"Mumble" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... figure of a workman carrying a basket appeared. Beside him ran a little boy. He passed me, wishing me good night. I was minded to speak to him, but did not. I answered his greeting with a meaningless mumble and ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... old lady who sat huddled in an armchair, her hands crooked over a cane, a ruffled cap above her silvery hair. He manfully voiced his request for the child's hand in marriage. The old lady seemed to mumble an assent. The happy lover looked about for his fiance when, to his stupefaction, the old lady arose briskly from her chair, threw off cap, silvery wig, gown of black, and stood revealed as the child herself, smiling roguishly up at him from beneath the sunbonnet. With ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... dejectedly. "It makes me yawn. John says I mumble." She looked at me sharply, distrustfully. "You are very kind, but—it's ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... rough, heady, strong, Dangerous to disquiet: let him bide! He needs some bone to mumble, help amuse The darkness of his den with: so, the fawn Which limps up bleeding to my foot and lies, —Come to me daughter!—thus ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... have planted finger and foot on the ledges of that solid precipice and climbed to the invisible summit. Hilderman was muttering to himself beneath his breath, but I was too dazed, my brain was too numbed to make any sense out of the confused mumble of words which came from him. Dennis held my arm in a vice-like grip that stopped the circulation, and almost made me cry ...
— The Mystery of the Green Ray • William Le Queux
... have been positively brutal to say how very far from contented he felt, so Horace could only mumble that he had never been lodged like that before ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... also whose books and writings tell What certain path to heavenly bliss us leads; And hermits good, and ancresses that dwell Mewed up in walls, and mumble on their beads, And virgin nuns in close and private cell, Where, but shrift fathers, never mankind treads: On these they called, and on all the rout Of angels, martyrs, ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... sure To have my wife as jealous as a Turkey: But that's all one; ile goe through, let her mumble. ...
— The Two Noble Kinsmen • William Shakespeare and John Fletcher [Apocrypha]
... expected—the soldiers were climbing the slope. For almost half an hour he kept his position, and behind him Roger muttered on, staring up at the sky. Amid the mutterings from time to time the old man heard a curse. They sank at length to a mumble, senseless, rambling on and on, without ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... official reports of the Lords' debates a speech begins thus: "Lord —— (who was indistinctly heard)." The Commons' report might well adopt this salutary practice as a warning to Members who persistently mumble, or who address their remarks to the body of the House instead of to the SPEAKER. Ministers are the worst offenders. One of them was asked this afternoon, for example, whether the Judicial Adviser to the SULTAN had discouraged the use of the English ...
— Punch, Volume 156, 26 March 1919 • Various
... he flew out at the boatmen and the summer visitors who listen to their tales. Without moving a muscle of his face he emitted a powerful "Rot," from somewhere out of the depths of his chest, and went on in his hoarse, fragmentary mumble. "Stare at the silly rocks—nod their silly heads [the visitors, I presume]. What do they think a man is—blown-out paper bag or what?—go off pop like that when he's hit—Damn silly yarn—Hint indeed! . ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad
... little scrawl to CULCHARD, who examines it with the deepest interest.) I knock off quite a number of these while I'm abroad like this. Send 'em in letters to relatives at home—gives them a notion of the place. They are—ar—kind enough to value them. (CULCHARD makes a complimentary mumble.) Yes, I'm a very rapid sketcher. Put me with regular artists, and give us half an hour, and I—ar—venture to say I should be on terms with them. Make it three hours, and—well, I daresay ...
— Punch, Or the London Charivari, Volume 101, November 21, 1891 • Various
... helping to carry bales of goods from ships and freight-boats to the depot of the Germans, the so-called Fontego[17]—of course you know the building"—Directly Antonio uttered the word Fontego, the old woman began to chuckle and laugh most abominably, and to mumble, "Fontego—Fontego—Fontego." "Have done with your insane laughing if I am to go on with my story," added Antonio angrily. At once the old woman grew quiet, and Antonio continued, "after a time I saved a little bit of money, and bought a new jerkin, so that I looked quite fine; and then I got enrolled ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... he paused, coughed, and completed what he had to say in a sort of mumble, but his meaning was wholly clear. He would not accept the offer of Pauline in marriage, even though she was the sister ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... natural sphere of society to ask Lords, Generals, Aldermen, and other persons of fashion, but is niggardly of his hospitality towards his own equals, is a Dinner-giving Snob. My dear friend, Jack Tufthunt, for example, knows ONE Lord whom he met at a watering-place: old Lord Mumble, who is as toothless as a three-months-old baby, and as mum as an undertaker, and as dull as—well, we will not particularise. Tufthunt never has a dinner now but you see this solemn old toothless patrician at the right-hand of Mrs. ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Fanny's account of her visit to the Law Courts. At her first visit she had come to the conclusion that the Judges were either made of wood or were impersonated by large animals resembling man who had been trained to move with extreme dignity, mumble and nod their heads. To test her theory she had liberated a handkerchief of bluebottles at the critical moment of a trial, but was unable to judge whether the creatures gave signs of humanity for the buzzing of the ...
— Monday or Tuesday • Virginia Woolf
... For presently every one of the listeners had gone off to sleep. The reader, whose back was toward the new-comer, did not see him. He was the only one left awake, and Bobby looked to see him drop over at any moment. But the little fat man read right along in a drawling, sleepy mumble, something about the Athenians until Bob cried out: "Hello, Ole Puddin'-bag, everybody'th gone to thleep; you'd jeth as well hole up ...
— Queer Stories for Boys and Girls • Edward Eggleston
... to grin, At breakfast, on the sly, And mock the wobble of his chin And eyebrows belt so high And kind: "How did you rest, last night?" We'd mumble and let on Our voices trimbled, and our sight ...
— Riley Songs of Home • James Whitcomb Riley
... mumble so. I hear my man, Adolph. I trained him.... You ought to have an ear-trumpet. You're getting ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... in voices scarce above a whisper; and brown children fondled each other, laughing noiselessly, or lay asleep on rugs which would be costly elsewhere. In the bazaars nothing was selling, and no man did anything but mumble or eat, save the few scholars who, cross-legged on their mats, read and laboured towards Nirvana. Priests in their yellow robes and with bare shoulders went by, oblivious of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... into the tavern after Flagg had marched away to the big house on the ledges. The crowd made way for the new drive boss; those in his path stared at him with interest; mumble of comment followed as the men closed in behind him. When he sat down in a corner of the tavern office and lighted his pipe his subalterns showed him deference by leaving him to himself. That isolation gave Landlord Brophy his opportunity to indulge his bent in gossip unheard ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day
... faced up upon the second floor, and it was from the central of these that the sinister sounds were issuing, sinking sometimes into a dull mumble and rising again into a shrill whine. It was locked, but the key had been left on the outside. Holmes flung open the door and rushed in, but he was out again in an instant, with ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... edge of the town or at home when mother was away, in the barn while milking—at every opportunity I went through my selection with most impassioned voice and lofty gestures, sustained by the legends of Webster and Demosthenes, resolved upon a blazing victory. I did everything but mumble a smooth pebble—realizing that most of the boys in my section were going through precisely the same struggle. Each of us knew exactly how the others felt, and yet I cannot say that we displayed acute ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... steel bar upon the shutter increased in volume. Martin heard a mumble of voices, and a stamping of feet on the pavement. Then a door closed and the sounds ceased. Martin knew that several men had entered the saloon. The danger seemed to ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... about young people having to make mistakes, but his mumble was pleasant, and then he crossed to her side, and ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... form of God on high, Mutter and mumble low, And hither and thither fly; Mere puppets they, who come and go At bidding of vast formless things That shift the scenery to and fro, Flapping from out their Condor wings ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... brought down his contribution nicely written out on quarter sheets. Whilst ASHBOURNE declaiming, DERBY seized opportunity to read his speech over to himself. This all very well if he had strictly carried out intention, but, when he grew so interested in it as to mumble passages in an audible voice, situation grew embarrassing. At last KIMBERLEY, who sat near, gently nudged him. "One at a time, my dear DERBY," he whispered. "We know you're accustomed to dual action. DARBY and JOAN, you know; but won't ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. July 4, 1891 • Various
... looking at the scene in silent horror; they heard not Chouteau's appeals for assistance; were powerless to raise a hand. And Pache, in a sudden outburst of piety and pity, dropped on his knees, joined his hands, and began to mumble the prayers that are repeated at ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... faster than fate: we are they who ride early or late: We storm at your ivory gate: Pale Kings of the Sunset, beware! Not on silk nor in samet we lie, not in curtained solemnity die Among women who chatter and cry, and children who mumble a prayer. But we sleep by the ropes of the camp, and we rise with a shout, and we tramp With the sun or the moon for a lamp, and the spray of ...
— Forty-Two Poems • James Elroy Flecker
... the same fearless simplicity into her love. Caponsacchi falters and recoils in his adorations of her, with the compunction of the voluptuary turned ascetic; he hardly dares to call his passion by a name which the vulgar will mumble and misinterpret: she, utterly unconscious of such peril, glories in ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford
... through that 9th of November his lordship has had a racking rheumatism, or a toothache, let us say, during all dinner-time—through which he has been obliged to grin and mumble his poor old speeches. Is he enviable? Would you like to change with his lordship? Suppose that bumper which his golden footman brings him, instead i'fackins of ypocras or canary, contains some abomination of senna? Away! Remove the golden goblet, insidious cupbearer! You now begin ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... man, who was gazing stupidly at Patches, returned the salutation with an unintelligible mumble, and proceeded ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... long night watches, he forgot, more or less, all about his duty, and meditatively regarded the whirling wave as it seethed away into the darkness. All was silence, except for the mumble, mumble, mumble of the propellers. They were in the AEgean Archipelago and islands passed in an unbroken procession of indistinct shadows. Mac's thoughts were far away, and he was thinking of just such a night ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... "there is not a moment to be lost. At any minute they may enter our room and find it empty! You are ready? Then, not too softly, or it may rouse suspicion! And mumble ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... noisy stairs rapidly; the door creaked. Then voices began again outside the house, an indistinct mumble, rising to one sharp height ...
— Trailin'! • Max Brand
... return. Then another hour followed, and Anthony, who had now begun to feel the effect of his drubbing more keenly, renewed his clamor, with the result that a half-dozen policemen appeared, causing Allan to retreat to a corner and mumble prayers. From their demeanor it looked as though they were really bent upon mischief, but Kirk soon saw that an official had come in answer to his call. He felt less reassured when he perceived that the person in uniform who ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... harmless, had by the side of the brook piled a great number of stones; he would wade into the river for them, followed by a cur dog, whom he would frequently call his Jacky, and even his Nancy; and then mumble to himself, 'Thou wilt not leave me. We will dwell with the owl in the ivy.' A number of owls had taken shelter in it. The stones he waded for he carried to the mouth of the hole, and only left just room ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... good, quiet fun for a rainy day is Jack-stones. Although not played much nowadays it is very interesting and is to indoors what "mumble-the-peg" is to outdoors. It is played usually with small pieces of iron with six little feet: but it can also be played with small pebbles all of a size. All kinds of exercises can be used, many of ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... too big for our understanding. Like the night and the stars. And lust, Remington! lust and bitterness! Don't I know them? with all the sweetness and hope of life bitten and trampled, the dear eyes and the brain that loved and understood—and my poor mumble of a life going on! I'm within sight of being a drunkard, Remington! I'm a failure by most standards! Life has cut me to the bone. But I'm not afraid of it any more. I've paid something of the price, I've seen ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... Mumble, mumble,—"the Lady Jane sank back on her couch"—resumed Eyebright, speaking rather thickly by reason of the bread and butter. "She was very pale, and one tear ran ...
— Eyebright - A Story • Susan Coolidge
... After all, in spite of the pretentious impostors who trade upon the claim, literature, contemporary literature, is the breath of civilized life, and those who sincerely think and write the salt of the social body. To mumble over the past, to live on the classics, however splendid, is senility. The New Republic, therefore, will sustain its authors. In the past the author lived within the limits of his patron's susceptibility, and led the world, so far as he did lead it, from that cage. In the present he lives within ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells
... woman began to mumble out something about my delay, and how she could not be held responsible if anything happened; but caring nothing about responsibility, hers or mine, I took baby from her without ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... there is no one that knows me," and a disciple asked what was meant, he replied, "I do not murmur against God. I do not mumble against man. My studies lie low, and my penetration lies high. But there ...
— Religions of Ancient China • Herbert A. Giles
... the colour of your eyes and hair? 50 Why, if you were a lady, it were fair The world should know—but, as I am afraid, The Quarterly would bait you if betrayed; And if, as it will be sport to see them stumble Over all sorts of scandals. hear them mumble 55 Their litany of curses—some guess right, And others swear you're a Hermaphrodite; Like that sweet marble monster of both sexes, Which looks so sweet and gentle that it vexes The very soul that the soul is gone 60 Which lifted from her ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... an ignoramus out of his own mouth. He does not know the literature of socialism, its philosophy, nor its politics. He wags his head sagely and rattles the dry bones of dead and buried ideas. His lips mumble mouldy phrases, such as, "Men are not born equal and never can be;" "It is Utopian and impossible;" "Abstinence should be rewarded;" "Man will first have to be born again;" "Cooperative colonies have always failed;" and "What if we do divide up? in ten years there would be rich ...
— War of the Classes • Jack London
... "Then mumble thy charm o'er the embers warm," That baron proud replied; "No boon from my hand shalt thou receive, Nor foaming ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... reason Peter stared at him in an odd way, and Jock burst into one of his loudest laughs. Peter seemed to mumble something which Mr. Hobhouse failed to catch, and then when they had passed, he could ...
— The Man From the Clouds • J. Storer Clouston
... Cease then to mumble rotten bones; and strive to clothe with flesh and blood The skel'eton; and to shape a Form that all shall hail as fair ...
— The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi • Richard F. Burton
... goes on to give a truly appreciative and affectionate sketch of young Arthur Mynors; and then he quotes the sentence about the Master of the Beagles, and on this he comments thus: "The aged Barbarian will, upon this, admiringly mumble to us his story how the battle of Waterloo was won in the playing-fields of Eton. Alas! disasters have been prepared in those playing-fields as well as victories; disasters due to inadequate mental training—to want of application, knowledge, ...
— Matthew Arnold • G. W. E. Russell
... suddenly cornered, turned first red, then white, and tried to mumble out some evasion. But Mr Barnacle was not the man to be ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... mumble an explanation, burst into tears and fled in alarm, never again to emerge from the back regions. My father commanded me to the bell again, but as I rose Thompson entered. He was even then a stately and dignified person, and it was with a measured tread ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 21, 1914 • Various
... hearty-like about the atmosphere When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here. Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossoms on the trees, And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and the buzzin' of the bees; But the air's so appetizin', and the landscape through the haze Of a crisp and sunny morning of the early autumn days Is a picture that no painter has the colorin' to mock, When the frost is on the punkin ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... bone down first and hide it awa'. The Sabbath in a kirkyard is a dull day for a wee dog, so he aye gets a catechism of a bone to mumble over." ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson
... the people being gathered in villages. Are they thus collected by that dogma of their religion, which makes them believe, that to keep the Creator in good humor with his own works, they must mumble a mass every day? Certain it is, that they are less happy and less virtuous in villages, than they would be insulated with their families on the grounds they cultivate. The people are illy clothed. Perhaps they have put on their worst clothes at this moment, as it is raining. ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... river bank, but the boat was floating in midstream and the Wizard was obliged to mumble some magic words to draw it to the bank, so the Scarecrow could get the oil-can. Then back they flew to the tin man, and while the Scarecrow carefully oiled each joint the little Wizard moved the joints gently back and forth until they worked ...
— Little Wizard Stories of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... and manner as mechanical as that of the judge, would mumble his oft repeated story, giving the exact minute of his observations, the actions of the woman in accosting different pedestrians and in her ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... men-at-arms who loitered in the castle, grumbling at their lack of employment, and killing the time with drinking and foolish games and gross talk. There was an old chaplain in the house, a lazy and gluttonous priest, who knew enough of his trade to mumble his mass, and no more; women there were none, except an old waiting-woman, a silent faithful soul, who loved the boy and petted him, and mourned in secret over his miserable upbringing, but who, having no store of words to tell her thoughts, could only be dumbly kind to him, ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... Scouts...." He tried to identify himself to this strange Confederate, but the words that got out were a thick mumble. Then, somehow he was on the ground and the man was holding a canteen to his mouth, dribbling blessed liquid over that choking ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton
... ye!" and ends, "All those of you having just cause for complaint draw near and ye shall be heard." However, you would have thought it was of no import here. Custom and indifference had allowed it to sink to a mumble. A third bailiff guarded the door of the jury-room; and in addition to these there were present a court clerk—small, pale, candle-waxy, with colorless milk-and-water eyes, and thin, pork-fat-colored hair and beard, who looked for all the world like ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... a very weak belief in right reason, we are soon silenced when a man pleads the prime right to do as he likes, because this is the prime right for ourselves too; and even if we attempt now and then to mumble something about reason, yet we have ourselves thought so little about this and so much about liberty, that we are in conscience forced, when our brother Philistine with whom we are meddling turns boldly round upon us and asks: Have you any light?—to shake our heads ruefully, and to let him ...
— Culture and Anarchy • Matthew Arnold
... glistening nails, clawed the keys with a dreadful mechanical motion. There were stacks of music-sheets on counters, and shelves, and dangling from overhead wires. The girl at the piano never ceased playing. She played mostly by request. A prospective purchaser would mumble something in the ear of one of the clerks. The fat man with the megaphone would bawl out, "'Hicky Bloo!' Miss Ryan." And Miss Ryan would oblige. She made a hideous rattle and crash and clatter of sound compared to which an Indian tom-tom would have ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... light and life and flight, Upon the sandy bottom, agate strewn. The fishers mumble, waiting till the night Urge on the clouds, and cover ...
— Silverpoints • John Gray
... money, he could pardon all his sins, and even when in purgatory for them, he could bring him to heaven. And so we must conclude he died 1733, Dec. 23d, and went down to Tophet with a lie in his right hand, and so remains in spite of all the priest could mutter or mumble over him, as the author of his Elegy in his master's ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... what he calls you?" she said. "'Tis but a mumble, his little tongue is not nimble enough for clearness, but he says it his pretty best. 'Tis Mother ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... and the light was cut off. Tom and Astro rose and quietly made their way toward the door. They stopped, leaned against the door, and tried to hear what was going on inside, but were unable to distinguish more than a vague mumble of voices, because of their masks and the thickness of the door. Suddenly, however, they were conscious of footsteps ...
— Treachery in Outer Space • Carey Rockwell and Louis Glanzman
... him, studying the kindly furrowed face, the massive head set on rounded shoulders, the shaggy eyebrows, the long whitening beard moving with the mumble of the pious lips, the brown peering eyes held close to the sacred tome, the high forehead ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... them separately into the ground, saying to Zingis: "While we read in our holy books, it shall come to pass through the power of the idol, that these two pieces of reed shall fight together, and whose part shall get the better, to that king shall the victory be given." The astrologers began to mumble their prayers and incantations, while the multitude stood around to observe the result; and after some time, the two pieces of reed seemed spontaneously to fight together, and the portion inscribed with the name of Zingis got the mastery ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... the situation that I presented to my cat—for I had got into the habit of talking to him quite as much as he talked to me—while we sat at supper together on the last evening that we were to pass on board of the Ville de Saint Remy; and while he did not make much of a reply to me he did mumble some sort of a purring answer that I took to mean he was willing, if I ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier
... jar and confusion of this great storm begins, that 'continues still,' and blasts our lives, in spite of all the spells that we mumble over it, and in spite of all the magic that all our magicians can bring to bear on it. 'Meagre success,' at least, is still the word here. No wonder that the storm continues, under such conditions. No wonder that the world is full of the uproar of this arrested work, this violated ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... in which so many affections are swallowed up. They only met at meals, when they sat opposite each other, not looking at each other, never speaking, forcing themselves to eat a few mouthfuls, not so much for the sake of eating as for the sake of appearances. Christophe would contrive to mumble a few words, but Louisa would not reply; and when she tried to talk he would be silent. This state of things was intolerable to both of them, and the longer it went on the more difficult it became to break it. Were they going to part like that? ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... night air to enter in; There, with a thumb to keep her place She'd read, with stern and wrinkled face, Her mild eyes gliding very slow Across the letters to and fro, While wagged the guttering candle flame In the wind that through the window came. And sometimes in the silence she Would mumble a sentence audibly, Or shake her head as if to say, "You silly souls, to act this way!" And never a sound from night I'd hear, Unless some far-off cock crowed clear; Or her old shuffling thumb should turn Another page; and rapt and stern, Through her great glasses bent on me She'd glance ...
— The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century • William Lyon Phelps
... step, and a heart palpitating with anxiety, Rita followed her guide into the convent, making, as she went, anxious enquiries concerning her father's health. To her first question the old woman replied by an inarticulate mumble; and upon its repetition, a brief "I do not know; the lady abbess will see you,"—checked any further attempt upon a person who either could not or would not give the much wished-for information. Passing through a corridor and up a staircase, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... boasting nothing said the fog. Only he rose up slowly and trailed away from the sea and, crawling up long valleys, took refuge among the hills; and night came down and everything was still, and the fog began to mumble in the stillness. And I hear him telling infamously to himself the tale of his horrible spoils. "A hundred and fifteen galleons of old Spain, a certain argosy that went from Tyre, eight fisher-fleets ...
— Fifty-One Tales • Lord Dunsany [Edward J. M. D. Plunkett]
... of either; I remit both twain. I see the trick on't: here was a consent, Knowing aforehand of our merriment, To dash it like a Christmas comedy. Some carry-tale, some please-man, some slight zany, Some mumble-news, some trencher-knight, some Dick, That smiles his cheek in years, and knows the trick To make my lady laugh when she's dispos'd, Told our intents before; which once disclos'd, The ladies did change favours, and then we, Following the signs, woo'd ...
— Love's Labour's Lost • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... Belford, it is impossible so far to hurt the morals of this lady, as thou and thy brother varlets have hurt others of the sex, who now are casting about the town firebrands and double death. Take ye that thistle to mumble upon. ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... somebody here for Lucy to talk to!" Lucia was diseased-looking and unkempt-looking and she ironed very badly. Everyone tried to help her out. They instructed her with a flow of English. When Lucia would but shake her head they used the same flow, only much louder, several at once. Then Lucia would mumble to herself for several minutes over her ironing. At times, late in the afternoon, Miss Cross would ...
— Working With the Working Woman • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... stake; in short, I behaved like a little boy just set free from school. Thus the time passed very quickly. At last Zourine glanced at the clock, put down his cue, and told me I had lost a hundred roubles.[13] This disconcerted me very much; my money was in the hands of Saveliitch. I was beginning to mumble excuses, when Zourine said— ...
— The Daughter of the Commandant • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... twice; and the slaves were emancipated. A bold step must be taken. The parish must be astonished in some way or other; but no one was able to suggest what the step should be. At length, a very old lady was heard to mumble, in indistinct tones, 'Exeter Hall.' A sudden light broke in upon the meeting. It was unanimously resolved, that a deputation of old ladies should wait upon a celebrated orator, imploring his assistance, and the favour ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... I have to say in a few plain words. It saves time and money; I'm convinced, too, that it carries more weight. Everyone nowadays can write a book, and most people do; but how many can talk? The art is being utterly forgotten. Chatter and gabble and mumble—an abuse of language. What's ...
— Our Friend the Charlatan • George Gissing
... trouble in Ireland," the man with The Morning Post turned the subject. The young man was ready for him. "There will always be trouble in Ireland," he said, with what the novelists describe as a curl of his lip, "so long as Ireland exists." The tramp continued to mumble about the condition of his friend's nose, Johnny relapsed into silence, and the young man made the man with The Morning Post tremble by a horrible picture of what the country would be like under a Labour ...
— The Pleasures of Ignorance • Robert Lynd
... of Teutons, who always seem to travel in hordes, only German gutturals held the table, and we who had no facility with them muttered meek French or sullen English to our neighbors. The next day French would be the rule, and Teuton must mumble in it and Anglo-Saxon stammer or hold its peace. Curiously enough, although we were in Italy, Italian was rarely, almost never, spoken among us, our only use of it being in orders to the servants. Our ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... seemed to have overcome Gavin. For after a single attempt at resistance. he swayed and hung heavy on Standish's supporting arm. He made shift to mumble a dazed good night to Claire. Then he suffered Milo to support him up the stairs and along the wide upper hall to the open doorway of ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... that bound her ankles to the obdurate iron, and severed the bands that bruised and held her white wrists. Even then she could not speak, though she smiled a little, faintly and forlornly and gratefully. She struggled to say one word, but it resolved itself into a cacophonous and inarticulate mumble, half-infantile, half-imbecile. ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer
... as I please, and you will be compelled to forgive me because I have paid them; and if it were not for these indulgences, I could fast, I could beat myself, and perform numberless other penances; I could mumble petitions to you, not thinking of what I was saying; indeed, I have no fear but what I can make ample amends to you for this gift which you have bestowed, for this pardon which you have offered. Dear friends, you ...
— Count Ulrich of Lindburg - A Tale of the Reformation in Germany • W.H.G. Kingston
... I am, to have one, He'll let it so dear that he shall be undone. And he seeks to get parsons' livings into his hand, And puts in some odd dunce that to his payment will stand: So, if the parsonage be worth forty or fifty pound a year, He will give one twenty nobles to mumble ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley
... to wash," he said, thickly. "I cut my wrist on that damned glass, and I'm blood all over, and my head's wrong, somehow." His voice trailed off into an unintelligible mumble, but he held one hand up into the circle of light, and I saw that his cuff was soaked with blood and his hand streaked ...
— The Gloved Hand • Burton E. Stevenson
... he did, for I could hear the low mumble of his voice and occasionally catch a scriptural phrase, but neither my aunt nor myself participated in this mockery of family prayers. She said she had too much to do, and she could not spare me from the cheese tub and the churn. She scolded her ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... understand each other. What pleasure did she find in listening to his bad French? and in her native Hungarian he could not even say, "I love." Why had she not come to him, Gregorio Livadas, who could talk to her well and would not mumble like an idiot and look red and uncomfortable! Then he saw she was drinking champagne, and he sighed. Ah, yes, these English were rich, and women only cared for money; they were unable to give up their luxuries for ...
— Stories by English Authors: Africa • Various
... Yea, but, said Grangousier, they pray to God for us. Nothing less, answered Gargantua. True it is, that with a tingle tangle jangling of bells they trouble and disquiet all their neighbours about them. Right, said the monk; a mass, a matin, a vesper well rung, are half said. They mumble out great store of legends and psalms, by them not at all understood; they say many paternosters interlarded with Ave-Maries, without thinking upon or apprehending the meaning of what it is they say, which truly I call mocking of God, and ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... mumble and I stooped low but he relaxed suddenly and seemed to shrink. I felt his heart but it was still. I tried his eyes and they were sightless. Patsy sent up a heartrending wail and crawled over behind his master's gun and knapsack, so I knew my old ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... must have guessed Mark's intention, for raising her stick she forbade him to move, and before he had time to mumble an apology and flee she was ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... perhaps she was not thinking of me, after all; for our pew was near the pulpit, and there was almost always something funny about old Mr. Crewe. His brown wig was hardly ever put on quite right, and he had a way of raising his voice for three or four words, and lowering it again to a mumble, so that we could scarcely make out a word he said; though, as my mother observed, that was of no consequence in the prayers, since every one had a prayer-book; and as for the sermon, she continued with some causticity, we all of us heard more of it ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... difference between "Platoon right," for instance, and "Right by squads," even though the commands may not have been given for an hour. And one must know it whether corporal or not, for half the time the corporals do not yet know it themselves, and either mumble their commands or are silent, so that they are no help. And even if a fellow knows what to do, but lags in the doing of it, then he is likely to put the whole line out. Further, freight trains rumble by at the bottom of the drill field, the wind whistles in ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... crime, but only following the blameless dictates of nature. The remembrance of those childish reproaches haunts me yet oftentimes in my dreams. My school-days come again, and the horror I used to feel, when in some silent corner, retired from the notice of my unfeeling playfellows, I have sat to mumble the solitary slice of gingerbread allotted me by the bounty of considerate friends, and have ached at heart because I could not spare a portion of it, as I saw other boys do, to some favorite boy; for if I know ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... said the friendly Susan, and the young man agreed fervently, in a bashful mumble, "It's fierce, all right," and returned to his book. Susan, when she got down at her corner, gave him a little nod and smile, and he lifted his hat, ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... instant the man was at his side, and had quickly gagged him. This had the further effect of awakening the unfortunate lad; and he struggled to loosen his bonds, but they were too strongly tied. He endeavored to answer Jack, but only a meaningless mumble resulted, for the gag ...
— Lost on the Moon - or In Quest Of The Field of Diamonds • Roy Rockwood
... me from growing wise! And I will mumble the same to my last turn: Heaven save me from ...
— Wanderers • Knut Hamsun
... month, and the viper thrust his head between his lips; upon which the old man closes them and makes believe to mumble the horrid head, the body appearing violently convulsed, as if it really ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... the surface be everlastingly damned!" said the other man in brown as Hoopdriver receded. Hoopdriver heard the mumble and did not distinguish the words, and he felt a pleasing sense of having duly asserted the wide sympathy that binds all cyclists together, of having behaved himself as becomes one of the brotherhood of the wheel. The other man in brown watched his receding ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... to mumble painful guilty the dormitory the tie the chin he got off with a good fright without appearing to do so, he was looking at ...
— Le Petit Chose (part 1) - Histoire d'un Enfant • Alphonse Daudet
... to me in a dream, an' tol' me you was dead. I done specks he'll cry like everything, when he reads dat," she interpolated, with a nod of triumph. "Sometimes I reckon we sha'n' never see each other no mo'; but you mus' never forget your Janey. Um-mm," she went on, in an inarticulate mumble. ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray
... little pebble; I wiped it clean on my coat sleeve and put it into my mouth so that I might have something to mumble. Otherwise I did not stir, and didn't even wink an eyelid. People came and went; the noise of cars, the tramp of hoofs, and chatter of tongues filled the air. I might try with the buttons. Of course there would be no use ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... mulisto. Mulish obstina. Multiple multoblo. Multiplicand multigato. Multiplication multigado. Multiplied multigita. Multiplier multiganto. Multiply (trans.) multigi. Multiply (intrans.) multigxi. Mumble murmuri. Mummy mumo. Munch macxi. Mundane monda. Municipal urba. Munificence malavareco. Munificent malavara. Murder mortigi. Murder mortigo. Murderer mortiganto. Murky malhela, malluma. Murmur murmuri. Muscat wine muskatvino. Muscle ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... country side. The village children had been called in by their mothers, and there was not the usual sound of boys and girls at play in the street. The rumble of a cart in the distance sounded like the mutter and mumble of a discontented spirit; and as Lucy passed through the square formed by the old timbered houses by the lych ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... Tenney looked at him, seemed to have something to say, and finally managed it. As Raven remembered, it was something about pa'tridges and his gun. Whether he was shaken by fright, one could not have told, but he was, as Charlotte remarked upon it afterward, "all to pieces." Raven ignored the mumble, whatever it was, and Tenney, finally understanding that he might as well be as far off the earth as Dick, for all the attention anybody was going to pay him, turned, limping, and then Raven, with that mechanical sensitiveness to physical need always awake in him now, ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... shorn crown in the least admonish them that a priest should be free from all worldly desires and think of nothing but heavenly things. Whereas on the contrary, these jolly fellows say they have sufficiently discharged their offices if they but anyhow mumble over a few odd prayers, which, so help me, Hercules! I wonder if any god either hear or understand, since they do neither themselves, especially when they thunder them out in that manner they are wont. But this they have ...
— The Praise of Folly • Desiderius Erasmus
... managed to mumble, dropping into her own chair again from sheer inability to stand ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... good manners put on his glasses to look at Mr. Edwardes, and I, having to say something, thought that I might as well introduce them to each other, though I took care to mumble Bunny's name so that it could not be heard. Mr. Edwardes bowed and opened his paper again, but Bunny having arrived at the fact that I was face to face with a don of some kind, thought he would try to pass the time pleasantly. Considering what he had already said about race-horses ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... I am. Any woman will break her neck to see two people, for whom she does not care a hair-pin, stand up, one in white and the other in black, and mumble a few words that she knows by heart, and then take position at the end of a room and have "society" paraded up to them by solemn little corporals with white favors, and then file off to the rear for rations of Perigord ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... bread and sweetmeats, and if ever so well-disposed, compliance with the request was impossible. None of the rest, however, not even his sister, could keep their countenances, for the eye of the speaker had pointed and sharpened his words; and William, very red in the face, was understood to mumble, as soon as mumbling was possible, that "he wouldn't laugh unless he had a mind to," and a threat to ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... worn into cart-tracks, and tufted with rosemary, box, lavender, and lentisk. On the way it passes the Abbaye de Mont Majeur, a ruin of gigantic size, embracing all periods of architecture; where nothing seems to flourish now but henbane and the wild cucumber, or to breathe but a mumble-toothed and terrible old hag. The ruin stands above a desolate marsh, its vast Italian buildings of Palladian splendour looking more forlorn in their decay than the older and austerer mediaeval towers, which rise up proud and patient and defiantly erect beneath the ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... room and came back with a number of grey cards in his hand. He began to mumble over the descriptions, ...
— The End of Her Honeymoon • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... when you like!" I answer heartily, and I neither mumble nor stutter, nor do I feel any disposition to drop my eyes. I like to look at him. For the rest of dinner I am absolutely mute, I make only one other remark, and that is a request to one of the footmen ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... bent, poison of serpents mixed! violence of hands weighed, measured, and trafficked with as so much coin! where is all this going on? Do you suppose it was only going on in the time of David, and that nobody but Jews ever murder the poor? If so, it would surely be wiser not to mutter and mumble for our daily lessons what does not concern us; but if there be any chance that it may concern us, and if this description, in the Psalms, of human guilt is at all generally applicable, as the descriptions ...
— The Two Paths • John Ruskin
... ignorance, of error, of necessity, of sickness, of malice, of all passions; to return step by step to that imbecility whence one sprang; from the moment when we lisp our first words, down to the moment when we mumble the words of our dotage, to live among rascals and charlatans of every kind; to lie expiring between a man who feels your pulse, and another man who frets and wearies your head; not to know whence ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... a distant mumble to a shrieking roar, and the next thing, each man had landed upon the concrete-and-paint bull's-eye before the ...
— Minor Detail • John Michael Sharkey
... tranquil, only a little puzzled, till something seemed to dawn upon him; but the unwonted light in his eyes died out instantly. As a Jacobus on his native heath, what a mere skipper chose to say could not touch him, outcast as he was. As a ship-chandler he could stand anything. All I caught of his mumble was a vague—"quite correct," than which nothing could have been more egregiously false at bottom—to my view, at least. But I remembered—I had never forgotten—that I must see the girl. I did not mean to go. I meant to stay ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... ruined or deserted church, where owls mope and hoot, where bats flit in the gloaming, where gypsies lodge of nights, and where toads squat under the desecrated altar. Thither the bad priest comes by night with his light o' love, and at the first stroke of eleven he begins to mumble the mass backwards, and ends just as the clocks are knelling the midnight hour. His leman acts as clerk. The host he blesses is black and has three points; he consecrates no wine, but instead he drinks the water of a well into which the body of an unbaptized infant has been flung. ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... increased ferocity, sprang at the knight, screaming and clenching her hands. But he cried out, "Hold! or I will cleave thee in twain, even as thy cat." And in truth she stopped stone-still, but soon began to spit and murmur. Whereupon he cried out again, "Ay, spit and mumble; but know that my good friend, of whom I told thee, stands without, and if but a finger of mine aches, now or in future, he ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... waiting—waiting some word from the bulky shadow which stood with folded arms close against a square of gray, while over their heads a wretched old man paced back and forth, wringing his hands, pausing at every turn to peer out into the night and to mumble the name ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... eaten, our remarks grow rarer. Then Mame begins again to mumble; once again she yields to emotion under the harsh flame of the lamp, and once again her eyes grow dim in her complicated Japanese mask that is crowned with cotton-wool, and something dimly shining flows ...
— Light • Henri Barbusse
... seize upon his opportunity, began his reminiscences immediately, saying "Honey, wait now," when his wife thought herself well organized to talk, and frequently broke into his narrative. "Wait untell I gits through. Den you can talk." Aunt Mollie would frown and grunt, mumble to herself as she rocked back and forth in her chair. She pulled the two long braids of brown silky hair, streaked with white, and tied at the ends with cotton strings. She spat vigorously into the fire, kept muttering and shuffling her feet, which were encased ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Tennessee Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... A little mumble greeted this, and then, silence again. Whenever it grew too painful, Carol said reproachfully, "Everybody does it." And no ...
— Prudence Says So • Ethel Hueston
... because my money was all in the hands of Saveliitch. I began to mumble excuses, when Zourine exclaimed, "Oh! well! Good God! I can wait till morning; don't be distressed about it. Now let us go to supper." What could I do? I finished the day as ...
— Marie • Alexander Pushkin
... I will not mumble it. You all know colonial law on homicide. In the case of any person killed while in commission of a felony, no prosecution may be brought in any degree, against anybody. I'm going to contend that Leonard Kellogg was murdering a sapient ...
— Little Fuzzy • Henry Beam Piper
... was thick with tobacco smoke. A hundred men or so, garbed in furs and warm-colored wools, lined the walls and looked on. But the mumble of their general conversation destroyed the spectacular feature of the scene and gave to it the geniality of common comradeship. For all its bizarre appearance, it was very like the living-room of the home when the members of the household come ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... mumble of relief from Jot's quarter, followed by another silence. Then again Old Tilly's contented voice crept ...
— Three Young Knights • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... brushed the dirt off his knees. "If there's anything that stirs my temper, it's this mumble-grumble, whiffle-and-hint business. Out and open, that's my style." He was reflecting testily on the peculiar reticence ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... remaining near the fighting line. Lieutenant Jarvis was shot through the arm, Captain Belknap of E Company was lying dead near his company, and scores of other brave men had gone to their last reckoning. Hanigan, Hogan's bunkie, was badly wounded, and out of his head. Every once in a while he would mumble, "Never you mind, fellers, we will be all right yet, just stand 'em off a little while longer and Denny will be here with the 11th Cavalry. He said he'd do it and by God! he ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... work to do this watch—as you know," interrupted the parson. He said the words so solemnly and sternly they sounded like a judgment; aye, and they nipped the rising courage of the mate. He could only mumble, and stammer out, ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... two men appeared to be talking earnestly, only a mumble of voices reached Dick's ears when the men were no more than thirty feet away. Then they stepped into the road, where they halted hardly more than a dozen feet away from ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys with Pershing's Troops - Dick Prescott at Grips with the Boche • H. Irving Hancock
... poor old dame to trudge it, Tick, tack, tick, tack, on such a devil's dance: Crumbs, it took me quite aback to see her stop so humble, Casting up into my face a sort of shiny glance, Bless you, bless you, that was what I thought I heard her mumble; Lord, a prayer for poor old Bill, a rummy sort of chance! Crumbs, that shiny glance Kinder made me king of all the sky from here ...
— Collected Poems - Volume Two (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... paragraph without proffering a word of correction, whereat he looked vastly self-complacent, convinced, no doubt, that he had acquitted himself like a real born and bred "Anglais." In the same unmoved silence I listened to a dozen in rotation, and when the twelfth had concluded with splutter, hiss, and mumble, I solemnly ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... of her followers that a young man at the very beginning of his career, able to teach, able to work, able to dig, educated and trained and cultured, can stoop to accept a good income in such a position as this. Think of it! Six old men, able surely, if they are good for anything, to mumble their prayers for themselves somehow; yet provided with an Oxford scholar, an able-bodied young man, to read the service for them daily! He thinks it very fine, no doubt, a good income and a good house for life, and nothing to do but to canter over morning and evening ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... lips of his legal brother. He did not intend disrespect to the very honorable Umpire, nor the gentlemen Commissioners, when he said that the rules on which the business of the Commission had been conducted seemed to him to be a complete mumble, growing deeper and deeper with difficulties. Language had been used in that forum which would be more genially localized in Whitechapel, Drury Lane, St. Giles's, or the Surrey Side: he was sorry to see his transatlantic brother ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... spy, as well as the spy-courier," MacLeod said. "The information he transmitted was picked up piecemeal from different indiscreet lab-workers and students attached to our team. Of course, we are investigating, mumble-mumble. Naturally, no one will admit, mumble-mumble. No stone will be left unturned, mumble-mumble. Disciplinary ...
— The Mercenaries • Henry Beam Piper
... hour I am a free man. I will live what I am, and speak what I feel to be the truth. The truth shall be its own justification. I will wear no robes, mumble no ceremonies, call no man Rabbi, and permit no man to call me Rabbi. I proclaim the universal priesthood ...
— The One Woman • Thomas Dixon
... that's what he did, and whatever his motives may have been it was jolly decent of him . . . and . . ." here Grantly lowered his voice to the faintest mumble, "he never said a word of reproof or exhortation . . . I tell you he behaved like a ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... She put her hand to her mouth to suppress an exclamation. Pinto was talking, but his voice was a mumble. ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... Dade's presence, drunk or sober, made his own plight seem a shade less hopeless. He did not dare a second glance, with Davis and the Captain walking at either stirrup; but he listened anxiously—listened and caught a drunken mumble from the rear, and a chorus of chuckling laughs ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... valley with the river running through it, beyond which rose other green hills yet more beautiful than the eastern ones. I asked the lad the name of the place, but I could not catch what he said, for his answer was merely an indistinct mumble, and before I could question him again he left me, without a word of salutation, and trudged away ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... Mr. Prokofieff wrote unfolds itself with rapidity. Theater habitues eavesdropping on the rehearsal mumble in the half-dark that there was never anything like this seen on earth or in heaven. Mr. Anisfeld's scenery explodes like a succession of medieval skyrockets. A phantasmagoria of sound, color and action crowds the startled proscenium. ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... away in a low mumble as the men passed on. Gregory emerged from his cover and looked after the two fishermen. Then he noticed the girl had finished her calculations ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton
... sung lots of songs and we played marbles, mumble peg, and town ball. In de winter we would set around de fire and listen to our Mammy and Pappy tell ghost tales and witch tales. I don't guess dey was sho' nuff so, but ...
— Slave Narratives, Oklahoma - A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From - Interviews with Former Slaves • Various
... describe. For the Antiquarian Society, I shall leave them in peace with Whittington and his Cat. As my contempt for them has not, however, made me disgusted with what they do not understand, antiquities, I have published two numbers of "Miscellanies," and they are very welcome to mumble them with their toothless gums. I want to send you these—not their gums, but my pieces, and a "Grammont,"[2] of which I have printed only a hundred copies, and which will be extremely scarce, as twenty-five copies are gone to France. Tell me how ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole
... French Academy, or until twenty years have expired since the proclamation of the present decree." This cut the ground from under the feet of all rivals, and the Academy could meet twice a week as before and mumble its definitions with serene assurance. From this false security it was roused by the incident ...
— Gossip in a Library • Edmund Gosse
... next line if any of them faltered. The prompter, surely he was destiny, fate, the irresistible course of events, with which no man can struggle, any more than the actor can struggle with or alter the lines that are set down for him. He may mumble them, he may act dispiritedly and tamely, but he has undertaken a certain part; he has ...
— The Blotting Book • E. F. Benson
... children, is a very wise cricket. I dare say Greenie has had a hard time, but then, lazy worms often do. Now let us sing a little song about these flowers we've been hopping about in; it's pleasanter. Chirp, don't sing too loud, Chirk, not too fast, and Chee, don't mumble your words:" ...
— The Cheerful Cricket and Others • Jeannette Marks
... mask like some roguish roistering Roscius (I spit at them all) to beguile with Stage shows the gaping Woman, whose Sex hath still chiefly upheld these Mysteries, and are voiced to be the chief Stage-haunters, where, as I am told, the custom is commonly to mumble (between acts) apples, not ambiguously derived from that pernicious Pippin, (worse in effect than the Apples of Discord,) whereas sometimes the hissing sounds of displeasure, as I hear, do lively reintonate that snake-taking-leave, and diabolical ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... pride that this fair being could wear his shoes, and that she was wearing them, that he could only mumble some stupid words about being so glad to serve her. And she, wise girl, said nothing about the quantities of soft cotton-wool which Dame Charter had been obliged to stuff into the toes before they would stay upon ...
— Kate Bonnet - The Romance of a Pirate's Daughter • Frank R. Stockton
... one of the scared-mouse kind. She looks you square in the eye when there's any call for it and she don't mumble her remarks when she has something to say. Not Miss Joyce. Her words come out clear and crisp, with a slight roll to the r's and all the final letters sounded, like she'd been taking elocution ...
— Torchy and Vee • Sewell Ford
... fear lest Hugh be tempted to put his threat into execution, Nick managed to swallow his pride, and mumble that he guessed he must be out of condition just then, a fact so evident that Thad had to ...
— The Chums of Scranton High - Hugh Morgan's Uphill Fight • Donald Ferguson
... tooth to that of a mistress there's no pang that is not bearable. The apprehension is much more cruel than the certainty; and we make up our mind to the misfortune when 'tis irremediable, part with the tormentor, and mumble our crust on t'other side of the jaws. I think Colonel Esmond was relieved when a ducal coach-and-six came and whisked his charmer away out of his reach, and placed her in a higher sphere. As you have seen the nymph in the opera-machine go up to the ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was shivering with cold, and understood little of this dark talk, began to mumble his ritual, skipping those parts of it which he could not remember. So another grain was planted in the cornfields of death and immortality, though when and where it should grow and what it should bear he neither knew nor cared, who wished to escape from fears and fightings ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... mumble of relief from Jot's quarter, followed by another silence. Then again Old Tilly's contented ...
— Three Young Knights • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... Swetchine, the Russian, whose house in Paris was the rendezvous of the most fervent Catholics. Her writings had filled him with insufferably horrible boredom; they were more than merely wretched: they were wretched in every way, resembling the echoes of a tiny chapel where the solemn worshippers mumble their prayers, asking news of one another in low voices, while they repeat with a deeply mysterious air the common gossip of politics, weather forecasts and the state of ...
— Against The Grain • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... mumble this to himself in German: "Kepler perceived a little, he saw dimly; Newton comprehended the easy half; but Anderwelt, Anderwelt of Heidelberg, ...
— Pharaoh's Broker - Being the Very Remarkable Experiences in Another World of Isidor Werner • Ellsworth Douglass |
