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Rattle   /rˈætəl/   Listen
Rattle

verb
(past & past part. rattled; pres. part. rattling)
1.
Make short successive sounds.
2.
Shake and cause to make a rattling noise.



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"Rattle" Quotes from Famous Books



... Opera far into the morning of the Sabbath; an excellent contrivance for poising the balance between God and Mammon, and illustrating the ease with which a man's duties to both, may be accommodated and adjusted. How the carriages rattle up, and deposit their richly- dressed burdens beneath the lofty portico! The powdered footmen glide along the aisle, place the richly-bound prayer-books on the pew desks, slam the doors, and hurry away, leaving the fashionable members ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens

... minesweeper and a fragment gashed the decks but did not penetrate them. In the cabins the concussion of almost every bomb which fell on shore was felt with curious precision. The glass of wheel-houses and deck cabins was shattered, and the rattle and thud on the decks and iron sides denoted the storm of ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife

... not supposed to sleep during the night, but to be on guard. Every two hours, that is, at each of the five watches into which the night is divided, he should make a round of the outbuildings to satisfy himself that all's well. This he does not do quietly, but to the beating of a bamboo rattle, so that thieves may know he is on the lookout and run away. Sometimes, in order to keep up his courage, I have even heard him shout "I see you," "I know who you are," ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready

... roar and rattle of the wheels shivered the quiet into little bits. I rose to go away, but two men in white clothes stood in front of me. The first one said:Its him! The second said So it is! And they both laughed almost as loudly as the machinery roared, and mopped their foreheads. ...
— The Man Who Would Be King • Rudyard Kipling

... and shouting his battle cry, rushed forward, firing as he advanced. In the meantime the gate had been opened. Many of the Arabs and a large number of their followers sprang in. No resistance was offered. Others were about to follow when the gate was shut, and directly afterwards the sharp rattle of musketry was heard, mingled with the shouts of the Arabs and the shrieks and cries of the negroes, but not a shot, was fired at those outside. Then there came an ominous silence. Suddenly it was broken by renewed firing, but this time the shots were directed towards ...
— Ned Garth - Made Prisoner in Africa. A Tale of the Slave Trade • W. H. G. Kingston

... issue the rattle of tin pots and the shouts of the boys told off to protect the ripening fruit from the attacks of crows, parrots and other feathered marauders. Nor do these sounds terminate at night-fall; indeed they become louder after dark, for it is then that the flying-foxes come forth and work sad ...
— A Bird Calendar for Northern India • Douglas Dewar

... the poor thing had a noose round its neck and could by no manner of means have extricated itself. The flat head, and vivid vicious eye, and darting tongue, were none of them lovely to behold; but the sort of threatening whirr produced by its rattle, together with the deepening and fading of the marks on its skin, either with its respiration or the emotions of fear and anger it was enduring, were peculiarly dreadful and fascinating. It was quite a young ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble

... I were walking down the road outside the Old Squire's stables, and Saxon smelt us, and we could hear him run and rattle his chain, and he ...
— Last Words - A Final Collection of Stories • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... 'Mid the rattle of blocks and the tramp of the crew, Hisses the rain of the rushing squall; The sails are aback from clew to clew, And now is the moment ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various

... great chandeliers in the saloon are freshly lighted. The assemblage is much the same as that already noticed in connection with the place. The divan has its corps of sleepers and burden of garments, and the tables yet resound with the rattle and clash of dice. Yet the greater part of the company are not doing anything. They walk about, or yawn tremendously, or pause as they pass each other to exchange idle nothings. Will the weather be fair to-morrow? Are the preparations for the games complete? Do the laws of the Circus in Antioch ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace

... for an' had recommended to every sinner in the neighborhood. He was settin' in his room. God o' Isr'el! You orto 'a' seen the motions he made with his hands an' the way he tried to speak when I went in there, but all I could hear was jest a long yell an' a kind of a rattle in his throat. Heavens an' airth! how desperit he tried to spit out the thing that was gnawin' his vitals. Ag'in an' ag'in he'd try to tell me. Lord God! how ...
— The Light in the Clearing • Irving Bacheller

... old critters once get loose enough to play they rattle to pieces mighty fast," said the mate. "But this is ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... immediately dashes off in all haste, whips crack, wheels fly, and shouting, racing and singing along all the roads, the country-folk rattle away to their homes. Our two turn their wheels towards the ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair

... At the first rattle of the lottery bag, Filomena rushes in here, opens the window, and calls for a certain number. If anyone else wants it, she must manage to find two soldi in her pocket. If I fling a few soldi from my bed towards the window, this facilitates ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes

... which my companion whispered would bring us to his house; and here we paused to take breath and look back. The sky was red behind us, the air full of the clash and din of the tocsin, and the flood of sounds which poured from every tower and steeple. From the eastward came the rattle of drums and random shots, and shrieks of "A BAS COLIGNY!" "A BAS LES HUGUENOTS!" Meanwhile the city was rising as one man, pale at this dread awakening. From every window men and women, frightened by the uproar, ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman

... lay alone in the throes of death, an old man breathing with difficulty and turning his head from side to side as amid his tears he uttered a name. The old man was alone, but from time to time a groan or the rattle of a chain was heard on the other side of the wall. Far away there was a merry feast, almost an orgy; a youth was laughing, shouting, and pouring wine upon the flowers amid the applause and drunken laughter of his companions. The old man had the features of his father, the youth ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal

... gliding over the floor, and hissing around our feet. They have been disturbed and frightened by the unwonted intrusion. We, too, are frightened, for we hear the dreaded rattle ...
— The Scalp Hunters • Mayne Reid

... rattling of thin chains diverted Madeline's attention. At first she imagined it was made by the telegraph wires. Then she heard a step. The door swung wide; a tall man entered, and with him came the clinking rattle. She realized then that the sound came from his spurs. The man was a cowboy, and his entrance recalled vividly to her that of Dustin Farnum in the first act ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey

... studying about Charlemagne, a page of your history text occupying the centre of your attention. The marginal distractions in such a case would consist, first, in external sensations, such as the glare from your study-lamp, the hissing of the radiator, the practising of a neighboring vocalist, the rattle of passing street-cars. The bodily distractions might consist of sensations of weariness referred to the back, the arms and the eyes, and fainter sensations from the digestive organs, heart and lungs. ...
— How to Use Your Mind • Harry D. Kitson

... rippling fountain before the forester's house, and caressed the little firs in the hedge, which stood as close and regular as the bristles in a brush. She thought she had never seen the forest so cheerful before. The dogs barked furiously; she heard the fox rattle his chain, and looked up at the bull-finch, who jumped to and fro in his cage, and tried ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... extraordinary success) the difficulty of the back of the head, for which he had no documents beyond a hazy recollection of a public meeting; delighted himself by his treatment of the collar; and was only recalled to the cares of life by Michael Finsbury's rattle at ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... We rattle leisurely into Atchison on a Sunday evening. Lights gleam in the windows of milk-white churches, and they tell us, far better than anything else could, that we ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 4 • Charles Farrar Browne

... upstairs; for presently they heard her running down, after which a fresh rattle began at the obstinate bolt. But still the door did not open, and at length Mrs. Worrett put her lips to the ...
— What Katy Did At School • Susan Coolidge

... breast. He heard Ali, who moved behind him preparing his evening meal, and he listened with strange attention to the sounds the man made—to the short, dry bang of the plate put upon the table, to the clink of glass and the metallic rattle of knife and fork. The man went away. Now he was coming back. He would speak directly; and Almayer, notwithstanding the absorbing gravity of his thoughts, listened for the sound of expected words. He heard them, spoken ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad

... of these rejoicings the sharp rattle of musketry was heard, and the Italians rushed to cover. A reconnoitering party reported that the Austrians were intrenched in a large villa beyond a stream outside the town. The Italian troops began an attack upon this position, and a skirmish party sought to take a position ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... into the black, cold water of the pools. The hoofs of the horses and the spurs of the men clanked against the stones; now and then one of the heavily laden packhorses stumbled and was sworn at, and once a warning rattle, issuing from a rank growth of fern on the hillside, caused a momentary commotion. There was no more laughter, or whistling, or calling from the van to the rear guard. The way was arduous, and every man must watch his footsteps; moreover, the last rays of the sun were gilding the ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston

... complimented, pricked up one ear, lifted a foot, and jogged off. The depot wagon became merely a shadowy smudge against the darkness of the night. For a few minutes the "chock, chock" of the hoofs upon the frozen road and the rattle of wheels gave audible evidence of its progress. Then these died away and upon the windswept platform of the South Harniss station descended the black gloom of lonesomeness so complete as to make that which had been before ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln

... release, rest, quietus, fall; loss, bereavement; mortality, morbidity. end of life &c. 67, cessation of life &c. 142, loss of life, extinction of life, ebb of life &c. 359. death warrant, death watch, death rattle, death bed; stroke of death, agonies of death, shades of death, valley of death, jaws of death, hand of death; last breath, last gasp, last agonies; dying day, dying breath, dying agonies; chant ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget

... already up behind; the cockaded groom at the horses' heads stood ready to let go; everything was prepared for the signal, and Swithin gave it. The equipage dashed forward, and before you could say Jack Robinson, with a rattle and flourish drew up at ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... him like a sob, a hoarse sound like the death rattle of a dying man; it seemed indeed like the agony of death when the father's love was powerless. There was a pause, and neither of the sisters spoke. It must have been selfishness indeed that could hear unmoved that cry of anguish that, ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac

... a solemn and majestic manner. We cannot expect such big wheels to hurry themselves. Under the bridge, puffing a little more quickly, then we rattle through Westbourne Park and by Wormwood Scrubs. Puff-puffing much more quickly now, but not quite so loudly, as the driver has pulled the lever back and the steam goes up with less force through the chimney: working quietly. Away, away, on our iron steed through Ealing ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... have a fancy to end their days up in the mountains, where they can hear the winds blow and the birds sing, and nothing else. I'm not quite that way myself. I hope I'll die with my window wide open, so that I can hear the ferry-boats in the river, and the Broadway cars, and the rattle of the elevated trains. That's the music that beats in my blood, Mr. Courage! and I guess I'll never be able to change the tune. Say, will you pass that bottle, sir? We'll drink once more, sir, and I'll give you a toast. May that last investment ...
— The Great Secret • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... say, the Prince (though they did not know he was anything but a true Swineherd)—let no day pass without making something, and one day he made a rattle which, when it was turned round, played all the waltzes, galops, and polkas which had ever been known since ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Various

... and over they rolled together, a hideous and awe-inspiring spectacle, but the yellow one would not loose his hold, and at length poor black-mane grew faint, his breath came in great snorts and seemed to rattle in his nostrils, then he opened his huge mouth, gave the ghost of a roar, ...
— A Tale of Three Lions • H. Rider Haggard

... not love the name of Catalina. Even the wild mountain men speak it with respect, and down in the coast towns at night, when the typhoon is lashing the waters of Tanon Strait, and the rain and wind make the nipa leaves on the roofs dance and rattle, the older people gather their little black-eyed grandchildren around the shell of burning cocoanut oil and tell ...
— Philippine Folklore Stories • John Maurice Miller

... sickness and death, the sorcerer who uses him as his tool is the indirect cause. The demon is thought to do his work by inserting some alien substance into the body of the sufferer, and a medicine-man is employed to extract it by chanting an invocation to the maleficent spirit, shaking his rattle, and sucking the part of the patient's frame in which the cause of the malady is imagined to reside. "After many ceremonies he will produce from his mouth some strange substance, such as a thorn or gravel-stone, a fish-bone or bird's claw, a snake's tooth, or a piece of wire, ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer

... vans, hansoms, and growlers, blocked the way in front of them. A single policeman, with his back turned to them, and his two arms going like an animated semaphore, was the only human being in their immediate vicinity. Amid all the roar and rattle of the huge city they were as thoroughly left to themselves as though they were in the centre ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... grey and cold, the trees were wet, everything in the garden looked dejected and uninviting, it certainly did make one long to get to work. The sound of unfamiliar women's voices was heard downstairs and upstairs, there was the rattle of a sewing machine in Granny's room, they were working hard at the trousseau. Of fur coats alone, six were provided for Nadya, and the cheapest of them, in Granny's words, had cost three hundred roubles! The fuss irritated Sasha; he stayed in his own room and was cross, but ...
— The Schoolmaster and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... swooping down upon them with long strides, their black garments flying in the wind, their eyes rolling strangely behind their masks, and brandishing their alms-cups, which had "Pour les Pauvres" lettered upon them, and gave forth a clapping sound like a watchman's rattle. There was something terrible in their appearance and the rushing speed of their movements. Amy screamed and ran behind her mother, who visibly shrank. Katy stood her ground; but the bat-winged fiends in Dore's illustrations to Dante occurred to her, and her fingers ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge

... then," said I, "I am in this charming land which I entered for the first time to the noise of the drum and the rattle ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... and see Numanus bleed, Child of AEneas! This, thy valour's due, Great Phoebus grants, nor stints a rival's meed. Now cease."—He spake, and vanished from their view. His arms divine the Dardan chieftains knew, And heard the quiver rattle in his flight. So, warned by Phoebus' presence, back they drew The fiery youth, then plunged into the fight. Death seems a welcome risk, and danger ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil

... knees than any one I ever met, and it was all for mercy's sake. When the reapers in harvest time saw a figure whirling past in a cloud of dust, or the family at the foot of Glen Urtach, gathered round the fire on a winter's night, heard the rattle of a horse's hoofs on the road, or the shepherds, out after the sheep, traced a black speck moving across the snow to the upper glen, they knew it was the doctor, and, without being conscious of it, ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren

... countenance, and the appropriate mise-en-scene of the old-fashioned parlour fireside and its listening circle of excited faces, and, outside, the wintry blast and the moan of leafless boughs, with the occasional rattle of the clumsy old window-frame behind shutter and curtain, as the blast swept by, is at best a ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 2 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... the watermen named Rotherhithe, was on one bank, the marshes of the Isle of Dogs were gay with white cotton-grass and red rattle on the other. Then came the wharves and building yards of Deptford, and beyond them rose the trees of Greenwich Park, while the river below exhibited a forest of masts. The boat stopped at a landing-place ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge

... rattle of rifle-firing from the valley below the fort, and Muriel Roscoe, lying on her couch, pressed both hands to her eyes and shivered. It seemed impossible that the end could be so near. She felt as if she had existed for years in this living nightmare ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell

... the rattle of a tin cup against the jug. As she moved carefully down the way toward the spring, Blatch's voice ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan

... the familiar rumour of the ship by night: the prolonged sloughing of riven waters down the side, gnashing of swells hurled back by the bows, sibilance of draughts in alleyways, groaning of frames, a thin metallic rattle of indeterminate origin, the crunching grind of the steering gear, the everlasting deep-throated diapason of the engines, somewhere aft in that tier of staterooms a persistent human snore ... nothing unusual, ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph

... with a prolonged rattle in that said Ar—r, which was not without great significance. "But you sees the real gentleman who han't got his bread to get, can hafford to 'spise his cracter in the world. A poor tinker must be timbersome and nice in his 'sociations. But sit ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various

... returned Mrs. Billickin, 'if I was to tell you, sir, that to have nothink above you is to have a floor above you, I should put a deception upon you which I will not do. No, sir. Your slates WILL rattle loose at that elewation in windy weather, do your utmost, best or worst! I defy you, sir, be you what you may, to keep your slates tight, try how you can.' Here Mrs. Billickin, having been warm with Mr. Grewgious, cooled a little, not ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens

... this clue eagerly, when all of a sudden she started. Her ear had caught the rattle of a carriage over the stones of the stable yard. She rang the bell, and inquired if that ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade

... the weight, being a flimsy creature alongside a man like me, and, besides, I was blazing to that height of wrath that I could have bit into a chisel. I gave him first the one and then the other, so that I could hear his head rattle and crack, and ...
— Island Nights' Entertainments • Robert Louis Stevenson

... deck before the crew had surrounded the wheelhouse. There was a rattle of steamer folded chairs, a pounce by the third mate, and out came the unfortunate ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr

... against your frozen one, and thus I'll die. When this foul place has crumbled to the sunlight, some relic-hunting lunatic will stumble o'er our bones, and pitiless will weave a tale for eyes more pitiless to read. Back, Stygian ghoul! Death's on me now. I feel his rattle in my throat! My limbs are blocks of ice! My heart has tuned it with the muffled dead-march drum! A jar of crashing worlds is in my ears! A drowsy faintness ...
— Debris - Selections from Poems • Madge Morris

... said Peter, looking vaguely round for them. "I got him a rattle and a ball, but he doesn't seem to care about them much; Lucy says he's not young enough yet. Here's his bottle. And his night clothes are upstairs, and his other day clothes, and his bath. Thomas leads the simple life, though; he really possesses very little; I think he's probably going to ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay

... Another is, the mothers fear that the poisonous vipers and snakes will bite them. Truly, I never knew any place where the land is so infested with all kinds of the most venomous snakes, as in the low lands round about Savannah. The moccasin snakes, so called, and water rattle-snakes—the bites of both of which are as poisonous as our upland rattlesnakes at the north,—are found in myriads about the stagnant waters and swamps of the South. The females, in order to secure their infants from these poisonous snakes, do, as I have said, often work with their infants on ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... from another room. So did the clerk, and Mr. Allison came around from behind the cashier's desk. Others who heard the glass rattle down on the sidewalk ran in to see ...
— Halsey & Co. - or, The Young Bankers and Speculators • H. K. Shackleford

... he returned to the pit, For he'd borrowed a trifle more money, And ventured another large bet, Along with blobbermouth Coney. When Coney demanded his money, As is usual on all such occasions, He cried, — thee, if thee don't hold thy rattle, I'll pay thee as Paul ...
— Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler

... somethin' about a best parlor smell that would give it away any time. Phew! I can almost smell wax wreaths and hair-cloth, even though they have been took away. No, this is an empty house all right, but I'll make good and sure for your sake, Emily. Ain't there any stairs to this old rattle-trap? Oh, yes, here's the front hall. Hello! Hello, ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln

... know doesn't hurt him. He'll love you just the same, and you'll love him. As for Brockton, let him get another girl. There are plenty around. Why, if this chance came to me, I'd tie a can to Jerry so quick that you could hear it rattle all ...
— The Easiest Way - A Story of Metropolitan Life • Eugene Walter and Arthur Hornblow

... at last," Jack exclaimed as the rattle of musketry sounded loud and continuous. "I wondered when they ...
— The Bravest of the Brave - or, with Peterborough in Spain • G. A. Henty

... to their allotted task, and his reeking pipe did its duty with hearty goodwill. There was the sound of strident voices in the outer room, and the rattle of the door handle ...
— The Man in the Twilight • Ridgwell Cullum

... clinch their certainty, that did. They could not know that the young successful lover had recognized Drylyn's strange face, and did not want to tell the truth before him, and hence was telling an unskilful lie instead. A rattle of wheels sounded among the pines ahead, and the stage came up and stopped. Only the driver and a friend were on it, and both of them knew the shot-gun messenger and the sheriff, and they asked in some astonishment what the trouble was. It had been stage-robbers the sheriff had started after, ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister

... flint-beds, to an old lady's flower-garden, through which they carry it with a surprising head into the fields beyond, when they begin to fall into line, and the sportsmen doing the same—"one at a time and it will last the longer"—"Tummas" tootles his horn, the hunt is up, and away they all rattle at "Parliament pace," as ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees

... running north of St just when above the rattle of the train rose a curious dull sound. It came from the east, and was like the low growl of a veld thunderstorm, or a ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan

... battle. I saw the Russians cross and recross the river. I saw their officers cheer and wave them on in the coolest, bravest manner, until they were shot down by scores. I was near enough to hear at times, in the lull of artillery, and above the rattle of the musketry, the excited cheers which told of a daring attack or a successful repulse; and beneath where I stood I could see—what the Russians could not—steadily drawn up, quiet and expectant, the squadrons ...
— Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands • Mary Seacole

... young children, that is boyishness of a harmless kind. For example, suppose we should see a boy, eighteen years old, playing marbles a great deal, we should say that he was boyish. So if you were to have a rattle or any other such little toy for a plaything, and should spend a great deal of time in playing with it, we should say that it was very boyish or childish. Still that kind of boyishness does little harm, and we should not probably do any thing about it, but should leave ...
— Stuyvesant - A Franconia Story • Jacob Abbott

... A rattle of wheels made her look up and hastily wipe the hem of her pink skirt across her face again. A wagon was stopping at the gate, and the man who was to stay in one of the tents and take care of the bees in their absence was getting out to discuss the details of the arrangement. Joyce ...
— The Little Colonel: Maid of Honor • Annie Fellows Johnston

... hear the rattle of the train on the railway lines, and, turning towards the other end of the platform, he saw that Ninian, having settled about the luggage and finished listening to the story of the fox hunt, was approaching them. "Come on," he said, ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine

... screwdriver was slightly longer than the one he had used aforetime for a similar purpose—and he unscrewed the solitary screw and raised the lid of the coffin, letting all the screws roll off it with a great rattle.... An overwhelming rush of chloroform vapour escaped.... She lay within, dressed in her black dress, and her dress had been crammed into the coffin hastily, madly, and was thrust down in thick, disorderly folds about her feet, and her hair half covered her face. ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett

... over his head, ended at last in a long corridor closed by an iron door. The figure with the lamp opened the door with one of the keys he wore suspended at his girdle, where, during the whole of the brief journey, the king had heard them rattle. As soon as the door was opened and admitted the air, Louis recognized the balmy odors that trees exhale in hot summer nights. He paused, hesitatingly, for a moment or two; but the huge sentinel who followed him thrust him out of the ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... gave me my first thrill of real alarm. I shouted, but my voice fell dead in the snowy air. The gale was blowing more furiously than ever, and the cold was so intense that it penetrated my thick clothing and caused my teeth to rattle together! ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis

... him at length a small sum, which was gladly accepted, though much below the original demand. The troops were engaged in the service of France; and the duke of Hanover thought himself happy in being able to amuse himself at his leisure with the rattle ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson

... patiently, and then came the rattle of wheels, and loud voices and laughter, as a vehicle drew up ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke

... hold on these more noble creatures, must surely seize on you (Rev 20:1). The world should be convinced of judgment then, "because the prince of this world is judged" (John 16:8). And that before they came to this condition of hearing the eternal sentence rattle in their ears; but seeing they did not regard it then, they must and shall feel the smart of it now. "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... the fog had drawn its curtain gently around the strange pair, and sea and shore were blotted out, he whispered, "Tell me, it was even so, was it not, daughter, on the night she came?" When the distant clatter of blocks and rattle of cordage came from the unseen vessel, now standing out to sea, he whispered again, "So, this is what thou didst hear, even then." And so during the night he marked, more or less audibly to the half-conscious woman at his side, the low whisper of the waves, the murmur of the ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte

... his promise, and went one evening that week to see George at Islington. Hardy had been invited to meet him; and the three friends, as they kept up a perfect rattle of conversation, interspersed with many crossfired jokes, made the merriest and happiest little party ...
— Life in London • Edwin Hodder

... by French newsboys, and folks begin to count the minutes on their watches. There are men on the ground who saw the first guillotine at work. They describe the click of the cleaver, the steady march of victims upon the scaffold-stairs, the rattle of the death-cart turning out of the Rue Saint Honore, the painted executioners, with their dripping hands, wiping away the jets of blood from the hard, rough faces; nay! the step of the young queen, white-haired with care, but very beautiful, who bent her body as she had ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend

... carefully inspect it before starting out and see that each member is in good physical condition, has serviceable shoes, a full canteen, one ration, a first-aid packet, and that his rifle and ammunition are in good condition. He will see that the equipment is arranged so as not to rattle; that nothing bright is exposed so as to glitter in the sunlight; that nothing is taken along that will give information to the enemy should any member fall into his hands, as, for example, copies of orders, maps with position of troops marked thereon, letters, ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department

... view was lost the sharp rattle of musketry continued some time, but practically the fight had been already won by Hooker's men, the enemy only holding on with a rear-guard to assure his retreat across Chattanooga Valley to Missionary Ridge. ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... detected the rattle of distant wagon wheels. "That's Tom comin' now," said he. "He's a heap more regular than the Socorro stage. That's him, because I can ...
— Heart's Desire • Emerson Hough

... it wasn't. With the rattle of the first milkcart, which in a modern city has taken the place of the half-awakened bird, he woke up, and if he had been in jail he could not have felt a more choking sense of imprisonment. There was no escape for ...
— Ladies Must Live • Alice Duer Miller

... Rattle-snakes, bears, rock-slides, avalanches, steep descents, and many other hazards, to say nothing of numerous attacks by unfriendly tribes of Red Indians, fill the pages of this book with terrifying and perilous situations. Not a long book, ...
— Dick Onslow - Among the Redskins • W.H.G. Kingston

... very old," he said; "but you strike me as extremely young. To rattle ahead of everything is not a ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... shells which had been hurtling upon the French trenches ceased a trifle, the din of the German bombardment was rendered almost noiseless, was shut out, as it were, was eclipsed, by the demoniacal rattle of those French 75's casting shell at the advancing enemy. The massed ranks marching from the cover of the trees, heads of columns appearing at the summit of many a ravine which gave access to the heights, battalions forming up outside their shelter, ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton

... trusted at large. There was a mournful dispirited look about the hound, evidently an aged animal, for the once black muzzle was touched with grey, and there was a film over one of the keen beautiful eyes, which opened eagerly as he pricked his ears and lifted his head at the rattle of the door latch. Then, as two boys came out, he rose, and with a slowly waving tail, and a wistful appealing air, came and laid his head against one of the pair who had appeared in the pont. They were lads of fourteen and fifteen, clad in suits of new mourning, with the short belted ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge

... young girl's hand, and looked at her so earnestly with his dark, grave eyes, that hers drooped. "Sister Amy," he said, gently, "I was prepared to welcome you on general principles, but I now welcome you for your own sake. Rattle-brain Burt will make a good playmate, but you will come to me when you are in trouble;" and ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe

... I came opposite the house, and my hounds—I knew their deep voices—roused by the noise, bayed furiously from the kennels. I heard their chains rattle; how I wished they would break them! and then I should have protectors that would be peers to the fiercest denizens of the forest. The wolves, taking the hint conveyed by the dogs, stopped in their mad career, and after ...
— Evenings at Donaldson Manor - Or, The Christmas Guest • Maria J. McIntosh

... rattle of the chain announced that the anchor was down. The sails were dewed up, and service ...
— Chasing the Sun • R.M. Ballantyne

... the wind and the rattle of the rain could be heard the screams of frantic women and children. The scenes were pitiful. Men and women were looking for loved ones, and when a torn and mangled form was taken from the debris, a woman's shriek would tell the story of a ...
— The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado • Logan Marshall

... own feelings (or, indeed, in what I was able to gather independently of them) of that passionate seriousness of purpose, without which tests as severe as this have never been successfully withstood. It was irritating to me, while I heard the sharp rattle of fire, to be unable to gather anything of what was going on, and I thought by climbing the Kreuz tower I might get a good view. Even from this elevation I could not see anything clearly, but I gathered enough to satisfy myself that after an hour of ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner

... upon it." Those still exist who were witnesses to his exultation when one morning he entered Mrs——'s drawing-room, with an open letter in his hand, and, in his peculiarly joyous and animated manner, exclaimed, "Don't be surprised if I play all sorts of antics! I am like a child with a new rattle! Here is a letter from my friend Lord Byron, telling me he has dedicated to me his poem of the 'Corsair.' Ah, Mrs.——, it is nothing new for a poor poet to dedicate his poem to a great lord; but it is something passing strange for a great lord to dedicate his book to a poor ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 13, No. 356, Saturday, February 14, 1829 • Various

... would probably be gathered. Port fires had been distributed among the landing party. As these were lost to sight as they entered the town, those on board ship watched eagerly for the sound of combat. Nothing, however, was heard for a minute or two; then came a single shot, and then a rattle of musketry. ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty

... bois brules are on the bank of the river below. Emilia's heart grew still as she heard them swear. Their sacr-r-r-r-re rolled like the rattle of a rattlesnake. They were coming up the hill, quarreling drunkenly about the powder. Now they were between the house and the stable, getting ready to dig a hole for the "poudre ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston

... Nevertheless, the Queen's Government is carried on, and the propensity and aptitude of men for this work seems to be not at all on the decrease. If we have but few young statesmen, it is because the old stagers are so fond of the rattle of ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope

... and Ibn Batuta reports similar occurrences, earlier, at the court of the King of Delhi. There is another case in Histoire Prodigieuse d'une jeune Fille agitee d'un Esprit fantastique et invisible. {109b} A bourgeois of Bonneval was beset by a rapping rattle of a sprite. 'At dinner, when he would lay his hand on a trencher, it was carried off elsewhere, and the wineglass, when he was about drinking, was snatched from his hand.' So Mr. Wesley's trencher was set spinning on the table, when nobody touched it! In such affairs we may have the origin of ...
— Cock Lane and Common-Sense • Andrew Lang

... rocked stationary on that sea of moonbeams, I pondered over that twilight of the heroic world. In the soft rattle of the water on the hull I seemed to hear the rattle of all that armor, of all those swords swinging rusty on the walls, neglected by the degenerate sons of the great champions of old. I had long been in search of a theme which I called the theme of the "Prowess of Ogier;" ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee

... animals is so delightfully naive that it ought to be reproduced as a nursery wall-paper. The creatures pass in review in four processions, and Adam must have had to be uncommonly quick to make up his mind first and then rattle out their resultant names in the time. The main procession is that of the larger quadrupeds, headed by the unicorn in single glory; and the moment chosen by the artist is that in which the elephant, having just heard his name (for the first time) and ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas

... and placing them away on the shelf behind Borg's back, dropped a heavy tin cup. The cabin was very still, and the sharp rattle came without warning. On the instant, with a brute roar, the chair was overturned and Borg was on his feet, eyes blazing and face convulsed. Bella gave an inarticulate, animal-like cry of fear and cowered at his ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London

... attachment like an Egyptian sistrum; and finally an equally respected authority claims that the machol was not an instrument at all, but a dance. Similarly the maanim has been described as a trumpet, a kind of rattle box with metal clappers, and we even have a full account in which ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell

... enough," said Mr. John. "If you want to do what a boy would do, dispose of the doll on the shortest notice. Get it out of your sight and mind as soon as possible, and then never give it any more thought than you'd give the rattle you used to shake when you were a baby, or the rubber ring you cut ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, Nov 1877-Nov 1878 - No 1, Nov 1877 • Various

... his ten years, and tall of his age, walks to the bar and calls for two tumblers of lemonade, which Old Boody stirs with an appetizing rattle of the toddy-stick,—dropping, meantime, a query or two about the Squire, and a look askance at the parson's boy, who is trying very hard to wear an air as if he, too, were ten, and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various

... consul and Cossack station, still maintains a Russian telegraph and postal service. The mail is carried from the border in a train of three or four telegas, which rattle along over the primitive roads in a cloud of dust, with armed Cossacks galloping before and after, and a Russian flag carried by the herald in front. Even in the Kuldja post-office a heavily armed picket stands ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben

... against the garden wall, like an artist's lay figure waiting to be forwarded, until the dog- cart should arrive from the farm-house below. In due time—and a very long time it seemed to Mr. Idle—the rattle of wheels was heard, and the crippled Apprentice was lifted into the seat. As the dog-cart was driven back to the inn, the landlord related an anecdote which he had just heard at the farm-house, of an unhappy man who had been lost, ...
— The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices • Charles Dickens

... base, a stream disappears in an arched cave at the foot of a towering rocky cliff, and I have bethought me since of whether, like Allan Quatermain's subterranean stream, it would, if followed, reveal things heretofore unseen. And so we climb the lovely Suran Pass, rattle down the western slope upon the Black Sea coast, and ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens

... Close-fitting casements and solid doors insured peace within; the wind in stormy hours might moan or rage outside this rocky pile, might hiss and shriek and tear its wings among the jagged ruins, bellow and thunder in and out of opened vaults, but it might not rattle a window of the modern castellan's quarters or shake a latch of ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... slyly loosing every thing by day; and when night comes, cast off the band and swing in the cranes? But how lower the tackles, even in the darkest night, without a creaking more fearful than the death rattle? Easily avoided. Anoint the ropes, and they will travel deftly through the subtle windings ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville

... sun beat on the fevered man, and he moved uneasily. To his ears came the far-away beat of a tom-tom, growing nearer and nearer until it mixed with the sound of bells and the hail-like rattle of gourds. Soon he heard the breaking of sticks under the feet of approaching men, and from under the pines a long procession of men appeared—but they were shadows, like water, and he could see the landscape beyond them. They were spirit-men. He did not stir. The moving retinue came up, ...
— The Way of an Indian • Frederic Remington

... invasion is begun. No man spoke a word; no sound was audible save the distant hum and cracking of the city, the cry of a thousand frogs, and the muffled tramp of our advancing footsteps. I thought the enemy, if any were near, must surely hear the cartridges rattle in my cartridge box as we double-quicked to close up, and I put my hand behind me to stop the clatter. If any enemy were near, indeed! There seemed an enemy behind every bush, a rebel in every corner of the worm fence. I am in the rear ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... all this deluge of blood, mangled bodies, and the groans of the wounded and dying, our ears were continually greeted by the awful, everlasting rattle of the musketry, the roar of the field batteries, and the booming, shaking, and trembling of the siege ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert

... own way," he thought, "and not bother her; but I'll be dinged if I want to croak in this God-forsaken hole—Grand Avenue for mine, when it comes to passing in my checks. Gee! but I'd like to hear the rattle of the Lake Street 'L' and see the dolls coming down the station steps by Skidmore's when the crowd comes home from the ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... complacently submitted to. The quiet and peaceful seclusion in which he and those who had preceded him had lived, and the repose of his declining years was to be disturbed by the whistling of the locomotive and the rattle of the train. The din, and bustle and activity of trade was to be brought to his very threshold, and the ease and comfort of his aristocratic retirement would soon become a thing of the past. This must not and could not be permitted, and the blood of the patrician boiled within his ...
— Bucholz and the Detectives • Allan Pinkerton

... so overcome with emotion that, after uttering a long sigh like a death rattle, he sank, a dead weight, into the ...
— A Nest of Spies • Pierre Souvestre

... about time for the Sun to return. As his wife thought of what he might do to the boys, her anger turned to compassion, and she bade them wrap themselves in the clouds that hung on the wall, and hide. Ere long a great rattle was heard outside, and a moment later the Sun came striding in and hung up his glistening shield. "What strangers are here?" he asked. There was no answer. Again he asked the question, repeating it a third time and a fourth, waxing angry. Then his wife began to scold. She told him that two ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis

... The prolonged rattle of the shinglers' hammers upon the roof of the big barn attracted him, and, crossing over between the ranch house and the artesian well, he stood for some time absorbed in the contemplation of the vast building, amused and interested with the confusion ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris

... so," he admitted. "Oh, yes, she's pretty—no doubt about that. But I don't think she's fussy. You'll like her, Sheila. She doesn't scare or rattle easily. In some ways she ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm

... ourselves to mystery, and are content. We apply to everything inexplicable the test of partial view, and maintain our tranquillity. We fall into the ranks, and march on, acquiescent, if not jubilant. We hear the roar of cannon and the rattle of musketry. Stalwart forms fall by our side, and brawny arms are stricken. Our own hopes bite the dust, our own hearts bury their dead; but we know that law is inexorable. Effect must follow cause, and there is no happening without causation. So, knowing ourselves to be only one small brigade ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... heart fluttered on hearing the chariot of the one, and then of the other, rattle through the court-yard, and the hollow-sounding foot-step giving notice of each person's stepping out, to take his place on the awful bench which my fancy had formed for ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson

... dull rattle. The fingers closed once more, and relaxed. The light behind the eyes ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke

... dashed his rattle indignantly to the ground. The Frenchman took his very pleasantly, and kissed it, saying to the girl that he would long preserve the coral, as a memento ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville

... it, as if it had been his own rifle, his features twisted up into a mathematical calculation, and his right hand describing in the air all manner of geometrical figures. At last he was ready; one more squint along the gun, the match was applied, and the explosion took place. The rattle of the stones warned us that the ball had taken effect. When the smoke cleared away, we looked in vain for the third and fourth windows, and a tremendous hurra burst forth for old Deaf Smith, as he was called, for the bravest ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various

... leaning forward, her face alight. There was nothing visible; but a low, continuous warble, interspersed with a sort of liquid rattle, struck the ear. Taking a bunch of millet stalks from her basket, she directed Thor while he tied them to the bough of a birch that trailed its lower branches to the snow. When they had gone forward they perceived, on looking ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King

... as he bade her, and tried to listen, but only heard a low whirr and rattle like the noise of a ...
— Twinkle and Chubbins - Their Astonishing Adventures in Nature-Fairyland • L. Frank (Lyman Frank) Baum

... at the top of his lungs. But there was no one on the rear platform to see him, and the closed windows and the rattle of the wheels were sufficient to render a much louder noise than he could make inaudible to the dozing passengers. And now the engineer pulled out the throttle-valve to make up for lost time, and the clatter of the train faded into a distant roar and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, November, 1878 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various

... Molteno we picked up a hundred volunteers—fine-looking fellows all eager to encounter the enemy, but much surprised at the turn events had taken. They, too, were ordered to fall back. The Boers were advancing, and to despondent minds even the rattle of the train seemed to urge 'Retreat, ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill

... the honest nappy. * * * * * I've seen me daist upon a time I scarce could wink or see a styme; Just ae half mutchkin does me prime; Aught less is little, Then back I rattle with the rhyme As gleg's a whittle. [Footnote: The First Epistle ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins

... prank or wild frolic she didn't indulge in. I told her I should have liked to see her dance, only there were no castanets to be had. Instantly she seized the old woman's only earthenware plate, smashed it up, and there she was dancing the Romalis, and making the bits of broken crockery rattle as well as if they had been ebony and ivory castanets. That girl was good company, I can tell you! Evening fell, and I heard the ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee

... than you really are. I wish—if I dare wish you anything different—that you were! It makes me uncomfortable to remember that I am—what? Almost half a year your elder as time flies:—not really, for your brain was born long before mine began to rattle in its shell. You say quite old things, and quietly, as if you had had them in your mind ten years already. When you told me about your two old pensioners, the blind man and his wife, whom you brought to so funny a reconciliation, I felt ("mir war, ich wuszte nicht wie") that I would like very ...
— An Englishwoman's Love-Letters • Anonymous

... up anchor, and Massa Boatswain's cane Come rattle on our backs, for all de world like rain. Such a getting ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat

... and began to tie up some fallen carnations; he stooped and helped me, saying all the while I know not what, only that it seemed to me the most beautiful language I ever heard. Then we walked up and down the long peach walk until I heard the rattle of father's wagon. ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... out again and told the driver to take them to the Fifth Avenue Hotel. "There's a hat- store around there somewhere, seems to me," he said; and they talked of March's accident as well as they could in the rattle and clatter of the street till they reached the place. March got his hat, passing a joke with the hatter about the impossibility of pressing his old hat over again, and came out to thank Dryfoos ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... was shining brightly. From the road in front of the store—Trumet's "Main Street"—came the rattle of wheels and the sound of laughter and conversation in youthful voices. The sounds drew nearer. Someone shouted "Whoa!" Daniel Dott, a ray of hope illuminating his soul at the prospect of a customer, rose hurriedly ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln

... he led the men through the forest, he seemed again to be back on Cape Cod picking his way over their own lost road through the wood, and he heard "the beat of a horse's feet and the swish of a skirt in the dew." And then a carbine would rattle, or a horse would stumble and a trooper swear, and he was again in the sweating jungle, where men, intent upon his life, crouched ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis

... sleeve and shivering. Also, I noticed that in his hands he had a paper of some sort. Presently a gentleman came by, and tossed the grinder a small coin, which fell straight into a box adorned with a representation of a Frenchman and some ladies. The instant he heard the rattle of the coin, the boy started, looked timidly round, and evidently made up his mind that I had thrown the money; whereupon, he ran to me with his little hands all shaking, and said in a tremulous voice as he ...
— Poor Folk • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... pollution of his presence, leaving him alone in the great house with the black page. And this house was shunned as though marked with the cross of the pestilence. The more high-spirited Jew-boys would throw stones at its windows or rattle its doors, but it was even keener sport to run after its tenant himself, on the rare occasions when he appeared in the streets, to spit out like their elders at the sight of him, to pelt him with mud, and to shout after him, "Epicurean!" ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... reins with a vague sense of momentary relief: it was something to do. Under the influence of the fresh autumn air his spirits rose; he found himself enjoying the swift rattle of the cart and the beat of the horse's feet. After all, think of Caddy's grit; think of her fine constitution! A fighting chance—that was little enough to say, though. Why couldn't he have put it a little stronger? Hitchcock ...
— In The Valley Of The Shadow • Josephine Daskam

... beside yuh, coming back, and then yuh won't rattle around in the seat so much. She's good and solid—just hang onto her and you'll be all right," said ...
— Chip, of the Flying U • B. M. Bower

... There was a rattle, a faint crash, and then, as the wheels of the two vehicles almost grazed one another in ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various

... burst in upon her long-suffering roommate with a vehemence that made every cup on the tea-table rattle. "I almost let her know what we thought," she said, "but I guess I smoothed it over. Do you suppose Eleanor Watson isn't going to make up with her ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton

... instance he had the greatest difficulty in proving that the machine had been used in Georgia, although at that very moment three, separate gins were at work within fifty yards of the building in which the court sat. They were all so near, that the rattle and hum of the machinery could be ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris

... his own. The brain within was well developed with healthy exercise. It filled its case, and did not rattle like a withered kernel, or sound soft like a rotten one. It was a vigorous, muscular brain. The owner felt that he could trust it for an effort, as he could his lungs for a shout, his legs for a leap, or his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various

... giddy centurion, don't you?" said Beetle, listening to the crash and rattle of grounded ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling

... has a fortune thrust under his nose. Shows your g-g-good sense. I was right. I always am. I knew you were too bright a man to hide your light under a half b-b-bushel of a village like that. In those seven-by-nine towns, all the sap dries out of men, and before they are forty they begin to rattle around like peas in a p-p-pod. In such places young men are never anything but milk sops, and old men anything but b-b-bald-headed infants! You needed to see the world, young man. You required a teacher. You have put yourself into good hands, and if you stay with me you shall ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss

... was on the other side, on his knees, his arms outstretched towards Emma. He had taken her hands and pressed them, shuddering at every beat of her heart, as at the shaking of a falling ruin. As the death-rattle became stronger the priest prayed faster; his prayers mingled with the stifled sobs of Bovary, and sometimes all seemed lost in the muffled murmur of the Latin syllables that tolled like ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert

... I must hold on to all my movable possessions, to keep them from getting away. After this unaccountable state of things had existed for a while, there came, one day, a terrible shock, which threatened to crack the moon's skull and rattle its fragments down upon my head. This was followed at intervals by similar or lighter shocks, and it was all so exceedingly unusual that I became very curious to know what was happening. Then all was quiet for many ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan

... perish? To the duke, you fool? Try to reach him with your lamentations, when, reduced to a living skeleton, you lie buried in a dungeon five fathoms deep, where light and sound never enter; where darkness goggles at hell with gloating eyes! There gnash thy teeth in anguish; there rattle thy chains in despair, and groan, "Woe is me! This ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... made the windows rattle; the weapon fell from her hand, having done its work and, amid the smoke, a body dropped heavily on the carpet, which ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet

... thick that it might almost be felt overspread the scene. Then there was a flash of lightning so vivid that it seemed as if a bright day had been created and extinguished in a moment leaving the darkness ten times more oppressive. It was followed instantaneously by a crash and a prolonged rattle, that sounded as if a universe of solid worlds were rushing into contact overhead and ...
— Martin Rattler • R.M. Ballantyne

... called it "the haunted house,"—the owners have n't been able to let it since the last tenants left on account of the noises,—so it has fallen into sad decay, and the moss grows on the rotten shingles of the roof, and the clapboards have turned black, and the windows rattle like teeth that chatter with fear, and the walls of the house begin to lean as if its knees were shaking, —take the man who did n't mind the real risk of the cars to that old house, on some dreary November evening, ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)

... sorts of cheese for breakfast, and poison you at all other meals. You'll live in an atmosphere of dried fish and engine-room oil, and you'll be driven half-mad by children who squall, and other children who rattle the saloon domino-box all through the watches. You'd much better come with me. I'll drop you at a steamer's port in the Channel somewhere some time. You aren't in a hurry. Come, ...
— The Recipe for Diamonds • Charles John Cutcliffe Wright Hyne

... pulled in his horse, but at the instant stiffened in his saddle and wheeled about on the road. A rattle of galloping hoofs struck the ground behind them; two riders wheeled and stopped. One drew close and held ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt

... came gaspingly. Dick thought of the death-rattle he had heard in Acredale when old man Nagle, the madman, died. He dared not give more water, but he gathered leaves from the aromatic bushes and pressed them to the fevered lips. Before he could withdraw them, the eager jaws closed upon the balsamic shrub. They answered the purpose ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan

... her dreams to hear The bolts of death around him rattle, Hath shed as sacred blood as ere Was poured ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain

... absolutely 'on the square.' I don't know exactly how to express it, but it seems somehow as though only the very little things of Life are offered in open packages—that all the big things come sealed very tight. You can poke them a little and make a guess at the shape, and you can rattle them a little and make a guess at the size, but you can't ever open them and prove them—until the money is paid down and gone forever from your hands. But goodness me!" she cried, brightening perceptibly; "if you were to put an advertisement ...
— The Indiscreet Letter • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott

... ground. Then up the steep came the Goth-folk, and the spear-wood drew anigh, And earth's face shook beneath them, yet cried they never a cry; And the Volsungs stood all silent, although forsooth at whiles O'er the faces grown earth-weary would play the flickering smiles, And swords would clink and rattle: not long had they to bide, For soon that flood of murder flowed round the hillock-side; Then at last the edges mingled, and if men forbore the shout, Yet the din of steel and iron in the grey clouds rang about; But how to tell of King Volsung, and the valour of ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung • William Morris

... was pinning his plaid together at the throat, when the wind came with a sudden howl, rushed down the chimney, and drove the level smoke into the middle of the room. It could not shake the cottage—it was too lowly: neither could it rattle its windows—they were not made to open; but it bellowed over it like a wave over a rock, and as in contempt blew its smoke back ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... from the ship, that seemed to grow fainter and fainter every time I looked at her, so swallowing is the character of ocean darkness, and so subtle apparently, so fleet in fact, the settling away of a fabric under canvas from an object stationary on the water. I could distinctly hear the rattle of the oars in the rowlocks, and the splash of the dipped blades, but could not discern the boat. It was speedily evident, however, that they were pulling wide of me; my ear could not mistake. Again I tried to ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various

... be thankful that I had the opportunity of paying this visit to Ypres while it still retained vestiges of its former beauty. Dark and hideous dreams of drives on ambulances in the midnight hours haunt me now when the name of Ypres is mentioned. I hear the rattle of lorries and motorcycles and the tramp of horses on the cobblestones. The grim ruins on either side of the road stand out hard and sombre in the dim light of the starry sky. There is the passing of innumerable men and the danger of the traffic-crowded ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott

... pocket-miner reiterated tonelessly. "First rattle out the box. Begins at the grass roots and goes all ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London

... dreams Mrs. Egg beheld a bronze menacing skeleton beside her pillow. It whispered and rattled. She woke, gulping, in bright sunlight, and the rattle changed to the noise of a motor halting on the drive. She gave yesterday a fleet review, rubbing her blackened elbows, but felt charitable toward Frisco Cooley by connotation; she had once sat down on a collie pup. But her bedroom clock struck ten times. Mrs. ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various

... Bloundell would come into Pen's rooms after breakfast, and it was astonishing how quick the time passed as the bones were rattling. They had little quiet parties with closed doors, and Bloundell devised a box lined with felt, so that the dice should make no noise, and their tell-tale rattle not bring the sharp-eared tutors up to the rooms. Bloundell, Ringwood, and Pen were once very nearly caught by Mr. Buck, who, passing in the Quadrangle, thought he heard the words "Two to one on the ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray



Words linked to "Rattle" :   crackle, shake, toy, sound, noise, tail, ruckle, rattler, crepitation rale, rattle-top, plaything, go, crepitate, agitate



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