"Singing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and made breezier his second day's toil that he had not only the sunlight and the bird's singing in the little wood, to say nothing of a more scientific apparatus to work with, but also human companionship, and that of the most intelligent type. After leaving the doctor and before leaving the village he had bethought himself of seeking the little court or ...
— The Trees of Pride • G.K. Chesterton
... noise were predominant; the dancing women, evidently not what they should be, had clean faces, but horridly dirty feet, and were very plain. The dancing was poor, consisting chiefly of ungraceful motions of the hands and forearms; the singing pleasing, harmonious but monotonous. ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith
... could have heard them singing on the steamer,—the voices of the girls and the men blended into unison by the distance, rising and falling in ...
— Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town • Stephen Leacock
... most beautiful street of a beautiful city was a broad avenue, shaded by a quadruple row of limetrees, reaching out into the thick forest of secular oaks and beeches—swarming with fallow-deer and alive with the notes of singing birds—by which the Hague, almost from time immemorial, has been embowered. The ancient cloisterhouse and church now reconverted to religious uses—was a plain, rather insipid structure of red brick picked ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... morning to that place clad in very fair raiment, swords girt to their sides and spears in their hands, and abode there on the highway from morn till even as though they were a guard to it. And they made merry there, singing songs and telling tales of times past: and at the sunsetting their grooms came to fetch them away to the Feast of the Eve of ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris
... Design of this excellent Performance (as the Author acquaints us in his Advertisement to the Reader) is "to improve Psalmody or Religious Singing," and so encourage and assist the frequent Practice of it in publick Assemblies and private Families with more Honour and Delight; yet the Reading of it may also entertain the Parlour and the Closet with devout Pleasure and holy Meditations. Therefore he ...
— Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... surely you are not about to sow the seeds of discord so early. Look at the scene before you—hear how the birds are singing, how merrily the sun shines and how beautifully the water sparkles! Who can be cross on ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... a hurry,' she said, smiling grimly to herself, but in a moment they were back again with large pots of water, which they poured on the fire. Then they joined hands and danced round it, singing: ...
— The Lilac Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... saw some five or six hundred girls collected in one room, and heard them sing. The singing was very pretty, and it was all very nice; but I own that I was rather startled, and to tell the truth somewhat abashed, when I was invited to "say a few words to them." No idea of such a suggestion had dawned upon me, and I ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... when he heard the Canadian lad's voice, for he realized that it was one of rare sweetness as well as power; and being fond of singing, and knowing scores of college songs, he promised himself he would in good time teach them to Owen, for their voices would blend admirably, while Eli's had a certain harshness about it that ...
— Canoe Mates in Canada - Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan • St. George Rathborne
... something free and easy and gipsy-like about the evening, a sort of fireside picnic that brought June dreams in January. As the hours wore on, the singing, which had been noisy and rollicking, gradually mellowed into sentiment, a sentiment that found vent in dreamy eyes and long-drawn-out choruses, with a languorous over-accentuation of the sentimental passages. One by one, the singers fell under ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... the Greek world, but wherever it went, it always gave evidence of its birthplace by certain strange Oriental elements both in its myths and in its rites. Its devotees were a noisy orgiastic band, who filled the streets with their dances, and the air with their singing and the clashing of their symbols, to the accompaniment of the rattling of coin in the money box—for the collection of money from the bystanders was always a ...
— The Religion of Numa - And Other Essays on the Religion of Ancient Rome • Jesse Benedict Carter
... cheerful hours they passed, 75 Of who was bit, or who capotted last; This speaks the glory of the British queen, And that describes a charming Indian screen; A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes; At ev'ry word a reputation dies. 80 Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat, With singing, laughing, ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... much shouting, staggering, balancing, and clutching that they resumed their climb. Peter was then nursing a wrist that had been wrenched in the confusion, looking away from it only to give the loudly singing Alix an ...
— Sisters • Kathleen Norris
... generally speaking, are fond of singing, and, in some instances, I have heard many very good songs. The war-boat song, for example, is remarkably striking. The recitative of the leading songster, and then the swell of voices when the boatmen ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 266, July 28, 1827 • Various
... The balance on one leg in walking a plank as a proof of sobriety. A man placed one foot on a seam and flourished the other before and behind, singing, "How can a man be drunk when he can dance Pedro-pee," at which word he placed the foot precisely before the other on the seam, till he proved at least he had not lost his equilibrium. This was ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... "good and great man." Later, on an anniversary, she was taken by her mother through the fog in a hansom cab, and given a large bunch of bright, sweet-scented flowers to lay upon his tomb. The candles in the church, the singing and the booming of the organ, were all, she thought, in his honor. Again and again she was brought down into the drawing-room to receive the blessing of some awful distinguished old man, who sat, even to her childish eye, somewhat apart, all gathered together ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... dearly, and rarely had an opportunity to hear it, the girl went at once and played and sang for her, and then Mrs. Murray used the same argument—that of giving a friend pleasure—with regard to Noel. At first it was difficult and awkward, but before very long Christine and Noel were singing duets together, and music now became a delightful part of their evening's entertainment. How dull the evenings were when Noel did not come!—for sometimes there were engagements from which he could not escape. Mrs. Murray missed ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... this, as we could afford to let them have it, seeing that we could scarcely have found room to stow away the oil in our hold. It was the Yankee's first fish, too, so they were in great spirits about it, and towed it to their ship, singing "Yankee-doodle" ...
— Fighting the Whales • R. M. Ballantyne
... on Thursday for my little farm on Yarrow. I will have a confused summer, for I have as yet no home that I can dwell in; but I hope by-and-by to have some fine fun there with you, fishing in Saint Mary's Loch and the Yarrow, eating bull-trout, singing songs, and drinking whisky. This little possession is what I stood much in need of—a habitation among my native hills was what of all the world I desired; and if I had a little more money at command, I would just be as happy a man as I know of; but that is ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... the stress of the Budget fight, when, if ever, he was at a tension, he went off for a week-end with the Attorney-General and a distinguished journalist. They had a railway compartment to themselves on the journey from London. Part of the time was passed in singing popular songs, the choruses of which Lloyd George trilled out enthusiastically. And yet Lloyd George is not a stranger to the formalities. High office brought to him a marked care for those little chivalries which are part of Parliamentary ...
— Lloyd George - The Man and His Story • Frank Dilnot
... hadn't been home to dinner—that I heard Rawlins Richardson and Horace Trevano chattering about Maisie Hartopp. The "Jo-Jo" song had made the biggest kind of a hit that winter at the Gaiety, and the hit had been made by the Hartopp singing it to a stage box which the Johnnies scrambled to bid ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... spite, at flurried spots, of their own direction posts) whence they were coming or whither going—only that here they lay, between the fields or through them, like idle veins of earth, with sometimes company of a man or boy, whistling to his footfall, or a singing maid with a milking pail. And how ungrateful it would be to forget the pleasant copses, in waves of deep green leafage flowing down and up the channeled hills, waving at the wind to tints and tones of new refreshment, and ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... ply your trade! In a shower of gravel Stamp upon your spade! Many a rose shall ravel, Many a metal wreath shall rust In the rain, and I go singing Through the lots where you are flinging Yellow ...
— Second April • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... her and two years passed over them, whilst Num grew up, nor was there in all Cufa a fairer or sweeter or more graceful girl than she. She learnt the Koran and all manner of knowledge and excelled in music and singing and playing upon all kinds of instruments, so that she surpassed all the folk of her time. One day, as she sat with her husband in the wine-chamber, she took the lute and tuning ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume III • Anonymous
... good for her; and no trouble to me. Everybody ought to have one of these idealizations, like Dante's Beatrice. [He clasps his hands behind him, and strolls to the hearth and back, singing]. ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw
... thistle in the ruined courts of chieftains, the grass whistling on the windy heath, the blue stream of Lutha, and the cliffs of sea-surrounded Gormal. It was noticed that there was no mention of the wolf, common in ancient Caledonia; nor of the thrush or lark or any singing bird; nor of the salmon of the sealochs, so often referred to in modern Gaelic poetry. But the deer, the swan, the boar, ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... his papers in order). Yes, and I must try and read through some of these before dinner; and I must think about your costume, too. And it is just possible I may have something ready in gold paper to hang up on the Tree. (Puts his hand on her head.) My precious little singing-bird! (He goes into his room and shuts the ...
— A Doll's House • Henrik Ibsen
... walls. Then, to enlighten and convert the Governor, charms were muttered, rattles were shaken, and offerings were committed to the flames. After all these operations the silent spectators, at a given signal, started on their feet and marched round the magic circle, singing, whooping, and drumming in horrible discord. With occasional intervals, which were spent by the performers in taking fresh air, the exhibition continued during the whole night, so that when the appointed ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 380, June, 1847 • Various
... seeing. He was thinking of Sayers' young wife—to be sure, she was not so young now: she must be well over thirty—an innocent-faced creature, sitting at the piano in a white gown, singing, while he and poor Sayers paced the garden-walk in the twilight. Poor woman! how was she to bear it? Those knives, too! The General ground his ...
— Mary Gray • Katharine Tynan
... Elizabeth going out with Dr. Denbigh in his machine two or three times, but she's a regular fusser with men, and he's got a kind heart, so I wasn't wise to anything in that. The day Peg came home for Christmas she was singing like the blue canaries down in the parlor, and I happened to pass Aunt Elizabeth's door and she was ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo
... a true English spirit—true-born English every inch of him. I remember him, when first I saw him ten years ago at his father's, Farmer Ashfield's, at the harvest-home; there was Gilbert in all his glory, seated on the top of a hay-rick, singing, ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... "Then he commenced singing like a very bird, the dear fellow. His voice is as sweet as his face; any woman would fall in love with him. I'm precious glad that my girl, Euphenice is ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... who is born of Mary in Bethlehem while the angels are singing their carols over the fields where the shepherds watch, the Child Who brings peace to men of good will, still, after nearly two thousand years, finds His gift ignored and His longing to lift men to God unsatisfied. "He came unto ...
— Our Lady Saint Mary • J. G. H. Barry
... cottager, and spoke from it at open-air meetings. In Mrs John Mills's life of her husband is an account of John Bright's first extempore speech. It was at a temperance meeting. Bright got his notes muddled, and broke down. The chairman gave out a temperance song, and during the singing told Bright to put his notes aside and say what came into his mind. Bright obeyed, began with much hesitancy, but found his tongue and made an excellent address. On some early occasions, however, he committed his speech to memory. In 1832 he called ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... sometimes concerts, of which nobody took any notice. She used to go home late at night, on foot or in an omnibus, worn out, but quite good-tempered: and she used to practise her scales bravely and trim her own hats, talking a great deal, laughing readily, and often singing for nothing. ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... submitted sooner they might have saved oceans of blood—chiefly their own. They come, nobles and clergy, to join the National Assembly, to labour with it upon this constitution that is to regenerate France. But the reunion is a mockery—as much a mockery as that of the Archbishop of Paris singing the Te Deum for the fall of the Bastille—most grotesque and incredible of all these grotesque and incredible events. All that has happened to the National Assembly is that it has introduced five or six hundred enemies to hamper ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... her breakfast this morning, singing. She was happy. She had found a door out of monotony; theatrical drama had given way to the living. She had opened the book of adventure and she was going straight through to finis. That there was an undertow of the sinister escaped ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... four hundred. Religion so spreads in Kingston, that those who will not leave the Church of England to join the Dissenters, have formed themselves into evening societies: it is delightful to hear the people at the different places singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs; and to see a great number of them who lived in the sinful state of fornication (which is the common way of living in Jamaica), now married, having put ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various
... o' the apple. Wi' thae jewels she bargained for permission to be a second night in the young knight's chamber; but the auld wife gied him anither sleeping-drink, and he again sleepit till morning. A' night she kept sighing and singing as before: ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various
... the stuns on us. Long rows of tents, with big roaring log fires in front hot enough to roast you if you went too near; mobs of men talking, singing, chaffing, dealing—all as jolly as a lot of schoolboys. There was grog, too, going, as there is everywhere. No publics were allowed at first, so, of course, it was sold on ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... up the weeds, and then having dispensed with these things I shall go,' ima cono io fuqe iuqeba nome ia, utaie ia fito bito motu, ut[vo]tu sacamori suru (129) 'when it already is late at {153} night, urging themselves on to drink and sing, the men enjoy themselves dancing and singing.' ...
— Diego Collado's Grammar of the Japanese Language • Diego Collado
... after the revolving line-tubs, oars, and other floating furniture, while aslope little Flask bobbed up and down like an empty vial, twitching his legs upwards to escape the dreaded jaws of sharks; and Stubb was lustily singing out for some one to ladle him up; and while the old man's line—now parting—admitted of his pulling into the creamy pool to rescue whom he could;—in that wild simultaneousness of a thousand concreted perils,—Ahab's yet unstricken boat seemed drawn ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... little lass," he said, stooping to her ear, and coaxing back courage, thought the parson, with a voice extraordinarily tender. "Way out o' t' crowd her vitals'll settle back to rights and she'll foot it another six mile singing." ...
— Ambrotox and Limping Dick • Oliver Fleming
... before we had the usual premonitions of a coming gale,—seas washing over the whole forward part of the vessel, and her bows beating against them with a force and sound like the driving of piles. The watch, too, seemed very busy trampling about decks and singing out at the ropes. A sailor can tell by the sound what sail is coming in; and in a short time we heard the top-gallant-sails come in, one after another, and then the flying jib. This seemed to ease her a good deal, ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... national festivals the Hebrews sang the hymns of their lyric poets, accompanied by musical instruments. The art of singing, as connected with poetry, flourished especially under David, who instituted twenty-four choruses, composed of four thousand Levites, whose duty it was to sing in the public solemnities. It is generally ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... to me as though a voice spoke, "The word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword." Almost immediately after, the little one said, "Mamma, sing 'Shepherd,'" - our Leader's hymn, that both the big and the little children love. I began singing, and commencing with the second line, the little voice joined me. I shall never forget the feeling of joy and peace that came over me, when I realized how quickly God's word, through Science and Health and the beautiful hymn, had accomplished the ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy
... off, the creaking and grinding ceased, the captain shouted something, and was answered from a distance, and again from a greater distance, just as the lugger heeled over a little, and there came the rattle and clanging of the capstan, with the heave-ho singing of ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... and thicket the wild deer bounded like forms of beauty in a dream; squirrels were chattering, robins and thrushes were singing in gladness and pride; and wild fowl were sporting in water and air. he went out to the fallows, and they were covered with Indian corn, or gilded with yellow stubble; with here and there a garden studded with cool and lusty melons, ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... at the rocks that guard his cave. But the laundress is of so unromantic and jouncing a figure that I abandon the fancy when no more than her shoulders are above the scuttle. She is, however, an amiable creature and, if the wind is right, I hear her singing at her task. When clothespins fill her mouth, she experiments with popular tunes. One of these wooden bipeds once slipped inside ...
— Chimney-Pot Papers • Charles S. Brooks
... moment the two exclusive, chalk-mark men, having at last really finished their play, could be heard coming along in the rear, vociferously singing a song to march-time, and keeping vigorous step to the same in ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... don't get her to do it. Why, mother, haven't you had eyes to see that these two have been in love for years? Nobody in the world had ever the least control over him but her: he would do anything for Wenna; and she—why she always came back singing after she had met and spoken to him. And then you talk about a prudent and sensible husband! I don't want Wenna to marry a watchful, mean, old, stocking-darning cripple, who will creep about the house all day and peer into cupboards, and give her fourpence-halfpenny ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various
... they lifted their well-trained voices to sing in choir, vacant as the sparrows, while the eloquent, far-reaching, aspiring words floated melodiously from them, sometimes, with truly medieval license, singing to the sacred music those songs from the streets (no one cared to detect) which were really in their hearts. A world of vanity and appetite, yet after all of honesty with itself! Like grown people, they were but playing a game, and meant ...
— Gaston de Latour: an unfinished romance • Walter Horatio Pater
... Labour. A Socialist League[152] and several labour publications exist. Workers assemble to see moving pictures of labour demonstrations, and a labour meeting has defied the police in attendance by singing the whole of the "Song of Revolution." But crippled as the unions are under the law against strikes and by the poverty of the workers, they find it difficult to attain the financial strength necessary for effective action. ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott
... So men often drug themselves into forgetfulness. They turn away from the unwelcome subject, and forget it at the price of all moral earnestness and often of all happiness; a lethargic sleep or a gaiety, as little real as that of the Girondins singing in their prison the night before being ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... teacher (whom Esther could not help but feel was sadly incompetent) had all gone home and it was very quiet on the porch steps. She closed her eyes and dreamed and clearly through her dream she heard, as she had heard that first morning in early summer, a determinedly cheerful, yet husky, voice singing. Some one ...
— Up the Hill and Over • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... light-minded souls. With such great show as they exhibit in their knavish life, as going through with mass, begging, singing, &c., do they allure and draw light-minded and unstable souls, who are without faith, to imagine that everything is spiritual; and all is shaped to this end, that men may think that in that estate every one shall have ...
— The Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude Preached and Explained • Martin Luther
... engaged in their office. The rapidity of their pace, the flare of their torches, the gleam of their eyes through their masks, and their sable garb, give them a kind of supernatural appearance. I return to bed and fall asleep amidst the shouts of people returning from the opera, singing as they go snatches of the music with which they had been ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... into the middle of the lake, creasing the still water into tiny ripples. The air was hot and calm, and the heavy leaves of trees and shrubs hung motionless. The singing-birds were silent. Only in the green shade were the hearts of the two lovers in tumult—a tumult of ...
— The Squire's Daughter - Being the First Book in the Chronicles of the Clintons • Archibald Marshall
... to travel on a certain day, have the power of insuring good weather on that day. It is supposed that they do this by singing a powerful song. Some of the enemy can cause bad weather, when they want ...
— Blackfoot Lodge Tales • George Bird Grinnell
... behind a mauve curtain into an adjoining room. Esther heard her moving about, opening and shutting boxes and singing a snatch of song all the time. Presently she came back with a tray crowded with little pots and phials of all sizes and descriptions. She plumped down on her knees beside ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres
... came upon some creeping plants, indications that we were approaching a glade. Some birds were singing in the branches as we hurried on, but I had made up my mind to shoot the first one large enough to make a meal for my brave little companion ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... long, and winding and slow is the track, The sharp rocks fret us, the eddies bring us delay, But we sing sweet songs to our mother, and answer her back; Gladly we answer our mother, sweetly repay. Oh, we hear, we hear her singing wherever we roam, Far, far away in the silence, ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman
... better pretty soon. We followed down the ravine for many miles, and when this came out into a larger one, we were greatly pleased at the prospect, for down the latter came a beautiful little running brook of clear pure water, singing as it danced over the stones, a happy song and telling us to drink and drink again, and you may be sure we did drink, for it had been months and months since we had had such water, pure, sweet, free from the terrible ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly
... drinking, swearing, singing, fighting and scuffling with one another. They have spent the night in taverns. In the morning they have slept off their drunkenness and have gathered ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... singing songs, and acting tableaux;—and all under the name of Mademoiselle Cettini! Nothing could be worse,—unless, indeed, it might be of service to him to know that she was earning her bread, and therefore not in distress, and earning it after a fashion of which he would be at liberty to express his ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... thistle-down he has been kindly scattering to the four winds, the goldfinch spreads his wings for a brief undulating flight, singing in waves also as he goes to where tall, thick-set mullein stalks stand like sentinels above the stony pasture. Here companies of the exquisite little black and yellow minstrels delight to congregate with their somber families and feast ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... sort, the services which now began were exceedingly interesting; and as Annie had not been to a negro church since she was a little girl, and very seldom then, she gave very earnest and animated attention to what was going on. The singing, as it always is among the negroes, was powerful and melodious, and the long prayer of Brother Enoch Hines was one of those spirited and emotional statements of personal condition, and wild and ardent supplication, which generally pave the way for a most powerful awakening in ...
— The Late Mrs. Null • Frank Richard Stockton
... the scene became so obscured in twilight, that the eye could not follow the distant perspective of the valley in search of a cottage, or a hamlet. A glow of the horizon still marked the west, and this was of some little use to the travellers. Michael seemed endeavouring to keep up his courage by singing; his music, however, was not of a kind to disperse melancholy; he sung, in a sort of chant, one of the most dismal ditties his present auditors had ever heard, and St. Aubert at length discovered it to be a vesper-hymn to ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... singing away, following up the current of the brook, and striving to mingle a more lightsome cadence with its melancholy voice. But the little stream would not be comforted, and still kept telling its unintelligible secret of some very mournful mystery that had happened—or making a prophetic lamentation ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... he heard Mary Josephine singing. Like a bit of steel drawn to a tension his normal self snapped back into place. His readjustment came with a lurch, a subtle sort of shock. His hands unclenched, the tense lines in his face relaxed, and because that God Almighty he had challenged had given to him an unquenchable humor, he saw ...
— The River's End • James Oliver Curwood
... the people, who blamed him for the degradation of Spain, breaking into a passionate joy, singing, dancing, building bonfires, and giving every manifestation of delight. In Madrid, when the news reached there, the enthusiasm ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... after that he boomed about the cabin, singing queer old songs in a patois, rumbling to the faithful Golemar, washing the dishes while Houston wiped them, joking, talking of everything but the troubles of the day and the plans of the night. Outside the shadows grew heavier, finally to turn to pitch darkness. The bull ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... prayer, the singing, and the final benediction were over, Annie crept out into the dark street as if into the Outer Darkness. She felt the rain falling upon something hot, but she hardly knew that it was her own cheeks that were being wetted ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... guests in bumpers of French wine. He adds that these compliments were "so moist and numerous that they became more and more indistinct, noisy and irrational" and that before they ended "Nearly every one stood up singing his own favorite song. There is a stage of emotion which can only be expressed in noises. That stage had been reached. They put me in mind of David Culver's bird shop where many song birds—all of a different feather—engage in a kind of tournament, each pouring out his soul with a desperate ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... curly-headed fellow, full of fun, and very fond of singing. When quite a young man he had been given to drink, and was riotous when he had had too much; but after he married he gave up drinking, ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... and that his auditors as they listened trembled lest, with each sentence, that deep musical voice should fall on eternal silence. All this while he had been working at lectures and boys' books, when, as he said, "a thousand songs are singing in my heart that will certainly kill me if I do not utter them soon." One of the thousand, "Sunrise," he uttered with a temperature of 104 degrees burning out his life, but it is full of the rapture of ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... boys down to be out of my way. After completing my day's work, I descended by the light of the moon, and was alarmed to find that Fritz and Jack were not below; and still more so, when I heard their clear, sweet voices, at the summit of the tree, singing the evening hymn, as if to sanctify our future abode. They had climbed the tree, instead of descending, and, filled with wonder and reverence at the sublime view below them, had burst out into the hymn ...
— The Swiss Family Robinson; or Adventures in a Desert Island • Johann David Wyss
... living in a certain valley of the mountains who will know why the soul-proud youth came to bend under invisible burdens, and why he feared, as an angel of vengeance, that early cowboy with the yellow hair, who came singing down from the high divide into Amalon where a girl was waiting in her dream of a single love; others who, to this day, will do not more than whisper with averted faces of the crime that brought a curse upon the land; who still live in ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... large body of the enemy which had been covered by the forest, rushed upon its summit with a shout, and poured down a general volley. The whole Prussian line returned it by one tremendous discharge. The drums and trumpets struck up, the battalions and squadrons advanced, singing their national hymn. The skirmishers poured forward and the battle began. How shall I speak of what I felt at that moment; the sensation was indescribable! It was mingled of all feelings but personal. I was absorbed in that glorious roar, in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... that had wandered down to the Manorhouse, or an abridgment of ancient history, in which was omitted everything but the proper names. To these attainments she added a certain modicum of skill upon the spinet, and the power of singing old songs with the richest and sweetest voice that ever made one's eyes moisten or one's ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... there is left some loveliness of environment, and the dulness of tutors and professors matters very little when one can loiter in the grey cloisters at Magdalen, and listen to some flute-like voice singing in Waynfleete's chapel, or lie in the green meadow, among the strange snake-spotted fritillaries, and watch the sunburnt noon smite to a finer gold the tower's gilded vanes, or wander up the Christ Church ...
— Intentions • Oscar Wilde
... a corps of Priests and Myrmidons, leading their way stolidly through the paths of Central Park. Following them came the revelers, a mass of men and women marching, laughing, singing, shouting, dancing their way along to the accompaniment of more music than ...
— Pagan Passions • Gordon Randall Garrett
... of what was simply an enjoyment to herself. She delights as much, or more, in singing than any one ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... his other vocations, he was the singing-master of the neighborhood, and picked up many bright shillings by instructing the young folks in psalmody. It was a matter of no little vanity to him on Sundays, to take his station in front of the church gallery, with a band of chosen ...
— The Legend of Sleepy Hollow • Washington Irving
... Yogi theories of sound-production in speaking and singing, we wish to say that experience has taught them that the timbre, quality and power of a voice depends not alone upon the vocal organs in the throat, but that the facial muscles, etc., have much to do with the matter. ...
— The Hindu-Yogi Science Of Breath • Yogi Ramacharaka
... shelled by the German batteries, the machine gun bullets were raining around; if neither of these agencies of hell were busy, airplanes were flying, many times so low that they seemed to be even with the tops of the trees and singing us their humming hymn of hate. An idea of the deadly nature of the conflict may be had from the first day's casualties, that covered ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... His Majesty the Emperor. A Japanese schoolboy with an accordion in his hands, singing and playing the national anthem, or Kimiga. There is a little wind-bellows at the bottom of the toy; and when you operate it, the boy's arms move as if playing the instrument, and a shrill small voice is heard. Price, ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn
... in the death-flurry, spinning round and round, and lashing the sea into foam with his broad tail. He is still; and now the boats venture to come close up to the carcase, and fixing grapnels in it, with tow-lines attached, they form in a line, and commence towing their conquest to the shore, singing as they row, their measured ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor
... to meet at the altar; but Nastasia was not in a position to give him any comfort or consolation. On the contrary, she only added to his mental perturbation as the evening went on. Up to this time she had invariably done her best to cheer him—she was afraid of his looking melancholy; she would try singing to him, and telling him every sort of funny story or reminiscence that she could recall. The prince nearly always pretended to be amused, whether he were so actually or no; but often enough he laughed sincerely, delighted ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... in the Springtime, I am sitting here, your guest. Nay—I think it is a vision, or a fancy - Part of dreamland Necromancy; And I question: is it true That the great warm hearts of you, Heard the winging of that singing in the West, Heard the chiming of my rhyming From the farmhouse ...
— Poems of Experience • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... the Church." In the face of many stronger expressions in the O.T. received without hesitation, this explanation seems untenable, or at least insufficient. And the same may be said of G. Jahn's theory that some mention of the singing of the three, contained in the original, was expunged by the Massoretes ...
— The Three Additions to Daniel, A Study • William Heaford Daubney
... wing, Mauville prepared to make as effective defense as lay in his power and looked around for his aid, the driver of the coach. But that quaking individual had taken advantage of the excitement to disappear. Upon hearing the threats, followed by the singing of bullets, and doubting not the same treatment accorded the master would be meted out to the servant, the coachman's fealty so oozed from him that he dropped his blunderbuss, groping his way through the long halls to the cellar, where he concealed ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... remember the time," enquired Minnie, "when I invited all the girls in the singing-class to tea? How I did fret about the cake-basket being old-fashioned, and moaned about the pattern of the tea cups." And she laughed ...
— Hollowmell - or, A Schoolgirl's Mission • E.R. Burden
... ineffably strange and spectral. The turbid stream sweeps along without a sound, and the pale tenements hang above it like a vague miasmatic exhalation. The dimmest back-scene at the opera, when the tenor is singing his sweetest, seems hardly to belong to a world more detached ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... doublet, and carried into the air; he was quickly missed by his master and the workmen, and a great enquiry was made for Francis Fry, but no hearing of him; but about half-an-hour after Fry was heard whistling and singing in a kind of a quagmire. He was now affected as he was wont to be in his fits, so that none regarded what he said; but coming to himself an hour after, he solemnly protested, that the daemon carried him so high that he saw his master's house underneath him no bigger than ...
— Miscellanies upon Various Subjects • John Aubrey
... press me to move forward, but held up his hand as if to bid me hearken. The folk and guests there had already shaken themselves down since our departure, and were gotten to be reasonably merry it seemed; for one of the guests, he who had spoken of France before, had fallen to singing a ballad of the war to a wild and melancholy tune. I remember the first rhymes of it, which I heard as I turned away my head and we moved on ...
— A Dream of John Ball, A King's Lesson • William Morris
... town, lay for some distance along a sandy road with woods on each side of it. The sea was hidden, but there were the fresh green buds on the trees to look at, and the blue sky overhead flecked with little white clouds, and the larks to listen to singing high up in the air over distant cornfields. By and by the road came out on the cliff again, and soon made a sudden dip so that the sea was now quite close to them, and on the other side another sea of freshly-springing wheat stretched away inland for ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... "can you see now that there's something more to it than jealousy? Whatever I try to do, he fights. When I wanted to begin singing again last spring, he fought that. And when I wanted to give it all up, after he'd so nearly died, he wouldn't let me. And when I'd refused the best chance I'd ever had, for him, and then changed around and accepted ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster
... plane tree on one side, a wall on the other, and from the open doorway of an Inn a pale path of light. Over the Inn hangs a full golden moon. Against the wall, under the glimmer of a lamp, leans a youth with the face of THE WINE HORN, in a crimson dock, thrumming a mandolin, and singing: ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... remained with the Sioux, and was suspected to have furnished one of their repasts. What appeared not a little singular and indeed ludicrous in this funeral comedy was the contrast exhibited by the terrific lamentations and yells of one part of the company while the others were singing and dancing ...
— An introduction to the mortuary customs of the North American Indians • H. C. Yarrow
... that often precede dissolution, seem to impart to the subject of them a peculiar aptitude for delicate and refined spiritual impressions. We could not afford to have it always night,—and we must think that the broad, gay morning light, when meadow-lark and robin and bobolink are singing in chorus with a thousand insects and the waving of a thousand breezes, is on the whole the most in accordance with the average wants of those who have a material life to live and material work to do. But then we reverence that clear-obscure of midnight, when everything is still and dewy;—then ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... reigns in her virgin beauty; where trees grow, where corn grows; where men grow better than they do anywhere else in the world. This is the land to study nature in all her luxuriant charms, under glorious green branches, among singing birds and laughing streams; this is the land to hear the cooing of the turtle-dove, in far, deep, cool, sylvan bowers; to feel your soul expand under the mighty influences of nature in her primitive ...
— Old Mackinaw - The Fortress of the Lakes and its Surroundings • W. P. Strickland
... the night—I forget the name of it— we found every house full of soldiers of the royal army, and but for our passes I do not know what we should have done. Before every door there were dragoons drinking and singing round the tables, and some were dancing with the girls of the village. Some of them shouted at us when they saw we were coming from Paris, and called us runaway rebels; but Eustace showed his pass, told them what it was, ...
— Stray Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... silent character, by no means deficient in intelligence, and trustworthy withal. He had long been a follower of the Intendant, and had served in the army. He was very devout; and generally, when not addressed, was singing hymns in a ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... and I worked together at it with considerable difficulty. We soon saw that we should have to eliminate the famous scene of the casting of the statue. When we reached this point in the play, Benvenuto had already done a good deal of singing, and this scene with its violence seemed certain to exceed the strength of the most valiant artist. In connection with our Proserpine, I have been accused of supposing that Vacquerie had genius. It would ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... herself in her "better days." In order to accomplish this, and prevent the work being twitched out of their hands, and themselves dragged off by Adrian to play at ball or shuttlecock with him, she would secure the quietness and attention of the party by singing old ballads, and relating marvellous histories, to which they would listen with an eagerness and interest that banished all wish for any other kind of entertainment. Of these she had an abundant store, but what afforded the ...
— The Flower Basket - A Fairy Tale • Unknown
... would have charge of the boy at the Duke of Savoy's Court, and she gave him two crowns. There was no time for more, as the Bishop of Grenoble was now calling his nephew. As he set forth on that Saturday morning, riding his spirited chestnut towards Chambery, with the sun shining and the birds singing, and all his future like a fair vision before him, young Bayard thought ...
— Bayard: The Good Knight Without Fear And Without Reproach • Christopher Hare
... of the house, dolls' dressmaker, and manufacturer of ornamental pincushions and penwipers, sat in her quaint little low arm-chair, singing in the dark, until Lizzie ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... rain-making is connected with sacred springs, and even now in rural France processions to shrines, usually connected with a holy well, are common in time of drought. Thus people and priest go to the fountain of Baranton in procession, singing hymns, and there pray for rain. The priest then dips his foot in the water, or throws some of it on the rocks.[1105] In other cases the image of a saint is carried to a well and asperged, as divine images formerly were, or the waters are beaten or thrown into the ...
— The Religion of the Ancient Celts • J. A. MacCulloch
... from which alone I sing, Thou weariest and saddenest my soul! O butterfly that joyest on thy wing, Pausing from bloom to bloom, without a goal— And thou, that singing of love for evermore, Fond nightingale! from wood to wood dost go, My life is as a never-ending war Of doubts, when likened to the peace ye know, And wears what seems a smile and is ...
— Modern Italian Poets • W. D. Howells
... in the street outside, a half-frozen clarinetist was sending up a mournful carol from the mouth of his reed. Somewhere in the distance a high-voiced child was singing. And the wind played a dirge as it marched past the ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... men had taken. Back to the earth they gave treasures of ancient folk, Gold to the gloomy mould, where it now lieth Useless to sons of men as it e'er was of yore. Then round the mound there rode twelve manly warriors, Chanting their bitter grief, singing the hero dead, Mourning their noble king in fitting words of woe! They praised his courage high and his proud, valiant deeds, Honoured him worthily, as it is meet for men Duly to praise in words their friendly lord ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt
... bottle by his side, and a Bible in his hand; and read passages and comment on them, and pronounce them lies. Any thing like religious feeling among the slaves irritated him. He said that so much praying and singing prevented the people from doing their tasks, as it kept them up nights, when they should be asleep. He used to mock, and in every possible way interrupt the poor slaves, who after the toil of the day, knelt in their lowly cabins ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... perfect alienation of the mind from prayer, and therefore is contrary to that attention which presents our prayers in a right line to God. For so have I seen a lark rising from his bed of grass, soaring upwards and singing as he rises and hopes to get to Heaven and climb above the clouds; but the poor bird was beaten back with the loud sighings of an eastern wind and his motion made irregular and inconstant, descending ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... time the Crane got over his fright and he became very hungry once more. The pond had been still so long that many of the Frogs were singing their pleasant chorus, and above them all there boomed the deep voice of the ...
— Wigwam Evenings - Sioux Folk Tales Retold • Charles Alexander Eastman and Elaine Goodale Eastman
... rendered me senseless. My gun, which was lying across the saddle, was snatched from its place, and finally the Indian who had hold of the bridle started off toward the Arkansas River, leading the mule, which was being lashed by the other Indians, who were following. The savages were all singing, yelling, and whooping, as only Indians can do, when they are having their little game all their own way. While looking toward the river, I saw on the opposite side an immense village moving along the bank, and then ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... William Penn the Quaker, or any Anabaptist, Papist, Muggletonian, Jew, or Sweet-Singer,[7] have liberty to come into St Paul's Church, in the midst of divine service, and endeavour to convert first the aldermen, then the preacher, and singing-men? Or pray, why might not poor Mr. Whiston,[8] who denies the divinity of Christ, be allowed to come into the Lower House of Convocation, and convert the clergy? But, alas! we are overrun with such false notions, that, if Penn ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... to be another Horris! "HORACE" I should have written, but in place of it You see the word—well, I'm within an ace of it. Awake my muse! strike up! your bard inspire To write this—"by particular desire." Wet towels! Midnight oil! Here! Everything That can induce the singing bard to sing. Shake me, Ye Nine! I'm resolute, I'm bold! Come, Inspiration, lend thy furious hold! MORRIS on Pegasus! Plank money down! I'll back myself to win ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, May 27, 1893 • Various
... read through some of these before dinner; and I must think about your costume, too. And it is just possible I may have something ready in gold paper to hang up on the Tree. (Puts his hand on her head.) My precious little singing-bird! (He goes into his room and shuts ...
— A Doll's House • Henrik Ibsen
... much.' Ante, iii.293. Miss Burney records a story she had from Mrs. Thrale, 'which,' she continues, 'exceeds, I think, in its severity all the severe things I have yet heard of Dr. Johnson's saying. When Miss More was introduced to him, she began singing his praise in the warmest manner. For some time he heard her with that quietness which a long use of praise has given him: she then redoubled her strokes, till at length he turned suddenly to her, with a stern and angry countenance, and said, "Madam, before you flatter ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... compassion, it is the angel of God arriving among us on the caressing breath, a messenger of mercy, and pouring into the tortured depths of our poor heart its healing dew. It is Jesus saying to Mary, and, in her, to all those whom grief afflicts: "Why weepest thou?" It is David singing: "Why art thou cast down, O my soul?" It is Isaiah crying: "Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people; speak ye comfortably ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume 10 (of 10) • Various
... at 4.30 A. M.—it literally tore us from sleep, for it seemed as if the very house were tumbling down about our ears and the singing and whizzing of those big shells was bizarre, to put it mildly. One did not know whether to get up or efface one's self in the blankets. I remember having the utmost confidence in the headboard of my bed, which was toward the window. But that did not obliterate the siren ...
— Lige on the Line of March - An American Girl's Experiences When the Germans Came Through Belgium • Glenna Lindsley Bigelow
... the music of "Little Nell," a ballad composed by the late Mr. George Linley, to the words of Miss Charlotte Young, and dedicated to Charles Dickens. He was very fond of it, and his eldest daughter had been in the habit of singing it to him constantly since she ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... While they were singing, they heard some one knock at the door. They heard the bell ring, and when the door was opened, five soldiers, clad in uniform, demanded Duke Erlan to deliver himself up. They walked straight up to him, and told him that ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... that evening! The golden summer was dying then; the flowers seemed to be yielding all their sweetest perfumes to it; there was a lovely light from the evening sky that lingered on the tufted lime trees; the birds were singing a faint, sweet vesper hymn; the time so soon was coming when they were to cross the sunny seas in search ...
— Coralie • Charlotte M. Braeme
... a good mien, and proud in proportion, as we discovered by the chilling and haughty manner in which he received us. Farnham and I agreed to keep watch alternately, but this arrangement was superfluous, as neither of us could sleep a wink for the infernal thumping and singing made by the medicine men all night long, by a dying native. I had an opportunity of seeing the sick man make his last will and testament: having caused to be brought to him whatever he had that was most precious, ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... of this best of kings Is extant still, upon a sign That on a village tavern swings, Famed in the country for good wine. The people in their Sunday trim, Filling their glasses to the brim, Look up to him, Singing ha, ha, ha! and he, he, he! That's the sort ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... often answer to the purpose, but rather appeared to reply as to some interrogatory of her own; in the midst of one occupation, she would start up to another; leave that, in turn, undone, and sit down in silence lasting for hours. Her voice, in singing, was exquisitely melodious; she had too, an intuitive talent for painting; and she read all the books that came in her way with an avidity that bespoke at once the restlessness and the genius of ...
— Godolphin, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... voices, singing in unison, fill the workshop; the song has no room there; it strikes against the stones of the walls, it moans and weeps and reanimates the heart by a soft tickling pain, irritating ...
— Twenty-six and One and Other Stories • Maksim Gorky
... not think it so funny that evening when, as the girls sat about a fire they had made in the open, singing and telling jokes, and Lizzie was washing up the supper dishes, a sudden shrill whoop arose from ...
— The Girls of Central High in Camp - The Old Professor's Secret • Gertrude W. Morrison
... on with his work without replying; indeed, the little bird did not expect an answer. It was only singing its natural song, and it ...
— A Collection of Beatrix Potter Stories • Beatrix Potter
... dressed like the flowers. Walk around in the midst of the palaces and from thy hiding-place see each of them enter by herself in her own apartment admiring her beauty and her magnificent dresses, all showing their joy and mirth since they will not know of thee; then listen to their singing and their playing and their joyous company in their apartments and perhaps you'll attach yourself to one of them who'll play with thee, keep thee awake and be thy cup-companion, dispelling what may remain of thy restlessness. But he replied, O Mesrur, bring to ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... Bohemian glass in great profusion, and a "one year chronometer" of great precision. A really beautiful inlaid ivory table is disfigured by a menagerie of coloured miniature leaden cats, lions, lizards, dogs, a children's kaleidoscope, and some badly-stuffed birds, singing automatically. On another table were more glass vases and a variety of articles made of cockle shells on pasteboard, cycle watches, and brass ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... until it passed the corner by the old brown farmhouse and disappeared from view. It had left the station long ere she reached the Cure, for she had walked slowly, and lights were shining from the different rooms, and there was a sound of singing in the parlor, and the party of croquet players had come up from the lawn, and ladies were hurrying toward the bathroom, when she came in and climbed the three flights of stairs which led to the fourth ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... ambush. Not far from it there did live a rich farmer who did keep many cows in his ground, to furnish Dort with butter and milk. The milkmaid coming to milk saw all under the hedges soldiers lying; seemed to take no notice, but went singing to her cows; and having milked, went as merrily away. Coming to her master's house, she told what she had seen. The master wondering at it, took the maid with him and presently came to Dort, told it to the Burgomaster, who sent a spy immediately, ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... home. The shrieking wind, the wet, slippery streets, the lightning flashing against the blurred wind-shield, the crashes of thunder that drowned all other sounds, were sufficient to try the nerves of the steadiest driver. But Mac sped his car through it with reckless disregard, singing, despite his hoarseness, with Birdie and Monte, and shouting laughing defiance as the ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... of faces, keen and alert, with that look in the eyes that one sees in LePage's Jeanne d'Arc; the click, click of bullets from the distant rifle range blended with a chorus of deep voices near at hand singing "Over There"; a clear, blue sky, crisp autumn air and the sparkling waters ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... play, to see them babies, with their long, bright, curling hair, their sparkling eyes, and their beautiful light tread, a rambling about the garden, deep in love. Boots was of opinion that the birds believed they was birds, and kept up with 'em, singing to please 'em. Sometimes they would creep under the Tulip-tree, and would sit there with their arms round one another's necks, and their soft cheeks touching, a reading about the Prince, and the Dragon, ...
— Half-Hours with Great Story-Tellers • Various
... remarkable persons had passed in review before her, English, French, German, Italian, lords and fiddlers, deans of cathedrals and managers of theatres, travellers leading about newly caught savages, and singing women ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... dress, their manners were, all of them, singularly vulgar and disagreeable, and their expressions still more so, for they hardly spoke a word, without adding "a G-d d— me" to it, and thus cursing, quarrelling, drinking, singing, and fighting, they seemed to be pleased, and to enjoy the evening. I must do them the justice to add, that none of them, however, at all molested me or did me any harm. On the contrary, every one again and again drank my health, and I took ...
— Travels in England in 1782 • Charles P. Moritz
... twigs, leaves and grass, thus making a mound often six or eight feet high, and containing enough material to load several wagons, in which the eggs are buried. The young birds are not helpless when hatched, like the young of most of our singing birds, but are quite strong and active, and able to burrow their way out of the mound, and ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, July 1878, No. 9 • Various
... lovely summer morning—the sun a few yards up the sky; the grass glittering with dew; the birds singing as if they were singing their first and would sing their last; the whole air, even in his little room, filled with a cool odour as of blessed thoughts, and just warm enough to let him know that the noontide would be hot. And there ...
— Gutta-Percha Willie • George MacDonald |
