Free Translator Free Translator
Translators Dictionaries Courses Other
Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Trill   Listen
verb
Trill  v. i.  To utter trills or a trill; to play or sing in tremulous vibrations of sound; to have a trembling sound; to quaver. "To judge of trilling notes and tripping feet."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Trill" Quotes from Famous Books



... happy little trill of laughter. After all, there were some good points about being grown-up. At that moment she had no hankering whatever for the days of ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey

... for a bit. She looked at him oddly, an inscrutable little light flickering in her eyes. All at once she broke out with a merry trill of laughter. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various

... bird, which is so well described by Nuttall, but is apparently unknown by the author of the Report, is one of the most common in the woods in this vicinity, and in Cambridge I have heard the college yard ring with its trill. The boys call it "yorrick," from the sound of its querulous and chiding note, as it flits near the traveller through the underwood. The cowbird's egg is occasionally found in its ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau

... the west became vividly purple with a subtle illusive deep-crimson glow beneath, while the sky above their tops, a saffron dome rose almost to the zenith. These mystical things are here joined: The trill of black-birds near at hand, the cackle of barn-yard fowls, the sound of hammers, a plowman talking to his team, the pungent smoke of burning leaves, the cool, sweet, spring wind and the glowing down-pouring sunshine—all marvelous and satisfying ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland

... A blackbird in the garden of the Square was uttering a long, low, chuckling trill. She ran to the window and peeped out. The bird was on a plane-tree, and, with throat uplifted, was letting through his yellow beak that delicious piece of self-expression. All things he seemed to praise—the sky, the sun, the trees, the ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... and 'bother'; 'bursar' and 'purser'; 'thrice' and 'trice'{110}; 'shatter' and 'scatter'; 'chattel' and 'cattle'; 'chant' and 'cant'; 'zealous' and 'jealous'; 'channel' and 'kennel'; 'wise' and 'guise'; 'quay' and 'key'; 'thrill', 'trill' and 'drill';—or in the consonants in the middle of the word, as between 'cancer' and 'canker'; 'nipple' and 'nibble'; 'tittle' and 'title'; 'price' and 'prize'; 'consort' and 'concert';—or there is a change in both, as between ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench

... sit the whole day long Beside the window-sill, And listen to the joyous song That warbler loves to trill. ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson

... along, more or less conscious that a pair of dark blue eyes were regarding them, and they thought they heard a trill of laughter, but it might have been one of the maids. They need not have felt embarrassed for there was the grace in their movements that goes with strength ...
— Frontier Boys on the Coast - or in the Pirate's Power • Capt. Wyn Roosevelt

... peal far at sea Cunning fingers fashioned me. There on palace walls I hung While that Consuelo sung; But I heard, though I listened well, Never a note, never a trill, Never a beat of the chiming bell. There I hung and looked, and there In my gray face, faces fair Shone from under shining hair. Well I saw the poising head, But the lips moved and nothing said; And when lights were in the hall, Silent moved ...
— Underwoods • Robert Louis Stevenson

... we shall call Cri-Cri, like other frisky and gay young people, carried the day quite over the head of the solemn old philosopher under the calla-leaves. At night, when all was still, he would trill a joyous little note in his throat, while old Unke would answer only with a cracked guttural more singular than agreeable; and to all outward appearance the two were as good friends as their different natures ...
— Queer Little Folks • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... proves the good right he has to his name. Trill and quavers and roulades are shaken from his bow as lightly as foam from the prow of a ship. The music leaps rollicking up and down, here and there, till the air is all a-quiver with merriment. The ...
— Melody - The Story of a Child • Laura E. Richards

... worth waiting for, and Georgie did not hesitate to let drop that she had sung four last night to his accompaniment. And hardly had he repeated that the third time, when she appeared at her window, and before all Riseholme called out "Georgie!" with a trill at the end, like a bird shaking its ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson

... one fable that touches very near the quick of life,—the fable of the monk who passed into the woods, heard a bird break into song, hearkened for a trill or two, and found himself at his return a stranger at his convent gates; for he had been absent fifty years, and of all his comrades there survived but one to recognize him. It is not only in the woods that this enchanter carols, though perhaps he is native there. He sings in the most ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James

... in her fireside chair, And thinks of the husband so brave to dare, And dreams once more That the war is o'er; While the South-birds trill Near the picket-camp still, And the picket lies dead on the hill. For men must fight for the sleeping Right, And God stands by ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... nameless unknown Mystery toward which her life was drifting was embodied in this infinite silence. So sleep would not come to her until dawn. Then the stir of the wind in the trees, the bleat of sheep, the trill of mocking-birds ...
— The Heart of the Desert - Kut-Le of the Desert • Honore Willsie Morrow

... flowers waved in the breeze that rose as the sun threw its first beams over the earth. Birds of all kinds vied with each other, as they sang their joy on that beautiful morning. The priest stood listening. Suddenly, off at one side, he heard a trill that rose higher and clearer than all the rest. He moved toward the place whence the song came, that he might see what manner of bird it was that could send farther than all the others its happy, laughing notes. ...
— Indian Story and Song - from North America • Alice C. Fletcher

... amiable throughout. It cannot be that they said too much in that letter from Paris." A little trill of bitter laughter escaped her. "We are to continue to make this our home for as long as it shall pleasure us. So long shall it ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini

... lonely wood, But lo! the faeries light their firefly lamps, Elusive foxfire flames from marish damps; Hastes to the morris-dance an elfin brood; A far bell chimes, the cricket cheerly shrills, The droning beetle sounds his hoarse bassoon And hylas trill; eftsoon the rising moon The ambient ...
— The Path of Dreams - Poems • Leigh Gordon Giltner

... nest in flocks of thousands, in a wonder of full song, all eagerly pressing on towards the hills but they left their songs behind them, as it were, to be sung by the other birds. In the pastures and cultivated fields the chipping sparrows, newly arrived from the South, took up the trill with an accent of their own, and all the pine warblers sang it, each with an individuality that slightly but clearly marked him from his fellow. I think all birds show this slight but definite individuality in manner and voice and are probably ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard

... the midst of the forest trees, And heard the sweet sigh of the wandering breeze, And this with the tinkle of heifer bells, As they trill on the ear from the dewy dells, Are the sounds ...
— What I Remember, Volume 2 • Thomas Adolphus Trollope

... chattering partly with cold but even more with nervousness. This was a bad preparation for the coming interview, and with an irritation born of despair she pressed the bell-button to such good purpose that she could hear footsteps approaching, almost before the trill of the ...
— The Splendid Folly • Margaret Pedler

... could not understand The magic touches of a hand That seemed, beneath her strange control, To smooth the plumage of the soul And calm it, till, with folded wings, It half forgot its flutterings, And, nestled in her palm, did seem To trill a ...
— Riley Love-Lyrics • James Whitcomb Riley

... finch-like. The yellow-breasted chat has the greatest variety of vocal expressions. The ground warblers are compensated for their sober, thrush-like plumage by their exquisite voices, while the great majority of the family that are gaily dressed have notes that either resemble the trill of mid-summer insects or, by their limited range and feeble utterance, sadly belie the family name. Bay-breasted Warbler. Blackburnian Warbler. Blackpoll Warbler. Black-throated Blue Warbler. Black-throated Green Warbler. Black-and-white ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan

... singing loudly is not singing well; But ever by the song that's soft and low The master singer's voice is plain to tell. Few have it, and yet all are masters now, And each of them can trill out what he calls His ballads, canzonets, and madrigals. The world with masters is so covered o'er There is no room for ...
— The Writer, Volume VI, April 1892. - A Monthly Magazine to Interest and Help All Literary Workers • Various

... when the collegian was expected home. The roses were blossoming and the pinks were sweet, in the old-fashioned flower garden in front of the house; and the smell of the hay came from the fields where mowers were busy, and the trill of a bob-o'-link sounded in the meadow. It was evening when Pitt made his way from his father's house over to the colonel's; and he found Esther sitting in the verandah, with all this sweetness about her. The house was old and country fashioned; ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner

... And the R, by carrying the tip of the tongue to the top of the palate, so that being grazed by the air that comes out with force, it yields to it and comes back always to the same place, making a kind of trill: R. AR. ...
— The Middle Class Gentleman - (Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme) • Moliere

... they had started on that thrilling adventure into the forest, which had ended with his carrying her in his arms, she had gone to the piano and had played for him. Now her fingers touched softly the same notes. A little humming trill came in her throat, and it seemed to David that she was deliberately recalling his thoughts to the things that had happened before the coming of St. Pierre. He had not lighted the lamp over the piano, and for a flash her dark eyes smiled at him out of the ...
— The Flaming Forest • James Oliver Curwood

... Palgrave, there's Rosetti too; Trill on, ye two, the song of future years, Move, Palgrave, move, with bosom rent anew, An audience multitudinous to tears; Scratch on with quill unwearied and no fears, The world shall fling thee thy resplendent bays, For Popular Opinion ...
— The Minstrel - A Collection of Poems • Lennox Amott

... Empress Carlota used to walk, flung out its tendrils gaily to the salt sea breeze, and seemed never to miss the kindlier sun of its former home. At one side there was a small cemented pool, the birds' drinking-place, where many of the little creatures came to dip their bills and trill their morning songs. In this quiet scented garden, kept safe from intruding eyes on all sides by vine-covered walls and shrubbery, one might sit and dream, reminded of the outside world only by the clanging of a street-car bell or the distant whistle ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez

... whispering voice of Spring, The thrush's trill, the cat-bird's cry, Like some poor bird with prisoned wing That sits and ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... Jack, and the swift trill of rifle-cracks rang out on the soft evening silence. As swiftly as they could press finger on trigger, the three comrades emptied their magazines completely into the fringe of forest three hundred yards away. This storm of tiny, whirling slips of lead struck among ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore

... intelligence, are down below hatches fighting furiously to annex and drill into submission the alien and distracting mass of food that you have taken on board. They are like stevedores, stowing the cargo for portability. A little later, however, when this excellent work is accomplished, the bosun may trill his whistle, and the deck hands can be summoned back to the navigating bridge. The mind casts off its corporeal hawsers and puts out to sea. You begin once more to live as a rational composition of reason, emotion, and will. The ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley

... with a long breath. "My sister Solly is married." Smiles broke all over her little face. She hid it in Sally's skirts, and a little peal of laughter like a bird-trill came from ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... trill and sing With a flute-like voice, Dance as light as bird on wing, Laugh for careless joys: Yet it's I ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti

... bride rides a mare, led by one of Shaheen's brothers, and as we pass the fountain, the people pour water under the mare's feet as a libation, and Handumeh throws down a few little copper coins to the children. The women in the company set up the zilagheet, a high piercing trill of the voice, and all goes merry as a marriage bell. When we reach the house of Shaheen, he keeps out of sight, not even offering to help his bride dismount from her horse. That would never do. He will stay among the men, and ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup

... the stone breast of the image, and the darkling eyes seemed to keep watch over its slumbers. The lonely bird grew to love its lonely protector, and during the day it would sit from time to time on some rainshoot or other abutment and trill forth its sweetest music in grateful thanks for its nightly shelter. And, it may have been the work of wind and weather, or some other influence, but the wild drawn face seemed gradually to lose some of its hardness and unhappiness. Every day, through ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki

... sing in the meadows and fill all the air with sweetness, They sing only in the present, and they sing because they must; They are wanton in their pureness, and in all their fine completeness, They trill out their lives forgotten to the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... as he turned to look for her, she felt a strange thrilling in her bowels: a sort of trill strangely within her, yet extraneous to her. She caught her hand to her flank. And Ciccio was looking up for her from the market beneath, searching with that quick, hasty look. He caught sight of her. She seemed to glow with a delicate light for him, there beyond all ...
— The Lost Girl • D. H. Lawrence

... bright morning about Easter Day, proclaiming his arrival, with much variety of motion and attitude, from the peak of the barn or hay-shed. As yet, you may have heard only the plaintive, homesick note of the bluebird, or the faint trill of the song sparrow; and the ph[oe]be's clear, vivacious assurance of his veritable bodily presence among us again is welcomed by all ears. At agreeable intervals in his lay he describes a circle or an ellipse in the air, ostensibly prospecting ...
— Bird Stories from Burroughs - Sketches of Bird Life Taken from the Works of John Burroughs • John Burroughs

... now, Time-trenched on cheek and brow, Whom I once heard as a maid From Keinton Mandeville Of matchless scope and skill Sing, with smile and swell and trill, ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy

... himself back into the wall of the wigwam, and with head alert—and eyes wide open—watched his companion attentively. Not a movement of the Willow escaped him. She was radiant—and happy. Her laugh, sweet and wild as a bird's trill, set Baree's heart throbbing with a desire to jump about with her among ...
— Baree, Son of Kazan • James Oliver Curwood

... rock, sublime and vast, That, like some giant king, o'er-glooms the hill; Nor there the pine-grove to the midnight blast Makes solemn music! but th' unceasing rill To the soft wren or lark's descending trill, Murmurs sweet undersong mid jasmine bowers. In this same pleasant meadow, at your will, I ween, you wander'd—there collecting flowers Of sober tint, and herbs of ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge

... nonsense. I say teach them the scales, to run up and down the gamut! Gradus ad Parnassum's the thing! Classical, classical! Yesterday you made your daughter play that Trill-Etude by Carl Meyer. Altogether too fine-sounding! It tickles the ear, to be sure, especially when it is played in such a studied manner. We stick to Clementi and Cramer, and to Hummel's piano-school,—the good old school. ...
— Piano and Song - How to Teach, How to Learn, and How to Form a Judgment of - Musical Performances • Friedrich Wieck

... how much snap and go there was to it until I heard Miss Hampton trill it out. Why, she just tosses up that perky chin of hers and turns loose the catchy melody until you felt the warm waves splashin' and saw the moonlight dancin' across the bay! I don't know where or what ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford

... open window came the clear trill of a canary singing blithely in its cage. Within the tidy, homely little room a pale-faced girl and a youth of slender frame listened intently while the bird sang its song. The girl was the ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: German (V.2) • Various

... records, and rotten The meshes of memory's net; When the grace that forgives has forgotten The things that are good to forget; When the trill of my juvenile trumpet Is dead and its echoes are dead; Then the laurel shall lie on the crumpet ...
— The Battle of the Bays • Owen Seaman

... walk with you up to the ridge of the hill, And we'll talk of the way we have come through the valley; Down below there a bird breaks into a trill, And a groaning slave bends to ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various

... facility she could rise with ease from the faintest sound to the most superb crescendo, could send her tones sweeping through the air with the most delicious undulations, imitating the swell and fall of a bell, and could trill like a bird on each note of a chromatic passage. She dazzled her listeners, but left the ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore

... The noise of it reaches august ears. An act of gracious condescension follows. Her Ladyship has the supreme delight of leading a scion of Royalty to a chair of state in her drawing-room, to hear Sir Raucisonous bleat and Miss Quaver trill. ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous

... until the bright upward trip begins anew, with the enchanting burst of chord and descending harmonies. A climactic height is stressed by a rough meeting of opposing groups, in hostile tone and movement, ending in a trill of flutes and a reentry of ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp

... Mellicent gasped with amazement, while Rosalind gave a trill of laughter, and threw ...
— About Peggy Saville • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey

... mountains once slept now they seemed wide-awake. Keen eyes saw every moving thing, from the bees in the bluebells to the slow fishing-boats far out at sea; sharp ears that were cocked like a collie's heard every chirp and trill and rustle, and a nose that understood everything was holding up every vagrant breeze and searching it for its message. For the cubs were coming out for the first time to play in the big world, and no wild mother ever lets that happen without ...
— Northern Trails, Book I. • William J. Long

... analysis without detriment to his reputation. For clearness and limpidity of touch and unerring precision, for impetuosity of style, combined with dreamy delicacy, he has few rivals. The evenness and brilliancy of his trill are unequalled, the mechanical process required to produce it being lost to sight in the wonderful birdlike nature of the effect. In the playing of classical music, Mr. Gottschalk has to contend against his own individuality. This individuality, naturally intense and of a ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... as long as the young man's footsteps resounded on the stony paths; but when they died gradually away in the distance, when nothing could be heard save the monotonous trill of the grasshoppers basking in the sun, she threw herself down on the green heap of rubbish; she covered her face with her hands and gave way to a passionate outburst of ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... broken by the sharp trill of the telephone. Slavin arose lethargically from the mess-table ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall

... not pine for forest wilds Within the "blue Canary isles," As exiles from their native home, For in a foreign domicile They first essayed their gamut-trill Beneath a cage's gilded dome; But maybe some sad throbbing Betimes their spirits stirs, Who love as we Dear liberty, That they, admired and petted, ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard

... the pretty fellow, cocked up his bright black eye, As if to say, "Little mistress, it will do you no harm to try." Then taking some slight refreshments, and polishing off his bill, Broke into a rapture of singing that ended off with a trill; And Maud, with her head bent forward, sat listening to his lay, And fast as he sang, she whistled, ...
— Harper's Young People, April 6, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... rim of a young rising moon Hung in the west as you leaned on the bar And spun a thread of some sweet April tune, And wished a wish and named the falling star. We heard a brook trill in the fields afar; The air wrapped round us that entrancing fold Of vanishing sweet stuff that mortal hold Can never grasp—the mist of dreams—as down The street we went in that ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various

... and his wife, as he drew near, could be seen bending above a kettle that was just about to boil. So vividly did the whole scene suggest the painted bliss of a stage setting, that it would have been hardly surprising to see her step forward among the flowers and trill out her ...
— The Touchstone • Edith Wharton

... interrupted by gasps for breath, whereupon Roseen, still vigorously footing it, would take up the tune after a fashion of her own, her voice imitating as nearly as might be the sound of a fiddle. Overhead a lark was soaring, and his trill, wafted down to them, mingled with their quaint human music; far away over that brown and purple stretch of bog the plovers were circling, their faint melancholy call sounding every now and then. The sun would soon set, the air ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)

... fling, Cheerful he sits, and forms the banquet scene, In regal splendour on the crowded green; And as around he greets his valiant bands, Showers golden presents from his bounteous hands;[28] Voluptuous damsels trill the sportive lay, Whose sparkling glances beam celestial day; Fill'd with delight the heroes closer join, And quaff till midnight cups of ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous

... soaring into the air and descending in loops and spirals. The scarlet tyrant I saw in the orchards and gardens. The male is a fascinating little bird, coal- black above, while his crested head and the body beneath are brilliant scarlet. He utters his rapid, low-voiced musical trill in the air, rising with fluttering wings to a height of a hundred feet, hovering while he sings, and then falling back to earth. The color of the bird and the character of his performance attract the attention of every observer, bird, beast, or ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt

... they stood, each where he was, two figures in clay instead of one. Interrupting, awakening, torturing, sounded the thing they had so long expected; the impact of a step upon the floor of the porch without; a moment later another, uncertain, and another; a pause, and then, startlingly loud, the trill of an ...
— The Dominant Dollar • Will Lillibridge

... pathos there! It's just one trill of laughter and merriment, a sunbeam and effect. Play ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various

... and little Emily exclaimed, at the same moment. And a mocking-bird, flying by, stopped a moment to trill a sweet strain, as if he, too, was glad to welcome back this lovely ...
— Dew Drops, Vol. 37, No. 15, April 12, 1914 • Various

... retire—not just yet. Instead, on a pretext, any pretext, I knock out the ashes from my old pipe, fill it afresh, and wait. I wait patiently, because, inevitable as Fate, inevitable as that call from out the dark void of the sky, I know there will come a trill of the telephone on the desk at my elbow; my own Polly—whose name happens to be Mary—is watching as I take ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge

... pleasure," Fomishka said, "but what about the trill, Snandulia Samsonovna? After my verse ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev

... notes with him to be sure that this was not indeed a trap. Better to retreat now than to be taken like fish in a net. He crept out of his place, gave the chittering signal call of the fluff-ball, and heard Jil-Lee's answer in a cleverly mimicked trill of a ...
— The Defiant Agents • Andre Alice Norton

... exclaiming 'Mr. and Miss Apsley' (which ended with a crow) he stuffed his red pocket handkerchief into his mouth and escaped. At the sound of the names, Merton had turned towards the inner door, open behind him, whence came a clear and piercing trill of feminine laughter from Miss Blossom. Merton angrily marched to the inner door, and shut his typewriter in with a bang. His heart burned within him. Nothing could be so insulting to clients; nothing so ruinous to a nascent business. He wheeled round to greet his ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang

... rose from his bed, and at that very moment a thousand little birds, who lived in his room, began to twitter and trill. "Awake so early, little ones!" whispered the lawyer. He ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various

... part, I minded not how the hours went. The day advanced as if to light some work of mine; it was morning, and lo, now it is evening, and nothing memorable is accomplished. Instead of singing like the birds, I silently smiled at my incessant good fortune. As the sparrow had its trill, sitting on the hickory before my door, so had I my chuckle or suppressed warble which he might hear out of my nest. My days were not days of the week, bearing the stamp of any heathen deity, nor were they minced into hours and fretted by the ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau

... them, read them in my presence; And now and then an ample tear trill'd down Her delicate cheek: it seem'd she was a queen Over her passion; who, most rebel-like, Sought ...
— The Tragedy of King Lear • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]

... for me, she is not for another;' or 'Where she has sinned, there let her suffer.' That is revenge; it is the feeble device of a man who thinks in his simple soul that when beauty is gone loathing is at hand." Another light trill ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine

... tread, As of one musing sadly on the dead— 'Twas Julio; it was his wont to be Often alone within the sanctuary; But now, not so—another: it was she! Kneeling in all her beauty, like a saint Before a crucifix; but sad and faint The tone of her devotion, as the trill ...
— The Death-Wake - or Lunacy; a Necromaunt in Three Chimeras • Thomas T Stoddart

... soldier, who in turn stared as steadily at John; and John was singing like a lark, with a lark's spontaneous delight in singing, with an ease and self-abandonment which charmed eye almost as much as ear. Higher and higher rose the clear, sexless notes, till two of them met and mingled in a triumphant trill. To Desmond, that trill was the answer to the quavering, troubled cadences of the first verse; the vindication of the spirit soaring upwards unfettered by the flesh—the pure spirit, not released from the pitiful human clay without a fierce struggle. ...
— The Hill - A Romance of Friendship • Horace Annesley Vachell

... morning. This is Miss Melville, whom I went to meet. She is going to marry Richard very soon." Marion did not, Ellen noticed with exasperation, make any adequate response to this generous little trill of greeting. The best she seemed able to do was to speak slowly, as if to disclaim any desire to ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West

... Hence it is a tempting retreat from the cyclones and typhoons that sometimes sing among a man's Lares and Penates. In view of my own gilded matrimonial future, I reverently salute my ally—the 'Century!' There! Mamma calls you. Go trill like a canary at the Cantata, and waste no sighs on the smiling Ellewoman you leave behind you. Tell ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson

... see him, he continuing mighty pale all dinner and melancholy, that I was loth to let him take his journey tomorrow; but he began to be pretty well, and after dinner my wife and Barker fell to singing, which pleased me pretty well, my wife taking mighty pains and proud that she shall come to trill, and indeed I think she will. So to the office, and there all the afternoon late doing business, and then home, and find my brother pretty well. So to write a letter to my Lady Sandwich for him to carry, I having not writ to her a great while. Then to supper and so to bed. ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... Danvers had followed her into the house. It was a homelike room; a canary's trill greeted them, and a glimpse of old-fashioned plants in the bay-window wakened memories of English homes. How different it was from his rooms ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman

... the lights went out, for the fire-flies fled in every direction; but in the darkness Twinkle thought she could still hear the drone of the big bass fiddle and the flute-like trill of ...
— Twinkle and Chubbins - Their Astonishing Adventures in Nature-Fairyland • L. Frank (Lyman Frank) Baum

... God, seest me."' When wasn't I tempted to do wrong? and I had for a long time the uncomfortable feeling that two great eyes were always staring at me. But this isn't sleigh-riding chit-chat," and she broke into a merry little trill ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe

... poured its full splendor upon the quiet city. Through the haze the convent on La Popa sparkled like an enchanted castle, with a pavement of soft moonbeams leading up to its doors. The trill of a distant nightingale rippled the scented air; and from the llanos were borne on the warm land breeze low feral sounds, broken now and then by the plaintive piping of a lonely toucan. The cocoa palms throughout ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... melancholy lute, Were night owl's hoot To my low-whispered coo— Were I thy bride! The skylark's trill Were but discordance shrill To the soft thrill Of wooing as I'd woo— ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert

... it was over. A second, and the revel was on. The earth was not silent now. There was no warning trill of prairie owl. As dropped the figures from above there broke forth the Sioux war-cry: long drawn out, demoniac, indescribable. Blood curdling, more savage infinitely than the cry of any wild beast, the others took it up, augmented it by a score, a hundred throats. Again the ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge

... have spoken without laughing! That little meaningless trill at the end of everything made Diana nearly wild. She could find no answer to the last speech, ...
— Diana • Susan Warner

... Trill-ll! It was not a cheer, but a subdued, breathless gasp that rose from the two camps of fans as the opposing lines rushed at each other. Dick could not help a slight groan, for Adams, of Cobber, reached the pigskin first. But Adams kicked it off over the line. Here was Gridley's ...
— The High School Freshmen - Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports • H. Irving Hancock

... The muffled tramp of the Museum guard Once more went by me; I beheld again Lamps vainly brighten the dispeopled street; Again I longed for the returning morn, The awaking traffic, the bestirring birds, The consentaneous trill of tiny song That weaves round monumental cornices A passing charm of beauty: most of all, For your light foot I wearied, and your knock That was the glad reveille of my day. Lo, now, when to your task ...
— Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 2 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... bird, called again with a mellow, warbling trill, and then struck up the quaint old madrigal with the bird's song running through it. Carew leaped to his feet, with a flash in his dark eyes. "My soul! my soul!" he exclaimed in an excited undertone. "It is not—nay, ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett

... the less, from Song's excess, Sings the blackbird late and early: Nor the bobolink's trill the less Laughs for very happiness, Gurgling through ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... showed on either side, it drew fire like a flue-hole. Suddenly our Virginian sprang on the ledge, and like a trill on a piano poured a six-shooter into the ...
— Crooked Trails • Frederic Remington

... certain amount of what I might call 'natural technic' possessed by every one—some one point which is easy for him. It Is often the trill. It has frequently come under my notice that players with little facility in other ways, can make a good trill. Some singers have this gift; Mme. Melba is one who never had to study a trill, for she was born with a nightingale in her throat. I knew a young man in London who was evidently born ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower

... Swallow, if I could follow, and light Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill, And cheep and twitter twenty ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney

... rustle of silks and a hum of voices, and now and then a silvery laugh would ring out above these like the trill of a bird in a breezy grove. Later, light airy music floated through the rooms, followed by the rhythmic cadence of feet. A thinly clad shivering little match-girl stopped on her weary tramp to her cellar and caught glimpses of the scene through the oft-opening ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe

... Rusty sang his dawn song right under Farmer Green's window. His musical trill, sounding very much like the brook that rippled its way down the side of Blue Mountain, always made Farmer Green feel glad that another day ...
— The Tale of Rusty Wren • Arthur Scott Bailey

... a little song A little song to soothe my heart! I'd make it all of little things The plash of water, rub of wings, The puffing-off of dandies crown, The hiss of raindrop spilling down, The purr of cat, the trill of bird, And ev'ry whispering I've heard From willy wind in leaves and grass, And all the distant drones that pass. A song as tender and as light As flower, or butterfly in flight; And when I saw it opening, I'd ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... A low trill came from the throat of Carolyn June. The two horses stopped feeding and looked around toward the gate. The bird-like call was repeated. The Ramblin' Kid was astonished to see Captain Jack and the outlaw mare move eagerly in the direction from whence the ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman

... A sudden trill sounded down the street behind her. Turning her head, Grace saw Arline Thayer bearing down upon her. "I thought I'd never make you hear me," panted the little girl. "Ruth is going home ...
— Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower

... between his knees, playing on it as on a cello; then he caught it to his breast again in a sudden fury of improvisation—an arpeggio, light and running, his fingers barely touching the strings—the snatch of a theme—a trill, low and passionate—the rush of a scale. He toyed with the Stradivarius mocking it, ...
— The Black Cross • Olive M. Briggs

... heretofore, saintly Madame Etalage had, it was said later, much to do with the unhappy taking-off of that ostentatious and haughty lady. It had Mlle. Affettuoso, songstress, with, it is true, an occasional break in her trill; and, last, but not least, that general friend of mankind, more puissant, powerful and necessary than all the nightingales, butterflies, or men of letters—who, nevertheless, are well enough in their places!—Tortier, the only Tortier, who ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham

... come my uncle would turn blithely from this melancholy contemplation and call for a lamp and his bottle. While I was about this business (our maid-servant would not handle the bottle lest she be damned for it), my uncle would stump the floor, making gallant efforts to whistle and trill: by this exhorting himself to a cheerful mood, so that when I had moved his great chair to the table, with the lamp near and turned high, and had placed a stool for his wooden leg, and had set his bottle and glass and little brown jug of cold water conveniently at hand, his face would ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan

... came in her hardened face— She had not wept for years; But the robin's trill, as some sounds will, Jarred open the door of tears. She thought of the old home far away; She heard the whr-r-r of the mill; She heard the turtle's wild, sweet call, And the wail of ...
— The Kingdom of Love - and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... of roses in a still As that which from chaf'd musk-cat's pores doth trill, As th' almighty balm of th' early East, Such are the sweet drops of my mistress' breast. And on her neck her skin such lustre sets, They seem no sweat-drops, but pearl coronets: Rank sweaty froth thy mistress' ...
— English literary criticism • Various

... stentorian proclamation of its tonic a few seconds before, and could not begin the repetition till the concert-master had plucked the first note of the air on his violin. A short time before I heard Mme. Patti perform the feat of beginning the trill which accompanies the melody by the orchestra in the middle of the dance song in "Dinorah" without a suggestive tone or chord after a hubbub and gladsome tumult that seemed, to have lasted several minutes. A new bass, ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel

... of last year? or has the little coquette been practising it all winter, in some gay Southern society, where cat-birds and bobolinks grow intimate, just as Southern fashionables from different States may meet and sing duets at Saratoga? There sounds the sweet, low, long-continued trill of the little hair-bird, or chipping-sparrow, a suggestion of insect sounds in sultry summer, and produced, like them, by a slight fluttering of the wings against the sides: by-and-by we shall sometimes hear that same delicate rhythm burst the silence of the June midnights, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various

... happy flute to be played on by Krishna! Little wonder that having drunk the nectar of his lips the flute should trill like the clouds. Alas! Krishna's flute is dearer to him than we are for he keeps it with him night and day. The flute is our rival. Never is Krishna parted from it.' A second cowgirl speaks. 'It is because the flute continually thought of Krishna that it gained this ...
— The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry • W. G. Archer

... effect on the mind of the listener. The song of the Veery consists of five distinct strains or bars. They might, perhaps, be represented on the musical staff, by commencing the first note on D above the staff and sliding down with a trill to C, one fifth below. The second, third, fourth, and fifth bars are repetitions of the first, except that each commences and ends a few ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various

... a common ancient practice; the very words "thrall," "thralldom," are etymologically connected with the roots "thrill," "trill," "drill," (Compare Exod. xxi. 6; Deut. xv. 17; Plut. Cic. 26; and ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar

... changeful tongue That talketh all the day with me: I trill in every bobolink's song, And every brooklet bears along My ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various

... of a lonely bird singing in the wilderness! A lonely bird that sings with glee! Sunny and sweet, and light and clear, its airy notes float through the sky, and trill with innocent revelry. ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli

... still whistling herself back to familiar things as she ran lightly up the stairs; had warmed to a long final trill as she stood in the doorway. The girl looked up in amazement. She had been sitting there, elbows on her knees, face in her hands. It was hard to see what might have been seen in her face because ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell

... in the midst of a winning game, I still watched eagerly and ungratefully for manatees. Kiskadees splashed rather than flew through the drenched air, an invisible black witch bubbled somewhere to herself, and a wren sang three notes and a trill which died out in a liquid gurgle. Then came another crocodile, and finally the manatees. Not only did they rise and splash and roll and indolently flick themselves with their great flippers, but they stood upright on their tails, like Alice's carpenter's companion, and one fondled ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe

... silences in woody aisles wherethrough Cool paths go loitering, and where the trill Of best-remembered birds hath something new In cadence for the hearing—lingering still Through all the open day that lies beyond; Reaches of pasture-lands, vine-wreathen oaks, Majestic still in pathos of decay,— The road—the wayside pond Wherein ...
— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley

... been the day, how tender the tone of every voice. The road under the moon was white and from a persimmon tree in an old field came the trill of a mockingbird. Two happy men were riding toward an ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read

... clear, sharp, chirruping trill, and Abel and Tregelly darted into the light as if urged forward by the same spring, while Dallas stood for the moment petrified—unable to stir. For from the upright logs close to which he stood ...
— To Win or to Die - A Tale of the Klondike Gold Craze • George Manville Fenn

... weather. Even Hannah's care-worn face was softened into contentment and enjoyment. As for Reuben's honest phiz, it was a sight to behold in its perfect satisfaction. Even the negro driver of the heavy wagon let his horses take their time as he raised his ear to catch some very delicate trill in a bird's song, or turned his head to inhale the perfume from ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... eagle is scarcely a song-bird, but still, He may have a good ear for the nightingale's trill! Fair Philomel comes to old Aquila's aid!!! Faith! the picture is pretty, so ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Nov. 1, 1890 • Various

... flicked down out of the cypress tree and perched on the gate top, looked up at Cleek with bright, sharp eyes, flung out a wee little trill, ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew

... Land! Summer in the heart of England—summer in wooded Warwickshire,—a summer brilliant, warm, radiant with flowers, melodious with the songs of the heaven—aspiring larks, and the sweet, low trill of the forest-hidden nightingales. Wonderful and divine it is to hear the wild chorus of nightingales that sing beside Como in the hot languorous nights of an Italian July—wonderful to hear them maddening themselves with love and music, and almost splitting ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... you, my friend, where'er you be, Though known or all unknown to me; To you, who love the things of God, The dew-begemmed and velvet sod, The birds that trill beside their nest. "Oh, love, sweet love, of life is best;" To you, for whom each ...
— The California Birthday Book • Various

... beam over me soft and serene, Let the dawn shed over me its radiant flashes, Let the wind with sad lament over me keen; And if on my cross a bird should be seen, Let it trill there its hymn ...
— Lineage, Life, and Labors of Jose Rizal, Philippine Patriot • Austin Craig

... opposite a wood whose trees blackened the slow dawn. Then, without a word, they ran across the road, and, in a few minutes, were lost in the thick underbrush of the little forest. It was past four o'clock and the dawn began to trill over the rim of night; the east burst into stinging sun rays, while the moving air awoke the birds and sent scurrying around the smooth green park a cloud of ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker

... piteous strain, Grief-laden, tear-evoking, shrill; Ah woe is me! woe! woe! Dirge-like it sounds; mine own death-trill I pour, yet breathing vital air. Hear, hill-crowned Apia, hear my prayer! Full well, O land, My voice barbaric thou canst understand; While oft with rendings I assail My ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner

... smiled and took up his fiddle and his bow. His hands were still for a minute, and then the instrument began to sigh and trill. The sounds gathered in strength, soared high, then thinned and sank to no more than the whisper of a tune—and then Pat began to sing. This is ...
— The Harbor Master • Theodore Goodridge Roberts

... of the grove, little birds live at ease, I wish not to wander from you; I'll still dwell beneath the deep roar of your trees, For I know that my Joe will be true. The trill of the robin, the coo of the dove, Are charms that I'll never forego; But resting through life on the bosom of love, Will remember ...
— Wild Flowers - Or, Pastoral and Local Poetry • Robert Bloomfield

... art thou a-chiding? I will play a spurt, why should I not? I set not[150] a mite by thy checking: What hast thou to do, and if I lose my coat? I will trill the bones, while I have one groat; And, when there is no more ink in the pen,[151] I will make a shift,[152] as well as ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley

... in the direction of Upton Wood, thoroughly enjoying their walk. Occasionally, they stopped to gather a few wild flowers, or listen to the joyous trill of a bird. They were at the edge of the wood, when Grace suddenly ...
— Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School • Jessie Graham Flower

... the part of birds to vary their music, how is it that there is still such a degree of uniformity, so that, as we have said, every species may be recognized by its notes? Why does every red-eyed vireo sing in one way, and every white-eyed vireo in another? Who teaches the young chipper to trill, and the young linnet to warble? In short, how do birds come by their music? Is it all a matter of instinct, inherited habit, or do they learn it? The answer appears to be that birds sing as children talk, by simple imitation. ...
— Birds in the Bush • Bradford Torrey

... plumes, the thrush clad all in brown, the robin jerking his spasmodic throat, the oriole drifting like a flake of fire, the jolly bobolink and his happy mate, the mocking-bird imitating the notes of all, the red-bird with his one sweet trill, and the busy little wren, are all making the trees in our front yard ring with their ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller

... the real music lessons, and taught him how to whistle and how to warble and trill. "Good Cheer! Good Cheer!" intoned the king. "Coo Cher! Coo Cher!" imitated the Cardinal. These songs were only studied repetitions, but there was a depth and volume in his voice that gave promise of future greatness, when age should have developed ...
— The Song of the Cardinal • Gene Stratton-Porter

... until now whole rooms, filled with ladies and gentlemen, are bodily carried up from the first story to the roof; a professional musician playing the while on the piano—not the old-fashioned thing our grandmothers used, but a huge instrument capable of giving forth all sounds of harmony from the trill of a nightingale to the thunders of an orchestra. And when you reach the roof of the hotel you find yourself in a glass-covered tropical forest, filled with the perfume of many flowers, and bright with the scintillating plumage of ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly

... thou, MUNATIUS, whether Fate ordain The Camp thy home, with glancing javelins bright; Or if the graces of that fair domain, Umbrageous Tivoli, thy steps invite; If trumpets sound the clang that Warriors love, Or round thee trill the choirings of the grove, In flowing bowls drown every vain regret, Enjoy the ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward

... beast in wild-wood still, To thunder-roll, to bugle-trill, To maiden singing on the hill, To every sound Thy voice, responsive, straight doth fill ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various

... dulcet notes inspire my rhyme: Each in your voice perfection seem,— Rare, rich, melodious. We might deem Some angel wandered from its sphere, So sweet your notes strike on the ear. In song or ballad, still we find Some beauties new to charm the mind. Trill on, sweet sisters from a golden shore; Emma and Anna, sing for us once more; Raise high your voices blending in accord: So shall your fame be ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter

... house. Great bronze butterflies fluttered in the sunshine, brilliant humming-birds plunged deep into the long trumpet-flowers; from the topmost bough of a locust, heavy with bloom, came the liquid trill ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston



Words linked to "Trill" :   pronounce, sing, articulate, enounce, enunciate, shake, musical note



Copyright © 2024 Free-Translator.com