"Hum" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... father paces to and fro Through the chambers of the old chateau, Waiting, waiting to hear the hum Of wheels on the road that runs below, Of servants hurrying here and there, The voice in the courtyard, the step on the stair, Waiting for some one who doth not come! But letters there are, which ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... Macloud. "Let me see where we are, and where Annapolis is.... Hum! we're almost opposite! Can't we get a boat in the morning to take us across direct—charter it, I mean? The Chesapeake isn't wide at this point—a sailing vessel ought to make it ...
— In Her Own Right • John Reed Scott
... 'Hum! It is clear that we cannot be starved here. They must come to us if they are to kill us. Behind a barricade of barrels we could hold our own against the five rascals whom we have seen. That is, probably, why they have sent that ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Front. It was the warmest and stillest of May days, and in the clearing where we stopped for luncheon the familiar boom broke with a magnified loudness on the noonday hush. In the intervals between the crashes there was not a sound but the gnats' hum in the moist sunshine and the dryad-call of the cuckoo from greener depths. At the end of the lane a few cavalrymen rode by in shabby blue, their horses' flanks glinting like ripe chestnuts. They stopped ...
— Fighting France - From Dunkerque to Belport • Edith Wharton
... out of the express elevator, there was no one in sight that I remember but the boy who was with me. I pressed the button of the local, which was just beside the express—there was a buzz and whirring hum as if the elevator had ascended, and the door opened. As I stepped over its threshold, I felt a violent blow and terrific pain on the back of my head, and seemed to fall into limitless space. That was all I knew until I woke up in the hospital where Mr. Blaine had taken me after discovering and ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... in lone Dalgonar glen, That, with its bosom basking in the sun, Lies like a bird; the hum of working men Joins with the sound of streams that southward run, With fragrant holms atween: then mix in one Beside a church, and round two ancient towers Form a deep fosse. Here sire is heired by son, And war comes never; ancle deep ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 19, - Issue 549 (Supplementary issue) • Various
... a clear lane of gliding water Whose banks seem lonely as the path of light Crossing mid ocean south of Capricorn. Her son steals warily after a butterfly And is as hushed with hope to capture it As are the birds with heat. An insect hum Circles the spot as round a cymbal's rim, Long after it has clanged, tingles a throb Which in a dream forgets the parent sound, Oppressed by this protracted and awe-filled pause, She hardly dares to wade the stream and moves As though in ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various
... the European species is a sort of drumming or whizzing note, like the hum of a spinning-wheel. The male commences this performance about dusk, and continues it at intervals during a great part of the night. It is effected while the breast is inflated with air, like that of a cooing Dove. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... started out again on fresh roamings - "Lord, thou hast been our dwelling-place in all generations"! - I remember, - it seems to me now as if it had been some time before I was born, - how the muslin curtains floated in on the evening wind, and the hum and stir of the street came up to my ear; the bustle and activity, though it was evening; and how the distant battlefields of Virginia looked in forlorn contrast in the far distance. Yet this was really the desert and that the populous place; for there, somewhere, my world was. I grew very ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... Irresponsibility had weakened him. He had forgotten how to shift for himself. The night yawned about him. His senses, accustomed to the hum and bustle of the camp, used to the continuous impact of sights and sounds, were now left idle. There was nothing to do, nothing to see nor hear. They strained to catch some interruption of the silence and immobility of nature. They were appalled by inaction and by the feel ...
— White Fang • Jack London
... door opened to admit the men, and somebody claiming Kitty's attention at the moment she turned away without reply. For a few minutes the conversation became more general until, after a brief hum and stir, congenial spirits sought and found each other and settled down into little groups of twos and threes. Somewhat to Nan's surprise—and, although she would not have acknowledged it, to her annoyance—Peter Mallory ensconced himself next to Penelope, and Ralph Fenton, ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... my side a fate-charged, tiny tot, dabbling in the water, mocking the songs of the birds, and ever turning her face, with its great brown wistful eyes, to catch the breath of destiny and to hear the sad dread hum of the future. But my old chum Billy Little was the ...
— A Forest Hearth: A Romance of Indiana in the Thirties • Charles Major
... compelling in the tones of these cries. They rang as bugle calls to battle. In their hum and murmur there was more than curiosity—more than the tribute of a people to their leader. There was in the very sound the electric rush of the first crash of the approaching storm. The man inside who had led soldiers to death on ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... cries of the cicada, the grasshopper, and tree frog make an incessant hum, and produce by their monotony a pleasing melancholy.... Every half-hour different balsamic odours fill the air, and other flowers alternately unfold their leaves to the night.... While the silent vegetable world, illuminated by scores of fireflies ...
