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More "Violin" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... outskirts of the town; but he sold it, and with the purchase-money bought a team of brown horses and a little carriage in which he drove about to stay with the squires. But as the horses were a deal of trouble and money was required for oats, Anton Prokofievitch bartered them for a violin and a housemaid, with twenty-five paper rubles to boot. Afterwards Anton Prokofievitch sold the violin, and exchanged the girl for a morocco and gold tobacco-pouch; now he has such a tobacco-pouch as no one else has. As a result of this luxury, he can no longer ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... he had gone many steps, he was halted. There began to reach his ears a rich but slender strain of sound, a golden thread of melody. At first he thought that it was a 'cello or the lower notes of a violin, but presently he became aware that it was a woman singing in a half-voice without thought of what she sang—as women croon to a child, or over their work, or when they are idle and ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... space and comfort of every kind—and the sea in sight! Such a pretty garden, too, grass and trees and shrubs and flowers. And near enough for us all to see you as often as you wish. Beth, be excited too! I must bring my violin, I think, and play a triumphal ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... Music is an instinct with these Hungarian gipsies. They play by ear, and with a marvellous precision, not surpassed by musicians who have been subject to the most careful training. Their principal instruments are the violin, the violoncello, and a sort of zither. The airs they play are most frequently compositions of their own, and are in character quite peculiar, though favourite pieces from Wagner and other composers are also given by them with ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... handsomeness of a man of the world. His forehead was high; his lips were thin; his nose inclined toward the Roman pattern; his black moustache was carefully curled and twisted at the extremities. Moreover, he was musical; for he held in one hand the bow of a violin, having just laid down the instrument itself on the sofa after a ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... practised in Vaermland. The guitar, with its mouldy, silken ribbon and its worn screws, and the dented horn, with faded tassels and cord were put away in the lumber-room in the attic, and the dust settled inches deep on the long, iron-bound violin boxes. Yet the less little Ruster had to do with flute and music-pen, so much the more must he turn to the brandy flask, and at last he became quite a drunkard. It was ...
— Invisible Links • Selma Lagerlof
... were found at one time on a Saturday night. Many of the beer-shops are a haunt of the young of both sexes among the factory people, 'the majority with faces unwashed and hair uncombed, dancing in their wooden clogs to the music of an organ, violin, or seraphine.' ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 449 - Volume 18, New Series, August 7, 1852 • Various
... diverted from this subject, which was evidently growing to be a painful one to one of the company, by the sound of a violin played with, singular skill and correctness ...
— Cape Cod Folks • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... there was one thing Polly could do it was whistle. Indeed, she insisted that it was her only accomplishment and many a happy little impromptu concert was given in Middies' Haven with Happy's guitar, Shortie's mandolin and Durand's violin. ...
— Peggy Stewart: Navy Girl at Home • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... in savage whoopings, songs and dances. They had got a reprobate blind fiddler into the parlour, where their punch-bowl steamed—a most agreeable and roistering sinner, who sang indescribable songs to the quaver of his violin, and entertained the company with Saturnalian vivacity, jokes, gibes, and wicked stories. Larry Cleary, thou man of sin and music! methinks I see thee now. Thy ugly, cunning, pitted face, twitching and grinning; thy small, sightless orbs rolling ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... Violin music testified that the witches were merry. We halted, and the horses neighed and were answered by others ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... sighed with her, but Felix and Barbara were frankly delighted with the painted floors, the casement windows, and the low, big-beamed rooms. In the evenings, as the two would sit on the wide doorstep, the voice of Felix's violin would mingle with the voice of the wind in the oak, while Barbara listened, entranced, for her brother was a real master of his instrument. It would laugh and sing and sigh, while Barbara pressed closer and closer to ...
— The Windy Hill • Cornelia Meigs
... irreparable—and while she was turning over in her mind in what manner she could explain to the Mother Superior that the mistake about the hour had been no fault of hers—and the Mother Superior, alas! would be sure to make inquiries as to the friends whom she had visited—the magic violin of M. Szmera played its first notes, accompanied by Madame Odinska on the piano, and by a delicious little flute. They played an overture, the dreamy sweetness of which extorted cries of admiration from ...
— Jacqueline, v3 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)
... and observe its outline, and get your friends to draw it up and pass judgment on it. In fact, while the actual work of making a bow takes about eight hours, it requires months to get one adjusted so that it is good. A bow, like a violin, is a work of art. The best in it can only be brought out by infinite care. Like a violin, it is all curved contours, there is not a straight line in it. Many of my bows have been built over completely three or four times. Old Horrible first pulled eighty-five pounds. It was reduced, shortened, ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... a violinist who is exceptional also; he draws the bow over his violin, and low, sweet strains of music come floating to our ears; then the music will suddenly change to the wild ecstasy of joy which will compel you to notice the player. When you look at him, you will know that his soul ...
— Reno - A Book of Short Stories and Information • Lilyan Stratton
... descending tune half-way between a wail and a laugh. And ever in interlude is the skipping, mincing step,—here of reeds answered by solo violin with a light clank of cymbals. Answering the summoning fifes, the unison troop of fiddlers dance the main step to bright strokes of triangle, then the main ghostly violin trips in with choir of wind. And broadly again sweeps the song between ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp
... magnetism in a piece of steel suspended nearby, though the two objects do not actually touch, each other. An object which is electrified will by induction electrify another object situated some distance away. A note sounded on the piano, or violin, will cause a glass or vase in some distant part of the room to vibrate and "sing," under certain conditions. And, so on, in every form or phase of the manifestation of energy do we see the principle of induction in ...
— Clairvoyance and Occult Powers • Swami Panchadasi
... turning over this problem in his mind, he painted feverishly, and for three days after Miss Greeby had come to stir up muddy water, he remained as much as possible in his studio. Chaldea visited him, as usual, to be painted, and brought Kara with his green coat and beloved violin and hairy looks. The girl chatted, Kara played, and Lambert painted, and all three pretended to be very happy and careless. This was merely on the surface, however, for the artist was desperately wretched, because the other half ...
— Red Money • Fergus Hume
... Others had tried it, but the sudden cooling of the metal had caused the moldboard to warp and lose its shape, and all good plowmen know that a moldboard has to have a form as exact in its way as the back of a violin, otherwise it simply pushes its way through the ground, gathering soil and rubbish in front of it, until horses, lines, lash and cuss words drop in despair, and give it up. The desirable and necessary thing was to preserve the exact and delicate shape of the moldboard so that ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 11 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Businessmen • Elbert Hubbard
... came up, and its bright light made the day longer; and when everybody had eaten a last piece of sponge-cake, and the heap of strawberries on a great round India dish had been leveled, what should be heard but sounds of a violin. Betty had discovered that Seth Pond,—the clumsy, good-natured Seth of all people!—had, as he said, "ears for music," and had taught himself ...
— Betty Leicester - A Story For Girls • Sarah Orne Jewett
... intellectuals very well; she was good at listening to symphony concerts, but she never had much luck in discussing the cleverness of the wood winds in taking up the main motif. It is history that she refused a master of arts with an old violin, a good taste in ties, and an income ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... better or get more of the spirit of dance in their music than those did to-night. They had just given us the most lovely swinging things, one after another, when suddenly they all stopped and the leader drew his bow across his violin. Never in all my life have I ever heard anything like the call of that waltz from that gipsy's strings. It laughed you a signal and you felt yourself follow ...
— The Melting of Molly • Maria Thompson Daviess
... small farm in Merrytown, but as a matter of fact he lived off of a comfortable income left him by his very capable father. He spent most of his time reading the eighteenth-century essayists, John Donne's poetry, the "Atlantic Monthly," the "Boston Transcript," and playing Mozart on his violin. He did not understand his wife and was thoroughly afraid of his son; Hugh had an animal vigor that ...
— The Plastic Age • Percy Marks
... shall resign myself to my solitude," he answered. "It is quiet. I shall not hear the patron touching on his violin. It is that which occupies his ...
— Barlasch of the Guard • H. S. Merriman
... of twenty-five or six, with big wrists, big, muscular hands, and a rather unpleasant, lowering face; and a little, middle-aged man with straightforward, friendly hazel eyes and a pointed beard. The pale, boyish one carried a violin made from a cigar box under his arm, just such a violin as the darkies make down South. This violin was very beautifully made, and decorated with a rustic design. ...
— A Volunteer Poilu • Henry Sheahan
... whose abilities would excite the pride of many a clear-sighted person. For instance, in addition to the before-mentioned LESUEUR, who is an excellent geographer and a good mathematician, might be quoted HUARD, a man of erudition and a correct printer; likewise CAILLAT, a capital performer on the violin, and a celebrated composer. For vocal and instrumental music, printing, and handicraft work, there might be noticed thirty or forty, as well as ten or twelve for knowledge relating ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... (Not a toot!), While the leading violin And the flute Wail and plead in low duet Till, it may be, eyes are wet. She her trombone doth ...
— In Divers Tones • Charles G. D. Roberts
... work, listening to her singing. She had been taught by a good master and her voice was pure and pliant, although as yet only half developed. The little concerts they gave their friends were really charming — with Clifford's banjo, Gethryn's guitar, Thaxton's violin, Yvonne's voice and piano. Clifford made the programs. They were profusely illustrated, and he spent a great deal of time rehearsing, writing verses, and rehashing familiar airs (he called it "composing") which would have been as well devoted to ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... upon four or five of them to venture on board. As soon as they entered the ship I made them several, presents, and in a very little time they appeared to be perfectly at ease. As I was very desirous to entertain them, one of the midshipmen played upon the violin, and some of my people danced; at this they were so much delighted, and so impatient to show their gratitude, that one of them went over the ship's side into the canoe, and fetched up a seal-skin ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... known whence came that song. Who composed it? No one could tell. One verse was given by Eliezer to his friend after a state of ecstatic unconsciousness which visited him often; the second was composed by Aryel, Calman's son, while playing on his violin in the grove. Some of them had their birth in Meir's breast, and others were whispered by the childish lips of Haim, Abraham's son. Thus are composed all folk songs. Their origin is in longing hearts, ...
— An Obscure Apostle - A Dramatic Story • Eliza Orzeszko
... over the fence with the melon and hastened as fast as he could after Horatio, who was already moving across the clearing with his violin under one arm and the green ears under ...
— The Arkansaw Bear - A Tale of Fanciful Adventure • Albert Bigelow Paine
... addition to the general subjects and the lectures at the Sorbonne, Nelka also studied music, in particular the violin, and at a time was quite proficient in it, though she did not keep it up, as she did with painting, which she continued for ...
— Nelka - Mrs. Helen de Smirnoff Moukhanoff, 1878-1963, a Biographical Sketch • Michael Moukhanoff
... they acted an Italian comedy in a very creditable manner. The orchestra comprised only four musicians. At the conclusion of the second act the consul's son, a boy of twelve years, played some variations on the violin very prettily. ...
— A Visit to the Holy Land • Ida Pfeiffer
... was styled by the men) were quite won by the way in which he laboured to understand the use of the sextant, and other matters connected with the mysteries of navigation; and stout Jonathan Dall, the captain, was overjoyed when he discovered that he was a good player on the violin, of which instrument he was passionately fond. In short, Will Osten became a general favourite on board the Foam, and the regard of all, from the cabin-boy to the captain, deepened into respect when they ...
— Sunk at Sea • R.M. Ballantyne
... blacksmith, but a small crowd, mostly composed of children, gathered round somebody. On going to see who it was, he discovered a battered-looking old man with an intellectual face, and the remnants of a gentlemanlike appearance, playing on the violin. A very few touches of his bow told Arthur, who knew something of music, that he was in the presence of a performer of no mean merit. Seeing the quality of his two auditors, and that they appreciated his performance, the ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... no ordinary widower. As you looked at his severe, thoughtful face, surmounted by a shock of beautiful white hair, you instinctively respected him; and when you heard that he lived by cobbling shoes by day and playing a violin in the Theatre Royal orchestra by night, occasionally putting off his leather apron to give a music lesson in the front parlour of an afternoon, you respected him all the more. There had been but one thing ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... great many young people were on board when they arrived, and now they appeared again, coming along the street and disappearing at the steep stairway opposite. The lighted windows were full of heads already, and there were now and then preliminary exercises upon a violin. Mr. Aldis had grown old enough to be obliged to sit and think it over about going to a ball; the day had passed when there would have been no question; but when he had finished his cigar he crossed the street, and only stopped before the lighted ...
— The Life of Nancy • Sarah Orne Jewett
... Australia, some of a ferocious character, while others tended more to excite laughter. Three of those scamps visited, at noon-day, a settler's house, and, coolly walking in, called for luncheon, and made themselves quite at home. While thus regaling themselves, they happened to see a violin hanging against the wall, and asked their host, whether he could play. On being answered in the affirmative, they made him strike up, while they danced to his music. When tired of this amusement, they helped themselves to whatever struck their fancy, and then went ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson
... shallow box, across which he had fastened some violin strings rather loosely; and Phil himself was an invalid boy who had never known what it was to be strong and hardy, able to romp and run, or leap and shout. He had neither father nor mother, but no one could have loved him more or have been any ...
— Prince Lazybones and Other Stories • Mrs. W. J. Hays
... of many heavy feet, and trembled with the shock of noise—an incessant roar of men's voices, punctuated with women's screams. Then the riot quieted somewhat; there was a clapping of hands, and a violin began to squeak measures intended to be Oriental. The next moment the listener scrambled up one of the rotting piles and stood upon the veranda. A shaft of red light through a broken shutter struck across the figure above the shoulders, revealing ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington
... is a feature of the west. Anybody who comes across the boy will be good to him. Now, let's have a little music and then to bed. A whole day in the saddle tires me, though I'm bound to get used to it yet, and so shall all of you. Come, Erminie, give me a song; and Dorothy dear, get out your violin." ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... while it lasted. He fitted himself out with new shirts and buckskins, sashes, caps, neips, and moccasins, and when he was not on duty showed himself like a hero, knife in sheath, a weather-browned and sinewy figure. To dance, sing, drink, and play the violin, and have the scant dozen white women, the half-breeds, and squaws of Mackinac admire him, was a voyageur's heaven—its brief duration being its charm. For he was a born ...
— The Black Feather - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... that. You have only to look at the sort of amusements that most people fly to when they have not anything to do, to see that there is quite as much, if not more, peril to communion of soul with God in times when the whole nature is somewhat relaxed, and the strings are loosened, like those of a violin screwed down a turn or two of the peg, than there ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... old man, Whose white hair, worn and thin, Fell o'er his shoulders, as he played His cherished violin, Forever drawing to and fro O'er silent strings ...
— Poems • John L. Stoddard
... orchestra of L'Alcazar in Bordeaux, and a great friend of Gounod. When he returned to New Orleans after an absence of forty-six years to play for his native city once more, he was old, but not worn, nor bent, the fire of youth still flashed in his eye, and leaped along the bow of his violin.[91] One may mention a long list of famous musicians of color of the State, but our picture must be filled in rather with the broad sweep of the mass, ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various
... me, is dear above all instruments," replied she; "it alone has tones that respond to those of the human heart." [Footnote: The infanta, who played on several instruments, excelled on the violin. Wraxall, ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... supported by outriggers. The stern is elevated about three or four feet, something like a ship's stern-post. The head is flat above, but prow-like below, and turns down at the extremity, like the end of a violin. Some knives, beads, and other trifles were conveyed to our visitors; and they gave us a few cocoa-nuts, upon our asking for them. But they did not part with them by way of exchange for what they had received from us. For they seemed to have no idea of bartering; ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... would consent to one thing, 'twould make us very happy. You can't play the violin, worse luck; but you might take a step or two round the deck with Annie, if I strike up a waltz-tune for you to ...
— Noughts and Crosses • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... During the hours which she spends in private, in pleasure, and in the care of her person, she amuses herself by caroling the sweetest strains. For her France and Italy ordain delightful concerts and Naples imparts to the strings of the violin an harmonious soul. This species is in fine at once the queen of the world and the slave of passion. She dreads marriage because it ends by spoiling her figure, but she surrenders herself to it because it promises happiness. If she bears children it is by pure chance, ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... another at regular intervals upon your ear. Any quick and regular succession of sounds makes a note, even though it may be an ugly one. The squeak of a slate pencil along a slate, and the shriek of a railway whistle are not pleasant, but they are real notes which you could copy on a violin. ...
— The Fairy-Land of Science • Arabella B. Buckley
... Conneelys had done well in the Intermediate. Their elder brother was a priest. Father Tom's photograph was in the centre of the chimney-piece a-top of the clock. They could play the piano and violin and had fortunes when the time came for them to marry. Their mother would never have permitted them to serve in the bar nor even behind the drapery counter. They were black-haired, rosy, buxom girls, who set the fashions ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... said to another. "At the opera every night unless serious affairs keep him away! There you may see him nodding his old head and bursting his gloves with applauding when a good thing is done. He ought to have led an orchestra or played a 'cello. He is too big for first violin." ...
— The Lost Prince • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... disappear from the face of the earth as completely as the mastodon. The present application of the saying is to the people of Goa, who, while they carry through the world patronymics which breathe of conquest and discovery, devote their energies rather to the violin and the art of cookery. The caviller may object to the application of the words "fine art" to culinary operations, but the objection rests on superficial thought. A deeper view will show that art is in the artist, not in his subject or his materials. ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA
... July day, and he walked slowly—for there was plenty of time—with his eyes fixed on the far-off, shimmering sea. That minstrel of heat, the locust, hidden somewhere in the shade of burning herbage, pulled a long, clear, vibrating bow across his violin, and the sound fell lazily on the still air—the only sound on earth except a soft crackle under the Bishop's feet. Suddenly the erect, iron-gray head plunged madly forward, and then, with a frantic effort and a parabola or two, recovered itself, while from the ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... husband had been carried to a Southern port, she learned by the merest chance, and, disguising herself in man's attire, and leading her little son by the hand, she set forth in quest of him, carrying with her a violin, which, together with the clothes she wore, had been found in the trunk of Monsieur Grambeau, brought on the vessel in which she came, but which depository she had been obliged to abandon, when setting forth on ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield
... open air. On St. John's Day the entire population, old and young, dance around a May-pole erected at some convenient place, and at harvest time, whenever the last sheaf in a field is pitched upon the cart or the stack, it is customary for somebody to produce a musical instrument, a violin, a nyckleharpa, a harmonicum, or perhaps only a mouth organ, and everybody—for the boys and girls of the family all work together in the hay and harvest fields—join in a dance ...
— Norwegian Life • Ethlyn T. Clough
... eyes, pursuing their race after excitement. A silence had come over the party. The play was high and the gamesters too absorbed to note anything but the game. From the ball-room came the sound of violin, flute and harpsichord, shrieks of shrill laughter, oaths from drunken wranglers and ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce
... evening discussing the talents of a certain orchestral conductor, who also played the violin. I was talking to a member of his orchestra, a very genuine artist. We agreed that he had conducted badly; but, I said in his defence, "Anyhow his intentions are good. You must admit that he has a feeling for music." "My dear fellow," exclaimed the bandsman pettishly, ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... a passion, for Ricka, as well as Mr. B., could never have enough, and it was a pleasure to see the real and unaffected delight upon their faces when I played. We were really quite well supplied with musical instruments, for there were now in the Mission two guitars, one mandolin, a violin and a few harmonicas, besides the two organs, while as for vocalists everybody sang from Mr. H. down to the Eskimo boys, girls ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... airs and concerted pieces from the operas,—and a precious work they make of it sometimes! Not only do the instruments go very badly together, but the parts they play are not arranged for them. A violone grunts out a low accompaniment to a vinegar-sharp violin which saws out the air, while a trumpet blares in at intervals to endeavor to unite the two, and a flute does what it can, but not what it would. Sometimes, instead of a violone, a hoarse trombone, with a violent cold in the head, snorts ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various
... to the beginning of the world. No music save Nicot's violin, which he plays sadly enough; no masks, no parties, no galloping to the hunt, no languishing in the balconies. Were it not pregnant with hidden dangers, I should love this land. I wonder who is the latest celebrity at the old Rambouillet; a poet ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... liked this new place very much. The whole day long he could see the young ladies and gentlemen enjoying themselves; going out for drives in the evenings and quite late at nights, playing the piano or the violin, and singing and dancing. He saw the ladies sitting with the young students on the window sills, engaged in animated conversation, and then going in pairs to walk the dark avenue of lime trees, lit up only by streaks of moonlight. He saw ...
— The Forged Coupon and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... The crowth, or crowd, was a species of violin. The rote a sort of guitar, or rather hurdy-gurdy, the strings of which were managed by a wheel, from which ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... heard, until in a few weeks' time—why I don't even know their repertoire, but they can call quail, larks, owls, orioles, whip-poor-wills, so perfectly they get answers. James will never do anything worth while in music, he's too much like me; but Malcolm is saving his money and working to buy a violin; he's going to read a music score faster than he will a book. I'm hunting an instructor for him who will start his education on the subjects which interest him most. Do ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... to your notice the bearer of this, young Bocklet, who is a very clever violin-player. If you can be of any service to him through your acquaintances, do your best for him, especially as he is warmly ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826 Vol. 2 • Lady Wallace
... susceptible to every influence about it. One might liken its quality to that of a violin which owes its fine properties to the tempering of time and atmosphere, and transmits through its strings the very thrill of sunshine that has sunk into its wood. His utterances are modulated by the very changes of ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... yet been considered proficient enough to take an active part in the monthly entertainment, but Flossie's name was one of the first on the list. She played the violin remarkably well, better than almost anybody else at Chessington; and as she was seldom nervous, her pieces were generally very successful. The day following Evelyn Fletcher's fright happened to be "Mutual Improvement Friday". The girls only spent a short time ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... is so impossible to be escaped from, that I fear Broadstairs and I must part company in time to come. Unless it pours of rain, I cannot write half-an-hour without the most excruciating organs, fiddles, bells, or glee-singers. There is a violin of the most torturing kind under the window now (time, ten in the morning) and an Italian box of music on the steps—both in full blast." He closed with a mention of improvements in the Margate theatre since his memorable last visit. In ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... of young folks had assembled at his uncle's to dance. One of the company, named Cummings, played on the violin. In the course of the evening Oliver undertook a hornpipe. His short and clumsy figure, and his face pitted and discolored with the small-pox, rendered him a ludicrous figure in the eyes of the musician, who made merry at his expense, dubbing him his little Aesop. Goldsmith ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving
... plump Faenza jar; a tall Dutch clock was going through a gavotte with a spindle-legged ancient chair; a very droll porcelain figure of Littenhausen was bowing to a very stiff soldier in terre cuite of Ulm; an old violin of Cremona was playing itself, and a queer little shrill plaintive music that thought itself merry came from a painted spinet covered with faded roses; some gilt Spanish leather had got up on the wall and laughed; a Dresden ...
— The Nuernberg Stove • Louisa de la Rame (AKA Ouida)
... was urging! And who could resist the sweet wild delirium of a violin's call? Certainly not an Irishman intent upon a moonbeam imprisoned in a girl's bright hair. ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... attention to her voice. Mellow and suave and of astonishing volume was Margaret's voice; it came not from the back of her throat, as most of our women's voices do, but from her chest; and I protest it had the timbre of a violin. Men, hearing her voice for the first time, were wont to stare at her a little and afterward to close their hands slowly, for always its modulations had the tonic sadness of distant music, and it thrilled you to much the same magnanimity and yearning, cloudily conceived; and yet you could ...
— The Eagle's Shadow • James Branch Cabell
... golden locks; the youths, with their soft beardless faces framed in combed-out hair, with their daggers on their hips and their plumed hats between their fingers; and the serious bearded men, in silken robes; drawing nearer the poet, letting go lute or violin or music-book as they listen on the villa terrace or in some darkened room, where the sunset sky turns green-blue behind the pillared window, and the roses hang over the trellise of the cloister. And as they did four ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee
... to mention an incident which broke but one heart? Yes, I think the sad episode is not without importance, even in so vast a picture. It was a child's funeral. The little wooden coffin, scantily covered with a black pall, was not larger, as Theophile Gautier says, "than a violin case." There were few mourners. A woman, the mother doubtless, in a black stuff dress and white crimped cap, holding by the hand a boy, who had not yet reached the age of sorrowing tears, and behind them a little knot of neighbours and ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... through which they shone with pale yellow glow. Evidently even some of the business buildings were only canvas; and these, and the multitude of tents, gleamed dully like a great encampment. Voices sounded constantly, echoing across the water; hammering never ceased; music floated—strains of violin and trumpet and piano! From the water-front clear back up the sides of the hills San Francisco was alive by night as by day. And on the hour all the vessels in the harbor struck their bells, in a great, ...
— Gold Seekers of '49 • Edwin L. Sabin
... room above them there came the shrill shriek of a violin. It wailed itself into silence, and then broke forth again in a series of ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... a cat and a dog, a small piece of land, and a few orange trees. The boy gave the dog away to a neighbour and sold the land and the orange trees. Every bit of money he obtained from the sale he invested in a violin. He had longed for a violin all his life and now he wanted one more than ever. While his father had lived he could tell his thoughts to his father, but now there was none to tell them to except the violin. What his violin ...
— Tales of Giants from Brazil • Elsie Spicer Eells
... asked, pointing to the violin, and speaking in a slow, deliberate tone, as if he did not feel at home ...
— Paul the Peddler - The Fortunes of a Young Street Merchant • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... and then a blaze of yellow light shining within this circular building, on its red satin and gilt plaster, and on the spacious picture of a blue Italian lake, with peacocks on the wide stone terraces. The noise at first was bewildering. The leader of the orchestra was sawing away at his violin as savagely as if he were calling on his company to rush up and seize a battery of guns. What was the melody that was being banged about by the trombones, and blared aloud by the shrill cornets, and sawed across by the infuriated ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... my eyes did say it. At any rate, she looked as straight at me as I at her, and I noticed that she paled a little and shrank—yet continued to look, as if I were compelling her. But her voice, beautifully clear, and lingering in the ears like the resonance of the violin after the bow has swept its strings and lifted, was perfectly self-possessed, as she said to her brother: "That will be delightful—if ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... STIVER]. O, but you must consider this, my friend; There is no Want where Love's the guiding star; All's right without if tender Troth's within. [To Falk. He loved her to the notes of the guitar, And she gave lessons on the violin— ...
— Love's Comedy • Henrik Ibsen
... both his invitations. Then, after the supper, pipes alight, we sauntered down the street, a vast leisure expanding our horizons. At the street corner stood a tall, poetic-looking man, with dreamer's eyes, a violin clasped under his chin. He was looking straight past us all out into the dusk of the piney mountains beyond, his soul in the music he was producing. They were simple melodies, full of sentiment, and he played as though he ...
— Gold • Stewart White
... at Epworth League socials, Sunday school class doings, in the Sunday school orchestra—violin and b-flat cornet respectively—and, most significant of all in its effect on all the later years, they went through Win-My-Chum week together. The hand of the ...
— John Wesley, Jr. - The Story of an Experiment • Dan B. Brummitt
... in full swing; it was chiefly brass; but now and then, in softer moments, one could hear a violin squeaking uncertainly. At least it went along with a marked, regular rhythm, and the dancers swirled industriously around the floor. A very gay crowd; color was apparently appreciated in The Corner. And Donnegan, ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... here, straddling a kitchen chair, and noisily joyous as usual, was Peter Coleman. Susan knew in a happy instant that he had gone to find her at her aunt's, and had followed her here, and during the meal that followed, she was the maddest of all the mad crowd. After dinner they had Josephine's violin, and coaxed Betsey to recite, but more appreciated than either was Miss Brown's rendition of selections from German and Italian opera, and her impersonation of an inexperienced servant from Erin's green isle. Mrs. ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... and would be letting things fall. She had better get some old soldier used to nursing. "And don't whisper in the room," said he; "nothing irritates them worse; and don't let anybody play a piano within hearing; but in a day or two you may try him with slow and continuous music on the flute or violin if you like. Don't touch his bed suddenly; don't sit on it or lean on it. Dole sunlight into his room by degrees; and when he can bear it, drench him with it. Never mind what the old school tell you. About these things they know a good deal less ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... girl in a fancy dress and with long, flowing hair passes among the spectators and gathers a few shillings. Not far away is observed Punch and Judy in the height of a successful quarrel to the music of a harp and a violin. The automatic contestants pound and pommel each ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... a dogged precision which made them agreeable enough to listen to, but droll to look at. Ruth, with her chin upon her dimpled arm, watched Reuben as he played. He had tossed back his chestnut mane of hair rather proudly as he tucked his violin beneath his chin, and had looked round on his three seniors with the air of a master as he held his bow poised in readiness to descend upon the strings. His short upper lip and full lower lip came together firmly, his brows straightened, ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... from respect for the "young master," or from self-acknowledgment that he was in the wrong. He learned the craft of river boatman in this engagement. One day, on being asked to kill a hog, he replied like the Irishman with the violin, "that he had never done ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... his trunk over to Conboy's from the station and changing back into the garb of civilization before meeting that girl again, that wonderful girl, that remarkable woman who could play a tune on him to suit her caprice, he thought, as she would have fingered a violin. ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden
... Diddled. Where 's Whitbread? Romilly? Where 's George the Third? Where is his will? (That 's not so soon unriddled.) And where is 'Fum' the Fourth, our 'royal bird?' Gone down, it seems, to Scotland to be fiddled Unto by Sawney's violin, we have heard: 'Caw me, caw thee'—for six months hath been hatching This scene of royal ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... his arm, which I gladly accepted, happy to be relieved from the impertinence of my female companion. We returned to tea; after which the ladies sung, and played by turns on the piano forte; while some of the gentlemen accompanied with the flute, the clarinet, and the violin, forming in the whole a very decent concert. An elegant supper, and half an hour's conversation after it, closed the evening; when we returned home, delighted with our entertainment, and pleased with ourselves and each other. My imagination is so ...
— The Coquette - The History of Eliza Wharton • Hannah Webster Foster
... so like they should then be so insanely unlike, that is the shock and the enigma. That an ape has hands is far less interesting to the philosopher than the fact that having hands he does next to nothing with them; does not play knuckle-bones or the violin; does not carve marble or carve mutton. People talk of barbaric architecture and debased art. But elephants do not build colossal temples of ivory even in a roccoco style; camels do not paint even bad pictures, though equipped with the material of many camel's-hair ...
— Orthodoxy • G. K. Chesterton
... to serve, he stepped from behind the wagon and looked across the rolling stretch of open country. There was no one in sight. Softly, almost stealthily, he crept up to the wagon, fetched out from its wooden case a small violin, made his way to the further side of the wagon, sat down with his back to the wheel and began to play. His eyes were closed. Sometimes the movements of his fingers were so slow that the melody seemed to die away. Then unexpectedly he picked it up, carrying ...
— The Black Box • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Daily News, to which the cafe subscribed, and for which in those days Andrew Lang was writing the leaders everybody was reading. But Lang could not reconcile us to the nightly Gran Concerto of a piano, a flute and a violin of indifferent merit concealed in a thicket of artificial trees, and the Best Society meant tourists, and after we had shocked a family of New England friends by inviting them to share its tawdry pleasures with us, and after a few evenings had given ...
— Nights - Rome, Venice, in the Aesthetic Eighties; London, Paris, in the Fighting Nineties • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... wicked and unprincipled as he was, his merriment, off-hand and daring, lent him a certain fascination and popularity among us. He was very witty, his laugh was rich and constant, he sang well, and played in a dashing way the violin. Every night he found some one to gamble with him. Every night he drank a pint of whisky, and kept ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... of the recent debate in the Senate on the alleged unconstitutional indiscretions of our Imperial Master. (H.I.M., I should add, is at present on a lecturing tour in the Peloponnesus; statements in the Custos Burdigalensis to the effect that He is giving a series of violin recitals are wholly without foundation.) The impression produced is on the whole one of unanimous condemnation of His Majesty's recent action. How—it is argued even by the Right—can it tend to the stability of Roman foreign policy that ...
— The Casual Ward - academic and other oddments • A. D. Godley
... from Mr. Nokes, he (Triplet), seeing the orchestra thinned by desertion, and nugatory by intoxication, had started from the pit, resuscitated with the whole contents of his snuff-box the bass fiddle, snatched the leader's violin, and carried Mr. Nokes triumphantly through; that thunders of applause had followed, and Mr. Nokes had kindly returned thanks for both; but that he (Triplet) had hastily retired to evade the manager's acknowledgments, preferring to wait an opportunity like the present, when both ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... be inferior, for the tone of all the beauty in the world is sad." Much Tom Helmer knew of beauty or sadness either! but ignorance is no reason with a fool for holding his tongue. "But there is the violin, now!—that can be as sad as any organ, without being so ponderous. Hear this, now! This is the violin after the organ—played ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... admitted, "and I play on the violin for money whenever the occasion offers, something which you will yet congratulate yourselves upon if you wish to reach the root of this mysterious and dastardly crime. But that I am a nobody I deny, and I even dare to hope ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green
... with kindly mirth, the old man drew on his woollen gloves and took up his hat and the violin-bag. Then he offered ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... zither, so we can have music as we sail, and Grif will bring his violin, and Ralph can imitate a banjo so that you'd be sure he had one. I do hope it will be fine, it is so splendid to go round like other folks and enjoy myself," cried Jill, with a little bounce of satisfaction at the prospect ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... water streaming under his lee, and the swoosh of breaking seas that had no power to harm him. Peace rode with him. His body rested, and the tension left his nerves which for months had been strung like the gut on a violin. ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... hear me doing the double F in the Boston Cake Walk to get me at my best. You've heard Kubelik on the violin? Well, it's not a bit like that, and yet there's just the something which links great artists together, no matter what ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... contact, so that the mind is attentive to constantly recurring impressions, and readily learns to discern their variations. This difference is clear in the use of musical instruments. The harsh and painful touch of the 'cello, bass-viol, and even of the violin, hardens the finger-tips, although it gives flexibility to the fingers. The soft and smooth touch of the harpsichord makes the fingers both flexible and sensitive. In this respect the harpsichord ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... we often saw the soldiers of his guard assemble on the grass-plot before the castle; one of them would play the violin and instruct his comrades in dancing. The beginners would study the 'jetes' and 'assembles' with the closest attention; the more advanced ones would execute a whole contredance. From behind the window-blinds we watched them ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... Lad, who was sitting on a chair hidden away behind the Trapper, "John Norton," and the Lad took hold of the sleeve of his jacket and pulled the Trapper's head down towards him, "would you like to hear a violin to-night?" ...
— How Deacon Tubman and Parson Whitney Kept New Year's - And Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... the Austrian court, especially the Hungarian women, are notably beautiful and fascinating as well. It is the Magyar elan, that abandon which prompts a woman to toss her jewelled bangle to a Gypsy leader of the orchestra, when his violin moans and flashes out ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... lately, but I do now," and Dorothy stood up and swept the bow over the strings. Doctor of Music in violin, an accomplished musician, playing upon one of the finest instruments the world has ever known, she was lifted out of herself by relief from the dread of the Fenachrone invasion and that splendid violin expressed every ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith
... from the foot of the flower-strewn table, clad in an improvised toga, while a gentleman in Joss-like vestments carved and complimented in a single breath at the top of the Bohemian board. From the adjoining room came the music of hired minstrels: the guitar, the violin, and blending voices—a piping tenor and a soft Spanish falsetto. They chanted rhythmically to the clatter of tongues, the ripple of laughter, and ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... carried an aroma of fun and light-heartedness about him that was simply contagious. He sang Beranger's ditties with a verve and elan that brought back bonny Paris and student days to those of us who were acquainted with them. One moment he played exquisite bits from Mozart on his violin, to the accompaniment of the vicar's violoncello, that were most entrancing; the next, scraped away at some provoking tarantella that almost set the whole of us dancing, in defiance of the proprieties generally observed at ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... in this manner, groaning over my hapless fate, I heard the sound of a violin, and raising my head, perceived a company of men and women dancing on the grass at some distance from me. I looked upon this to be a favourable season for distress to attract compassion, when every selfish thought is banished, and the heart dilated with ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... wayfarers trudged over the deep white snow-fields on their buoyant snow-shoes, or coasted through the clear and bracing air on swift toboggans. In the evening they flocked to a chosen rendezvous, where a home-bred violinist tuned them through gay quadrilles; and anon the lonely violin would be drowned in the lusty voices of the dancers, who suited ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... she murmured, and she smiled a strange, sweet smile, "do you know, I find you like a rare violin which hitherto has been used by ordinary musicians to play their popular airs upon, but which is now highly strung and being touched by the bow of an artist who loves it. And oh! the exquisite sounds which ...
— Three Weeks • Elinor Glyn
... know more than I do. You must go and study in Berlin." Berlin was at once attracted to the youthful musician by his playing on the harpsichord and the organ. But the death of his father compelled him to earn his daily bread. Willing to descend, that he might rise, he became a violin player of minor parts at the Hamburg Opera House. The homage he had received prompted his vanity to create a surprise. He played badly, and acted as a verdant youth. The members of the orchestra sneeringly informed him that he would never earn his salt. Handel, however, ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth
... my head, or, more definitely—a violin. I bought a fiddle on my own account. Of course my father saw the instrument; if I could keep it out of his sight I could not very well keep it out of his hearing. Then, besides, little boys should not be deceptive. He says: ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... continued her grumbling; soon came the murmuring of a conversation carried on in low tones. Then nothing more was heard save the persistent shrilling of the neighbouring cricket, who continued to scrape away at his disagreeable instrument with the determination of a beginner on the violin. ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... all in their place. There were the chemical corner and the acid-stained, deal-topped table. There upon a shelf was the row of formidable scrap-books and books of reference which many of our fellow-citizens would have been so glad to burn. The diagrams, the violin-case, and the pipe-rack—even the Persian slipper which contained the tobacco—all met my eyes as I glanced round me. There were two occupants of the room—one Mrs. Hudson, who beamed upon us both as we entered; the other the ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... volumes of Standard English Songs, a book of songs by Schubert, a book of sacred melodies consisting chiefly of solos and duets from the oratorios, another containing a selection of songs from various operas, and, in sheet, a few ballads and a quantity of music specially composed for the violin. As she glanced through my budget, our hostess volubly expressed her delight, and was pleased to compliment me very highly upon the taste which had dictated my choice. Then, opening one of the books of English songs and placing it before her on the piano, she ...
— The First Mate - The Story of a Strange Cruise • Harry Collingwood
... and will listen to piano or violin while quietly occupied, for example if they are drawing. One Nursery School teacher plays soft music to get her babies to sleep, and our little ones fidget less if some one sings softly ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... life. I had seen the curtain roll up on a new act of this most wonderful of all plays to the music of an orchestra hidden indeed in my grove of chestnuts, but sweeter, more joyous, more full of the promise of perfect things than ever a violin touched by human fingers. Then the thrushes had hopped out on to my dew-spangled lawn, where before the hot sun the grey, gossamer-like mist was vanishing like breath from a mirror; my roses raised their heads, and the breeze from the west—a lazy, fluttering breeze—borrowed ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... stand, Roumanians in red frocks were playing; all swarthy, white-toothed, with the faces of whiskered, pomaded apes, with their hair licked down. The director of the orchestra, bending forward and affectedly swaying, was playing upon a violin and making unseemly sweet eyes at the public—the eyes of a man-prostitute. And everything together—this abundance of tiresome electric lights, the exaggeratedly bright toilettes of the ladies, the odours of modish, spicy ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... the students' rooms at St. Benet's. A few rare prints and some beautiful photogravures of well-known pictures adorned the walls. The room was crowded with knick-knacks and rendered gay and sweet by many tall flowers in pots. A piano stood open by one of the walls and a violin lay carelessly on a chair not far off. There were piles of new music and some tempting, small, neatly bound books lying about. A fire glowed on the hearth and a little brass kettle sang merrily on the hob. The cocoa-table was drawn up in front of the fire and on a quaintly ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... I could write old Santa Claus a leetla letter and tell how good the poor children way down in the steerage have been. And there's my cousin Tomasso from Italy. Oh, Santa Claus must bring him a new violin. Then he can make-a the beautiful music on the golden streets of New York. If there is anybody at all in the whole beeg world who should have a nice-a, beeg-a Christmas, it is the verra poor leetla children whose mammas and papas haven't got very much money. But sometimes ...
— The White Christmas and other Merry Christmas Plays • Walter Ben Hare
... nor the love of his youth. It was a heart-breaking song; and though his voice was pitched so low it was almost like singing in a whisper, there was a strange, vibrating power in it, as there is in the strings of a violin touched but lightly by the bow. Sir S. transferred his attention from the wall to me as he sang this sad old ballad, and I could not look away, because there was the same compelling power in his eyes ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... years old sang several Hebrew melodies; she had a fine voice. In the evening we had with us, for the second time, a little boy, eight years old, who played exquisitely on the violin. He also recited the portion of the Pentateuch selected for the Sabbath reading in the Synagogue, with several of the commentaries on the same, by heart; a very handsome child. By his extraordinary talent he supports his parents and family—in all ten persons. Sir ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore
... perfection as a rhythmical sequence. In piano playing the accentual points of a passage may be given by notes struck in the bass register while unaccented elements are supplied from the upper octaves; in orchestral compositions a like opposition of heavy to light brasses, of cello to violin, of cymbals to triangle, is employed to produce rhythmical effects, the change being one in timbre, combined or uncombined with pitch variations; and in all percussive instruments, such as the drum and cymbals, the rhythmic impression depends solely on intensive variations. ...
— Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1 • Various
... Toulouse. By the kindness of Mr. Roche, banker, at Cork, I learn that this collection 'is a truly splendid one.' The possessor's talents are not confined to the partial walk of bibliography: in his younger years, he was considered one of the first gentlemen-violin players in Europe. He quitted Ireland forty years ago, and now resides at Toulouse, in his 70th year, surrounded by a numerous and respectable family. His leading passion, in book-collecting, (like his countryman's, poor Mr. Quin—who gave 170 ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... Crompton's character may be seen when it is stated he was an enthusiastic musician, and earned 1s. 6d. a night by playing the violin at the Bolton Theatre. Four or five years after the invention was known, he removed to the township of Sharples, where he occupied a farm-house called "The Oldhams," being probably induced to take this step in order to ...
— The Story of the Cotton Plant • Frederick Wilkinson
... distant cousin who did not understand the use of it at all. And he thought that, if it were to go very cheap, perhaps Rico could buy it. Presently he bethought himself that if he could not use the violin, neither would he have any use for money. For all that, he could not bring himself to let the instrument, for which he had paid down six hard ...
— Rico And Wiseli - Rico And Stineli, And How Wiseli Was Provided For • Johanna Spyri
... they treated her with respect and kindness. Somehow she picked up a desultory education among them. One broken-down old scene-painter taught her to read and write, and another, a French artist, taught her the rudiments of French, and also to play on the violin. 'They all treated me as a plaything,' she once said to me, 'and poor as they were, they would bring me toys and sweets. I think, nay, I am sure, that they were careful of their talk before me, ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... his desk, and in a short time produced three stanzas and a chorus to which his friend soon set the notes of a lilting air, brightening up with enthusiasm as he wrote. Seizing his violin, which he had with him, he played the melody, and in a few minutes more he had filled in the counterpoint and made a complete hymn-tune. By that time two other friends, who could sing, had come in and the quartette ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... in a little drug-store just opposite, while at our left, as we turned the corner, a tumble- down saloon sent out on the night a mingled sound of clicking billiard-balls, discordant voices, the harsher rasping of a violin, together with the sullen plunkings of ...
— Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley • James Whitcomb Riley
... equal facility in Indian, French, Gaelic, and English, although Peter spoke the last somewhat indifferently. In the evening a young man, of the name of Fraser, with his two sisters, children of a Highland neighbour, came in to visit the McDonalds, and Peter producing his violin, we danced jigs and reels, in a manner and with a spirit not often seen but in Ireland or Scotland. The doctor, unable to withstand the general excitement, joined in the dances with as much animation as any of us, and seemed ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... estate as this boy. Let us follow him into the story land of childhood. In Germany every child passes through fairyland, but there was no such land in Josiah Franklin's tallow shop, except when the busy man sometimes played the violin in the inner room and sang psalms to the music, usually ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... fiddle without any strings to it, and going through all the airs and graces of a real violinist, he sawed the air with an imaginary bow, making the notes with his voice so well that you could not imagine it was not a real violin playing. This delighted the audience most of all, and he was encored again and again, and when the entertainment was finished, the two boys said 'they wished they could have ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... up the hill struck six, the postmistress hurriedly opened her door and stood anxiously peering up the street, the loafers who had been dozing on the saloon benches shuffled out and leaned up against the posts, the old piano in the Miners' Home began to rattle and a squeaky violin to gasp for breath, while the pompous landlord of the "Palace Hotel," sending a Chinaman to drive away a dozen pigs that had been in front of his door through the day, took his post on the sidewalk to await his ...
— The Transformation of Job - A Tale of the High Sierras • Frederick Vining Fisher
... he likes to sing and likes the song.' Then Naldo: ''Tis a pretty kind of fame At best, that comes of making violins; And saves no masses, either. Thou wilt go To purgatory none the less.' But he: ''Twere purgatory here to make them ill; And for my fame—when any master holds 'Twixt chin and hand a violin of mine, He will be glad that Stradivari lived, Made violins, and made them of the best. The masters only know whose work is good: They will choose mine, and while God gives them skill I give them instruments to play upon, ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... of death had haunted him Through many a weary day; With dread disease his youthful frame Was wasting slow away. He took his violin and sighed,— "I am too weak ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... a moi!" he exclaimed, as he produced a key from a lanyard round his neck. He opened the case and drew forth a violin and bow. The case had been well made and water-tight; he applied the instrument to his chin. At first, only slow melancholy sounds were elicited; but by degrees, as the strings got dry, the performer's arms moved more rapidly, ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston
... observed the quiet entrance of Billy and Clay directly after the shooting, and he put this and that together. He knew that both of them were finished musicians. Clay Whipple was an exceptionally good violin player, and Ted had often heard Billy Sudden make a piano fairly sing. Evidently they had got to the point where they could stand the fiddler's music no longer, and had ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... reconnoitre the batteries on the island and watch the explosions of the shells. We passed a deserted farm-house, and saw a squad of Colonel Buford's soldiers running down pigs and chickens. Crossing a creek upon a corduroy bridge, we came to a second squad. One was playing a violin, and several were dancing; they were as happy as larks. We stood upon the bank of the river opposite the island. Before us was the floating battery, which was formerly the New Orleans dry-dock. It mounted eight guns. There were four batteries on the Tennessee shore and several on the island. We ...
— My Days and Nights on the Battle-Field • Charles Carleton Coffin
... ran away from home, leaving his parents to die of grief. For being kind to a sick "old woman" he was given a magic violin. Soon after, he was arrested for climbing into a house at night. When he was about to be hanged for a thief, he was granted a last request. He asked to be allowed to play his favorite piece on ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... favourite musical composer and an accomplished violinist. In appearance, Don Laureano strongly resembles the renowned Paganini, and it is for this reason, together with his marvellous performances on the violin, that his admirers sometimes advise him ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... most of his boy chums called "doing nothing." He had been standing still, practising for two hours steadily, and his throbbing head and weakening knees finally conquered his energy. He flung himself down among the pillows, his violin and bow on a nearby chair. Then a voice jarred on every nerve of his sensitive body; it was a lady's voice in the next room, and she was saying ...
— The Shagganappi • E. Pauline Johnson
... seldom wrote but out of pique; and he probably owed his origin as an author to a circumstance of this nature. Middleton when young was a Dilettante in music; and Dr. Bentley, in contempt, applied the epithet "fiddling Conyers." Had the irascible Middleton broken his violin about the head of the learned Grecian, and thus terminated the quarrel, the epithet had then cost Bentley's honour much less than it afterwards did. It seems to have excited Middleton to deeper studies, which the great Bentley not ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... one nation could inflict on another was to cut off from it the story of the national soul. For not all music can be played upon any instrument, and human nature for most of us is like a harp on which can be rendered the music written for the harp but not that written for the violin. The harp strings quiver for the harp-player alone, and he who can utter his passion through the violin is silent before an unfamiliar instrument. That is why the Irish have rarely been deeply stirred by English literature ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... succeeded in enlivening even this tedious journey. He was a good linguist and a sound classical scholar, besides having, as he had told Odo, a pronounced taste for antiquarian research. In addition to this, he performed agreeably on the violin, and was well-acquainted with the history of music. His chief distinction, however, lay in the ease with which he wore his accomplishments, and in a breadth of view that made it possible to discuss with him many ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... thought, and their ugly faces. She shivered slightly as she recalled the face of "Le Boss" as it was last bent upon her, frowning and dark, and as ugly as a hundred devils, she was quite sure. Ah, he would take away her violin—Le Boss! he would give it to his own girl, whom she, Marie, had taught till she could play a very little, enough to keep the birds from flying away when they saw her, as they otherwise might; she was to have the violin, the ...
— Marie • Laura E. Richards
... satisfied. I have seen, and I know. Now I shall call her back no more lest the thing should get the mastery of me, and I become unfitted for my work on earth. This morning I could scarcely hold the bow of the violin, and its sweetest notes sounded harsh to me; I heard discords among their harmonies. Also I had no voice to sing, and after all the money and time that have been spent upon them, I must keep up my playing and singing, since, perhaps, in the future if ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard
... pugilistic entertainments to tired men. Each of them had one thick ear. Willie Woodbine had two. They fought one another with science (as old professionals) and challenged any man in the crowd. Then one of them played the violin and drew the soul out of soldiers who seemed mere animals, and after another fight Willie Woodbine stepped up and talked of God, and war, and the weakness of men, and the meaning of courage. He held all those fellows in his hand, put a spell on them, kept them excited by a new revelation, ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... water-sprite rose presently and proposed the health of the Old King. Wine-glasses were filled to the brim with golden or crimson wine; as the glasses clinked together, the vibrations sounded sweet yet sad like some high violin note, as it dies on the string. Then a wind arose, summer lightning played round the room, illuminating vividly the faces of that strange company; a roar of thunder shook the castle. Brunhilde's ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... Vassyvkov by the ear, crying, "Get out, stupid, blockhead," but Raisky stood by him, because Vassyvkov, inattentive, sleepy, idle, who never did his work even for the universally beloved Russian master, would every afternoon after dinner take his violin, and as he played, forget the school, the masters and the nose-pullings. His eyes as they gazed into the distance, apparently seeking something strange, enticing, and mysterious, became wild and gloomy, and often ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov
... Diddled. Where's Whitbread? Romilly? Where's George the Third? Where is his will?[603] (That's not so soon unriddled.) And where is "Fum" the Fourth, our "royal bird?"[604] Gone down, it seems, to Scotland to be fiddled Unto by Sawney's violin, we have heard: "Caw me, caw thee"—for six months hath been hatching This scene of royal itch ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... is a guitar with muga silk strings, which is played with a little wooden key held in the hand. Ka maryngod is an instrument much the same as the last, but is played with a bow like a violin. Ka marynthing is a kind of guitar with one string, played ...
— The Khasis • P. R. T. Gurdon
... d'esprit. But let me tell you, if you do not make haste back, I shall be half in love with the author of the Marseillaise, who is a handsome man, a little too broad-faced or so, and plays sweetly on the violin. ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... listened. Across the mellow stillness, mingled with the croon of the wind in the trees and the flute-like calls of the robins, came a strain of delicious music, so beautiful and fantastic that Eric held his breath in astonishment and delight. Was he dreaming? No, it was real music, the music of a violin played by some hand inspired with the very spirit of harmony. He had never heard anything like it; and, somehow, he felt quite sure that nothing exactly like it ever had been heard before; he believed that that wonderful ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... you mean? Why, Jamie, just a pencil and paper, so—that isn't like learning to play the piano or violin!" ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... seated; a great artist performs on the violin, accompanied by another great artist on the piano. The lights rise; somebody evidently crosses the stage behind the curtain. They are disposing the scene. In a moment ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... in the carriage was Margari's own brand-new mantle, for which he had paid nine and twenty gulden. The vagabond would be sure to lay his hands upon it. No, he would rather go to look for the fiddle himself. So he found the violin case at last somehow, and handing it to the baron through the csarda window (for he durst not trust himself inside), he retired again beneath the coach-house, although the rain was now splashing ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... human heart. But of this anon. We trace the young boy to school; we see him a chorister in the choir of St. Michael's, Lueneburg. Here he entered the gymnasium, studying Greek and Latin, organ-and violin-playing. Here, too, he exhausted the treasures of the musical library. But at Hamburg the great Reinken was giving a series of organ recitals. Thither young Bach repaired. At Celle he became acquainted with several suites and ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... also mounted upon a mule, while several men on foot accompanied them, one of whom carried his lance and shield. Upon near approach he immediately dismounted and advanced toward us, bowing in a most foppish manner, while his attendant followed him on foot with an enormous violin, which he immediately handed to him. This fiddle was very peculiar in shape, being a square, with an exceedingly long neck extending from one corner. Upon this was stretched a solitary string, and the bow was very short and much bent. This was an ...
— In the Heart of Africa • Samuel White Baker
... began to regard the deed itself as almost achieved. Decision is always soothing after doubt, and he fell into a pleasant dreamy state. A gentle wind was blowing, the forest was dry and the leaves rustled with the low note that is like the softest chord of a violin. It became penetrating, thrillingly sweet, and hark! it spoke to him in a voice that he knew. It was the same voice that he had heard on the Ohio, mystic, but telling him to be of heart and courage. He would triumph over hardships and dangers, ...
— The Scouts of the Valley • Joseph A. Altsheler
... namely, wind instruments, as the trumpet, and the organ;—stringed instruments, as the harp or lyre, violin, &c.; and instruments of concussion, in which the sound is produced by striking a sonorous body, as for ...
— A Catechism of Familiar Things; Their History, and the Events Which Led to Their Discovery • Benziger Brothers
... in on my friend, Sherlaw Kombs, to hear what he had to say about the Pegram mystery, as it had come to be called in the newspapers. I found him playing the violin with a look of sweet peace and serenity on his face, which I never noticed on the countenances of those within hearing distance. I knew this expression of seraphic calm indicated that Kombs had been deeply annoyed about something. Such, indeed, proved to be ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr
... and adequately appreciated, both by the artistes and the orchestra, as well as by the general public. This may have been due to two causes; first, the actors and actresses were not embarrassed by his directing from the pianoforte instead of with the violin as those in Bamberg were, and in the second place his criticisms and essays on musical subjects in Rochlitz's Musicalische Zeitung had gained him a certain reputation as an authority in musical matters. After having refused the offer of a post as music-director in his native city of Koenigsberg ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... hostelry did a rushing business during the evening hours, for the dance did not begin until seven. A Mexican orchestra, consisting of a violin, an Italian harp, and two guitars, had come up from Oakville to furnish the music for the occasion. Just before the dance commenced, I noticed Uncle Lance greet a late arrival, and on my inquiring of June who he might be, I learned that the man was Captain Frank Byler from Lagarto, ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... Sicilians are not only polite in themselves, but the cause that politeness or an attempt at it, is in other men; and this was the best I could do at the moment in their manner. Knowing I was among experts, I had not much fear as to their reception of my little compliment, just as a student of the violin is less nervous when performing before a master of the instrument than before the general public. The brigadier and his guards accepted it as though it were of the finest quality, and ...
— Diversions in Sicily • H. Festing Jones
... vision which the conductor of the orchestra can have of it in looking at his score. We represent to ourselves notes linked on to notes on an imaginary sheet of paper. We think of a keyboard on which one plays, of the bow of a violin which comes and goes, of the musicians, each one of whom plays his part in conjunction with the others. Let us abstract these spatial images; there remains pure change, self-sufficing, in no way attached to a 'thing' ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn
... German, some of the most advanced French scholars gave a scene from Les Femmes Savantes, and Enid recited the famous soliloquy from Hamlet, which was much applauded. With one or two more songs and piano pieces, and a solo on the violin from a girl in the lowest class, the programme for the concert was completed; and Sir John Carston then rose to address the school. He was an amusing speaker, and made all smile by assuring them he felt more nervous ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... this island a hurdy-gurdy. The Momuses on either side of him had each another instrument peculiar to the Father of Waters, which may be likened to a stringed weather-glass held upside down. There were likewise a little flute and a violin. All went well for awhile, and we had had several sparkling repartees exchanged between the performers on the tambourine and bones, when the black of melancholy aspect, turning to the latter, and addressing him in a deep and improving ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... young East Side fellow who plays violin solos at the moving-picture theatre around the corner is so talented that, if he had the money to go to Europe to study, he would be a rival to Kreisler ...
— The American Credo - A Contribution Toward the Interpretation of the National Mind • George Jean Nathan
... prizes, distinctions or qualifications. No music is now too difficult for them to execute. But that is exactly what they do—they execute it: destroy its head and heart by sheer mechanical perfection. They have mastered the piano, or the organ, or the violin, or their own voice; ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various
... whipped by an attachment—for the tenor of Roger's life, with its whole-hearted collection of house property, had induced in his only daughter a tendency towards passion—she turned to great and sincere work, choosing the sonata form, for the violin. This was the only one of her productions that troubled the Forsytes. They felt at once ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... contest and after supper came the dance. Stripped of dishes, the tables were quickly drawn aside and the room swept by eager hands. Then came the struggle for partners and the strife to be "first on the floor." Usually the violin furnished the only music and the figures most in favor were the reel and the jig, in which all participated with a zest and abandon unknown to the modern ballroom. "They danced all night till broad daylight and went home with the girls in the morning," some on foot ...
— History and Comprehensive Description of Loudoun County, Virginia • James W. Head
... out the idea, and even borrowed a circus rider whose act was to play the violin while standing on the back of a galloping horse and to throw somersaults on such precarious platform while still playing the violin. This man he got merely to play simple airs in slow time, so that the assistants could ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... train had moved many yards the slack of the steel rope was taken up. It tautened and drew up almost to a straight line, so tense that it sang like a violin string in the sharp wind gusts. Then the steel-laden cars creaked, started, and rolled shoreward after the train, groaning under their burden. The men all along the bridge raised a ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... those moments when the roses lay Like red spilled wine on his triumphant way, And shouts acclaimed him through the music's beat, Above the voice of flute and violin. But I have known his hour of sore defeat — I — I have known the tears ...
— The Little Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... ordinary widower. As you looked at his severe, thoughtful face, surmounted by a shock of beautiful white hair, you instinctively respected him; and when you heard that he lived by cobbling shoes by day and playing a violin in the Theatre Royal orchestra by night, occasionally putting off his leather apron to give a music lesson in the front parlour of an afternoon, you respected him all the more. There had been but one thing against Mr. Tipping's eligibility for ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... to my stateroom after breakfast to read. The Baron retaliates by becoming aware of pretty Miss Rogers' existence. Pretty Miss Rogers' mamma is conspicuously polite to him, and pretty Miss Rogers' self offers to play the piano to his violin. It is Mrs. Steele who brings me these tidings and assures me that Miss Rogers plays well, and, as for the Baron de Bach, he is a master! I resolutely read my book till luncheon time and, going up on deck afterwards, I am surprised that the ever-watchful ...
— Under the Southern Cross • Elizabeth Robins
... was Michel Vert, but the transposition was so generally used that Brunet, the clerk of the municipal court of Soulanges, was in the habit of writing Michel-Jean-Jerome Vert, called Vermichel, practitioner. Vermichel, a famous violin in the Burgundian regiment of former days, had procured for Pere Fourchon, in recognition of certain services, a situation as practitioner, which in remote country-places usually devolves on those who are able to sign their name. ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... and she smiled a strange, sweet smile, "do you know, I find you like a rare violin which hitherto has been used by ordinary musicians to play their popular airs upon, but which is now highly strung and being touched by the bow of an artist who loves it. And oh! the exquisite sounds which are coming, and will yet come forth to enchant the ear, and satisfy the sense. All ...
— Three Weeks • Elinor Glyn
... in the church. The procession, first united like one long coloured scarf that undulated across the fields, along the narrow path winding amid the green corn, soon lengthened out, and broke up into different groups that loitered to talk. The fiddler walked in front with his violin, gay with ribbons at its pegs. Then came the married pair, the relations, the friends, all following pell-mell; the children stayed behind amusing themselves plucking the bell-flowers from oat-ears, or ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... or a girl, is beginning to learn music, to play the violin or the piano. At first it is drudgery, and its immediate results are a trial unto all that are in the house. The parent or teacher says: "Persevere, obey instructions, and as you pass through routine into the soul, the task will soon be lost in the pleasure." The beginner may ...
— Men in the Making • Ambrose Shepherd
... Schafroff, moving nearer to Lialia, as if the matter were becoming much more complex, "we mean to ask Lida Sanina and Sina Karsavina to sing. Each a solo, first of all, and afterwards a duet. One is a contralto, and the other, a soprano, so that will do nicely. Then I shall play the violin, and afterwards Sarudine might sing, ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... described, is covered with elaborate carvings. Groups of musical instruments, standing out almost detached from the background, occupy the panels. Ancient and modern, clustered with careless grace and quaint variety, from the violin down to a string of sleigh-bells, they call up all the echoes of forgotten music, such as the thousand-tongued organ blends together in one ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various
... turned principally upon religious and moral topics, and was directed to warn her friends how a female should live, Christianly, well-governed, and so as to incur no reproach. When she sang, which often happened, she heard herself accompanied by an imaginary violin or piano, and would take up and continue the accompaniment upon an instrument herself. She sewed, did knitting, and the like. But on the other hand, she imagined on one occasion that she wrote a letter upon a napkin, which she folded with the intention of sending it to the post. Upon waking, she ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... trees. You should have heard them sing their native songs, so plaintive and yet so mild. Father and mother, two little sisters and a brother, were begging their bread in that way. They were dressed very neatly, although evidently extremely poor. The father had a violin which he played very sweetly, the mother sang, the two little girls danced, and the boy put in a soft and melancholy tenor. I hardly ever listened to sadder music. It seemed as if their hearts were in it, ...
— Paris: With Pen and Pencil - Its People and Literature, Its Life and Business • David W. Bartlett
... assumed the office of parson and conducted the church services to a barn full of colored brethren; by performing the part of mourner whenever the professor undertook to superintend a funeral; and by playing the tambourine in accompaniment to the professor's violin whenever the latter became master of ceremonies for a ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... it to me." The Commandant took the tools from him and easily pried open the lid, for the scantling was light, almost flimsy. Within lay an object in an oilskin case, by the shape of it, apparently a violin; and yet somewhat larger ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... Cooper came on with his violin—a great master as I now remember him. Then Hope ascended to the platform, her dainty kid slippers showing under her gown, and the odious Livingstone escorting her. I was never so madly in love or so insanely jealous. I must confess ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... and House-Decorator, &c. Repairs Neatly Executed. Instruction in the Violin. Funerals at the ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... terms as those on which Frankh had brought him away from Rohrau. To Vienna Haydn went, was entered in the Cantorei of St. Stephen's, and there for some years he sang in the choir. In return he was taught reading, writing and arithmetic, religion and Latin. He had excellent masters for singing and for violin and harpsichord; but he had no teaching in theory. Reutter gave him only two lessons, and he was left without guidance to cover as much music-paper as he could get hold of. But he stuck grimly to the task of making himself an efficient composer, and worked out his ...
— Haydn • John F. Runciman
... Nero played the violin accompaniment to the burning of Rome, down, through the ages, to 5:15 a. m., April 18, 1906, and up to the present date, the San Francisco disaster is the most prominent recorded in history. It was the greatest spectacular drama ever staged and produced the biggest ...
— The Spirit of 1906 • George W. Brooks
... finished the washing bills, was now engaged in tying certain pieces of bladder round certain pots of preserves. The eldest Miss Morton, a young woman of five or six-and-twenty, who was about to be very advantageously married to a young gentleman who dealt in coals and played the violin (for N——- was a very musical town), had just joined her for the purpose of extorting "The Swiss Boy, with variations," out of a sleepy little piano, that emitted a very painful cry under the awakening ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... tall as themselves. Upon the violins Tantaine noticed there were chalk marks at various distances. In the middle of the room was a man, tall and erect as a dart, with flat, ugly features and lank, greasy hair hanging down on his shoulders. He, too, had a violin, and was evidently giving the children a lesson. Tantaine at once guessed that this was ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... episode is not without importance, even in so vast a picture. It was a child's funeral. The little wooden coffin, scantily covered with a black pall, was not larger, as Theophile Gautier says, "than a violin case." There were few mourners. A woman, the mother doubtless, in a black stuff dress and white crimped cap, holding by the hand a boy, who had not yet reached the age of sorrowing tears, and behind them a little knot of neighbours and ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... the salle is fully as interesting to me as the performance, good as that is—with a handsome, delicate-looking young professor of music playing the violin, an actor from the Palais Royale showing a diction altogether remarkable, two well-known gymnasts doing wonderful stunts on horizontal bars, a prize pupil from the Conservatory at Nantes acting, as only the French can, in ...
— On the Edge of the War Zone - From the Battle of the Marne to the Entrance of the Stars and Stripes • Mildred Aldrich
... fashion of those musical as well as valiant days) up rose that noble old favorite of good Queen Bess, from cornet and sackbut, fife and drum; while Parson Jack, who had taken his stand with the musicians on the poop, worked away lustily at his violin, and like Volker of ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... prodigious. The compass of the organ far surpasses that of all the instruments of the orchestra. The violin notes alone reach the same height, but with little carrying power. As for the lower tones, there is no competitor of the thirty-two-foot pipes, which go two octaves below the violoncello's low C. Between the pianissimo ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... sometimes given to musical persons in recompense for voicelessness. The Count spoke like one who could sing, but his throat was delicate, and so the world lost a great singer. Of most instruments he spoke with a half-concealed contempt. But of the violin he said nothing. He was not a man to turn the conversational ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman
... his violin by tightening the strings; the tighter they are and the thinner they are, the higher the note they give. Some of the strings are naturally higher than others; the highest is a smaller, finer string than the lowest. When the violinist plays, ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne
... fishing, others to reading, while a few employed themselves in drying their clothes, which had got wet the previous day, and one or two entertained themselves and their comrades with the music of the violin and flute. All were busy with one thing or another, until the rock began to show its black crest above the smooth sea. Then a bell was rung to ...
— The Lighthouse • R.M. Ballantyne
... upon a stone, and, hearing several children talking round him, 'My dear little gentlemen,' said he, 'I will play you all the pretty tunes that I know, if you will give me leave.' The children wished for nothing half so much. He put his violin in tune, and then thrummed over several jigs and other scraps of music, which, it was easy to conjecture, had been ...
— Forgotten Tales of Long Ago • E. V. Lucas
... becoming a concert pianiste, continued her studies under the best instructors that money could procure. Things ran along smoothly until Edith met a young Italian named Guido Savelli, who was studying the violin at the same conservatory. His brilliant playing had already created a sensation wherever he appeared, and he gave promise of ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... of my mother's playing. I see myself, sitting on a great black book, the family Bible. I must have been very small, and it was a large Bible, and lay on a table in the sitting-room. I see my mother standing before me, with her violin on her arm. She is light, young, and very graceful; beauty seems to flow from her face in a kind of dark brightness, if I may use such an expression; her eyes are soft and deep. I have seen no other eyes like my mother Marie's. ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... will be terribly cut up, but I will confess to you in confidence that they are very good, better than my collection of poems, which are not worth a shot." Elsewhere he tells us, that when, after one of Paganini's concerts, he was passionately complimenting the great master on his violin-playing. Paganini interrupted him thus: "But how were you ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... that I have learnt that much, at any rate, by having been in prison. But I must say again that I no longer make roulades of phrases about the deep things I feel. When I write directly to you, I speak directly: violin variations don't interest me. I am grateful to you. If that does not content you, then you do not understand, what you of all men should understand, how sincerity of feeling expresses itself. But I dare say the story told ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... in the proper place to furnish the wedding processional—or perhaps some musical friend may be found to play the violin. ...
— Entertaining Made Easy • Emily Rose Burt
... situated under the root of the tongue, and having an opening into the windpipe by which the animal can force air into it. This increases the power of its voice, acting something like the hollow case of a violin, and producing those marvelous rolling and reverberating sounds which caused the celebrated traveler Waterton to declare that they were such as might have had their origin in the infernal regions. The howlers are large and stout bodied monkeys, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... precision which made them agreeable enough to listen to, but droll to look at. Ruth, with her chin upon her dimpled arm, watched Reuben as he played. He had tossed back his chestnut mane of hair rather proudly as he tucked his violin beneath his chin, and had looked round on his three seniors with the air of a master as he held his bow poised in readiness to descend upon the strings. His short upper lip and full lower lip came together firmly, his ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... again his ride On Memphremagog's wooded side; Sat down again to moose and samp In trapper's hut and Indian camp; Lived o'er the old idyllic ease Beneath St. Francois' hemlock trees; Again for him the moonlight shone On Norman cap and bodiced zone; Again he heard the violin play Which led the village dance away, And mingled in its merry whirl The grandam and the laughing girl. Or, nearer home, our steps he led Where Salisbury's level marshes spread Mile-wide as flies the laden bee; Where merry mowers, hale and strong, Swept, ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... tune called Roger de Coverley is to be met with earlier than 1695, when it was printed by H. Playford in his Dancing Master? I am happy in being able to inform your correspondent that the tune in question may be found in a rare little volume in my possession, entitled "The Division-Violin, containing a Choice Collection of Divisions to a Ground for the Treble-Violin. Being the first Musick of this kind ever published. London, Printed by J.P. and are sold by John Playford, near the Temple-Church, 1685, ...
— Notes & Queries 1849.12.22 • Various
... conclusively indicated that loud, quick music was disagreeable to her. Professor C. Reclain of Leipsic, once, during a concert, saw a spider descend from one of the chandeliers and hang suspended above the orchestra during a violin solo; as soon, however, as the full orchestra joined in, it quickly ascended to its web.[59] This fact of musical discrimination in a creature so low in the scale of animal life is truly wonderful; it indicates that these lowly creatures have ...
— The Dawn of Reason - or, Mental Traits in the Lower Animals • James Weir
... suggests Hope, "thy brain was the violin whence it issued, and the fever in thy blood the bow that drew it forth.—But who made the violin? and who guided the bow across its strings? Say rather, again—who set the song birds each on its bough in the tree of life, and startled each in its order from its perch? Whence came the ...
— Lilith • George MacDonald
... of the music, which is the cause of all these words, was first thought of (we believe) in terms of a large orchestra, the second (Hawthorne) in terms of a piano or a dozen pianos, the third (Alcotts)—of an organ (or piano with voice or violin), and the last (Thoreau), in terms of strings, colored possibly with a flute or horn.] That music must be heard, is not essential—what it sounds like may not be what it is. Perhaps the day is coming when music—believers will learn "that silence ...
— Essays Before a Sonata • Charles Ives
... hangs her wind-harps in the trees for autumn breezes to play thereon; that must have been sweet music when Jenny Lind so charmed the world with her voice, and when Ole Bull rosined the bow and touched the strings of his violin; that was sweet music when I sat in the twilight on the stoop of my childhood's home and heard the welkin ring with the songs of the old plantation; but the sweetest music in this old world is that ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain
... ashamed of myself when I see my name on them. And then, as you know, I become stupid as soon as I am obliged to write for an instrument that I can not endure. Occasionally for the sake of a change I have composed something else—pianoforte duets with the violin, and a bit ...
— Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words • Friedrich Kerst and Henry Edward Krehbiel
... aroma of fun and light-heartedness about him that was simply contagious. He sang Beranger's ditties with a verve and elan that brought back bonny Paris and student days to those of us who were acquainted with them. One moment he played exquisite bits from Mozart on his violin, to the accompaniment of the vicar's violoncello, that were most entrancing; the next, scraped away at some provoking tarantella that almost set the whole of us dancing, in defiance of the proprieties generally observed ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... the soldiers had gathered around a huge bonfire, amusing themselves with a variety of games; and, at a little distance, a few females, their wives and daughters, were collected on a plat of grass, and dancing with the young men, to the sound of a violin. The shrill fife, the deep-toned drum, and noisy bag-pipe, occasionally swelled the concert; though the monotonous strains of the latter instrument, by which a few sturdy Scots performed their national dance, were ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... the old beau chef, whereby this point was once known. The Spectator also, if I remember right, declared the old sign of the Cat and the Fiddle to be quite beyond his comprehension. In truth, no two objects in the world have less to do with each other than a cat and a violin, and the only explanation ever given of this wonderful union, appears to be, that once upon a time, a gentleman kept a house with the sign of a Cat, and a lady one, with the sign of a Fiddle, or vice versa. That these two persons fell in love, married, and set up an Inn, which to commemorate their ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 366 - Vol. XIII, No. 366., Saturday, April 18, 1829 • Various
... here at the windows and learn all you wish to know. There isn't a man in this town that would see Gordon arrested and not fight to free him. Feeling is running high here now. You know, it's something like a violin string. You can stretch it just so far and ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... unobtrusive feather of the fantastic, somewhere a personal magic in the inimitable twist or lie of a bow—; her face looked out at you from a g or an x, a gesture flashed back to you in a sudden distinguished stroke of the pen, and her voice was somewhere, everywhere, among the words, like a violin. ...
— The Romance of Zion Chapel [3d ed.] • Richard Le Gallienne
... precious work they make of it sometimes! Not only do the instruments go very badly together, but the parts they play are not arranged for them. A violone grunts out a low accompaniment to a vinegar-sharp violin which saws out the air, while a trumpet blares in at intervals to endeavor to unite the two, and a flute does what it can, but not what it would. Sometimes, instead of a violone, a hoarse trombone, with a violent cold in the head, snorts out the bass ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various
... said grimly. "With my violin, a good cook, English books and papers—I hate your Yankee trash—and occasional travel, I think I could get through life without very great ennui. I do not expect to be governor of ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... death had arrived," says Brantome, "Mademoiselle sent for her valet, Julian, who could play the violin to perfection. 'Julian,' quoth she, 'take your violin and play on it until you see me dead—for I am going—the Defeat of the Swiss, and play it as well as you know how; and when you shall reach the words "tout est perdu," play it over four or five times as piteously as ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... most people fly to when they have not anything to do, to see that there is quite as much, if not more, peril to communion of soul with God in times when the whole nature is somewhat relaxed, and the strings are loosened, like those of a violin screwed down a turn or two of the peg, than there is ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... Interlachen! Ho for Lucerne and the Righi! Dined at Thun in a thunder storm. Stopped over night at Langnau, an out-of-the-way place. H. and G. painted Alpine flowers, while I played violin. This violin must be of spotless pedigree, even as our Genevese friend, Monsieur—, certified when he reluctantly sold it me. None but a genuine AMATI, a hundred years old, can possess this mysterious ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... last cries horribly. The old shed rattled in every part with the thud of many heavy feet, and trembled with the shock of noise—an incessant roar of men's voices, punctuated with women's screams. Then the riot quieted somewhat; there was a clapping of hands, and a violin began to squeak measures intended to be Oriental. The next moment the listener scrambled up one of the rotting piles and stood upon the veranda. A shaft of red light through a broken shutter struck across the figure above the shoulders, ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington
... have the guitar, the violin, the flute, the cymbals, the trumpet, and the conch-shell. There is the luptima also, another very curious instrument, formed of a dozen long perforated reeds joined with bands and cemented at the joints with wax. The orifice at one end is applied to the lips, and ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... exclaimed Budge, in great excitement. "There!—the piano's shut! Isn't that too mean! Oh, I'll tell you—here's Uncle Harry's violin." ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... the conversation. He stood motionless, just where Patty had left him, with a hand resting on the top of the piano, and it seemed to him that at least half an hour went by. Then a sound close by made him start; it was the snapping of a violin string; the note reverberated through the silent shop. But by this time the murmur of conversation had ceased, and Hilliard hoped that Patty's uncle ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing
... search in the stores to find the vast steel-blue tureen that bonnets him. Fouillade, the boatman from Cette, rolls his wicked eyes in the long, lean face of a musketeer, with sunken cheeks and his skin the color of a violin. In good sooth, my two neighbors are as unlike as day ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... diversions of the day are done. The firing squad leave the guns. The twang of guitar and screech of violin open the fandango. ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... you were coming." Perhaps my eyes did say it. At any rate, she looked as straight at me as I at her, and I noticed that she paled a little and shrank—yet continued to look, as if I were compelling her. But her voice, beautifully clear, and lingering in the ears like the resonance of the violin after the bow has swept its strings and lifted, was perfectly self-possessed, as she said to her brother: "That will be delightful—if you think we ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... funeral pass. The English coffins are made very economically, according to the exact form of the body; they are flat, and broad at top; tapering gradually from the middle, and drawing to a point at the feet, not very unlike the case of a violin. ...
— Travels in England in 1782 • Charles P. Moritz
... occasionally to meet at his house; where they exercised themselves in singing, from the works of Croft, Green, Boyce, Purcell, Handel, and such authors as they possessed. One of them played the bassoon, another the flute, and a third the violin, I had a quick ear, was attracted by their harmony, and began to join in their concerts. A treble voice was a great acquisition; I was apt and they encouraged me, by frequent praise and admiration. My uncle gave ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... not find it difficult to place his brown tree in his pictures, 'Not at all,' said C., 'I never put one in at all.' And when Sir George was crying up the tone of the old masters' landscapes, and quoting an old violin as the proper tone of colour for a picture, Constable got up, took an old Cremona, and laid it down on the sunshiny grass. You would like the book. In defiance of all this, I have hung my room with ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... a sufficient protection for you. If you wish to build your boats at Samee or Sego, at Sansanding or Jinnie, name the town, and Mansong will convey you thither." He concluded by observing, that Mansong wished me to sell him four of the blunderbusses, three swords, a fiddle (violin) which belonged to Mr. Scott, and some Birmingham bead necklaces, which pleased above every thing; that he had sent us a bullock, and his son another, with a fine sheep. I told Modibinne that Mansong's friendship was of more value to me than ...
— The Journal Of A Mission To The Interior Of Africa, In The Year 1805 • Mungo Park
... consulted, however, the big bell clanged for preparation, and the magician was obliged to pocket her cards, hurry downstairs, get out her lesson books, and write a piece of French translation, while the inquirers into her mysteries also separated, some to practise piano or violin, and some to study. ...
— The Princess of the School • Angela Brazil
... guests there was a long-haired and wild-looking foreign personage, who was the "lion" of the evening, and sat with half a dozen admiring women about him. Now he was escorted to the music-room, and revealed the fact that he was a violin virtuoso. He played what was called "salon music"—music written especially for ladies and gentlemen to listen to after dinner; and also a strange contrivance called a concerto, put together to ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair
... romantic bluff on the other, the broad, and smooth stream rolling calmly down through the forest, and floating the boat gently forward,—all these circumstances harmonize in the excited youthful imagination. The boatmen are dancing to the violin on the deck of their boat. They scatter their wit among the girls on the shore, who come down to the water's edge to see the pageant pass. The boat glides on until it disappears behind a point of wood; at this moment, perhaps, the bugle, with which all the boats are provided, ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... Bott, a native of Hesse Cassel, Germany, emigrated with his wife Matilda to this country, bringing with him a celebrated violin known as "The Duke of Cambridge Stradivarius," which he had purchased in 1873 for about three thousand thalers—a sum representing practically the savings of a lifetime. Bott had been leader of a small orchestra in Saxe Meiningen as ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... after his death, fetched, under the hammer, upwards of L4,000. About twenty years ago an old friend of mine in Leicestershire, who had met with some heavy losses, desired to sell a fine Stradivarius violin, which had been in his family more than a century, and he sent it to me that I might offer it to Mr. Gillott. I called upon him to ask permission to bring it to him for inspection. I can recall now ...
— Personal Recollections of Birmingham and Birmingham Men • E. Edwards
... music, arose in Italy during the Renaissance. In the sixteenth century the three-stringed rebeck received a fourth string and became the violin, the most expressive of all musical instruments. A forerunner of the pianoforte also appeared in the harpsichord. A papal organist and choir-master, Palestrina (1526-1594 A.D.), was the first of the great composers. He gave music its fitting place in worship by composing melodious hymns and masses ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... shifted in their orbits like two louis d'or floating on quicksilver. The curve of his nose gave him an aquiline silhouette, which suggested the Oriental or Jewish type. His hands, long, slender, with prominent veins and sinews protruding like the strings on a violin, with nails like the claws on the membraneous wings of the bat moved with a senile trembling painful to behold, but those nervously quivering hands became firmer than pincers of steel, or the claws of a ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... on Music may be divided conveniently into the numerous sub-headings which treat of particular instruments, songs, printed music generally, and accounts of the early musicians and their works. Treatises upon the violin are fairly numerous;[85] but I do not remember having come across many works on the Jew's harp or ocarina. There are interesting old books on the virginals, harpsichord, and spinet. Before the end of the fifteenth century a number of Missalia, Gradualia, Psalteria, and Libri ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... training, about the same for all students of music, each student must acquire technical command of the chosen instrument. This is necessarily acquired by practice on the instrument, whether it be piano, violin, oboe, or whatever else. In the same way, vocal technique is acquired by practice in actual singing. Practice makes perfect, with the ...
— The Psychology of Singing - A Rational Method of Voice Culture Based on a Scientific Analysis of All Systems, Ancient and Modern • David C. Taylor
... accord she took to poetry and music. In effect, had Doris Martin attended the best of boarding-schools and training colleges, she would have received a smattering of French and a fair knowledge of the piano or violin, whereas, after more humble tuition, it might fairly be said of her that few girls of her age had read so many books and assimilated their contents so thoroughly. From her mother she inherited her good looks and a small yearly income, just sufficient to maintain ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... viveurs of Stockholm, but had latterly taken to himself a beautiful wife, and had become a more settled character; though his exuberant spirits and love of enjoyment still remained, and rendered him the gayest and most agreeable of travelling companions. Nagel, the celebrated violin player, and his lively little wife, were also among the passengers. They were returning from America, where he had been exchanging his silvery notes against good gold coin. Nagel is a Jew by birth, a most accomplished ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... is understood a property possessed by sound apart from pitch and volume, and dependent on the nature of the source from which a tone is derived. It is the tone-colour by which the tone of a violin, for instance, is distinguished from a tone of equal intensity and pitch produced by a flute. Similarly, two musical instruments of the same kind are distinguished from each other ...
— Man or Matter • Ernst Lehrs
... into a spring; and her heart, at that ethereal shock, began to move more soberly. The sun that sails overhead, ploughing into gold the fields of daylight azure and uttering the signal to man's myriads, has no word apart for man the individual; and the moon, like a violin, only praises and laments our private destiny. The stars alone, cheerful whisperers, confer quietly with each of us like friends; they give ear to our sorrows smilingly, like wise old men, rich in tolerance; and by their double scale, so small ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... shall have to tell you a little story of our Rose, as I sometimes tell some of my boys at the College of Divinity," continued the good man. Rose, an exemplary unmarried woman of thirty, was the bishop's daughter. "Rose," resumed her father, "wanted to study the violin when she was about twelve, and her peculiar old pater decided that first she must learn to cook. Her mother quite agreed with me, and the young lady was accordingly taken out to the kitchen and ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... and heard his brother Sandy sing and play on the violin, beautifully as usual. James himself sang the Reel of Tullochgorum, with hearty cheer and uplifted voice. When I came home I learned that we had beat the Coal Gas Company, which is a ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... enough for a "dance." When the dancing room is small, the flageolet is preferable to the horn, as it is less noisy and marks the time as well. The piano and violin form the mainstay of the band; but when the rooms are large enough, a ...
— Our Deportment - Or the Manners, Conduct and Dress of the Most Refined Society • John H. Young
... he probably means our organ. Our other musical instruments were as follows: An accordion, belonging to the ship, and a flute, violin, and several Jew's-harps, belonging to one of ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... into his pale face as he slept. Henry's own eyes began to waver. A deep sense of peace and rest soothed him, heart and brain. He had meant to watch the night through, but even he had reached the limit of endurance. The faint moaning of the wind outside, like the soft, sweet note of a violin, came to his ears, and lulled him to slumber. The fire floated far away, and, still sitting in his chair with his rifle between his ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... of civilisation. At New Herrnhut, in Greenland, he founded a settlement, as thoroughly organised as Herrnhut in Saxony. He built a church, adorned with pictures depicting the sufferings of Christ. He taught the people to play the violin. He divided the congregation into "choirs." He showed them how to cultivate a garden of cabbages, leeks, lettuces, radishes and turnips. He taught them to care for all widows and orphans. He erected a "Brethren's House" for the "Single ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... shading; scarcely a score of his lyrics are of the highest order. He gives us often the blaring music of a military band or the loud, swelling volume of an organ, but very seldom the softer tones of a violin ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... across the moon, A pale smoke of violin music blows over the moon, Cherry petals fall and flutter, And the white Pierrot, Wreathed in the smoke of the violins, Splashed with cherry petals falling, falling, Claws a grave for himself in the fresh ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... gliding through the sunlit waters of Great Egg Harbour Inlet, Clara's hand happened to fall on Morrow's, which was resting on the gunwale. She let her hand remain there. Morrow looked at it, and then at her face. She smiled. When the Italian violin player on the boat came that way, Morrow gave him a dollar. Alas for the loveliest girl ...
— Tales From Bohemia • Robert Neilson Stephens
... begun already. We have music on Saturday mornings. Next Saturday a string quartette, and violin solos by a young Florentine woman—a friend—very good indeed, daughter of our Professor Tortoli, who ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... and a violin played in the nearest saloon struggled up to them with the opening and shutting of its swinging baize inner doors. There was boisterous chanting from certain belated revelers in the next street which had no such remission. ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... Donal's heart no one knew but himself. His soul was full of music, and he longed to have a violin. ...
— The Child's World - Third Reader • Hetty Browne, Sarah Withers, W.K. Tate
... to the better judgment and defter hands of a woman. There are fine statues and splendid paintings, and bric-a-brac enough to deceive anyone into believing it to be the home of a bevy of girls. There is a grand piano in the end of the room, and a violin in its case in the corner—this latter had been the faithful companion of Henry Rayne through many years of his life, and held as conspicuous a place in his drawing room as it did in his esteem. Upstairs again, we find the strangest little room of all. A girl's bedroom, richly, handsomely ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... him a poet that writes for his own diversion, any more than that gentleman a fiddler who amuses himself with a violin.—Swift. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XX. No. 557., Saturday, July 14, 1832 • Various
... of turtle soup, whitebait, jugged hare, Christmas pudding, mince-pies, dates, figs and crystallized fruits, with rum and stout as drinks. In the evening everybody joined in a "sing-song." Hussey had made a one-stringed violin, on which, in the words of Worsley, he "discoursed quite painlessly." The wind was increasing to a moderate south-easterly gale and no advance could be made, so we were able to settle down to the ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... request at once; he seemed never so happy as when Constance was playing his accompaniments, and for the next twenty minutes she and he were singing together. Then Captain Gates asked me a little hesitatingly if I would play on my violin. I had not often used it since I had been with the Forsyths, but I had always been very fond of it, and had played for hours to my ...
— Dwell Deep - or Hilda Thorn's Life Story • Amy Le Feuvre
... interested him far more, each article in it bearing eloquent testimony to the happy young life of whose tragic end he had now often heard, but of which he was unable to recall the faintest memory. Passing slowly through the room, his attention was caught by a violin case standing in an out-of-the-way corner. With a cry of joy he drew it forth, his fingers trembling with eagerness as he opened it and took therefrom a genuine Stradivarius. At that moment his happiness knew no bounds. Seating ...
— At the Time Appointed • A. Maynard Barbour
... A violin with broken strings that fingers have caressed, A diamond-set betrothal ring that lover's lips have pressed, A high shell comb, a spangled fan, a filmy bit of lace, A heart-shaped locket, ribbon-tied, that frames a ...
— Cross Roads • Margaret E. Sangster
... Hall from London, of, as Roland says, 'a pocket edition of the light fantastic toe;' really, Vaura, my feet are something to fold up and put away; I am so much ashamed of the flesh and bone nature has given them, when I look at his they are too small; but he could easily carry himself in his own violin case. What are you doing with Sir Tilton Everly? At luncheon, yesterday, at the Hall, someone said they had heard from a friend at Paris that the wee mon had been seen in same box with you at the theatre. Mrs. Haughton looked as black as night at the news, as he was wanted ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny
... in his new sleigh with the glossy red back and the scrolls of gilt at the corners. Matt was a lithe, animated youth who could do many unexpected and serviceable things: a little singing, a little violin-playing, and tricks with cards. He was younger than Stella, but he reflected, as he drove with her over the smooth road, nobody would ever know it because he was dark and she was fair, and he resolved to let his mustache grow a little ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... refreshments at clubs in the intervals, is not such good training as the care of the sick in all weathers for sprinting over a course laid at ninety degrees. Nor again can the best of athletes go swiftly up a ladder if he carries a priceless violin in one hand and its equally priceless bow in his teeth, and handicaps himself with varnished leather buttoned boots. They climbed, the one below ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, June 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... in magnificent costumes, officers in uniforms flashing with gold, the show of wealth and power, the perfume of flowers and the music of violin and flutes gave Margaret the impression of a dream, so sharp was the contrast with her own life ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon
... the winter when the more well-to-do residents chose to give an entertainment in the schoolroom, and admitted the poor into the cheaper seats. Everybody knows the nature of these functions. There were readings and recitations; young ladies sang drawing-room songs or played the violin; tableaux were displayed or a polite farce was performed; a complimentary speech wound up the entertainment; and then the performers withdrew again for several months into the aloofness of their residences, while the poor got through their winter ...
— Change in the Village • (AKA George Bourne) George Sturt
... VIOLINS.—James Thoms, South Boston, Mass.—This invention relates to a new and improved manner of attaching the E-string to the tail piece of a violin, whereby a comparatively small portion of said string is wasted ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various
... had been rung into managin' one of these war benefit stunts, and she's decided to use their new east terrace for an outdoor stage and the big drawin'-room it opens off from as an auditorium. You know, Mrs. Robert used to give violin recitals and do concert work herself, so she ain't satisfied with amateur talent. Besides, she ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford
... though the actress were really alone. Turns her back to the audience when necessary. Does not look out into the auditorium. Does not hurry as though fearing the audience might grow restless. Soft violin music from the distance, schottische time. Kristin hums with the music. She cleans the table; washes plate, wipes it and puts it in the china closet. Takes off her apron and then opens drawer of table and takes a small ...
— Plays: The Father; Countess Julie; The Outlaw; The Stronger • August Strindberg
... we withdrew to another room to take our coffee. The merchant and his son, both ardent musicians in their leisure hours, played a sonata for pianoforte and violin. I was at the opposite extremity of the room, looking at some fine proof impressions of prints from the old masters, when a voice at my side startled ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... violin string makes an excellent chain for stringing beads. It will stand a great amount of wear and tear and will ...
— Fowler's Household Helps • A. L. Fowler
... the smoothest and calmest state of the sea. During the interval between the morning and the evening tides, the artificers were variously employed in fishing and reading; others were busy in drying and adjusting their wet clothes, and one or two amused their companions with the violin and German flute. ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson
... only canvas; and these, and the multitude of tents, gleamed dully like a great encampment. Voices sounded constantly, echoing across the water; hammering never ceased; music floated—strains of violin and trumpet and piano! From the water-front clear back up the sides of the hills San Francisco was alive by night as by day. And on the hour all the vessels in the harbor struck their bells, ...
— Gold Seekers of '49 • Edwin L. Sabin
... not on record that they spoke to him on his journey); provides Esmeralda with dresses and petticoats—not too long to hide her pretty ankles, red stockings, and her lovely little foot—gold and diamond rings, violin, tambourine, the guitar, Wellington boots, and starts upon his trip to Norway in the midst of summer beauty. Many times he must have said to himself, "Oh! how delightful." "As we journeyed onward, how fragrant the wild flowers—those wild flowers can never be forgotten. Gipsies like flowers, ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... a grand occasion. One of the count's sons had brought his violin, his cousin had a balalaika, a triangular peasant guitar, and one of the lackeys had his harmonica, to play for the dancing. The young men sat on a rough improvised bench; the servant stood beside them. The peasants seemed shy. They hesitated and argued a good ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... musicians that attend evening parties, the operator upon the double-bass had early in the evening shown slight symptoms of inebriety, which were alarmingly increased during supper-time by a liberal consumption of wine, ale, gin, and other compounds. The harp, flageolet, and first violin, had prudently abstained from drinking—at their own expense, and had reserved their thirstiness for the benefit of the bibicals of the "founder of the feast," and, consequently, had only attained that ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... was followed by Bach's appointment as Kapellmeister to the duke of Coethen, a post which he held from 1717 to 1723. The Coethen period is that of Bach's central instrumental works, such as the first book of the Wohltemperirtes Klavier, the solo violin and violoncello sonatas, the Brandenburg concertos, and the French ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... would feel what a divine consolation is music! And they shout for joy, they beam with happiness when a teacher says to them, "You will become an artist." The one who is first in music, who succeeds the best on the violin or piano, is like a king to them; they love, they venerate him. If a quarrel arises between two of them, they go to him; if two friends fall out, it is he who reconciles them. The smallest pupils, whom he teaches to play, ...
— Cuore (Heart) - An Italian Schoolboy's Journal • Edmondo De Amicis
... insanity of rage had smashed up all their household, as though baboons had been at play or fighting through the rooms. The chest of drawers had been looted or its contents tumbled out upon the floor. Broken glasses, bottles, jugs, were mixed up with a shattered violin, the medals of a grandfather who fought in '70, the children's broken toys, clothes, foodstuff, and picture frames. I saw many of such houses after the coming and going ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... were the wind did not amount to much but it was blowing at quite a lively rate closer to the earth and doubtless the broad palmetto leaves must be making a considerable slashing as they struck one another, dead and withered ones sawing like some giant violin bow. ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb
... much a matter of course that no preparations were needed save the putting away of the tables and benches. The music was always ready, a dozen or more players of the violin and piano relieving each other in rendering sets of cotillons, waltzes and polkas, the latter dance being then ...
— My Friends at Brook Farm • John Van Der Zee Sears
... not possess the power to hear and see. Experiments, for instance, have been made with bees to find out if they have any sense of hearing, by shouting close to a bee, drawing discordant notes on the violin, striking pieces of metal together, and so on, to all of which the bee remained indifferent. What else could she do? Neither of these sounds hurt if she heard them, nor seemed to threaten danger; they simply conveyed no impression at all to ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... the roof. The lumberman's hour of bliss had arrived. Even old man Nelson looked a shade less melancholy than usual as he sat alone, well away from the fire, smoking steadily and silently. When the second pipes were well a-going one of the men took down a violin from the wall and handed it to Lachlan Campbell. There were two brothers Campbell just out from Argyll, typical Highlanders: Lachlan, dark, silent, melancholy, with the face of a mystic, and Angus, red-haired, quick, impulsive, and devoted ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various
... he had a veritable passion, and to have a passion for a thing means that you excel in it—excellence is a matter of intensity. One of the players in the band was a Frenchman, and William made an arrangement to give the "parlez vous" lessons on the violin as ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... best; the men riding about on horseback among the houses, and the women sitting on carpets before the doors. Under the piazza of a "pulperia," two men were seated, decked out with knots of ribbons and bouquets, and playing the violin and the Spanish guitar. These are the only instruments, with the exception of the drums and trumpets at Monterey that I ever heard in California; and I suspect they play upon no others, for at a great ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... he would conduct, even at the time when his deafness had become almost complete. The musicians, in order to keep together, agreed at length to follow the slight indications of time which the concertmeister (first violin-player) gave them; and not to attend to Beethoven's conducting-stick. Moreover, it should be observed, that conducting a symphony, an overture, or any other composition whose movements remain continual, vary little, and contain few nice gradations, is child's play in comparison with conducting ...
— The Orchestral Conductor - Theory of His Art • Hector Berlioz
... yet unmistakably beautiful, face. The large dark eyes, the curved, sensitive mouth, the exquisite modelling of the features, the graceful lines of the slightly undeveloped figure, the charming pose of head and neck, the slender wrist bent round the violin which she held, formed a picture of almost ideal loveliness. Sydney could hardly refrain from an exclamation of surprise and admiration. He piqued himself on knowing a little about everything that was worth knowing, and he had a considerable acquaintance ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
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