"Undertone" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... thinking that the unsavory reputation of this island may keep those fellows from coming here," Walter observed in an undertone. ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... five inches of rain to his credit. (So far, eleven inches was the Territory record for one night). Also the fringe of birds was back at the billabong, having returned with as little warning as it had left, and once more its ceaseless chatter became the undertone ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... stakes were was no business of Mr. Draper's. The gentlemen said they would play for shillings, and afterwards counted up their gains and losses, with scarce any talking, and that in an undertone. A bow on both sides, a perfectly grave and polite manner on the part of each, and ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... received with enthusiasm; in 1852 he was elected to the Academy, but his work was done, and already an ill-controlled indulgence in alcohol had fatally undermined his never robust strength; his writings, besides possessing the charm of an exquisite style, heightened by an undertone of true tenderness, are chiefly remarkable for the intense sincerity of feeling, albeit of a limited range, which animates them, and which finds its highest expression in his four great lyrical pieces, "Les Nuits"; his fine instinct for dramatic situation and gift of witty dialogue are manifest ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... him to one side, and they talked for a few moments in a rapid undertone. More than once the manager of the restaurant, for such I imagined him to be, glanced towards me, and I was fairly certain that I formed the subject of their conversation. When it was finished Louis beckoned, and we all three turned towards the door together, ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... of the front window!" returned Phyllis, in a hushed undertone. "There's something queer going ...
— The Dragon's Secret • Augusta Huiell Seaman
... awful, the Ponsonby girls giggled aloud, and finally got into such gales of laughter that I was ashamed. The organ had dropped into the customary groaning undertone that is meant, I suppose, to give courage to the nervous ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... waited a moment before looking up at me. "And I'm afraid Mr. Evers will never forgive me," she added after her look, in the rich undertone that had impressed me overnight, before ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung
... duke replied in an undertone, touching his son's arm with the point of the forefinger of his left hand, and pointing up to the panel with the stick he held in his right: "Dawne, if it were not for what that panel conceals—" he ended by folding his hands on the top of his stick, looking down ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... on the sixth day after parting company from the Spaniards, the vessel was hove to to take a pilot aboard. Captain S—— took him aside as soon as he boarded, and asked him in an undertone if he ever did anything in the contraband line. He held up his hands as though he were horrified at the ...
— Looking Seaward Again • Walter Runciman
... sullen undertone in his voice. His eyes still dwelt darkly on her. "If he raises an objection, I will ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman
... an undertone of intimacy. "Genius.... A great irresponsible genius.... Difficult to help.... I wish I could do ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells
... approach of a city magistrate, now acquired the habit of alluding to mandarins in casual conversation by names of affectionate abbreviation. Also, being advised of the expediency by a voice speaking in an undertone, he sought still further to extend beyond himself by suffering his nails to grow long and obliterating his name from the public announcements upon ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... moment that he did so he was conscious of an insufferable light. A sound was in his ears like the low, rhythmic thunder of a distant sea breaking in successive waves upon the beach, and out of this noise, seeming a part of it, or possibly coming from beyond it, and intermingled with its ceaseless undertone, came the articulate words: "Jerome Searing, you are caught like a rat in a trap— in a trap, ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... poor father till the speech of the evening had been made. So Dickens made his speech, and a brilliant one it was—it is brilliant even as one reads it now, in the coldness of print, without the glamour of the speaker's voice, and presence, and yet brilliant with an undertone of sadness, which the recent death of the speaker's father would fully explain. And Forster, who knew of the yet later blow impending on his friend, had to sit by and listen as that dear friend, all unconscious of the dread application of the ...
— Life of Charles Dickens • Frank Marzials
... always fascinating. It was full of glancing allusion, wit, sparkle, and with that constant undertone of significance that may be serious or gay, but which always lingers with a certain impressiveness to haunt the mind of the listener. Dr. Hiram Corson, who may perhaps be regarded as Browning's greatest interpreter, speaks of one of his visits to the poet, in London, where the ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... coming," affirmed Judy in an undertone for the twentieth time, "but I think it will be after ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... Coombe said and spoke in an undertone rapidly. "She thinks you mean to turn her out of the house as if she were ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... had whispered spoke in an undertone to his fellows. One of them went out swiftly; the others threw wide the three doors and then gathered up the fallen gold. It was replaced in its box and gravely presented to Kendric. He threw back the lid, thrust into his pocket without counting what he deemed equal to the ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... could not be expressed by signs, in a gentle, soft, and private way. Two and two were in general to live together, so that one might watch the other. After departing from the supper hall to bed it was not permitted them to speak again in public, except upon urgent necessity, and then only in an undertone. All scurrility, jests, and idle words were to be avoided; and after any foolish saying, the repetition of the Lord's Prayer was enjoined. All professed knights were to wear white garments, both in summer and winter, as emblems of chastity. The esquires and retainers ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... somewhat apart, talking in an animated undertone to each other. They did not even approach the fire to roast their food; and Mr. Hardy's attention being attracted by this circumstance, he asked what they were talking ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... my wand first thing I do," she said in an awed undertone. "It is useless to try to do ...
— The Shape of Fear • Elia W. Peattie
... of the fall hardly pierced the confused uproar, and Carrie, shielding her scorched face with her hand, was appalled by the din. Green wood split with detonating cracks, the snapping of branches was like musketry, and the flames roared in a deep undertone. Her dress fluttered, for eddying draughts swept the rocks. She was dazzled but fascinated, unconscious of heat and fear, for she had not seen or imagined a ...
— Partners of the Out-Trail • Harold Bindloss
... sees a human fight, while they are trying to make a political squabble. He may win them over to-night, but this is only the beginning. The real fight is against individual self-interest." He laughed in an undertone. "I remember he told me once that the only trouble with Christianity was the Christians. 'You can't have Christianity', he said, 'until Christians are different'. That's just as true, of course, of politics. The only trouble with ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... greens and purples that you saw those grown-up children in the Village joyously splashing on their wooden toys or the walls of their absurd and charming "shops" will somehow get into the grey fabric of your life; and a certain eager urging undertone of idealism and hope and sturdy aspiration will make you restless as you follow your common round. Perhaps you will go back. Perhaps you will keep it as a rainbow memory, a visualisation of the make-believe country where ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... for yourselves the characters, and can follow the simple action which owes its slight interest only to the constant effort of the dreamer to attain his ideal,—the Rose,—and owes its charm chiefly to the constant disappointment and final defeat. An undertone of sadness runs through it, felt already in the picture of Time which foreshadows the end of Love—the Rose—and her court, and with it the ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... had been whistling at the window, said to Drake in a cynical undertone: "The man is hipped and sore. He has lost his challenge, and we ought to make allowances ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... one is my favorite, but the off one is the best goer, though she's dreadfully hard bitted," answered Ben the younger, with such a comical assumption of a jockey's important air that his father laughed as he said in an undertone: ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... called that he would return in two days. Of his possible reception by Telly he was a good deal in doubt. She had written to him in reply to his letters, but between each of the simple, unaffected lines all he could read was an undertone of sadness. That, with a vivid recollection of what Uncle Terry had disclosed, led him to believe there was some burden on her mind and that he had or was no part ...
— Uncle Terry - A Story of the Maine Coast • Charles Clark Munn
... the means of leading me to think about this thing." Why should she care, though, whether people thought about this thing or not? Yesterday she didn't. During all the talk she kept up this little undertone of thought, this running commentary on her sudden change of views and feelings, and wondered, and wondered, could it be possible that she was utterly changed? And yet, when she came to think of it, wasn't she? Didn't she love Christ? And then it struck her as the strangest ...
— Four Girls at Chautauqua • Pansy
... roof o 'the cabin. An' when I thinks of it all, as think of it I does, meanderin' along with my friendly ol' flute, of an evenin' in the fall o' the year, when trade's done an' the shelves is all put t' rights, I hears that undertone o' patter an' splash an' sigh. There was that in the lad's face t' stir an ache in the heart of a sentimental ol' codger like me; an' when I seed the grim lines an' gray color of it, an' when I caught the sorrow an' pride ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan
... he cried, clearing a space around them with the point of his sword. "His Majesty has committed him to my custody, and I am responsible for him. Pardon me if I disarm you, Sir," he added in an undertone to the prisoner. ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... is the word." He spoke in an undertone—a voice of acquiescence, or rather obedience. "Perhaps it will not be so bad when I remember more." They ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... floated up to them, the daily toil, the noise of it, its bartering, its going and coming. Men and women must live, even in a revolution, and to live, work. Underneath it all there was something unnatural, a murmur, a growl, the sound of an undertone, secret, cruel, deadly; yet the woman's pointing finger was all Lucien was conscious of ...
— The Light That Lures • Percy Brebner
... became apparent to the crowd on the green that they were not likely to be vouchsafed any information unless they asked for it, a brisk disputation, conducted in an undertone, so that it might not reach the ears of the gentlemen, arose as to ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... George," asked Billie in an undertone, "if we side-step the Amber Drawing-Room? I'm wild to get into that garden. There's a man working among those roses. Maybe he ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... quoting oddly in undertone, "'And Beauty drew him, by a single hair,'" and the words ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley
... years of age as he was at any later time. His early sermons, delivered to his first charge in Philadelphia, displayed the same individuality, the same force and completeness and clearness of construction, the same deep, strong undertone of religious thought, as his great discourses preached in Westminster Abbey six months before his death. His sentences are sonorous; his style was characterized by a noble simplicity, impressive, but without a touch showing that dramatic ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... Bedouins preparing to pass the Great Desert. Arrived in the forest about nightfall, and well and duly shut up in their Gibraltar of wood, the sportsmen may eat, drink, and smoke, and converse in an undertone; but a heavy fine is invariably inflicted on those who make the least noise. No one is permitted to sneeze, talk loud, or laugh; as to blowing one's nasal organ vigorously, the thing is absolutely forbidden; no one is allowed to have a cold, much less an influenza, for at least eight hours, ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... tell me again that the Austrians are tyrants," said Mrs. Vervain in undertone to ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... or wrong-doer, now brooding tender as a mother-bird over some fledgling soul, now broken with sobs as she mourns over the sins of Church and world, and again chanting high prophecy of restoration and renewal, or telling in awestruck undertone sacred mysteries of the interior life. Dante's Angel of Purity welcomes wayfarers upon the Pilgrim Mount "in voce assai piu che la nostra, viva." The saintly voice, like the angelic, is more living than ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... truce to child's play," replied the count's evil genius, in an undertone; "you know as well as I do what I mean. Besides, you must have observed how the princess's glance softens as she looks at you;—you can tell, by the very inflection of her voice, what pleasure she takes in listening to you, and can ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... princes 'by the grace of God' live here very pleasantly," muttered Napoleon in an undertone; "they know better how to build and furnish their residences than to preserve them to their children. Well, I am a good architect, and have come to reconstruct the royal palace of Prussia. Do you think, Duroc, those ingrates will thank ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... accompany me to the stable?" suggested his host, when the meal was over, the mild words being backed by an undertone of considerable authority. Stuart would have liked to protest, for he was feeling chipper and lively, but, just as he was about to speak, he remembered Andy's remark, on board the motor boat, about "food for fishes." Probably Cecil's allies were ready for any kind of bloodshed, ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... she picked out the very largest oysters she had, to stew for us. When we had finished our supper and had paid for it, and were going down to take our little boat again,—for we had rowed up the river,—Euphemia stopped and looked around her. Then she clasped her hands and exclaimed in an ecstatic undertone: ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton
... still, we would have been travelling some hidden side-path, where doubtless Joseph and Innocentina, chaperoned by les animaux, were happily straying at this moment. I could almost hear the donkey-girl's mechanically constant, warning cry, "Fanny-anny, Fanny-anny! Souris-ouris!" like a low undertone of accompaniment to the ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... down solicitously, murmured in a melancholy undertone, shook her head; then disappeared from the window, and, after a moment or two, ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... then went on to describe her failure. She told it to them with laughter between her sentences, but among her listeners was one at least who caught the undertone of sadness in ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... important preparations of the mind, she (Miss Bertram) was complete, being prepared for matrimony by a hatred of home, restraint and tranquillity, by the misery of disappointed affection and contempt of the man she was to marry; the rest might wait." This is not the touch of Gerard Douw. An undertone of irony, never obtrusive but everywhere perceptible, shows that the artist herself knew very well that she was not painting gods and Titans, and keeps everything on ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... attempting to express my appreciation and thanks to Admiral Sampson for the courtesy of allowing us to precede him into Santiago, Admiral Schley, with that naivete and apt turn of expression so characteristic of him, in a half undertone side-remark, cautioned me with "Don't give him too much credit, Miss Barton; he was not quite sure how clear the channel might be. Remember ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton
... my stomach. "But you are better," he murmurs; "the stomach is not so hard." I protest—he seems astonished, the interne then says to him in an undertone: ...
— Sac-Au-Dos - 1907 • Joris Karl Huysmans
... insignificant remarks about the crops; all the unimportant words about the spelling-school. Not for the sake of the remarks. Not for the sake of the weather. Not for the sake of the crops. Not for the sake of the spelling-school. But for the sake of the undertone. And then she traveled back over the three years of her bondage and forward over the three years to come, and fed her heart on the dim hope of rebuilding in some form the home that had been so happy. And she prayed, with more faith than ever before, for deliverance. For love brings faith. Somewhere ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston
... call to Nell. I am afraid the case must have been desperate, for I am seldom the victim," I said in an undertone to our host, who acquiesced with a laugh. "Harriet Henderson must be dead, for Nell usually sends the worse one to her," I added under ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... said Mrs. Carroll, in an undertone, as the tall fellow leaped to the ground, slipped the bridle over his arm, and ...
— A Tar-Heel Baron • Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton
... straight at Tom with a look as sure and steady as his rifle. "Slade's Hole isn't known outside of Barrell Alley, Tom," he said impressively, although in the same cautious undertone, "but Tom Slade is known from one end of this sector ...
— Tom Slade Motorcycle Dispatch Bearer • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... be sure I will," said Jonas; then with a laugh out of the side of his mouth, he added in an undertone, "Don't seem to want that I should set a net; she runs right into ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... thanking the captain for his courtesy, descended to the cabin along with him, and sat down on a sofa in the darkest corner of it. Here he smoked vehemently, while his companion, assuming rather a mysterious air, said, in an undertone: ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... of the crowding, jostling, kicking, squealing band, mingled with the merry voices of the men, with now and then a shout of anger or warning as the cowboys moved here and there among their restless four-footed companions; and always, like a deep undertone, came the sound ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... who is but a Buffalo, and, of course, has not the great Wolf wisdom, may be mistaken. You who are an eater of grasses when you are ill, eat of this Fur Flower, as you name it; then also I will eat in great faith—after a little," he added in an undertone. ...
— The Outcasts • W. A. Fraser
... the rear, Labiskwee spoke in an undertone to Smoke. "He is eating," she said. "It is ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... standing at the edge of the ravine, and looking down on them, uttered a soft but thrilling amen to every prayer. When it was over, and the men prepared to fill in the grave, she spoke to Welch in an undertone, and begged leave to pay her tribute first; and, with this, she detached her apron and held it out to them. Hazel easily climbed up to her, and found her apron was full of sweet-smelling bark and aromatic leaves, whose fragrance ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... ours was, from outlying farms. And when they and we had passed in through the gateways—where the townsfolk of old lashed out against their robber Infidel and robber Christian enemies—all the black little narrow streets were filled with an undertone of murmuring voices and an overtone of ...
— The Christmas Kalends of Provence - And Some Other Provencal Festivals • Thomas A. Janvier
... he said, in an undertone, "I didn't get out at Warnworth after all. It would have been dreadful if you'd been left all alone in ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... crossed a great bridge and set his foot within the smiling city that has crushed or crowned more poets than all the rest of the world. His breath came quickly as Paris sang to him in a little undertone her vital chant of greeting—the hum of ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... all I require. You see, I have so much health and superfluous heat that I like to be cool; and then I have the—" he stopped short here, for he could not quite deviate from the truth so far as to say he actually had the asthma, so he added, in an undertone, "If I had the asthma I could not breathe, you know, in this small room, pretty as it is, and upon my word it is lovely. Have you no larger chamber which I ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... SISTERHOOD OF SHAME AND DEATH.—Whenever we pass the sisterhood of death, and hear the undertone of song, which is one of the harlot's methods of advertising, let us recall the words, that these represent the "pestilence which walketh in darkness, the destruction that wasteth at noonday." The allusion, of course, is to the fact that the great majority of these harlots are ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... heard the slight grating sound of small cakes of ice, floating with various speed, full of content and promise, and where the water gurgles under a natural bridge, you may hear these hasty rafts hold conversation in an undertone. Every rill is a channel for the juices of the meadow. In the ponds the ice cracks with a merry and inspiriting din, and down the larger streams is whirled grating hoarsely, and crashing its way along, which was so ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... her, Bran?' said Raphael, in an undertone. 'I must really emancipate myself from your instructions if you require a similar simplicity in me. Stay! there wanders a mule without a rider; we may as ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... see," growled Hank in an undertone to his brother, "why we would take any risk riding under ...
— Bart Stirling's Road to Success - Or; The Young Express Agent • Allen Chapman
... of low whispering in my vicinity. This thoroughly aroused me, and without stirring my body I slowly turned my head, when to my astonishment I beheld Kouaga, standing erect with arms folded beneath his white burnouse, talking in an undertone to a dark-bearded stranger who also wore flowing Arab garments and bore in his hand a long-barrelled flint-lock gun with quaintly-inlaid stock. The man seemed older than the Grand Vizier of Mo, for his beard was tinged with grey, and the brown hand that held ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... where gray Belerium fronts the spray Smiting the bastion'd crags through centuries flown, While, 'neath the hissing surge, Ocean sends up a deep, deep undertone, ...
— The Visions of England - Lyrics on leading men and events in English History • Francis T. Palgrave
... Carl in an undertone. "Don't go rowing at Ma now. If you do she may get her back up and not take you to the party at all. I hate to be scrubbed within an inch of my life as much as you do, but I'm not saying so to-day. I'd be boiled in oil sooner than not go to ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett
... above orchestral undertone, The plaining wail of muted violin, The hushed oboe and the distant din, Of muffled drum or viol's raucous groan— Sudden arises one pure voice-like tone, A silver trumpet's tongue that stirs the soul To feel the theme, and the harmonious whole A sonant setting seems for that alone; So, ...
— The Path of Dreams - Poems • Leigh Gordon Giltner
... Finisher of faith and prayer, who watches over our praying, and sees to it that in all who trust Him for it their education in the school of prayer shall be carried on to perfection. Let but the deep undertone of all our prayer be the teachableness that comes from a sense of ignorance, and from faith in Him as a perfect teacher, and we may be sure we shall be taught, we shall learn to pray in power. Yes, we may depend upon it, HE teaches ...
— Lord, Teach Us To Pray • Andrew Murray
... of you agree with me," Lois said; "and I do not know much poetry; but there seems to me to run an undertone of lament and weariness through most of what I know. Now take the 'Death of the Flowers,'—that you were reading ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner
... did not mean to walk home with John; but on the other hand she did not mean to walk with the squire. She revolved the matter in her mind as she sat in the library talking in an undertone with Mr. Juxon. She liked the great room, the air of luxury, the squire's tea and the squire's conversation. It is worth noticing that his flow of talk was more abundant to-day than it had been for some time; whether it was John's presence which stimulated Mr. Juxon's imagination, ...
— A Tale of a Lonely Parish • F. Marion Crawford
... spread rich carpets, and half a dozen enormous cushions of soft-coloured silk were thrown negligently one upon the other. Three doors, hung with curtains, opened upon the balcony,—and near to the middle one, two slave-girls, clad in white, crouched upon their heels and talked in an undertone. ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... undertone, and still she muffled the light, while steadily the weight of his arms increased. Suddenly he crowded her to the earth. "Arthur," she murmured, "Arthur, what are you going to do? Don't kill me ...
— Bylow Hill • George Washington Cable
... for the sake of deafness, and found convenient as a sort of flying chaperon. The countess could not hear much of the music, but she was fond of the world and liked to be seen, and she could not hear at all what Del Ferice said in an undertone to Madame Mayer. Sufficient to her were the good things of the day; the rest was in no way her business. There was Valdarno in the club-box, with a knot of other men of his own stamp. There were the ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... kennel-door, Towser bounded forth to meet him As he oft had done before. And the farmer stooped and loosed him From the dog-chain short and stout; To himself he softly chuckled, "Bessie's feller must look out." But the maiden at the window Saw the cruel teeth show white; In an undertone she murmured,— "Towser must ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... along," said Bertha; and then added, in an undertone, "you know what I promised to show you, Lizzie. Come with me; let them make up the game ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... words Asher caught the undertone of courage, and he knew that a battle for supremacy was on, a struggle between physical outcry and ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... morality or money. I wished to hurl myself and my theories to the test, and gauntlet my defiance to a withered world. It was a happy time, looked back on now as a dream, in which, however, there was an undertone of nightmare. We had three little rooms up many mild flights of unbalustered stairs. Our main furniture consisted of mattresses which, like morning clouds, were rolled away when the ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... hermit in an undertone, as if the remark were made half to himself and half to Ivor, whose head appeared at the window, and whose old countenance was wrinkled with a grin of delight at this unexpected display of prowess; "mine ancient skill, it would seem, has not deserted me, for which I am thankful, for ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... his respects to the ladies in his usual free and easy manner, expressed some surprise, but no regret, at hearing that he was late, and never deigning any notice of Matthew or myself, took his place beside Miss Dashwood, with whom he conversed in a low undertone. ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... von Balderdash gave some orders in an undertone; the troops opened on the left, and disclosed a row of prisoners, including several women, standing bound and blindfolded against a wall, each one at a distance of several yards from his neighbor. The captain ordered ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... cigarette, blew out the lamp and said the Lord's Prayer in an undertone, but he got no farther than the fifth petition. Then ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... a gloomy dinner for the Freshman, baked funeral meats and he the corpse. Mrs. Perkins gave him a motherly smile and told him in a careful undertone that she was glad he was going to be one of her boys, after which he felt childishly close to tears. He sat out-doors with the others and smoked and joined weakly in the singing. The roses clinging to the porch had never been so sweet; the Rho dog had never nosed so affectionately against ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field
... About this time, or a little later, in the still spring morning, the prairie hens or prairie cocks set up that low, musical cooing or crowing that defies the ear to trace or locate. The air is filled with that soft, mysterious undertone; and, save that a bird is seen here and there flitting low over the ground, the sportsman walks for hours without coming any nearer the source of the ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... knights of Malta, and a few ecclesiastics. I told the Queen it was probably an assemblage of persons residing in the neighbourhood who wished to see her. She rose, opened the window, and appeared in the balcony; immediately all these worthy people said to her, in an undertone: "Courage, Madame; good Frenchmen suffer for you, and with you; they pray for you. Heaven will hear their prayers; we love you, we respect you, we will continue to venerate our virtuous King." The Queen burst into tears, and held her handkerchief ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... well, and recalled in fancy old, youthful Christmases, and pledged mentally many an old friend, and my melancholy was mellowing into a low, sad undertone, when, just as I was raising a glass of wine to my lips, I was startled by a picture at the window-pane. It was a pale, wild, haggard face, in a great cloud of black hair, pressed against the glass. As I looked, it vanished. With a strange thrill ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various
... generally consist of four paragraphs, corresponding to four steps in the medical ceremony. In this case there are five, the last being addressed to the terrapin instead of to a dog. The prayers are recited in an undertone hardly audible at the distance of a few feet, with the exception of the frequent ha, which seems to be used as an interjection to attract attention and is always uttered in a louder tone. The beads—which are here white, symbolic of relief—are of common use in connection ...
— Seventh Annual Report • Various
... piled with papers, some of which were dusty and worn-looking. Carroll instantly conceived the idea that these were Dr. West's property. He took his letter quietly from his pocket; and, when the attention of the others was diverted, laid it on the table, with the remark, in an undertone, audible only ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte
... lounging near her, trying hard not to look bored, elevated his eyebrows as his ear caught the sentence, and addressed her in undertone: "Is Foster hard up? If he is, you are not on his hands yet, Sis; and I'm inclined to think father is good for all the finery you may ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... clerk (who prided himself upon being well read) occupied his seat below the old "three-decker" pulpit, and whenever a quotation or an extract from the classics was introduced into the sermon he, in an undertone, muttered its source, much to the annoyance of the preacher and amusement of the congregation. Despite all protests in private, the thing continued, until one day, the vicar's patience being exhausted, he leant over the pulpit side and immediately exclaimed, "Drat ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... overpowered laughter, for Frank was young and handsome, and full of what he said. It was quite romantic to be talked to like that. She would like to see the men threaten each other. But then—the scandal— father might never get over it. And if he married again? Speaking slowly, and in an undertone so as not to betray herself, she said: "O Frank, I'm sure you would not do ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... Inferno. There was almost no conversation; only once in a while was heard a remark, in a whisper or an undertone, addressed by a player to his neighbor; the only sound was that short, dry rustle of the cards and the crackling of new bank notes, or the tinkle of gold coins making their way round the table from the bank to the players, and from the ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... had given them for Tom, and now they forced a dose of this down the lad's throat. Then they rubbed his hands and wrists. Gradually they saw a change in Tom. He began to breath a little deeper and muttered something in an undertone. ...
— The Rover Boys in Alaska - or Lost in the Fields of Ice • Arthur M. Winfield
... cameo against the shadow of the cut-banks. At his feet another half-breed is wrapped in his blanket, and from here to the bow the boat is strewn with these human cocoons. The reclining friend breaks the silence with a word or two of Cree in an undertone to the steersman, a screech-owl cries, from high overhead drops down that sound which never fails to stir vagrant blood—the "unseen flight of strong hosts prophesying as they go." It is the wild geese feeling the old spring fret even as we feel it. In imagination ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... has become clear, we will set to music pitched in the joyous major our Lord's own words, "I do always the things that are pleasing to Him." And then we will set our lives to that joyous music with its rare undertone of the exquisite minor. It may mean Africa for you, or China for this other one. It may mean a plainer home at home, a simpler wardrobe, a more careful use of money. It may mean a new dominant note in your preaching, and all the ...
— Quiet Talks on Following the Christ • S. D. Gordon
... 'as gawn, sir," said the porter, with a note of reproach in his confidential undertone. The man was a favorite with Raffles, who used him and tipped him with consummate tact, and he knew me ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... Christmas services was 'bout As cold and wuthless kind o' love To offer up as he knowed of; And, as fer him, he railly thought 'At the Good Bein' up above Would think more of us—as he ought— A-stayin' home on sich a day And thankin' of him thataway. And jawed on in an undertone, 'Bout leavin' Lide and Jane alone There on the place, and me not there To oversee 'em, and p'pare The stuffin' for the turkey, and The sass and all, ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow—Book 3 - Christmas Poems from 'round the World • Various
... nave. The choir rose in a body, the nave huddled; Isoult, as she believed, saw Prosper, spear, crest, and shield. Her heart gave a great leap, then stood still. Perhaps there was a flicker in the Abbot's undertone; his lips may have been dry; but his courage was beyond proof. ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett
... her millions that she was placed before me," she said in an undertone to her husband, as soon as the guests had returned to the drawing-room. And, giving orders that her carriage should be summoned immediately, she left the house without speaking to any one, and with the air of a peeress of England outraged in ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa
... sat alway thro' the long day Spinning the weary thread away; And ever said in undertone: "Come, that I be no ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various |
