"Piano" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Jemima Turnbull contributed in turn their share toward the evening's entertainment by singing "Hearts of Oak," "The Bay of Biscay," "Then farewell my trim-built wherry," and other songs of a similar character, to a somewhat uncertain accompaniment upon a discordant jangling old piano—the chief merit of which was that a large proportion of its notes were dumb. Their gallant father meanwhile sipped his grog and puffed away at his "church-warden" in a high-backed uncomfortable-looking chair in a corner near the fire, utterly sunk, apparently, ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... in the far corner of the parlor by the piano. If you know of any other little people, you can bring them there, too," and they each darted off in search of ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... Garrow's tea and cut the leaves of the Revue des Deux Mondes, which he invariably read until he dressed for dinner, she stole away to the further room, where she could play the piano, write letters, muse over novels, or indulge in reverie without fear of interruption. But as she entered it that afternoon its air of peace seemed the bleakness of desolation. A terrible and afflicting grief swept, like an icy breeze, ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... piano myself afterwards and played. Played! It was terrible! Never would I have believed that I could make such a mess of it. I didn't sing until they began trying carols. I didn't mean to do so then, but I chimed in before I ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... broad-shouldered farmers came in, with Baldwin apples in their cheeks as well as in their cellars at home, and their trim tidy wives. Eight or ten Irish children came also,—Bridget, Rosanna, Patrick, and Michael, and Mr. And Mrs. O'Brien themselves. Aunt Kindly had her piano there, ...
— Two Christmas Celebrations • Theodore Parker
... luxuriously furnished drawing-room. Double doors, centre, opening to hall and stairway. Grand piano at right, fireplace next to it, with large easy-chair in front. Centre table; ...
— The Naturewoman • Upton Sinclair
... embarrassing. One day she announced she wanted me to marry one of her brothers-in-law. "I got two nice ones and we'll go out some Sunday afternoon and you can have your pick. One's a piano tuner; the other's a detective." I thought offhand the piano tuner sounded a bit more domestic. ...
— Working With the Working Woman • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... right there in the room, there's a lot doin' that she ain't in on. Trust Vee. Say, she can drum out classical stuff on the piano and fire a snappy line of repartee at me all the while, just loud enough for me to catch and no more, without battin' an eye. Say, I'm gettin' quite a musical education, just helpin' to stall off Auntie that way. And you should see the cute schemes Vee puts over—settin' a framed photo ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford
... The leading periodicals dealing with farm problems, sociology, and economics, as well as lighter subjects, would be on file. In connection with this building would be an assembly-room suitable for dances, social events, and theatricals, and equipped with a player piano and concert-size talking machine. Arrangements were being made for a weekly exchange of records, for a weekly musical evening by artists from the city, for a semi-monthly vaudeville show, and for Sunday meetings addressed by the best ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... been playing to your little boy, Mrs. Carr," she said with the manner which Miss Polly had described as "flighty." "He came into my room when he heard the piano, and it was a real pleasure ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... and were wrapped in warm blankets; and to-day they are invited to the farm at the convent of Boerglum. In comfortable rooms they encounter hospitality and friendly faces. They are addressed in the language of their country, and the piano sounds for them with melodies of their native land; and before these have died away, and the chord has been struck, the wire of thought, that reaches to the land of the sufferers, announces that they are ...
— What the Moon Saw: and Other Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... exhausted; Eden's curiosity about his friend's projected novel, described so far by negatives only, had apparently subsided, for he managed to turn the conversation to some other subject; and presently Constance was persuaded to sit down to the piano. She played under difficulties on the dismal old lodging-house instrument, but declined to sing, alleging a cold, of which there was no evidence. Merton turned the music for her, and for the first time his friend ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... we proceed uphill through the region of vines and olives, until we have passed the Punta di Scutolo, where begins our descent into that famous tract of country, the Piano di Sorrento, a plateau above the cliffs, some four miles in length by one in breadth. Poets of antiquity and bards of the Middle Ages alike have sung the delights of the Sorrentine Plain, and have painted in glowing colours of inspired verse ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... on the right, a wide stove of dark porcelain, a high-backed arm-chair, a cushioned foot-rest, and two footstools. A settee, with a small round table in front of it, fills the upper right-hand corner. In front, on the left, a little way from the wall, a sofa. Further back than the glass door, a piano. On either side of the doorway at the back a whatnot with terra-cotta and majolica ornaments.— Against the back wall of the inner room a sofa, with a table, and one or two chairs. Over the sofa hangs the portrait of a handsome elderly man in a General's ...
— Hedda Gabler - Play In Four Acts • Henrik Ibsen
... in together and spoiled the prettiest little party that was ever started in Eldara. First was that player piano which Sally got shipped in and paid God-knows-how-much for; the second was this greenhorn ...
— Trailin'! • Max Brand
... everything. The cabinet was carried off. The large library had lost many of its choicest volumes, while the remainder, with heaps of letters, lay thrown in wild confusion about the floor. The pile of sheet music which had been left on the piano by the family, had been culled over and nearly all taken away. In fact such a sad scene of destruction was rare, even in the track of a ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... each other's frat houses while we were haltering the Freshmen. I've seen nine frats, with a total of one hundred and fifty members, sitting up nights for a week at a time working out plans to despoil each other of a runty little fellow in a pancake hat, whose only accomplishment was playing the piano with his feet. One frat wanted him and that started ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch
... now proceeded to the drawing-room and prepared to take out the piano. They tried it every way. The first way took a piece out of the doorpost, the second made a dint two inches deep in the piano, the third knocked over the grandfather clock, which fell with a resounding crash, breaking its glass, and incidentally a tall china plant stand that happened to ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... the gramophone has ceased; but, alas! Captain d'Arcy has begun—on the piano. As I write, the scheme of communication between his right and his left flanks has broken down. Like a prudent officer, he suspends operations, gives the "stand-fast!" and sends out a cautious patrol to reconnoitre the position. He even cedes a little of the ground he ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 30, 1914 • Various
... property, contributed to general use such articles of furniture she possessed as met apartment needs. From one, for example, came a comfortable bed, from another, chairs and a reading lamp, from a third a lounge chair, and from the fourth her piano and couch. Of small rugs, sofa pillows, pictures and miscellaneous small furnishings there were sufficient to make ...
— American Cookery - November, 1921 • Various
... stylish gowns and garments the country girl's outfit was deftly concocted. The young wife could sew neatly and rapidly. When all was ready the sum of two hundred dollars lay in her writing desk. Her grand piano, too large for the new quarters, was removed from storage to a dealer's, and was sold for three hundred more. She wrote at once to an uncle in a Western city; told him of her little efforts, and asked what she might do with her ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... was next to Ivanov's study. There still remained out of the ruin a carpet and some armchairs near the large, dirty windows, an old piano stood unmoved, and some portraits still ...
— Tales of the Wilderness • Boris Pilniak
... chance of such a thing, I hope you will not refuse a request of mine, which is that you will be so obliging as to apply to some London publisher, and offer him the following works of mine. Grand Trio for piano, violin, and violoncello [Op. 97], 80 ducats. Pianoforte Sonata, with violin accompaniment [Op. 96], 60 ducats. Grand Symphony in A (one of my very best); a short Symphony in F [the 8th]; Quartet for two violins, viola, and violoncello in F minor [Op. 95]; Grand Opera in ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826, Volume 1 of 2 • Lady Wallace
... was quickly rewarded. Silver Screenings proffered some fresh views of Beulah Baxter, not in dangerous moments, but revealing certain quieter aspects of her wondrous life. In her kitchen, apron clad, she stirred something. In her lofty music room she was seated at her piano. In her charming library she was shown "Among Her Books." More charmingly she was portrayed with her beautiful arms about the shoulders of her dear old mother. And these accompanied an interview with ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... the ranch. We sat down three at table in a dining-room forty feet long, Aunt Isabel Dwight, Fraeulein Henschel, and myself. Fraeulein was the resident governess. She was a great, soft-hearted, injudicious creature, a mass of German interjections, but she had the grand style on the piano. There had been weeks of such weather as we are having now. Exercise was impossible till after sundown. I had dreamed of a breath of freedom, but instead of the open door I was in straiter bonds ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... written for them. The limited compass of the pianoforte, for example, was certainly the sole reason why Beethoven failed to continue in octaves the entire ascending scale in one of his sonatas. Had the piano in his day possessed its present compass, he would undoubtedly have written the passage throughout in octaves, i.e., as modern pianists play it. If a rigid adherence to the printed letter of ancient music is to be strictly observed, ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... she found herself, with the others, sitting very quiet and listening to two girls playing a duet on the piano. Then one of them sang a Scotch song. There was warmth and richness, the warbling of birds, the melody of brooks, in the rendering, and Bernice heard a ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... way; then he would have her join in the dancing, and bade Ellen Chauncey give her lessons. There was a little backwardness at first, and then Ellen was jumping away with the rest, and thinking it perfectly delightful, as Miss Sophia's piano rattled out merry jigs and tunes, and little feet flew over the floor as light as the hearts they belonged to. At eight o'clock the young ones were dismissed, and bade good-night to their elders; and, pleased with the kind kiss Mrs. Marshman had given her, as well ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... and shook bells with a frenzy that was worth an excellent salary, the silly gentleman from Tooting the while blowing furiously upon his flute, and combining this intemperate indulgence with an occasional assault upon a cottage piano that stood immediately before him, or a wave of the baton that asserted his right to the position of chef d'orchestre. Immediately beyond this shrine of music the Prophet perceived a Moorish nook containing a British buffet, and, in quite the most Moorish corner ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... they used to be. Several cheap oleograph copies of beautiful pictures adorn the walls, and the best parlour, which used to be kept in a condition of deadly propriety for state occasions only, is evidently used in the course of daily life. A brand-new piano, with a pretty little girl seated before it, suggests advancing refinement, and the expression of the child's face, while she attempts the impossible task of stretching an octave, indicates despair. There is another little ...
— Philosopher Jack • R.M. Ballantyne
... may truly be called natural, as it is that into which the string naturally divides itself when stricken. An attentive ear can readily distinguish the succession of sounds as far as the small seventh. The longer bass strings of any piano of full tone and resonant sounding board will suffice for the experiment. These are also the natural notes as found, with differences in compass, in the simple horn and trumpet, and the phenomenon is visibly shown in the well-known experiment of grains of sand placed ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... a little, there arrived in town a vaulted box, in which the dullest fancy might conjecture a piano. Greatly indeed were heads shaken. If doom were easily invoked, Jane would hardly have lived to unpack the treasure and help to lift it up the ...
— A Prairie Infanta • Eva Wilder Brodhead
... lighted on this rainy November night. Outside in the garden the trees creaked and bent before the wind, and the heavy barred gate, left open by the last comer, a piano student named Scatchett and dubbed "Scatch"—the gate slammed to and fro monotonously, giving now and then just enough pause for a hope that it had latched itself, a hope that was always destroyed by ...
— The Street of Seven Stars • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Minna the youngest. It was on Easter-day that last I went over to see them; Wearing my best new coat, that is now hanging up in the closet, And having frizzled my hair, like that of the other young fellows. Soon as I entered, they tittered; but that not at me, as I fancied. Minna before the piano was seated; the father was present, Hearing his daughters sing, and full of delight and good-humor. Much I could not understand of all that was said in the singing; But of Pamina I often heard, and oft of Tamino: And ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... relieves the mind from the necessity of paying attention to the details of the successive steps of the act. When piano playing has been completely reduced to habit, the finger movement, the reading of the notes, etc., are all carried on successively ...
— Increasing Efficiency In Business • Walter Dill Scott
... music had been given, from Mozart and Beethoven and Handel; and Betty had got into full swing of conversation again, when a pause around her gave notice that another performer was taking her seat at the piano. Betty checked her speech with a little impulse of vexation, and cast her eyes ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... she appeared supremely lovely, and this John Kenyon admitted to himself with a sigh, for her very loveliness seemed to place her further and further away from him. Somebody played something on the piano, and this was, in a way, a respite for John. He felt that nobody was looking at him. Then a young man gave a recitation, which was very well received, and Kenyon began to forget his uneasiness. A German gentleman with long hair sat down ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... Creek, rejoicing, on the south, west, north, and east of it, respectively, that they had got inside; while the rest of the world peeped in enviously through a knot hole. In the middle of this cherished area piano factories—or was it shoe factories?—proudly reared their chimneys, while the population promenaded on a rope walk, saluted at every turn by the benevolent inmates of the Soldiers' Home on ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... apartments where they receive formal company are on the front of the house. Their living rooms, however, are a salon and dining-room at the back, opening upon the garden. Here there are young and old, grandparents and children and dogs all at once, eating, drinking, smoking, piano-playing, and pistol-firing (in the garden), all going on at the same time. It is one of those establishments where every earthly thing that can be eaten or drunk is offered you; porter, soda water, small ...
— Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire • James Wycliffe Headlam
... probably know that sound is produced by rapid motion. Put your finger on a piano wire that is sounding, and you will feel the motion, or touch your front tooth with a tuning-fork that is singing; in the last case you will feel very distinctly the raps made by the vibrating fork. Now, a sounding body will not only jar another body which touches it, ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, Nov 1877-Nov 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... n. Abbreviation for 'argument' (to a function), used so often as to have become a new word (like 'piano' from 'pianoforte'). "The sine function takes 1 arg, but the arc-tangent function can take either 1 or 2 ...
— THE JARGON FILE, VERSION 2.9.10
... have any three thousand dollars," she continued, undisturbed; "all I had was an allowance of a hundred a month, a grand piano, a horse (you remember my, blood mare, Gee-whizz?) a lot ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... mother was a servant connected with his father's household. The child was given to my wife to rear, and she accepted the charge. The child bloomed into a perfect beauty, possessed a charming voice, could perform with extraordinary skill on the piano, and seemed to have inherited the mind of her father, whose praises have been ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs
... dinner. Aunt Mary was upstairs, and Beatrice was at the piano. We were waiting for Lowell, who had promised to come up and spend the evening. I was sitting at the centre-table, pretending to read, but watching Beatrice. Her back was turned toward me, so I could stare at her as long as I pleased. The ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... kalejdoskopo. Kangaroo didelfo. Keel kilo. Keen (sharp) akra. Keep teni, gardi. Keep silence silentigxi. Keeper gardanto. Keepsake memorajxo. Keg bareleto. Kennel hundejo. Kernel kerno. Kettle bolilo. Key sxlosilo. Key (of piano, etc.) klavo. Keyboard klavaro. Keystone cxefsxtono. Kick piedfrapo. Kid kaprido. Kidnap forsxteli. Kidney reno. Kill mortigi. Kill (animals) bucxi. Kilogramme kilogramo. Kilolitre kilolitro. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... our experience of life, their solution is so obvious that they cease to be problems. Thus, the unaided intellect might be puzzled to say how sounds can grow more alike by continuing to grow more different. Yet a child can answer the question by sounding an octave on the piano. But this solution is reached by having sensible knowledge of the reality and not by logical argument. Bergson's view, therefore, is that the intellect has been evolved for practical purposes, to deal in a certain way with material things ...
— Mysticism in English Literature • Caroline F. E. Spurgeon
... supper I did not know whither to betake my solitary self. I was hungry for conversation, society, exchange of ideas. It occurred to me to go and see our friends, the ——s; they were at supper. Afterward we went into the salon: mother and daughter sat down to the piano and sang a duet by Boieldieu. The ivory keys of the old grand piano, which the mother had played on before her marriage, and which has followed and translated into music the varying fortunes of the family, were a little loose and jingling; but the ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... form, I placed myself by the young lady and endeavored to at least divide her attention with my Confederate friend. The apple-jack dilated most engagingly on the remarkable beauty of the evening, the pleasantness of the weather generally, and the delightfulness of Shelbyville. There was a piano in the room, and finally, after having occupied her attention jointly with O'Brien for some time, I took the liberty to ask her to favor us with a song; but she pleaded an awful cold, and asked to be excused. The apple-jack excused her. The Storeys ...
— The Citizen-Soldier - or, Memoirs of a Volunteer • John Beatty
... some feast lay about the room, scattered in places where even a prowling cat would have been surprised to find them. A straggling cluster of deep red roses in a marmalade jar bowed their heads over tobacco ashes and unwashed goblets. A chafing-dish stood on the piano; a leaf of sheet music supported a stack of sandwiches in ...
— The Trimmed Lamp • O. Henry
... toward the music room, for there was one where the blind inmates played and sang, and as Mr. Brown and the children went through the door Lucile uttered a low cry at the sight of a man who was just getting up from the piano. ...
— Bunny Brown and his Sister Sue Giving a Show • Laura Lee Hope
... understood, as you say," answered Charles, "modern music did not come into existence till after the powers of the violin became known. Corelli himself, who wrote not two hundred years ago, hardly ventures on the shift. The piano, again, I have heard, has almost given ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman
... of tune, which was all the time, and made bitter remarks of a killingly sarcastic nature to Miss Leech when she stumbled over the accompaniments. On Wednesdays there was a dancing class, where a pinched young lady played the piano with the energy of despair, and a hot and agile master with unduly turned-out toes taught the girls the Lancers, earning his bread in the sweat of his brow. He also was sarcastic, but he clothed his sarcasms ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp
... in the world is the practice of music more universally extended and at the same time the science so little understood as in America. Almost every house included between the Delaware and Schuylkill has its piano or harpsichord, its violin, its flute, or its clarinet. Almost every young lady and gentleman from the children of the Judge, the banker, and the general, down to those of the constable, the huckster, and the drummer, can make a noise upon some instrument ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... elevations a fine wire (piano wire 1/32 inch in diameter) is generally used, but to protect the user against electric shocks the wire must be connected with an "earthed" terminal, on the ...
— Things To Make • Archibald Williams
... messieurs," said Frederick, as he returned to the musicians, "we will take our parts, and you, Quantz, take your place at the piano." ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... post in the billiard-room, or by the cribbage-board, or at the piano which Gervase had got for her. She had some small skill to play and sing to him, and was indefatigable in learning the simple tunes and songs he liked. And night after night she was left alone, unapproached, uncalled for; or else Gervase stumbled in from the dining-room or from an adjournment ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... out of mind, and in its place is the fashionable boarding-house. The skilled housewife is felt to be unappreciated. Men, they tell us, prefer a pretty face to a noble heart, a delicate to a skilled hand, a girl who can play the piano rather than one who can cook a dinner, a pretty doll instead of a glorious woman capable of keeping the house, and of guiding the man with womanly strength. Ah, it is a mistake. America is the land of homes. Our undeveloped territory offers to every man a farm. Men and women need not to be cooped ...
— The True Woman • Justin D. Fulton
... drinking the business of their lives, beginning early and sitting late. They have a varnish of art over their swinishness, and must have music as well as wine. So, in many a drink-shop in England, a piano or a band adds to the attractions, and gives a false air of aestheticism to pure animalism. Isaiah feels the incongruity that music should be so prostituted, and expresses it by adding to his list of musical instruments 'and wine' as if he would underscore the degradation ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... contents stolen or rendered worthless; the carpets, soaked with a trampled conglomerate of mud and water, oil and filth, the debris left by the feet of the maddened, howling crowd, were entirely ruined; beds and bedding, mirrors, and smaller articles had been carried away, the grand piano had had a fire kindled on the key-board, as had the sofas and chairs upon their velvet seats, fires that were, none knew ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... the finest house in town," said Faith consolingly, "and a piano and a horse and buggy. He is going to have ...
— At the Little Brown House • Ruth Alberta Brown
... different with us. Our minister now performs the function of the Greek poet at marriages and funerals. Our funeral sermons and newspaper paragraphs have taken the place of the Greek encomiums. Our fiddles or piano do duty instead of the Greek dithyrambs, hyporchems, and other dancing songs. Our warriors are either left unsung, or celebrated in verse that reads much better than it sings. The members of the "Benevolent Pugilistic Association" do not stand so high in the British ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... in the darkest night. I'll bet they could in our house. From end to end it is kept looking as if we had shut it up and gone to Europe,—not a book, not a paper, not a glove, or any trace of a human being, in sight. The piano shut tight, the bookcases shut and locked, the engravings locked up, all the drawers and closets locked. Why, if I want to take a fellow into the library, in the first place it smells like a vault, and I have to unbarricade windows, and unlock and rummage for half an hour before ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various
... side was a large stone fireplace; in a corner stood a grand piano; the center was dominated by a simple, flat-topped desk, across which much of the traffic of the American ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... in a whiff. We have daughters too, we have. Good smart American girls, who can adorn a palace or grace a hut on demand, not afraid of poverty, and able to take care of good round dollars. They can play the piano all the morning and cook dinner all the afternoon if they're called on to do it; so your difficulties ain't my difficulties. I'll take the hall at your figures; term, five years; and if the baron'll come down and spend a month with ...
— The Water Ghost and Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... as I sat gloomily in my room, with feet protruding from the window, and body inclined rearward, (the American attitude of despair,) the piano tinkled. It was the same melody which had attracted me a few happy days before. Strengthening myself with a powerful resolution to extricate myself from the bewitching influence which had surrounded me, I arose, and went straightway ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... the first week of the holidays Lorna amused herself as best she might in their little lodgings in Naples. While her father was at the office she read or sewed, or played on a wretched old piano, which had little tune in it but was better than nothing. The evenings were her golden times, for then they would go out together, sometimes into the Italian quarters of the city, or sometimes by tram into the suburbs, where there ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... slurring vowels and wandering aspirates of East London, and then lifted a face one-half blackened, the appeal to the love of humor was more effective than the other could have been. A company of young men in masks with a piano in their boat, which one played while another led the singing in an amazing falsetto, were peculiarly successful in collecting their reward, and were all the more amusingly eager because they were, as our English friends believed, undergraduates on ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... Clonmel,—beautiful, and with the distinction of knowledge and a clever use of it,—they were a contrast to the ordinary Irish country girl, whose whole equipment of dress and accomplishments was "two washing gowns and a tune on the piano." The girls took part in all the gayeties of the town, and, besides the charm of their conversation, were graceful dancers; and though Marguerite was less beautiful, she was most tasteful in dress, and this became always a noted characteristic of hers. They became the attraction of an English ...
— Some Old Time Beauties - After Portraits by the English Masters, with Embellishment and Comment • Thomson Willing
... the window, looking out into the twilight. Decima stood near the fire in a thoughtful mood. Lucy was downstairs in the drawing-room at the piano. They could hear the faint echo of her soft playing as they sat there in silence. Sibylla was in no humour to talk: she had repulsed Decima rudely—or it may rather be said fractiously—when the latter had ventured on conversation. ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... only the simple airs, but the most difficult exercises usually played by his daughters, were repeated again and again, the touch of the musician being timid, but singularly true and delicate. Going down, they found Tom, who had been left asleep in the hall, seated at the piano in an ecstasy of delight, breaking out at the end of each successful fugue into shouts of laughter, kicking his heels and clapping his hands. This was the first time he ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various
... were taken aboard the Pioneer. Everything was marvelous to them. The cabin with its complete furnishings, the musical instruments, the phonograph, the piano player, which acted like a wizard, because it gave out the sweet musical tones, as though it were a living thing, and then a moving picture screen, which was the last thing the boys installed before they left New York, ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Treasures of the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... change in it was marked. The grand piano had vanished, and in its place stood an enormous cabinet made of wood, stained black, and covered with grotesque gold figures, whose unnatural faces were twisted into the expressions of all the vices. Some of these faces smiled, others ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... the fears that had been drilled into her twanging like piano wires—shrank from the skeletal-seeming shape beside her, held herself ...
— The Moon is Green • Fritz Reuter Leiber
... play away. It's good to hear the piano going again. And, between ourselves, I'm beginning to feel depressed by the stillness of the house. It's difficult to believe that this is home since we took on hospital work. Between ourselves, I sha'n't be sorry when Ormsby says good-bye. As a strong man and a soldier, I like him; but, as a sick ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley
... Prue were in their glory, and as soon as the breakfast things were out of the way, they prepared for a grand cooking-time. They were handy girls, though they had never heard of a cooking-school, never touched a piano, and knew nothing of embroidery beyond the samplers which hung framed in the parlor; one ornamented with a pink mourner under a blue weeping-willow, the other with this pleasing verse, each word being done in ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... thunder passed away as I told you. The weather cleared up; the people walked out in their best clothes; the dinners came in from the bakers; I sat dreaming at my wretched little hired piano, nicely dressed and looking my best—and still no Midwinter appeared. It was late in the afternoon, and I was beginning to feel offended, when a letter was brought to me. It had been left by a strange messenger who went away again immediately. I looked at the letter. Midwinter at last—in writing, ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... if there is one thing more grateful to my feelings than another, it is a new house—a large house, with its ceilings embellished with snowy mouldings; its floors glowing with warm-tinted carpets, with cushioned chairs and sofas to sit on, and a piano to listen to; with fires so arranged you can see them, and know there is no humbug about it; with walls garnished with pictures, and above all mirrors, wherein you may gaze and always find something to admire, you know. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various
... about in handsome carriages. Just in the centre and height of the thoroughfare Mme. Ricard's establishment looked over it. We went in at a stately doorway, and were shown into a very elegant parlour; where at a grand piano a young lady was taking a music lesson. The noise was very disagreeable; but that was the only disagreeable thing in the place. Pictures were on the walls, a soft carpet on the floor; the colours of carpet and furniture were ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... of the bridesmaids, at the request of Lady Belgrade, sat down to the piano and condescended to favor the company with a ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... I remember one such outing we arranged to Loschwitz, where we made a kind of gypsy camp, in which Carl Maria von Weber played his part in the character of cook. At home we also had some music. My sister Rosalie played the piano, and Clara was beginning to sing. Of the various theatrical performances we organised in those early days, often after elaborate preparation, with the view of amusing ourselves on the birthdays of our elders, I can hardly remember one, save a parody on the ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... can, as if in fear of taking cold. Skimming along close to the floor, he reaches the opposite side of the room, and, slowly rising again, peers into the canary's cage. The occupant resents the liberty with erect feathers, and our balloon quickly descends, and takes refuge under the piano. Recovering his presence of mind, presently he peeps cautiously out, and begins to ascend again. Here he comes toward us—slowly, majestically! Strike at him with a fan, and lo! he retreats in great disorder to a remote corner of the ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, May, 1878, No. 7. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... are the same frosty mists, and there is the same intensely cold convent with its menagerie smell, and the same breed of dogs fast dying out, and the same breed of jolly young monks whom I mourn to know as humbugs, and the same convent parlour with its piano and the sitting round the fire, and the same supper, and the same lone night in a cell, and the same bright fresh morning when going out into the highly rarefied air was like a plunge into an icy bath. Now, see here what ...
— Reprinted Pieces • Charles Dickens
... at last gave up her book, and took her work-box instead. We were no longer moping and dull around the table. And bye and bye Henrietta, much alarmed, was sent to the piano, and her poor little music certainly sounded very meagre when Mr. ...
— Richard Vandermarck • Miriam Coles Harris
... in the reading-room's affairs. There was the matter of a new piano for the Sunday-school room. The instrument in use had been a second-hand one when the Sunday School obtained it; and it was forever ...
— Janice Day at Poketown • Helen Beecher Long
... became frequent and friendly. There were horseback rides together in the mornings, sails in the afternoons, and duets on the piano in the evenings. Then her Parisian toilets made poor Sophy's Largo dresses look funnily dowdy, and her sharp questions and affected ignorances of Sophy's meanings and answers were cleverly aided by Madame's cold silences, lifted brows, and hopeless acceptance of ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... At our own restaurant, two Negro women made the best corn-fritters we had ever tasted; a green parrot and a monkey squawked and chattered on the balustrade; a Filipino boy played marches on a cracked piano-forte. ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... well. I believe I could do an hour's practice if there was only a piano here," Violet answered, as she glanced wistfully at her music-roll, which lay on ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... had time enough for such things, though we lost many a free hour in music lessons. Ludo was learning to play on the piano, but I had chosen another instrument. Among our best friends, the three fine sons of Privy-Councillor Oesterreich and others, there was a pleasant boy named Victor Rubens, whose parents were likewise ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Hermia mounted the platform (a piano box turned on its side) and began to thump the drum and cymbals. Her position was conspicuous and she began a little uncertainly, for it was one thing to choose one's audience among the simple folk of the countryside, another to face the kind of crowd which now gathered ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs
... event, modifying or throwing light upon the principal matter without affecting its essential character; an accompaniment is something that unites with the principal matter, tho not necessary to it; as, the piano accompaniment to a song; a concomitant goes with a thing in natural connection, but in a subordinate capacity, or perhaps in contrast; as, cheerfulness is a concomitant of virtue. A circumstance is not strictly, nor usually, an occasion, condition, effect, or result. (See these ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... down his spotless wristbands, laid himself back on the soft sofa, soothed by the elegant surroundings no less than by the coolness of the atmosphere. Having no better comparison at hand, he compared this luxurious room, with its soft couches, brilliant flowers, and opened piano, to the chamber in the house of a West India planter, where all was glare and heat and barbarism without, and all soft and cool and luxurious within. He was so charmed with this comparison—he had a knack of being easily pleased with his own thoughts—that he commenced to turn a fresh sentence ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... over, Miss Stubbs said graciously: "Mr. Barton, if you are not pressed for time, will you linger a while? I play a little on the piano, and if you are fond of music, I will play for you. Usually I have to be in the store, but this ...
— Five Hundred Dollars - or, Jacob Marlowe's Secret • Horatio Alger
... the same use as the study of writing, grammar, or piano-playing. In learning to write we have to think precisely how each letter is formed, how one letter is connected with another, where to use capitals, where to punctuate and the like. But after we have become proficient in writing, we do all this without once ...
— Practical Ethics • William DeWitt Hyde
... ask yourself, why did I not send a polite note to Johnny's father asking him to restrain his little boy from over-composition, begging him not to force the child's musical genius too quickly, imploring him (in short) to lock up the piano and lose the key? What kept me from this course? The answer is "Patriotism." Those deep feelings for his country which one man will express glibly by rising nine times during the morning at the sound of the National Anthem, another will direct to more solid uses. ...
— The Sunny Side • A. A. Milne
... to play the pianola to accompany the hymns, but, since the rolls were scored rather for musical effect than for church services, the pianola was suddenly found to be playing something quite different from what was being sung. All through the expedition the want of some one who could play the piano was felt, and such a man is certainly a great asset in a life so far removed from all the pleasures of civilization. As Scott wrote in The Voyage of the Discovery, where one of the officers used to play each evening: "This hour of music has become an institution which ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... secure a tete-a-tete in the house of Connor. On this particular evening, Trix was practising scales on the piano in the drawing-room, while Mollie read a novel, and Betty lolled on the rug; the three boys were busy at lessons, or, as they eloquently described it, "stewing," round the dining-room table. Mr Connor was smoking his pipe and reading ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... ladies to the drawing-room, and then Maurice lured Madeleine to the piano, and was soon in raptures over the wild, sweet melodies which she sung with untutored pathos. His grandmother could scarcely conceal her vexation. Approaching the singer, she took an opportunity, while ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... him shortly before how I had boarded the Calais boat at Dover in the form and semblance of a piano, snugly housed in one of Messrs. Erard's cases, while my servant engaged in pleasant converse on the quay the bailiff who had been set to watch for me: this, while they were actually slinging me on board. The picture of the ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman
... theatre with Florry Tressilian. Oh that Nick would only do something of that sort now! This desire, quickened by the presence of the strange, expressive woman, by the way she scattered sweet syllables as if she were touching the piano-keys, combined with other things to make our young lady's head swim—other things too mingled to name, admiration and fear and dim divination and purposeless pride and curiosity and resistance, the impulse to go away ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... ample work to do in the form of playing for the people. Their instruments are the fiddle, 'cello, viola, clarinet, tarogato (a Hungarian specialty), and, above all, the cymbal. The tarogato looks like a grand piano with the top off. It stands on four legs like a table and has wires drawn across it; on these wires the player performs with two little sticks, that are padded at the ends with cotton-wool. The sound is wild and weird, but if well played very beautiful indeed. ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume VI • Various
... the poverty, the untidiness, the want of system and thrift, that existed about the cabin, notwithstanding his knowledge of French and other academic subjects. Another time, when riding on the outer edges of a town in the South, I heard the sound of a piano coming from a cabin of the same kind. Contriving some excuse, I entered, and began a conversation with the young colored woman who was playing, and who had recently returned from a boarding-school, where she had been ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... to receive "beaux" and addicted to the piano-forte accomplishment, was at that time practicing across the hall an instrumental composition, entitled, "La Reve." Under the title, printed in very small letters, was the English translation; but I never thought to look at it. An elocutionist ...
— The Delicious Vice • Young E. Allison
... an artist who shall play on an assembly of men as a master on the keys of a piano,—who seeing the people furious, shall soften and compose them, shall draw them, when he will, to laughter and to tears. Bring him to his audience, and, be they who they may,—coarse or refined, pleased or displeased, sulky or savage, with their opinions in the keeping ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... never mind. Perhaps you have fallen to Miss Pennycuick's piano? Did you hear it going as we passed ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... pleasure in the fashionable modern composers. It seemed to him "playing tricks with music—like nonsense verses—music to please me," added he, "must have a subject." Our friend appeared struck with this observation, "I understand you, sir," she replied, and immediately seated herself at the piano. "Have the kindness to listen to the three following airs, which I played on a certain occasion extempore, as substitutes for words. Will you try to guess the meaning I wished to convey, and I shall then ascertain the extent of my success." She instantly gave us ...
— The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1838 • James Gillman
... caper a bit, musically, roaring in basso profundo a morning song of its own. The result is grotesque in the extreme. I once heard a big-chested man sing "Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep," while his accompanist jigged out an accompaniment on the highest octave to be found on the keyboard of the piano. The pond and the fishermen seem to be doing something ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... a neighbour in later life that few letters passed between them. 'He was a true musician; not that he was a great performer on any instrument, but that he so truly appreciated all that was good and beautiful in music. He was a good performer on the piano, and could get such full harmonies out of the organ that stood in one corner of his entrance room at Little Grange as did good to the listener. Sometimes it would be a bit from one of Mozart's Masses, or from one of the finales of some one of his or Beethoven's Operas. ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... call that thing artistic, Mrs. Hewson, if you mean the thing that's over the piano in ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... exuberance of life and affection, which the chilling atmosphere of that New England home somewhat suppressed, and with an increasing love for books and cultured people. "I rise a little before five," she writes, "walk an hour, and then practise on the piano till seven, when we breakfast. Next, I read French—Sismondi's Literature of the South of Europe—till eight; then two or three lectures in Brown's Philosophy. About half past nine I go to Mr. Perkins's school, and study Greek till twelve, when, the school being dismissed, I recite, go home, ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton
... but little room in Hester's life for music. Her days were an endless round of dish-washing and baby-tending—first for her mother, later for herself. There had been no money for music lessons, no time for piano practice. Hester's childish heart had swelled with bitter envy whenever she saw the coveted music roll swinging from some playmate's hand. At that time her favorite "make-believe" had been to play at going for a music lesson, with a carefully modeled roll of brown paper suspended ...
— The Tangled Threads • Eleanor H. Porter
... close to the fire by his side. Here she was silent for a few moments, letting the comfort of the whole scene sink in to his brain—and then, when the maid came in to clear away the dinner-table, she got up and went to the piano, where she played some soft, but not sentimental tunes. Music of a certain sort would be the worst thing for him, but a light air while Marie was in the room could do no harm. Though, when she went over close to him again, she saw that even this pause had allowed him time to ...
— The Man and the Moment • Elinor Glyn
... herself to be elected perpetual President, she will leave the Presidential arm-chair at the beginning of every debate, in order to demolish by anticipation all who may venture to speak after her. She will play various kinds of music upon the piano with a uniform vigour that would serve well for the beating of carpets, and will express much scorn for the feeble beings who use the soft pedal, or indulge in the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, March 29, 1890 • Various
... adopt it enthusiastically; but that he was still puzzled over the very necessary word to fit the strongly marked refrain. However, he was not going to give it up. Next morning, when Grieg was in his room peacefully giving a piano lesson to a young lady, a furious ringing was heard at his front-door bell, as if the ringer would tear the bell from its wires, followed by a wild shout of "'Fremad! Fremad!' Hurrah, I have got it! 'Fremad!'" Bjornson, for of course the intruder was he, rushed ...
— Three Comedies • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... been a concert pianist; now she had such large arthritic knobs on all of her knuckles that her hands had become claws. Though there was still that very same fine upright in the cabin that I had learned to play as a child, she had long since given up the piano. Her knees also had large arthritic knobs; this proud woman with a straight back and long, flowing strides was bent over, limping along with a cane. She was also 30 pounds overweight and her blood pressure was ...
— How and When to Be Your Own Doctor • Dr. Isabelle A. Moser with Steve Solomon
... play a duet, on which Athalie said, modestly, that she had forgotten her music—the only instrument she could play on now was the chopping-board. Since the great catastrophe, Athalie only played the piano when she knew ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... neglected; her mother, though a most exemplary woman, both as a Christian and a member of society, had never tied her up in a fashionable corset to improve her figure, nor sent her to a fashionable boarding school to improve her mind; the consequence was that she knew nothing of the piano,—Virgil seems to have had the gift of prophecy with regard to this part of modern education, when he said ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... that their flat was well-provisioned, well-furnished, heated and lighted. There were a few books and magazines, a piano, a writing desk, even a pack of ...
— A Woman for Mayor - A Novel of To-day • Helen M. Winslow
... established in that house, the stepmother of those children, she found it impossible. Despite the fact that her attention had been focussed so strongly on them, the fringe of her vision had included their surroundings, the costly furniture, the piano against the farther wall, the music rack. Evidently the girl was learning to play. She felt a renewed, intenser bitterness against her own lot: she was aware of something within her better and finer than the girl, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... mischief. I told you I'd give you something better than the Journal would give you, and I am going to give you a happy day in the country. We're now on our way to this lady's house. You are my guest, and you can play golf, and bridge, and the piano, and eat and drink until the polls close, and after that you can go to the devil. If you jump out at this speed, you will break your neck. And, if I have to slow up for anything, and you try to get away, I'll go after you—it ...
— The Scarlet Car • Richard Harding Davis
... classmates are to make their careers—three as physicians, two as pharmacists, two as teachers, one as a business man, the other as a lawyer. The young woman graduate received two diplomas, the second being in music, her industry and ability being evidenced in the fact that her long hours with the piano did not prevent her receiving high honors in the classroom. One of the men had walked fourteen miles each day, summer and winter, besides doing the "chores" morning and night; another has had a chair in a barber shop every evening; others have ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 54, No. 3, July, 1900 • Various
... A piano-organ was pouring the metallic music through our open windows, while a voice of brass brayed the words, which I have since obtained, and print above for identification by such as know their Italy better than ...
— Raffles - Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... place where she worked and has never been able to stand up since. On her birthday her friends give her a party that she may have a bit of brightness. I went over to play that they might dance. She is fond of music and an old piano has recently been given her by—by some ...
— People Like That • Kate Langley Bosher
... them, you would feel what a divine consolation is music! And they shout for joy, they beam with happiness when a teacher says to them, "You will become an artist." The one who is first in music, who succeeds the best on the violin or piano, is like a king to them; they love, they venerate him. If a quarrel arises between two of them, they go to him; if two friends fall out, it is he who reconciles them. The smallest pupils, whom he teaches to play, regard him as a father. Then all go to bid him good night before retiring ...
— Cuore (Heart) - An Italian Schoolboy's Journal • Edmondo De Amicis
... woman, or one who can do little save strum on the piano or make embroidery as intricate as it is useless, means divorce or murder. For him, sweetness, gentleness, self-control, sound common sense, shrewdness, and domestic virtues are incomparably superior to any mental brilliance or physical comeliness. He needs a "homely" woman, and should remember ...
— Epilepsy, Hysteria, and Neurasthenia • Isaac G. Briggs
... is a boudoir upholstered in light gray silk damask, with bouquets of flowers. This is Madame Desvarennes's favorite room. A splendid Erard piano occupies one side of the apartment. Facing it is a sideboard in sculptured ebony, enriched with bronze, by Gouthieres. There are only two pictures on the walls: "The Departure of the Newly Married Couple," exquisitely painted by Lancret; ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... corner of this room was a piano, and the piece of modern music above the key-board showed that someone had been recently playing. A lamp of neat design hung from the wainscoted ceiling, while another with a soft shade stood upon a centre-table. ...
— Glen of the High North • H. A. Cody
... purity of principle the prejudice of education has left upon their intellect. In our more fashionable hells, wine and choice liqueurs are the stimulants 321to vice; here, the seduction consists in the strumming of an ill-toned piano, to the squeaking of some poor discordant whom poverty compels to public exposure; and who, generally being of the softer sex, pity protects from the severity of critical remark. I need not say our report to the Dalmaines was unfavourable; and the divine little countess, frustrated ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... because her chest is delicate, and she has come home to be coddled. She don't like it a bit—leaving school, I mean—so it seems that none of us are contented. She's clever, in music especially; plays both violin and piano uncommonly well for ...
— Sisters Three • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey |
