this disguise, ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... tradesman as Bernard Quaritch has been victimized by the book-thief. These are his own words: 'A little dark man, of about forty-five years of age, with a sallow complexion, apparently a Dutch or German Jew, speaking in broken English in an undertone, introduced himself, showing me a business card, "Wunderlich and Co." The following day the pretended Wunderlich selected books from my stock to the amount of L270, and said he would come again and select more. At the same time the little dark, ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts
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