— The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle Ages and - Modern Times • Alfred Biese
... territories of our respective beings ever become one. But even now, and on mere everyday grounds, we are finding reason to think otherwise. You are about to make an observation at table and some member of your family makes it before you; you are thinking of a certain tune and someone begins to hum it; you have a certain purpose in mind and, lo, the same thought finds expression in someone else, despite all probabilities. Oh, you may remark, This is only thought transference. Precisely, but what are you except your thought? All being, remember, is conscious ...
— The New Theology • R. J. Campbell
... fresh grass is loaded with dew, every bead of which sparkles in the light of the brilliant sun. A big, yellow-shouldered bee comes booming through the open window, and buzzes up and down my room, and threatens my shrinking ears, and then dives through the window again; and his form recedes and his hum dies away, as if it were the note of a reed-stop in the "swell" of a church organ. There is such confusion in the songs of the birds, that I can hardly select the different notes, so as to name their owners. There is a great deal of bird-singing that ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb
... had much results as yet," said the tramp. "But now things is goin' to hum. The Bishop and his whole gang's coming over ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells
... Abraham, which the pagan Arabs had polluted with idolatry, the Jews in corrupting their holy books. At the same time he heard a Voice, and sometimes he felt a noise in his ears like the tinkling of bells or a low deep hum, as if bees were swarming ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... auspicious start—barring the little delay caused by the twins—could not have been provided. The day was one of those balmy ones in June, when it is neither too hot nor too blowy, when the breeze seems fairly laden with the sweet scent of flowers, and the lazy hum of bees mingles with ...
— The Outdoor Girls of Deepdale • Laura Lee Hope
... riband across the fields until it vanished among the trees at Ashness. Presently, however, she heard the throb of a car coming up the valley and a cloud of dust rolled up behind a hedge. It was Thorn's car; she knew its hum and as she watched the dust get nearer her face went white. Then, as the hum became loud and menacing, she clenched her hand and ran in nervous panic up the drive. She was breathless when she reached the house, but pulled herself ...
— The Buccaneer Farmer - Published In England Under The Title "Askew's Victory" • Harold Bindloss
... the palace; and at one side of it was the workshop, built of strong pines and oaks; and the giant heard the hum of wheels, and the noise of the fairy looms, where the fairies ...
— Mother Stories • Maud Lindsay
... The hum and hissing was louder. It seemed to throb within us, as though vibration were communicating to every fiber of ...
— Wandl the Invader • Raymond King Cummings
... metalliferous hills; and, at this time, in consequence of the Dutch-Spanish War, and the multitude of Protestant refugees, it was getting filled with ingenious industries; and rising to be, what it still is, the busiest quarter of Germany. A Country lowing with kine; the hum of the flax-spindle heard in its cottages, in those old days,—"much of the linen called Hollands is made in Julich, and only bleached, stamped and sold, by the Dutch," says Busching. A Country, in our days, which is shrouded at short intervals ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. III. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Hohenzollerns In Brandenburg—1412-1718 • Thomas Carlyle
... be surprising after this, if I deliver a maxim, which is condemned by several metaphysicians, and is esteemed contrary to the most certain principles of hum reason. This maxim is that an object may exist, and yet be no where: and I assert, that this is not only possible, but that the greatest part of beings do and must exist after this manner. An object may be said to be no where, when ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume
... temperaments, which contrive to be buoyant on the glistening bubble of Dignity, she had likewise a modest estimate of her dues. Alack, my poor heroine had no pride! Mrs. Ford's silent censure awakened no resentment. It sounded in her ears like a dull, soporific hum. Lizzie was deeply enamored of what a French book terms her aises intellectuelles. Her mental comfort lay in the ignoring of problems. She possessed a certain native insight which revealed many of the horrent inequalities of her pathway; but she found ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... thought of lots of things As in my bed I lay; The whole long list of English kings From Alfred till to-day. I thought of bats and bicycles, Of stilts, and tops that hum, Then turning to the window-pane, I thought of you, and sighed again: "Whenever ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... higher faith. When he suddenly stopped and quickly seized a hymn-book, the audience drew a long sigh. At once people moved about again and looked at each other and smiled. The whole congregation were at one with the preacher. There was a low hum of whispering voices. But all was attention again when the hymn was read. Then the glorious song. One of the finest organists in the country, a blind gentleman by the name of Wood, was the power behind the throne. The organ did praise God. Every one ...
— Russell H. Conwell • Agnes Rush Burr
... next day, and went directly to an upper room, at some distance from those usually occupied by the family, from whence came the busy hum ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... amid a low hum of conversation. Dreamy music is heard, which might be a continuation of the music ...
— Nero • Stephen Phillips
... Eredia (1613), describing the smaller vessels of Malacca which he calls balos in ch. 13, De Embarcacoes, says: "At the poop they have two rudders, one on each side to steer with." E por poupa dos ballos, tem 2 lemes, hum en cada lado pera o governo. (Malacca, l'Inde merid. et le Cathay, Bruxelles, 1882, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... jerked out of their element and vanish forever, and though you broke a quartern loaf into crumbs, he would snap his tail at you with enlightened contempt. If," said my father, soliloquizing, "I had been as syllogistic as those scaly logicians, I should never have swallowed that hook which—Hum! there—least said soonest mended. But, Mr. Bolt, to return to ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... delightful. The fresh air, redolent of new-mown hay, fanned her pale cheek and feverish brow, and allayed her agitation and excitement. The perfect stillness, broken only by the lowing of the cattle in the adjoining pastures, by the drowsy hum of the dor-fly, or the rippling of the beck in the valley, further calmed her; and the soothing influence was completed by a contemplation of the serene heavens, wherein were seen the starry host, with the thin bright crescent of the new moon in ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... any music, except that of the doleful and droning church choir. We sang simple songs about nature, conduct, duties to the Heavenly Father, to parents and teacher. Their notes lingered in my ears for a great many years, and I can still hum some of them. We drew plain figures, blocks, cones, the sides and roofs of buildings and outlines of trees. In penmanship I made no progress, and it was always unformed and illiterate until I was a man, and took it in hand without a teacher. My two years' detention from school did not seem ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... gethered all the weapins up, an' then he come an' grinned, He showed his ivory some, I guess, an' sez, "You 're fairly pinned; Jest buckle on your leg agin, an' git right up an' come, 'T wun't du fer fammerly men like me to be so long from hum." At fust I put my foot right down an' swore I would n't budge. "Jest ez you choose," sez he, quite cool, "either be shot or trudge." So this black-hearted monster took an' act'lly druv me back Along the very feetmarks o' my happy mornin' track, ...
— The Biglow Papers • James Russell Lowell
... bees are examined through a glass hive, all appears at first like confusion: but, on a more careful inspection, every animal is found regularly employed. It is very delightful, when the maple and other trees are in bloom, or the clover in the meadows, to be abroad and hear their busy hum. ...
— The History of Insects • Unknown
... in its result. In a deep, careless stroke, his paddle struck a submerged log and the slender blade snapped short off with a loud crack, the ticklish canoe careened suddenly to one side, then righted again with a sullen splash. At the sound the silent point quickly stirred with life. There was the hum of excited voices and a blinding flash of flame lit up the darkness, followed by the sharp crack of rifles and the ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... was; we were driving down full tilt with a five-knot tide under us. If we struck there was one consolation; the end would come soon. As 'John Peel' ended we could hear the tide race take up the tune and hum it on the wind of our passage; and above it I heard the third officer call out that he ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... followed the under cook, the scullery boy went back to cleaning the knives, Susan, the parlor maid who was going through the kitchen with her dustpan and broom, hurried off with a backward glance or two, and Phronsie was left quite alone to hum her way along ...
— Five Little Peppers Midway • Margaret Sidney
... the hotel; but Miss Marigold, she's to hum," said the black girl, grinning. "Won't you step in? Miss will be dreffle sorry ...
— The Blunders of a Bashful Man • Metta Victoria Fuller Victor
... musketry and the thunder of heavy cannon shook the island. The regiments in line in front of the cleared space before the battery, returned the fire with energy, and the marine howitzers also responded. Soon a shell from the enemy's work came flying through the woods with a hum, which increased to a howl, and burst with a startling explosion within a few rods of the hospital. Nobody was hurt; but the incident had a very marked effect on Jack Winch. He got better at once, and moved to the rear with ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... "Hum!" grunted Marzio, pulling a long face and looking up under his eyebrows. "I know that is your opinion, Sor Gasparo. I am sorry that you should put so much faith in the stability of things. So you, too, have got the malady of speculation. ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... scorned'—Nation, you hear, Pickles—nation, not woman. There is just one thing to save this crumbling Republic; give us more paper money—greenbacks on greenbacks, mountain high. Let the Government rent by the month or lease by the year every printing-press in the country—let the machinery sweetly hum as the sheets of treasury-notes fall in cascades to the floor, to be cut apart, packed in bundles, and sent to any citizen who wants them on his own unendorsed note—unendorsed, Pickles, and at two per cent.! Ever study logic, ...
— A Strange Discovery • Charles Romyn Dake
... who had for some time been plunged in a silent revery,—"'Sdeath! why can you not stifle your love for the fine arts at a moment like this? That hum of thine grows louder every moment; at last I expect it will burst out into a full roar. Recollect we are ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... happening. The great guns weren't so bad," he continued—"but the rifle-bullets that came singing along in clouds like mosquitoes! Yah!" he used to snap, each time he told me the tale, slapping his ears right and left, as one does at the hum of those intrusive insects. He did not like the carpenter, either, for reasons of another kind. They were both humorists, but of a different order. Indeed, I don't think that the boatswain, though slightly ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... "Hum, hum—without wishing to detract from her, you must confess that she is a woman very difficult to estimate, at first sight," said Croustillac, with some bitterness. "You cannot be surprised if I consider the subject before I answer your question. ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... and waited and squirmed for a solid hour and a quarter. The steady hum of her mother's voice was interrupted occasionally by brief replies from Ernest. At last, Chicken Little heard a movement and roused herself joyously. But her mother began to speak again—this time with reverent solemnity. Chicken Little forgot herself and listened ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... SPIEGEL. Hum! hum! Brother, what I told you just now remains between ourselves; there is no occasion for his knowing it. ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... got to the first hoop the rats ceased to run up the wall, his hand became less shaky, he began to play a very good knife and fork at the bacon and Iden's splendid potatoes; by-and-by he began to hum ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... was short; she was taken to a place a little beyond the head of the lake, and there, though she had liberty to breathe the air, fast fixed within the walls of a daily sameness that became gradually the hum of voices accusing Alvan of one in excess of the many sins laid against him by his enemies. Was he not possibly an empty pretender to power—a mere ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... is helped out by the pigeons that flock everywhere undisturbed about the approaches to the building, fluttering to be fed from the hand of some recognized friend, and scarcely evading the feet of the casual wayfarer. With this scene before him, if one will close his ears to the hum of the great city at his back he can readily imagine himself on classical soil, and, dreaming of Greece and Italy, he will enter the door quite prepared to find himself in the midst of antique marbles and the atmosphere of ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams
... "Hum!" observed the reporter, who had not given any decided opinion. "They are six and well-armed. If they each lay hid in a corner, and each fired at one of us, they would soon be masters of ...
— The Secret of the Island • W.H.G. Kingston (translation from Jules Verne)
... tooken in a schooner that was gwine to run the blockade," answered Christy. "We was comin' out'n Pass Christian, and was picked up off Chand'leer [Chandeleur] Island, and fotched over hyer. We didn't feel too much to hum after we lost our wages, and we done took a whaleboat and came ashore here, with only one bottle of whiskey atween us. That's all there is on't. Now, ...
— A Victorious Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... would press up the hill after them to see what was to be seen. The high houses full on every story of eager heads thrust forth, relieving with unintentional yet lively decoration the many-windowed fronts, the shopkeepers crowding at their doors or seizing cap and halberd to follow, the hum and excitement of the roused town, surround the envoys like the background of a picture. Most probably they went on foot, the distance being so short, preceded by a glittering herald and pursuivant—perhaps David Lindsay, who can tell? still too young to ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... frequent mutinies only Craven seemed able to quell. He had sat far into the night, staring gloomily into the blazing fire, smoking pipe after pipe, listening to the multifarious noises of the forest—the sudden distant crash of falling trees, the incessant hum of insect life, the long-drawn howl of beasts of prey hovering on the outskirts of the camp, the soft whoo-whoo of an owl whose cry brought vividly to his mind the cool fragrance of the garden at Craven Towers and the nearer more ominous sounds ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... Thy making, though Thy handiwork is not very clear in our outer man as yet. We bless Thee that we feel Thy hand making us. What if it be in pain! Evermore we hear the voice of the potter above the hum and grind of his wheel. Father, Thou only knowest how we love Thee. Fashion the clay to Thy beautiful will. To the eyes of men we are vessels of dishonor, but we know Thou dost not despise us, for Thou hast made us, and Thou dwellest ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... when the hum of voices had ceased "I never thought as how I'd have to get up here and make a speech to-night or I might have taken to the woods. Howsomever, mother and Susan says as it's gettin' late it's about time we had ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... permanent steel horseshoe magnet, which would hardly be possible at all. One who has watched the installation of a dynamo, knowing that there is nowhere near any ordinary source of electricity, and has seen its armature begin to whirl and hum, and then in a few moments the violet sparklings of the brushes and the evident presence of a powerful current of electricity, is almost justified in the common opinion that the genius of man has ...
— Steam Steel and Electricity • James W. Steele
... hands them to her. She pulls on one hastily and begins buttoning it with ostentatious unconcern]. Go further away from me, quick. [He walks doggedly away from her until the piano prevents his going farther]. If I button my glove, and you were to hum a tune, ...
— How He Lied to Her Husband • George Bernard Shaw
... "Hum! I thought as much!" says she. "Craig always could lie easier than he could tell the truth. Young man, you don't look to me like a person called ...
— Odd Numbers - Being Further Chronicles of Shorty McCabe • Sewell Ford
... row. Old discoloured walls divided them from each other and from the gardens of a parallel block of bigger houses, whose slates and chimneys towered above the intervening trees. The street in front of those houses was completely hidden, but the hum of its traffic travelled pleasantly to the ear, and there were other reassuring sights and sounds. In one of the contiguous gardens a very small boy was wheeling a doll's perambulator; on the other side, where the fine, ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... apices, which is spun, thrown, and caught by means of a cord strung to two sticks. The idea of the game appears originally to have come from China, where a top (Kouengen), made of two hollow pierced cylinders of metal or wood, joined by a rod—and often of immense size,—was made by rotation to hum with a loud noise, and was used by pedlars to attract customers. From China it was introduced by missionaries to Europe; and a form of the game, known as "the devil on two sticks," appears to have been known in ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 3 - "Destructors" to "Diameter" • Various
... green moss patch, under a big tree—and how she rambled all along shore gathering the tiniest little shells that ever a wave tossed up—and how she took off her shoes and stockings and dipped her feet in the cool water, and listened to the bees' drowsy hum from the old tree trunk close by, and watched the busy ant stagger home, under the weight of his well earned morsel—and how she made a bridge of stones over a little streamlet to pluck some crimson lobelias, ...
— Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends • Fanny Fern
... not afraid; the isle is full of noises, Sounds and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not. Sometimes a thousand twanging instruments Will hum about mine ears; and sometimes voices, That, if I then had waked after long sleep, Will make me sleep again; and then, in dreaming, The clouds methought would open, and show riches Ready to drop upon me, that, when I waked, I ...
— Under the Trees and Elsewhere • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... he said at length, hesitating with hum and with haw, "the thing is—well, to speak the truth, you take me a good deal by surprise! I do not know how the thing may appear to Mrs. Palmer. And then the girl herself, you will allow, ought, in a free country, to have a word ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald
... "Hum!" he was wont to say, looking suspiciously at our wet, sleek heads and general clean appearance—clean for us, that is, for the Missouri River, sandy though it was, was vastly cleaner than Duffy's Pond or puddles of that ilk—"been in swimming again, ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... men again—it was needful to pick a path down the steep descent very carefully—and when she came, breathless, upon the clump of birches among which the tents were pitched it was evident from the hum of voices that the strangers had already arrived. Pushing in among the trees, she stopped, with her heart beating unpleasantly fast, face ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... of Craig Ronald drowsed in the quiet of noon. In the open court the sunshine triumphed, and only the purple-grey marsh mallows along the side of the house under the windows gave any sign of life. In them the bees had begun to hum at earliest dawn, an hour and a half before the sun looked over the crest of Ben Gairn. They were humming busily still. In all the chambers of the house there was the same reposeful stillness. Through them Winsome Charteris moved with free, light step. She glanced in to see that her grandfather ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... among whose reeds The wild fowl fed, but now no longer dwells. No more the bison feeds Upon the prairie, for the once drear plain Laughs in the sun and waves its golden grain. By a slender chain Ocean is linked to ocean, and the hum Of labor in the wilderness foretells The greatness of a nation yet to come. In Southern seas Another nation grows by slow degrees, In dreamy India, under tropic sun, Two hundred millions own an Empress' sway, And day by day. New territories won Shed lustre on our Queen's ...
— Fleurs de lys and other poems • Arthur Weir
... a dominion Whose spokesmen spake out strong Their purpose and opinion Through pulpit, press, and song. I scarce had means to note there A large-eyed few, and dumb, Who thought not as those thought there That stirred the heat and hum. ...
— Poems of the Past and the Present • Thomas Hardy
... the power lever back to zero. The power hum died. The liquids slid back to their natural level, the chair tipped over and lay still, ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak
... met by Olson, one of the squareheads, come to tell Newman that all was ready for the burial. So we joined the crowd, and Nils was put away, in the dead of night, by the light of one lantern and many stars. The hum of the wind aloft and the purr and slap of the waters against the bows ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... begun to hum a tune indifferently, smiled, looking first at the yard and then at my neck, and the hate in his eyes seemed to ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... There the beach was slashed by many black, saw-toothed reefs. The sea leaped up upon them on one side and the trees bore down upon them on the other. The air was filled with tumult, the hollow roar of the waves, the strident hum of the pines. For the first day, Pete entertained himself with exploration, clambering from one reef to another, pausing only to look listlessly off at the horizon, climbing a pine here and there, swinging on a bough while he stared absently back over the island. But although his look fixed ...
— Angel Island • Inez Haynes Gillmore
... young shaver. There's better times to come. If the discovery of this galoot don't mean a gold boom in Timber Town, you may send the crier round and call me a flathead. Things is goin' to hum." ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... quite so bad, for then the hooting of a vagrant owl, or it may be the distant howl of a prowling timber wolf, that gray skulker of the pine lands, is apt to break the monotony; but even in the midst of summer there is lacking the hum of insects and the bustle of woods life—at best one hears the weird call of the whip-poor-will, called by the Indians, the "wish-a-wish," or if near a marsh the ...
— Canoe Mates in Canada - Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan • St. George Rathborne
... cow-bell's ever-changing sound— The new-chopped tree's deep thundering on the ground; The patter of the rain on forest leaves, The tree-frog's pipe, which oft the ear deceives, The blazing log-heaps, and the rude rail fence— The wild-bee's hum of gratitude intense For hoards of honey, which our woods still yield; The plenteous crops contained in each small field; The Summer evening's song of "Whip-poor-will," Near, or remote, while all beside is still; The clamorous crow's most harsh discordant note; The blue jay, prone to ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... They dined at a little round table in the most desirable corner of the room—the professor and Edith, Mr. Bomford and himself. The music of one of the most famous orchestras in Europe alternately swelled and died away, always with the background of that steady hum of cheerful conversation. It was his first experience of a restaurant de luxe. He looked about him in amazed wonder. He had expected to find himself in a palace of gilt, to find the prevailing note of the place an unrestrained and inartistic gorgeousness. He found instead that the decorations everywhere ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... with voices—the voices of beasts and birds, reptiles, and insects—for the tree-frogs and ciendas were as noisy as the larger creatures. At other times a perfect stillness reigned, so that he could distinctly hear the tiny hum of the mosquito; and then, all at once, would fall upon his ear the melancholy wailing of the night-hawk—the "alma perdida," or "lost soul"—for such is the poetical and fanciful name given by the Spanish Americans ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... by the men. They knew their work was cut out for them, and each man was eager to play his part in the great drama of the morrow. There was no excited talk indulged in. None of the buzz of preparation nor the hum of anticipation which to the civilian mind should precede a desperate battle, but three or four members of the detachment took out their soldiers' hand-books and wrote in them their last will and testament, requesting their commander to witness the same and act as executor. ...
— The Gatlings at Santiago • John H. Parker
... the bunk and put his eyes to the porthole, catching a view of blue water below and blue sky above, and the sea as it raced past showed that the vessel was moving swiftly. He heard, too, the hum of the strong wind in the rigging and the groaning timbers. It was enough to tell him that they were fast leaving New York behind, and that now the chances of his rescue upon a lone ocean were, in truth, very small. But once ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... coarse-fibred leaves in which they had been baked, were portions of beef, pork, veal, fish, chickens and other viands usual to a banquet in our own land. Bands of native boys with stringed instruments played continuously' during the feast, making music of a peculiar character, that rose and fell as the busy hum of conversation and mingled with the joyous laughter of the men and maidens that were gathered about ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson
... the ambrotype and held it close to her eyes, then her hand sank until the picture dropped back into its place, and the lonely desolate woman buried her face in her palms. The pretty guilt clock on the mantle ticked monotonously, and the hum of life, and the busy roll of vehicles in the vast city, was borne in through the window, like the faint roar of yet distant Niagara; and after awhile when the sharp stroke of the clock announced four the bowed ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... I'll bet that it will be six hundred Jovian years before any of them ever come within a hundred kilometers of it again. I'm glad of it, too, because they'll let our power plant alone now. Well, let's get going—we've got to make things hum ...
— Spacehounds of IPC • Edward Elmer Smith
... make their fellow creatures better. 'Untiring humor seemed the ruling passion of his soul. With a heart open to all innocent pleasures, purged from the leaven of malice and uncharitableness, it was as natural that he should be full of mirth as it is for the grasshopper to chirp or bee to hum, or the birds to warble in the spring ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... foreign women pass him by, their tarnished coins held tight, They toss their heads and will not hear his music's wistful hum— But through each alley way and street, like moths that seek the light, With eager eyes and laughing lips ...
— Cross Roads • Margaret E. Sangster
... "Hum! Well, I don't believe you'll succeed. I intend to rebuild my gun at once, though I may make some changes in it. I am sure I shall succeed the next time. But as for you—a mere youth—to hope to rival men who have ...
— Tom Swift and his Giant Cannon - or, The Longest Shots on Record • Victor Appleton
... dashed in their faces, the hum of the cordage overhead was in their ears, and their thoughts had gone back to that day, now nigh upon eight years back, when they, as unknown and untried boys, had started forth to see the ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... might have crawled up and shot me in the eye through this hole. I won't hold my eye here all the time!" said he, rising, and to his astonishment Sneak stood at his elbow, whither he had glided softly, his quick ear having caught the hum of Joe's soliloquy, and his curiosity leading him to find out the meaning of the mysterious jargon of ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... his part of the boat, as an old stage-driver is about the snugness of his box. When close to the whale, in the very death-lock of the fight, he handled his unpitying lance coolly and off-handedly, as a whistling tinker his hammer. He would hum over his old rigadig tunes while flank and flank with the most exasperated monster. Long usage had, for this Stubb, converted the jaws of death into an easy chair. What he thought of death itself, there is no telling. ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... had great honor. And I was just thinking that one glorious thing about this same queen was that she at least escaped from all the twentieth-century strain and dislocation in the relationship between city men and women, when the hum of that car brought me back to earth and reminded me that I might have a tableful of guests to feed. The car itself drew up, with a flutter of its engine, half-way between the shack and the corral, and at that sound I imagine we all rather felt like Robinson Crusoes listening to the ...
— The Prairie Wife • Arthur Stringer
... men are always at a disadvantage except on the stage. The hum-drum is the style for Englishmen. Bishop Burnet calls Marvell "a droll," Parker, who was to be a bishop, calls him "a buffoon." Marvell is occasionally humorous and not infrequently carries a jest beyond the limits of becoming mirth; but he is ...
— Andrew Marvell • Augustine Birrell
... a marble fountain in the middle of it, the Greek captains awaited the coming of Pausanias. A low and muttered conversation was carried on amongst them, in small knots and groups, amidst which the voice of Uliades was heard the loudest. Suddenly the hum was hushed, for footsteps were heard without. The thick curtains that at one extreme screened the door-way were drawn aside, and, attended by three of the Spartan knights, amongst whom was Lysander, and by two soothsayers, who were seldom absent, in war or warlike council, ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton
... orders to call for them later in the day. They walked on over the crisp dry grass, and seated themselves on a bit of the fallen masonry. The reaches of the placid river lay before them, and the hum of the alert cricket was in their ears. Now and then a bird flew surreptitiously from one bush to another, with the stealthy, swift motion of flight in autumn, so different from the heedless, fluttering, hither-and-yon vagaries of the spring and early summer. The time for frivolity is over; the ...
— A Christmas Accident and Other Stories • Annie Eliot Trumbull
... and hoped. The throb of the engine became a monotonous hum and whir, and the crash of the waves like the boom of some big drum. Rob, looking through one of the ...
— The Motor Boys on the Pacific • Clarence Young
... mother appeared at the side of the house, for she had been in the kitchen. She raised her eyes toward the cliff as she crossed the farm-yard with something for the hens, looked up again and began to hum. Oyvind sat down to wait. The underbrush was so dense that he could not see very far into the forest, but he listened to the slightest sound. For a long time he heard nothing but the birds that flew up and cheated him,—after a while ...
— A Happy Boy • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... hearts have heard the low whistle of the flying arrow and the sweet hum of the bowstring singing in the book, The Witchery of Archery by Maurice Thompson. To Will and Maurice Thompson we owe a debt of gratitude hard to pay. The tale of their sylvan exploits in the everglades of Florida has a charm that borders on the fay. We who shoot the bow today are children of ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... more had left the table, but the rest, lingering over their fresh filled coffee cups, sat around telling tales, and Tex Calder was among them. He was about to push back his chair when the hum of talk ceased as if at a command. The men on the opposite side of the table were staring with fascinated eyes at the door, and then a big voice boomed behind him: "Tex Calder, stan' up. You've come to the end of ...
— The Untamed • Max Brand
... promised to marry me, I was at one sort of fever-pitch, and when I got to work on that play I was at another. No writer while exercising an abnormal faculty is quite sane. His brain is several pitches above normal and his nerves are like hot taut wires—that hum like the devil. If this were not the case he would not be an imaginative writer at all. But he certainly is in no condition to reveal himself to a woman. I have made wild and sporadic love to you—sporadic is the word, for between ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... through his most important business deals, and its busiest hours were those which most men devote to rest. But John Burkett Ryder never rested. There could be no rest for any man who had a thousand millions of dollars to take care of. Like Macbeth, he could sleep no more. When the hum of business life had ceased down town and he returned home from the tall building in lower Broadway, then his real work began. The day had been given to mere business routine; in his own library at night, free from inquisitive ears and prying eyes, he could devise new schemes for strengthening ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... veranda after a day of keen activity in the burning sun. He felt slack and jaded, for he had had difficult work to do and his dusky laborers had flagged under the unusual heat. There was now no touch of coolness in the stagnant air, and although the camp down the valley was very quiet a confused hum of insects came out of the jungle. It rose and fell with a monotonous regularity that jarred upon Dick's nerves as ...
— Brandon of the Engineers • Harold Bindloss
... meal hour there was a continual round of merriment, and every one was enjoying himself to the fullest extent. But now the hum of voices ended. The ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Treasures of the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... walks threaded everywhere a large shrubbery, and in all sorts of corners and quiet places little dining tables had been placed. Scarcely any one was in sight of any other person, although they were so close together that all the time there was a hum of voices. In the distance, down by the river, a large gondola was passing slowly backwards and forwards, on which an orchestra played soft music. Julien and Madame Christophor crossed the narrow strip of lawn ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... A hum of voices arose around the room. Men called out soothing words to the Red One and expostulations to Leif. Others felt furtively for their weapons. Some of the women turned pale and clung to each other. Helga arose, her beautiful face ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... of sprouting grass! In a blur the violets pass. Whispering from the wildwood come Mayflower's breath and insect's hum. Roses carpeting the ground; Thrushes, orioles, warbling sound:— Swing me low, and swing me high, To the warm clouds ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... Now entertain conjecture of a time When creeping murmur and the poring dark Fills the wide vessel of the universe. From camp to camp, through the foul womb of night The hum of either army stilly sounds,[1] That the fix'd sentinels almost receive The secret whispers of each other's watch:[2] Fire answers fire;[3] and through their paly flames Each battle sees the other's umber'd face:[4] Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighs Piercing the night's dull ear; ...
— King Henry the Fifth - Arranged for Representation at the Princess's Theatre • William Shakespeare
... the field mouse and the toad Have burrowed; where, beside the road, The grasshopper and katydid All winter have been safely hid; And when the bumblebee will come A-booming back with pleasant hum? April can tell you, for 'tis she Opens the ...
— Dew Drops Vol. 37. No. 17, April 26, 1914 • Various
... lighted his pipe and composed himself beside the camp-fire to smoke and rest awhile before going to bed. The silence of the wilderness enfolded lake and shore; yet presently it came to be a silence accentuated by near and distant sounds, faint, wild, lonely—the low hum of falling water, the splash of tiny waves on the shore, the song of insects, and the dismal hoot ...
— The Mysterious Rider • Zane Grey
... her head as she had often felt it before. But she dared not let her mind go out to him in answer, for, if once she did so, she knew also that he would discover her. So she sat, and fed her eyes upon his face, taking her farewell of it, while round her, and beneath her, the hum of the House went on, as ever present and as unnoticed as the hum of ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... Verdi kept putting him off, till the evening before the orchestral rehearsal, when he brought forth the lines; but at the same time he demanded a promise that Mirate—nor indeed any of the singers—should not hum or whistle the air till it should be heard at the first performance. This signified Verdi's belief that the song would instantly become a universal favourite. The faith was justified. The whole country went ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon |
