"Syllable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... party so much sense of what was doing, that it mattered little about Mr. Somers' want of it. It mattered nothing to Faith, how his words were spoken; nobody that heard them forgot how hers were—the sweet clear sounds of every syllable; only that once or twice she said "yes" where by established formula she should have said the more dignified "I do." Perhaps "yes" meant as much. Those who heard it ...
— Say and Seal, Volume II • Susan Warner
... masters his life. And let it be especially observed, how extensive and how varied is the truth of our modern masters—how it comprises a complete history of that nature of which, from the ancients, you only here and there can catch a stammering descriptive syllable—how Fielding has given us every character of the quiet lake, Robson[65] of the mountain tarn, De Wint of the lowland river, Nesfield of the radiant cataract, Harding of the roaring torrent, Fielding ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... describe with more heart-stirring and heart-soothing pathos than is conveyed in the simple language of him whom the Saviour at that awful hour addressed, as He committed his mother to him of especial trust. But not one syllable falls from the lips of Christ, or from the pen of the beloved disciple, who records this act of his blessed Master's filial piety, which can by possibility be construed to imply, that our blessed ...
— Primitive Christian Worship • James Endell Tyler
... there were a Saxon lawyer, a Moravian banker, and last, though not least, as perfect a specimen of the tribe John Bull, as the eye of the naturalist need desire to behold. Our worthy countryman understood not one syllable of German, and his French was lame to a degree. But he bore about him a portly person, a good-humoured, rosy, and rather large countenance, and looked round upon the company, amid which, after prodigious labour, he succeeded in establishing himself, with an ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig
... for you that you haven't," added the captain, shaking his head—a significant gesture, which seemed to relate to the future, rather than to the present. "If you lisp a syllable of it, you will need a patch on your skull.—Now," he continued, "what do you want ...
— The Yacht Club - or The Young Boat-Builder • Oliver Optic
... the company, he said in a sonorous tone, laying a strong emphasis on the last syllable of every word, according to the custom of the gente rufianesca ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... circumstances, the bargain was soon struck. Not a syllable about the explosion at Cheetham's was to reach the second floor lodger's ears, and no Hillsborough journal was to mount the stairs until the young man's return. If inquired for, they were to be reported all sold out, and a London ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... the primeval and universal language of the race. For the love which receives the New Born, cadences the monotonous chant; and human sympathies are felt by the innocent and confiding infant before his eyes are opened fully upon the light, before his tongue can syllable a word, his ear detect their divisions, or his mind divine their significations. But Music looms not only through the base of our being; like the encompassing sky, her arch spans our horizon. Lo! is it not the language through which the Angels convey the secrets ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... high ardor which, as he cloudily remembered now, had once controlled a boy who dreamed in Windsor Forest and with the lightest of hearts planned to achieve the impossible. For what is more difficult of attainment than to achieve the perfected phrase, so worded that to alter a syllable of its wording would ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... The proper division of this Old Norse word is not into v[i]-king, but into v[)i]k-ing. The first syllable means a "bay" or "fiord," the second is a patronymic termination, so that "vikings" are "sons of the fiord,"—an eminently appropriate ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... syllable that call-boy spoke! There was a giggle behind his voice, too; old Topham was the butt of every joke. The first call, which had fooled me, must have been from some giddy girl who wanted to guy the old fellow. She had fooled me all right. But this—this ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... double duty, as K is also T, and L is also R. The most northern island of the group, Kauai, is as often pronounced as if it began with a T, and Kalo is usually Taro. It is a very musical language. Each syllable and word ends with a vowel, and there are none of our rasping and sibilant consonants. In their soft phraseology our hard rough surnames undergo a metamorphosis, as Fisk into Filikina, Wilson into ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... the window; but it was too late. Strangwise who had not missed a syllable of the interrogatory was at the curtains in a flash. As he plucked the hangings back, Desmond made a rush for him; but Strangwise, wary as ever, kept his head and, drawing back, jabbed his great automatic ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... name given to several kinds of verse, from Alcaeus, their reputed inventor. The first kind consists of five feet, viz. a spondee or iambic, an iambic, a long syllable and two dactyles; the second of two dactyles and two trochees. Besides these, which are called dactylic Alcaics, there is another, simply styled Alcaic, consisting of an epitrite, two choriambi and a bacchius; ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... were whispered to the little actors. Then they withdrew to the hall, where all sorts of costumes had been laid out for the evening, dressed their parts, and each detachment marched into the library, performed its syllable and retired, leaving the audience, mainly composed of parents, to guess the answer. Often they invented their own words, did their own costuming, and conducted the entire performance independent of grown-up assistance or interference. Now and then, even at this early period, they ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... on her letters to him, in which she had never mentioned a syllable concerning Knight. It is desirable, however, to observe that only in two letters could she possibly have done so. One was written about a week before Knight's arrival, when, though she did not mention his promised ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... and combinations, so that it seemed a miracle already that with so few notes one could make so much music. My father was well aware of these letters and furtively regarded me half scornfully, half disturbed, as I sat deciphering them patiently and with earnest devotion to the last syllable. That it was all over with Emmy was a relief to him, but all the more anxiously he watched this animated correspondence and the increase of the maternal influence; especially as I ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden
... the pocket of a grateful man, who that same evening told the whole party his conversation with young Riviere, on whom he pronounced high encomiums. Rose's saucy eyes sparkled with fun: you might have lighted a candle at one and exploded a mine at the other; but not a syllable did ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade
... Darrow smiled at her. "Well, here's a very good exposition in words of one syllable. I'll leave you the paper. Professor, what have you concluded as to ...
— The Sign at Six • Stewart Edward White
... through quiet and ill-lighted streets, and Del Ferice leaned back in his corner, not listening at all to Orsino's talk, though he occasionally uttered a polite though utterly unintelligible syllable or two which might mean anything agreeable to his companion's views. The situation was easy enough to understand, and he had grasped it in a moment. What Orsino might say was of no importance whatever, but the consequences of any action ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... were present as well as the Marechal; but no one answered a syllable. They had looked toward the Cardinal, who remained as immovable as an equestrian statue, and they imitated his example. The answer must have been that the fault was not with the soldiers, but with him who had ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... an Old-Man-of-the-Sea-like tenacity in Placidia's smiling impuissance. She did not know one syllable of French. A new-born babe could not have revealed itself more utterly incompetent. I verily believe that, despite our haste, we would have ended by escorting Placidia across Paris, and ensconcing her in the Marseilles train, had not Providence intervened in the person of a kindly disposed ...
— A Versailles Christmas-Tide • Mary Stuart Boyd
... on the second syllable) the birds exclaimed in half-petulant remonstrance at my intrusion as I hobbled about over the rocks. Presently one of them darted up into the air; up, up, up, he swung in a series of oblique leaps ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... was singularly smooth; it had all the qualities of culture; every syllable, every lapse of his rude dialect, was as distinct as if he had been taught to speak in this way; his tones were low and even, and modulated to suave cadences; the ear experienced a sense of relief after the loud, strident voice of the miller, ...
— The Moonshiners At Hoho-Hebee Falls - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... Tuvache by his side listened to him with staring eyes. Monsieur Derozerays from time to time softly closed his eyelids, and farther on the chemist, with his son Napoleon between his knees, put his hand behind his ear in order not to lose a syllable. The chins of the other members of the jury went slowly up and down in their waistcoats in sign of approval. The firemen at the foot of the platform rested on their bayonets; and Binet, motionless, stood with out-turned elbows, the point of his sabre in the air. Perhaps ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... information and to extort this they were placed in a line. The two first being questioned, answered, "No se" (I do not know), and were one after the other shot. The third also said "No se;" adding, "Fire, I am a man, and can die!" Not one syllable would they breathe to injure the united cause of their country! The conduct of the above-mentioned cacique was very different; he saved his life by betraying the intended plan of warfare, and the point of union in the Andes. It was believed that ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... conveyance itself is generally burdened with a perfect load of ceremony, in which not one iota can be safely neglected. Ancient law uniformly refuses to dispense with a single gesture, however grotesque; with a single syllable, however its meaning may have been forgotten; with a single witness, however superfluous may be his testimony. The entire solemnities must be scrupulously completed by persons legally entitled to take part in them, or else the conveyance ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine
... etc.) Ah! I thought so! (Taking card from him.) You may go—stop—(reading card.) Show the lady up, and not a word of warning to her that she will meet me instead of your master. If you breathe a syllable to her you shall be discharged. Keep whistling all the while go that I may know you are not telling her. (DIBBS whistles Dead March and goes off slowly; he is heard in the distance as if he went downstairs. The sound becomes louder as ...
— Three Hats - A Farcical Comedy in Three Acts • Alfred Debrun
... willingly swerve or dissent from the mind and sense of his author, albeit some go more near to the words of the author, and some use the liberty of translating at large, not so precisely binding themselves to the strait interpretation of every word and syllable."[347] In his own share of the translation Udall inclines rather to the free than to the literal method. He has not been able "fully to discharge the office of a good translator,"[348] partly because of the ornate quality of Erasmus's style, partly ...
— Early Theories of Translation • Flora Ross Amos
... as he is of tender years, they will not transport him—at least, I should think not; they may imprison him for a few months, and order him to be privately whipped. I do not see what you can do but remain quiet. I should recommend you not to say one syllable about it until ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... the letter, men of Athens; you hear how noble and generous it is. But about the Phocians or the Thebans or the other subjects of the defendant's report—not a syllable. Indeed, in this letter there is not an honest word, as you will very shortly see for yourselves. He says that he retained the ambassadors to help him reconcile the people of Halus: and such is the reconciliation that they have ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 1 • Demosthenes
... flung one arm up violently, striking the headboard with his knuckles. "I won't hear a syllable against Madame de Vaurigard!" Young Cooley regarded him steadily for a moment. "Have you remembered yet," he said slowly, "how ...
— His Own People • Booth Tarkington
... They had a language of their own, and no pains could induce them to speak anything else. It was in vain that a little sister, five years older than they, tried to make them speak their native language,—as it would have been. They persistently refused to utter a syllable of English. Not even the usual first words, 'papa,' 'mamma,' 'father,' 'mother,' it is said, did they ever speak; and, said the lady who gave this information to the writer,—who was an aunt of the children, and whose home was with them,—they were ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... outside of the "Cambridge Telegraph," there was one passenger who ought to have impressed his fellow-travellers with a very respectful idea of his lore in the dead languages; for not a single syllable, in a live one, did he vouchsafe to utter from the moment he ascended that "bad eminence" to the moment in which he regained his mother earth. "Sleep," says honest Sancho, "covers a man better than a cloak." ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Bostonian writes us that PUNCHINELLO'S voice (a Great Organ, truly) has reached the "Hub," and actually silenced the Great Organ of that pleasant rural town. So far, good; but he adds that Massachusetts takes umbrage at the first syllable of our name, on account of its being at variance with the prohibitory law of that pleasant but Puritanical State. Certainly, in a moral point of view, it is better to be in a Puritanical State than in a State of Punch; ...
— Punchinello, Vol.1, No. 4, April 23, 1870 • Various
... which seemeth, is in the accent, which sometime gapeth, and, as it were, yawneth ill-favoredly, coming short of that it should, and sometime exceeding the measure of the number, as in Carpenter; the middle syllable being used short in speech, when it shall be read long in verse, seemeth like a lame gosling that draweth one leg after her; and Heaven being used short as one syllable, when it is in verse stretched out with a diastole, is like a lame dog that holds up one leg."[266] It is ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell
... small. 'Twas only because, speaking once upon the subject of metrical composition, he seemed totally ignorant of what are called rhopalick verses, from the Greek word, a club—verses in which each word must be a syllable longer than that which goes before, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... Huanu, which is a term in the Quichua dialect meaning "animal dung;" for example, Huanacuhuanu (excrement of the Huanacu). As the word is now generally used it is an abbreviation of Pishu Huanu—Bird-dung. The Spaniards have converted the final syllable nu into no, as they do in all the words adopted from the Quichua which have the like termination. The European orthography Guano, which is also followed in Spanish America, is quite erroneous, for the Quichua ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... like it—well—pranks! She is the funniest creature that ever lived, I believe, and can mimic and imitate any mortal creature. She sat in the carriage this morning, and one might have fancied from her expression that she hardly heard a word, but I haven't a doubt that she could repeat every syllable that was uttered. Oh, here come the Bensons and ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott
... be sagigilid in its Tagal form. The root gilid signifies in Tagal, "margin," "strand," or "shore." The reduplication of the first syllable, if tonic, signifies active future action. If not tonic and the suffix an be added, it denotes the place where the action of the verb is frequently executed. The preposition sa indicates place, time, reference. The atonic reduplication may ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... in the blind and bloody action of a court and jury who imagined themselves sitting over a powder-magazine. That a robbery took place, there was abundant evidence in the finding of some of the articles, and the admissions of Hughson and others; but there was not a syllable of competent evidence to show that there was an organized plot. And the time came, after the city had gotten back to its accustomed quietness, that the most sincere believers in the "Negro plot" ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams
... is the first syllable thou hast uttered concerning any young lady, or of the death ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Short was the interval between ambition's crime and love's revenge with our poor Margaret. Wilford might never know how cruelly his bitter words wrung her smitten soul. She did not answer him. Paler she grew with every reproach—deeper was the self-conviction with every angry syllable. She wept until he left her, and then she wrote to Michael. As matters stood, and with their present understanding—he was perhaps her best adviser. Wilford called to see her on the following day—but Margaret's door was shut ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... contemporaries. Wilson, doubtless, saw the necessity, in 1588, of adopting some of those improvements of versification in which Marlowe had led the way; he therefore laid aside (excepting in a few comic scenes) his heavy, lumbering, and monotonous fourteen-syllable lines (sometimes carried to a greater length for the sake of variety) and not only usually employed ten-syllable lines, but introduced speeches of blank verse. His drama opens with this then uncommon form, and he avails himself of it afterwards, ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley
... to the water. A familiar passage in his reading, about airy tongues that syllable men's names, rose so unbidden to his ear, that he put it from him with his hand, as if it ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... king," writes Mr. Bunn, and he looked forward to the result with anxious curiosity. On the 7th of February came an answer from Sir Thomas Mash. "I have the pleasure to return your drawing without a syllable of objection." On the 8th, "Bertrand et Raton," under the name of "The Minister and the Mercer," was first produced ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... was in his veins. He heard that a mission was about to depart for Zanzibar and East Africa. A knowledge of English was a necessary part of the equipment of the chief officer. Francqui wanted this job but he did not know a syllable of English. He went to a friend ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... exactly fit any other. For this reason I had rather listen to a poet reading his own verses than hear the best elocutionist that ever spouted recite them. He may not have a good voice or enunciation, but he puts his heart and his inter-penetrative intelligence into every line, word, and syllable. I should have liked to hear Tennyson read such ...
— Our Hundred Days in Europe • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... common sense, enabled him to go straight to the point and to keep a firm hand upon the whole management of the case. No rambling or irrelevance was possible under him. His strong physique, and the deep voice which, if not specially harmonious, was audible to the last syllable in every corner of the court, contributed greatly to his impressiveness. He took advantage of his strength to carry out his own ideal of a criminal court as a school of morality. 'It may be truly said,' as he remarks, ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... Delvile, with a start almost frantic. "Oh never, then, was truth so scandalously wronged!—I denied the whole charge!-I disbelieved every syllable!—I pledged my own honour to prove every ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... very wise remark, she walked back across the ridge-pole and climbed in the window. There was nothing for Tom to do but follow; which he did slowly and reluctantly. Something would have to be said now, at any rate. But not a syllable said Gypsy. She went to the looking-glass, and began to brush her hair as unconcernedly as if everything were just as she left it and ...
— Gypsy Breynton • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... putrifies; but if [Greek: ou] be acuted and exile, it sounds, Non computrescit pluvia; it does not putrify with Rain; and this indeed is taken out of the Iliad [Greek: ps]. Another is, [Greek: didomen de oi euchos aresthai]: the Accent being placed upon the last Syllable but one, signifies, grant to him; but plac'd upon the first Syllable [Greek: didomen], signifies, we grant. But the Poet did not think Jupiter said, we grant to him; but commands the Dream itself to grant him, to whom it is sent to obtain his Desire. For [Greek: didomen], ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus
... had bitterly lamented that she could devise no obstacle had merely to let this helpful chance take its own course. And this, indeed, was what the voice said, what it repeated with keen insistence, never adding another syllable. After that there would be nothing. After that there would merely remain the shattered remnants of a suppressed man, and a pit of darkness splashed with blood, in which she discerned, foresaw nothing ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... factotum should benefit by this goodness of his. He discoursed to me in moved terms of the sorrows and privations of his tenants in their two tiny rooms upstairs. And all the while Quarriar preserved his attitude of drooping dignity, saying no syllable except under special appeal. ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... with it. Perhaps the most important evidence is that of Pini, which exactly corroborates Mather's statement, and certainly there is not a single syllable, from first to last, at variance with it." Thus speaks Giovanni Pini, the important witness of the scene of blood and outrage:—"On the day in question, about twelve o'clock, more or less, I was in the Via Martelli, about half way down, when I heard coming towards ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... Greek words? I would give anything to outshine Molly and make her look foolish, I would! She doesn't know one word of Greek—only Latin. Do, for pity's sake, tell me, if 'tis only one Greek word! and I won't say another syllable, not if Madam gives you a ...
— The Maidens' Lodge - None of Self and All of Thee, (In the Reign of Queen Anne) • Emily Sarah Holt
... Thompson's death the separate edition of the 'Hound of Heaven' sold fifty thousand copies; and, apart from anthologies, many more thousands were sold of the books containing it." When the "Hound of Heaven" is selected for study, and explained in words of one syllable, by a young Japanese student in the Tokyo Imperial University almost thirty years after the poem was published, one can hardly maintain that it calls for certain ecclesiastical affiliations before ...
— The Hound of Heaven • Francis Thompson
... us of the Egyptian hieroglyphs, the majority are totally unlike them, both in form and execution. A careful examination of them reveals a medley of human and animal outlines, geometrical figures, and objects of daily use, which all doubtless corresponded to some letter or syllable, but to which we have as yet no trustworthy key. This system of writing is one of a whole group of Asiatic scripts, specimens of which are common in this part of the world from Crete to the banks of the Euphrates and Orontes. It is thought that the Khati must ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... inside, Wilbur looked over the pack to see that it was riding easily, and led Baldy to where he could have a few mouthfuls of grass. And when he came out the Forester was even more silent than usual, and rode for two hours without uttering a syllable. ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Foresters • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... upon the captain. There was no part for which nature had so liberally endowed him as that of the genial ship-captain. But to-day he was silent and abstracted. Those who knew him could see that he hearkened close to every syllable, and seemed to ponder and try it in balances. It would have been hard to say what look there was, cold, attentive, and sinister, as of a man maturing plans, which still brooded over the unconscious guest; it was here, it was there, it ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... intended no harm—quite the contrary! After an instinctive recoil, he leaned against a table and wiped his forehead, breathing in gasps, incapable of pronouncing a syllable. ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... could hook his own, and whom he could pester with his family griefs as I do you, the dear old boy would have his dreary story to tell too. I hate banks, bankers, Bundelcund, indigo, cotton, and the whole business. I go to that confounded board, and never hear one syllable that the fellows are talking about. I sit there because he wishes me to sit there; don't you think he sees that my heart is out of the business; that I would rather be at home in my painting-room? We don't understand each other, but we feel each other, ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... for the name of his town proved a puzzle till a present-day Dominican missionary from Amoy explained that it appeared to be the combined names for Chinchew in both the common and literary Chinese, in each case with the syllable denoting the town left off. Apparently when questioned from what town he came, Chinco was careful not to repeat the word town, but gave its name only in the literary language, and when that was not understood, he would repeat it in ...
— Lineage, Life, and Labors of Jose Rizal, Philippine Patriot • Austin Craig
... funeral of an old member, hesitates about the street and number and says that they can be found in the telephone directory, Dr. Conwell's deep voice breaks quietly in with, "Such a number [giving it], Dauphin Street"—quietly, and in a low tone, yet every one in the church hears distinctly every syllable of that ...
— Acres of Diamonds • Russell H. Conwell
... am inconstant." He paused, but of course she had not a syllable to say. "I have changed my love. But I could not speak of a new passion till I had told the story of that which has passed away. You have heard it all now, Mary. Can you try to love me, after that?" It had come at last,—the thing for which she had been ever wishing. It ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... acquainted with the object in which one pays him adorations. Do thou then, if it pleases thee, seek the protection of the chief of the deities. He sometimes rejoices, and sometimes yields to wrath, and sometimes utters the syllable Hum with a very loud noise. He sometimes arms himself with the discus, sometimes with the trident, sometimes with the mace, sometimes with the heavy mullets, sometimes with the scimitar, and sometimes with the battle axe. He it is that assumes the form of Sesha who sustains the world on his ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... aware that rabbit-coursing, conducted under recognised and established regulations, affords pastime to large masses of the industrious population who are unable, from their pecuniary circumstances, to indulge in the more expensive forms of sport? Those were JEMMY'S words, each syllable deliberately enunciated. What a study for ...
— Punch, or, the London Charivari, Volume 98, March 8, 1890. • Various
... Italian young Signora, named Leonora Barroni, with her Mother and Sister, whome he had hearde at Rome, at the Concerts of Cardinal Barberini; and how she was "as gentle and modest as sweet Moll," yet not afrayed to open her Mouth, and pronounce everie Syllable distinctlie, and with the proper Emphasis and Passion when she sang. And after this, to my greate Contentment, he tooke me to the Gray's Inn Walks, where, the Afternoon being ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... flood of tears, took her papa by the hand, and kissed it; but her heart was so full, that she could not utter a syllable. Cherry and Nancy were now again good friends, and he for some ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... very small indeed, one can hardly doubt that parts at least are primitive Romanesque, as old as any one chooses. It is the fellow of the little church of Montmajeur near Arles, but far ruder. But at Querqueville the name is part of the argument; the building gives its name to the place. The first syllable of Querqueville is plainly the Teutonic kirk; and it suggests that it got the name from this church having been left standing when most of its neighbours were destroyed in the Scandinavian inroads which created Normandy. The ...
— Sketches of Travel in Normandy and Maine • Edward A. Freeman
... and it is dramatically fitting that Hamlet in the circumstances should say what he does. On the other hand, when the Duke in MEASURE FOR MEASURE, playing the part of a friar preparing a criminal for death, gives Claudio a consolation which does not contain a word of Christian doctrine, not a syllable of sacrificial salvation and sacramental forgiveness, we are entitled to infer from such a singular negative phenomenon, if not that Shakspere rejected the Christian theory of things, at least that it formed no part of ...
— Montaigne and Shakspere • John M. Robertson
... veiled and filmy coldness to his glance. The personal dignity of the Bishop, his commanding presence, a certain picturesque magnificence, the rich and well-modulated voice, the incisiveness of his manner of speech, with the clear-cut value given to every word and syllable, were characteristics that marked him ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... to keep him," answered M. Flamaran; "I haven't uttered a syllable for three hours. I must let myself out a little. We will fish ...
— The Ink-Stain, Complete • Rene Bazin
... genius belongs the honour of devising and then perfecting this alphabet which has been such a blessing to thousands of Cree Indians. The principle on which the characters are formed is the phonetic. There are no silent letters. Each character represents a syllable, hence no spelling is required. As soon as the alphabet is mastered, the student can commence at the first chapter in Genesis and read on, slowly of course, at first, but in a few ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... them! Not a scorched syllable shall escape! Would you have me a damned author—To undergo sneers, taunts, abuse, and cold neglect, and faint praise, bestowed, for pity's sake, against the giver's conscience! A hissing and a ...
— Nathaniel Hawthorne • George E. Woodberry
... words slowly, with a tigerish glare of hate leaping out of his eyes, with deadly menace in every syllable. Then he was gone down the winding stair-way like a black ghost, and so ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming
... doubtful whether Adela Branston heard one syllable of that counsel which Mr. Saltram administered so gravely. Her mind was full of the failure of this desperate step which she had taken. He seemed farther from her now than before they had met, obstinately adverse to profit by her ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... girl do? She had no eyes to see, no ears to hear what her grandfather tried to teach her. She was very small. She could only read words of one syllable at a time; she rose above the bad meaning which he had tried to put into her mind, because her little mind could not do otherwise, and she read the words not 'God is nowhere,' but 'God ...
— Fifty-Two Story Talks To Boys And Girls • Howard J. Chidley
... you have sought to stand between me and distress. Until to-day you have, under fire, proven true to your code of knighthood, and to-day I could forget—but could you? Of all the things I have ever said to you, of love, I have no syllable to retract. Even now I repeat it. I love you absolutely. When I suggested your leaving for a time I did a desperately hard thing—and you misunderstood it. Unless you can understand it, dear, it would do no good to come back, it would only mean other humiliating memories. This is not an easy ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... the little man, dragging out the words syllable by syllable, "there, my lord, are your hat and cloak. Oblige me by quitting this house ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... additional instance beyond the innumerable ones given, which shows how deeply our system of banking is fixed in our ways of thinking. The Government keeps the money of the poor upon it, and the nation fully approves of their doing so. No one hears a syllable of objection. And every practical manevery man who knows the scene of actionwill agree that our system of banking, based on a single reserve in the Bank of England, cannot be altered, or a system of many banks, each keeping its own reserve, be substituted for it. Nothing but a revolution ...
— Lombard Street: A Description of the Money Market • Walter Bagehot
... certainly did not understand much; literature was not in her line. She would sit opposite Pasinkov, her chin in her hands, staring at him—not into his eyes, but into his whole face—and would not utter a syllable, but only heave a noisy, sudden sigh. Sometimes in the evenings we used to play forfeits, especially on Sundays and holidays. We were joined on these occasions by two plump, short young ladies, sisters, and distant relations of the ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... water-cask ashore, and left it in a neglected taro patch, where the ground was moist and warm. Musquitoes were the result. "When tormented by them, I found much relief in coupling the word Coleman with another of one syllable, and pronouncing them together energetically." The musquito chapter is very amusing, showing the various comical and ingenious manoeuvres of the friends to avoid their tormentors, and obtain a night's sleep. At last they entered a fishing canoe, paddled some distance from shore, and dropped ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 380, June, 1847 • Various
... hand I thought we were only being asked to take care of it for a later day. The storm had begun to threaten. Some one was trying to say to me—'off to camp and then to the front,' and—'must have the flag now,' and still I said, 'No, oh, no!' But before I could get any one to add a syllable there was the Captain himself with the three men of the color guard behind him, the middle one Victorine's father. I don't know how I began, but only that I went on and on in some wild way till I ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable
... was then taken up by Mr. Beckley, the clerk of the House, and again read from beginning to end. Beckley's enunciation, by the by, was admirably clear, giving every syllable of every word, and I may say, he was almost the only officer, whose official duty it is to read, whom I ever heard ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... the village far behind us. I was already quite tired out, and yet I did not utter a syllable to suggest our returning. I would rather have gone to the end of the world ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... over Canada. He was the most stay-at-home and sedulous of our ministers. He worked while others slept or sailed the seas. No Victory Loan advertisement proof escaped the eagle eye of this ex-newspaperman before it went to press. He scanned and corrected every syllable. Every advertisement was a ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino
... Plenty of swamp, Bourdon, on Kekalamazoo. [Footnote: This is the true Indian word, though the whites have seen fit to omit the first syllable.] Run canoe in swamp; den safe 'nough. Injins won't look 'ere, 'cause he don't know whereabout look. Don't like swamp. Great danger down at ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... speak! She knew from every syllable I uttered that I perfectly loathed it, and I know that she tried to make it as hateful to me all the way through as she could. She played it at me, and she knew it was me. It was as if she kept saying all the time, 'How do you like ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... amid echoes. On the other hand, nothing is more unpleasant than to hear all at once, and just beside one, the bellowing of a bull, who thus authoritatively announces himself, as if nobody else had any right to utter a syllable in his presence. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... this spring of love resembleth] At the end of this verse there is wanting a syllable, for the speech apparently ends in a quatrain. I find nothing that will rhyme to sun, and therefore shall leave it to some happier critic. But I suspect that the ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson
... House of Commons last night till half [an] hour past twelve. The majority of our side against the second reading of Burke's Bill,(153) and in fact, by a following question of rejecting it, was of 43, if I mistook not. I was not in the House to hear anybody speak a syllable, nor do I ever wish it. I believe there is no actor upon the stage of either theatre who, repeating what the author has wrote, does not, at the same time, recite his own private sentiments oftener, than our ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... Canterbury, Tillotson, stood alone in wishing the church were well rid of it. In fact, it has happened to the present writer to hear the Thirty-nine Articles summarily disposed of by one of the most zealous members of the American branch of that communion, in a verb of one syllable, more familiar to the ears of the forecastle than to those of ...
— Pages From an Old Volume of Life - A Collection Of Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... words which were the joy of the Mess,—"pilliate," "whizzle," "contemporative," and dozens of others that I can't remember; and what used to charm us particularly was that he so often went out of his way to put the accent on the wrong syllable, such as in bilyetting, brigade, attack, ambassador, &c. He was, indeed, a ...
— The Doings of the Fifteenth Infantry Brigade - August 1914 to March 1915 • Edward Lord Gleichen
... from the legend that, during a controversy between the gods and men, Pro-me'theus, [Footnote: In most Greek proper names ending in 'eus', the 'eus' is pronounced in one syllable; as Or'pheus, pronounced Or'phuse.] who is said to have surpassed all his fellow-men in intellectual vigor and sagacity, stole fire from the skies, and, concealing it in a hollow staff, brought it to man. Jupiter, angry at the theft of that which had been reserved from ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... to his brother. Then he added a syllable and called again, "O-e!" Little Sebastiano woke, sat up and looked about him, rubbing ...
— The Children of the King • F. Marion Crawford
... this passage: "I have only four girls who can read English and understand it. My two little Dyaks, Limo and Ambat, are very fond of learning English hymns, and say them in such a plaintive, touching voice, pronouncing each syllable so clearly, but they don't understand it until it has been explained to them in Malay. Limo's brother and uncle came this week from Sarebas—two fine, tall men, with only chawats[2] and earrings by way of clothes. Limo was delighted; ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... not contain the same number of letters. The compositor brings this about by arranging his words and spaces skillfully. The spaces must be as nearly as possible of the same length, and yet the line must be properly filled. If a line is too full, he can sometimes place the last syllable on the following line; if it is not full enough, he can borrow a syllable, and he can at least divide his space so evenly that the line will not look as if ...
— Makers of Many Things • Eva March Tappan
... something for the camp. One man, a miner from Northumberland, set out the name of the camp in large letters done in white stones on a green bank behind the canteen. He gave all his spare time for two days to the work, and when he had finished we discovered that he had left out a letter in the first syllable of the name. He was a patient as well as an enthusiastic man. He began ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham
... Christian name," she proceeded, "is Carmina; (put the accent, if you please, on the first syllable). The moment Mrs. Gallilee heard the name, it struck her like a blow. She enlightened the old woman, and asserted herself as Miss Carmina's aunt in an instant. 'I am Mrs. Gallilee:' that was all she said. The result"—Miss Minerva paused, and pointed to the ceiling; "the result is up there. ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... commendation; and this is an inseparable and legal part of it. Legal, I say,—legal, and not destructive of respectability. That is the point. In ordering such lashes, that ancient miscreant (for old he already was) neither violated any syllable of the slave-code, nor forfeited his social position. He was punishing "disobedience"; he was admministering "justice"; he was illustrating the "rights of property"; he was using the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... have come to you to put your protestations to the proof. If you meant every word you said, every syllable, every letter, you can serve me well. If not, good-night ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... of the pharaoh, or the storm of shouts roaring about him, so stunned Prince Ramses that he could not utter a syllable. He fell at his father's feet, and the lord of the world pressed the heir to his ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... Turgenev,' said the little foreigner, pronouncing every syllable distinctly. She looked at the ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... away with his grimy hand and went over to the bed, rolling the inert figure toward him till the face was in plain view. A sudden fit of trembling took possession of him and he dropped nervelessly beside the bed with his hands outstretched and uttered a sob ending in a single syllable, ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... meaning to the reporting parties for many hundreds of years. Briefly, a great mysterious word is spelt as it were by the whole sum of the scriptural books—every separate book forming a letter or syllable in that secret and that unfinished word, as it was for so many ages. This cooperation of ages, not able to communicate or concert arrangements with each other, is neither more nor less an argument ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... the descending glass, it has an ominous appairance," the Scotchman answered, with much stress on the first syllable of the adjective. ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... his party, in the act of serving a writ, and the bailiff was murdered on the spot, while one of the murderers was killed by a shot from the police. Mr. O'Connell and the association demanded justice for the death of the latter; but not a word was said on the heinousness of his crime, or a syllable of regret was uttered concerning the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... found) would be heard with little respect, who could dream of objecting his religion to an ally whom the nation would not only receive with its freest thanks, but purchase with the last remains of its exhausted treasure. To such an ally we should not dare to whisper a single syllable of those base and invidious topics upon which some unhappy men would persuade the state to reject the duty and allegiance of its own members. Is it, then, because foreigners are in a condition to set ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... heavy heart Teddy made his way back through the woods to where the Indians were congregated. They were seated around the camp-fire engaged in smoking, but did not exchange nor utter a syllable. They all understood each other, and therefore there was no need of talk. The Irishman seated himself beside them, and joined an hour or two in smoking, when they ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... you were heartily wearied of them. When you were spoony about Marjory Anne, you thought that once your donkey came, once you were fairly married and settled, what a fine thing it would be! I do not say a syllable against that youthful matron; but I presume you have discovered that she falls short of perfection, and that wedded life has its many cares. You thought you would enjoy so much the setting-up of your carriage; your wife and ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... yonder, Colonel, and overheard every syllable that passed, and under the canopy bigger villains are not than the two who are together now. There's no time for talking—all's ready," and he pointed to the harnessed post-horses, "Go in, keep an eye open, and close mouth—order ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various
... beside the house there came a grievous howl, distressful to the spinal marrow, a sound of animal pain. It was repeated even more passionately, and another voice was also heard, one both hoarsely bass and falsetto in the articulation of a single syllable. "Ouch!" There were sounds of violent scuffing, and the bass-falsetto voice cried: "What's that you stuck me with?" and another: "Drag her! Drag her back ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... stunned absolutely by this news that no words would come to her. She stared at Kitty, her face growing whiter and more wooden-looking each moment. Then, without vouchsafing a syllable of reply, she left the room, ...
— Wild Kitty • L. T. Meade
... the objects of nature that surround the homes of the savage. The speech being finished, the chief sits down amid a universal "Ho!" uttered by the company with an emphatic prolongation of the last letter—this syllable being the Indian substitute, we ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne
... vowel between o and u. Like us, the Egyptians lacked the true sound of e, and in their language are found our ha and kha, which we do not have in the Latin alphabet such as is used in Spanish. For example, in this word mukha," he went on, pointing to the book, "I transcribe the syllable ha more correctly with the figure of a fish than with the Latin h, which in Europe is pronounced in different ways. For a weaker aspirate, as for example in this word hain, where the h has less ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... tender and plaintive. Marcia had conquered her sobs and was singing again with her whole soul, singing as if she were singing to David. The words drew him strangely, wonderingly toward the parlor door, yet so softly that he heard every syllable. ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... view, we must beg leave seriously to assure him, that the mere rhyming of the final syllable, even when accompanied by a certain number of feet; nay, although (which does not always happen) those feet should scan regularly, and have been all counted accurately upon the fingers— is not the whole art of poetry. ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... of—but similitudes fail me. In this delicious retreat, which may be compared to the Garden of Eden before the tempter entered, are the choicest flowers of rhetoric. I hear a voice as from the far-off past, and I wonder will that be the voice which will utter the "last syllable of recorded time?" ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... repeat I what I have said before?—Turn back, thou egregious arguer, turn back to my long letter of the 13th,* and thou wilt there find every syllable of what thou hast written either ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... with fire, and obeying Ercildoune's precept, "Tong is chefe of mynstrelsye," to the syllable.—Don Giovanni's hitherto fondly chanted "Andiam, andiam," become suddenly impersonal and prophetic: IT shall go, and you also. A cry—before it is a song, then song and accompaniment together—perfectly done; and the march "towards the ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... tapping with the fingers. By peculiar variations of the drumming, known only to the initiated, the performer could drum out whatever he wished to express in such a way, it is alleged, as to be intelligible to initiated listeners without uttering a single syllable with the voice. ...
— Hawaiian Folk Tales - A Collection of Native Legends • Various
... important—so trivial, indeed, that for the present I had rather not mention them, lest I should expose their memories to the ridicule of the unreflecting. I shall now proceed to my narrative, with the repeated assurance, that the reader will no where find in it a single syllable that is not ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... devised a means for indicating the inflection of the voice in speaking, by which the cadences which orators found necessary in impassioned speech could be classified, at least to some extent. When the voice was to fall, a downward stroke [] was placed above the syllable; when the voice was to be raised, an upward stroke [/] indicated it; and when the voice was to rise and fall, the sign was [/], which has become our accent in music. These three signs are found in the French language, in the accent aigu, or high accent, as ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell
... introduces to us the two ridiculous doctors, Bahis and Macroton, in L'Amour medecin, he makes one of them speak very slowly, as though scanning his words syllable by syllable, whilst the other stutters. We find the same contrast between the two lawyers in Monsieur de Pourceaugnac. In the rhythm of speech is generally to be found the physical peculiarity that is destined to complete the element of professional ridicule. When the ...
— Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic • Henri Bergson
... President stands: not a syllable of it has been, or will be, retracted. The principles which it announces rest on their inherent justice and propriety, on their conformity to public law, and, so far as we are concerned, on the determination and ability of the country to maintain them. To these principles ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... repetition of it be not also an error.—"For," commencing the parenthesis, "we would give much" stands for cause. The emphasis should, I think, be {387} laid on for; and commit be accented on the first syllable. Thus the line, though of twelve syllables, is not unmetrical; indeed much less prosaic than with the old reading ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 54, November 9, 1850 • Various
... of which the very sight is enough to fill a man with horror.' The accomplished Evelyn, giving an account of his journey from Italy through the Alps, dilates upon the terrible, the melancholy, and the uncomfortable; but, till he comes to the fruitful country in the neighbourhood of Geneva, not a syllable of delight or praise. In the Sacra Telluris Theoria of the other Burnet there is a passage—omitted, however, in his own English translation of the work—in which he gives utterance to his sensations, when, from a particular spot he beheld a ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... their wounds. They lean heavily on sticks, their bodies are twisted and maimed, but their faces are shining with pride and joy. The French General draws his sword and addresses them. One catches words like 'honneur' and 'patrie.' They lean forward on their crutches, hanging on every syllable which comes hissing and rasping from under that heavy white moustache. Then the medals are pinned on. One poor lad is terribly wounded and needs two sticks. A little girl runs out with some flowers. He leans forward and tries to kiss her, but the crutches slip and he nearly ...
— A Visit to Three Fronts • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of this place," said Paul, glancing at the long brown lashes and oval outline of the cheek so near his own, "is simple, yet affecting. A cruel, remorseless, but fascinating Hexie was once loved by a simple shepherd. He had never dared to syllable his hopeless affection, or claim from her a syllabled—perhaps I should say a one-syllabled—reply. He had followed her from remote lands, dumbly worshiping her, building in his foolish brain an air-castle of ...
— A Ward of the Golden Gate • Bret Harte
... but by its very words. And here we must note the skill of the poet in surmounting an added or artificial difficulty, in the subject he had chosen as combined with his notion of inspiration. He must not deviate in a single syllable from the words of the Hebrew books. He must take up into his poem the whole of the sacred narrative. This he must do, not merely because his readers would expect such literal accuracy from him, but because to himself that narrative was the very truth which he was, ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison
... "Why, what ails the old boat, I wonder?" Then she remembered. She was in the Tampico hotel which called itself a cafe, and the landlord's wife was knocking on her door and calling "Nin-a, nin-a" with a plaintive stress on the first syllable. The word means girl, and oddly enough, is often used by a Mexican servant to address ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... a stranger in Paris, listen to the words of Titmarsh.—If you cannot speak a syllable of French, and love English comfort, clean rooms, breakfasts, and waiters; if you would have plentiful dinners, and are not particular (as how should you be?) concerning wine; if, in this foreign country, ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... birthplace, the latter the property, of Prince Metternich, lead M. Dumas into a little digression on the subject of the celebrated diplomatist. The family name, we are informed, was originally Metter, but received the addition of the last syllable ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... read it twice, and read it to pure and gentle and intellectual women. I say to-day it ought to be in every household in this broad land. It ought to be the domestic gospel of every true, gentle, loving, virtuous woman upon all this continent. There is not one line or syllable in it that is not written in letters of gold. I shall not read it, for my strength does not suffice, nor will the patience of the Senate permit, but from beginning to end it breathes the womanly sentiment which has made pure and great men ...
— Debate On Woman Suffrage In The Senate Of The United States, - 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, And January 25, 1887 • Henry W. Blair, J.E. Brown, J.N. Dolph, G.G. Vest, Geo. F. Hoar.
... and Paddy, after having raised the collar of his big coat on his shoulder, and twisted up the shoulder along with it, directly puts the query back to the lawyer, without altering a syllable of it, for the purpose of ascertaining more accurately whether that is the precise question that has been put to him; for Paddy is conscientious. Then is the science displayed on both sides. The one, a veteran, trained in all the technicalities of legal puzzles, ...
— Phil Purcel, The Pig-Driver; The Geography Of An Irish Oath; The Lianhan Shee • William Carleton
... Lucy; her husband's Luther: that, perhaps, accounted for the first syllable; afterwards, whether her mind lapsed off into combinations of such outshining appellatives as "Clara" and "Marion," or whether Mr. Grapp having played the clarionet, and wooed her sweetly with it in her youth, had anything to do with it, cannot be told; but in those prescriptive days of ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... distich. Yet the horrible details are controlled and unified in the powerful imagination of the poet. We believe Dr. Blacklock was right in thinking that this poem, though Burns had never written another syllable, would have made him a high reputation. Certainly it was not the work of a man daily dazing his faculties with drink; no more was that exquisite lyric To Mary in Heaven. Another poem of this period deserving special mention is The Whistle, not merely because of its ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... my peace I give unto you," she repeated, and went on with the sermon. Her tones were low, but clear, and her articulation so perfect that no syllable was lost; she could have been distinctly heard in a room twice as large as this. The sight was one which thrilled every heart that looked on it; no poor laboring man there was so dull of sense and soul that he did not sit drinking in the wonderful picture: the tall, queenly woman robed in ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson
... is another syllable or two in the charade of my destiny still to be guessed; but after I have had a glimpse of court life at Rosembray I ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... along the cliffs from Polperro to the Fowey estuary finds himself first in the parish of Lanteglos, known as Lanteglos-by-Fowey, to distinguish it from Lanteglos-by-Camelford. The accent, locally, is laid on the second syllable; and the name is a curious composite of Celtic and corrupted Latin. Taking the t as simply euphonious, we have the Celtic lan, first signifying an enclosure, then a sacred enclosure or consecrated ground, finally the ...
— The Cornwall Coast • Arthur L. Salmon
... author-priest the commercial conditions do not begin until he has completed his work. The state of the market, the condition of the public mind—these will have no influence on the work itself. Not a comma nor a syllable will he alter for all the gold of Afric[*]. But, the manuscript once finished, the commercial considerations begin. The prophet has written his message, but the world has yet to hear it. Now, we cannot easily ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... prevented. The French Revolution is the obvious type of figure which lies close at hand so one picks it up. The French Revolution—its Reign of Terror—the orgies of carnage—the cataclysms of agony—need not have been, but they WERE. To put it in words of one syllable." ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... were on board, the captain began questioning us about the siege of Paris, from which city he had assumed that we must have come, notwithstanding our immense distance from Europe. As may be supposed, I had not heard a syllable about the war between France and Germany, and was too ill to do more than assent to all that he chose to put into my mouth. My knowledge of Italian is very imperfect, and I gathered little from anything that he ...
— Erewhon • Samuel Butler
... as soon as dinner was ended, Bonaparte said to me, "Bourrienne, let us go and take a walk." It was the middle of May, so that the evenings were long. We went into the park: he was very grave, and we walked for several minutes without his uttering a syllable. Wishing to break silence in a way that would be agreeable to him, I alluded to the facility with which he had nullified the last 'Senatus-consulte'. He scarcely seemed to hear me, so completely was his mind absorbed in the subject on which he was meditating. At length, suddenly ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... suppose that Madame's cheerful demeanour indicated that I was forgiven. Nothing of the kind. One syllable more, on our walk home, she addressed not to me. And when we reached the ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... power, so slavery at the South owes its activity to Northern influence. Perhaps it is due to myself to say that the word scampering, a few lines above, has no revengeful reference, in its first syllable, to the author of the trick. The cause of humanity, I find, has a tendency to make one cautious and charitable in ...
— The Sable Cloud - A Southern Tale With Northern Comments (1861) • Nehemiah Adams
... South can boast of, employ these mighty instruments of power to create the public sentiment and to control the public affairs of their region, so as best to secure their own supremacy. No word of dissent to the institutions under which they live, no syllable of dissatisfaction, even, with any of the excesses they stimulate, can be breathed in safety. A Christian minister in Tennessee relates an act of fiendish cruelty inflicted upon a slave by one of the members of his church, and he is forced to leave his charge, if not to fly the country. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... the first decennium of this century. It is singular that only one blemish is suggested by any of the contemporary critics in Dr Cook's verses, viz. in the word xunon, for which this critic proposes to substitute ooinon, to prevent, as he observes, the last syllable of ocheto from being lengthened by the x. Such considerations as these are necessary to the trutinae castigatio, before we can value Coleridge's place on the scale of his own day; which day, quoad hoc, be ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... of verse which Emerson occasionally, not very often, indulges in. This is the crowding of a redundant syllable into a line. It is a liberty which is not to be abused by the poet. Shakespeare, the supreme artist, and Milton, the "mighty-mouth'd inventor of harmonies," knew how to use it effectively. Shelley employed it freely. ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... the charade, you should arrange who is to bring in the charade word or syllable. You must also settle what you are going to say, or at least, what the act is to be about. Let every scene be well thought out and be as short as possible. You must be as quick as ever you can between the acts, for all the fun will be spoiled if you ...
— My Book of Indoor Games • Clarence Squareman
... but observe, Mr Trapwit, how nicely you have opposed squire Tankard to colonel Promise; neither of whom have yet uttered one syllable. ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding
... keep step to the music. To do this it is necessary to slur certain words and run others together; also, since the mistakes of Chaucer's copyists are repeated in modern editions, it is often necessary to add a helpful word or syllable to a line, or to omit others that ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... by her; abandoning him not only to her subjects to treat him as they had done her, but to all strangers to subdue and conquer him. It was in vain to employ menaces against her: the fear of death or other misfortune would never induce her to make one step or pronounce one syllable beyond what she had determined. She would rather perish with honor, in maintaining the dignity to which God had raised her, than degrade herself by the least pusillanimity, or act what was unworthy of her station and of her race. Murden, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... practically the first Spanish dramas not anonymous. As a lyric poet Encina excels in the light pastoral; he was a musician as well as a poet, and his bucolic villancicos and glosas in stanzas of six-and eight-syllable lines are daintily written and express genuine love of nature. The Portuguese GIL VICENTE (1470-1540?) was a follower of Encina at first, but a much bigger man. Like most of his compatriots of the sixteenth ...
— Modern Spanish Lyrics • Various
... will tell you—I'll explain in words of one syllable. Mind you, I don't undertake to settle the question—Heaven forbid! It may be all right for Marietta Mortimer to kill herself body and soul by inches to keep what bores her to death to have—a social position in Endbury's two-for-a-cent society, but, for the Lord's sake, why do ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... side, he placed a bed across the end of the tent and asked Sheikh Abdul Qadir, late Smith, to sit cross-legged on it, to glare fixedly and furiously into vacancy, and to grunt at intervals, but on no account to utter a syllable. ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband |
