"Muffled" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... The plaining wail of muted violin, The hushed oboe and the distant din, Of muffled drum or viol's raucous groan— Sudden arises one pure voice-like tone, A silver trumpet's tongue that stirs the soul To feel the theme, and the harmonious whole A sonant setting seems for that alone; So, high above earth's murmurous stir and strife, Riseth thy voice in clear enringing song— ...
— The Path of Dreams - Poems • Leigh Gordon Giltner
... The compass had been broken, and was useless; the wax light in the lantern would not burn in such a rarefied atmosphere. We descended gently across a thick layer of whitish clouds, and when we had got below them, Andreoli heard a sound, muffled and almost inaudible, which he immediately recognised as the breaking of waves in the distance. Instantly he announced to me this new and fearful danger. I listened, and had not long to wait before I was convinced ...
— Wonderful Balloon Ascents - or, the Conquest of the Skies • Fulgence Marion
... house was the only unlighted house in the district. The circumstance hinted of an ambushment. Waring crossed to the deeper shadows and whistled. The call was peculiarly low and cajoling. He was answered by a muffled nickering. His horse Dex was evidently corralled at ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... hair-cloth down to mission—cast-offs from the homes of Oliver's more fortunate brothers and sisters. When I first saw Ruth there in the midst of the confusion of unpacking, the room in Irving Place with its old chests and samovars, Esther Claff quietly writing in her corner, the telephone bell muffled to an undisturbing whirr, ...
— The Fifth Wheel - A Novel • Olive Higgins Prouty
... with raiment of white waves, Thy brave brows brightening through the gray wet air, Thou lulled with sea-sounds of a thousand caves And lit with sea-shine to thine inland lair: Whose freedom clothed the naked souls of slaves And stripped the muffled souls of tyrants bare: O! by the centuries of thy glorious graves, By the live light of th' earth that was thy care, Live! thou must not be dead! Live! let thine armoured head Lift itself to sunward and the fair Daylight of time ...
— Platform Monologues • T. G. Tucker
... back in his great arm-chair, his legs all muffled up in furs, for he could get no heat; and by him stood Herluin the prior, and wondered when he would die, and Thorold take his place, and they should drive out the old Gregorian chants from the choir, and have the new Norman chants ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... announcement was being delivered, Alison Williams, the nearest to the door, had emerged. She lifted out the little muffled figure of Lovedy, set her on her feet, and then looking neither to the right nor left, as if she saw and thought of no one else, made but one bound towards Colonel Keith, clasped both hands round his arm, turned him ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... steep, rocky wall in the forest; the men were laboring to hoist the church-bell up to a staunch cross-beam between two mighty fir-trees, and in the weird light of their torches, the wild surroundings looked wilder and more fantastic. Anon, the muffled noise and bustle of the work being at an end, the laborers withdrew, and a strange, feverish silence seemed to brood over the forest. Lage took a step forward, and seized the bell-rope; the clear, conquering toll of the metal rung solemnly through the silence, and from the rocks, ...
— Tales From Two Hemispheres • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... She would have recognized that piercing cry anywhere. It was Rajah. In the next room, and she had not known that Warrington (she would always know him by that name) was stopping at the same hotel! She listened intently. Presently she heard muffled sounds: a clatter of metal. A few minutes later came a softer tinkle, scurry of pattering feet, ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... high music began to reach them. At the foot of the hill they saw the sparse lights and shapes of the town where ended the gray strip of road. The many sounds—feet, voices, and music—grew clearer, unravelling from their muffled confusion, and the fiddling became a ...
— Lin McLean • Owen Wister
... to fill the great edifice with sweet and inspiring sounds. Instead, there now was only the muffled tread of marching feet, the rumble of heavy wheels, and the low, ominous beating of drums to ...
— The French Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... old song. The 'payre of clavicordys' is the clavichord, which in 1536 was a keyed instrument of much the same kind as the virginals,[16] with about three and a half octaves. It was used by nuns, and therefore had its strings muffled with bits of cloth ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor
... child caught sight of Thurston standing with his face half muffled in his cloak. A figure to be strangely recognized under similar circumstances in after years. Then she did ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... A muffled scream interrupted her, a quick catching of the breath by a stout lady, a newcomer, who was seated on a divan, I should have judged this woman to be a rather commonplace person except that her deeply sunken eyes seemed ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... her berth, the rhythmic pounding of the engines, the muffled sound, at intervals, of feet upon the deck, all were soothing; but the remembrance of that discussion, with its mortifying climax, made sleep impossible. This childish sensitiveness she fully realized,—and despised,—but nerves achieved an ...
— The Pines of Lory • John Ames Mitchell
... voice answered the 'phone, and told her Mr. Carter could not come now. She asked who it was but got no response, except that Mr. Carter couldn't come now. The voice had a muffled, thick sound. "Tell him to call me then as soon as possible," she said, and the ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... little entry opened, with a rush of the whistling wind, and a man stepped in. The dog half rose, and though he wagged his tail, in token that he knew the step to be that of a friend, he kept up a low whine. A young man, muffled to the eyes, and with the water dripping from his huge pea-jacket, ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various
... here to-night!" exclaimed old man Sweeny, as a frail figure, muffled up in a huge ulster, staggered through the doorway and stood leaning against the wall, trying to ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.) • Various
... I followed every rising fancy, I heard a step approach; it was a figure muffled in a cavalry cloak, which I soon perceived to ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... vitals of the people. 'Tis so at Versailles; 'tis so at Quebec. Lust—selfishness—rapine—public plunder everywhere—except among the small party of the Honnetes Gens: [120] a carnival of pleasure, to be followed by the voice of wailing and by the roll of the muffled drum. ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... was a great public funeral, in which the men of Dumfries and the neighbourhood, high and low, appeared as mourners, and soldiers and volunteers with colours, muffled drums, and arms reversed, not very appropriately mingled in the procession. At the very time when they were laying her husband in his grave, Mrs. Burns gave birth to his posthumous son. He was called Maxwell, after the physician who attended his father, but he died in infancy. The spot ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... sombre look, irresponsive to the nurse's admiration. While she helped the interne with the complicated dressing, the little nurse made ready for removal to the ward. Then when one of the ward tenders had wheeled the muffled figure into the corridor, she hurried ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... bayonet-spikes; but straining too much, for the helpless cub was choking in his mother's grip. She must lay him down or strangle him; with such a weight she could not much longer keep out of reach. She tried to give the howl for help, but her voice was muffled by the cub, now struggling for breath, and as she tried to ease her grip on him a sudden wrench jerked him from her mouth into the grass—into the power of the merciless Hound. Tito was far smaller than the Dog; ordinarily she would have held him in fear; but her little one, her ...
— Johnny Bear - And Other Stories From Lives of the Hunted • E. T. Seton
... some time before I heard anything, but I presently made them out, though the snow muffled them a good deal. They did not seem far off, and a minute or two later they ceased. We lay there two days longer, and then even the chief was of opinion that they would have moved off. My own idea was that ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... were leaving to the clock's round of desert sameness. About ten at night Chillon and Mr. Wythan escorted Carinthia, for the night's watch beside her uncle, down to Lekkatts. It was midway that the knocks on air, as of a muffled mallet at a door and at farther doors of caverns, smote their ears and ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... loath'd and leprous face, And fright the enamour'd dotards from themselves: But such is the perverseness of our nature, That if we once but fancy levity, How antic and ridiculous soe'er It suit with us, yet will our muffled thought Choose rather not to see it, than avoid it: And if we can but banish our own sense, We act our mimic tricks with that free license, That lust, that pleasure, that security; As if we practised in a paste-board ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson
... lake was calm and unbroken as the face of a mirror, a dense fog had arisen which prevented objects at the head of the vessel from being seen from the stern. Two men only were visible upon the after deck; the one lay reclining upon an arm chest, muffled up in a dread-nought pea jacket, the other paced up and down hurriedly, and with an air of deep pre-occupation. At intervals he would stop and lean over the gang-way, apparently endeavouring to pierce through the fog and catch a ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... to some resting place: At last I spied a meadow newly mowed, The hay was rotten, the ground half o'erflowed: We made a breach, and entered horse and man, There our pavilion, we to pitch began, Which we erected with green broom and hay, To expel the cold, and keep the rain away; The sky all muffled in a cloud 'gan lower, And presently there fell a mighty shower, Which without intermission down did pour, From ten a night, until the morning's four. We all that time close in our couch did lie, Which being well compacted kept us dry. The worst was, we did neither sup nor sleep, And ...
— The Pennyles Pilgrimage - Or The Money-lesse Perambulation of John Taylor • John Taylor
... orchard only by a low clipped hedge of young whitethorn, in the middle of which stood of a small gate. In a moment he was in the orchard, and from behind its low wall he perceived a female proceeding to the north side muffled like himself in a cloak, which he immediately recognized to be that of his wife. His teeth became locked together with the most deadly resentment; his features twitched with the convulsive spasms of rage, and ...
— The Dead Boxer - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... and stillness had become a real presence in these old places. The voice of the guide and the company beneath had a hushed and muffled sound; and when I rustled the ivy leaves, or, in trying to break off a branch, loosened some fragment of stone, the sound affected me with a startling distinctness. I could not but inly muse and wonder on the life these old monks and abbots led, shrined up here as ...
— Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 (of 2) • Harriet Elizabeth (Beecher) Stowe
... came muffled against him. She was clinging to him very tightly. He could feel her fingers straining upon each other. He stroked ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell
... time, with thoughtful attention, I at length succeeded perfectly in translating their import. They were sounds occasioned by the artist in prying open the oblong box, by means of a chisel and mallet—the latter being apparently muffled, or deadened, by some soft woollen or cotton substance in which its ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 4 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... ergoes and fallacies, he put their backs to the wall, gravelled them in the deepest questions, and made it visibly appear to the world that, compared to him, they were but monkeys and a knot of muffled calves. Whereupon everybody began to keep a bustling noise and talk of his so marvellous knowledge, through all degrees of persons of both sexes, even to the very laundresses, brokers, roast-meat ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... with sorrows with which a stranger (with which often a brother) cannot intermeddle. There is One Brother "born for adversity," who can. How often has that voice broken with its silvery accents the muffled stillness of the sick-chamber or death-chamber! "'I will not leave you comfortless:' the world may, friends may, the desolations of bereavement and death may; but I will not; you will be alone, yet not alone, for I your Saviour and your God will ...
— The Words of Jesus • John R. Macduff
... on the top of this kopje, as I sit with my back against a rock and indite these little records. It seems hard to imagine that early every morning muffled-up, shivering forms wait anxiously for King Sol to stick his dear, red, blushing face above yonder range of kopjes to warm us with his genial presence. Yesterday we had some of Plumer's men in our little camp. They were rattling good fellows, ...
— A Yeoman's Letters - Third Edition • P. T. Ross
... temple dedicated to some worship which he did not recognize, but felt himself bound to respect. The exercises had not yet commenced, however, when the boy's attention was arrested by an event apparently of trifling interest. A woman having her face muffled in a hood and a cloak drawn completely about her form advanced slowly up the broad aisle and took place upon the foremost bench. Ilbrahim's faint color varied, his nerves fluttered; he was unable to turn his ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... heard the tread of Dudley's thick boots on the oak boards, and faint and muffled the sound of his voice as he cross-examined old Wyat before entering ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... paused and extended a hand toward the, young officer. "Roland! Roland!" said the spectre in a muffled voice, "it would be a pity not to follow to the grave those ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... The oars, carefully muffled with straw, worked silently. The boat, skilfully steered by the boatswain, had reached the large shoal of crustaceans. The starboard oars still sank in the green and limpid water, while those to larboard, raising the reddish liquid, seemed to rain drops ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... eat. Ruey, chilled and weak, could not even find relief in sleep. Her fortitude nearly deserted her. The tears had their way. She lay curled in her seat, a wretched, disconsolate little heap, when a brown-bearded man, muffled in furs, entered, flashing the light of his lantern here and there, eagerly scrutinizing the faces. He paused at Ruey's seat, an indefinable something attracting him, though the face was covered by two hands. Suddenly ...
— Divers Women • Pansy and Mrs. C.M. Livingston
... established its Mission on the Red River decades ago. In fact, he knew as little about Canada as he did about Timbuctoo, and in his simplicity thought himself "the first that ever burst into that silent sea." When the evening breeze brought to his ears a muffled sound, he was in doubt how to ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... A muffled sound was heard. A bell tinkled and a hat appeared. It was the Auray post. Again the same man, the same horse, the same mail-bag. He was ambling quietly towards Quiberon; he would be back directly and return again the next day. He is the guest of the ...
— Over Strand and Field • Gustave Flaubert
... ticks (inaudible) in its inner court there, at its ease, hour after hour, as if nothing special, for it or the world, were passing! It tolled one when the firing began; and is now pointing towards five, and still the firing slakes not. Far down in their vaults the seven prisoners hear muffled din as of earthquakes; their ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... the faint reply from the cabinet. Or rather it seemed to me to come from the floor near the cabinet, and perhaps to be a trifle muffled by ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... receiving from the admiral his last instructions; and many a hearty hand-shake, and many a fervent "Success attend you, my dear fellow," did he receive before passing down the lofty side of the 100-gun ship, into the pinnace which, with muffled oars and a crew armed to the teeth, awaited him at the foot ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... The song of the sea in its old halls rung out in a style quite unearthly. The slamming of the mighty doors seemed far off in the chambers of the cliff, and the echoes trembled themselves away, muffled into stillness ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... every particular as good as his word. Four days later, the Nemorosa sounded her way, under the cloak of a dark night, into a certain haven of the coast of England; and a boat, rowing with muffled oars, set me ashore upon the beach within a stone's throw of a railway station. Thither, guided by Sir George's directions, I groped a devious way; and finding a bench upon the platform, sat me down, wrapped in a man's fur great-coat, to await the coming of the day. It was still ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson
... Zealand warrior, once met, fresh from battle, in his native village. He concluded that on some similar early voyage Paul must have undergone the manipulations of some pagan artist. Covering his arm again with his laced coat-sleeve, Paul glanced ironically at the hand of the same arm, now again half muffled in ruffles, and ornamented with several Parisian rings. He then resumed his walking with a prowling air, like one haunting an ambuscade; while a gleam of the consciousness of possessing a character as yet un-fathomed, and hidden power to back unsuspected ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... retreated to the road, and stood looking at the cabin, trying to decide whether he should break in the window and shoot the dog, and run the risk of being shot in return by whoever might be concealed within, when his attention was suddenly arrested by a strange sound, as of heavily muffled footsteps close behind him. He turned quickly, and in the starlight beheld a sight that seemed to chill the blood in his veins. Not more than fifty feet distant, and slowly approaching him, were the spotted horse and ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... heard from places that seemed far away. But for the rumbling of the thunder, the only sound from the mysterious world outside would have been the scream, now like the cry of a cat, now like a puppy's bark, of an owl flying with muffled wings up and down the valley. Very different, however, was this little owl's cry from the madman's shout of the great eagle owl, which I had often heard in the rocky vale of the Alzon. I threw open the window of my bedroom and looked out upon the night. It was illumined, not ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... a muffled, muffled concert. Here were life, reality and dreams. Here were sun, warmth and light. Here were colour, form and line, and in this line, outlined by the mountains against the sky, the artistic background of all ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... the rolling of wagons laden with merchandise, the metallic groan of iron falling on the pavements, the creaking of windlasses, the whistling of steamboats, now in piercing shrieks, now in muffled roars, the cries of haulers, sailors and custom-house officers—all these diverse sounds blend in a single tone, that of work, and vibrate and linger in the air as though they feared to rise and disappear. And still the earth continues to give forth new sounds; heavy, rumbling, ...
— Twenty-six and One and Other Stories • Maksim Gorky
... fight, and fall, with his face muffled up in his garment, is, I think, a little hard to conceive! Besides, Juba, before he killed him, knew him to be Sempronius. It was not by his garment that he knew this; it was by his face, then: his face therefore was not muffled. Upon seeing this man with ...
— Lives of the Poets: Addison, Savage, and Swift • Samuel Johnson
... you? Whence come you, and what seek you here?" His voice was heavy and toneless as a muffled bell. ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... pond, to the sky, and to a sight that explained my disquietude. The west, half-way to the zenith, was green—the black-and-blue green of bruised flesh. Out of it shot a fork of lightning, and behind it rumbled muffled thunder. ...
— Roof and Meadow • Dallas Lore Sharp
... green, They stoop and languish, pace and preen Bare shoulder, painted fan, Gemmed wrist and finger, neck of swan; And still the pluckt strings warble on; Still from the snow-bowered, link-lit street The muffled hooves of horses beat; And harness rings; and foam-fleckt bit Clanks as the slim heads toss and stare From deep, dark eyes. Smiling, at ease, Mount to the porch the pomped grandees In lonely state, by twos, and threes, Exchanging languid courtesies, While torches ...
— Georgian Poetry 1920-22 • Various
... A beam, pale but wavering, shot out into the darkness as he succeeded in his effort, and by its light, as men in moments of emotion may see some one thing or action painted on their retina by a lightning flash, he saw Archelaus bringing his stick, muffled in a coat, down on Ishmael's head. The next second the blow fell—there had not been time for Archelaus to check the impetus of the blow when the discovering light flared onto him. There came the heavy sound of a body ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... of the shop windows with their unwelcome decoration. Even in the square on market mornings business flagged. The country folks, chilled by their cold drive to town, cowered, muffled in thick wraps, over their little charcoal stoves, lacking energy to call attention to their wares. The sage with the onions was absent, but the pretty girl in the red hood held her accustomed place, warming mittened fingers at a chaufferette which she held on her ...
— A Versailles Christmas-Tide • Mary Stuart Boyd
... confronted a new situation. The next day but one was the anniversary again. The boy was older, and observant. It would not be possible to conceal from him the significance of the procession marching through the streets with muffled drums. Even the previous year he had demanded the reason for crape on his grandmother's statue, and had been put off, at the cost of Miss Braithwaite's strong feeling for the truth. Also he had not been allowed to see the morning paper, which ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... a door open and close softly on the floor above; then slippered feet came pat-patting down the stairs. The wild rattle of the bell suddenly stopped; a muffled voice could be heard protesting dismally against the din. But suddenly the vague complaint gave way to ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Investigator • John T. McIntyre
... another, all-mysterious, but from its very mystery a deeper fear. Abner Dimock began to stay at home, to be visited at late hours by one or two men whose faces were full of evil and daring; and when, in the dead of the long nights, Hitty woke from her broken and feverish sleep, it was to hear muffled sounds from the cellar below, never heard there before; and once, wrapping a shawl about her, she stole down the stairways with bare feet, and saw streams of red light through the chinks of the cellar-door, and heard the ring of metal, and muttered oaths, all ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... was glad of the cheerful blaze in the hearth: but gradually, as time wore on, the weather became more rough, and the sound of the great breakers against the Admiralty Pier, though some distance from the inn, came to her as the noise of muffled thunder. ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... about it—and get it square with the rest of life. Career and Politics must take their chances of that. It's part of the general English slackness that they won't look this in the face. Gods! what a muffled time we're coming out of! Sex means breeding, and breeding is a necessary function in a nation. The Romans broke up upon that. The Americans fade ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... speech was some relief to Cecilia, who was beginning a laughing reply, when Morrice called out, "That man looks as if he was upon the scout." And, raising her eyes, she perceived a man on horseback, who, though much muffled up, his hat flapped, and a handkerchief held to his mouth and chin, she instantly, by his air and figure, recognized ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... quietly, in a long string, making a muffled sound in the fog. As they went towards the nearest station a wind suddenly ...
— Mary Gray • Katharine Tynan
... but to recall thy steps and issue to upper air, this is the task and burden. Some few of gods' lineage have availed, such as Jupiter's gracious favour or virtue's ardour hath upborne to heaven. Midway all is muffled in forest, and the black coils of Cocytus circle it round. Yet if thy soul is so passionate and so desirous twice to float across the Stygian lake, twice to see dark Tartarus, and thy pleasure is ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... music of the night, Upon its lonely flight Into the west, where sink its ebbing sands; That muffled music seems Like voices heard in dreams, Sigh'd back from long-lost years ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... be told, has not our generation had enough of duels, hair-breadth escapes, post-chaises, and highwaymen, mysterious strangers muffled in great-coats, and pistols which always miss fire when they shouldn't? To say positively that we have done with all this might appear extravagant in the light of the popularity of certain modern heroic novels. But it might not be ...
— The Bibliotaph - and Other People • Leon H. Vincent
... muffled suddenly. A little while later he entered the yard-gate and stopped in the moonlight and, from his window, Crittenden looked down and watched him. The boy was going through the manual of arms with his ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.
... the window in heavy showers, for it was a stormy night. The door of the bedroom stood wide open. What was that sound coming up the stairs from the hall below? It was certainly not the ticking of the clock. It seemed more like muffled and stealthy footsteps. In an instant Ingred was very wide awake indeed, and listening intently. There it came again! She could not lie still and ignore it. She got out of bed, and with rather shaking knees walked on to the landing and peeped over the ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... she was well in with the land she hove-to, and three boats were manned and lowered. Harry was appointed to go in one of them. They were to pull up the harbour and attack the three vessels, and, if necessary, one boat's crew was to land and storm the fort. With muffled oars they pulled up the harbour. They could just make out the vessels as they lay floating in silence on the calm water, a light wind blowing off-shore. The boats got close up to the brig before ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston
... crept by, when a muffled noise in the dark corner distinctly sounded above the pelting raindrops, while as if to mock at my quickened fears, the wires continued their monotonous warning, "Watch the box—watch the box—watch the ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... so far, had disturbed the stillness of the night. Save for the muffled throb of the rare all-night cars passing the front of the house, our vigil had been a silent one. The full moon had painted about the floor weird shadows of the clustering ivy, spreading the design gradually from the door, across the ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... showing light enough at least to distinguish faces. It was such a light as that in which he had seen the deer looking at him motionless as he rode home with Dick. Yet the three who now rode up towards him were so muffled about the faces that he feared he would not know them. They were men, all three of them; and he could make out valises strapped to the saddle of each; but, what seemed strange, they did not speak as they came; and it appeared as ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... Brown, he muffled up his anger pretty well, He said, "I have a notion, and that notion I will tell; I will nab this gay young sorter, terrify him into fits, And get my gentle wife to chop ...
— A Nonsense Anthology • Collected by Carolyn Wells
... regard to our young lady after I had begun to know her. I couldn't have said what I felt about her except that she was undefended; from the first of my sitting with her there after dinner, under the stars—that was a week at Folkestone of balmy nights and muffled tides and crowded chairs—I became aware both that protection was wholly absent from her life and that she was ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... ashore, so on the quarter-deck at sea—the trumpets of one victory drown the muffled drums of a thousand defeats. And, in degree, this holds true of those events of war which are neuter in their character, neither making renown nor disgrace. Besides, as a long array of ciphers, led by but one solitary numeral, swell, by mere force of aggregation, into an ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... the smoke-room the conversation was limited to the announcement of bids and orders to the stewards. This group had about exhausted available discussion when the ship gave a sudden lurch sideways and forward. There was a muffled noise like the slamming of some large door at a good distance away. The slightness of the shock and the mildness of the report compared with my imagination was disappointing. Every man in the room was on his feet ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... moments a group of women approached, supporting a figure clothed in white with a hood drawn over her face. She was bent nearly to the ground and muffled shrieks and wails came from the depths of her veil as she prostrated herself in front of the altar. For more than an hour this chief mourner, the wife of the deceased, lay on her face, her whole figure shaking ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... on nothing; poised in the night air of the tower, with their draped and hooded heads merged in the dim roof; motionless and shadowy. Shadowy and dark, although he saw them by some light belonging to themselves—none else was there—each with its muffled ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... know a fine one," she began, sinking her voice to a creepy undertone that made the girls cast uneasy glances behind them. "It's all about a haunted house that has clanking chains in the cellar, and muffled footsteps, and icy fingers that c-lutch you by the throat on the stairs as the clock ...
— The Little Colonel's House Party • Annie Fellows Johnston
... loosely about her face; Vera as a Bacchante crowned with vine leaves, laughing saucily; Vera draped as a devote, with drooping eyes and hands crossed meekly upon her bosom. Sometimes she would be in a ball-dress, with lace about her white shoulders; sometimes muffled up in winter sables, her head covered with a fur cap. But always she was beautiful, always a young queen, even in these poor, fading photographs, that could give but a faint idea of her loveliness to ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... Wisdom, Nature, and Reason. The precinct is sacred; the music tells us that—the halo streaming from sustained notes of flutes and clarinets, the muted trumpets, the solemn trombones in softest monotone, the placid undulations of the song sung by the violins, the muffled, admonitory beats of the kettledrums. The genii leave Tamino after admonishing him to be "steadfast, patient, and silent." Conscious of a noble purpose, the hero boldly approaches the Temple of Reason, but before he can enter its portals, ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... Suddenly a muffled sound broke the silence: knock, knock, knock, like the blow of hammers when the workmen are busy at some distance. Hugo's brave little heart began to beat; for he knew that the noise must be made by the Kobolds at work on ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... the breeze freshened, and I heard the distant and muffled noise which in the West announces either an earthquake or an "estampede," of herds of wild cattle and other animals. Our horses, too, were aware of some danger, for now they were positively mad, struggling to break the lassoes ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... railing; just beneath and over this railing hung two men. At first I thought they were ill, but upon passing near I learned that they were simply limp and helpless with laughter, the sound of which they contrived to keep muffled. To my surprise I recognized the persons of young Lord ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane
... With a muffled objurgation he fell upon the jumble and began to overhaul it. The object sought defied his fevered efforts to unearth it and with teeth set, he ransacked the studio, resentfully flinging a melee of hindrances ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... But a woman's muffled scream was the answer. With a spring like a cat Loring threw himself on the intruder and bore him down. In an instant Folsom had barred the gate, and the woman, ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King
... him attracted his attention and he turned to see her standing in a corner of the great room, holding a lamp in her hand and looking towards him. Her gold breastplate and crown were gone, with every other ornament, and she was clad, or rather muffled in robes of pure white fitted with a kind of nun's hood which lay back upon her shoulders. Also on her arm she carried a shawl or veil. Standing thus, all undecked, with her long hair fastened in a simple ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... behind it stood the family carriage, its lamps unlit. The horses stirred uneasily, but the oxen waited in dull, indifferent patience. Presently the door opened, and two men came out and awkwardly bore a plain coffin to the cart. Then they mounted to the front of the cart, hiding between them a muffled lantern. They wore cloths over the lower part of their faces, and felt hats drawn low over their eyes. Something in their gait showed them to be seafaring men, ...
— The Story of a New York House • Henry Cuyler Bunner
... couplet, the same form exactly in which Pope wrote his major productions. Yet the rime, which is as evident as the recurring strokes of a tack-hammer in Pope, is scarcely heard at all in My Last Duchess. Its effect is so muffled, go concealed, that I venture to say that many who are quite familiar with the poem, could not declare offhand whether it were written in rime or in blank verse. This technical trick is accomplished by what the French call overflow, the running on of the sense ...
— Robert Browning: How To Know Him • William Lyon Phelps
... two—form a circle and clasp hands. Two odd players in the center are called, "Mary" and "John." The object of the game is for John to catch Mary. As he is blindfolded, he can only locate her in her stealthy movements by the sound of her muffled voice. When he says, "Mary, where are you?" she must answer as often as ...
— Entertainments for Home, Church and School • Frederica Seeger
... the enemy approaching, One can hear the muffled drum, And the marching of the soldiers, As on ...
— True Stories of Wonderful Deeds - Pictures and Stories for Little Folk • Anonymous
... worked in incredulous fury. He shifted the gun to his left hand and came striding purposefully towards Miss Mines, right fist cocked. Then, as Dasinger tensed his legs happily, a muffled thump from deep within the wreck announced the opening of the ...
— The Star Hyacinths • James H. Schmitz
... frozen road was slippery as glass and the chauffeur was a cautious North-countryman whose faith in the chains locked round the wheels was not unlimited; he was driving carefully, with a wary eye for the worst patches noted on the outward run, and, beside him, equally alert, sat Yoshio muffled to the ears in an ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... hope—" began the other, stopping suddenly, with half-opened mouth, to listen, for just then there came to their ears a half-muffled sound that might be the scream of a red-headed woodpecker up on some rotten treetop, or anything ...
— The Outdoor Chums at Cabin Point - or The Golden Cup Mystery • Quincy Allen
... the light in the hall, was a young man muffled in a thick overcoat for protection against the sharp autumn wind which was blowing along the rain-splashed street. He stepped inside the door as Colwyn opened it, and, glancing at the detective from a pair of dark eyes just visible beneath the ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... near the door there was a flutter of wings where a brood of white turkeys settled to roost. Beyond the bole of the tree a small negro in short skirts was "shooin'" a large rooster into the henhouse, but at the muffled fall of Gay's horse's hoofs on the dead leaves, she turned with a choking sound, and fled to the shelter of ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... muffled by distance, but that could not take the terror out of it, and it was the most dreadful sound to me that I had ever heard. It went all about, everywhere, down there: along the halls, through all the rooms, in both stories, and in the basement and the cellar; then outside, and farther and ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... the last day of the year," began Helen when a muffled whisper had told her that all was ready, "and everybody is eager to know what is going to happen next year. We all would like to know, how the war is going to turn out, and what is going to be the result of ...
— Ethel Morton's Holidays • Mabell S. C. Smith
... unobstructed sphere where passion never comes, he begins his illimitable work. His life now is grafted upon the Infinite, and will be fruitful as no earthly life can be. Pass on, thou that hast overcome! Your sorrows O people, are his peace! Your bells, and bands, and muffled drums sound triumph in his ear. Wail and weep here; God makes it echo joy and triumph there. ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... returned noiselessly to his place just as Sosha knocked. After a pause, the knock was repeated. Then the door was tried, shaken, and pulled. In vain. There came no sound from within. Ivan heard his servitor inform the would-be condolers that his master had evidently gone out again. There were muffled good-byes and so—silence. ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... truck lights died responsively. Then the green and red starboard and port lamps and lights in wardroom and galley went out and men hurried along the deck placing tarpaulins over the engine room gratings. Only the binnacle lights remained and these were muffled with just a crack for the helmsman to ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... mechanism of the arrangements, and under the impression that I was placing my clothes, &c., on the ledge, I was in reality dropping them on to the unfortunate occupant of the nether berth, hence the muffled snoring, and when my forty guinea repeater descended upon some unprotected portion of his cranium it put the closure on his dreams in a ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol 2 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... glowing out of the devotional book he was trying to read, and he sat thus—when suddenly there came a tap at the door, and on his summons, there glided in "a masked muffled mystery," who laid a letter on the open book, and stood back ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne
... thee, I feel the subtlest thrill Stir thy dusk limbs, tho' all the heavens are still, And 'neath thy rings of rugged fretwork mark What seems a heart-throb muffled in the dark. ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... Gebnitz was to sing, That rare soprano. All the fiddles strummed With tuning up; the wood-winds made a ring Of reedy bubbling noises, and the sting Of sharp, red brass pierced every ear-drum; patting From muffled ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... sudden commotion behind him, a swift rush of feet, a muffled thud, and a gasping, agonized grunt. The next instant the huge acetelyne lamp that lighted the room fell to the floor with a crash and the place ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... of the Temple clock was telling out the hour of seven in muffled accents (as though it apologised for breaking the studious silence) as I emerged from the archway of Mitre Court and ...
— The Red Thumb Mark • R. Austin Freeman
... sitting erect, rigidly attentive, listening to the muffled sound of a woman's voice in the entry. A few moments later came a knock at the library door, and Sam entered. The old darky ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... from the first Monday after Harold's pin-sticking exploit that the minister had "lively sessions" with his boy. The old sexton privately declared that he heard muffled curses and shrieks and the sound of blows rising from the cellar of the parsonage—but this story was hushed on his lips. The boy admittedly needed thrashing, but the deacons of the church would rather not have it known that the minister ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... motors told him that the lower hatch was opening, and Jason watched as a hairline crack appeared in the thick metal, then widened as the heavy door ground outwards. Through the opening he had a glimpse of a figure muffled in a heavy-duty spacesuit. That must be Meta's work, she would have contacted the ship by radio while it was on its way down and explained the standing orders that no off-worlders were to be allowed out of their ...
— The Ethical Engineer • Henry Maxwell Dempsey
... maintaining his Ku-Klux masquerade, parleyed with his underlings and consulted a heavy nickel-cased watch. His gesture showed a petulant impatience. The men in the silent circle stirred uneasily and from time to time low growls broke from their muffled lips. Obviously they were awaiting some development which though overdue had ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... "There was a constant muffled roar. It was like the biggest oil refinery in the world burning up on the mountain top. There was a tremendous explosion about 7.45 o'clock, soon after we got in. The mountain was blown to pieces. There was no warning. The side of the volcano was ...
— The San Francisco Calamity • Various
... lads to enter the house for shelter on such a day; and it seemed well nigh impossible that his tale of the place being too full to hold us could be true. However, we started to walk. On our way we met four horsemen going towards the house, closely muffled up ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... leap. Was this, then, the end of his chase? Was Beatrix in yonder house? Would he soon hold her in his arms—or was he about to learn that she was lost to him for ever? In the tumultuous rush of feeling his power of quick decision left him for the moment; but Dauvrey's muffled exclamation ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... himself, but not in vault nor cave; He plunged within a vase extremely large, Where holy-water always was in charge; No demon would have thought to find him there, So well the clod had chosen his repair; In sacred stoles he muffled up his skin, And, 'bove the water, only kept his chin; There we will leave him, while the priests profound Repeated ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... remained fixed intently upon the wall, and there was a long pause ere she answered him. Her voice, too, which had been so clear and ringing, was now low and muffled as that of one ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... in readiness his return. Lucas went stealthily and watched, unobserved, the movements at Rothschild's gate. He did not lie long in ambush before he heard some one leaving the Hebrew millionaire's mansion, and going towards the carriage. He saw Rothschild, accompanied by two muffled figures, step into the carriage, and heard the word of command, "To the City." He followed Rothschild's carriage very closely, but when he reached the top of the street in which Rothschild's office was situated, Lucas ordered his carriage to stop, from which he stepped out, and proceeded, reeling ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... to keep me here, I mean. We moved towards the house, and presently from behind us there sounded in the night the splintering crash of a well-kicked plate of ham sandwiches, accompanied by the muffled oaths of a ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... Alice, who thought her mission at the piano was over, rose to go, but Mrs. Barton ordered her to resume her seat, and the dancing was continued till the carriage came up the gravel sweep to fetch Milord away. This was generally about half-past eleven, and as he muffled himself up in overcoats, the girls were told to cram his pockets ...
— Muslin • George Moore
... booming noise droned continuously in my ears before it waked me. At last I was roused. I listened. The sound was like nothing I had ever heard before. It seemed as if a heavy-sledge hammer, or huge wooden mallet, carefully muffled in wadding, was at work in the room below me. The stable clock struck four. 'No mason,' thought I, 'no mason would commence his day's work at four in the morning. Burglars, perhaps,' and I resolved to give alarm. The noise ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... He heard the muffled throb of the big limousine draw up at the stage door as he made his way to Harriet's room. Her father was still there and a crowd of musicians, singers, and critics were waiting in a group outside ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... solitary in my room, immersed in memory, dreaming of old days and their buried secrets. The fire, before which I mused, was burning clear without flame, and its intense glow, which alone lighted my apartment, cast a red tint on the furniture and walls. Outside the streets were muffled deep with snow, in which no footstep was audible. All was quiet as death, silent as the grave, save for the faint murmur of my own breathing. Time and space seemed annihilated beyond those four narrow walls, and I was as a coffined living centre ...
— Arrows of Freethought • George W. Foote
... they were clambering were so uneven that sometimes the young girl was mounting one at the same moment that Reddy was descending from another. Her reply, half muffled in her shawl, was delivered over his head. "Oh, because pa says most of the men here don't give their real names—they don't care to be known afterward. Ashamed of their ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... "gone out" at Harwell, and so, when at about nine the two boys beard many footfalls outside their door, and when in response to West's loud "Come" five mysterious and muffled figures in black masks entered they were somewhat puzzled what ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... some brief and muffled answer was returned. Miss Blake smiled and went over to her elk-horn throne. There she sat and sewed—an incongruous ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt
... his master's arm. The moon had disappeared underneath a fragment of cloud and they stood in complete darkness. Both men listened. From one of the paths which led through the grounds from the beach, came the sound of muffled footsteps. A startled owl flew out and wheeled over their heads with a ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... muffled in a large cloak was ushered in, and at Gerrard's invitation, sat down on the floor. When Badan Hazari was gone, he lowered the cloak a little, and looked at Gerrard as though he expected recognition, but ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier
... him a signal, Dost began again, but without stirring a muscle; in fact, so rigid did he look that it would have puzzled any one to make out whence the low muffled voice came with such a peculiar whispered hiss, caused by its passing through the thick beard ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... the Tin Woodman, speaking in muffled tones because so much water covered him. "I cannot drown, of course, but I must lie here until you find a way to get me out. Meantime, the water is soaking into all my joints and I shall become badly rusted before I ...
— Little Wizard Stories of Oz • L. Frank Baum |
