"Laughter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... thoughts, until the peal of the bell announced the Hilliards' arrival. From her corner she could not see the doorway, but judging from the sounds of coming and going, of dragging heavy weights, of scurrying along the passage, of whispered colloquies, and sudden explosions of laughter, it was evident that some great ...
— More about Pixie • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... come, girls and boys, Not a weary mile is vain! Hark—dim laughter's radiant noise! See the ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... But even the comedies share in the somber gloom which absorbed the poet's attention during this period. The comedies before 1600 had been full of sunshine, brimming with kindly, good-natured mirth, overflowing with the genial laughter which makes us love the very men at whom we are laughing. But the three comedies of this Third Period are bitter and sarcastic in their wit, making us despise the people who furnish us fun, and leaving an unpleasant taste in the mouth after the laugh is over. Some ...
— An Introduction to Shakespeare • H. N. MacCracken
... bawling, cursing, snapping, snorting and wildly clawing at the air, Buffalo Jones whaled it with a bean-pole until he was tired. With commendable forethought Mr. Jones had for that occasion provided a moving-picture camera, and this film always produces roars of laughter. ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... looked out. Another prison-van had stopped close to the one he occupied. He moved the plate still farther, put his foot on one of the spokes of the wheel and leaped to the ground. A coachman saw him, roared with laughter, then tried to raise an outcry, but his voice was lost in the noise of the traffic that had commenced to move again. Moreover, Arsene Lupin was ...
— The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsene Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar • Maurice Leblanc
... sense for men - Rings but reverberate folly, whence resounds Returning laughter. Weep or smile on me, Thy sunshine or thy rainbow softens not The mortal earth wherein thou hast clad me. Nay, But rather would I see thee smile than weep, Mother. Thou art ...
— The Duke of Gandia • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... hears laughter and song all day—it's delightful to be with such a merry crew. A week from ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott
... there is excellent characterisation, excellent criticism, and in the ode to Burns a very notable discrimination of the greater Burns, not the Burns of the love-poems but the fighter, the satirist, the poet of strenuous laughter. ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... Morning Star heard the laughter of the Little People echo deep within the rocks, for they like to play pranks with the earth children. And far down the stream, she saw the fish leap with joy at being still alive. She took up her empty basket and went back to ...
— Stories the Iroquois Tell Their Children • Mabel Powers
... water-colors which seem to shiver and to be entirely expatriated there. Through an open door behind me, from a small room in which the sun shines brightly, I hear the chattering of sisters and children, childish joys, pretty little bursts of laughter, all sorts of fresh, clear vocal notes: a sound as from a dovecote bathed in the sun. Sisters in white with black caps pass and repass; one stops in front of my chair. She is short, badly developed, with an ugly, sweet face, a poor face by the grace of God. She ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... waiting for him. Then he urged Buster up the steps, through the door and up the aisle. The others followed him. A moment later, the schoolroom was chaos. Horses pranced over the desks. Dogs barked and fought among the horses' legs. Babies screamed. Oaths filled the air. Lost Chief rocked with laughter. ...
— Judith of the Godless Valley • Honore Willsie
... heavy bang of an iron-barred door, or the clank of chains—the sad thoughts of the many who trod these corridors on their way to death, depressed me greatly, and equally unprepared me for what was to come; for as we drew near the great hall, the busy hum of voices, the sound of laughter, and the noises of a large assembly in full converse, suddenly burst upon the ear, and as the wide doors were thrown open, I beheld above a hundred people, who, either gathered in single groups, or walking up and down in parties, seemed all in the ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... ambiguous policy seems to me anything but flattering, either for the Italian Kingdom or for the Papacy. As in 1888 and with the same ceremonies, Leo XIII will receive the Emperor-King of Prussia at the Vatican, and William II, as on that previous occasion will be able to split his sides with laughter on returning to the Quirinal, mimicking the Holy Father and boasting that he has befooled ...
— The Schemes of the Kaiser • Juliette Adam
... passion, but with it are other mental states besides passions, as we define them. All strong emotion affects the body sensibly, but not all emotions are passions. There are emotions that arise from and appertain to the rational portion of the soul. Such are Surprise, Laughter, Shame. ...
— Moral Philosophy • Joseph Rickaby, S. J.
... rather go to drink a cup of mulse mixed with Greek wine, and accompany it with a fat fieldfare and a good fish, a veritable pike from the Tiber island?' Those who heard the orator laughed; but was it not a very serious matter, that such things were subjects for laughter?" ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... and all the saints, that in all his life he had never met with a worse thief than the Abbe Coignard. Notwithstanding it remained clearly evident that he liked my good tutor; and it was a real pleasure, as soon as one of these quarrels had terminated, to listen to his laughter as he said: ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... was wrong! not striped; wreenkled, you say? all up togezzer like a brown apple when he is dry up,—like zis way!" and Mother Marie drew her pretty face all together in a knot, and looked so comical that we went into fits of laughter. ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... bottom seem a trivial calamity? Answer, ye who have ever been in like pitiful case. We draw a curtain over the abject miseries of three days; over the Dutch-built captain's unseasonable joking and huge laughter—he, that could eat junk and biscuit if the ship was in Maelstrom! Robert could have thrown his boots at him with pleasure, while the short, broad figure stood in the doorway during his diurnal visit, chewing ...
— Cedar Creek - From the Shanty to the Settlement • Elizabeth Hely Walshe
... the face of the dawn is the splendour of May, But the sky's and the sea's joy fades not as earth's pride passes away. Yet hardly the sun's first lightning or laughter of love on the sea So humbles the heart into worship that knows not or doubts if it be As the first full glory beholden again of the life new-born That hails and applauds with inaudible music the season of morn. A day's length since, and it was not: a night's length more, and the ...
— A Channel Passage and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne—Vol VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... exclaimed; "he is a new fellow, and I did not recognize him, and arrested him! Very well, I will go and let him out, that he may let you in!" and he hurried away, surprising the Peterkin family with what seemed like insulting screams of laughter. ...
— The Peterkin Papers • Lucretia P Hale
... Malone said. "FBI." He reached for his wallet and found it. He flipped it open for Lynch, who stared at it for what seemed a long, long time and then burst into laughter. ...
— Out Like a Light • Gordon Randall Garrett
... companions, ridiculous but triumphant. He hitched up a leg of the riding-breeches and displayed a long, green silk stocking. Both Johnny and Lily doubled up with laughter. ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... pasha—these are golden baits; yet these are below the throne and diadem of a sovereign prince. But from these to have descended into asking for "an old black coat," on the American precedent! Faugh! What remains for Ireland but infinite disgust, for us but infinite laughter? ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... hidden from view in a convolution of the winding road, but they were so near that their voices could be heard as they talked. Frequently the sound of laughter came backward from them. ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... years back; how his color went and came, whilst his loving memory of the little sister was revived by her own descriptive traits, giving back, as in a mirror, the fawn-like grace, the squirrel- like restlessness, that once had kindled his own delighted laughter; how he would take no denial, but showed on the spot, that, simply to have touched—to have kissed—to have played with the little wild thing, that glorified, by her innocence, the gloom of St. Sebastian's cloisters, gave a right to his hospitality; how, through ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... a storm of laughter. Laughter well modulated and kept within bounds, be it understood; no other was tolerated in ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... regarded as a malcontent. The man who read the list through or asked any question about anything inscribed became suspected of enquiring about himself or his companions, and the one who did not read or enquire was suspected of being displeased at it and for that reason incurred hatred. Tears or laughter proved fatal on the instant: hence many were destroyed not because they had said or done anything forbidden, but because they either drew a long face or smiled. Their attitudes were so carefully observed as this, and it was ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume 1 (of 6) • Cassius Dio
... the courage of the body, nor, when passionate action had brought him naught, a certain reserve force of philosophy. He now did the best thing he could have done,—burst into a roar of laughter. "Zooks!" he cried. "It's as good a comedy as ever I saw! How's the play to end, captain? Are we to go off laughing, or is the end to be bloody after all? For instance, is there murder to be done?" He looked at me boldly, one hand on his hip, the ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... a kind of merriment,—not true cheerfulness, neither careless nor idle jesting, but a determined effort at gaiety, a resolute laughter, mixed with much satire, grossness, and practical buffoonery, and, it always seemed to me, void of all comfort or hope,—with this eminent character in it also, that it is capable of touching with its bitterness even the most fearful subjects, so that as ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... from the ground, for our hearts were fierce with hate and with longing to avenge the terrors we had borne. The doomed slew the doomers, while from the circle of the Ingomboco a great roar of laughter went up, for men rejoiced because the burden of the witch-doctors had fallen ...
— Nada the Lily • H. Rider Haggard
... the play. He could hear the murmur of voices and music, the bursts of laughter and applause, the tramp of happy feet going up the guildhall stairs to the Mayor's show. Everybody went in free at the Mayor's show. The other boys could stand on stools and see it all. They could hold horses at the gate of the inn at the September fair, and so see all the farces. They could ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... the garden behind the house he heard the sound of voices and laughter. He recognized the laugh. It was Dot's. It was a full-bodied, fruity laugh. Luke walked round the house and into the garden to ...
— If Winter Don't - A B C D E F Notsomuchinson • Barry Pain
... involuntarily, inevitably, into the background,—the dim distance which their eyes cannot penetrate. But, from the fraction which you do project, they construct another you, call it by your name, and pass it around for the real, the actual you. You bristle with jest and laughter and wild whims, to keep them at a distance; and they fancy this to be your every-day equipment. They think your life holds constant carnival. It is astonishing what ideas spring up in the heads of sensible people. There are those who assume that a person can never have ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... up with ribbons like the balsam and swathings of a mummified life. Her letters had had a different fate, her written love had been scattered, lost in the void. They had been left forgotten in old suits, burned in the fireplaces, or had fallen into strange hands, where they provoked laughter at their tender simplicity. The only letters he kept were a few of the other woman's and, as he thought of this, he was seized with remorse, with infinite shame ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... South Carolina, advancing into one of the aisles with a sarcastic smile and silvery tone of voice, said, 'What aid from the House would the Speaker desire?' The Speaker snarled back, 'The gentleman from South Carolina is out of order!' and a peal of laughter burst forth from all sides ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... his soul thirsted after. He flung himself into the stream and drank with all his might. Let those say who have been thirsty once how delicious that first draught is. As he rode down the avenue towards home—Pen shrieked with laughter as he saw the Reverend Mr. Smirke once more coming demurely away from Fairoaks on his pony. Smirke had dawdled and stayed at the cottages on the way, and then dawdled with Laura over her lessons—and then looked at Mrs. Pendennis's gardens and ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... will not be reclaimed from such courses as lead to ways that go down to hell, where their soul must mourn, even then when their flesh and their body are consumed. O! how dear bought are their pleasures, and how will their laughter be turned into tears and anguish unutterable! and that presently, for it is coming! Their 'judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not' (2 Peter 2:3). But what good will their covenant of death then do them? And will their agreement of hell yield them comfort? ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... of the carriage, and thought of the many leaves in the book of her life which had been folded-down since she took farewell of these green glades in her girlish days. And as she sits, quietly thinking, while the little group round her are making the green aisles resound with their merry laughter, we fancy, as we glance at her face, that it is one we have seen before in this valley. The "stealthy day by day" has certainly done its work; the outline of Grace's cheek is sharper than it used to be, and the eager, speaking ...
— Geordie's Tryst - A Tale of Scottish Life • Mrs. Milne Rae
... manner, but as strange! For when his Lord look'd down, his looks would be As full of mirth, ready to burst in Laughter; That I perceiv'd he scarce contain'd himself: But if his Lord did look about to speak, Then was his Face demure, with hand on Breast, Turning his Eyes to Heav'n, and groaning sighs. As you have seen, my Lord, a Canting Preacher Aiming to cheat his Audience, wanting matter, Sigh ...
— The Fatal Jealousie (1673) • Henry Nevil Payne
... between a theatrical Aminadab Sleek and Sir John Falstaff, with the stuffing omitted. When our hostess caught sight of me in this new garb, she rubbed her hands together in great glee, and, springing to her feet, gave vent to a perfect storm of laughter—jerking out between the explosions: ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... me than any music I ever heard. Thank God! we all can laugh again. I am getting old, and in the course of nature must soon jog on to the better country. When that time comes, the only music I want to hear from earth is good, honest laughter." ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... grey walls and a sunk balustered garden that lay at the foot of a terrace, I heard through the open windows of one brilliantly lighted room the click of billiard balls and the sound of men's light-hearted laughter, and through another the ...
— Dead Men's Money • J. S. Fletcher
... study is there, but only that simplicity so much sought for in the most precious passages of Daphnis and Chloe translated to the Marivaux by Amyot himself. The piece was listened to with ravishment. There was universal praise among the audience, an inexpressible abundance of tears, of laughter, of gayety, of sighs, of words fitly spoken, of eloquent silence." Of the plot we take the following account from an article by Paul de Musset: From the beginning we feel the air of the country, the harvest, and ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... much of the old nursery furniture, the tiny chairs of the children, the store-cupboard with the farmyard pictures on the panel, the stuffed pet-birds—all the homely wrack of life; and we had been recalling many of the old childish incidents with laughter and smiles. When I rose to go, she sate still for a minute, and her eyes filled with quiet tears, "Ah, those were happy days!" she said. But there was no repining about it, no sense that it was better to forget old joys—rather a quiet pleasure that so much that was beautiful ...
— Joyous Gard • Arthur Christopher Benson
... of honor. Russian and French officers embraced him, congratulated him, and pressed his hands. Crowds of officers and civilians drew near merely to see him. A rumble of Russian and French voices and laughter filled the air round the tables in the square. Two officers with flushed faces, looking cheerful and ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... what the watchers expected. With a howl of terror the little darky leaped to his feet and dashed away at a bounding, leaping run, breaking through the undergrowth as though it were reeds. One glance, as he flew by the watchers without seeing them, caused them to hold their sides and double up with laughter. The line was still fastened to Chris' leg, and drew after it the captive of his hook. One glance behind and Chris began to holler, "Help, help, Massa Walt, help, Massa Charley. De snake's goin' to get dis nigger. Oh golly, ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... hill and down dale, and by beech and pine wood, in the cheerful morning sunshine. The English get down at all the ascents and walk on ahead for exercise; the French are mightily entertained at this, and keep coyly underneath the tilt. As we go we carry with us a pleasant noise of laughter and light speech, and some one will be always breaking out into a bar or two of opera bouffe. Before we get to the Route Ronde here comes Desprez, the colourman from Fontainebleau, trudging across on his weekly peddle ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... but he did not eat. He was cramped, but he did not move. He picked up the books she had given him. He was quickened by the powdery beauty of Youth's Encounter; by the vision of laughter and dancing steps beneath a streaky gas-glow in the London fog; of youth not "roughhousing" and wanting to "be a sport," yet in frail beauty and faded crimson banners finding such exaltation as Schoenstrom had ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... life; mirth is apparently excluded, as the superfluous members of his equations are eliminated by the algebraist. Fun is not practical enough for the American, and subserves none of his profitable projects; it provokes to idle laughter, and militates against the unresting career of industry which he has prescribed, and his utilitarian spirit thinks it were as well abolished. His recreations are akin to his toil. If he give to study such hours as business spares, fates first claim his attention, and then philosophy ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... which bespeaks the kindly humorist,—and his slightly protruding under lip seemed covertly to taste the flavour of unspoken jokes. Old Brown's jokes were mainly left unspoken, but he spent a good part of his life in laughing without any very apparent reason for laughter, and may have been internally the way he ...
— Young Mr. Barter's Repentance - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... at what Norman said, though she felt much inclined to do so. She remembered too well the effect her laughter had produced on the previous evening, and she was most anxious not to ...
— Norman Vallery - How to Overcome Evil with Good • W.H.G. Kingston
... speech produced nothing else besides a loud laughter, which all the respect due to his majesty from those about him could not make them contain. This made me reflect how vain an attempt it is for a man to endeavor to do himself honor among those who are out of all degree of equality or comparison with him. And yet I have ...
— Gulliver's Travels - Into Several Remote Regions of the World • Jonathan Swift
... sentiment is repugnant. I would not unduly praise the virtue of restraint. It is often merely temperamental. But it is not always a sign of coldness. It may be pride. There can be nothing more humiliating than to see the shaft of one's emotion miss the mark of either laughter or tears. Nothing more humiliating! And this for the reason that should the mark be missed, should the open display of emotion fail to move, then it must perish unavoidably in disgust or contempt. No artist can be reproached for shrinking from a risk ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... sound of laughter and of amused voices—voices of men, women, and children—resounded in the street while this wine game lasted. There was little roughness in the sport, and much playfulness. There was a special companionship in it, an observable inclination on the part ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... a certain gift of humour, which displayed itself in flippant witticisms generally at the expense of others. He undoubtedly possessed the art of provoking laughter, but there was always malice behind his frivolity. In appearance he was elegant without being engaging, and one felt the spitefulness of the dark eyes beneath the abundant hair, and the hardness of his mouth showed itself even when he laughed. An onlooker could not have failed to contrast ...
— War-time Silhouettes • Stephen Hudson
... fire-brand, but, not knowing what to do with it, simply watched the Indians stick theirs into the bushes, sometimes high up, sometimes low down. I saw them dodge about, and heard their shouts of warning and their peals of laughter. Then myriads of hornets came buzzing and swarming about. This frightened me so that I ran back to where the brown babies ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... and unrebukedly the same vices to the male half of his overflowing congregation. These out-pourings—"Pechadur truenus wyf i! Arglwydd madden i mi!"—extempore prayers, psalms chanted with a swaying of the body, hymns sung uproariously, scripture read with an accompaniment of groans, hysteric laughter, and interjections of assent, and a rambling discourse—lasting fully an hour, were in the Welsh language; and David on his three or four visits—and it can be imagined what a sensation they caused! The Vicar's son—himself perhaps ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... fringing the tea tables and filling the summer air with their chatter and laughter, were gathered not only the cream, but the very top skimmings of all the fashion and folly of Trouville—twenty minutes away, automobile time—their blossoming hats, full-blown parasols, and pink and white veils adding another flower-bed to the ...
— The Man In The High-Water Boots - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... arrived at last?" cried a voice from out of the darkness, and then Laura and Flossie appeared, standing by the gate. The three cadets looked glumly at each other, and then Pepper commenced to snicker and all burst into a hearty spell of laughter. ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield
... air, tempered by the languid ocean breeze, bore aloft the laughter and friendly bantering of the marketers, mingled with the awakening street sounds and the morning greetings which issued from opening doors and windows. The scent of roses and the heavier sweetness ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... of Beauty, the mother of Love, the Queen of Laughter, the Mistress of the Graces and the Pleasures, could make no impression on the heart of the beautiful son of Myrrha, (who was changed into a myrrh tree,) though the passion-stricken charmer looked and spake with the lip and eye of the fairest of the immortals. Shakespeare, ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... which had held their belongings, nailing one piece upon another, the grain of contiguous layers running transversely, until he had a solid body some three inches thick and of such great strength that they were both moved to laughter as ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... do that again or I'll call out the police," responded that funny Mr. Buzz Clendenning, as he shook me away from him, while my Uncle, the General Robert, and the great Gouverneur did both indulge in laughter. ...
— The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess
... I say I've FOUND the wife for you?" Purdy was not jesting, and did not join in the fresh salvo of laughter with which Mahony greeted his words. "Oh, blow it, Dick, you're too fastidious—too damned particular! Say what you like, there's good in all of 'em—even in old Mother Flannigan 'erself—and 'specially when she's got ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... her flowers!" said Sam,—"you needn't all laugh so. I don't mean either that I didn't mean—" but what more he meant Sam left unsaid, which did not much stay the laughter. ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... There was no laughter at this; it was not time to laugh yet. They sat looking at the young man, primed and ready for the big laugh, indeed, but holding it in for its moment. As gravely as the cowboy had risen, as solemnly as he held his countenance in mock seriousness, ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden
... Roger, they be all gone away." I unbolted and pushed open the little door quickly enough then; and though I was dazed with the candlelight the first thing that I saw was Dolly's face, her eyes as bright as stars with merriment and laughter, and her cheeks flushed to ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... and adorned with their own holy acts as with the marks of their order (painted over their bodies), constantly visit that Sabha (Assembly). Many illustrious Gandharvas, and many Apsaras fill every part of that mansion with music; both instrumental and vocal and with sounds of laughter and dance. And, O son of Pritha, excellent perfumes, and sweet sounds and garlands of celestial flowers always contribute towards making that mansion supremely blest. And hundreds of thousands of virtuous persons, of celestial beauty and great wisdom, always wait upon and worship ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... solitaire with his marked cards and whistled. He worked at his raised-picture puzzles and sang snatches of merry song. He talked with anybody who came near him—talked very fast and laughed a great deal. But behind the whistling and the singing and the laughter Susan detected a tense strain and nervousness that she did not like. And at times, when she knew Keith thought himself alone, there was an expression on his face that disturbed Susan not ...
— Dawn • Eleanor H. Porter
... upon us again, catching my empty denial and tossing the words to upper air with eldritch laughter. Then there was a lull, and I felt rather than heard the choking back of stifled moans and knew that the man by my side, who had held iron grip of himself before other eyes, was now giving vent to grief ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut
... orders in a high dynamic voice. In his left hand he clasped a bulgy umbrella, the badge of his dignity and the symbol of his authority. The four askaris, big men too, with masterful high-cheekboned countenances, rushed here and there seeing that the orders were carried out. Expostulations, laughter, the sound of quarrelling rose and fell. Never could the combined volume of it all override the ...
— The Land of Footprints • Stewart Edward White
... that they would have begun his schooling at once but when they came out into the store and saw the big Vermonter standing in the candlelight their laughter ceased for a moment. Bill was among them with a well-filled bottle in ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various
... when I was rambling in the forest, an old man stopped to look at me catching an insect. He stood very quiet till I had pinned and put it away in my collecting box, when he could contain himself no longer, but bent almost double, and enjoyed a hearty roar of laughter. Every one will recognise this as a true negro trait. A Malay would have stared, and asked with a tone of bewilderment what I was doing, for it is but little in his nature to laugh, never heartily, and still less at or in the ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... satin ribbons; the hat or Bonnet, Mr. Spittal said, was a Parisian slouch, and had a plume of three white feathers.' But all this leaves a blank impression, and it is rather by reading backward in these old musty letters, which have moved me now to laughter and now to impatience, that I glean occasional glimpses of how she seemed to her contemporaries, and trace (at work in her queer world of godly and grateful parasites) a mobile and responsive nature. Fashion moulds us, and particularly women, deeper than we sometimes ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson
... labors of fathers and brothers, until afternoon was wearing away, and it was time to betake themselves home to make ready for the still more important event of the day. Gaily they rushed down the hill, their joyous laughter and merry shouts—relieved as they were from the restraint which good manners had imposed in the priest's presence—awaking the echoes of the glen. For many of them would be allowed to take part ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... performance of Mrs. Oakley I have but one recollection, which is that of having once, while acting it with my father, disconcerted him to such a degree as to compel him to turn up the stage in an uncontrollable fit of laughter. I remember the same thing happening once when I was playing Beatrice to his Benedict. I have not the least notion what I did that struck my father with such irrepressible merriment, but I suppose there ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... parapets, he will listen to the extensile tale of their simple sorrows. He will hear, with a sigh, that the profits of petty larceny are declining; he will be taught to regret the increasing infirmities of his Papa's temper; and portraits in sepia of his Mamma will be observed by him to excite laughter mingled with dark impulsive words. Thus there will pass into Baby's eyes glances of suspicious questionings, "the blank misgivings of a creature moving about in ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... I'd had enough. Now and here in the middle of all these carriages was a bully good time and place for me to get away. I turned to the Bishop. He was blushing like a boy. I blushed, too. Yes, I did, Tom Dorgan, but it was because I was bursting with laughter. ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... suddenly, with a long sigh, for in reality he was deeply disappointed at his failure, and had aspired to be their story-teller as well as playmate. Ordinary life bored him dreadfully. He had melancholy yearnings after youth and laughter. "Let's do something else now. What do you say to a ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... the mathematical section of the institute. Indeed, he sought by all possible means to aid the labours of the savants, whose dissertations were now heard in the large hall of the harem that formerly resounded only to the twanging of lutes, weary jests, and idle laughter. The labours of the savants were not confined to Cairo and the Delta. As soon as the victories of Desaix in Upper Egypt opened the middle reaches of the Nile to peaceful research, the treasures of Memphis were revealed to the astonished gaze of western learning. ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... instead of evincing a becoming sense of her romantic situation, burst forth into a merry peal of laughter, and, catching him by one shoulder, gave him ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various
... he could do to hold his fiery wooden steed. He waddled and pranced out in front of the abolitionist, and turned and faced him, whereat his steed showed the most violent symptoms of running away. The young men roared with laughter, and the spectators roared with them, and even the abolitionist laughed. All laughed but Little Compton. The procession was marched to the court-house enclosure, and there the prisoner was made to stand on the sale-block so that all ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... great deal of laughter downstairs, I listened, and gathered that "Stick-in-the-Mud" had arrived, and the men were chaffing him for having paid the half-breed two dollars for lending him two oxen for five minutes ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... except in the neighborhood of the villages. They had better sport than they expected, for hares darted out in numbers from behind the rocks. Some of these were bowled over, while others escaped; and there was much bantering and laughter among the young men, none ...
— For Name and Fame - Or Through Afghan Passes • G. A. Henty
... and broke out into a hearty fit of his silent and peculiar laughter. Hurry's legs were just released, and he had been placed on his feet. So tightly had the ligatures been drawn, that the use of his limbs was not immediately recovered, and the young giant presented, in good sooth, a very helpless and a somewhat ludicrous picture. ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... the Carnival week again—the mad blaspheming week of revelry and devilry. The streets were rainbow with motley wear and thunderous with the roar and laughter of the crowd, recruited by a vast inflow of strangers; from the windows and roofs, black with heads, frolicsome hands threw honey, dirty water, rotten eggs, and even boiling oil upon the pedestrians and cavaliers ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... and Kettel with him, and a third voice joined the laughter. The young man also laughed and said: 'Here I bring the venison which my kinsman desired; but as ye see I have brought it over-late: but take it, Kettel. When cometh ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris
... been making at a raft, With little hope in such a rolling sea, A sort of thing at which one would have laughed,[112] If any laughter at such times could be, Unless with people who too much have quaffed, And have a kind of wild and horrid glee, Half epileptical, and half hysterical:— Their preservation would ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... and that the crucified Nazarene looked not upon the splendor of ceremonies but upon the thoughts of the heart of His disciples. Here in a barn, amid vulgar folk, and uncouth, dim surroundings, He had appeared, He, her Lord and Master. He had touched her with that white unspeakable appeal. The laughter died upon the fair girlish face and prayer issued from the beautiful lips. If vulgar folk, the despised Baptists, were good enough for the Christ, were they not good enough for her? Among them she had felt His consecrating touch and among them ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... no imposition is too great for the credulity of men. Priests and physicians should never look one another in the face. They have no common ground, nor is there any to mediate between them. When the one comes, the other goes. They could not come together without laughter, or a significant silence, for the one's profession is a satire on the other's, and either's success would be the other's failure. It is wonderful that the physician should ever die, and that the priest should ever live. Why is it that the priest is never called to consult with the physician? ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... be so, else why, years after, Do we retrace And mix with shadowy, recollected laughter Thoughts ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... an egg?" demanded Mrs Wade, with a burst of hearty laughter; for she laughed, as she did everything else, with all her might. "Is that all thou'st got by thy journey? Marry, but I would have tarried another day, and fetched two! Poor Father Pulleyne! so he's but to have one egg to his supper? If them hens have laid no more, I'm a Dutchwoman! ...
— The King's Daughters • Emily Sarah Holt
... pavement; some sought the shade of the porticos with their favourites; others were earnestly engaged in conversation, and filled the gay illuminated apartments, where they resorted to drink coffee and sorbet, with laughter and merriment. A thoughtless giddy transport prevailed; for, at this hour, anything like restraint seems perfectly out of the question; and however solemn a magistrate or senator may appear in the ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... confidences as to the latest items of news they had gathered in the confessional from Catholic servants employed in Protestant families, and, without mentioning any names, would repeat, amid shouts of drunken laughter, the sins that some of ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... the word before the blood flew back into his cheeks; his eyes flashed again as they looked into mine, and he burst into a fit of triumphant laughter, which shocked and startled ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... assurance of the five Nymphes, went with them to the bathes where they had great laughter in the deuise of the fountaine, and also by his vnction. Afterward being brought to the Queene Eutherillida, he did see many thinges worthie of regard, but chiefly the worke of ...
— Hypnerotomachia - The Strife of Loue in a Dreame • Francesco Colonna
... Dunreddin was in the hall, and her page behind her, and she beckoned me from my post aloft on a foot-board, summoning the deserters before me and awarding them future expiations, amidst all manner of jeering and jinking and laughter. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... my Lectures, printed in 1831. I subjoin a few extracts: "A couple of malignant fellows, a while since, railing at me in the Bookseller's shop, among other things they said, 'and his friend Noyes has cast him off,' at which they set up a laughter." "No doubt, you understand, how ridiculously things have been managed in our late General Assembly; voting and unvoting, the same day; and, at last, the squirrels perpetually running into the mouth open for ...
— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham
... would come and play Rabbits with us?" came the words in a desperate rush, with laughter ...
— Jimbo - A Fantasy • Algernon Blackwood
... crazy." Lydia proffered this negation in so halting an accent that Rankin burst into another peal of laughter. "But it must be horrid for you to wash dishes and cook!" protested Lydia, feeling resentful that her inculcated horror of a man's "lowering himself" to woman's work should be taken with so little seriousness. She tried to rearrange a ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... weariness there would be the silence of all song, would be death, utter vanishment to the gladness of the universe. The sun would go out like a spark upon burnt paper, and the heart of man would forget the sound of laughter. Then he said to himself: "The larks do not make their own singing; do mortals make their own sighing?" And he saw that at least they might open wider the doors of their hearts to the Perseus Joy that comes to slay the grief monsters. Then he thought how his life had been widening ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... Then laughter-loving Aphrodite made answer to her: "Tydeus' son wounded me, high-hearted Diomedes, because I was saving from the battle my dear son Aineias, who to me is dearest far of all men. For no more is the fierce battle-cry for Trojans and Achaians, ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... across space. Drawing nearer the sounds of men and life reached forward to meet them—laughter, the neighing of horses, the high, broken cry of a child. They felt as if they were returning to a home they had left and that sometimes, in the stillness of the night or when vision lost itself in the vague distances, they still ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... the scene was too much for his risible nerves, and he fairly roared with laughter, whilst even Lady Bellamy went as near to it as ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... to force the thing, but the cold, unyielding stone might well have laughed at my futile, puny endeavors. In fact, I could have sworn that I caught the faint suggestion of taunting laughter from beyond ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... in the sequel, and the Baron returned just at nightfall; while his ghastly demeanour and unquiet eye betokened the nature of his visit. It is said many a wild and unearthly peal of laughter resounded that night through ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... was still there; his wool a little grayer; his mouth as wide; his laughter as ready as ever. Grandemont told him of his plan, and the old chef swayed with pride and delight. With a sigh of relief, knowing that he need have no further concern until the serving of that dinner was announced, he placed in Andre's hands a liberal ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... room, feeling that I should be an intruder upon that family reunion. I took up a book and endeavored to interest myself in its pages. I could distinctly hear the joyous murmur of voices from below, varied by bursts of laughter, not loud, but strikingly mirthful. I soon heard light footsteps ascending the stairs; the next ...
— The Path of Duty, and Other Stories • H. S. Caswell
... obstruction into an imaginary impossibility of withdrawing yourself, and had an effect on your senses before reason had time to operate." This, which was evidently the case, set every one, except the gentleman who had suffered so much by it, into a roar of laughter. But it was not easy to draw a single smile from him: he ruminated on the affair, while his companions rallied and ridiculed this change in him: he well remembered the agitations he had been in. "Well," replied he; when he had ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... Helen attempted to find the Pope contemporary with Edward the First, she asked Elizabeth why she had written the Pope down as Leo Nonus Cardinal, on which she was informed, with a sufficient quantity of laughter, that the word in question was the name of a flower, Leonurus Cardiaca, looking like anything but what it was intended for in Elizabeth's writing, and that Pope Martin the Fourth was to be found on the other side of the Kings of France and Spain, ...
— Abbeychurch - or, Self-Control and Self-Conceit • Charlotte M. Yonge
... which children of all ages play this somewhat noisy game can hardly be imagined. Try it, you fun-loving parents, and be rewarded by the tears of joy their mirth and laughter will cause. ...
— A History of Nursery Rhymes • Percy B. Green
... as he was by the storm himself, he burst out into a roar of laughter at the sight of his brother literally running before the wind in the most comically absurd manner, till, finding a dry spot, he flung himself down in the soft sand, sad clung there with all his might while Dick scudded to him and ...
— Menhardoc • George Manville Fenn
... eyes on his with a sudden wonder at his meaning. "My own!" she said with the faintest tinge of astonished laughter in her voice. "What else ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... of the attendants lit up by the blaze of the fire, and the forms of the French soldiers sitting at their table close to it, with the Arabs clustering round them. Sounds of loud conversation and occasional roars of laughter, that was almost childish in its frank lack of all restraint, told her that one feast was a success. She looked at her companions and made a sudden resolve—almost fierce—that the other, over which she was presiding, should be ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... a stunned silence and then the Army major strangled on a mouthful of coffee; the security man turned beet red in the face and Dr. Peterson's jaw bounced off his breastbone. Johnny, unable to hold back an explosion of laughter, dashed for the ...
— Make Mine Homogenized • Rick Raphael
... utterly out of the question to ponder gloomily upon the bitter past while these two chaps were whipping jokes back and forth, and insidiously drawing him into the conversation, until greatly to his astonishment he even burst out into a hearty peal of laughter, the first expression of merriment that had sprung from his ...
— Canoe Mates in Canada - Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan • St. George Rathborne
... statue offers no resistance. Another blow rolls the head of the idol on the floor. It is said that a colony of frightened rats ran forth from its interior. The kingcraft, and priestcraft, and solemn swindle of seven hundred years are exploded in a shout of laughter; the god is broken to pieces, his members dragged through the streets. The recesses of the Serapion are explored. Posterity is edified by discoveries of frauds by which the priests maintain their power. Among other wonders, a car with four horses is seen suspended near the ceiling by means of ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper
... said, 'Sir, I am very glad to hear this. I hope the day will never arrive when I shall neither be the object of calumny or ridicule, for then I shall be neglected and forgotten.' Croker's Boswell, p. 837. See ante, ii. 61, and pp. 174, 273. 'There was much laughter when M. de Lesseps mentioned that on his first visit to England the publisher who brought out the report of his meeting charged, as the first item of his bill, "L50 for attacking the book in order to make it succeed." "Since then," observed M. de Lesseps, "I have ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... in The New York Sun:—"A new writer who is an old master.... He lets all the poet in him loose.... He has set himself in line with those great dead to whom the novel was a living, throbbing thing, vibrant with the life blood of its creator, pulsing with sensitiveness, laughter, idealism, tears, the fire of youth, the joy of living, passion, and underlying it all that sense of the goodness of God and His earth and His children without which nothing is achieved, ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... it will come quickly," said Sir Ralph with half a sigh. "This is not like the old days when Edward held his state here. Many is the time I have seen this great place bright with women's faces and ringing with their laughter; the ramparts crowded, and scarce a shady seat but held a fair dame and gallant lover. Where are now the sweet voices and the swishing gowns? Gone—maybe, forever; Elizabeth is in sanctuary a mile up yonder stream, and Edward is too young ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... where the weeds were now breast high, or running with mad, childish abandon between the high hedgerows. And many a night after it was too dark to see they heard the man's heavier bass underrunning the light treble of her laughter which, to their sensitive ears, was never quite free from a ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans
... practical jesters called planoi. Chrysippus, who was not only a philosopher, but a man of humour—a union we are not surprised to find common at that date—and who is said, perhaps with equal truth, to have died like Philemon in a fit of laughter, on seeing an ass eat figs off a silver plate—mentions a genius of this kind, one Pantaleon, who, when at the point of death told each of his sons separately that he confided to him alone the place where he had buried his gold. When he was dead, they all betook themselves to the same spot, ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... the men that live in the South Country Are the kindest and most wise, They get their laughter from the loud surf, And the faith in their happy eyes Comes surely from our Sister the Spring, When over the sea she flies; The violets suddenly bloom at her feet, ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... a burst of delighted laughter). There he is now! (To Lincoln.) If any word would bring you, that ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay
... of the gasolene and began scraping her slippers, side and bottom, on the running-board of the automobile. The jelly-bean contained himself no longer. He bent double with explosive laughter and after a ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... lighted, and comparatively quiet, though the music and laughter and swish of dancing feet were fully audible there. Noel found her a comfortable chair, and seated ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... joke. Vishinsky's laughter met with shock and anger from the people all over the world. And, as a result, Mr. Stalin's representative received orders to stop laughing and ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... eyes are large, clear, and honest, and of a peculiarly dark violet; they are beautiful eyes, winning and sweet, and steady in their glance. His mouth, shaded by a drooping fair mustache, is large and firm, yet very prone to laughter. ...
— The Haunted Chamber - A Novel • "The Duchess"
... seated on a low garden-chair, and his young guests were grouped about him on a Persian carpet which had been spread there. Gladys was roused from her reverie by seeing Valentine snatch a piece of paper from Crayshaw—peals of laughter following his pretended ...
— Fated to Be Free • Jean Ingelow
... perhaps the greatest mocker that ever lived knew better than to laugh at Mathilde. The abysses of his brain no one can, or even dare, explore—but, listen as we will at the door of that infernal pit of laughter, we shall hear no laugh against his faithful little Mathilde. It is not at Mathilde he laughs, but at the precious little blue-stocking, who freshened the last months of his life with a final infatuation—that still unidentified "Camille ...
— Old Love Stories Retold • Richard Le Gallienne
... and though she knew that it was improper, she liked it. When he was gone she could not remember what it was that had made her laugh, but she remembered that she had laughed. For a long time past very little laughter ...
— Miss Mackenzie • Anthony Trollope
... Mr. Grey had known much, but had said nothing when he was speaking those severe words which Mr. Scarborough had always contrived to receive with laughter. But he had felt their injustice, though he had himself ridiculed the idea of law. There had been the two sons, both born from the same mother, and he had willed that they should be both rich men, living among the foremost of their ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... exquisite ivory-white satin and Honiton lace. Her bridesmaids wore the orthodox pink and blue of palest shades. There was the usual elaborate breakfast; the cake and favours, the flowers and music, and the finely dressed company filling the old rooms with subdued laughter and conversation. All things were managed with that consummate taste and order which money without stint can always command; and Elizabeth felt that she had inaugurated a standard of perfection which cast all previous ...
— A Singer from the Sea • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... funny he looks!" laughed the Calico Clown. "Oh, dear me! This is better than any joke I could tell! Oh, how funny!" And the Calico Clown doubled up in such a kink of laughter that his cymbals ...
— The Story of a White Rocking Horse • Laura Lee Hope
... spring of a woman's soul that cannot resist the charm of flattery. This is proved by History from the time of Eve to our days and I myself proved it when I again spoke on the subject of hats. The laughter was not so loud and soon ceased altogether. At last the women answered me, with an annoyed and discontented air, that my insistance vexed them. Then I knew that the fortress was about to capitulate and ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... every slope graze herds of winter-worn gun-horses and transport mules. The new grass has gone to the heads of the latter and they make continuous exhibitions of themselves, gambolling about like ungainly lambkins and roaring with unholy laughter. Summer has come, and my groom and countryman has started to whistle again, sure sign that Winter is over, for it is only during the Summer that he reconciles himself to the War. War, he admits, serves very well as a light gentlemanly diversion ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 13, 1917 • Various
... maids, and causing a recoil and startled ejaculation even of the strong man on whom they chanced to try their powers of alarm. Hugh himself was once glad to cover the confusion of his own fright with the hearty fit of laughter into which the perturbation of the boys, upon discovering whom they had startled, threw him. It was rare fun to them; but not to the women about the house, who moved from place to place in a state of chronic alarm, scared by the ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... what, if cheerful shouts at noon, Come, from the village sent, Or songs of maids, beneath the moon, With fairy laughter blent? And what if, in the evening light, Betrothed lovers walk in sight Of my low monument? I would the lovely scene around Might know ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... into a violent fit of laughter. "See how your Viola is estimated by your friend. A fine victory, to carry her off from the ugliest dog between Lapland ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... Carl ceased firing he threw his head backward, looking over his shoulder again, and from that hideous face without nose or mouth came a gurgling noise that was like, and yet not like, laughter. ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... Abe, or any of the servants, calling me 'Miss Flutey!'" And Aunt Selina laughed aloud just as the door opened and Sally popped her head through the aperture. Seeing the happy faces and hearing the unusual laughter, she immediately closed the door, without having been seen or heard. Out in the wide hall she lifted both arms high toward the ceiling and rolled her eyes devoutly upward as she murmured, "Praise be to the Lud, dat dat little tree is come wif healin' in its leaves." After ...
— The Blue Birds' Winter Nest • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... sorely every morsel; And had clothed himself in raiments Which a beggar scarce would stand in. He had never fed the hungry, And had never clothed the naked, That he might increase his riches. Sero in this hovel saw him Bending o'er his golden treasures; And he laughed derisive laughter, And sarcastic was his manner, As his servants he commanded To the miser's presence, saying, "Lo! our princely Sero wisteth Whence are all these hoarded riches,— If in scruple they were gathered. If ye long to take them with you When you leave this land of Weemus For the lands ...
— A Leaf from the Old Forest • J. D. Cossar
... a book? I mean, is it written what the hero said and what she answered and how they said it? Is it written all about him and the villain? I mean are there signs, letters for everything; for laughter, cries, love ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... Dan a look, and went; we could hear her playing in her bedroom; it sounded like a dance of spirits; and just when one thought she had finished, out it would break again like a burst of laughter. Presently, John Ford begged our pardons ceremoniously, and stumped off indoors. The violin ceased; we heard his voice growling at her; down he came again. Just as he was settled in his chair there was a soft swish, and something dark came falling through the apple boughs. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... shall be the sign of your new worship. See how it points to the sky. Let us call it the tree of the Christ-child. Take it up and carry it to the chieftain's hall. You shall go no more into the shadows of the forest to keep your feasts with secret rites of shame. You shall keep them at home, with laughter and song and rites of love. The thunder-oak has fallen, and I think the day is coming when there shall not be a home in all Germany where the children are not gathered around the green fir-tree to rejoice ...
— The First Christmas Tree - A Story of the Forest • Henry Van Dyke
... the wind blew the hat down the hill, and Hal ran after it, amidst the laughter of his kind friends, the young Sweepstakes, and the rest of the little regiment. The hat was lodged at length, upon a bank. Hal pursued it: he thought this bank was hard. But, alas! the moment he set his foot upon it, the foot sank. He ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... know that, then?" asked the merchant. His peculiar method of laughter, two or three quick breathings through the nostrils, said more than any words ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... chorus of fiendish laughter, as if the infernal regions had been broken loose—this was the song of another feathered innocent, the laughing jackass—not half a bad sort of fellow when you come to know him, for he kills snakes, and is an infallible sign of ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... excused,' said Mrs. Dusautoy, bursting into a merry fit of laughter. 'Oh, I never heard anything more charming than your introduction! I beg your pardon, but I laughed last evening till I was worn out, and waked in ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge |
