"Modulation" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... quite apparent that R. L. S. and Modestine are the models responsible for this state of things. And, since the style in itself is pleasant enough, I don't know that any one need complain. What put me upon this reflection was Vagabonds in Perigord (CONSTABLE), which, for the modulation of its prose, might almost have been an unacknowledged work of the Master, but is actually written by Mr. H. H. BASHFORD. It concerns the wanderings on foot of certain pleasure pilgrims along the course of the river ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, May 20, 1914 • Various
... Its rhythm is so irregular, and its notes, especially in the quick movement, so mixed and huddled together, that a stranger finds it impossible to reconcile his ear to it, so as to perceive its modulation. Some of these pibrochs, being intended to represent a battle, begin with a grave motion, resembling a march; then gradually quicken into the onset; run off with noisy confusion, and turbulent rapidity, to imitate the conflict and pursuit; then swell into a few flourishes of ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... poet, not a writer of rhymes or jingles, but as we have said a true poet in his soul. Anna felt this in all her intercourse with him and heard it in the tones of his voice when he spoke, a voice that had a ring in it, a resonance, and that exquisite power of modulation which says more than the words themselves. And so time went swiftly and sweetly by with their walks and rides, and occupations, until they were twenty years old. Anna happy in the possession of Cecil's love, with life as she wished it, pure, joyous life, with music and beauty everywhere. ...
— Peak's Island - A Romance of Buccaneer Days • Ford Paul
... it is without compass, depth, sweetness,—and has none of the winning tones which reach the inmost soul, and none of the tones of passionate energy, which raise you out of your own world into the speaker's. But his modulation is smooth, measured, dignified, though occasionally injured by too elaborate a swell, ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... of the fine arts sends its messages to the human soul by virtue of a fourfold capacity: Firstly, the imitation of the voices of Nature, such as the winds, the waves, and the cries of animals; secondly, its potential delight as melody, modulation, rhythm, harmony—in other words, its simple worth as a "thing of beauty," without regard to cause or consequence; thirdly, its force of boundless suggestion; fourthly, that affinity for union with the more definite and ...
— The Great German Composers • George T. Ferris
... in the judgment of his countrymen showed that, after all, the national Polish element in his compositions was not the main cause why they were not rated at once at their true value. It was their novelty of form, harmonic depth and freedom of modulation, that made them for a long time caviare to the general. This was again proved when he went to Paris. Chopin was a Pole only on his mother's side, his father having been a Frenchman, who had emigrated to Poland. It might have been supposed, therefore, ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... in these Preludes that Ignaz Moscheles first comprehended Chopin and his methods of execution. The German pianist had found his music harsh and dilettantish in modulation, but Chopin's originality of performance—"he glides lightly over the keys in a fairy-like way with his delicate fingers"—quite reconciled the elder man ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... she came to Paris for the purpose of seeing the President in behalf of certain of her friends, and that it was a successful mediation. What is peculiar in her manners and conversation is the absolute simplicity of both. Her voice is low and rapid, without emphasis or variety of modulation. Except one brilliant smile, she was grave—indeed, she was speaking of grave matters, and many of her friends are in adversity. But you could not help seeing (both Robert and I saw it) that in all she said, even in her kindness and pity, there was an under-current of scorn. A scorn of pleasing ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... soft melodies of Hindustan, whose characteristic is their gentle and soothing effect, the music of the Singhalese appears to have consisted of sound rather than of harmony; modulation and expression having been at all times subordinate to volume ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent
... his part, with fresh and hearty voice, touched here and there by a plaintive modulation, told about that ride on Farcalladen Rise; a tale of broken laws, and fight and fighting, and death and exile; and never a word ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... message, as if from a tuned receiver. But he could not get a fix on it, and nobody might be listening. He exhausted the normal communication pattern. Then he broadcast on old-fashioned amplitude modulation which a modern communicator would not pick up at all, and which therefore might be used by men ...
— Pariah Planet • Murray Leinster
... quaver figure rises aspiringly, and the sustained parts swell out proudly. The piquant cadenza forestalls in the progression of diminished chords favourite effects of some of our more modern composers. The modulation from C sharp minor to D major and back again (after the cadenza) is very striking ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... all odds the most popular fellow of his time. His very popularity increased the danger." As if he had been pleading his own cause, Thayer's voice was full of earnest eagerness. Even in the midst of her anxiety and pain, Miss Gannion felt the power of its flexible modulation; and her half-formulated condemnation of ...
— The Dominant Strain • Anna Chapin Ray
... among the tranquil haunts of meditation. Sometimes the splashing of the oar is heard, and the boatman's song awakens the surrounding echoes; but the most usual music is that of the native songsters, whose melody steals pleasingly on the ear, with every modulation, at all hours, and in every change of situation.—Hon. Judge Hall's Letters from ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 350, January 3, 1829 • Various
... ordinary children of grace, can't accomplish. He is well liked by his congregation, and we have heard of no fighting over either his virtues or defects. He has quite a clerical look, and, if he hadn't, his voice would give the cue to his profession. There is an earnest unctuous modulation about it, which, as a rule, is acquired after men have flung overboard the common idioms of secular life. The salary of Mr. O'Dell is about 160 pounds a year, and although he would like more, he can make ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... time to me. Strange how exactly I remember every word he says! I could set down any conversation of his, word for word, from beginning to end; if there were any means of doing so, I could reproduce every modulation of his voice. ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... deck. Over his usually sphinx-like face brooded the troubled expression of one who confronts an unwelcome necessity. Suddenly he halted before the girl's deck-chair, and, schooling his voice with an apparent effort, spoke in his old-time even modulation, but for once he found it difficult to meet the eyes of ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... what he says in the church of Banff, which we are informed "is very large, and peculiarly constructed, with an unusually high pulpit, to suit the high galleries;" and moreover, "the said Rev. George Henderson is considered to be destitute of a musical ear, which prevents the correct modulation of his voice!" ...
— The Economist - Volume 1, No. 3 • Various
... of insult and tokens of contempt, for which it is not easy to find a name, which vanish to nothing in an attempt to describe them, and yet may, by continual repetition, make day pass after day in sorrow and in terrour. Phrases of cursory compliment and established salutation may, by a different modulation of the voice, or cast of the countenance, convey contrary meanings, and be changed from indications of respect to expressions of scorn. The dependant who cultivates delicacy in himself, very little consults ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... side was made dismal by it. Laughter, when out of place, mistimed, or bursting forth from a disordered state of feeling, may be the most terrible modulation of the human voice. The laughter of one asleep, even if it be a little child,—the madman's laugh,—the wild, screaming laugh of a born idiot,—are sounds that we sometimes tremble to hear, and would always willingly forget. Poets have imagined no utterance of ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... and begs to be remembered in the old way to you. I used all my eloquence, all the persuasive flourishes of the hand, and heart-melting modulation of periods in my power, to urge her out to Harvieston, but all in vain. My rhetoric seems quite to have lost its effect on the lovely half of mankind. I have seen the day—but that is a "tale of other years."—In my conscience I believe ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... rows of faces as a criminal eyes the judges and the jury on whom his life depends. A murmur would have set him quivering; any slight incident upon the stage, Coralie's exits and entrances, the slightest modulation of the tones of her voice, would perturb him ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... returned from the last stanza to a repetition of the first; the fine modulation in which his voice stole upon the first line, and the pathetic energy with which it pronounced the last, were such as only exquisite taste could give. When he had concluded, he gave the lute with a sigh to Emily, who, to avoid any appearance of affectation, immediately began to play. ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... Challoner, leaping back with a cry of almost superstitious terror, beheld the whole structure mount, foot by foot, against the face of the retaining wall. At the same time, two heads were dimly visible above the parapet, and he was hailed by a guarded whistle. Something in its modulation recalled, like an echo, the whistle of the man with ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson
... leave of the Gardener and returned to their place, where they sat down to converse. And Taj al-Muluk said to Aziz, "O my brother, recite me some verses: perchance it may broaden my breast and dispel my dolours and quench the fire flaming in my heart." So Aziz chanted with sweet modulation ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... superiority over that of all other nations. It is Cambrensis who remarks that "the attention of these people to musical instruments is worthy of praise, in which their skill is, beyond comparison, superior to any other people; for in these the modulation is not slow and solemn, as in the instruments of Britain, but the sounds are rapid and precipitate, yet sweet and pleasing. It is extraordinary, in such rapidity of the fingers, how the musical proportions are preserved, and the art everywhere inherent among ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... flutes and oboes; after a powerful climax, and a beautiful subsidence of the storm in the lower strings, the second subject appears in the relative major with honeyed lyricism. The conclusion, which is made rather elaborate by the latter-day symphonists, is reduced to a brief modulation by Mr. Chadwick, and almost before one knows it, he is in the midst of the elaboration. It is hard to say whether the composer's emotion or his counterpoint is given freer rein here, for the work is remarkable both for the display of every technical resource and for the irresistible ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes
... writers. Achilles stands as tall as Troy, Merlin is as old and as wise as the world. Rhythm and poetical expression are essential attributes of dramatic genius, but the original sign of race and mission is an instinctive modulation of man with the deeds he attempts or achieves. The man and the deed must be cognate and equal, and the melodic balance and blending are what first separate Homer and Hugo from the fabricators of singular adventures. In Scott leather jerkins, swords, horses, ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... piano led to many experiments, in which Professor Fillmore took part, and that brought to light many interesting facts. Among these facts may be mentioned the complexity of rhythms, one played against the other; the modulation implied in some of the melodies; the preference for a major chord in closing a minor song; and the use of certain harmonic relations which have been deemed peculiar ...
— Indian Story and Song - from North America • Alice C. Fletcher
... pane of straw-coloured shimmer, Across it, in a tangent, A smear of rose, black, silver. Short twists and upstartings, Rose-black, in a setting of bubbles: Sunshine playing between red and black flowers On a blue and gold lawn. Shadows and polished surfaces, Facets of mauve and purple, A constant modulation of values. Shaft-shaped, With green bead eyes; Thick-nosed, Heliotrope-coloured; Swift spots of chrysolite and coral; In the midst of green, ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... by his burning words. Unfortunately, there is no form of ability which is so transient in its effects as this perfervid style of oratory. So much of its potency depends on the action of the speaker, on the glance of his eye and the modulation of his voice, that no report could do justice to it, even if there had been reporters at that time capable of putting down every word he uttered. The speeches of even Gladstone, when reported word for word, read but indifferently when seen in cold type, ...
— Wilmot and Tilley • James Hannay
... if he feared that he was about to tell some secret that must not yet be uttered; and indeed, as he spoke of the change from the little street in Shepherd's Bush to that ancient house in the woods of the far west, a change seemed already to possess himself, and his voice put on the modulation of an antique chant. Mary looked at him steadily and touched his arm, and he drew a long breath before he ...
— The House of Souls • Arthur Machen
... lovely maniac, just brought into an adjoining chamber. She was singing the pathetic ballad of old Rob with the most heart-melting falls and pauses. Jemima had half-opened the door, when she distinguished her voice, and Maria stood close to it, scarcely daring to respire, lest a modulation should escape her, so exquisitely sweet, so passionately wild. She began with sympathy to pourtray to herself another victim, when the lovely warbler flew, as it were, from the spray, and a torrent of unconnected exclamations and questions burst from her, interrupted ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... recipient mind is different, and there is the symbolism of a new medium between it and the speaker. The writer, being cut off from all those effects which are producible by the physical intonations of the voice, has to find substitutes for them by other means, by subtler cadences, by a more varied modulation, by firmer notes, by more complex circuits, than suffice for the utmost perfection of spoken language, which has all the potent and manifold aids of personality. In writing, whether it be prose or verse, you are free to produce effects whose peculiarity one can only define vaguely, ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Volume I (of 3) - Essay 4: Macaulay • John Morley
... fulness."[89] These melodies so correspond with the emotions, that they reproduce the least thrills of body and mind by their vigorous workings-up and delicate reliefs, by splendid barbarities of modulation and strong and glowing colour, by gentle gradations of light and shade or imperceptible ripples of thought, which flow over the body like a steady tide. It is an art of peculiar sensitiveness, more delicately expressive than that of Wagner; not satisfying itself with the modern tonality, ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... discrimination of the creature is confined to the mere execution of musical compositions. Whatever may have been the case at the outset of its training, its present and perfected intelligence extends even to the secrets of composition. Thus, if a vicious modulation, or a false relation of parts, occur in a piece of music, the animal shows symptoms of uneasy hesitation; and if the error be continued, will infallibly give the grand condemnatory howl. In short, Poodle is the terror of all the middling composers ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... Lady Jane's attention, A modulation toward the theatre, Also, in the case of revolution, A possible ...
— Hugh Selwyn Mauberley • Ezra Pound
... I presume, I have by this Example given proof sufficient (viz. ocular demonstration) to evince, that there is such a modulation, or bending of the rayes of light, as I have call'd inflection, differing both from reflection, and refraction (since they are both made in the superficies, this only in the middle); and likewise, that this is ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... beauty moved him, perhaps it was merely opposition that raised his love suddenly to the dignity of a passion that made him for once forget himself, his clothes, his personal appearance, and the gentlemanly modulation of his voice. ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... by the use of suitable fields of force it can be used as a carrier wave. Most of this stuff of the fields of force—how to carry the modulation up and down through all the frequency changes necessary—was figured out by the Martians ages ago. Used as a pure carrier wave, with a sender and a receiver at each end, it isn't so bad—that's why our communicator and radio systems ...
— Spacehounds of IPC • Edward Elmer Smith
... words are commonly like those of string music, short and transient, which rise and perish upon a single touch; those of other languages are like the notes of wind instruments, sweet and swelling, and lengthened out into variety of modulation. ...
— Essays and Tales • Joseph Addison
... Birds of Eastern North America) "it is most at home in secluded woodland and thickety retreats. . . . Its notes are not remarkable for variety or volume, but in purity and sweetness of tone and exquisite modulation they are unequalled." Its "water-dripping ...
— The Waste Land • T. S. Eliot
... interspersed with many readings from the poets noted, which was deeply impressive. At one time he quoted the "Shepherd's Song" from Faust, "Der Schaefer putzte sich zum Tanz." This he gave with exquisite modulation, dwelling upon the refrain at the end of each stanza, "Juchhe, Juchhe, Juchheise, heise, he, so ging der Fiedelbogen!" This he recited with such effect that one imagined he heard the touch of the bow upon the strings ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... accessories than in the drama's literary quality. Subtlety is at any rate absent from his criticism. He is either bored or amused. The piece is either the best or the worst that he ever witnessed. His epithets are of the bluntest and are without modulation. Wiser than more professional dramatic critics, he avoids labouring at reasons for ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee
... for a swift walk over the hills. At this hour she had the roads to herself and was glad of it, for she felt ridiculous. At breakfast, although she had a ravenous appetite, she ate sparingly. The day was spent in reading aloud, in lessons in deportment, voice modulation, conversation, and the like; in learning how to enter and how to leave a room, how to behave at a tea or a reception, how to accept and how to make an introduction, how to walk, how to sit, how to rise. Allie did sums in arithmetic, she studied grammar and geography ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... of a perfect voice in a single long note or shake used to bring the house down in the days of our grandparents, just as the subtle orchestral blendings of Wagner entrance hearers incapable of distinguishing the notes of a chord and sometimes even incapable of following a modulation. ...
— The Beautiful - An Introduction to Psychological Aesthetics • Vernon Lee
... speech disappeared, and soul and heart—or what seemed soul and heart—resounded. The charm lay in the intervals, using that word in its musical sense. She would say a few syllables in one note, and end her sentence in a soft modulation upwards, then downwards, then into her own note again. The curve of sound was as artistic as any line of beauty ever struck by his pencil—as satisfying as the curves of her who ...
— The Well-Beloved • Thomas Hardy
... applying for assistance to any one. Were I to become a parliamentary orator, I should wish to be an original one, even if not above mediocrity. What pleasure should I take in any speech I might make, however original as to thought, provided the gestures I employed and the very modulation of my voice were not my own? Take lessons, indeed! why, the fellow who taught me, the professor, might be standing in the gallery whilst I spoke; and, at the best parts of my speech, might say to himself, "That gesture is mine—that modulation is mine." ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... appear to have been extraordinary. "His ear," says the agreeable reminiscent already quoted, "(as a musical feeling is called) was so delicately acute, and his inflexorical powers so nice and rapid, that he could run in any direction or modulation, the diatomic or chromatic scale, and even split the quarter-notes of the enharmonic; neither of which, however, did he understand scientifically, though so consummately elegant his execution: and his musical memory was so tenacious that he could whistle through the melodies of whole ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XX. No. 557., Saturday, July 14, 1832 • Various
... years ago most organs were so tuned that the player had to limit himself to certain key signatures if his music was to sound at all pleasant. Using excessive modulation or wandering into forbidden keys resulted in his striking some discordant interval, known as the "wolf." The writer remembers being present at a rehearsal of Handel's "Messiah" in St. George's Hall, Liverpool, Eng., in 1866, when the organ was tuned on the unequal temperament system, ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller
... then actuated the levitator modulation and narrowed out of the alley, rose over the city, and headed toward the rugged mountains that formed the backbone of ...
— The Players • Everett B. Cole
... play of his I ever saw, "Gente Conocida," impressed me, I remember, at a time when I understood about one word in ten and had to content myself with following the general modulation of things, as carrying on to the stage, the moment the curtain rose, the very people, intonations, phrases, that were stirring in the seats about me. After the first act a broad-bosomed lady in black silk leaned back in ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... in Italian Violinists and writers for the instrument, of whom the chief was Giuseppe Tartini, born 1692. Dr. Burney says of his compositions: "Though he made Corelli his model in the purity of his harmony and simplicity of his modulation, he greatly surpassed that composer in the fertility and originality of his invention; not only in the subjects of his melodies, but in the truly cantabile manner of treating them. Many of his adagios want nothing ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart
... the Quarterly Review, vol. xxxiv. p. 241:—"On one of the author's incidental topics we must pause for a moment with delightful recollection. We mean the readings of Le Texier, who, seated at a desk, and dressed in plain clothes, reads French plays with such modulation of voice, and such exquisite point of dialogue, as to form a pleasure different from that of the theatre, but almost as great as we experience in listening to a first-rate actor. When it commenced, M. Le Texier read over ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... subtle indications of bias, are adapted and converted into harmony. A certain general style, a certain general manner of expression, are common to all, as is also the case in, let us say, The Tempest. But what distinction, what variation of tone, what delicacy and expressiveness of modulation! As a simple matter of fact, few writers have ever had a greater ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... of singular quality; if she raised it the effect was not agreeable, owing possibly to its lack of strength, but in low tones, such as she employed at present, it fell on the ear with a peculiar sweetness, a natural melody in its modulation. ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing
... employed; and while the hinds are thus driving their patient slaves along the furrows, they continually cheer them with conversation, denoting approbation and pleasure. This encouragement is conveyed to them in a sort of chaunt, of very agreeable modulation, which, floating through the air from different distances, produces a striking effect both on the ear and imagination. The notes are few and simple, and when delivered by a clear, melodious voice, have something expressive of that tenderness and affection which man naturally ...
— A Shepherd's Life • W. H. Hudson
... to the rather dull grey-greenness which had prevailed before 1785, remained somewhat cold and wanting in quality, and the more forcible tints introduced in the draperies were frequently lacking in modulation and were not quite in harmony with the prevailing tone. Something of this deficiency in fusion is also noticeable in his flesh tints, the carnations of the complexions being somewhat detached owing to defective gradation where the pinks join the whites. ...
— Raeburn • James L. Caw
... spoken five minutes before all the passions and humours of the assembly were as much under his command as the keys of the instrument are under the hands of the musician. He had taken from nature a voice capable of infinite variety of modulation, a countenance of the most flexible play of expression; and he was keenly alive (as profound humourists are) equally to the ludicrous and the graver side of everything presented to his vigorous understanding. Leonard had the eloquence ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Character, or to accomplishment as a means of making ourselves agreeable in society, how profitably could a part of this time and labor be employed in acquiring the power and the habit of accurate language, agreeable modulation, distinct utterance, and courteous attention; and it can hardly be doubted that a person who possesses the power of conversing well finds and gives more pleasure in society than a person skilled to an ...
— The Elements of Character • Mary G. Chandler
... curvatures by the mere fracture. In the crests and lower hills, which are of softer rock, and largely influenced by external violence, the inner structure is straight, and the necessary curvatures are produced by perspective, by external modulation, and by the balancing of adverse influences of cleavage. But, as the accuracy of an artist's eye is usually shown by his perceiving the inner anatomy which regulates growth and form, and as in the aiguilles, while we ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... answer. Was it a boyish infatuation after all? Has it passed away as utterly as I believed? I can see her face now as I sit by the fire with the finest precision of detail. I can hear her voice, that soft, low voice, which was none the less sweet for its modulation of sadness. I think there are no women like her now-a-days—none, none! Did she marry Lorimer? and if not—? It seems strange now that we should have both been so attracted, and yet not strange when one considers it. At least ...
— The Poems And Prose Of Ernest Dowson • Ernest Dowson et al
... surrounded by an insulating shell of inertron, and this in turn by a spherical shell of katultron, from which the current radiates in every direction, tuning being accomplished by frequency of intermissions, with audio-frequency modulation. The receiving battery has a core pole of katultron and an outer shell of metultron. The receiving battery, of course, picks up all frequencies, the undesired ones ...
— The Airlords of Han • Philip Francis Nowlan
... he's perfect." He began to quote softly and fluently, to her uttermost surprise. His English was at times a thing to shudder at, but his Greek was irreproachable, perfect in its modulation and its flow. Freed from all flaws of accent, the musical quality of his voice declared itself ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... Lady. But he was a great literary artist. Within the cramped and starched regularity of the heroic couplet, which the fashion of the time and his own habit of mind imposed upon him, he secured the largest variety of modulation and emphasis of which that verse was capable. He used antithesis, periphrasis, and climax with great skill. His example dominated English poetry for nearly a century, and even now, when a poet like Dr. Holmes, for example, would write satire or humorous verse ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... and beloved, thou my love; Whose kiss seems still the first; whose summoning eyes, Even now, as for our love-world's new sunrise, Shed very dawn; whose voice, attuned above All modulation of the deep-bowered dove, Is like a hand laid softly on the soul; Whose hand is like a sweet voice to control Those worn tired brows it hath the ...
— The House of Life • Dante Gabriel Rossetti
... stranger stood quietly, his arms hanging loosely by his sides, studying Ross, as if the younger man was some problem he had been assigned to solve. When he spoke, his voice was a monotone lacking any modulation of feeling. ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton
... The modulation and formation of each figure conform strictly to Grecian models, as does also the entire arrangement of the figures in the group; and yet there is much of modern life in the figures, especially in the faces, in which the stereotyped Grecian profile has not been adopted. The attitudes of the figures ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 492, June 6, 1885 • Various
... may artificially tremble, or breathe heavily, but the strong pulsation of the carotid artery or the moistness of the skin from perspiration will not come with an imitated emotion. Of course, that is true of the actor on the stage, too. But the content of the words and the modulation of the voice can help so much that the shortcomings of the ...
— The Photoplay - A Psychological Study • Hugo Muensterberg
... who possesses a powerful, masculine voice, and who is a very popular speaker, but she is an exception. Anyhow I believe the worst speaker, male or female, could improve by practising private declamation, and awakening to the importance of articulation, modulation, ...
— America Through the Spectacles of an Oriental Diplomat • Wu Tingfang
... different in kind from a plan where all of the last movement is in insistent major. We know that it is quite possible to begin a work at some distance from the main key, leading to it by tortuous path of modulation; though there is no reason why we may not question the composer's own inscription, the controlling point is really the whole tonal scheme. Here the key of the second movement is built on a design in minor,—would have less reason in the major. For ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp
... citizens not represented in the government, the only class without a vote, and their only disability, the insurmountable one of sex." As these last significant words, with more than significant accent and modulation, came from the lips of the knightly, the courtly Horatio, a bestial roar of laughter, swelling now into an almost Niagara chorus, now subsiding into comparative silence, and again without further provocation rising into infernal sublimity, shook the roof of Tammany. Sex—the ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... tones that stir nothing. Mme. Lasalle it was, with a bevy of ladies, older and younger, among whom it was impossible at first to distinguish one from the other. So similar was in every case the display of French flowers, gloves and embroidery; so accordant the make of every dress and the modulation of every tone. Mme. Lasalle herself was, however, prominent, having a pair of black eyes which once fairly seen were for ever after easily recognizable. Fine eyes, too; bright and merry, which made themselves quite at home in your face in half a minute. ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... was peculiarly youthful and melodious, the timbre exquisite in modulation and volume, but the face belonged to a woman aged more by pain and ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... last night at the Cercle, and yet we waited for you long." A hoarse, hollow voice—very measured and slow, as if carefully disciplined to repress groans—yet every now and then there will come a modulation, that shows how rich and cheery it might have been when trolling a chanson a boire—how clear and sonorous when, over the stamping of hoofs and the rattle of scabbards, it rang out the one word "Charge!"—how winning and musical when whispering into a small, ...
— Sword and Gown - A Novel • George A. Lawrence
... whom Nat had not seen before, and still another round of applause went up when he arose to speak. It was a great treat for Nat to listen to the man whose fame made his name familiar to every school-boy. He drank in every word of his speech, closely observed every gesture and modulation of voice, and would have sat entranced till morning, "taking no note of time," if the gifted orator had continued to pour forth ...
— The Bobbin Boy - or, How Nat Got His learning • William M. Thayer
... sensibility, which is dormant in the insect, begins to awaken in the fish, and, though still subordinate, is quite awake in the bird, of which no better proof can be given than its power of sound, with the rudiments of modulation, in the large class of singing birds, and in some others a tendency to acquire and to imitate articulate speech. The next step of ascent brings us to the mammalia; and in these, including beasts and men, the complete and universal presence of a nervous system ...
— Hints towards the formation of a more comprehensive theory of life. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... its inevitable quality, the intimate way in which the buildings ally themselves with the soil and blend with the ever-varied and exquisite landscape, the delicate harmonies, almost musical in their nature, that grow from their gentle relationship with their surroundings, the modulation from man's handiwork to God's enveloping world that lies in the quiet gardening that binds one to the other without discord or dissonance—all these things are wonderfully attractive to those who have eyes to see and hearts to understand. The English ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield
... Round Relief, in which, as in the best coins, the sculptured mass projects so as to be capable of complete modulation into form, but is not anywhere undercut. The formation of a coin by the blow of a die necessitates, of course, the severest obedience to ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... think I can assure you that there is plenty of modulation, some unresolved dissonances. I suppose that that is what you want. Alas, there are ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... Plain Chant) was the earliest form of Christian church music. As its name indicates, it was a plain, artless chant without rhythm, accent, modulation or accompaniment, and was first sung in unison. Oriental or Grecian in origin, it had four keys called Authentic Modes, to which were added later four more called Plagal Modes. These modes, called Phrygian, Dorian, Lydian, etc., ...
— On the Execution of Music, and Principally of Ancient Music • Camille Saint-Saens
... others were grave. The rest of the band, as well as those who performed upon the bamboos, sung a slow and soft air, which so tempered the harsher notes of the above instruments, that no bye-stander, however accustomed to hear the most perfect and varied modulation of sweet sounds, could avoid confessing the vast power, and pleasing effect, of this ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... fourth division are a very important accompaniment to the anthem of dawn, their notes, though short, serving agreeably to fill up the pauses made by the other musicians. Thus, the hair-bird (Fringilla Socialis) has a sharp and trilling note, without any modulation, and not at all melodious, when heard alone; but in the morning it is the chief harmonizer of the whole chorus, and serves, more than any other voice, to give unity and symphony to the multitude ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... agreeable than the modulation of these words, the passage of the tone from a first note of surprise to its grave and womanly close. Again, the same suggestions of veiled and vibrating feeling. Sir Wilfrid's nascent ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... head of Nagaya, which twined round the summit of the ebony staff, seemed to peer down at her in a sort of drowsy reflectiveness. Then, all suddenly, Lysia spoke, . . how enchanting was the exquisite modulation of ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... sorry yesterday, Mr. Torrens." A modulation of Gwen's tone was not done intentionally. It came with her wish to ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... parcel—but my letter goes by the post as you see. Is there contrast enough between the two rival female personages of 'Pomfret.' I fancy not. Helena should have been more 'demonstrative' than she appeared in Italy, to secure the 'new modulation' with Walter. But you will not think it a strong book, I am sure, with all the good and pure intention of it. The best character ... most life-like ... as conventional life goes ... seems to me 'Mr. Rose' ... beyond all comparison—and ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... Never, in all the women he had heard speak, had he heard a voice like hers. The least sound of it was a stimulus to his love, and he thrilled and throbbed with every word she uttered. It was the quality of it, the repose, and the musical modulation—the soft, rich, indefinable product of culture and a gentle soul. As he listened to her, there rang in the ears of his memory the harsh cries of barbarian women and of hags, and, in lesser degrees of harshness, the strident voices ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... besotting of the virtues. Why, she has a look in her face beyond singing! I believe, if you was to push me hard, I might trace it home to a trifle of a squint. What matters? The height of beauty is in the touch that's wrong, that's the modulation in a tune. 'Tis the devil we all love; I owe many a conquest to my mole"—he touched it as he spoke with a smile, and his eyes glittered;—"we are all hunchbacks, and beauty is only that kind of deformity that I happen to admire. But come! Because you are chaste, for which I am sure I pay you ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... company then seat themselves in a circle on the grass, and feast on eggs fried with herbs, while gay tunes are played on the lionedda.[58] A cup of wine is passed round from one to another, and each, laying his hand on his neighbour, repeats, with a certain modulation of voice, supported by the music of the pipes, “Compare e comare di San Giovanni!”. The toast is repeated, in a joyous chorus, for some time, till, at length, the company rise, still singing, and, forming a circle, dance merrily ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... endless variations. Sometimes it was difficult even for those who knew her best to detect the original melody among the clashing cords that concealed it; but, let it be hidden as it might, one felt that it would resolve itself eventually, through many a jarring modulation and startling cadence, perhaps, back to the ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... there were, all that pleasant month of September, and he was with her all the time, watching her wants and doing her bidding,—reading over and over with a softened modulation her favorite hymns and chapters, arranging her flowers, and bringing her home wild bouquets from all her favorite wood-haunts, which made her sick-room seem like some sylvan bower. Sally Kittridge was there too, almost every day, with always some friendly ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... clutching the limb of a tree, to keep her in position. As soon as she had attained the upright attitude, another peal of laughter came ringing from her lips, as wild as that with which she had announced her approach; but there was also in its tones a certain modulation that betokened scorn! Neither of us uttered a syllable; but, observing a profound silence, stood waiting to hear what she had to say. Another scornful laugh, and ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... manuscript gives the music for the poetical parts,—music that is little more than a modulation. There is a different notation for the first two lines, but for the other lines this notation is repeated in couplets, except that the last line of each song or laisse—being a half-line—has a cadence of its own. The lines are all seven syllables ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... Was it the exquisite modulation of his voice? Or again were the gentle, friendly words the sudden revelation of a troubled life, a sensitive soul ready to pour itself out in a single phrase and longing to crystallise itself in one unparalleled second? They surprised me, those words of his, they seemed ...
— The Choice of Life • Georgette Leblanc
... of a typical German Rathskellar where he was unmolested; where the blustering pipes of a colossal orchestrion brayed through an aria from Trovatore with more sound than sentiment and all unmindful of modulation. ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... music. Lady Mabel played a dreary minor melody, chiefly remarkable for its delicate modulation from sharps to flats and back again. A large gentleman sang an Italian buffo song, at which the company smiled tepidly; a small young lady sighed and languished through "Non e ver;" and then Miss Tempest and Lord Mallow ...
— Vixen, Volume II. • M. E. Braddon
... the skylark's defiant challenge; from earth beneath the fussy scream of the blackbird; on all sides the tweetings, twitterings, chirrupings, chirrings and pipings of petulant finches, and, in tender modulation to the avian chorus, the deep-throated, innumerable, drowsy hum of insects. Colour and sound, love and war, it ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English
... the frozen bosom of age; remember, said she, putting her delicate arm upon his, remember your character and my honour. My master instantly dropped upon his knees, with eyes swimming with love, cheeks glowing with desire, and in the gentlest modulation of voice he said: My dear Caroline, in a few months our hands will be indissolubly united at the altar; our hearts I feel are already so; the favours you now grant as evidence of your affection are favours indeed; yet, when the ceremony is once past, what will now be received with rapture ...
— The Contrast • Royall Tyler
... genuineness which laid the foundation of his power as a preacher, making him strike unerringly those master chords that are common and universal in every audience. Gifts of oratory he had, both natural and acquired,—a full, melodious voice, so sympathetic in modulation and so attuned to [131] reverence that I have heard more than one person say that his first few words in the pulpit did more towards lifting them to a truly religious frame of mind than the whole service from any other lips,—a fine dramatic power, enough to have given him distinction as an actor, ...
— Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D.D. - Edited by his Daughter • Orville Dewey
... attitudes are natural, the draperies free and graceful. Old Vasari justly remarks "pajono di carne le figure." The woman standing in the centre of the room is Lucrezia della Fede; this is the first known likeness of her. There is a richness of colour without impasto, a modulation of shade giving full relief without startling contrast, a clear air below and celestial haze ...
— Fra Bartolommeo • Leader Scott (Re-Edited By Horace Shipp And Flora Kendrick)
... something in the insinuating tone of this speech, increased as it was by the modulation of his Scottish voice, that irritated his hearer unspeakably, all the more because it was the very thing she ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... once the fact that the voice is a natural reporter of the conditions, emotions, thoughts, and purposes (character and states or conditions) of the individual. The ring of true culture in the voice is that perfect modulation of tone and movement which, without self-consciousness, communicates exactly the meaning and purpose which impel the ...
— Expressive Voice Culture - Including the Emerson System • Jessie Eldridge Southwick
... obvious that our analysis has confined itself to the barest elements of the musical experience. Our music to-day, with its many-voiced harmonies, with its procession of chords instead of single tones, with its modulation into related keys, has an infinite wealth and complexity defying description. A large part of the astonishing effect of music is derived from the fact that in a brief space we seem to hear and absorb ...
— The Principles Of Aesthetics • Dewitt H. Parker
... that my scheme of wounding her vanity had succeeded, and I began by reading aloud an anacreontic, adding to its beauties by the modulation of my voice, and keenly enjoying her pleasure at finding her work so fair. When I improved a line by some trifling change she noticed it, for she followed me with her eyes; but far from being humiliated, she was ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... who wrote expressly for singers, and often with exquisite modulation, especially in his songs, forgets himself when he comes to the names of his dramatis persome,—"'Artaserse, 'Artabano, 'Arbace, Mandane, Semira, ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... his shoulders, but Lilias was so anxious to hear the lay, that she entreated him to be silent; and Sir James, with a manly mellow voice, with an exceedingly sweet strain in it, and a skill, both of modulation and finger, such as showed admirable taste and instruction, poured forth that beautiful song of the nightingale at Windsor, which commences King James's story of his love, in his poem of the ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... versus absolute music, color versus form, the relationship of music to the other arts, musical criticism." A third course treated of "general theory, dictation, harmony, comprising chords and their mutual significance, altered chords, suspensions, modulation, imitation, analysis, and the commencement of composition in the smaller forms." A fourth course comprised, in the first term, counterpoint, canon, choral figuration, and fugue; in the second term, "free counterpoint, canon and fugue, ...
— Edward MacDowell • Lawrence Gilman
... twist— Unique proposition Is this composition. (Alas! for the player who hasn't the wrist!) Now in the dominant Theme ringing prominent, Bass still repeating its one monotone, Double notes crying, Up keyboard go flying, The change to the minor comes in like a groan. Without a cessation A chaste modulation Hastens adown to subdominant key, Where melody mellow-like Singing so 'cello-like Rises and falls in a wild ecstasy. Scarce is this finished When chords all diminished Break loose in a patter that ...
— The Book of American Negro Poetry • Edited by James Weldon Johnson
... ghostly feeling to hear him, and it seems as if the air were peopled with spirits. Oh, he is a perfect wizard! It is as interesting to see him as it is to hear him, for his face changes with every modulation of the piece, and he looks exactly as he is playing. He has one element that is most captivating, and that is a sort of delicate and fitful mirth that keeps peering out at you here and there. It ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... nearer speaking than singing. Yet again, when I remember the tears I shed at the Psalmody of Thy Church, in the beginning of my recovered faith; and how at this time I am moved, not with the singing, but with the things sung, when they are sung with a clear voice and modulation most suitable, I acknowledge the great use of this institution. Thus I fluctuate between peril of pleasure and approved wholesomeness; inclined the rather (though not as pronouncing an irrevocable opinion) to approve of the usage of singing in the church; that so by the delight of the ears ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... *Not* 'Frequency Modulation' but rather an abbreviation for 'Fucking Manual', the back-formation from {RTFM}. Used to refer to the manual itself in the {RTFM}. "Have you seen the Networking FM lately?" 2. Abbreviation for "Fucking Magic", used in the ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... majesty of death. Bryant's blank verse when at its best, as in Thanatopsis and the Forest Hymn, is extremely noble. In gravity and dignity it is surpassed by no English blank verse of this century, though in rich and various modulation it falls below Tennyson's Ulysses and Morte d'Arthur. It was characteristic of Bryant's limitations that he came thus early into possession of his faculty. His range was always a narrow one, and about his poetry, as a whole, there is a certain coldness, ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... finish of Esmond, Romola, and Treasure Island, is a little critical of the hasty outpourings of spirit which satisfied our fathers in the forties, after the manner of Sybil, the Last of the Barons, or Barnaby Rudge. The Tennysonian modulation of phrase had not yet been popularised in prose, and spasmodic soliloquies and melodramatic eloquence did not offend men so cruelly as ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison |
