"Twang" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... stimulated and flattered the audience, pleased to find themselves on such easy terms with the new language. But to Pinchas the idea of peppering his pure Yiddish with such locutions was odious. The Prince of Palestine talking with a twang—how could he permit such an outrage ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... Nature holds her breath before launching upon the world the bitter blasts and blizzards and awful cold of a sub-arctic winter. There are days and days together when the azure of the sky remains unmarred by clouds, and the sun shines uninterruptedly. The air, brilliantly transparent, carries a twang of frost. Evening is bathed in an effulgence of colour. The sky flames in startling reds and yellows blending into opals and turquoise, with the shadowy hills lying in a purple haze in ...
— Troop One of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... speech, she delivered in quiet, Neutral American, the speech that covers the great prairie states and is as near accentless and pure as American English ever is. It branded her Ozark twang as a lie, and a great many other things about her. But it added something very solid to her claims ...
— Vigorish • Gordon Randall Garrett
... sedentary lives. At that time in the evening the Chaussee des Etats-Unis was naturally gay with the landsman's welcome to the sailor on shore. The cafes were crowded both inside and out. Singing came from one and the twang of an instrument from another, all along the quay. Soldiers mingled fraternally with sailors, and pretty young women, mostly bareheaded and neatly dressed in black, mingled with both. It was what a fastidious observer of life might call "low," ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... paradox (it is nothing worse) maybe allowed to pass. But when I heard them twittering in the distance, as I did almost immediately, I had no suspicion of what they were. The voice had nothing of that nasal quality, that Yankee twang, as some people would call it, which I had always associated with the nuthatch family. On the contrary, it was decidedly finchlike,—so much so that some of the notes, taken by themselves, would have been ascribed ...
— A Florida Sketch-Book • Bradford Torrey
... fugitive and ghostly, and we felt ourselves encompassed about as by some great conspiracy. We walked curiously up the little street until we reached the last house in the village, and came out beyond the screen of its wall. At the same instant something sang past my ear like the twang of a Jew's harp, my foot caught in a coil of wire, and I fell headlong. My companion, lagging behind and not yet clear of the friendly wall, stopped dead and cried to me not to stand up. I crawled back among the rubbish to the cover of the house. We took counsel together. To retreat ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... one, William Hannay, killed. Circulated description of John Porter through the country. Tall and lean; when fifteen years old shot a man in a brawl, and went North. Has been absent thirteen years. Assumed the appearance of a Northern man and speaks with the Yankee twang. Father was absent at the time of attack. Captured three hours after. Declares he knows nothing about doings of the gang. Haverley and Corben were friends of his sons. Came and went when they liked. Will be tried on ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... brigantine, and darkness broken only by the paling lights on the schooner and the red glow of the mate's pipe. Then out of the quiet came the sharp twang of a hawser, and the brigantine shivered. Both watchers started up and ran to the side, striving to penetrate the blackness. The lines ran down to their proper bollards, as usual, and the river sluiced swiftly alongside, ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... honourable social service, a conviction that had been her tacit comfort during much distasteful loyalty seemed to shrivel and fade. No doubt the writer was a thwarted blackmailer; even her accustomed mind could distinguish a twang of some such vicious quality in his sentences; but that did not alter the realities he exhibited and exaggerated. There was a description of how Sir Isaac pounced on his managers that was manifestly derived from a manager ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... anger from the hands of Rama of Bhrigu's line that celestial bow that had dealt death to the foremost of Kshatriyas. And, O Bharata, the mighty hero smilingly strung that bow without the least exertion, and with its twang loud as the thunder-rattle, affrighted all creatures. And Rama, the son of Dasaratha, then, addressing Rama of Bhrigu's said, "Here, I have strung this bow. What else, O Brahmana, shall I do for thee?" Then Rama, the son of Jamadagni, ...
— Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 1 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... ugly and Philistine. Well, I dont live in it. I find modern houses ugly. I dont live in them: I have a palace on the grand canal. I find modern clothes prosaic. I dont wear them, except, of course, in the street. My ears are offended by the Cockney twang: I keep out of hearing of it and speak and listen to Italian. I find Beethoven's music coarse and restless, and Wagner's senseless and detestable. I do not listen to them. I listen to Cimarosa, to Pergolesi, to Gluck and ...
— Fanny's First Play • George Bernard Shaw
... pray'd.—the favouring power attends, And from Olympus' lofty tops descends. Bent was his bow, the Grecian hearts to wound;(50) Fierce as he moved, his silver shafts resound. Breathing revenge, a sudden night he spread, And gloomy darkness roll'd about his head. The fleet in view, he twang'd his deadly bow, And hissing fly the feather'd fates below. On mules and dogs the infection first began;(51) And last, the vengeful arrows fix'd in man. For nine long nights, through all the dusky air, The pyres, thick-flaming, shot a dismal glare. But ere the tenth revolving day was ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... then I sang and shouted, Keeping measure as I sped, To the harp-twang of the snow-shoe As it sprang beneath ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... west-country man, thank God! a Wessex man, a citizen of the noblest Saxon kingdom of Wessex, a regular "Angular Saxon," the very soul of me adscriptus glebae. There's nothing like the old country-side for me, and no music like the twang of the real old Saxon tongue, as one gets it fresh from the veritable chaw in the White Horse Vale; and I say with "Gaarge Ridler," the ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... well; thoroughly understanding the text: with clear articulation, and the moderate emphasis proper to room-reading; with the advantage also of never having known the Theatre in his youth, so that he has not picked up the twang of any Actor of the Day. Then he read me King John, which he has some thoughts of editing next after Richard III. And I was reminded of you at Ipswich twenty-eight years ago; and of your Father—his look up at Angiers' Walls as he went out in Act ii. ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble (1871-1883) • Edward FitzGerald
... say to Englishmen travelling in America, don't condescend to the "guessing" and other loose styles of expression, and don't affect the nasal twang. Americans, with all their boast of one man being as good as another, are greatly pleased to entertain or travel with Englishmen having a title, and they pay a marked respect to Britishers who speak in a classical ...
— A start in life • C. F. Dowsett
... corner beneath which was the entrance to the tunnel, was nothing to the uproar which now arose, to the shouts which echoed across the dreary camp, to the reports of rifles which men, almost too aged to work, and employed as guards, let off in every direction. There was the twang of bullets in the air, while the darkness was punctuated by many a spot of flame, which showed where the sentries were doing duty. That commotion brought the Commandant flaring out of his quarters again, stamping his feet with anger, bellowing with passion. It would ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... deserter; "but half the British seamen one falls in with nowadays call themselves Americans, in order to escape serving his Majesty. I rather think this rascal is a Cornish or a Devonshire man; he has the twang and the nasal sing-song of that part of the island. If an American, however, we have a better right to him than the French; speaking our language and being descended from a common ancestry and having a common character, it is quite unnatural ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... and some West Indian bitters," Granet replied. "A chap who often goes to the States brought it back for me. Gives a cocktail the real Yankee twang, he says." ...
— The Kingdom of the Blind • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... The great wall of pines and hemlocks that keep off the west wind from Stillwater stretches black and indeterminate against the sky. At intervals a dull, metallic sound, like the guttural twang of a violin string, rises form the frog-invested swamp skirting the highway. Suddenly the birds stir in their nests over there in the woodland, and break into that wild jargoning chorus with which they herald the advent of ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... And growing up, became the sires Of scribes, commissioners, and triers; Whose bus'ness is, by cunning slight, To cast a figure for mens' light; To find, in lines of beard and face, 1155 The physiognomy of grace; And by the sound and twang of nose, If all be sound within disclose, Free from a crack or flaw of sinning, As men try pipkins by the ringing; 1160 By black caps underlaid with white, Give certain guess at inward light. Which serjeants at the gospel wear, To make the ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... sick!" I heard him shout. "Thought she looked in prime condition at the Springs." (Bush language frequently has a strong twang of cattle ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... we dream our dreams, sentimental little girls that we are! And after a time we open our eyes like kittens on life. I have opened mine, Larry,—very wide open. There isn't a sentimental chord in my being that you can twang any longer.... But we can be good-tempered and sensible about it. Run along now and have your cigar, or go over to the country club and find some one to play billiards,—only let me finish what you are pleased to call my rotten ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... seemed to cause a general overflow of spirits, and they went up the river like a party of children on a merry-making. Sylvia decorated herself with garlands till she looked like a mermaid; Mark, as skipper, issued his orders with the true Marblehead twang; Moor kept up a fire of pun-provoking raillery; Warwick sung like a jovial giant; while the Kelpie danced over the water as if inspired with the universal gayety, and the very ripples seemed to laugh ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... whence he came nor who he was. These deficiencies or drawbacks Lizzie recognised. But it was nothing against him in her judgment that he was a greasy, fawning, pawing, creeping, black-browed rascal, who could not look her full in the face, and whose every word sounded like a lie. There was a twang in his voice which ought to have told her that he was utterly untrustworthy. There was an oily pretence at earnestness in his manner which ought to have told that he was not fit to associate with gentlemen. There was a foulness of demeanour about him which ought ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... they twang on their harp of a thousand strings. At breakfast, this morning, when Jack passed me the corn-bread, I said innocently, 'Why, what have we here?' 'It is manna that fell in the night,' answered Jack, with an exasperating snicker. ...
— A Summer in a Canyon: A California Story • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... twang the elastic wood flung upwards, and the bound man was shot away from its tip with the speed of a lightning flash. He sang through the air, spinning over and over with inconceivable rapidity, and the great crowd of rebels held ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... swagger, along the street, I knew him again at once by his appearance; and, as he came nearer, I saw from his manner that he was intending to stop and speak to me, for he slightly raised his hat and in a soft, melodious voice with a colonial "twang" which was far from being disagreeable, and which, indeed, to my ear gave a certain additional interest to his remarks, he saluted me with "Good ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... It might have frightened the clergymen away. Unfortunately, no sooner had the old-fashioned among his readers begun to show signs of nervousness than he would suddenly feel in the mood for a tune on his Old Testament harp, and, taking it down, would twang from its strings a lay of duty. ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd
... which a condescending landlord has promised them after much negotiation for the week after next. The morning promenade is a wonderful sight; such a host of bilious faces, such an endless variety of eccentric costumes, such a Babel of tongues, among which the shrill twang of our fair American cousins is peculiarly prominent, could be found in no other place in the civilized world. A moralist would assuredly find here abundant food for reflection on the wonderful powers of self-deception possessed by mankind. ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... ere many Days ensue This Sentence not severe; I hang your Husband, Child, 'tis true, But with him hang your Care. Twang dang dillo dee. ...
— The Beggar's Opera - to which is prefixed the Musick to each Song • John Gay
... talking of his plans to seize Tell, and without a dream of danger, for the pass was silent and seemed deserted. But suddenly to his ears came the twang of the bow he had heard before that day; through the air once more winged its way a steel-barbed shaft, the heart of a tyrant, not an apple on a child's head, now its mark. In an instant more Gessler fell from his horse, pierced by Tell's fatal ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... buffoonery for which the general hatred, far more than its humour, secured a hearing. Archbishop Sheldon listened to the mock sermon of a Cavalier who held up the Puritan phrase and the Puritan twang to ridicule in his hall at Lambeth. Duelling and raking became the marks of a fine gentleman; and grave divines winked at the follies of "honest fellows" who fought, gambled, swore, drank, and ended a day of debauchery ...
— History of the English People, Volume VI (of 8) - Puritan England, 1642-1660; The Revolution, 1660-1683 • John Richard Green
... seized the hair-brushes and looking at myself in the glass began to use them. Suddenly a hush fell upon the noise outside, and I heard (the ports of my cabin were thrown open)—I heard a deep calm voice, not on board my ship, however, hailing resolutely in English, but with a strong foreign twang, "Go ahead!" ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad
... the cook—bang, twang! went the bell as he spoke. "Oh, listen to him!" said Mick: "for the tendher mercy o' ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... apology for presenting this little book to the public, feeling sure from our past experience, that it will be kindly welcomed by a great many lovers of their "native twang." THE PUBLISHERS. ...
— Yorkshire Ditties, Second Series - To which is added The Cream of Wit and Humour - from his Popular Writings • John Hartley
... tall man with a very nasal twang to bless the humble fare set before them, and a very long prayer followed before the benches were drawn closer to the board, and the large bowls of bread and milk, flavoured with strips of onion, were attacked by the hungry brethren ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... I nodded; and as the executioner clapped his heels together, straightened himself, and drew the arrow to his ear, we heard a low twang! And saw the black hand of the Seneca pinned to his own bow by ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... wave, far ahead the boys could see the lights of the Brutus. Only for a second, however, for the next minute she would vanish in the trough of a huge comber, and then they could hear the strained towing cable "twang" like an overstretched ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... snapping his fingers, "and hey for the life I love! Away with tanbark and filthy vats and foul cowhides! I will follow thee to the ends of the earth, good master, and not a herd of dun deer in all the forest but shall know the sound of the twang of ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... been an Indian of North or South America, instead of an Indian of the "East Indies," he would have pierced those fishes with an arrow at every twang of his bow. ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid
... Hampstead Road, the house which Kit enveloped in an inimitable air of domesticity. Her past had not been unconnected with the minor stage. She could play on the piano from ear, and sing the songs of the street with a charming cockney twang. But there was nothing of the stage about her now. She was born for domesticity and, as the wife of Malim, she wished to forget all that had gone before. She even hesitated to give us her wonderful imitations of the customers at the fried fish shop, because ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse
... I should take exception to the guffaw? Ten years ago I too guffawed, though I hope with not quite the Kensingtonian twang. The first Cezannes I ever saw seemed to me to be very funny. They did not disturb my dreams, because I was not in the business. But my notion about Cezanne was that he was a fond old man who distracted ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... if you mean to liue my yeares: but happy the father that begot thee, and thrise happy the Nurse that soffred such a toward yonker as thy selfe: I know thy vertues as well as thy selfe, thou hast a superficiall twang of a little something: an Italian ribald can not vomit out the infections of the world, but thou my pretty Iuuinall, an English Dorrell-lorrell, must lick it vp for restoratiue, & putrifie thy gentle brother ouer against thee, with the vilde impostumes ...
— The Art of Iugling or Legerdemaine • Samuel Rid
... first schoolmaster was a decrepit old man who went by the name of "Bowed Johnnie Ker,"—a Cameronian, with a nasal twang, which his pupils learnt much more readily than they did his lessons in reading and arithmetic, notwithstanding a liberal use of "the tawse." Yet Johnnie had a taste for music, and taught his pupils to SING their reading lessons, which was reckoned quite a novelty in education. ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... she had to attend lectures and demonstrations. There she met the doctors and students. Well, a pretty lot they were, one way and another. When she had put on flesh and become pink and bouncing she was just their sort: just their very ticket. Her voice had the right twang, her eyes the right roll, her haunches the right swing. She seemed altogether just the ticket. ...
— The Lost Girl • D. H. Lawrence
... sense of smell, in its ordinary state, much connexion with our present subject. Mr. Aubrey tells us, indeed, of an apparition which disappeared with a curious perfume as well as a most melodious twang; and popular belief ascribes to the presence of infernal spirits a strong relish of the sulphureous element of which they are inhabitants. Such accompaniments, therefore, are usually united with other materials for imposture. If, as a general opinion assures us, which is not ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... nor to be ashamed of. You can tell an Irishman from a Londoner by his accent; so you can a Scotchman; or a Yorkshireman for that matter: why should you not be able to tell an American? The error of your countrymen consists in attributing to all our people the nasal twang, which is almost peculiar to one section of the country. If I were asked the peculiar characteristic of a New-Yorker's speech, I should say monotone. Notice any one of our young men—you will find his conversational voice pitched in the same key. Sumner goes on ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... orders a 'pot' of some local brewer's manufacture—a man who knows exactly what he likes, and arranges to meet the hardy digestion of the mower and the reaper. He prefers a rather dark beer with a certain twang faintly suggestive of liquorice and tobacco, with a sense of 'body,' a thickness in it, and which is no sooner swallowed than a clammy palate demands a second gulp to wash away the relics of the first. Ugh! The second requires a third swig, and still a fourth, and ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... any Hottentot twang, if that's what you mean. Nor did he say, "Caesar and Pompey berry much alike, 'specially Pompey," which is the only specimen of negro language I can ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... Denham was as handsome as Cleopatra, to-night. Little Maurice is now singing to her. Did he take his guitar under his arm? It was here; for I saw a green bag near his hat, when we came in to-night.' Just then we heard the twang of a guitar under the window, and Redmond, in spite of himself, could not help a grimace.—Is it not a droll world?" said Laura, after a pause; "things come about ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... a lie then, and you believed her!' we heard a loud voice with a marked nasal twang say a minute later. 'To begin with, it wasn't at the big club but ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... lighter-coloured and newer material; also a very dirty coloured cotton shirt, open in front, and showing a large expanse of hairy chest. His voice was husky from much swearing at profligate cattle, and there was a curious nasal twang in his tone, a sort of affectation of Americanism that was a departure from the ordinary ...
— An Outback Marriage • Andrew Barton Paterson
... technical shortcomings might be, he could make any tune sound pretty when he sang it. He had the native gift of ease, pathos, rhythm, humor, and charm—and a delightful sympathetic twang in his voice. His mother must have sung something like that; and all Paris went mad about her. No technical teaching in the world can ever match a genuine inheritance; and ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... and dead grandchildren peopling the barge, and waving their hands to her in solemn measure; then, as the rope tightened and came up, dropping diamonds, it seemed to vibrate into two parallel ropes and strike her, with a twang, though it was far off. When she looked again, there was no barge, no river, no daylight, and a man whom she had never before seen held a candle close to ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... neutral inflections of his voice struck upon Sara's keyed-up consciousness as an indifferent finger may twang the stretched strings of a violin, producing a shuddering violation of ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... fire, for Ti-hi, without waiting for orders, drew an arrow to its head, the bow-string gave a loud twang, and the next instant we saw a savage bound from the ledge where he had hidden and run across the intervening space, club in one hand, bow in the other, yelling ...
— Bunyip Land - A Story of Adventure in New Guinea • George Manville Fenn
... he heard the metallic twang of a stringed instrument in the Mission garden beyond his own, and remembered his contiguity to the church with a stir of defiance. But he was relieved, nevertheless. His pent-up emotion had found vent, and without the nervous excitement that had followed his old exaltation. That night he slept better. ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... of the hill, with a dip of green meadow-land below them, rising on the other side into coppices. The twang of the horn, and the babbling cry of the hounds, reminded Albinia that the hunting season had begun, and looking over a gate, she watched the parti-coloured forms of the dogs glancing among the brushwood opposite, and an ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... he twang-ed straightway, And thereon began most sweetly to play; And after that lessons were played two or three, He strained out ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various
... but I do not know what train of thought my casual remark had suggested in him, for presently he began to speak. He spoke in a low voice, without any expression, but his accents were educated, and it was a relief to hear him after the twang and the vulgar intonations which for some time had ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... that it deepens the desolation—a mind unredeemed by virtue save in the shape of remorse—unvisited by weakness, until it came transmuted into the tiger of madness—whose very sermons were satires on God and man—whose very prayers had a twang of blasphemy—whose loves were more loathsome than his hatreds, and yet over whose blasted might and most miserable and withered heart men mourn, while they shudder, blend tears with anathemas, and agree that the awful mystery ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... garments, with hair dishevelled and sparkling eyes, proclaiming the advent of the god: "'Tis he! we saw him shoot athwart the temple's vault, which opened under his feet; and with him were two virgins, who issued from the temples of Artemis and Athena. We saw them with our eyes. We heard the twang of their bows, and the clash of their armor." Hearing these cries and the roar of the tempest, the Greeks dash on—the Gauls are panic-stricken, and rush headlong down the bill. The Greeks push on in pursuit. Rumors of fresh apparitions are spread; ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... can of milk, saying, with a twang: "Show me the way that I may walk therein," and, accompanied by the laughing girl, made rapid way to the pig-pen just as the old man set up a ferocious shout to call the hired ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... always shy of this young person, because, having an acute brain and generous impulses, and being a New-Englander by birth, she had believed herself called to be a reformer, and had lectured in public last winter. Her lightest remarks had, somehow, an oratorical twang. The man might have seen what a true, grand face hers would be, when time had taken off the acrid, aggressive heat which the, to her, novel wrongs in ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... a little. The spicy twang of the sassafras was yet on her tongue. "I'm afraid you won't give her back ...
— Young Lucretia and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins
... glance. This shaft had also gone wide of the mark, and he was not the man to bother about stray arrows. Upon my word, he was too unsuspecting; he was not fair game. I was glad that my missile had been thrown away,—that he had not even heard the twang ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... screaming, yelling, like the Indian war-whoop, cheering, and the thundering noise of the planks, grating along the deck, together with the ringing and clattering of their metallic vessels, they made altogether such a hideous "rattle-come-twang," that it was enough to raise all Chatham. All this was transacted in utter darkness. The officers doubtless saw, that bloodshed and promiscuous death would be the consequence of firing among the rioters, and prudently left it to subside with the darkness ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... took to swamp. Four of posse wounded; one, William Hannay, killed. Circulated description of John Porter through the county. Tall and lean; when fifteen years old shot a man in a brawl, and went north. Has been absent thirteen years. Assumed the appearance of a northern man and speaks with Yankee twang. Father was absent at the time of attack. Captured three hours after. Declares he knows nothing about doings of the gang. Haverley and Corben were friends of his sons. Came and went when they liked. Will be tried ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... heard scarce a note. There were quartettos and overtures by gentlemen performers whose names and faces I know not, and such was the never ceasing rattling and noise in the card-room, where I was kept almost all the evening, that a general humming of musical sounds, and now and then a twang, was ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... absolutely the same, and it takes the form of one vowel or another, solely according to the shape which the "resonator" assumes, and which may be described as a mould into which the tone is cast. The quality of the voice also—its throatiness, its nasal twang, its shrillness, harshness, and ugliness, or its purity, roundness, fulness, and beauty—depend mainly upon the nature of the resonator, and upon the way in which we work it. It is, therefore, a matter of the highest ...
— The Mechanism of the Human Voice • Emil Behnke
... in. Lanpher plucked at the loose strings of his courage, and managed to draw out a faintly responsive twang. "I'll show you whether ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... the main supports, and threading the starlight as they came. Night slowly brought her beauty and her mystery upon the world. The filmy pattern opened. There was a tautness in the lines that made one feel they would twang with delicate music if the wind swept its hand more rapidly across them. And now and again all vibrated, each line making an ellipse between its fastened ends, then gradually settling back to its thin, almost invisible bed. Cables of thick, elastic ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... cordiality of Martin's greeting. A quarter of an hour elapsed before anything of note occurred. Then, an elderly man whom I did not know, a farmer, by his dress, drew a copy of the "Kiota Tribune" from his pocket, and, stretching it towards Johnson, asked with a very marked Yankee twang: ...
— Elder Conklin and Other Stories • Frank Harris
... recollect driving down (with a certain trunk and carpet-bag on the box) with my own mother to the end of the avenue, where we waited—only a few minutes—until the whirring wheels of that "Defiance" coach were heard rolling towards us as certain as death. Twang goes the horn; up goes the trunk; down come the steps. Bah! I see the autumn evening: I hear the wheels now: I smart the cruel smart again: and, boy or man, have never been able to bear the sight of ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... we are trying to find was tall," said Merritt quickly, "and has a slight cast in his left eye. He talks with something of a twang, as though he ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... hot iron fly; A golden eagle on a screen their mark, So distant that it seemed a sparrow's size— "For," said the prince, "let not this joyful day Give anguish to the smallest living thing." They strain their bows until their muscles seem Like knotted cords, the twelve strings twang at once, And the ground trembles as at the swelling tones Of mighty organs or the thunder's roll. Two arrows pierce the eagle, while the rest All pierce the screen. A second mark was set, When lo! high up in air two lines of swans, Having one leader, seek ...
— The Dawn and the Day • Henry Thayer Niles
... "meal of victuals," and they said "dooty" and "roomor" and "noos" and "clawg," and sometimes would pop out "his'n" and "her'n." Several of the Stenes had been in business thirty years in metropolitan Chicago, yet they spoke in the twang of a Yankee hill-country. The women of the family were famous housekeepers—too neat to keep a cat lest there might be a cat hair on the carpet, and never liking visitors unless there was a dreadful note of preparation, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... Spartanburg, or Charlotte, or Greenville; there were masculine boots which yet bore incrusted upon their heels the red mud of Aiken or of Camden; there was one fat, jewelled exhalation who spoke of Palm Beach with the true stockyard twang, and looked as if she swallowed a million every morning for breakfast, and God knows how many more for the ensuing repasts; she was the only detestable specimen among us; sunbonnets, boots, and ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... in your charge, Walter, and do with him as you will. Guard well lest he betray us once again. Take him from my sight, for his breath poisons the room. And now, Nigel, if that worthy graybeard of thine would fain twang his harp or sing to us—but what in God's name ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... at her speculatively. "Well," he said at length, speaking with something of a twang, "I guess your father knows what he's about, but it beats me to understand why he has me here to study. ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... following the advice of James Montgomery. Fluent ease, often on the verge of twaddle, with here and there a bright, felicitous touch, with here and there a smack of the conventional hymn-book and pulpit twang—such weak and characterless effusions are all that is left of the passion-ridden pseudo-genius of Haworth. Real genius is perhaps seldom of ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson
... on to camp, but Fox-eye would not turn back. He drew his arrows from the quiver, and prepared to fight. But, even as he placed an arrow, a Snake had crawled up by his side, unseen. In the still air, the Piegan heard the sharp twang of a bow string, but, before he could turn his head, the long, fine-pointed arrow pierced him through and through. The bow and arrows dropped from his hands, he swayed, and then fell forward on the grass, dead. But now the warriors ...
— Blackfoot Lodge Tales • George Bird Grinnell
... effective use of chords, arpeggio passages, octaves and tenths, double and triple harmonics and succession of harmonics in thirds and in sixths. His long fingers were of invaluable service to him in unusual stretches, and his fondness for pizzicato passages may be traced to his familiarity with the twang of his father's mandolin. He shone chiefly in his own compositions, which were written in keys best suited to the violin. Students will find all that he knew of his instrument and everything he did in his Le Stregghe (The Witches), the Rondo de la Clochette, ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore
... one does not have to go to the woods or away from his own door to see and hear, is the hardy and ever- welcome meadowlark. What a twang there is about this bird, and what vigor! It smacks of the soil. It is the winged embodiment of the spirit of our spring meadows. What emphasis in its "z-d-t, z-d-t" and what character in its long, piercing ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... The Senator spoke with a clear, sonorous voice, no doubt with a twang, but so audibly as to satisfy the room in general. "I shall not," he said, "dwell much on your form of government. Were I to praise a republic I might seem to belittle your throne and the lady who ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... shock 'em, a ginger-beer bottle or "Bass," Wot 'appens to drop 'mong the lilies, or gets chucked aside on the grass, Makes 'em gasp like a frog in a frying-pan. Br-r-r-r! Wot old mivvies they are! Got nerves like a cobweb, I reckon, a smart Banjo-twang makes ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 15, 1891 • Various
... 'ar sand agrittin' between my teeth, I don't know but it was wicked, but I e'en a'most wished that there wouldn't never be another wreck!'" Lowell told the story with all the humour possible, rendering the deacon's remark with a twang and an emphatic dwelling on the double negative (a thing which Lowell believed we had suffered to drop out of polite speech unfortunately) with inimitable effect and most evident enjoyment. The substratum of the man was Yankee but ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... a voice startlingly like Harris's. It was Meeker, or Thirkle, as his men called him, imitating the high-pitched nasal twang of ...
— The Devil's Admiral • Frederick Ferdinand Moore
... confiscated, would comprise a jew's-harp, a bit of catgut, screws whittled out of wood, tacks, spools, pins, and the like. But when robbed of all these he could generally secrete a piece of elastic, which, when put between his teeth and stretched to its utmost capacity, would yield a delightful twang when played upon with the forefinger. He could also fashion an interesting musical instrument in his desk by means of spools and catgut and bits of broken glass. The chief joy of his life was an old tuning-fork that the ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin
... practised at the glass. I seek divine simplicity in him Who handles things divine; and all beside, Though learned with labour, and though much admired By curious eyes and judgments ill-informed, To me is odious as the nasal twang Heard at conventicle, where worthy men, Misled by custom, strain celestial themes Through the prest nostril, spectacle-bestrid. Some, decent in demeanour while they preach, That task performed, relapse into themselves, And having spoken wisely, ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... voice that spoke, soft and wheedling, yet with a certain unpleasant twang in it. She spoke to Melody, who sat still, with folded hands, and head bowed ...
— Melody - The Story of a Child • Laura E. Richards
... all. Van Koppen was described as a brisk, genial, talkative old fellow, rather fat, with a clear complexion, sound teeth, shrubby grey beard, a twang barely sufficient to authenticate his transatlantic descent, and the digestion of a boa-constrictor. He was tremendously fond of buttered tea-cakes—so the Duchess said; a man who, in the words of Madame Steynlin, "really appreciated good music" ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... Pinkethman, and the distressed air of Wilks; but soon the joke grew tiresome, and hisses became distinctly audible. By assuming as melancholy an expression as he could, and exclaiming with a strong nasal twang: "Odds, I fear I'm wrong," Pinkethman was enabled to restore the good-humour of his patrons. It would seem that on other occasions he was compelled to make some similar apology for his misdemeanours. "I have often thought," Cibber writes, "that a good ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... to his bowstring, and drew it to his ear. Then, as Fion shot forward his outstretched hands, casting a vivid light from his finger-tips over the surface of the sea, the arrow sped with a twang and a whiz. ...
— Edmund Dulac's Fairy-Book - Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations • Edmund Dulac
... after much the same fashion all the world over. Few Baltimorean voices are free from a perceptible accent; it is more marked in the gentler sex, but rarely so strong as to be disagreeable. The ear is never offended by the New England twang, or Connecticut drawl, and some tones rang true ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... talked, while there was the Southern accent to some extent, they missed that twang and peculiar type of expression so common ...
— The House Boat Boys • St. George Rathborne
... head, and clapped his upon my own, and burst out a-laughing again; upon which we all fell a-laughing for half an hour. One of the Honest Fellows got behind me in the interim, and hit me a sound slap on the back; upon which he got the laugh out of my hands, and it was such a twang on my shoulders, that I confess he was much merrier than I. I was half angry; but resolved to keep up the good humour of the company; and after holloing as loud as I could possibly, I drank off a bumper ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... which we have never before had occasion to speak: he was a first-class mimic; and he took no little pride in showing off his powers. He could imitate the brogue of an Irishman the broken English of a Dutchman, or the nasal twang of a Yankee, to perfection; and one day, while he was in the barn saddling his horse, he carried on a lengthy conversation with Bob Kelly (who was on the outside of the building), about some runaway cattle, and the old trapper thought all the ...
— Frank Among The Rancheros • Harry Castlemon
... shall chase his shadow and his mate the panther call. From the prairies and the regions where the pine-plumed forest grows Shall arise the tawny legions with their lances and their bows; And again the cries of battle shall resound along the plain, Bows shall twang and quivers rattle, women wail their warriors slain; And by lodge-fire lowly burning shall the mother from afar List her warrior's steps returning from the daring deeds ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... his animal with a checkered enamelled leather brow-band visible half a mile away—a black-and-white checkered brow-band! They can't do it, any more than an Englishman, by taking cold, can add that indescribable nasal twang to ...
— American Notes • Rudyard Kipling
... for the boom of the fairy bassoon, And the oboes and horns as they strike up a tune, And the twang of the harps and the sigh of the lutes, And the clash of the cymbals, the purl of the flutes; And the fiddles sail in To the musical din, While the chief all on fire, with a flame for a hand, Rattles on the gay measure and ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann
... relations, and becomes a minaret from whose balcony an invisible muezzin calls the Faithful to prayer. "Prayer is better than sleep." But what is this? A shuffle of feet on the pavement, a low hum of voices, a twang of some diabolical instrument, a preliminary hem and cough. Heavens! it cannot be! Ah, ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... and hand me the sugar—how do I get on? This is No 15,' said Appleboy, counting some white lines on the table by him; and taking up a piece of chalk, he marked one more line on his tally. 'I don't think this is so good a tub as the last, Tomkins, there's a twang about it—a want of juniper; however, I hope we shall have better luck this time. Of course you ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... enough to keep down his boyish gaiety, which he sometimes manifested by teasing his womenfolk. One of his favourite methods of doing this was to station himself on a chair in front of us, and, with his brown eyes lighted up with a whimsical smile, talk broad Scotch, in a Highland nasal twang, by the hour, until we cried for mercy. Yet he was decidedly sensitive about that same Scotch, and his feelings were much wounded by hearing me express a horror of reading it ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... brown; the reed is of medium width, well developed, and nearly equal all over, and it is singularly bowed from bottom to top, meeting, when joined (for it is in two parts), just as will a string of a violin when you hold it in both hands, and twang it to test its ...
— Violin Making - 'The Strad' Library, No. IX. • Walter H. Mayson
... one knee, bracing himself as firmly as he could against the rock, and, with his shield above his head and his sword in his hand, awaited the attack of the enraged animal. He heard the twang of the bow behind him; then he felt a mighty blow, which beat down his shield and descended with terrible force upon his helmet, throwing him forward on to his face. Then there was a heavy blow on his back; and it was ...
— The Young Carthaginian - A Story of The Times of Hannibal • G.A. Henty
... may never know such prosperity. I do not wish to be murdered; no man does; yet rather than see the ostrich and deer chased beyond the horizon, the flamingo and black-necked swan slain on the blue lakes, and the herdsman sent to twang his romantic guitar in Hades as a preliminary to security of person, I would prefer to go about prepared at any moment to defend my life against the sudden assaults ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson
... hours upon them with complacency. But when I see an archer in the very act of discharging his arrow, a dancer with one foot in the air, or a gladiator extending his fist to all eternity, I grow tired, and ask, When will they perform what they are about? When will the bow twang? the foot come to the ground? or the fist meet its adversary? Such wearisome attitudes I can view with admiration, but never with pleasure. The wrestlers, for example, in the same apartment, filled me with disgust: I cried out, For heaven's sake! give the throw, and have ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... was inexpressibly calm and peaceful—yet it was busy with sound and with movement. Rooks, those sanctimonious humbugs, circled overhead, cawing thieves' warnings, that had the twang of sermons, to other rooks, out of sight in neighbouring seed-fields. Lapwings, humbugs too, but humbugs in a prettier cause, started from the shrubberies where their eggs were hidden, and fluttered lamely towards the open. Sparrows innumerable were holding their ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... pricked up his ears at the sound of the slow rumble of a wagon turning into the yard. The wagon halted, and they heard the buzzing twang ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... saying ye arren't famous," he said. His voice had the faint, infinitely sweet twang of certain Irishry; a thing as delicate and intangible as the scent of lime flowers. "Our noble friend"—he indicated Carlos with a little flutter of one white hand—"has told me what make of a dare-devil gallant ye are; breaking the skulls of half the Bow Street runners for the sake of a friend ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... his voice got hold of those who heard him, and once more the big building rang with cheering. As the sound of hearty acclamation died away there was a great clatter of thrust-back benches through which the tuning of a fiddle broke. Then out of the tentative twang of strings rose, clear and silvery, the lament of Flora Macdonald, thrilling with melancholy, and there were men and women there whose hearts went back to the other wild and misty land of rock and pine and frothing river which they had left far away ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss
... I was serving her in the shop—that is, when I've seen her get out of a carriage! There has been luck to many a chap like me, in the same line of speculation: look at Tom Tarnish—how did he get Miss Twang, the rich pianoforte-maker's daughter?—and now he's cut the shop, and lives at Hackney, like a regular gentleman! Ah! that was a stroke! But somehow it hasn't answered with me yet; the gals don't take! How I have set my eyes to be sure, and ogled them!—All of them don't ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... there should turn out to be no such person as Dr. Ferguson?" exclaimed another voice, with a malicious twang. ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... more "get along" without his spice of cant, than without his chew of tobacco and his nasal twang. What follows, however, ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... snapped down to his right Colt. A blaze of flame leaped from the region of his hip. Along with the crashing roar of the explosion came a sharp, metallic twang. ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens
... arms and sat down. Some late roisterers passing by in the street were heard singing to the twang of a mandolin. It was a full, deep song, and the casual voices blended in perfect accord. As the harmony floated out of hearing, she looked up at ...
— Other Things Being Equal • Emma Wolf
... table; while Billy Grey and Ludwig Wolfen stood on the top of it and sang, or tried to sing, 'Home Sweet Home'; and the writer of this memory of those old Pacific days sat in a chair in the doorway and wondered where we should all be the next year. For, as we sang and danced, and the twang, twang of Sera's guitar sounded through the silent night without, Tom Devine, the American, held up his hand to MacBride, and ...
— Ridan The Devil And Other Stories - 1899 • Louis Becke
... the Canton of the Grisons made me familiar with all sorts of Valtelline wine; with masculine but rough Inferno, generous Forzato, delicate Sassella, harsher Montagner, the raspberry flavour of Grumello, the sharp invigorating twang of Villa. The colour, ranging from garnet to almandine or ruby, told me the age and quality of wine; and I could judge from the crust it forms upon the bottle, whether it had been left long enough ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... the voiceless voices of the night were shouting riotously. The wind came suffing through the swaying arms of the bearded waving hemlocks—Druid priests officiating at some age-old sacrament. Then a night-hawk swerved past with a hum of wings like the twang of a harp string. ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... says it has not exactly the genuine twang, but I hope no one will observe that but himself. I have more incidents in it than usual in works of the class—an elopement, a divorce, a duel, a ...
— Mr. Hogarth's Will • Catherine Helen Spence
... Go, Sir Andrew; scout me for him at the corner of the orchard, like a bum-baily. So soon as ever thou see'st him, draw; and as thou drawest, swear horrible; for it comes to pass oft, that a terrible oath, with a swaggering accent sharply twang'd off, gives manhood more approbation than ever proof itself would have ...
— Twelfth Night; or, What You Will • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... claret, here, eh, Silverbridge?" He could never hit off his familiarity quite right. He had my-Lorded his young friend at first, and now brought out the name with a hesitating twang, which the young nobleman appreciated. But then the young nobleman was quite aware that the Major was a friend for club purposes, and sporting purposes, ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... with hands on hips, Girls in bloom of cheek and lips, Wild-eyed, free-limbed, such as chase Bacchus round some antique vase, Brief of skirt, with ankles bare, Loose of kerchief and loose of hair, With conch-shells blowing and fish-horns' twang, Over and over the Maenads sang: "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt, Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt By the women ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... white, though many had gone close to it, when Nicholas Alwyn stepped forward; and there was something so unwarlike in his whole air, so prim in his gait, so careful in his deliberate survey of the shaft and his precise adjustment of the leathern gauntlet that protected the arm from the painful twang of the string, that a general burst of laughter from the bystanders attested their anticipation ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Now don't aggravate me. I say Mary Jane shan't learn to sing and plant another instrument of torture in this house, while I'm boss of the family. Her voice is just like yours; it's got a twang to it like blowing on the edge ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... about these women, from the youngest to the oldest, and with hardly an exception. In spite of their piety, they could twang off an oath with Sir Toby Belch in person. There was nothing so high or so low, in heaven or earth or in the human body, but a woman of this neighbourhood would whip out the name of it, fair and square, by way of conversational adornment. My landlady, who was pretty ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... may be described as The Dove of our colony. He is almost as great a pasha among the ladies as Bulbul. They crowd in flocks to see him at Saint Waltheof's, where the immense height of his forehead, the rigid asceticism of his surplice, the twang with which he intones the service, and the namby-pamby mysticism of his sermons, have turned all the dear girls' heads for some time past. While we were having a rubber at Mrs. Chauntry's, whose daughters are following the new mode, I heard the following talk (which ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... His features were unusually expressive and mobile from his somewhat scornful mouth to his deep-set, observant eyes, and clearly denoted the absence of the stolid Saxon strain in his blood. His accent too, though not that of an educated man, was quite free from the hateful Cockney twang. His dress was spare as his figure, but though well worn there was something spruce and trim about his whole demeanour which indicated that he was not totally indifferent to the impression he created on ...
— A Girl Among the Anarchists • Isabel Meredith
... speaking eyebrows and replied, quite loud now, for the choir leader had stood up already with his tuning-fork in hand, and one could hear it faintly twang: ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... pious burst, he proceeds to a castigation of the English for their observations on the nasal twang of his countrymen, and also for their criticism upon the sense in which sundry adjectives are used; and, to show the superior purity of the American language, he informs the reader that in England "the most elegant and refined ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... of this is why, for years afterwards, lanky, easy-going Bushmen, riding lazily past Dave's camp, would cry, in a lazy drawl and with just a hint of the nasal twang— ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... Witt and his secretary had been called and had filled the court with the echoing twang of New York (the controlled fury of the aged Witt was highly effective), Mrs. Henry Leek was invited to the witness-box. She was supported thither by her two curates, who, however, could not prevent her from weeping at the stern ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... tracks. If aeronautics is to be made popular, every one must be able to take part in it. It must cease to be a highly specialized business. It must be put on a basis where the ordinary person can snap the flying wires of a machine, listen to their twang, and know them to be true, just as any one now thumps his rear tire to see whether it is ...
— Opportunities in Aviation • Arthur Sweetser
... the middle. It was just like one of Tadema's pictures on the move—barring the brougham! The players led the way in white, with the dark wood chanters mounted with silver bells and mouthpieces, and made music with a little of the twang of our pipe chanter, but without the continuity and lift or crisp grace-notes. Young girls, with their faces tinted yellow with saffron, followed in dull red dresses. Behind the procession were classical-looking ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... the Yankees in this country that I was rather agreeably surprised by the few specimens of native Americans that I have seen. They were for the most part, polite, well-behaved people. The only peculiarities I observed in them were a certain nasal twang in speaking, and some few odd phrases; but these were only used by the lower class, who "guess" and "calculate" a little more than we do. One of their most remarkable terms is to "Fix." Whatever work requires to be done it must be fixed. "Fix the room" is, set it in order. "Fix the ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... trumpeter of a French cavalry corps had a fine charger assigned to him, of which he became passionately fond, and which, by gentleness of disposition and uniform docility, equally evinced its affection. The sound of the trumpeter's voice, the sight of his uniform, or the twang of his trumpet, was sufficient to throw this animal into a state of the greatest excitement; and he appeared to be pleased and happy only when under the saddle of his rider. Indeed he was unruly and useless to every body else; for once, on being removed to another part of the forces, and consigned ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... simple hearts to one another! Magdalen had called on the Sisters and asked them to tea at the Goyle, and there had come to the conclusion that Sister Beata was an admirable, religious, hardworking woman, of strong opinions, and not much cultivated, with a certain provincial twang in her voice. She had a vehement desire for self-devotion and consecration, but perhaps not the same for obedience. She sharply criticised all the regulations of the Sisterhoods with which she was acquainted, wore a dress of her own device, ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... condition, quality, goodness, or badness, of the wine. One tried it with the tip of his tongue; the other only put it to his nose. The first said the wine savored of iron; the second said it had rather a twang of goat's leather. The owner protested that the vessel was clean, and the wine neat, so that it could not taste either of iron or leather. Notwithstanding this, the two famous tasters stood positively to what they had said. Time went ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... speaks my mind,' said Elnathan, with a half-sanctimonious, half-waggish look, and slight nasal twang. ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... you's out o' sorts. Haan' I got nof'n berrer to do dan be tellin' tales ob old women dat's a-waitin' for de Lord's salvation?" said Flor, with a twang of great gravity,—and proceeded thereat to make her exit in a series of lively somersaults through the room and over ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various
... the first, speaking with a nasal twang I couldn't quite place. "Will it take this bit of a ...
— The Man Who Drove the Car • Max Pemberton
... passed away, Like a tide. Doors are open, windows wide. Why in stuffy London stay?" Sing the Sirens (slyboots they!) With a Tennysonian twang, To the Tourist, (Not the poorest You may bet your bottom dollar, Which those Sirens aim to "collar." Demoiselles, excuse ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, August 6, 1892 • Various
... only one wire cut from it. With this strand he made a joint so that the two ends of the despatcher's wire could be brought in easy contact. Then by knocking the two ends together he sent the warning. His cutting of the wire had made a peculiar loud twang and one of the outlaws heard it. Becoming suspicious, he and his partner started up the track to investigate. They came upon Dick, kneeling on one knee, engrossed in his work, and without one word of warning shot him in the back. They left him for dead, but thank ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... was his second whaling trip, he said, and he wanted no more. I told him I was glad to learn that he was a countryman of mine, but not surprised. His speech was well-larded with americanisms, "but," said I, "the true twang is wanting, and," added I, laughing, "I should know you for Hampshire for all your reckons and guesses if I had to eat you should I ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell
... instantly there was a low musical "twang," like that caused by the striking of a Jew's harp, or the quick vibration of a piece of watch-spring; a sharp click followed, and something was heard to fall on to the ebony floor ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... I, sir, I that can do Mungo to the very life. Now I say, boys, with what feeling could I pour out from my heart and soul, "Oh cussa heart of my old massa—him damn impudence and his cuss assurance." This he followed with a spirited twang of "Dear heart" on the violin, accompanying it with the words. Again a noise was heard. "What can it be?" said one. "What can it be?" said another. There was a push at the door. "Oh!" cried Hodgkinson, "it's only one of the hogs that roam about the alley, who, having more taste ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol. I. No. 3. March 1810 • Various
... of life from the village, which lay a half-mile back; no roll of wheels, or shout, or peal of bell. Burr Gordon kept on in utter silence until he came near the Hautville house. Then he began to hear music: the soaring sweetness of a soprano voice, the rich undertone of a bass, and the twang ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... grave people of thirty years ago. The deep bass note which once pealed from the belfry with a solemn and solitary dignity of sound has now lost it all amid the jangle of a half-dozen bells of lighter and airier twang. Even the parson himself will not be that grave man of stately bearing, who met the rarest fun only benignantly, and to whom all the villagers bowed,—but some new creature full of the logic of the schools and the latest conventionalisms of manner. The homespun disciples ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... TWANG. I reckon so. Our Guvner takes a crazy sight more pains than I would to sweetin thet ragin' devil Tecumseh's temper. I'd sweetin it wi' sugar o lead ef ...
— Tecumseh: A Drama • Charles Mair
... smiling bland, He yields them to her curious hand, When, instant, twang! the arrow flew, So just her aim, it pierced him through, Right through his heart, the luckless lad! (A heart, to do him right, he had); All prone he lies, in throbbing anguish, Through many an hour to pine and languish, And ...
— Poems (1828) • Thomas Gent
... to pass that this time there lived in the Manhattoes a jolly, robustious trumpeter, named Anthony Van Corlear, famous for his long wind; and who, as the story goes, could twang so potently upon his instrument that the effect upon all within hearing was like that ascribed to the Scotch bagpipe when it sings right lustily ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... Boozenberg had his little theory of Boniface Newt, which, unlike that worthy commission merchant, he did not impart to his ma and the partner of his bosom, but locked up in the vault of his own breast. Mr. Van B. gloried in being what he called a self-made man. He was proud of his nasal twang and his want of grammar, and all amenities and decencies of speech. He regarded them as inseparable from his success. He even affected them in the company of those who were peculiarly elegant, and was secretly suspicious of the mercantile paper ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... was close to the crimson curtain,—the sexual division of the boat, —behind which I continually heard whispers and stealthy footsteps; the noise of a comb laid on the table or a slipper dropped on the floor; the twang, like a broken harp-string, caused by loosening a tight belt; the rustling of a gown in its descent; and the unlacing of a pair of stays. My ear seemed to have the properties of an eye; a visible image pestered my fancy in the darkness; the curtain was withdrawn between me and the Western ...
— Sketches From Memory (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... such fancies, I sat on the side of my bed, I heard, the first time for a long while, the music beneath my window. At the first twang of the guitar a ray of light darted into my soul. I opened the window, and called down softly, that I was awake. "Pst, pst!" was the answer from below. Without more ado, I thrust the note into my pocket, took ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... towards the approaching cutter, as, snatching off his wide white Panama hat, he passed one duck-covered white arm across his yellowish-looking hairless face and shouted fiercely and in a peculiar twang— ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn
... energy, continued eating in the dark, his hand, from habit, going to his mouth. His attention being thus called to the force of habit, the strong-armed son of Pandu set his heart upon practising with his bow in the night. And, O Bharata, Drona, hearing the twang of his bowstring in the night, came to him, and clasping him, said, 'Truly do I tell thee that I shall do that unto thee by which there shall not be an archer equal to thee ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... head of the stairway looked straight ahead where a man with a strong bow held himself close in the shadow of a great rock. When the twang of the bow string sounded, she loosened not her hand from that of Ka-yemo as he fell, but with her other hand she pulled aside the robe from her breast—also the necklace of the white metal, that not anything turn aside the point of the arrow ...
— The Flute of the Gods • Marah Ellis Ryan
... over the deserted town. The night was dark and windless: the street lit glimmeringly from end to end, lamps, house windows, and the reflections in the rain-pools all contributing. From a public-house on the other side of the way, I heard a harp twang and a doleful voice upraised in the "Larboard Watch," "The Anchor's Weighed," and other naval ditties. Where had my Shyster wandered? In all likelihood to that lyrical tavern; there was no choice of diversion; in comparison ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... were both labour and enjoyment in them. Every week showed him a new town or city: classic Edinburgh, dirty Glasgow—cleaner nowadays—roaring Liverpool, rainy Manchester, smoke-clouded Birmingham and Sheffield, granite-built Aberdeen, jolly Dublin, with an unaccustomed twang in the whisky, after the Scottish progress; Belfast, Cork, Waterford. Everywhere character studies in shoals; dialect studies every day and all day long. Paul could train his tongue, before the twelve months' tour was over, to the speech of ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... some moments,—it seemed hours,—spell-bound, watching the face, but not daring to move even an eyelid, lest the discovery of the fact that I was awake, should be the signal for my own destruction. I expected every moment to hear the twang of a bow-string, and feel the head of an arrow penetrate my flesh; for I felt confident the spy ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens
... plucks Crumpled and cheap, and barbs with iron will: The hour that passes is her quiver-boy; When she draws bow, 'tis not across the wind, Nor 'gainst the sun, her haste-snatched arrow sings, For sun and wind have plighted faith to her: Ere men have heard the sinew twang, behold, In the butt's heart her ...
— Told by the Northmen: - Stories from the Eddas and Sagas • E. M. [Ethel Mary] Wilmot-Buxton
... Olympus' heights he pass'd, his heart Burning with wrath; behind his shoulders hung His bow, and ample quiver; at his back Rattled the fateful arrows as he mov'd; Like the night-cloud he pass'd, and from afar He bent against the ships, and sped the bolt; And fierce and deadly twang'd the silver bow. First on the mules and dogs, on man the last, Was pour'd the arrowy storm; and through the camp, Constant and num'rous, blaz'd the ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... twang,' goes old Tom's horn at the top of the wood, whither he seems to have flown, so ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... freight. There are fourteen carriages; and the passengers are countless—at least 600. Onward she darts at headlong speed, until, apparently in perilous proximity to her wharf, a frightful collision appears inevitable. The impatient Yankees press—each to be the first to jump ashore. The loud 'twang' of a bell is suddenly heard; the powerful engine is quickly reversed, and the way of the vessel is so instantaneously stopped, that the dense mass of passengers insensibly leans forward from the ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 454 - Volume 18, New Series, September 11, 1852 • Various
... scarce was each to his slumber laid, When the country folks came to serenade; With twang of fiddle, and toot of horn, And shriek of fife, they stayed till morn! Poor Campers! never a wink got they! So they started for home ...
— On the Tree Top • Clara Doty Bates
... and thy real and thy apparent place, and know him and his real and his apparent place, and act in some noble conformity with all that. What! The star-fire of the Empyrean shall eclipse itself, and illuminate magic-lanterns to amuse grown children? He, the god-inspired, is to twang harps for thee, and blow through scrannel-pipes, to soothe thy sated soul with visions of new, still wider Eldorados, Houri Paradises, richer Lands of Cockaigne? Brother, this is not he; this is a counterfeit, this twangling, jangling, vain, acrid, scrannel-piping ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle |
