"Listening" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... souls have place," is, with Browning, the condensed expression of an experience, a philosophy, and an art. Like the lovers of his lyric, he has renounced the selfish serenities of wild-wood and dream-palace; he has gone up and down among men, listening to that human music, and observing that human or divine comedy. He has sung what he has heard, and he has painted what he has seen. If it should be asked whether such work will live, there can be only one answer, and he ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... While the youth I define, With whom I in wedlock would class; And ye blooming fair, Lend a listening ear, To approve of the man ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous
... is irrefragable," as the great Oxford Sanskritist says. To which he is answered—"provided it does not clash with historical facts and ethnology." It may be—no doubt it is, as far as his knowledge goes—"the only evidence worth listening to with regard to ante-historical periods;" but when something of these alleged "prehistorical periods" comes to be known, and when what we think we know of certain supposed prehistoric nations is found diametrically opposed to his "evidence of language," the "Adepts" ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... by conversing in distinctly audible tones. Jammed in a doorway, between the persons who are trying to get in, and the people who would be only too glad to get out, is an Unsophisticated Guest who doesn't know a soul, and is consequently reduced to listening to the Recitation. This ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, July 18, 1891 • Various
... is one essential point for being prepared in other respects, and listening attentively to all the opponent states, is another. Still we may previously think of many particular incidents and prepare the mind for all emergencies, this being of special advantage in speaking, the thought being thereby the more easily ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... concealed from him what you made appear to me." "How came you to discover," replied she blushing, "that I acknowledged anything to Monsieur de Cleves?" "I learned it from yourself, Madam," replied he; "but that you may the better pardon the boldness I showed in listening to what you said, remember if I have made an ill use of what I heard, if my hopes rose upon it, or if I was the more encouraged to speak ...
— The Princess of Cleves • Madame de La Fayette
... Adolphus, such a declaration would have had the most powerful effects, and probably would have brought the wavering states back to their allegiance. But blinded by this unexpected turn of fortune, and infatuated by Spanish counsels, he anticipated a more brilliant issue from war, and, instead of listening to these propositions of an accommodation, he hastened to augment his forces. Spain, enriched by the grant of the tenth of the ecclesiastical possessions, which the pope confirmed, sent him considerable supplies, negociated ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... listening for two sounds—for the sound of wheels on the drive outside and for the noise of her husband's footsteps in the hall. Her dearest and oldest friend, a man who seemed almost indispensable to her living, would drive up in the rainy dusk ...
— England, My England • D.H. Lawrence
... standing near the dining-room door listening to the complaints of the students. The complaints that morning were especially emphatic and numerous, because the whole breakfast had been a failure. One of the girls who had failed to get any breakfast came out and went to the well ...
— Up From Slavery: An Autobiography • Booker T. Washington
... us, while at the same moment Diavolo and Evadne came round the corner of the house from the opposite direction and went to meet them. Evadne carried a parasol, but wore neither hat nor gloves. She looked very happy, listening ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... to see you at once," said Josiah, not listening to the criticism on his grammar, and ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... custom, to the counting-house. I still continued playing; and, turning to a sprightly lesson, I executed it with uncommon vivacity. I heard footsteps approach the door, and was soon convinced that Mr. Venables was listening; the consciousness only gave more animation to my fingers. He went down into the kitchen, and the cook, probably by his desire, came to me, to know what I would please to order for dinner. Mr. Venables came into the parlour again, with apparent carelessness. I ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... dream, meaning to let them rap until they tired of it. Suddenly a voice sounded through his defiant slumbers, clear and charming as a golden ray parting thick clouds. The next moment he found himself awake, bolt upright in the icy dusk of his room, listening. ...
— Blue-Bird Weather • Robert W. Chambers
... opportunity for Miss Gerty's introduction. Bob Apley, her cousin, stood very near her listening to the fun. He knew perfectly well how she longed for this gratification, and yet he would not give it to her now when he had such a golden opportunity. She had waited long enough for him to seek her out, but all in vain she resolved not to let this ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... west front are two feelings:—respect for the twelfth-century work, and passion for the rose fenestration; both subordinated to the demand for light. If it worries you to have to believe that these three things are in fact one; that the architect is listening, like the stone Abraham, for orders from the Virgin, while he caresses and sacrifices his child; that Mary and not her architects built this facade; if the divine intention seems to you a needless impertinence, you can soon get free from it by going to any of the later churches, ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... room. The stepmother and a group of friends hurried after, and the minister requested the people to remain quietly seated for a few minutes. The organ by this time had recovered its poise and was playing soft tender melodies, but the excited audience was not listening: ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... and with Sir J. Minnes and Sir W. Pen to White Hall in the latter's coach, where, when we come, we find the Duke at St. James's, whither he is lately gone to lodge. So walking through the Parke we saw hundreds of people listening at the Gravel-pits,—[Kensington]—and to and again in the Parke to hear the guns, and I saw a letter, dated last night, from Strowd, Governor of Dover Castle, which says that the Prince come thither the night before with his fleete, but that ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... hung a glorious atmosphere of detachment. These Jews, listening to the words that had come from the lips of the prophets in Israel, had been, on this day, thrown back thousands of years, to the time when the destruction of the temple was as real as the shattered spires and dome of the cathedral at Rheims. Old Ben Reitman, faint with fasting, was ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... made no complaint, nor gave any sign of pain but her silent tears. When her hair was cut, he tore open the top of the shirt, so as to uncover the shoulders, and finally bandaged her eyes, and lifting her face by the chin, ordered her to hold her head erect. She obeyed, unresisting, all the time listening to the doctor's words and repeating them from time to time, when they seemed suitable to her own condition. Meanwhile, at the back of the scaffold, on which the stake was placed, stood the executioner, glancing now and again at the folds of his cloak, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... corps went insane one dark night and craftily securing a rifle held up the first Englishman he found. He roundly berated the British officer with being the cause of the North Russian War on the Bolsheviki, told the puzzled but patiently listening officer to say a prayer and then suddenly blew off the poor man's head and himself went ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... relapsed into silence again. Jurgis had noticed that the beautiful young girl who sat by the center-table was listening with something of the same look that he himself had worn, the time when he had first discovered Socialism. Jurgis would have liked to talk to her, he felt sure that she would have understood him. Later on in the evening, when the group broke up, he heard Mrs. Fisher say ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... that of the young girl who organized our first really successful club of boys, holding their fascinated interest by the old chivalric tales, set forth so dramatically and vividly that checkers and jackstraws were abandoned by all the other clubs on Boys' Day, that their members might form a listening fringe to ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... to a great distance in search of plunder, and enter houses for the purpose of carrying off the farina or mandioca meal. The same naturalist relates that he was one night awoke by his servant telling him that rats were robbing the farina baskets. On listening, he was certain that the noise was unlike that made by rats. On going to the storeroom he there found a broad column of sauba ants, consisting of thousands of individuals, passing to and fro between the door and his baskets of meal. Most of those passing outwards were loaded each with a grain ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... mighty Mother, when he lay, When thy son lay, pierced by the shaft which flies In darkness? Where was lorn Urania When Adonais died? With veiled eyes, 'Mid listening Echoes, in her paradise 5 She sate, while one, with soft enamoured breath, Rekindled all the fading melodies With which, like flowers that mock the corse beneath, He had adorned and hid ...
— Adonais • Shelley
... in torturing me. I'm not a coward, Dr. Owen," Penelope lifted her head proudly, "for I truly have no fear of real danger that I can see and face squarely, but the unseen, the unknown——" She broke off suddenly, a strained, listening look on her face. Then she shivered though the glowing fire in the grate was making the room almost ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... his sight; but he gave no sign of being conscious of her presence. He was standing with his back to the mantel-piece, his arms crossed behind his head; there was a curious expression on his face, half-smile, half-sneer, but it was evident that he was merely looking and listening, not interfering with what ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... conscious of holding her attention, then after a few pages the story claimed all his, so that he read on for about half-an-hour without looking at her. When he did so he saw that she was not listening to him, but was watching something with strange eagerness. Such a fixed intent look was on her face that he was alarmed and sought the cause of it. Presently he found that her gaze was fixed on the movements of her pet dove which was in its cage hanging in the window. He spoke ...
— Lady Into Fox • David Garnett
... up my acquaintances and pleasures and seek the society of my friends. I have not the heart to join a conversation, but leave it to be carried on by others. My fixed attention and absorbed manner of listening convey the idea that I am deeply interested in what is being said, and he who undertakes to relate anything to me is so satisfied with my style of listening that he prolongs to infinity his monologue. Then my thoughts take flight and travel around the world; to the seas, archipelagoes, ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin
... have insisted, very justly, very wisely, and in the true spirit of modern democracy, that the conferences they have been holding with the Teutonic and Turkish statesmen should be held within open, not closed, doors, and all the world has been audience, as was desired. To whom have we been listening, then? To those who speak the spirit and intention of the Resolutions of the German Reichstag of the ninth of July last, the spirit and intention of the liberal leaders and parties of Germany, or to those who resist and defy that spirit and intention ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson
... and Mrs. Ambrose were together in the library downstairs, while John Short was waking from the short sleep he had enjoyed, and while the squire was listening in the study to Mr. Booley's graphic account of the convict's escape, Mrs. Goddard was alone with her husband, watching every movement and listening intently to every moaning breath ...
— A Tale of a Lonely Parish • F. Marion Crawford
... It so happens that I must go on duty in a few moments, and exchange this bright scene for a dim hospital ward; but I love my calling, Roger, and never has it seemed so noble as on this evening while listening to the physician who addressed us. There is such a deep satisfaction in relieving pain and rescuing life, or at least in trying to do so; and then one often has a chance to say words that may bring lasting comfort. Although I am without a ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... for the safety of a country to which he felt himself attached by new and stronger ties. Being invited by the Assembly of the States to give his opinion on the terms offered by the allied monarchs, he declared that their acceptance would entail upon them certain ruin, and that the very listening to such was pernicious in the highest degree to affairs, as tending to disunite and ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... thousand harvests burn, A thousand villages to ashes turn. To the thick woods the woolly flocks retreat, And mixed with bellowing herds confusedly bleat. Their trembling lords the common shade partake, And cries of infants found in every brake. The listening soldier fixed in sorrow stands, Loth to obey his leader's just commands. The leader grieves, by generous pity swayed, To see his just ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... gateway of the castle, whence he made his way to the village street. Here he spent the rest of the evening, and he made very excellent use of his time, though he passed the greater part of it in the parlour of the "Hen and Chickens," drinking very weak brandy-and-water, and listening to the conversation of the gentry who patronized ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... making abundant fun for his comrades, who all crowded around, listening with delight to the investigation. Even Captain Edney smiled, as he gave a glance ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... in righteous wrath, but Arnold Carruth was the angrier of the two. "Mean little cat yourself, listening," said he. His curls seemed to rise ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... of the lecture for the class recitation to which you were accustomed in high school. This substitution requires that you develop a new technic of learning, for the mental processes involved in an oral recitation are different from those used in listening to a lecture. The lecture system implies that the lecturer has a fund of knowledge about a certain field and has organized this knowledge in a form that is not duplicated in the literature of the subject. ...
— How to Use Your Mind • Harry D. Kitson
... caught the interest of several loitering waiters, who were listening open-mouthed. Even Roddy seemed a bit startled, and for once forgot to make business with his newspaper; but his wondering stare ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... church service during the South African War some recruits were listening to the chaplain in church saying, "Let them slay the Boers as Joshua smote the Egyptians," when a recruit whispered ...
— Best Short Stories • Various
... those before her, and a world in which such suffering as hers could be; a world infinite both ways. The porch gate was open because the organist was about to practise, and in another instant she was listening to the Kyrie from Beethoven's Mass in C. She knew it; Frank had tried to give her some notion of it on the piano, and since she had been in London she had heard it at St Mary's, Moorfields. She broke down and wept, but there was ...
— Clara Hopgood • Mark Rutherford
... can he see That has no eyes to see? And as for music, He paid with empty wonder for the pangs Of his infrequent forced endurance of it; And having had no pleasure, paid no more For needless immolation, or for the sight Of those who heard what he was never to hear. To see them listening was itself enough To make him suffer; and to watch worn eyes, On other days, of strangers who forgot Their sorrows and their failures and themselves Before a few mysterious odds and ends Of marble carted from the Parthenon — And all for seeing what ...
— The Three Taverns • Edwin Arlington Robinson
... with him. When I first came to Lexington, my boy Carter (just four years old then) used to go with me to chapel service when it was my turn to officiate. The general would tell him that he must always sit by him; and it was a scene for a painter, to see the great chieftain reverentially listening to the truths of God's word, and the little boy nestling close to him. One Sunday our Sunday-school superintendent told the children that they must bring in some new scholars, and that they must bring old people as well ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... the girl. I trembled while listening for the reply. "O Lordy! you berry innocent gal, make 'pear! S'pose I no see you write him name in dat ere book you got? S'pose I no see you make him letter in de sand, wha we camp on Akansaw? You scratch am name ebberywha; you got um on de big box inside Mass' ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... Florence was said, at the moment, to be not at home, though she was up-stairs, looking at four dozen new pocket-handkerchiefs which had just come from the pocket-handkerchief merchant, with the letters F.A. upon them. She had much more pleasure in looking at them than she would have had in listening to the congratulations of ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... a hillcrest he again halted and looked back, listening. Unimpeded by trees, the thick air holding all sound close to the earth, he could hear far-distant noises. The bark of a dog came clear—that was from Alec Porter's ranch on the slopes toward the valley. Facing ahead he caught, faint and ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... walk again pretty soon," said Frank, after they had remained another minute or so in a listening attitude. "You sit here and watch by this window, while ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish
... carried her tenderly from the starlit road to a large rock jutting out from the hillside. Here, in the shadow on the farther side, they lay down, and the girl fell at once into the deep sleep of utter bodily fatigue. The man lay open-eyed clasping her to him, his brain on fire with freedom, listening with joy to the cries of the wandering wild ...
— Six Women • Victoria Cross
... answered candidly. "When they are so far down the room one cannot hear a word. In the affair of the pistoles they stood near the cabinet at this end. One could not help but hear. As for listening at keyholes, ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... Often, with trembling lips, she raised her eyes to heaven, itself not more deeply blue; often she crossed her hands upon her breast, as in adoration and prayer; often she raised her head like one listening eagerly for a calling voice. Now and then midst his slow utterance, Joseph turned to look at her, and, catching the expression kindling her face as with light, forgot his theme, and with bowed head, ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks
... Socrates, which Critias heard from Solon; and I noticed when listening to you yesterday, how close the resemblance was between your city and citizens and the ancient Athenian State. But I would not speak at the time, because I wanted to refresh my memory. I had heard the old man when I was a child, and though I could not remember the whole of our yesterday's ...
— Timaeus • Plato
... confided. 'It is marvellous to me,' wrote Dr. Jeune to him (Dec. 21, 1853), 'how you can give attention so minute to university affairs at such a crisis. Do great things become to great men from the force of habit, what their ordinary cares are to ordinary persons?' As he began, so he advanced, listening to everybody, arguing with everybody, flexible, persistent, clear, practical, fervid, unconquerable. 'I fear,' Lord John Russell wrote to him (March 27), 'my mind is exclusively occupied with the war and the Reform bill, and yours with university reform.' Perhaps, ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... Mr. Brimsdown found himself listening anxiously for the porter's reply. By all the laws of Romance he should have had an old mother in a clean and humble home who would have been delighted to give the girl shelter for the sight of her pretty face. But pretty girls are plentiful in London, and kind-hearted old women are rare. The porter ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees
... the escape wheel would not encounter the impulse jewel at all, but fall into the passing hollow n; but if we give the balance a high velocity, the tooth would again encounter and act upon the jewel in the proper manner. Experienced adjusters of chronometers can tell by listening if the escape-wheel tooth attacks the impulse jewel properly, i.e., when both are moving with similar velocities. The true sound indicating correct action is only given when the balance has its maximum arc of vibration, ...
— Watch and Clock Escapements • Anonymous
... found themselves front to front near Heurtebise. According even to the admission of the enemy, our forces were so superior to those of the Prince of Orange, that we must have gained the victory if we had attacked. But the King, after listening to the opinions of his generals, some for, and some against giving battle, decided for the latter, turned tail, and the engagement was talked of no more. The army was much discontented. Everybody wished for battle. The fault ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... necessary to explain what I mean. It is that you do not choose to understand—you are far too clever. Why is it, then, that you bore yourself by regarding Institutions and listening to sermons in your jeunesse? It is all very well for Mademoiselle Susan, but you are not created for a religieuse. And again, it pleases you to spend hours with the stockbroker, who is as lacking in esprit as the bull of Joshua. He ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... point Alric, in his retreat among the bushes, also blushed scarlet, for it only then flashed upon him that he had been acting the mean part of an eavesdropper, and had been listening to converse which he should not have heard. Instead, therefore, of carrying out his original intention, he scrambled into the path with as much noise as possible, and coughed, as ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... while since, young one," Warrington said, who had been listening to his friend's confessions neither without sympathy nor scorn, for his mood led him to indulge in both, "you asked me why I remained out of the strife of the world, and looked on at the great labor of my neighbor without ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... did compel him or persuade him to it, but voluntarily of his own mind, contrary to his God's command: so then, God by suffering sin to break into the world, did it rather in judgment, as disliking Adam's act, and as a punishment to man for listening to the tempter; and as a discovery of his anger at man's disobedience; than to prove that he is guilty of the misery of ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... was a bad place for him. He had been to the spring for water, drinking enough to last him a good while, and then he had made a race against time for the nearest bushes. He lay now with his sharp-pointed, wolfish ears pricked forward, listening to the tokens of another ...
— Two Arrows - A Story of Red and White • William O. Stoddard
... St Matthew. This miracle also was done in Capernaum, called his own city. Pharisees and doctors of the law from every town in the country, hearing of his arrival, had gathered to him, and were sitting listening to his teaching. There was no possibility of getting near him, and the sick man's friends had carried him up to the roof, taken off the tiles, and let him down into the presence. It should not be their fault if the poor fellow was not ...
— Miracles of Our Lord • George MacDonald
... then continued upstairs amongst the bed-rooms by Mary and Molly, accompanied by the three little girls, who marched behind their elders in silent awe, Jupp and Joe remaining down in the hall and listening breathlessly for some announcement to come ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson
... moment vexed, irresolute, listening. She heard no sound. At last she deliberately stooped down and applied her eye to ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, Issue 2, February, 1864 • Various
... Lady Capilla was unwilling to reciprocate the passion of Champou the man, she was not averse to quiet interviews with Champou the Prince. In the course of one of these (see my picture), as she sat listening to his carefully-rehearsed and really artistic avowals, with her tail hanging out of the ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... a "bummel" by himself. In the evening, as we sat listening to the band at the Belvedere, Harris said, a propos of nothing in particular, "These Germans have no sense ...
— Three Men on the Bummel • Jerome K. Jerome
... prospect is beautiful, and the grandeur of the mountain outlines unsurpassed. There was such a repose and quiet here at this hour, as if the very hill-sides were enjoying the scene, and we passed slowly along, looking back over the country we had traversed, and listening to the evening song of the robin, we could not help contrasting the equanimity of nature with the bustle and impatience of man. His words and actions presume always a crisis near at hand, but she is ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... trips Mus-kin-gum would teach his little son how to distinguish one tree from another by examining its leaves; how to tell the name of a bird by listening to its call; how to read the signs of the Indians; how to read from their tracks the whereabouts of the enemy, the trail of the animals, and the secrets of the woods—the song of the birds, the whispering of the trees, and the murmuring of the brook; ...
— How Ethel Hollister Became a Campfire Girl • Irene Elliott Benson
... we are only capable of wearing pretty clothes and listening to pretty speeches, and that anything else is beyond our ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... soon after, and the occupants of the rough tent prepared for a good night's rest; but it was a long time in coming to the cousins, whose nerves had been too much jarred for them to follow the example of their three companions. And they lay listening to the many sounds about, principal among which was the barking and fighting of the sledge-dogs; but at last they dropped into a troubled slumber, one in which it seemed to Dallas that he was lying upon his hard waterproof sheet in a nightmare-like dream, watching ...
— To Win or to Die - A Tale of the Klondike Gold Craze • George Manville Fenn
... finished, during the reading of the third book, and several more were on the way. George had written the most delightful letters, each of which was read to his eagerly-listening sisters and brothers several times, for they were never tired of hearing about ...
— The Two Story Mittens and the Little Play Mittens - Being the Fourth Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... Yes, I see," said Thresk, but he spoke slowly and there was just audible a little inflection of doubt in his voice. Stella was listening for it; she heard it when her two ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... sitting-room behind the parlor now caught his attention, and listening he soon became aware that Miss Walton was teaching the children. "She has just the voice for a 'schoolmarm,'" he thought—"quick, ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... next my heart, And gently offered to impart Thy sorrows to my listening ear, Like a half-shy, half-trusting child, The while my lute, in wood-notes wild, Thine accents echoed far ...
— Undine - I • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... Listening, they heard the servant open the door, and then the sound of Jadwin's voice and the clank of his cane in the porcelain cane rack. But still Laura could not be persuaded to go down. No, she was going to bed; she had neuralgia; she was too nervous to so much as think. Her gown was "Dutchy." And ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris
... of the great angels traced upon the walls of the Chapel of S. Sigismund in the Cathedral of Rimini, to follow the undulations of their drapery that seems to float, to feel the dignified urbanity of all their gestures, is like listening to one of those clear early Italian compositions for the voice, which surpasses in suavity of tone and grace of movement all that Music in her full-grown vigour has produced. There is indeed something infinitely ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... streets, with my violin under my shoulder, drawing from it whatever music my heart desired. Occasionally I would pause at some convenient spot, lean against a wall, and give myself up to improvisation. At such times a little cluster of auditors would gradually collect in front of me, listening for the most part silently, or occasionally giving vent to low grunts and interjections of approval. One evening, I remember, a young woman joined the group, though keeping somewhat in the background; ...
— David Poindexter's Disappearance and Other Tales • Julian Hawthorne
... come," he exclaimed, eagerly grasping my hand and pressing it in his. "I bless you, my daughter,—and may God forever bless you for listening to a father's prayer!" ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... deeming that listening had been carried far enough, decided to leave the tribunal altogether, and to resume the post which he had formerly occupied as Pensionary ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... Brockway, the political secretary of the Independent Labor Party in England, writes in this manner: "The hymns of the Church are obsolete; the sermons are very rarely worth listening to; the forms of worship are unrelated to life; and such inspiration as comes from the devotion and beauty of some church services and buildings can be found ever more intimately and fully in the ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... meat?" "No." "Any flour or grain?" "No." "Any chickens?" "No." "Any eggs?" "No." "What do you live on?" "Nada" (nothing). The utter indifference of this boy, and the tone of his answer "Nada," attracted the attention of Colonel Mason, who had been listening to our conversation, and who knew enough of Spanish to catch the meaning, and he exclaimed with some feeling, "So we get nada for our breakfast." I felt mortified, for I had held out the prospect of a splendid breakfast of meat and tortillas with rice, chickens, eggs, ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... had a way of listening which made me yearn to tell him every insignificant detail of my life. I knew that he was a man of national reputation, but I hardly cared for that, since he was the pleasantest companion I had ever met. I found myself gossiping to him about our village worthies, making him laugh ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... other members of the household made amends, and she left tolerably well satisfied with her work. She had not been gone long when Peter was summoned by a sharp ring to his master's room, and found him sitting very erect in his chair, listening intently to sounds overhead, where there was the scurrying of feet mingled with Amy's voice and that of her maid, as box after box was ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... my bedroom! You have been listening, dear? But you are so emancipated. Ah, well! so our pure and beautiful friendship has been misinterpreted, bespattered! Just because you wear a morning wrapper, and have lived here alone for a year, people with coarse souls and ignoble eyes make unpleasant remarks! ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, March 21, 1891 • Various
... had some qualms about listening, but he soon dismissed them. If these men were open and aboveboard, why were they whispering in the dimly lighted bunk house? Whitey had never been able to overcome the first distrust he had felt for String ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... sometimes came near to the fire and joined in the conversation, though they more frequently sat at a little distance, listening to what was going forward, and often not a little amused by the ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... said that the Big Bear lived in a cavern away up in the mountain. She said that he kept watch of the game and that sometimes he shut the game in his cavern. Antler said she had often heard the Big Bear above the voice of the storm. And Fleetfoot, listening for his voice, thought he heard it in the wailing of ...
— The Later Cave-Men • Katharine Elizabeth Dopp
... walked in front; and I followed behind, bringing my attention to bear upon keeping in step. Rearranging my stride now and then, I marched through the empty corridors, listening to the drone of masters' voices teaching in their class-rooms, and wondering at the loudness of our footsteps. The sight of the prefects' door gave me ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... certain kindred Jewish sects, which were subject to Greek influences, such as the Gnostics and the Cainites. And upon them Philo appears to be pouring his wrath when he exclaims: "How have you the effrontery to go on making and listening to fine professions about piety and the honor of God, when you have within you, forsooth, the mind equal to God that comprehends all human things, and can combine good and evil portions, giving to some a mixed, to others an unmixed lot? And when anybody ...
— Philo-Judaeus of Alexandria • Norman Bentwich
... embarking on board the s.s. Godavery—his impedimenta increased by three ponies—the traveller steamed again for Singapore. The day after his arrival there he started for home, and some thirty-six hours later was once more seated in his verandah, listening all alone to the chanting songs of his Malay neighbours in the plain below. The moon was bright, and Pura ...
— From Jungle to Java - The Trivial Impressions of a Short Excursion to Netherlands India • Arthur Keyser
... of the living-room, listening with pleasure and smiling his brigand's smile. He was not as bad as you might think. He did mean to let her in eventually. His smile and his pleasure sprang purely from the fact that his lesson was so successful. With this in her mind, she wouldn't ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... thrown their cigarettes to the ground, scrambled to their feet. Johnny, sober-faced and round-eyed, was gazing intently up at the man; but Albert, feigning indifference, stood digging his toe into the earth. He was listening, however. ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... of the dispute had waked the patient, who, learning the cause of the disturbance, calmly begged they would give themselves no concern about him, but let him die in peace. The domestics, who had been for some time listening to the dispute, on hearing the scuffle, ran in and parted the angry combatants, who, like an abscess just lanced, were giving vent to all the malignant humours that had ...
— A Voyage to the Moon • George Tucker
... us. During tea-time the saloon was usually illuminated by forked lightning. The evenings we spent in baling out the boat, after which we took it in turns to go into the kitchen and warm ourselves. At eight we supped, and from then until it was time to go to bed we sat wrapped up in rugs, listening to the roaring of the thunder, and the howling of the wind, and the lashing of the waves, and wondering whether the boat would hold ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... he sat listening to the proceedings at the adjourned inquest next day that the whole story of what was now world-famous as the Middle Temple Murder Case was being reiterated before him for the thousandth time. There was not a detail of the story with which he ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... the Cock, with lively din, Scatters the rear of darkness thin, And to the stack, or the barn door, Stoutly struts his dames before; Oft listening how the hounds and horns Cheerly rouse the slumbering morn, From the side of some hoar hill, Through the high ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... talons in some part of me every moment. After waiting in this prostrate situation a few seconds I heard a violent but unusual noise, different from any sound that had ever before assailed my ears; nor is it at all to be wondered at, when I inform you from whence it proceeded: after listening for some time I ventured to raise my head and look round, when, to my unspeakable joy, I perceived the lion had, by the eagerness with which he sprung at me, jumped forward as I fell, into the crocodile's mouth! which, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... the girl a lifetime dragged by. Listening, she heard the opening of the front door, the murmur of low, speaking voices,—a murmur ceasing as abruptly as it began; then, wonder of wonders, the door closed again with a snap and a retreating step sounded once, twice, as when it had come, on the floor of the porch. Following, she marked ...
— The Dominant Dollar • Will Lillibridge
... Mother, when he lay, 10 When thy Son lay, pierced by the shaft which flies In darkness? where was lorn Urania When Adonais died? With veiled eyes, 'Mid listening Echoes, in her Paradise She sate, while one, with soft enamoured breath, 15 Rekindled all the fading melodies, With which, like flowers that mock the corse beneath, He had adorned and hid the coming bulk ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... much in obedience, as in surprise and fear: for on the raising of the hand, he became sensible of confused noises in the air; incoherent sounds of lamentation and regret; wailings inexpressibly sorrowful and self-accusatory. The spectre, after listening for a moment, joined in the mournful dirge; and floated out upon the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... His peculiar way of listening to conversation—absorbing everything and giving nothing out—made one uncomfortable. Josephine, seven years his senior, did not like the youth. She had had a wider experience and been better brought up than he, and she let him know it, but he ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard
... picture in which the little 'piou-pious' of the modern army advance, under the flag on which are inscribed the battles of the past; while the Old Guard rises from the earth to reinforce their ranks, and the ghostly figure of Jeanne d'Arc, symbolizing the spirit of France, leads on to victory. Listening as he talked, his hearers became infected with Sir Charles's spirit, and thinking of the past, looking to the future, he so kindled them that when he closed the book they all were ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... waked to the knowledge that a casement window was pounding somewhere in the house. For a while I lay and listened in that helpless, exaggerated resentment one feels at such a time. I'd drop off, get nearly to sleep, only to be jerked broad awake again by the thudding. Listening carefully I decided that the bothersome window was in Worth's room, and finally I got up sense and spunk enough to roll out of bed, stick my feet into slippers, and sneak over with the intention of ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... comrade rejected. In the evening Monty and Tom sat together at the door of the cabin, and conversed in low tones of any subject that happened to interest them for the time being. Monty set forth his political and social views, and the cat, listening with attention, mewed assent, or more rarely expressed an opposite opinion by the short, sharp mew, ...
— Lords of the Housetops - Thirteen Cat Tales • Various
... character, and formed the staple of his sermons. He had no patience with the refinements and reticences of modern theology, and in his later years observed with scorn and sorrow the progress of education and scholarly training in his own communion. After listening one day to a prayer from a young minister which shone more by its correctness than its unction, he could not refrain from saying, "Brother—, three prayers like that would freeze hell over!"— a consummation which did not commend itself to him as desirable. He often visited the cities of the Atlantic ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... the country summer Were well nigh over. 'T is perhaps a pity, When nature wears the gown that doth become her, To lose those best months in a sweaty city, And wait until the nightingale grows dumber, Listening debates not very wise or witty, Ere patriots their true country can remember;— But there 's no shooting (save grouse) ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... culture which distinguished him through life. In after years, when the cares of his numerous engagements fell thick upon him, we hear from Vespasiano that he still prosecuted his studies, reading Aristotle's Ethics, Politics, and Physics, listening to the works of S. Thomas Aquinas and Scotus read aloud, perusing at one time the Greek fathers and at another the Latin historians.[2] How profitably he spent his day at Urbino may be gathered from this account of his biographer: 'He ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... they were silent, listening to the call of an oven-bird far back in the spring trees. At last Strang got up, filled his pipe, and puffed at it savagely before he said, "Of course the whole thing's damned nonsense." He repeated that a little brutally to his wife's silence before in softened voice he added, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... about a mile before we reached the "Dugget mine," but our tramp was beguiled in listening to the peculiar conversation of our guide, who jerked out his sentences and words as though he was firing them at a whole regiment of refractory miners, and wished to make as short work as ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... witnessing the daily apparelling of Eliza and Georgiana, and seeing them descend to the drawing-room, dressed out in thin muslin frocks and scarlet sashes, with hair elaborately ringletted; and afterwards, in listening to the sound of the piano or the harp played below, to the passing to and fro of the butler and footman, to the jingling of glass and china as refreshments were handed, to the broken hum of conversation as the drawing-room door opened and closed. When tired of this occupation, I would retire ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... listening at the door? Wait a bit. What have you come about? I promised you something, didn't I? Ah, bah! I remember, to meet 'our fellows.' Let us go. I am delighted. You couldn't have thought of anything more appropriate." He snatched ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... "Oh, listening-in," he exclaimed, and fell silent. Facing about, he gazed southward to where, less than a mile away, sparkled in the bright July sunshine the clear waters of ...
— The Radio Boys with the Revenue Guards • Gerald Breckenridge
... first. The sickly gas flame was there on duty, undaunted, waiting for the end of the world to come and put it out. I think that the black-and-white hall surprised Ortega. I had closed the front door without noise and stood for a moment listening, while he glanced about furtively. There were only two other doors in the hall, right and left. Their panels of ebony were decorated with bronze applications in the centre. The one on the left was of course ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... and approached the stile, on the other side of which Emilie Schomberg still leant, listening to the fisherman's talk ...
— Emilie the Peacemaker • Mrs. Thomas Geldart
... cocoon turned it end for end to learn if the imago it contained were alive. Then Ammon took back the cocoon to smooth the edges. Mrs. Comstock gave them one long look as they stood there, and returned to her dandelions. While she worked she paused occasionally, listening intently. Presently they came down the creek, the man carrying the cocoon as if it were a jewel, while Elnora made her way along the bank, taking a lesson in casting. Her face was flushed with excitement, her eyes shining, the bushes taking liberties with her hair. For a picture of perfect loveliness ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter
... ten minutes longer for me," she said to herself. And that idea pleased her also as she walked slowly through the crowd. She fancied that she saw him growing impatient, looking at the clock, opening the window, listening at the door, sitting down for a few moments, getting up again, and not daring to smoke, as she had forbidden him to do so when she was coming to him, and throwing despairing looks at his box ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... round the open door an hour after, listening to a whippoorwill, and watching the slow moon rise over a hilly range just east of Centreville, when that elvish little "week! week!" piped out of the wood that lay behind ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... up in the chocolate tree, listening to one of the stories that Honey the gardener's son was so fond of telling her; and Honey the gardener's son lay on the grass below, and tried to catch the chocolate drops with which she was ...
— All the Way to Fairyland - Fairy Stories • Evelyn Sharp
... night and of the forest. It was before the Thenardier that she recoiled. She resumed her path to the spring, and began to run. She emerged from the village, she entered the forest at a run, no longer looking at or listening to anything. She only paused in her course when her breath failed her; but she did not halt in her advance. She went straight before ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... his sheep. All at once the sound of music fell upon his ear. It was no such music as shepherds play, but sweeter and richer than any he had ever heard before. He looked to see where the sound came from. Ah! who was that sitting on the hilltop, with the sheep around him listening to his music? Surely it was not ...
— Old Greek Stories • James Baldwin
... the passage she stood a moment, listening. All the ways of the house gave upon the passage in a space so narrow that by stretching out one arm she ...
— The Three Sisters • May Sinclair
... the next room—eager voices talked; hurried footsteps moved in it—an interval passed, and the doctor returned. "Was she listening?" whispered Mr. Neal, in German. "The women are restoring her," the doctor whispered back. "She has heard it all. In God's name, what are we to do next?" Before it was possible to reply, Mr. Armadale ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... recorded instance where the uplifted hand of murder has been paralyzed, or the innocent have been shielded by God. Thousands of crimes are committed every day, and God has no time to prevent them. He is too busy numbering hairs and matching sparrows; He is listening for blasphemy; He is looking for persons who laugh at priests; He is examining baptismal registers; He is watching professors in colleges who begin to doubt the geology of Moses or the astronomy of Joshua. All kinds of ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll |
