"Titter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... leisure &c 685. fun, frolic, merriment, jollity; joviality, jovialness^; heyday; laughter &c 838; jocosity, jocoseness^; drollery, buffoonery, tomfoolery; mummery, pleasantry; wit &c 842; quip, quirk. [verbal expressions of amusement: list] giggle, titter, snigger, snicker, crow, cheer, chuckle, shout; horse laugh, belly laugh, hearty laugh; guffaw; burst of laughter, fit of laughter, shout of laughter, roar of laughter, peal of laughter; cachinnation^; Kentish fire; tiger. play; game, game at romps; gambol, romp, prank, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... honester feller never breathed," said a rough voice in the gallery. The officers of the court looked aghast, and the strangers tittered with ill-suppressed laughter. "Who are you?" said the Judge, looking suddenly up, but with imperturbable gravity. The court was convulsed; the titter broke out into a laugh, and it was several minutes before silence and decorum could be restored. When the Ushers recovered their self-possession, they made diligent search for the profane transgressor; but he was not to be found. Nobody knew him; nobody had seen ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... a general titter. Mrs. Colonel Poyntz hushed it with a look of severe surprise. "What is there to laugh at? All women would be men if they could. If my understanding is masculine, so much the better for me. I thanked Mr. Vigors for his very handsome compliment, and he then went on to say that ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... was a general titter all round, which was immediately suppressed, as in a court of law; and Palaiseau reluctantly and noisily did as he ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... encounters between himself and the opposing counsel, Mr. Sullivan. During Parson's speech Sullivan picked up Parson's large black hat and wrote with a piece of chalk upon it: "This is the hat of a d—d rascal." The lawyers sitting round began to titter, which called attention to the hat, and the inscription soon caught the eye of Parsons, who at once said: "May it please your honour, I crave the protection of the Court, Brother Sullivan has been stealing my hat and writing his own ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... son of the Basha none dared to laugh outright save his father and Sakr-el-Bahr. But there was no suppressing a titter to express the mockery to which the proven braggart ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... There was a titter amongst the men at the expression of their big comrade's face, for Ladoc was ravenously hungry, and felt inclined to rebel at the idea of being obliged to start on a six-miles' walk without food; but as his young master was about to do the same he felt that ...
— Fort Desolation - Red Indians and Fur Traders of Rupert's Land • R.M. Ballantyne
... Peter did laugh, I am afraid. Even the Cardinal—well, his smile was perilously near a titter. He took ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... solemn Silence, all Move round the dark terrestrial Ball? What tho' nor real Voice nor Sound Amid their radiant Orbs be found? In Reason's Ear they all rejoice, And titter forth a glorious Voice, For ever singing, as they shine, "The Hand that made ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... beneath the tropic stars where Melpomene once stalked austere. Now to cause laughter to echo from those lavish jungles and frowning crags where formerly rang the cries of pirates' victims; to lay aside pike and cutlass and attack with quip and jollity; to draw one saving titter of mirth from the rusty casque of Romance—this were pleasant to do in the shade of the lemon-trees on that coast that is curved like lips ...
— Cabbages and Kings • O. Henry
... [Then Folly titter'd.] Mankind, who are accustomed to have their attention awaken'd to acts of daring Vice, or pre-eminent Virtue, may think the mean, base, cowardly, hypocritical Character not sufficiently interesting to claim their ...
— The First of April - Or, The Triumphs of Folly: A Poem Dedicated to a Celebrated - Duchess. By the author of The Diaboliad. • William Combe
... the curtain had to fall, a short overture was played, and the curtain rose again without the complete tableau, and the action of the play was resumed; but several times the laughter was renewed. It was only necessary for some person to titter over the ludicrous recollection, and instantly the house was laughing with that person. The next night the manager's child, swathed in flannel, with a mouth full of cough-drops, held the well-trained dog in his place until ...
— Stage Confidences • Clara Morris
... old fidget to send me travelling up again, just because he fancied he saw something amiss at the window. Nothing but a curtain flapping, or a shadder, for the poor dears is sleeping like lambs.' We heard her say this to herself, and a general titter agitated the white ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... grand-baby, the titter of talk, the tissue paper of unpacking outside my door, and the miawling of "Minnie" the cat, prevented me from resting upon my arrival in the morning, and when I went to the Senate after lunch I could hardly keep awake. The Four Power Treaty ...
— My Impresssions of America • Margot Asquith
... sufficiently uninteresting, and uninviting. We were all, however, soon struck by the book-like precision of his language, the clearness and closeness of his reasoning, and the extent of his legal knowledge. He spoke for about ten minutes; and, having risen amidst a half-suppressed titter, sate down amidst earnest cries of "Hear, hear, hear!" He afterwards spoke pretty regularly, especially upon legal questions; and those who, in due course, were appointed beforehand to argue against him, felt it expedient to come particularly well prepared! Shortly ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various
... be a late one. Do have upon the table, in the opening scene of the second act, something in a velvet case, or frame, that may look like a large miniature of Mabel, such as one of Ross's, and eschew that picture. It haunts me with a sense of danger. Even a titter at that critical time, with the whole of that act before you, would be a fatal thing. The picture is bad in itself, bad in its effect upon the beautiful room, bad in all its associations with the house. In case of your having nothing ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... your pleasure that we kiss and are friends again, I am ready to obey your command;" then, putting himself in the attitude of Pantaloon, he went up to Queus and gave him a hug, which set all present in a titter, notwithstanding they had been seriously affected by the scene which ...
— Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois, Complete • Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre
... feature of blown youth"—in short, the very type and image of poor Tokely in Peter Pastoral,—his eyes and ears were on the alert to catch the look of surprise, and buzz of admiration, which he very naturally anticipated. He was a little daunted by a suppressed titter which ran round the room; but he was utterly confounded when his best and dearest friend, Mr. Peaess himself, coming up to him exclaimed,—"Why, zounds! Mr. Stubbs, what have you been doing? By ——, the audience will ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 366 - Vol. XIII, No. 366., Saturday, April 18, 1829 • Various
... not more than a week after we had been sent to school. I held my slate in front of my face while I whispered something to the girl beside and the girl behind me. Both began to titter. ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... you something very particular. I don't know who can tell me, if you can't. How can a young lady find out whether a young gentleman is in love with her or not? Now, tell me the truth this time," she said with a nervous titter, ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... been very long in the second-from-the-front pew of the First Baptist church, when Rita, who, at the private suggestion of the matron, I had placed next to me, began to embarrass and disconcert me by her actions, causing the rest of the girls to titter (sometimes audibly) and thus to attract the congregation, also the pastor, so that finally an usher had occasion to whisper to me, admonishing me to retire with her, to which she replied, ...
— Fifteen Years With The Outcast • Mrs. Florence (Mother) Roberts
... dance of leaves in that aspen bower, There's a titter of winds in that beechen tree, There's a smile on the fruit, and a smile on the flower, And a laugh from the brook that ...
— Poems • William Cullen Bryant
... freckled face. The freckles lay thick on the small unimportant nose and clashed painfully against the roots of the amazing hair. They crowded out the flaxen eyebrows altogether. And yet he was pretty in a wistful, whimsical sort of way. He made Robert want to laugh. Someone close to Robert did titter, and muttered, "Go it, Carrots!" and Robert saw that the boy had heard and was horribly frightened. He winced and faltered, and Robert poked out viciously with ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... John laughing at me fit to kill himself; and bless me, ma'am, you are laughing, too. Am I never to be taken seriously? Are you thus to titter true reformation out of countenance? But I like it. But we are never tired of a man so long as we can laugh at him; we may cry ourselves to sleep, but who laughs himself to slumber? Ma'am, are you going to leave ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read
... the great tragedian comes on, shining in mail, dragging a two-handed sword, and mouths the grandiloquence which poets have put into the speech of heroes, the dress-circle requires all its good-breeding and its feigned love of the traditionary drama not to titter. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... that slight shifting of feet, that artificial coughing among several, which betrays a nervous suspense. At length there was a titter. But the soldier never moved. There he stood, his face to the south-east, upright as a column, his ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... the back part of the church suggested trinity as a substitute and started a titter, but the preacher had already got his dramatic momentum, and was sweeping along in a tumultuous tide of oratory. Right at his three victims did he aim his fiery eloquence, and ever and again he came back to his theme, "Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together ...
— The heart of happy hollow - A collection of stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... usual in England. The fact was, however, that Aunt Hannah knew very little French, and concluded that as the girls were never troublesome at their lessons with her it was the same thing with Monsieur. If she chanced to hear the sound of a titter, it was at once checked when she glanced round at the offender, and she would have been surprised, indeed, if she had known of the ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... work early in January: it was now two months later, and she was still being rebuked for her inability to sew spangles on a hat-frame. As she returned to her work she heard a titter pass down the tables. She knew she was an object of criticism and amusement to the other work-women. They were, of course, aware of her history—the exact situation of every girl in the room was known and freely discussed by all the others—but the knowledge did not produce ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... making this oration, there was a general titter behind him in the schoolroom. The orator had his back to the door of this ancient apartment, which was open, and a gentleman who was quite familiar with the place, for both Major Arthur and Mr. John Pendennis had been at the school, was asking the fifth-form boy who sate by the door for ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... There was a general titter from the Corporal, my host, and his wife, at the Traveller's semi-jest at his own unprepossessing appearance: but Madeline, a little disconcerted, bowed hastily, and ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... foul mind,' said Ida. 'I can imagine that as nobody ever admired you or made love to you when you were young, you may have mistaken ideas as to the nature of lovers and love-making'—despite the universal awe, this provoked a faint, irrepressible titter—'but it is hard that you should revenge your ignorance upon me. Mr. Wendover has never said a word to me which a gentleman should not say. Fraeulein Wolf, who has heard his every word, knows that ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... the veridicator was on, he looked up at the big screen behind the three judges; the globe above his head was a glaring red. There was a titter of laughter. Nobody in the Courtroom knew better than he what was happening. He had screens in his laboratory that broke it all down into individual patterns—the steady pulsing waves from the cortex, the alpha and beta waves; beta-aleph and beta-beth and beta-gimel and ...
— Little Fuzzy • Henry Beam Piper
... off the match!" said Virgilia, with a nervous titter. What state of overtension could have prompted her to a piece of bravado so ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... titter, and bowed to it when it arrived. "You will then return to Wady Haifa, and there remain two hours to suspect (sp.) the Camel Corps, including the grooming of the beasts, and the bazaar before returning, so I wish you a very happy ...
— A Desert Drama - Being The Tragedy Of The "Korosko" • A. Conan Doyle
... written the report. It sent a titter over England. He was so unwise as to despatch a copy of the newspaper containing it to Van Diemen Smith. Van Diemen perused it with satisfaction. So did Tinman. Both of these praised the able young writer. But they handed the paper to the Coastguard Lieutenant, who asked ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... robes, and trumpery of state; Behold him (for the maxim's true, Whate'er we by another do, We do ourselves; and chaplain paid, Like slaves in every other trade, Had mutter'd over God knows what, Something which he by heart had got) Having, as usual, said his prayers, Go titter, totter to the stairs: 1240 Behold him for descent prepare, With one foot trembling in the air; He starts, he pauses on the brink, And, hard to credit, seems to think; Through his whole train (the chaplain gave The proper cue to every slave) At once, as with infection caught, ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... objected to on account of a lack of respect. The rather bitter Mr. Carlyle wrote satirically of the manners of young ladies. He even had his fling at their laugh: "Few are able to laugh what can be called laughing, but only sniff and titter from the throat outward, or at best produce some whiffling husky cachinnations as if they were laughing through wool. Of none such comes good." A young lady must not speak too loud or be too boisterous; ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... stewards, firemen, sailors, or cabin-boys. And that greasy Achleitner! I assure you, all over the ship, in the forecastle, among the stewards when they polish the silver, and in the officers' cabins, they do nothing but titter and laugh at her and Achleitner and anybody falling under ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... cricket?" asked Urquhart's uncle, with his agreeable laugh that was too attractive to be described as a titter, a name that its high, light quality might have suggested. But to that Peter said "No." He had been asked to Astleys for the cricket week; he was going to play for Urquhart's team. Not that he was any good; but to scrape through without disgrace ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... a shadowy brow, 'Tis the wish to look wise,—not knowing how. Self-glory glistens o'er all that's there, The trees, the flowers have a jaunty air; The well-bred wind in a whisper blows, The snow, if it snows, is couleur de rose, The falling founts in a titter fall, And the sun looks ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... groan from Lord Carse, and something like a titter from the lady. The President went ...
— The Billow and the Rock • Harriet Martineau
... thanks," said he; "I shall never forget what you have done for me"; and Shelton could not help feeling that there was true emotion behind his titter of farewell. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... to give us the titter. Megrue was sure to spread the tale among Old Hickory's business friends. And who knew what that pair of foiled interviewers would do to us? Some of their stuff might get into the New York papers. Then wouldn't Mr. Ellins be let in for ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford
... There was a titter from the men near, and Captain Roby cried impatiently, "Why, there's enough to have blown the top off the kopje and destroyed ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn
... A titter rippled through the audience. Baker saw Wily poised, beet-red, to spring up once more; then apparently he thought better of it ...
— The Great Gray Plague • Raymond F. Jones
... eyebrow showing it. He immediately remembered that his mother often told him: 'Theodore, it is of no use to send you to match a skein of silk, for you never bring the right color.' When relating this, he observed a general titter in the room, and on inquiring the reason a candle was put near him, and, to his amazement, all agreed that the legs of his pantaloons were of different shades of green. Instead of a ridge all around his eyebrow, he has a little hollow ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... considerable Proficient in this Study, and have told several Things that have greatly surprized the Hearers. I am consulted chiefly by the Ladies, who come to my Lodgings by Two's and by Three's; and it is pleasant to hear them titter, and laugh among themselves, before they venture to knock at my Door. The young Things come in blushing, and express all the Fears and Confusions natural to Youth and Innocence: Immediately I examine them: One tells me, she desires to know when she shall be married; ...
— The Theater (1720) • Sir John Falstaffe
... them on perforce. I heare some excuse themselves, that they cannot expresse their meaning, and make a semblance that their heads are so full stuft with many goodly things, but for want of eloquence they can neither titter nor make show of them. It is a meere fopperie. And will you know what, in my seeming, the cause is? They are shadows and Chimeraes, proceeding of some formelesse conceptions, which they cannot distinguish or resolve within, and by consequence are not able to produce them in as-much as they ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... contests, a woman has ever the best of it at all points. The man plays with a button to his foil, while the woman uses a weapon that can really wound. Burgo knew that he must go,—felt that he must skulk away as best he might, and perhaps hear a low titter of half-suppressed laughter as he went. Even that might be possible. "No, Lady Glencora," he said, "I will not drive you from the room. As one must be driven out, it shall be I. I own I did think that you would at any rate have been—less hard to me." He then turned to ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... before their teacher, but these were gone and instead were those magic folding seats, all closed up tight. Elizabeth, still blind with fear, went to sit down upon a bench where no bench was, and instead sat down soundingly upon the floor. A titter of laughter ran over the room, and she sprang to her feet. She was quite unhurt, except her dignity, but even this she did not notice. The funny side of anything, though the joke was on herself, was always irresistible ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... came down heavily and squelched the titter which threatened to be something more. "Mr. Brickhouse ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher
... to thrash anybody, now, but a grown-up baronet; so he let off little Hicks, and passed over the general titter which was raised at his expense. However, he entertained us with his histories about lords and ladies, and so-and-so "of ours," until we thought him one of the greatest men in his Majesty's service, and until the school-bell rung; when, with ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Rinkitink lay back in his chair and chuckled his queer chuckle until he coughed, and coughed until he choked and choked until he sneezed. And he wrinkled his face in such a jolly, droll way that few could keep from laughing with him, and even the good Queen was forced to titter behind her fan. ...
— Rinkitink in Oz • L. Frank Baum
... indulged in a joke or joined in the laughter of his neighbours. When I remarked on his immovable features, I was told that he slept in starched sheets—and I believed it. At one of these dinners, Prince Louis Lucien Bonaparte caused a titter during a speech about the freedom which people enjoyed in England. "In France," he said, "with all the declamations about Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite, there is very little freedom, and, with all the trees of liberte which are being planted along the boulevards, there is very ...
— My Autobiography - A Fragment • F. Max Mueller
... looked awkwardly to his right and left as if seeking advice; but the nobles about him were watching the fair ladies, and had perhaps no counsel to offer. In the great stillness the Queen waited, still smiling triumphantly, and still he could find nothing to say, so that a soft titter ran through the ladies' ranks, whereat the King looked ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford
... said I, "I am not a military man, but a Christian, and I go not to shed blood but to endeavour to introduce the gospel of Christ into a country where it is not known;" whereupon there was a stifled titter, I then inquired if there were any copies of the Holy Scriptures in the convent, but the friendly voice could give me no information on that point, and I scarcely believe that its possessor understood the purport of my question. It informed me, that the office of lady abbess ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... well. Then, even as I stared, full of perplexity, I seemed to hear, far down, as though from untold depths, a faint whisper of sound. I bent my head, quickly, more into the opening, and listened, intently. It may have been fancy; but I could have sworn to hearing a soft titter, that grew into a hideous, chuckling, faint and distant. Startled, I leapt backward, letting the trap fall, with a hollow clang, that filled the place with echoes. Even then, I seemed to hear that mocking, suggestive laughter; but this, I knew, must ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson
... you, my dear miss Howe, that one of the young ladies smiled, and two or three were seen to titter, at this part of your narration, and you seemed, I thought, a little too angry for a girl of your sense and reading; but you will remember, my dear, that young heads are not always able to bear strange and unusual assertions; and if some elder person possibly, ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... old-fashioned name, to be sure," commented the taffetas angel, with a crystal sounding titter, "'tis as good as the heroine in a play. Whom were you called ...
— The White Riband - A Young Female's Folly • Fryniwyd Tennyson Jesse
... had been so aroused that she was unconscious of his too familiar manner. Leaning over the phonograph as Droop started the motor, she looked about her and said, with a titter: "What shall we say? Weighty words should grace so great an occasion, ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... Glass on "Fools".... There'd be all the cheap morality—"It's better, my young friends, to be good than to be bad. It pays better in the end"—and there'd be little stories, sentimental some of them and humorous some of them. There'd be a general titter of laughter at the humorous ones.... And the carbon prints, the "Ruysdael" always pointed out to visitors ... and after the war it will all be going on again. At Polchester, too, they'll be having cheap lectures in the Town-Hall and Shakespeare Readings and High-School ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... bending over the fireplace, a table already heavily laden, and several women bustling about it. Above his head he heard laughter, a hurried tramping of feet, and occasional cries of surprise and delight. He paused at the threshold, hardly knowing what to do, and when he turned a titter from one corner showed that his embarrassment was seen. On the porch he was seized by Easter's father, who drew him back into the room. The old mountaineer's face was flushed, and he had been ...
— A Mountain Europa • John Fox Jr.
... without verbs, accusatives translated as ablatives, and adverbs turned into prepositions, ensued, and after a hopeless flounder, during which Mr Gordon left him entirely to himself, Barker came to a full stop; his catastrophe was so ludicrous, that Eric could not help joining in the general titter. Barker scowled. ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... his official tone) I call the attention of the female prisoner to the fact that Christians are not allowed to draw the Emperor's officers into arguments and put questions to them for which the military regulations provide no answer. (The Christians titter). ...
— Androcles and the Lion • George Bernard Shaw
... into her ear, or going some distance away from the candle I made a current of air which would sway the candle flame, when my mother would exclaim, "how the wind does blow; some door must be open." Then my titter would reveal the rogue, who was reminded that ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... was so much engaged in getting out of the room quickly and silently, that he did not miss it. Reaching the open door just as she had gone out, when about two paces beyond it, he popped his head over her shoulder unobserved, and stole a kiss; I heard the smack, then a rustle, and then a titter, during which Adam was searching his pockets for the missing bottle, which of course he did not find there; and when he said something or other about the kiss, he foolishly, in his search for it, told her that he had lost so very desirable a present; upon which, as he afterwards told me, ...
— Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines - During 1848, 1849 and 1850 • Robert Mac Micking
... well you may think, And ladies replied with nod, titter, and wink; And the Prince, who in anger and shame had look'd down, Turn'd at length to his daughter, and spoke with a frown: "Now since thou hast publish'd thy folly and guilt, E'en atone with thy hand for the blood thou hast spilt; Yet sore for your boldness you both will repent, ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... true friend she had ever known, and Loring broke short the conversation by leaving the room. Then she came again, alone, and he refused to see her. Then she came with Mrs. Burton, and the house was in a titter, and he broke up his establishment and moved back to the hotel, to the scandal of his landlord, as has been said, who made loud complaint to the powers at headquarters. Then she wrote that she ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... "Father, be patient!" the wife says; "we once played 'blind-man's-buff' ourselves." Sure enough, father is playing it now, if he only knew it. Much of our time in life we go about blindfolded, stumbling over mistakes, trying to catch things that we miss, while people stand round the ring and titter, and break out with half-suppressed laughter, and push us ahead, and twitch the corner of our eye-bandage. After a while we vehemently clutch something with both hands, and announce to the world our capture; ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... girl-student, craning forward suddenly. But there was an audible titter in the group of teachers, which was at once caught up at the other end by Lyamshin and the schoolboy and followed by a hoarse chuckle ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... she, 'I like these fashions this year, but I'm not sure that they suit me. They're the same as when the Queen came to the throne.' 'Well,' said Mrs. Lambert sweetly, 'if they suited you then—' There was an audible titter, and Mrs. Lambert had an enemy ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... larger pasteboard square and a titter ran through the crowd. To her alarm, the little girl noticed that the colonel's son did not laugh. Instead, he opened his mouth and stared wildly. Another instant and the square was turned toward her. She gave a cry when she saw ...
— The Biography of a Prairie Girl • Eleanor Gates
... did fear him; Mutes, at his merry mops, turned "vocal." And fellows, hired for silence, "spoke all." No body could be laid in cavity, Long as he lived, with proper gravity. His mirth-fraught eye had but to glitter, And every mourner round must titter. The Parson, prating of Mount Hermon, Stood still to laugh, in midst of sermon. The final Sexton (smile he must for him) Could hardly get to "dust to dust" for him. He lost three pall-bearers their livelyhood, Only with simp'ring at his lively mood: Provided that they fresh and ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... could you do if it WAS Mr. Corey? You couldn't come to tea, you say. But HE'LL excuse you. I've told him you had a headache. Why, of course you can't come! It would be too barefaced But you needn't be troubled, Irene; I'll do my best to make the time pass pleasantly for him." Here the cat gave a low titter, and the mouse girded itself up with a momentary courage ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... at this time that people all over the State began to take up a song with an inimitably catching tune. The words of this song held up Mr. Bispham in so shrewdly true and farcically humorous a light that even his own star began to titter and threatened to slip from its high place in the heavens. The song fell so absolutely on the head of the nail that Mr. Bispham, when he heard it for the first time, was convulsed with anger and talked of horse-whips. The second time he heard it, he drew himself up with ...
— Aladdin O'Brien • Gouverneur Morris
... this but the shy jauntiness, the elaborate understatement, of something small in the presence of something great? That uneasy titter, caught from time to time as one turns Miss Coleridge's pages, we seem to have heard before in the Arena chapel or at the end of a Bach fugue. It is the comment of sophisticated refinement that can neither ...
— Pot-Boilers • Clive Bell
... can get up right enough on my own cheek," I said with a titter, though my mouth was full of the brackish water into which I had plunged at first head and ears over, while my teeth were chattering with cold, the frosty November air being chilly. "I shall fancy I'm climbing the greasy pole at a regatta and that you're the pig on the top, ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... stillness came and wrapped itself about her, a soft and velvety stillness; to shut out gasp or murmur or stifled titter. ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... spirit for his future. Some of the men whom I have seen in prison, condemned to death or a life of confinement, have begun their careers just in this way, showing disrespect for their elders and for the church. Beware, young people, who think you are smart and laugh and titter in the sanctuary; there is a prison waiting for you, there is a hell yawning for you. Behold, there is death in ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... the more so as the others began to titter. White Catherine saw, and a pink tinge came on her cheek. She said softly, "Why do you laugh? Is it because he is our brother you think he cannot be capable? Yes, Gerard, try with the rest. Many say you are skilful; and mother and I ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... a mouthful. "Dad, he set it an' it's doin' all right. He's up in another cabin." Through Hank's brainless titter, Joe added carefully, "Bad ground in the first right-hand drift. We had to abandon it. Rocks big as your head comin' in on yuh onexpected. None uh them right-hand drifts is safe fer a man t' ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... things, a stern admonitory glance from our father would let us into the secret of the new guest's status—his unsuitability to his surroundings. It was great fun to watch him furtively and listen to his blundering conversational efforts, but we knew that the least sound of a titter on our part would have been an unpardonable offence. The poor and more uncouth, or ridiculous, from our childish point of view, they appeared, the more anxious my mother would be to put them at their ease. ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... to his feet, and in doing so revealed the glories of the chest-protector. There was a subdued titter from the adjacent beds. ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... seized on the lady's apron, and appropriated the greater part of it. The appeal of "Dear Mr. Coleridge, do stop!" only increased his embarrassment, and also his exertions to dispose, as he thought, of his shirt; till the lady, to put a stop to the titter of the visitors, and relieve her own confusion, untied the strings, and thus disengaging herself, left the room, and her friend in possession of her ...
— The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1838 • James Gillman
... day till the school became a babel. The teacher tried reasoning, and such mild punishment as standing up in the middle of the floor, and keeping in after school. One big boy whom he stood up winked at the girls and made everybody titter; another whom he bade stay after school grabbed his hat and ran out of the room. The fellows played hookey as much as they wanted to, and did not give any excuse for being late, or for not coming at all. At last, when the teacher was driven desperate, and got in a rod (which he said he was ashamed ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells
... The titter of the crowd spurred his rage into fury. He took his whip between his teeth, and grasping the hand-rods, was about to lift himself into the cab. Parker put his gloved hand against the ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... consternation. The smile on the Napoleonic countenance of the barrister looked forced and frozen for the first time during the evening. Our author, who was nibbling cheese from a knife, left a bead of blood upon his beard. The futile Ernest alone met the occasion with a hearty titter. ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... was irresistible; and as the final "nevermore" was solemnly uttered the half-suppressed titter of two very young persons in a corner was responded to by a general laugh. Poe remarked quietly that on his next delivery of a public lecture "he would take Rose along, to act the part of the raven, in which she ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... the house, they were joined by throng after throng, each man of which, like the commander-in-chief, was armed with a flambeau. This was bad enough of itself, but the count's body-guard were all in a titter, and every man enjoyed ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... a suppressed titter among the younger part of the audience, totally overcame the patience of the taunted man of the anvil. 'Deil be in me but I'll put this het gad down her throat!' cried he, in an ecstasy of wrath, snatching a bar from the forge; and he might have executed his threat, had he not been withheld by ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... for the pretty baggage,' quoth the king quickly. And amid a general titter he extended his hand to me. 'I'll be sworn, though,' he continued, as I rose from my knee, 'that you want something, ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... cipher-key wherewith we decipher the whole man. Some men wear an everlasting barren simper; in the smile of others lies the cold glitter, as of ice; the fewest are able to laugh what can be called laughing, but only sniff and titter and snicker from the throat outward, or at least produce some whiffing, husky cachinnation, as if they were laughing through wool. Of ...
— Cheerfulness as a Life Power • Orison Swett Marden
... called, and ran. Tony scrambled up on the sill. A sort of titter ran over the ward and Tony, now on the platform outside, waved a ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... that precocious cynicism which is the young man's extra-Luxury. The first figure that caught Wilfrid's attention there was Mr. Pericles, in a white overcoat, stretched along a sofa—his eyelids being down, though his eyes were evidently vigilant beneath. A titter of ladies present told of ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... with this splendid Festival: we cannot, however, conclude without a remark:—the health of 'Lord Porchester and the Poets of England,' was drunk; and when his Lordship made his acknowledgments, he was interrupted by the titter of a hundred tongues and sat down, no doubt, feeling that the spirit of nationality was a little too exclusive. We forgot to mention that neither Campbell nor his poem made their appearance, which we regretted for several ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 532. Saturday, February 4, 1832 • Various
... Mamma, and then at a younger sister; and then there was a titter, and then a fluttering, and then a rising, and Mr. Winsley, Lord Vargrave, and the slim secretary ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book VII • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... about the corners of Elsie's lips, and she carefully avoided the glance of Lottie's eyes, which she knew were dancing with fun, while there was a half-suppressed titter from the girls ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... certainly be kept indoors for the rest of his natural life,' they said. 'Look at his hunched back, and his crooked legs,' and they began to titter. ...
— A House of Pomegranates • Oscar Wilde
... the second floor. As he left it, he heard the door-bell ring, its electric titter very clear in the silence of the house. No doubt it meant a telegram for his father. At the turn of the stairs on the first floor he saw the back of the butler before the open door. Evidently it was not a matter of a telegram, but of some late caller. ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... presiding genius of the place, with his strange accent, odd sayings, and angular motions, accompanied by good-natured grunts of grotesque wrath, became a sort of household figure. The dorsal breadth of pronunciation with which he would expose Mr Ivory's Erskine, used to produce a titter which he was always at a loss to understand. Though not the fashionable mart where all the thorough libraries in perfect condition went to be hammered off—though it was rather a place where miscellaneous collections were sold, and therefore bargains ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... deep tones, after the strain of expectancy, this extraordinary, gaunt apparition, this high, thin sound from the huge body, were too much for the American crowd's sense of humor, always stronger than its sense of reverence. A suppressed yet unmistakable titter caught the throng, ran through it, and was gone. Yet no one who knew the President's face could doubt that he had heard it and had understood. Calmly enough, after a pause almost too slight to be recognized, he went on, and in a dozen words his tones had gathered volume, he had come to his power ...
— The Perfect Tribute • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... fu' bein' pleasant an' fu' goin' smilin' roun', 'Cause I don't believe in people allus totin' roun' a frown, But it's easy 'nough to titter w'en de stew is smokin' hot, But hit's mighty ha'd to giggle w'en dey's nuffin' ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... Castle Brady my trials may be said, in a manner, to have begun. My cousin, Master Mick, a huge monster of nineteen (who hated me, and I promise you I returned the compliment), insulted me at dinner about my mother's poverty, and made all the girls of the family titter. So when we went to the stables, whither Mick always went for his pipe of tobacco after dinner, I told him a piece of my mind, and there was a fight for at least ten minutes, during which I stood to him like ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... after he begin that progress was when things began to happen to him. First he heard what seemed to be the low titter of a human voice laughing sweetly. Next came a far off, unutterably lovely strumming of music. And then he realized that, at a depth of about a hundred feet, he was hanging level with a hole which marked the ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... titter, caressing, Peeping up as the planets appear, And the roses, their warm love confessing, Whisper words, soft perfumed, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... through the shrubbery to approach the house! The morning room, where Helen was taking her tea, looked out on the shrubbery, and although it was now quite dark in the world of nature, those dreadful rough boys would crack boughs, and stumble and titter as they walked. Polly's face grew hotter and her hands colder; never did she bless her sister's rather slow and unsuspicious nature more than at this moment, for Helen heard no boughs crack, nor did the stealthy, smothered laughter, so distinctly ...
— Polly - A New-Fashioned Girl • L. T. Meade
... notice spring out upon him oppresses him, and, indeed, such a feeling is not altogether without justification. Many eyes look out at him at these corners as he goes by, and once the deadly silence is broken by a titter, evidently forcibly suppressed! Rylton takes no notice, however. His wrath is still so warm that he thinks of nothing but the picture-gallery, and that screen at the end of it—where she, ...
— The Hoyden • Mrs. Hungerford
... the barber, and a titter ran round the room. Meantime Jem had stepped up to the mirror, and stood gazing sadly at his reflection. Tears came to ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various
... and I had reasons for avoiding such curiosity,—reasons well enough founded, for instantly grins, broader than before, widened the mouths of the two married ladies, while even Miss Thrale began a titter that half choaked her, and Augusta, nodding to me with an arch smirk, said, "Miss Burney, ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... A titter ran around the room, speedily checked by the stern eye of the principal, and one or two of the new boys giggled outright; but Jim, with head erect, and fearless eyes fixed upon the master, was unmoved, perhaps did not even guess that the ...
— Uncle Rutherford's Nieces - A Story for Girls • Joanna H. Mathews
... she returned with a look of serious expectation, then dropped her eyes and veiled a different expression under the long lashes. But he was sorely embarrassed, and stammered out he scarcely knew what. A suppressed titter from Addie Marchmont and the young men was the only response he heard, and it was not re-assuring. He heartily wished himself back in Michigan, but was comforted by seeing Lottie looking gravely and reproachfully at ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... times, of course, when he was a little uneasy. He had heard men titter at the Club: Clare had, occasionally, spoken plain words as to his true position in the House, and he had even, at times, doubts as to the permanent value of the book on which he was engaged. During these awful moments he gazed through the rent curtain into a valley of dead men's bones ruled ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... ground of this ill-suppressed mirth (as well as I could make out) was simply the fact that I was an American. "Well," he would say, drawing out the word to infinity, "and I suppose now in your country, things will be so and so." And the whole group of my cousins would titter joyously. Repeated receptions of this sort must be at the root, I suppose, of what they call the Great American Jest; and I know I was myself goaded into saying that my friends went naked in the ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... prove the English schoolmaster to be absent. To read such announcements as "Chinese and Japanese Curious," "Blackwood Furnitures," "Meals at All Day and Night," and "Steam Laundry & Co." provoke a titter in a city where you believe yourself to be an unwelcome visitor. It is obvious that the scholars of China are not reduced to the straits ...
— East of Suez - Ceylon, India, China and Japan • Frederic Courtland Penfield
... She did titter right out in protracted meetin', Sister Henn don't deny it, and she felt dretful bad about it, and so did I. But Metilda said, and stuck to it, that she couldn't have helped laughin' if it had been to save her life. And though ...
— Samantha Among the Brethren, Complete • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... young blood being awakened, I was minded to return those kisses, and began to do so with a Jew's interest, when I heard a rough voice swearing many strange oaths, and heard also the other women who had sheltered with us in the cave begin to titter, for the moment forgetting all their private woes, as those of their sex will do when there is ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard
... what we are to do about those two children that Belinda's got to wheel on in the double perambulator. I asked the Duchess of MIDDLESEX to lend us her twins for a couple of nights, but she writes to say they've just got the measles. Isn't there any one here who can help us? [The three Ladies titter. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari Volume 98, January 4, 1890 • Various
... dreamed of saying him nay, and no bad habits held him in subjection. Everywhere he was treated with quite notable respect. Even when, partly from negligence, and partly to hide recurring pimples, he had allowed his beard to grow, Clara herself had not dared to titter. And although he suffered from certain disorders of the blood due to lack of exercise and to his condition, his health could not be called bad. The frequency of his colds had somewhat diminished. His career, ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... to send us some towels, then," growls one of the number, a black-browed, surly-looking fellow with ponderous, bent shoulders and a slouching mien. Some of his companions titter encouragingly, others are silent. The sergeant of the guard flushes angrily and ...
— A War-Time Wooing - A Story • Charles King
... explosion of thick wriggling laughter. I started, looked up, and encountered a window stuffed with four savage fragments of crowding Face: four livid, shaggy disks focussing hungrily; four pair of uncouth eyes rapidly smouldering; eight lips shaking in a toothless and viscous titter. Suddenly above and behind these terrors rose a single horror of beauty—a crisp vital head, a young ivory, actual face, a night of firm, alive, icy hair, ...
— The Enormous Room • Edward Estlin Cummings
... a titter among the girls. Never had Jeanne looked prouder or handsomer, and Cecile's broad nose distended with anger while her lips were purple. She was larger but she did not dare attack Jeanne, for she knew the nature and the ...
— A Little Girl in Old Detroit • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... supper. It was evident that Mr. Thompson had overlooked much lawlessness in the conduct of the younger people, in his abstract contemplation of some impending event. When the cloth was removed, he rose to his feet, and grimly tapped upon the table. A titter, that broke out among the Jones girls, became epidemic on one side of the board. Charles Thompson, from the foot of the table, looked up in tender perplexity. "He's going to sing a Doxology," "He's going to pray," "Silence for a ...
— Mrs. Skaggs's Husbands and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... mallauxdegado. Tire lacigi. Tire (bore) tedi, enui. Tired laca. Tiresome teda, enua. Tissue teksajxo. Tithe (a tenth part) dekono. Tithing dekoneco. Title titolo. Titmouse paruo. Titter rideti, ekrideti. To al. Toad bufo. Toast (a health) toasto. Tobacco tabako. Tobacco box tabakujo, tabakskatolo. Tobacco pouch tabakujo. Tobacco shop tabakbutiko. Toboggan glitveturilo. Tocsin tumultsonorilo. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... A loud titter greeted his utterance, and Commander Potvin stopped reading for a moment, and glanced round with a fierce expression, without being able to see whence the ...
— Stand By! - Naval Sketches and Stories • Henry Taprell Dorling
... and rehearsed until he knew every word by heart. He stepped forward, and gazed appealingly at the silent audience; but no word came from his dry lips. He swallowed convulsively, and appeared to be struggling with himself. A titter of laughter sounded from the back of the room. The old man's face became fiery red and then deathly pale. He looked helplessly and ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe
... titter in the courtroom; the officer who was holding Jurgis put up his hand to hide a smile, and the magistrate smiled without trying to hide it. "It's true, ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... was going on under one chandelier of the ballroom, beneath the other scarlet little General Gorgon, sumptuous Lady Gorgon, the daughters and niece Gorgons, were standing surrounded by their Tory court, who affected to sneer and titter at the Whig ...
— The Bedford-Row Conspiracy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... fell out of the balcony, so great was his joy when he saw Miss Ann's card in demand and realized that his mistress was being sought after. A flush was on the old lady's cheeks as she swept across the ballroom floor and seated herself in the outer row of chairs, reserved for the dancers. A little titter arose. ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... the arms she knew not what to do with, but apprehending open laughter, held them rigidly to her sides, shooting anxious glances at the opposite mirror. She encountered a battery of eyes. At the same time she heard a suppressed titter. It was only by an effort of will that she refrained from running out of the room, and she felt as if she had been dipped in the hot springs of Nevis. It was at this agonising moment that the amiable Lord Hunsdon presented the chair, with the murmured hope that he ...
— The Gorgeous Isle - A Romance; Scene: Nevis, B.W.I. 1842 • Gertrude Atherton
... bird's-eye view, or dive into dells for some rare plant? Well, well—there is a tradition, that once we were young ourselves; and so redolent of youth are these hills, that we are more than half inclined to believe it—so blush and titter, and laugh and look down, ye innocent wicked ones, each with her squire by her palfrey's mane, while good old Christopher, like a true guide, keeps hobbling in the rear on his Crutch. Holla there!—to the right ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... her seat at once, before grace had been said, and before the fifty-five had drawn in their chairs with the noise of a cavalry brigade on charge. She stood up again immediately, but it was too late; an audible titter whizzed round the table: the new girl had sat down. For minutes after, Laura was lost in the pattern on her plate; and not till tongues were loosened and dishes being passed, did she venture to steal ...
— The Getting of Wisdom • Henry Handel Richardson
... she laughed at me; for though I couldn't see her face for the horrid veil she kept over it, I saw from the anxiety she was in to hide it, from the shaking, of her whole figure, that she was in the convulsions of a suppressed titter. I'll shoot him ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various |
