"Chatter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fists; and at the same time, because it will cost him some money, he will refuse to protect the machines in his factory, though he is aware that the lack of such protection every year mangles, batters, and destroys out of all humanness thousands of working-men, women, and children. He will chatter about things refined and spiritual and godlike like himself, and he and the men who herd with him will calmly adulterate the commodities they put upon the market and which annually kill tens of thousands of ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... front apartment, when both were struck by the unusual chatter of voices on the outside. There must have been a large gathering of people who were ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis
... Mollie's lessons were irksome to her. Mollie's tongue was not easily silenced. In spite of all her efforts, her cheeks often burnt at the girl's innocent loquacity. Mollie was for ever making awkward speeches or asking questions that Audrey found difficult to answer; she would chatter incessantly ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... stiffness and shyness had so completely vanished that the visitors already seemed like old friends rather than new ones; and Audrey was just thinking how very happy life might be, even at home in Moor End, when, in a pause in the chatter, a sharp pitiful cry floated across the ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... began to chatter so that he was forced to steady his jaws. Tom and Dick looked aside, pitying the man for his evident ...
— The Young Engineers on the Gulf - The Dread Mystery of the Million Dollar Breakwater • H. Irving Hancock
... read half a dozen New York newspapers and the interest was always that of the trained editor at work. Richard was not only physically restless but his mind practically never relaxed. When others, tired after a hard day's work or play, would devote the evening to cards or billiards or chatter, Richard would write letters or pore over some strange foreign magazine, consult maps, make notes, or read the stories of his contemporaries. He practically read every American magazine from cover to cover—advertisements were a delight to him, and the finding of ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... saying, since M. Rudolph was also the M. Rudolph of dear Fleur-de-Marie, through his care she must be as happy as we; and this makes my happiness yet more perfect. How I run on! What will you say to me, my lord? But oh! you are so good! And then, you see, it is your fault if I chatter as much and as joyously as Papa Cretu and Ramonette, who no longer dare to rival me in singing. Indeed, M. Rudolph, I can tell you, I put it into their mouths. You will not refuse us one request, will ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... charming relation. Grannie for Granted (CONSTABLE) is the story of a delightful old lady who from her country home takes a placid and grandmaternal interest in the affairs of her descendants—their love affairs mostly, of course, or the engaging chatter of the smaller third generation. Some of the sayings of the latter are worthy examples of the "good enough for Punch" variety, which, as most persons with married friends know too well, is a phrase covering a wide range of quality. Most of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, February 11, 1914 • Various
... As they got in her electric runabout, Janet Strawn said, "Since dinner will not be served for two hours or more, let us drive in the park for a while." Gloria was pleased to see that Philip was interested in the bright, vivacious chatter of her friend, and she was glad to hear him respond in the same light strain. However, she was confessedly nervous when Senator Selwyn and Philip met. Though in different ways, she admired them both profoundly. ...
— Philip Dru: Administrator • Edward Mandell House
... I uttered in the Leslies' big, over-furnished drawing-room I know not. All I remember is that I sat with some insipid girl whose hair was flaxen and as colourless as her mind, sipping my tea while I listened to her silly chatter about a Cook's tour she had just taken through Holland and Belgium. The estimable Cook is, alas! responsible for much tea-table chatter among the ...
— The Sign of Silence • William Le Queux
... they could loaf. Neither man nor boss took any special interest in the work itself. The men were allowed to waste just so much time in getting water, in filling their pipes, in spitting on their hands, in resting on their shovels, in lazy chatter, and so long as they did not exceed this nothing ...
— One Way Out - A Middle-class New-Englander Emigrates to America • William Carleton
... my bedroom on that side of the house so that even times of hair-brushing may not be entirely lost, and the young woman who attends to such matters has been taught to fulfil her duties about a mistress recumbent in an easychair before an open window, and not to profane with chatter that sweet and solemn time. This girl is grieved at my habit of living almost in the garden, and all her ideas as to the sort of life a respectable German lady should lead have got into a sad muddle since she came to me. The people round about are persuaded that ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... neighborly crowd that waited for the 10:27. And as it waited Jim Tumley started singing "Auld Lang Syne." He began very softly but soon the melody swelled to a clear sweetness that hushed the laughing chatter and stilled the shuffling feet of the Pullman passengers who crowded the train vestibules or strolled in weary patience along the ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds
... at five in the morning, and went off to settle his business that he might be back by four o'clock in the country where the lady was? In fact, he ruined a very nice thoroughbred that I had just given him. Forgive my chatter, mademoiselle; I have but just come home from Germany. For a year I have heard no decent French, I have been weaned from French faces, and satiated with Germans, to such a degree that, I believe, in my ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac
... named by a German professor some six years before this time. So the tree was called sequoia gigantea and quietly went on growing, unmindful of the four nations who had quarrelled over its christening. Why, indeed, should it bother its lofty head with the chatter of people whose countries were unknown when this mighty tree was full grown? For these sequoias are the oldest of living objects and have probably been growing for four thousand years. How do we know this? Well, when a fallen trunk is sawed across, one can see rings in ...
— Stories of California • Ella M. Sexton
... "it is too cold to go to sleep; I sit up all night splitting wood and smoking and keeping the fire alight; if I had tea I would never lie down at all." As I made my bed he continued to sing to himself, chatter and laugh with a peculiar low chuckle, watching me all the time. His first brew of tea was quickly made; hot and strong, he poured it into a cup, and drank it with evident delight; then in went more water on the leaves and down on the fire again went ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler
... and pitiless historical reasonings! Mark this, thou unprofaned Nature: thou hast grown old, and for thousands of years this starry sky has spanned the space above thee—but thou hast never yet heard such conceited and, at bottom, mischievous chatter as the talk of the present day! So you are proud of your poets and artists, my good Teutons? You point to them and brag about them to foreign countries, do you? And because it has given you no trouble to have them ...
— On the Future of our Educational Institutions • Friedrich Nietzsche
... with the newspaper in her hand. If you had not been deaf and blind to her defects, you would have noticed that she couldn't fix her attention on it. She was always ready to join in the chatter of the ladies about her. When even their stores of gossip were exhausted, she let the newspaper drop on her lap, and sat in vacant idleness ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... should be mounted on a nag, riding out in a strange land, on a secret mission, with a pocket full of special service money. Whatever I had felt in the few days of the sea-passage was all forgotten now. I did not even worry about not knowing the language. It would keep me from loitering to chatter. My schoolboy French would probably be enough for all purposes if I vent astray. I was "to avoid chance acquaintances, particularly if they spoke English." That was my last order. Repeating it to ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... candidate for Harvard, and both mix on equal terms with the genial circle that collects round the bonfire lighted in front of the house every summer's evening. As one lazily lay there, watching the wavering play of the ruddy blaze on the dark-green pines, listening to the educated chatter of the boy who cleaned the boots, realising that a deer, a bear, or perchance even a catamount might possibly be lurking in the dark woods around, and knowing that all the material comforts of civilised life ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... ever. Humanity, with all its confluent streams, big and small, flows on and on, just as does the river, from its source in birth to its sea of death;—two dark mysteries at either end, and between them various play and work and chatter unceasing. ...
— Glimpses of Bengal • Sir Rabindranath Tagore
... deposit her eggs. While excavating, male and female work alternately. After one has been engaged fifteen or twenty minutes, drilling and carrying out chips, it ascends to an upper limb, utters a loud call or two, when its mate soon appears, and, alighting near it on the branch, the pair chatter and caress a moment, then the fresh one enters the cavity and ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... made no reply. There was a chatter of voices in the drawing-room, a chatter of a lightsomeness that Henson had never heard before. Well, he would soon settle all that. He passed quietly into the room, then stood in puzzled fear ...
— The Crimson Blind • Fred M. White
... insist upon it to the tradesman to keep company with tradesmen; let the fool run on in his own way; let the talkative green-apron rattle in his own way; let the manufacturer and his factor squabble and brangle; the grave self-conceited puppy, who was born a boy, and will die before he is a man, chatter and say a great deal of nothing, and talk his neighbours to death—out of every one you will learn something—they are all tradesmen, and there is always something for a young tradesman to learn from them. If, understanding but a little French, you were to converse every day a little ...
— The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.) • Daniel Defoe
... three steeples and its clock; and, a little higher, the village square, where a spring, fashioned into a fountain, gurgled from one basin into another, under a wide arched roof. I could hear from my window the chatter of the women washing their clothes, the strokes of their beaters, the rasping of the pots scoured with sand and vinegar. Sprinkled over the slopes are little houses with their garden patches in terraces banked ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... the trees about as fast as he could on the ground. Occasionally it would stop and chatter at him, throwing sticks in a most human way, as if ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... birdlings keep up with their mother! They like to talk as well as Eddie Dudley and some other children, whom I have heard pleasantly called little chatter-boxes. Children have much to learn, and must ask many questions. The world is new and strange to them, and is a constant source of surprise and wonder. I do not suppose people ever learn faster than before they are six years ...
— The Nest in the Honeysuckles, and other Stories • Various
... what a picture can do. She is in love. Please Heaven no mischief result! Erik is somewhat hot of temper. Please God he do no damage! Say not a word, else, aflame with wrath, he may shoot the rival from the wall!" Their chatter finally reaching her consciousness, Senta turns to them, annoyed. "Oh, keep still! Stop your silly laughing! Do you wish to make me really cross?" Further to tease her, they drown her voice with the refrain of their spinning-song: "Mutter and hum, good little wheel, cheerily, cheerily turn! ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... least a thorough gentleman. It may be conceit, or wrong self-consciousness, but from the moment the poor boy was spied in the shop, I had a perception that mamma and Mrs. Mansell marked him down. Personally he would be innocent, but, through all his chatter, I cannot shake off the fancy that I am watched, or that decided indifference is not needed to keep ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... buffalo meat had been served and the women were adjusting their packs, not without much chatter and apparent confusion. Weeko (Beautiful Woman), the young wife of the war-chief Shunkaska, who had made many presents at the dances in honor of her twin boys, now gave one of her remaining ponies to a poor old woman whose only beast of burden, ...
— Old Indian Days • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... as I spoke, he began to chatter in return, and springing out of his cover, he ran and jumped towards me. He was a little dark fellow, without a tail, just like Ungka. I could scarcely believe that I was awake, when the monkey, springing forward, ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston
... in large numbers from other countries, chiefly from France; and in London abound in Leicester-square, and are constantly to be met with under the Quadrant in Regent-street, where they grin, gabble, chatter, and sometimes dance, to the no small diversion of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... emulgentiarum profectibus Aeneades novem, cum privilegio Papali ad triennium et postea non. The Shitabranna of the Maids. The Bald Arse or Peeled Breech of the Widows. The Cowl or Capouch of the Monks. The Mumbling Devotion of the Celestine Friars. The Passage-toll of Beggarliness. The Teeth-chatter or Gum-didder of Lubberly Lusks. The Paring-shovel of the Theologues. The Drench-horn of the Masters of Arts. The Scullions of Olcam, the uninitiated Clerk. Magistri N. Lickdishetis, de garbellisiftationibus horarum canonicarum, libri quadriginta. Arsiversitatorium confratriarum, ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... the birds upon the wing Between the zunny show'rs o' spring,— Vor all the lark, a-swingen high, Mid zing below a cloudless sky. An' sparrows, clust'ren roun' the bough, Mid chatter to the men at plough,— The blackbird, whisslen in among The boughs, do zing the ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes
... doing so," replied Madame de Camps. "In the first place, Nais will chatter about it. Besides, Monsieur de Sallenauve addresses you in a most respectful manner, and there is nothing in the letter to feed your ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... Sunday, and Anne felt almost as if deserting her cause, when going to the English service in Whitehall Chapel Royal, now almost emptied except of the Princess's suite, and some of these had the bad taste and profanity to cough and chatter all through the special prayer drawn up by the Archbishop for ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... nothing to do but to jump in, though I, for one, would have taken the train in preference had there been one inside of two hours. Dutchy, however, seemed to be in a surprisingly good humor, and kept up a lively chatter about things that the club had made in our absence. The skis, which have already been described on page 42, had been built under Reddy's guidance, and they had already used them on Willard's Hill, coasting down like a streak and shooting way up into the air off ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... them perch and chatter on the rocks and fly screaming in the air, amongst them being guillemots, kittiwakes, gulls, terns, cormorants, puffins, and eider-ducks, for which latter St. Cuthbert is said to have had great affection; certainly they are the gentlest of these ...
— Northumberland Yesterday and To-day • Jean F. Terry
... afraid of her brother's anger to refer to it. She seated herself on the sofa, and putting back her bright, golden ringlets, that were scattered in wild profusion over her face, she immediately began to talk about the garden and her little playfellow, and continued to chatter away in her usual strain till her brother summoned her ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... and a chatter of conversation and a rustling of dresses arose from the hall. Oh, crumbs! They were going in to supper. Yes, the dining-room door closed; the coast was clear. William took out the rather battered-looking delicacy from ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... couple it was! What a lot they got out of life! Varian walked quietly by the group, to enjoy better the pretty, modish picture they made. Their quick chatter, their bursts of laughter, the sweet faint odor of the tea, the gay dresses and light flannels, with the quiet, sombrely attired servants to add tone, all gave him, fresh from Hunter's quick sense of the effective, an appreciation that gained force from his separateness; he ...
— Mrs. Dud's Sister • Josephine Daskam
... was awakened by the sun shining in at her window. She rose at once, dressed quickly, and was soon downstairs, but not before her mother, who was busily preparing the breakfast. There was so much to be done before the meal was ready, so much chatter over it, and so many last words to the boys and their father before they set out for the hay-field, that Ruth could not find an opportunity to ask her mother the question that was burning upon her lips, until all trace of the meal was removed and the children had ...
— Ruth Arnold - or, the Country Cousin • Lucy Byerley
... was well advanced. Mrs. Harold, the captain and Dr. Llewellyn had reached the limit of their appetites and were now watching and listening to the merry chatter of the young people who sat sipping the cider—they had long since passed beyond the DRINKING point—and eating the black walnuts and hickory nuts which had been gathered upon the estate, for Severndale was famous for ...
— Peggy Stewart: Navy Girl at Home • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... to let her teeth chatter, "it's like a play or—or a Wild West tale, isn't it? Like a 'Frank Merriwell'—remember when you used to adore ...
— Play the Game! • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... hung in the trees. There was to be no dancing and no forfeit games, for McElwin was still raw, and the master of the gathering on the lawn would not dare to throw sand on the spots where the rich man's prideful skin had been raked off. The entertainment was to consist of talk among the older ones, chatter among the slips of girls and striplings of men, with music ...
— Old Ebenezer • Opie Read
... fourth floor, there were sounds of movement, the low staccato chatter of typers, occasional bits of conversation, and the ...
— Fifty Per Cent Prophet • Gordon Randall Garrett
... men had been augmented by a party from out of the card room, and they were listening intently to the old fellow's chatter. They felt now that they ought to laugh, but somehow they could not, and the twitching of their careless faces ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... over the Great Divide. All Nature seemed conscious of the burden weighing to the earth every Indian thought, and trailing in the dust every hope of the race. The birds remembered not to sing—the prairie dogs ceased their almost continual and rasping chatter. The very horses seemed to loiter and fear the weary miles of their final day of travel. The hills, the sky, the very light of the noonday sun gathered to themselves a new atmosphere and spread it like a mantle over this travelling ...
— The Vanishing Race • Dr. Joseph Kossuth Dixon
... inside the church, which was brilliant with lighted tapers. And the pupils, made lively by the gentle warmth, the sound of the organ, and the singing of the choir, began to chatter in low tones. They boasted of the midnight treats awaiting them at home. The son of the Mayor had seen, before leaving the house, a monstrous goose larded with truffles so that it looked like a black-spotted leopard. Another boy told of the fir tree waiting for him, ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... Ah Cum would run his glance speculatively over the assortment and select that individual who promised to be the most companionable. He was a philosopher. Usually his charges bored him with their interrogative chatter, for he knew that his information more often than not went into one ear and out of the other. To-day he selected the girl, and gave her the lead-chair. He motioned the young man to the rear chair, because ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... happened that Mona was in early, and was obliged to listen to the happy chatter of the girls as they discussed their plans with a zest and good-humour such as seldom prevails when a company of girls have under discussion a subject on which each has her individual and separate ideas, and is anxious to ...
— Hollowmell - or, A Schoolgirl's Mission • E.R. Burden
... now, with his shoulders back, his head up. He could fancy how, to-morrow, their dull placidity would be wrung by the discovery of the crime. The little wood would fling its secret into the eager lap of these decrepit witches; they would crowd to their doors, chatter it, shout it, pull it to pieces. "Body of an Undergraduate . . . Body of an Undergraduate. ...
— The Prelude to Adventure • Hugh Walpole
... and held out his arms for the sleeping bud that contained in its folded petals all their domestic hopes; and as the star-eyed young mother kissed it lightly and laid it in its father's arms, the happy pair walked away, leaving the echo of their gay musical chatter lingering on the air. ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... short. He retained just a fleeting picture of feverish gaiety which seemed out of perspective; of profound bores who discussed the mistakes of the Higher Command in the arm chairs of the Club; of universal chatter concerning rations and meat coupons. Then he had left, and in a few short hours had been back once more in the mud holes. A good leave? Oh! undoubtedly, just as it should have been, where the one thing necessary was contrast. ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... very fast, all but the tall one, who, though she talked also, did not chatter as the others did, but spoke slowly, in a low tone which must be listened to, or it could not be heard. The four laughed a good deal, and when the tall woman smiled she lost something of her fascination, for she had large, slightly prominent eye-teeth which ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... deadly, stinging tail. Siegfried is not interested in the tail: he wants to know whether the dragon has a heart, being confident of his ability to stick Nothung into it if it exists. Reassured on this point, he drives Mimmy away, and stretches himself under the trees, listening to the morning chatter of the birds. One of them has a great deal to say to him; but he cannot understand it; and after vainly trying to carry on the conversation with a reed which he cuts, he takes to entertaining the bird with tunes on his horn, asking it to send him a loving ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw
... society chatter seemed to pall on young Rembrandt. It is said that when a 'bus-driver has a holiday he always goes and rides with the man who is taking his place; but when Rembrandt had a holiday he went away from the studio, not towards it. He would walk alone, off across the meadows, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 4 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Painters • Elbert Hubbard
... had so fascinated Basil Hallward, and many others besides him, seemed never to leave him. Even those who had heard the most evil things against him, and from time to time strange rumours about his mode of life crept through London and became the chatter of the clubs, could not believe anything to his dishonour when they saw him. He had always the look of one who had kept himself unspotted from the world. Men who talked grossly became silent when Dorian Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his face that rebuked them. His ...
— The Picture of Dorian Gray • Oscar Wilde
... this random chatter of my good-natured friend upon my mind may well be imagined. It was fortunate that he was quite too much occupied in what he was saying to note my annoyance. In vain, anxious to be let off, was I restrained in utterance—cold, unpliable. The good fellow took for granted that it was ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... treble in concert with the musicians of the palace before the Signory, following my notes: and a beadle used to carry me upon his shoulders. The Gonfalonier, that is, Soderini, whom I have already mentioned, took much pleasure in making me chatter, and gave me comfits, and was wont to say to my father: "Maestro Giovanni, besides music, teach the boy those other arts which do you so much honour." To which my father answered: "I do not wish him to practise ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... to meet at infrequent intervals, spent the delightful morning in the settlement of arrears of gossip, while two black gins sat in the shade of a mango-tree, smoked incessantly and did nothing placidly. At dinner-time the latter began to chatter volubly, and the mistress of the house, in an outburst of vicarious energy, called from the verandah—"Come, Topsy—come, Rosey. You do nothing all day. You two fella ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... fishermen's huts down the beach came an intense blue smoke of fires; above the soft rustle of the swell among the boats came the chatter of many sleepy voices, like the sound of sparrows in a city park at dusk. The day dissolved slowly in utter timelessness. And when the last fishing boat came out of the dark sea, the tall slanting sail folding suddenly ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... him—or her—as novel in London, not unkindly critical, but anxious to give information about his country—and uninvited. But whereas the Englishman is so accustomed to the abuse and criticism of other peoples that the harmless chatter of the American ripples more or less unheeded by him, the American, less case-hardened in his isolation, hears the Englishman's bluntly worded expression of contempt, and it hurts. It does not hurt nearly as much now as it did twenty ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... I came, the Ferrises gave me a beautiful dinner, and I wore evening dress for the first time in two years, and was as thrilled as a debutante at her first ball! It was so good to see cut glass and silver, and to hear dear silly worldly chatter that I grew terribly frivolous. Plates were laid for twenty, and who do you suppose was on my right? The severe young purser who was on the steamer I came over in! His ship is coaling in the harbour and he is staying with ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... twenty birds in an afternoon's walk. Here, too, is the metropolis of the turtledove, and the low sound of its crooning is heard all day in summer, the other most common sound being that of magpies—their subdued, conversational chatter and their solo-singing, the chant or call which a bird will go on repeating for a hundred times. The wonder is how the doves succeed in such a place in hatching any couple of chalk-white eggs, placed on a small platform of sticks, or of rearing any pair of young, conspicuous ...
— A Shepherd's Life • W. H. Hudson
... counted the days, and sat up half the night on the edges of each other's beds discussing the beautiful presents they were sure to receive; and a great deal might be written about what they said, but it has nothing to do with this story, except that their chatter helped to fill the air with the Christmas spirit, and with thoughts of giving as well as of receiving. Though they were rather spoiled children, they were generous too, and they laid all sorts of ...
— The Little City Of Hope - A Christmas Story • F. Marion Crawford
... his hand in weary protest, as he smiled apologetically at the court. "Darned if I didn't plumb forget one thing," he said. "We got to swear in these witnesses before they can chatter. Is there anybody got a Bible around 'em? Nope? Montana, I wished you'd lope over to that house and see what they got in the ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand
... was in no mood for company, missed the rest of the crew by two public-houses, and having purchased a baby's teething powder and removed the label, had a congratulatory drink or two before going on board again. A chatter of voices from the forecastle warned him that the crew had returned, but the tongues ceased abruptly as he descended, and three pairs of eyes ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs
... Tunis allowed shore leave, late as the hour was. But he sat beside the passenger on the Seamew's deck, and they talked. It was surprising how much those two found to talk about! Perhaps a good deal of their inconsequential chatter was to hide the anxiety each felt in secret as ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... iron-shod hoofs; the shrill, high cry of the street venders; the blasts of motor horns that seemed to rend the narrow street; the roar and rumble of the electric trams; the wail of fretful babies; the chatter of gossiping women; and above and through and below it all the cracking of the cabman's whip—that sceptre of the Roman cabby, that wand which is one part whip and nine parts crack. Sometimes it seemed to Mary Gowd that her brain was seared and welted by the pistol-shot ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... not respond to his light flow of chatter on the way home. She halted on the threshold of her home, and looked at him with despair in her ...
— Amarilly of Clothes-line Alley • Belle K. Maniates
... verses, I should have worked off my ill-humours in rhyme, and slept better in consequence, and greeted the dawn with joy. Wonder rather than joy was in my mind on this morning as the sky took colour and the woods stirred with the chatter of the birds. For the pirates had disappeared! Their boats lay against the beach, but there was, as it seemed to us at first, no visible sign of ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... panther, are found among mankind, and ought to excite no other emotion, when found in the man, than when found in the beast. Why should the true man be angry with the geese that hiss, the peacocks that strut, the asses that bray, and the apes that imitate and chatter, although they wear the human form? Always, also, it remains true, that it is more noble to forgive than to take revenge; and that, in general, we ought too much to despise those who wrong us, to feel the emotion of anger, ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... peaceful enough now. The children press their noses and little india-rubber fingers against the glass, and chatter and laugh ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... another idea, that made me jump from my chair and walk the floor. I might know what the monkeys say when they chatter to each other! What discovery in all natural history could be so great as this? The thought that these little creatures, so nearly allied to man, might disclose to me their dispositions, their hopes, ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... my dear," returned the chaperon, who sat listening to Madge's animated chatter with an ...
— Madge Morton's Secret • Amy D. V. Chalmers
... always said: "If you are hungry, eat; if you are thirsty, drink; but if you are in trouble, don't chatter."' ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... very distinguished besides. My sister was sixteen when I left; she must be eighteen now. She was pretty, and she ought to be beautiful. Then there is my brother Edouard, a delightful youngster of twelve, who will let off fireworks between your legs and chatter a gibberish of English with you. At the end of the fortnight we will ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... enough; for, in spite of all her chatter, she had no depth of mind. The tallest gum-tree was on Barlow's farm which adjoined the forty-acre on the east. Barlow had been a stockman for several years on Calvert's run, and had saved money. He invested his money in the Bank of Love, and the bank broke. ...
— The Book of the Bush • George Dunderdale
... befitting one for whom remains In life a journey through so many ills. But all the flocks and herds and all wild beasts Come forth and grow, nor need the little rattles, Nor must be treated to the humouring nurse's Dear, broken chatter; nor seek they divers clothes To suit the changing skies; nor need, in fine, Nor arms, nor lofty ramparts, wherewithal Their own to guard—because the earth herself And nature, artificer of the world, bring forth Aboundingly ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... ringing tones the adjutant ordered attention. The chatter and clamor instantly ceased. Briefly the young officer rattled off the details for the morrow, ...
— To The Front - A Sequel to Cadet Days • Charles King
... merely nodded. She gestured again, so imperiously that he obeyed, but with scant courtesy, and he did not look at all overjoyed at meeting the illustrious Mr. Graemer. He sat down however, ordered his luncheon and listened gravely enough to Edwina's chatter. ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke
... long time for the doctor to declare himself, they turned desperate, and began to chatter all manner of trifles. This had a good effect: it roused Aubertin from his reverie, and presently he gave them the following piece of information: "I told you the other day that a nephew of mine was just dead; a nephew I had not seen for many ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade
... don't mean kindred, like the beast,— Mere blood and bones and flesh and matter,— But what this last is makes no matter. Philosophers have tried to teach it, But all their learning cannot reach it; 'Tis matter still, "that's what's the matter" With all their philosophic chatter, And Latin, Greek, and Hebrew clatter, Crucibles, retorts, and receivers, Wedges, inclined planes, and levers, Screws, blow pipes, electricity and light, And fifty other notions, quite Too much to either read or write. Just ask the wisest, What is matter? And notice how he will bespatter ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... snare for the soul, and that true happiness and real virtue are not to be found in gilded saloons. They write to the newspapers denouncing the reluctance of young people to marry on small incomes, and urging girls to begin life as their mothers began it, and despise the silly chatter of those who think luxurious surroundings more important than the ...
— Reflections and Comments 1865-1895 • Edwin Lawrence Godkin
... so the world goes with the old; you take the fair lady for company and I a she-ass. Well, of the two give me the ass which is more safe and does not chatter." ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... not but admire the old lady's admirable manner. She kept up an easy chatter, sometimes in French, sometimes in English, with the Russian and with a Spanish artist; she never allowed Deena to feel out of touch with the conversation, and in the midst of it all she managed to ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... "degraded and insulted," and as having borne these insults with "submissive patience." The writers insisted that Kentucky had nothing to hope from the Federal Government, and that it was nonsense to chatter about the infraction of treaties, for it was necessary, at any cost, to take Louisiana, which was "groaning under tyranny." They threatened the United States with what the Kentuckians would do if their wishes were not granted, announcing ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt
... be in bed, anyhow," responded Ailsa gaily; and then, this giving the conversation a merry turn, they talked and laughed and kept up such a chatter that three-quarters of an hour went like magic and nobody seemed aware of it. But suddenly Ailsa thought, and then put ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... jabbering crowd we chaff and chatter with, we meet occasionally a man who never chaffs nor chatters,—a man who sees all things; perhaps because of this, suffers all things, but says nothing at all. The sphinxes are still extant. The old time ones were of stone and bronze; the modern ones are of ...
— How Deacon Tubman and Parson Whitney Kept New Year's - And Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... soup, and don't chatter, boy," said Jarette, sharply, and just then the cook came out smiling with a bucket nearly full of steaming, fragrant-smelling soup, and the man who had been by the wheel came behind him carrying a dozen tin mugs whose handles were strung ...
— Sail Ho! - A Boy at Sea • George Manville Fenn
... that brought them pounding at the postern gates. Old Conrad opened the gate in complete ignorance of our presence in the garden. (We happened to be in a somewhat obscure nook and seated upon a stone bench—so he must be held blameless.) The quartette brushed past the old man and I, hearing their chatter, foolishly exposed myself. ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... stony ways In little sharps and trebles; I bubble into eddying bays; I babble on the pebbles. With many a curve my banks I fret By many a field and fallow. And many a fairy foreland set With willow-weed and mallow. I chatter, chatter, as I flow To join the brimming river; For men may come, and men may go, But ...
— De La Salle Fifth Reader • Brothers of the Christian Schools
... had just turned in when a tramp came in and asked if he could sleep in the barn. One of the boys said, 'Yes.' The fellow lay down on the hay without any blankets, and as soon as he was laid down his teeth began to chatter and he shook all over, for he had a chill. Penloe instantly got up and lit a lantern, took his blankets over to the tramp and said: 'Here, brother, you have got a chill. Take my blankets and roll yourself up in them; you will be ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge
... a fine thing it was for Andy that there was an urgent demand for a horse at the lumber camp; that he could get twice the money for old Grey that the animal was worth. Mrs. Moran agreed that it would be a great help to old Andy, but Jacky's small face went white, he ceased his boyish chatter, and his little throat refused to swallow a mouthful ...
— The Shagganappi • E. Pauline Johnson
... Yahoos sought for with much eagerness, and would suck it with great delight; it produced in them the same effects that wine has upon us. It would make them sometimes hug, and sometimes tear one another; they would howl, and grin, and chatter, and reel, and tumble, and then fall asleep ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... beard an' the greatcoat an' cap an' the pack over all, an' Mrs. Bill an' I went out-of-doors. We stood still an' listened for a moment. Two baby voices were calling out of an upper window: 'Santa Claus, please come, Santa Claus!' Then we heard the window close an' the chatter above stairs, but we stood still. Mrs. Bill seemed to be laughing, but I observed that her handkerchief had the centre of the ...
— Keeping up with Lizzie • Irving Bacheller
... A thing as important as thistledown is as unimportantly dismissed. And yonder in heaven the moon sulks at us through a cloud with a quarter of her eye, reproaching us for our peace-destroying chatter. It destroys our own no less than hers. To dream is forbidden, but at least let ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... Parliament, not for the benefit of the country, but only for himself. He's an artist with the color-pot as well as in the theatre; but when he gets all the power into his own hands, then the pot's empty! I chatter and chatter, but it must come out, what's sticking in my throat, to the disadvantage of my own family. But I must now be the woman that will save a good many people. It is not done with my good will, or for the sake of ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... nothing was heard of her friends, and she was completely one of the home, she struggled more with the dullness and loneliness. She undertook all errands to the village for the sake of such change as a chatter with the young folk there afforded her, or for the chance of seeing the squire's lady or sons and daughters go by; and she was wild to go on market days ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... was fast becoming the stumbling-block of governments and the most powerful lever of revolutionaries. The chief of the peace armies resided in sumptuous hotels, furnished luxuriously in dubious taste, flooded after sundown with dazzling light, and filled by day with the buzz of idle chatter, the shuffling of feet, the banging of doors, and the ringing of bells. Music and dancing enlivened the inmates when their day's toil was over and time had to be killed. Thus, within, one could find anxious deliberation and warm debate; ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... start there is always a lot of nervous chatter—airy persiflage flies to and fro and much laughing is indulged in. But it has a forced, strained sound, that laughter has; it does not come from the heart, the heart being otherwise engaged for ...
— Roughing it De Luxe • Irvin S. Cobb
... way with girls was even more fruitful of result than her way with men. They might laugh at her, criticize her or even call her names significant of disdain, but they never left her long to herself or missed an opportunity to make the most of her irrepressible chatter. ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... so curious, I saw it a quarter of an hour ago in a special edition of a halfpenny rag; I was on my way to the office. (Showing paper.) Here you are! The Evening Courier. Quite a full account of the illness. You couldn't send for me, but you could chatter to some journalist. ...
— The Great Adventure • Arnold Bennett
... him profoundly and well might have glimpsed something of his train of thought—"as are statues and pictures symbols in the Roman church. My bright colored bird is older now than you will be, or I, when we die. Age, bright feathers and chatter! My puma means much to me that you would not understand, being of another race. Further, did you or another lift a hand against his mistress he would tear ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... get me out of court one of these days, squire," muttered Potts, "and so will you too, Master James Device.—A day of reckoning will come for both—heavy reckoning. Ugh! ugh!" he added, shivering, "how my teeth chatter!" ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... he said, "leave that sort of chatter alone! Keep it for others. Lieutenant Reimers does not care for that kind of thing. And I know him well, I assure you, my child; he is one of ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... resuming the march. In another quarter of an hour they were down once more, and so it continued for the rest of the way. Every ten minutes' walking—it was seldom steep enough to be called actual climbing—was followed by seven or eight minutes of sitting still, smoking and chattering. How they did chatter! It was to no purpose that we continued to move on when they sat down, or that we rose to go before they had sufficiently rested. They looked at one another, so far as I could make out by the faint light, and occasionally they laughed; but they would not and did ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... Chuck seemed quite satisfied that there was no one about. He hopped down from the old stone wall and scampered over to the doorway of his new house, and there he began to chatter. Sammy Jay stretched his neck until it ached, trying to hear what Johnny Chuck was saying, but he couldn't because Johnny's ...
— The Adventures of Johnny Chuck • Thornton W. Burgess
... leaves were turning yellow, and the squirrels were fat and tame, they roamed together through the dingle in search of hazel-nuts; and waded up and down the shallow stream, their chatter mingling with its bubbling noise, whilst they tried ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... here," Phil went on, selecting seats at a small table, with some casual friends, and then his resources of conversation and Patty's gay chatter did away with all chance for ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... point out the injury to the college dignity; in vain do the superintendents evince an unflattering lack of interest in the scholarship of Wellesley. It must be done. It is done. The president of the freshman class is called upon to recite her Greek lesson. She begins. The superintendents chatter and laugh discourteously among themselves. But the president of the freshman class has her own ideas of classroom etiquette. She pauses. She waits, silent, until the room is hushed, then she resumes her ...
— The Story of Wellesley • Florence Converse
... facts there could be no question. And did she justify it and excuse it; or was she, too, secretly unhappy? And was this the reason for her pride, and for her bitter speeches? It was a continual topic of chatter in Society, how Laura Hegan had withdrawn herself from all of her mother's affairs, and was interesting herself in work in the slums. Could it be that Nemesis had overtaken Jim Hegan in the form of his daughter? That she was the conscience ...
— The Moneychangers • Upton Sinclair
... by the arm and pulled him out on to the sidewalk. The way he whirled him around amid his wild glee made Frank's teeth chatter. ...
— The Boys of Bellwood School • Frank V. Webster
... The merry chatter ceased in an instant and every face turned towards the schooner, and a hundred pair of curious eyes watched. Then, one by one, they sat down and waited; all but the two at the gate, who remained standing, the boy's arm still ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke
... midst of their chatter and laughter a blast of frozen air and a spray of driven snow struck like ice through the room, and reached them even in the warmth of the old wolfskins and the great stove. It was the door ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... merrily to the music of Lovin Child's chuckling laugh and his unintelligible chatter. Bud made the discovery that "Boy" was trying to say Lovin Child when he wanted to be taken and rocked, and declared that he would tell the world the name fit, like a saddle on a duck's back. Lovin Child discovered Cash's pipe, ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... shall see," and so on—the unmeaning chatter of the crowd, which merely serves to show that it is at the command of the first who chooses to sway it. Stronger words were heard ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... that they had left the drawing-room before he entered it; for he no sooner appeared at the door, than the same little chatter-box, who had betrayed the change in her mother's plans to Mrs. Hilson, ran up to him to tell the great news that they were not going back to Charleston, but were to stay in New York all winter, 'mamma, and Jane, and all of them, except papa and Edward.' The ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... came up in a group, and the next hour or two were spent wandering through the pleasant gardens, while laughter, jokes, and good-humored chatter of all sorts ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... warm, and one of the windows stood open to the small balcony over the rail of which, on coming back from dinner, Maisie had hung a long time in the enjoyment of the chatter, the lights, the life of the quay made brilliant by the season and the hour. Mrs. Wix's requirements had drawn her in from this pasture and Mrs. Wix's embrace had detained her even though midway in the outpouring her confusion and sympathy had permitted, or rather had positively helped, her ...
— What Maisie Knew • Henry James
... the way we chatter. What you want to do to get your foot in the stirrup is supremely difficult. There's everything to overcome. You've neither an engagement nor the prospect ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... together in a surging affection, they walked down Fifth Avenue toward the hairdresser's. There was a diffused gray sparkle of sunlight—it was early for the throngs—through which they passed rapidly to the accompaniment of a rapid eager chatter. Linda wore a deep smooth camel's hair cape, over which her intense black hair poured like ink, and her face was shaded by a dipping green velvet hat. Her mother, in one of the tightly cut suits she affected, had never been more ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... to him hardly credible that he had been away from it all for a year and more. Nothing was changed. Across the room the same mirrors repeated the reflections he had observed so many times before. Nearby were the same booths and from within them came the same laughter and chatter and suppressed song. Opposite the tiny table the same man with the broad, good-natured face was making critical, smiling observation, as of yore. As ever, the look recalled the visionary ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... uncommon sight to see a clever man sit mum, abashed by the chatter of a cheery shallow-pate, who is happily unconscious of the oppressive triviality of his own conversation. Norburn's eager flow of words froze at the contact of Dick's small-talk, and he was a discontented auditor of ball-room and club gossip. It amazed him that a man should ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... of his master's new guest, he entered into conversation with the old man, who, like Eve upon another occasion, was tempted, nothing loth, for the old man loved to talk; and in a house so busy as the syndic's there were few who had time to chatter, and those who had, preferred other conversation to what, it must be ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... tender you the advice I did. But since you've already done what I wanted you to do, you've shown yourself far sharper than I am. There's nothing in this to drive you into another tantrum, and to make that mouth of yours begin to chatter away so much about 'you and I,' 'you and ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... remember it by—little to be told except that all the while the stream talked, the larks sang, and in the hollow of the hills three children were happy. George landed half a dozen trout before lunch-time; but Taffy caught none, partly because he knew nothing about fishing, partly because the chatter of the stream set him telling tales to himself and he forgot the rod in his hand. And Honoria, after hooking a tiny fish and throwing it back into the water, wandered off in search of larks' nests. She came slowly back when George blew a ...
— The Ship of Stars • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... charming little child she was, so quaintly sensible, and with a simplicity and innocence that went to one's heart. How would Recompense Gardiner regard a little girl like that? He would have her over sometime for a day and they would chatter in French. Perhaps he had better brush up his French a little. Then he smiled, remembering she had called herself stupid, and he was indignant that ...
— A Little Girl in Old Boston • Amanda Millie Douglas
... Mr. Dick, counterfeiting that affection and making his teeth chatter. 'Held by the palings. Cried. But, Trotwood, come here,' getting me close to him, that he might whisper very softly; 'why did she give him ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... foliage, looking on the lake-like rings of water. The Temple of the Sun, where the beauty of Asenath beguiled the Israelite to forget his sale into bondage and banishment, lies in shapeless hillocks, over which canter the mules of dragomen and chatter the tongues of tourists. Where the Lutetian Palace of Julian saluted their darling as Augustus, the sledge-hammer and the stucco of the Haussmann fiat bear desolation in their wake. Levantine dice ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... half- dreams of such a state whirling in the waltz, hopping in the polka, sliding in the galop, and then endlessly walking up and down between the dances, and eating and drinking the chill refreshments that it made my teeth chatter to think of. I suppose they decently came to me from time to time, though they seemed to be always dancing, for I could afterward remember Miss Gage taking a wrap from me now and then, and quickly coming back to shed it upon my lap again. I got so ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... asleep in Dorothy's room in the palace woke up and discovered he was lonesome. Everything seemed very still throughout the great building and Toto—that was the little dog's name—missed the customary chatter of the three girls. He never paid much attention to what was going on around him and, although he could speak, he seldom said anything; so the little dog did not know about Ozma's loss or that ...
— The Lost Princess of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... length he stood in front of a glassy door, and on the face of the door, in a graceful curve, was painted the legend, 'Mark Snyder, Literary Agent.' Shadows of vague moving forms could be discerned on the opalescent glass, and the chatter of typewriters ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... a tale of immortal life. Should I be sitting here, chattering of my infantile adventures, if I did not know that I was speaking for thousands? Should you be sitting there, attending to my chatter, while the world's work waits, if you did not know that I spoke also for you? I might say "you" or "he" instead of "I." Or I might be silent, while you spoke for me and the rest, but for the accident that I was born with ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... little pack animals laden with blankets, and all walked like fiends, pressing forward doggedly, hour after hour. Many of them were Italians, and one group which we overtook went along killing robins for food. They were a merry and dramatic lot, making the silent forests echo with their chatter. ...
— The Trail of the Goldseekers - A Record of Travel in Prose and Verse • Hamlin Garland
... his blankets on the floor of the bunk house and saw the various sleepers coiled or sprawled in their beds; their breathing had not yet grown restless at the nearing of day. He stepped to the door carefully, and saw the crowding blackbirds begin their walk and chatter in the mud of the littered and trodden corrals. From beyond among the cotton woods, came continually the smooth unemphatic sound of the doves answering each other invisibly; and against the empty ridge of the river-bluff lay the moon, no longer shining, for there was established a ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... overshadowing sombrero, with heavy silver braid wound about the crown. The women have the scantiest of clothing, arms and neck bare, dark eyes glittering, and dusky unkempt hair. The atmosphere is stifling, but we must endure it long enough to get some of the wares. The women chatter volubly, and even leave their booths to come and take us by the dress and urge us to some dingy stall. Vegetables and fruit are piled about in profusion, but we make our way to the pottery tables. I am afraid to admire the curious designs ...
— Under the Southern Cross • Elizabeth Robins
... a winter's day, But warm and bright, and calm as May, The birds, conceiving a design To forestall sweet St. Valentine, In many an orchard, copse, and grove, Assembled on affairs of love; And with much twitter and much chatter, Began to agitate ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... an idea of what a man may talk about and when he should hold his tongue. And he is such a fool as to think that his idle chatter can influence others. I don't suppose a bishop can refuse to ordain a gentleman because he is a general idiot. Otherwise I think the bishop is responsible for letting in such an ass as this." Mary said to herself, as she heard this, that it was the most ill-natured remark ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope
... like butterflies, keeping poised by a constant hovering motion, just tilting upon their feet, which scarcely touch the moist ground. You will seldom see them actually perch on anything less airy than some telegraphic wire; but, when they do alight, each will make chatter enough for a dozen, as if all the rushing hurry of the wings had passed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... Grace was said with solemn brevity by the Colonel, whose sum total of orthodoxy was comprised in that brief grace, and in regular attendance at church on Sunday mornings; and then there came a period of chatter and laughter which might have been a little distracting to a stranger. Each of the boys and girls had some wonderful fact, usually about his or her favourite animal, to communicate to the father. Aunt Betsy ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... straight. Heedless of the chatter and excitement behind him Omar walked on before, his staff raised on a level with his eye, counting aloud each step he took, measuring the distance, until when he had taken a thousand paces he suddenly stopped, examined the ground well, and then turning at exact right ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... much longer as they liked. When the cutter returned into the harbour to land her fish, Jack and Bill were sent below, so that the authorities might not see them and carry them off. Captain Turgot was much afraid of losing them. They were getting on famously with their French, and Bill could chatter away already at a great rate, though not in very good French, to be sure, for he made a number of blunders, which afforded constant amusement to his companions, but Pierre was always ready to ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston
... debut arrived, as doomsday will come at last; and after having been elaborately arrayed for her part by a gossiping tire-woman, who would chatter incessantly, relating, for the encouragement of the debutante, tale after tale of stage-fright, swoons, and failure,—after having been plumed, powdered, and most reluctantly rouged, the rose of nineteen summers having suddenly ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... entrance of the court, and penetrated into the garden. They cast their eyes on all four quarters; but not a soul was visible. When they became conscious of the splendour of the flowers and the chatter of the birds, they, with listless step, turned their course towards the I Hung court. There they found several servant-girls baling out water; while a bevy of them stood under the verandah, watching the thrushes having ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... table in the center of the box are given to a man in waiting to be wagered on the various events. The finishes are seldom very close, the Filipino ponies scampering around the turf like rats. A native band, however, adds to the excitement which the clamor at the booking office and the animated chatter of duenas, caballeros, jockeys, and senoritas in the ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... or to find the sun-dew blossom open, or to sketch some effect of morning sun. Louis would afterwards be tired and unhinged the whole day, but never convinced, only capable of promoting Clara's chatter; and ready the next day to stand about with her in the sun at the cottages, to the increase of her freckles, and the detriment of his ankle. Their frolics would have been more comprehensible had she been more attractive; but her boisterous ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a little while," she said. "You'll find me on the terrace. Although Mahmoud Baroudi drinks nothing, I am sure he likes men's talk better than woman's chatter." ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... specially instanced in these reports as unable to converse without gesture, often, in their domestic abandon, wrap themselves up in robes or blankets with only breathing holes before the nose, so that no part of the body is seen, and chatter away for hours, telling long stories. If in daylight they thus voluntarily deprive themselves of the possibility of making signs, it is clear that their preference for talks around the fire at night is explicable by very natural reasons wholly distinct ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... his soul that communicated themselves to all concerned. Then everybody would talk at once, and everybody insist upon showing everybody else what had been done since morning, and there was more hanging of pictures and changing of furniture, and so much chatter and laughter that it was ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... for I was safely and comfortably bestowed, as she could see, and ready for sleep; but she would not go, and there sat, with the candle in her hand, her face flushed and her great blue eyes soulfully glowing, while she continued to chatter in an incoherent and strangely irrelevant fashion: so that, astonished into broad wakefulness by this extraordinary behaviour, I sat bolt upright in bed, ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... who has been very successful in the launching of debutantes in society, always gives this advice to her proteges, "Talk, talk. It does not matter much what you say, but chatter away lightly and gayly. Nothing embarrasses and bores the average man so much as a girl who ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... in particular, it was exciting, ravishing, and the time flew by so unheeded that presently there came a sharp knock and an impatient voice cried, "Chatter! chatter! chatter! How long are we to be kept waiting for dinner, all ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... went back to his horse in silence. And silent he remained during the ride back to camp, despite Sandy's chatter. For already he had a vague theory and he was seeking stubbornly to render that theory less vague. When they had ridden back to the herd he singled out Chuck Evans and moved with him out of hearing ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... ugly Pista very quickly, others thought that the gardener was by no means amiss, though no longer very young; many said still more scandalous things. The young widow did not trouble herself about this chatter in the least; she had more important matters in her head and heart, and therefore could not hear the ...
— How Women Love - (Soul Analysis) • Max Simon Nordau
... elder restrained her. "Wait," she said, "my sister, until we hear the Abalkakmooech." [Footnote: Ground squirrel] And she lay still till the Adoo-doo-dech [Footnote: Red squirrel] began his early chatter and his morning's work. Then, without waiting, she jumped up, as did the elder, when they found themselves indeed on earth, but in the summit of a tall, spreading hemlock-tree, and that in such a manner that they could not descend without assistance. And it had come ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland
... coffee. It was a fine, lofty, oak-panelled old place, once the refectory of the monks, with great Gothic windows of stained glass, antique cabinets, and stands of armour. Against the dark oak, from floor to ceiling, the dresses of the women showed well, and, amid the laughter and chatter, I saw the gay, careless Bindo—a well-set-up, manly figure in his evening clothes—standing beside his hostess, chatting and laughing with her, while Sir Charles was bending over the chair of a pretty, ...
— The Count's Chauffeur • William Le Queux
... Nicolson, an important official in the Foreign Office. It so happened that Mr. Nicolson and Page were the only two members of the company who were the possessors of a great secret which made ineffably silly all the chatter that had taken place during the dinner; this was that the United States had decided on war against Germany and would issue the declaration in ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II • Burton J. Hendrick
... in travel now took more people where they could see for themselves the beauty of nature. In the new poetry we consequently find more definiteness. We can hear the whir of the partridge, the chatter of magpies, the whistle of the quail. Poets speak of a tree not only in general terms, but they note also the differences in the shade of the green of the leaves and the peculiarities of the bark. Previous to this time, poets borrowed ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... however, Angela decided that she must go. Her father's country called, with a voice she could hear above the music of the Southern town, the laughter of the pretty French girls and the chatter of black and brown babies who babbled a language which was neither French, Spanish, nor English, but a mixture of all. She bought more things of Monsieur Bienvenu, and also in other curiosity shops which she dared not mention to him, since his one failing was a bitter ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... the two men met, but Brant was unable to decipher the meaning hidden within the gray eyes. Neither spoke, and Miss Spencer, never realizing what her chatter meant, rattled ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... father, but he was so absorbed in looking over a new part he was to take, that he paid little attention to the chatter of the girls. ...
— The Moving Picture Girls - First Appearances in Photo Dramas • Laura Lee Hope
... things grouped themselves and fell into perspective as I passed farther and farther from them, and drew near the central origins of civilisation. I do not say that I saw the solution; but I saw the problem. In the litter of journalism and the chatter of politics, it is too much of a puzzle even to be a problem. For instance, a friend of mine described his book, The Path to Rome, as a journey through all Europe that the Faith had saved; and I might ...
— The New Jerusalem • G. K. Chesterton |
