"Mute" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... roofs or miniature domes, small, secret doorways, tiny windows like eyes narrowed for spying, and overhanging upper stories supported on close-set, projecting sticks of mellow brown which meant great age. Minarets sprang up in mute protest against the infidel, appealing to the sky. All that was left of old Algiers tried to boast, in forced dumbness, of past glories, of every charm the beautiful, fierce city of pirates must have possessed ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... I asked, looking curiously at this mute, dull-eyed black, so different from our grinning ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... like that of a spoiled baby. I looked down into her prostrate lover's eyes and smiled. 'I will not hurt you,' I said. 'Had she not consented, you could not have gained the victory. All I ask of you is to remain here for a few moments longer.' He stared, but was mute. I bound him hand and foot so that he could not stir. Then I took my knife and went to her. Her blue eyes glared wide—imploringly she turned them upon me—and ever she wrung her small hands and shivered and moaned. I plunged the keen bright blade deep through her soft white flesh—her lover cried ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... seems to me as if it were sinful thus to bury myself alive. My voice is no longer heard in song, and much more that dwells within me has become mute. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... peril; The wish is in my mind That I had fired the jungle, And left no leaf behind,— Burnt all bamboos to ashes, And made their music mute,— To save thee from the magic ...
— Last Poems • Laurence Hope
... there were no signs of tears upon the elder woman's face. Rigid, white, and hard, it looked almost as if it were carved in stone; a mute image of misery too deep for tears. There were lines upon her brow that had never been seen there before; her lips were tightly compressed; her eyes fiercely bright. She had thrown a black shawl over her head on coming away from the drawing-room into the draughty corridors. This shawl, ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... his haste to leave the spot. Arnold looked quickly at Harry and exchanged questioning glances, but spoke no word. Harry's hands were busy with the mute language, however. ...
— Boy Scouts in Southern Waters • G. Harvey Ralphson
... drawn from her that frantic negative Maitland had heard, to have been responsible for the overturning of the chair,—an accident that seemed to argue something in the nature of a physical struggle; the chair itself still lay upon its side, mute witness to a hasty and careless ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... promised the Queen to go; and all that we could get out of him was that he would defend me in Parliament better than I could defend myself. It is to be observed that though he chattered to us like a magpie in private, yet in public he was as mute as a fish. A surgeon who was in the Archbishop's service, going to visit him, commended him for his courage in resisting the importunities of his nephew, who, said he, had a mind to bury him alive, and encouraged him to rise ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... mechanics, of boys and women, of beggars and slaves, the last of whom might sometimes introduce the missionaries into the rich and noble families to which they belonged. These obscure teachers (such was the charge of malice and infidelity) are as mute in public as they are loquacious and dogmatical in private. Whilst they cautiously avoid the dangerous encounter of philosophers, they mingle with the rude and illiterate crowd, and insinuate themselves into those minds, whom their ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... talking now and as she talked she lifted her eyes. Nathaniel pressed his face close against the window, and smiled. That would let her know he was a friend. She seemed to answer him with a little nod and he fancied that her eyes glowed with a mute appeal for his assistance. But only for an instant, and then they turned again to the king. Not until that moment did Nathaniel notice upon her bosom a ...
— The Courage of Captain Plum • James Oliver Curwood
... her in mute sympathy while he finished his cigarette. There was a certain depression in his attitude of which presently she became aware. She summoned her resolution and turned herself from the great vision that so ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... the strange weapon stared up at them. Evidence, mute evidence, and yet its very existence said more than a thousand words. It was there. It ...
— Gold in the Sky • Alan Edward Nourse
... then throwing his prayers from him, he would clutch his rug in his fingers, and like a child try to double it up, or pick it to pieces. After snatching up his rug and throwing it away again and again, he would suddenly resume his prayers and erect posture, and stand mute, gazing through the aperture that admitted the light of day for upwards of a minute. This scene of imbecility and indecision, of horrible prostration of mind, ceasing in some degree when the ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... laughed joyously. "Enjoy myself! Like you!" he cried. "Man, you're as doleful as a mute at a laird's funeral! What's come over you? I know what it is. You go and take a ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... struggling and writhing with all his power; but the flailing went on, bat—bat—bat—with blows that might have disturbed an elephant. Ted's feelings became too strong for words; he started to howl, and the night re-echoed with the cries of the outraged bushranger. The rest of the gang stood mute, staring at this shocking scene, amazed and deeply offended. It was all so incongruous, so utterly opposed to rule and precedent; they could scarcely believe their senses. Dick was ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... youthful lords to roam? Oh had I stayed, and said my prayers at home! 'Twas this, the morning omens seemed to tell, Thrice from my trembling hand the patch-box fell; The tottering china shook without a wind, Nay, Poll sat mute, and Shock was most unkind! A sylph, too, warned me of the threats of fate, In mystic visions, now believed too late! See the poor remnants of these slighted hairs! My hands shall rend what even thy rapine spares: These in two sable ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley
... with awe. They showed by the quiet way they reached for the hymn-books, the reverent bowing of their heads for the final prayer, that they had all felt the power of Christ with the speaker. They lingered, many of them, and came up, pressing about him, just to touch his hand and make mute appeal with their troubled eyes. Some to ask him eagerly for reassurance of what he had been saying; others to thank him for the story. They were so humble, so sincere, so eager, these common people, like the ones of old who crowded around the Master and heard him gladly. ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... his brains upon the wall," said the veteran salesman of the National Academy, and there they remain without explanation or defense. The crowd as it passes, enjoys or jeers, as the ideas of this mute language are comprehended or confounded. Art requires no apology and asks none; all she requests is that those who would affect her must know the principles upon which she works. An age of altruism should be able to insure to the artist sufficient culture in ...
— Pictorial Composition and the Critical Judgment of Pictures • Henry Rankin Poore
... interest in the choice of a play for the theatricals, and could remember and find parallel passages; but alongside of these surviving powers, were lapses as remarkable, she misbehaved like a child, and a servant had to sit with her at table. To see her so sitting, speaking with the tones of a deaf-mute not always to the purpose, and to remember what she had been, was a moving appeal to all who knew her. Such was the pathos of these two old people in their affliction, that even the reserve of cities was melted and the neighbours vied in sympathy ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his forehead the tiny handkerchief drenched with the tears of the one beautiful woman that disinterestedly had loved him; the one that, forced from his last bedside, had refused a casket filled with gold and had left behind this final, mute and eloquent token of ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... it is not orderly in its arrangement or comprehensive in its contents. It is devoid of anything in the nature of a bill of rights,[461] and concerning the sovereignty of the people it has nothing to say. Even in respect to many essential aspects of governmental organization and practice it is mute. It contains no provision respecting annual budgets, and it leaves untouched the entire field of the judiciary. The instrument lays down only certain broad lines of organization; the rest it leaves to be supplied through the channels ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... a lady said to a small wit, "Come, Mr. ——, tell us a lively anecdote," and the poor fellow was mute during the remainder of the evening. "Favor me with your company on Wednesday evening, you are such a lion," said a weak party-giver to a young author. "I thank you," replied the wit; "but on that evening I am engaged to eat fire at the Countess of ——, and ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... dress, and the casket which she instinctively held in her hand, Elizabeth naturally conjectured that the beautiful, but mute figure which she beheld was a performer in one of the various theatrical pageants which had been placed in different situations to surprize her with their homage; and that the poor player, overcome with awe at her presence, had either forgot the part assigned her, or lacked courage ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... commiseration; "I would pity you if I durst; but I repeat, my life, and my husband's, and my children, who are now near Hermitage, would all be sacrificed to the rage of Lord Soulis. You must be content to submit to his will." Helen closed her hands over her face in mute despair, and the woman went on: "And as for the matter of your making such lamentations about your father, if he be as little your friend as your mother is you have not much cause to grieve ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... precious memory, at least—or she dies. Rose had hers. She hugged it, close. The L trains roared by, not thirty feet from her kitchen door. Alley and yard and street sent up their noises to her. The life of Chicago's millions yelped at her heels. On Rose's face was the vague, mute look of the woman whose days are ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... there was a mute eloquence about their looks and gestures which it was impossible to misunderstand. Every eye was fixed upon Mademoiselle Marguerite with an almost ferocious expression. She knew it only too well; but, sublime in her energy, ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... no light save what fell through a hole no bigger than a crown-piece; and here my daughter sat upon her bed and wept. Any one may guess that I straightway began to weep too, and was no better able to speak than she. We thus lay mute in each other's arms for a long time, until I at last begged her to forgive me for my letter, but of the Sheriff his message I said nought, although I had purposed so to do. But before long we heard the Sheriff himself call down into the vault from above, "What (and here he gave ...
— The Amber Witch • Wilhelm Meinhold
... best friends, as in the days of Kalevala, and usually is possessed of a ready tongue. The puhemies still plays a very important rle, for not only does he ask for the girl's hand (while the suitor sits like a mute), but he is obliged to help at the wedding ceremony and feast, and also has to provide, from his own purse, brandy and coffee for ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... seconds, that mute and motionless duel, then very suddenly from a wholly unexpected quarter there came an interruption. Columbus, sensing trouble, pushed his stout person between the two men and leapt whining upon Dick, pawing at him imploringly with almost ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... He stopped hard by me, and asked if I knew who he was? My astonishment had disconcerted me so much that I did not hear his question, which he repeated with a volley of oaths and threats; but I remained as mute as before. ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... however, again, in her way, all timorously and tenderly, has never mentioned it: any more than she has ever mentioned her own, which she would think quite indecent. This is precisely one of the things that, while it passes between us as a mute assurance, makes me feel myself more than the others verily HER child: more even than poor little Peg at the present ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo
... more of mute and agonised suspense, and men's fingers tightened their grip on the revolvers. Then the upturned straining eyes looked upon such a sight as human eyes will never see again save perchance those which, in the ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... harp, woke dulcimer and flute,— Then prone in dust fell prince and peer, in lowly worship mute! The wise, the gifted, and the great, the lordly and the base Before the image bent the knee, and bowed in dust ...
— Poems of the Heart and Home • Mrs. J.C. Yule (Pamela S. Vining)
... midnight stars, none of the fearful dumbness of the desert, that muteness without bound or break, eternal—none of these qualities in the sweet silence of October. I have listened to all of these, and found them answering to mute tongues within my own soul, deep unto deep; but such moods are rare—moods that can meet death, that can sweep through the heavens with the constellations, and that can hold converse with the dumb, stirless desert; whereas the need for the ...
— The Hills of Hingham • Dallas Lore Sharp
... is mute, but we find in other pyramids inscriptions of some hundreds of lines. The author of the story, who knew how much certain kings of the VIth dynasty had laboured to have extracts of the sacred books engraved within their tombs, fancied, no doubt, that his Kheops ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... they may have been found, anyway," added Mrs. Ford, gently leading Mollie toward the house, Betty at her side, while Grace and Amy followed, mute with sympathy. ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... Curb this over-zeal of thine! Doves wing frighted from the ground At a step's too sudden sound, And her passion is a dove, Frighted by too bold a love. Mute as marble Hermes wait By the blooming hawthorn-gate. Thou shalt see her wings expand, She shall flutter to thy hand. On thy forehead thou shalt know Something like a breath of snow, Or of pinions pure that beat In a whirl of whiteness sweet. And the dove, grown venturesome, Shall upon ...
— Enamels and Cameos and other Poems • Theophile Gautier
... irregular garrison, had entirely ceased; and it became doubtful whether the whole commotion did not proceed from a false alarm. The Smashes, in particular, whose vociferations for the first few minutes had been of a very decided kind, were now mute; and the exclamations of the women and children ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... Desmond's mute protest, he removed the cherished looking-glass, hung the photo in its place, and, drawing himself up to his full six-feet-two ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... Atlantic to th' Passific where rowls th' Oregon,' he says, 'an' fr'm ivry American who has th' blood iv his ancesthors' hathred iv tyranny in his veins,—your ancesthors an' mine, Mr. McAdoo,' he says,—'there goes up a mute prayer that th' nation as wan man, fr'm Bangor, Maine, to where rowls th' Oregon, that,' he says, 'is full iv salmon, which is later put up in cans, but has th' same inthrest as all others in this question,' ...
— Mr. Dooley: In the Hearts of His Countrymen • Finley Peter Dunne
... of a group like this Sumner's great and eloquent speech on the Barbarism of Slavery, seemed almost cold and dead,—the mute appeals of these little ones in their mother's arms—the unlettered language of these young mothers, striving to save their offspring from the doom of Slavery—the resolute and manly bearing of these brothers expressed in words full of love of liberty, and of ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... following the direction of the other's glance, and then looking inquiringly at Brush, as if to ask whether there was any danger to be apprehended from talking before the servant. "Pooh—nonsense!" said Brush, readily understanding the mute appeal. "Nonsense! You could not make him comprehend what we are talking about in six weeks, if you should do your prettiest. Why, the fellow has not two ideas above a jackass!—so ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... and then spurred her horse towards the scene of action. The crowd gave way as she approached, and she halted as she entered the circle round the stake, and sat gazing on the youth and maiden. She wondered to see the male victim lamenting, while the female was mute. But indeed she saw that he was weeping not out of grief but pity; or at least, not out of grief for himself; and as to the maiden, she observed her to be so wrapt up in the contemplation of the heavens at which she was gazing, that she appeared to ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... mute, till Philip glancing up Beheld the dead flame of the fallen day Pass from the Danish barrow overhead; Then fearing night and chill for Annie rose, And sent his voice beneath him thro' the wood. Up came ...
— Enoch Arden, &c. • Alfred Tennyson
... incensedly for a moment; but without quailing, Israel, now that all was out, still stood with mute respect before him. The king, turning suddenly, walked rapidly away from Israel a moment, but presently returning with a less hasty pace, said, "You are rumored to be a spy—a spy, or something of that sort—ain't you? But I know you are not—no, no. You are a runaway prisoner ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... the chords are mute, The bond is rent in twain; You cannot wake the silent lute, Or clasp its links again. Love's toil, I know, is little cost; Love's perjury is light sin; But souls that lose what I have lost, What have they ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... forging his beams of light. The pole-star paled. The breath of the new morrow stole up out of the rosy gray. The wings of the morning stirred and trembled; and in the darkness and chill and mysterious awakening, eyes looked into other eyes, hand sought hand, and cheeks touched each other in mute caress. ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... my expectation, to re-enter the town, and glided like mute spectres, side by side, up its empty and silent streets. The high and gloomy stone fronts, with the variegated ornaments and pediments of the windows, looked yet taller and more sable by the imperfect moonshine. Our walk was for some ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... of the platforms again. They became aware of the remote hooting and yelping of the machines of one of the General Intelligence Offices, and suddenly came men running, and along the platforms and about the ways everywhere was a shouting and crying. Then a woman with a face of mute white terror, and another who gasped and shrieked ...
— The Sleeper Awakes - A Revised Edition of When the Sleeper Wakes • H.G. Wells
... enough; but he must do as he said. As he is now he would be watched by suspicious eyes; I could not answer for his life. As the Hakim's black slave who helps his master and is mute, yes, he will be safe too. But this man—this servant? What can he do? Will he ...
— In the Mahdi's Grasp • George Manville Fenn
... resigned himself to show the way where the undergrowth was most sparse. Brown held both his skinny hands together behind his back in the grip of one vast fist, and now and then impelled him forward with a fierce push. Cornelius remained as mute as a fish, abject but faithful to his purpose, whose accomplishment loomed before him dimly. At the edge of the patch of forest Brown's men spread themselves out in cover and waited. The camp was plain from end to end before their ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... the terrible sky which canopied us. The stars were hid. Suddenly a frightful noise was heard from the west, and all the waves of the sea rushed to founder our frail bark. A fearful silence succeeded to the general consternation. Every tongue was mute; and none durst communicate to his neighbour the horror with which his mind was impressed. At intervals the cries of the children rent our hearts. At that instant a weeping and agonized mother bared her breast to her dying child, but it yielded nothing to appease the thirst of the little innocent ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard
... relinquishing Mercedes hand clasped in one of his own, he extended the other to the Catalan with a cordial air. But Fernand, instead of responding to this amiable gesture, remained mute and trembling. Edmond then cast his eyes scrutinizingly at the agitated and embarrassed Mercedes, and then again on the gloomy and menacing Fernand. This look told him all, and ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... moved his fingers softly over the strings every heart was hushed, filled with a sense of balmy rest. The lark soaring and singing above his head paused mute and motionless in the still air, and no sound was heard over the spacious plain save the dreamy music. Then the bard struck another key, and a gentle sorrow possessed the hearts of his hearers, and unbidden tears ...
— The Golden Spears - And Other Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... is man's heart, strong to bear this night's Unspeakable affliction of mute love That crazes lesser things. The rocks and clods Dissemble, feign a busy intercourse; The bushes deal in shadowy subterfuge, Lurk dull, dart spiteful out, make heartless signs, Utter awestricken purpose of no sense,— But I walk ...
— Gloucester Moors and Other Poems • William Vaughn Moody
... vagaries, and the secretly proud "au moins je suis autre"—more a boast than a confession—gives place to a wistful, apologetic admission of the difference as a fault. Here already we have something of that resignation which comes later to its fulness in the story of the Wanderer with the Mute. ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... an alarum that was sounding, and there were only two to hear; miles away beneath the mute stars English men and women lay asleep, with the hour thundering at their gates, and there was none to cry, "Awake!" When would the dawn come, when should we be gone? I could have cried out in that ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... the habit of following thy orders; but at mine he hath made it; 'twas Tompkins." Her voice rung with so much of truth, his Lordship was satisfied and looked at her with a lighter heart; then, as she pointed toward the door—a mute command for him to bring the whey—he frowned ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... turning inside, the modern surveys the work of the ancient, the remnants of time. And no less curious and no less remote do the old tapestries seem than the atelier where the high looms rear their cylinders and mute men play their colour harmonies on the warp. It all seems of other times; it all seems dead. And it is ...
— The Tapestry Book • Helen Churchill Candee
... himself to be dragged along. There was nothing else possible. Sir Adolphus continued, in a somewhat lower key, induced upon him by Charles's mute look of protest. It was a disquieting story. He told it with gleeful unction. It seems that Professor Schleiermacher, of Jena, "the greatest living authority on the chemistry of gems," he said, had lately invented, ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen
... close that the two men who were standing on the rocks with a tub between them doing their week's washing, asked me ashore; but I made a gurgling noise in my throat, and pointed to my ears and mouth as I passed on. I meant them to understand by this that I was a deaf mute, but they evidently took me for a lunatic, as I could ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... choice of mourning dresses. While the coffin was placed in the huge, black and white, wax-besprinkled catafalque that does duty for some three thousand dead in the course of its career—so I was informed by a philosophically-minded mute whom I once consulted on a point over a couple of glasses of petit blanc—while an indifferent priest mumbling the office for the dead, do you know what the friends of the departed were saying as, all dressed in black from head to ...
— The Firm of Nucingen • Honore de Balzac
... myself, called with a loud voice on him who had been my friend, my brother, my father, and who answered me nothing, and yet seemed to gaze upon me.... His death was inconceivable to me; the others were dismayed and mute; there arose between the good friar and myself the most cruel and painful dispute, ... I madly contending that my friend was still alive, and beseeching him with tears to accompany with the offices of religion the passing of that great ...
— Modern Italian Poets • W. D. Howells
... reason for these exclamations, for Captain Lee stood gazing in mute amazement at young Gurwood, while the latter returned the compliment with his eyebrows raised to the roots of his hair. The similarity of their expressions did not, however, last long, for Edwin became gradually confused, while the captain grew ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... and frowned; but his glance wandering unconsciously at Florence, Lumley thought he detected the true reply to his question, and became mute. ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... something in the panting breath which issues from the nostrils of a tired horse, in the tension of their muscles, and the prodigious efforts of their loins, which gives us, in a high degree, the idea of strength; but the mute resignation of these animals, when we know them to be overladen, inspires us with pity, and makes us regret the abuse of ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... for the execution, but it fell through on a rumor of confession. The Monday papers contained a last masterly letter from Grodman exposing the weakness of the evidence, but they knew nothing of a confession. The prisoner was mute and disdainful, professing little regard for a life empty of love and burdened with self-reproach. He refused to see clergymen. He was accorded an interview with Miss Brent in the presence of a jailer, and solemnly asseverated his respect for her dead lover's memory. Monday buzzed with rumors; the ...
— The Big Bow Mystery • I. Zangwill
... built in the newest style. I do not remember ever having seen a street which produced so remarkable an impression on me. The finest building is unquestionably the venerable cathedral. In Italy I had already seen numbers of the most beautiful churches; yet I remained standing in mute admiration before this masterpiece ...
— Visit to Iceland - and the Scandinavian North • Ida Pfeiffer
... production and enjoyment of art; and discipline, whether intellectual, moral, or religious. Taken at his own showing, Mr. Spencer seems to contemplate, as his model of an educated man, a prodigiously capable and efficient mute. But can he deny that the ability to express what one may know, and in speech, as well as in production, is at once the final proof, and in a very real sense the indispensable consummation of such knowing? Language is the counterpart and complement of Science. ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. VI, June, 1862 - Devoted To Literature and National Policy • Various
... the building only just in time. While yet a hundred yards or so from it, the cool night-breeze dropped all in a moment, and was succeeded by a hushed and breathless calm. An awful silence suddenly fell upon nature, the myriad insect voices became mute, the night-birds ceased to utter their melancholy cries, the sighing of the wind through the trees of the distant wood was no longer heard; a hush of dread expectancy ensued. A few seconds elapsed, and then a mysterious murmur filled the air, ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... oh! teach her, then, thou cold cascade! Pour all thy lessons for the lovely maid! And thou, bless'd grotto! let thy silence prove Her mute consenting answer to my love! And thou, bright river! as thou roll'st along, Bear on thy wand'ring wave a lover's song! Strong as thy current, as thy waters pure, Teach her to feel the passion ...
— Poems • Sir John Carr
... splendid girl, large and fair, and just a trifle coarse—not to be spoken of in the same day with you, dearest; but still a decidedly handsome creature. And she took remarkably well. She was a very lively girl, "never ran mute," Sir George used to say. Sir George was very fond of her. She amused him, poor girl, with ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... only feebly. Neither physically nor mentally had she the strength to repulse him. If he had taken her in his arms, she could hardly have resisted. But he did not attempt to conquer more than her hand. He stood beside her, letting her feel the whole mute, impetuous offer of his manhood—thrown at her feet to do what she ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... while the ladies, not comprehending what had occurred, had sat as mute as stones; but now having so far recovered themselves as to find a voice, the younger of the two fell to screaming, at which the Sieur Simon called out to her to be still, for these were friends who had come to help them, and not enemies who had ...
— Stolen Treasure • Howard Pyle
... Think what it must have been to wake up in the midst of that voiceless hush, and, look out over that grim congregation of the dead! What gratitude shone in his skinny white face when he saw a living form before him! And how the fervency of this mute gratitude was augmented when his eyes fell upon the life-giving cordials which I carried in my hands! Then imagine the horror which came into this pinched face when I put the cordials behind me, and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... aside, he gazed about at the spectators in the nave, at the crowd behind them, interested in the next case or in others to come up later, at the hangers-on in the side aisles; for a time, mute, he stared at the glowing charcoal fire in the ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... pale, dressed himself without uttering a word, and followed the slave to the door of Vaninka's room. Having arrived there, with a motion of his hand he dismissed the informer, who, instead of retiring in obedience to this mute command, hid himself in the corner of ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - VANINKA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... blazes is Bunny?" I asked, for his name was beginning to get on my nerves, and Fred Foster sitting as dumb as a mute was enough ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... into the neatest and most polished little black sabots, and which, as she clattered up the stairs before me, lavishly displaying them, made her look like the heroine of an opera-bouffe. Her talk was all in n's, g's and d's, and in mute e's strongly accented, as autre, theatre, splendide—the last being an epithet she applied to everything the Capitol contained, and especially to a horrible picture representing the famous Clemence Isaure, ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... first gazed at him in mute surprise; then hurried, with every variety of squeak, and quack, and fluttering wing, ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne
... rock, with giant-bound, High on their iron poles they pass; Mute, lest the air, convuls'd by sound, Rend from above a ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis
... memory now dwell; this trembling figure, to whose decrepitude the bending staff confesses as she totters down the hill; the gathering gloom of the sky, in which one ray of promise for a bright to-morrow shines from the setting sun; the mute witnessing of the trees upon the hill, which have seen her pass and repass from joyful youth to lonely age, and even her eager grasp upon the poor treasure of herbs that she bears,—all these items of the scene impress one with a sympathy whose ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume I. No. VI. June, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... perceived the sneer; some great calamity had befallen her, of which she as yet scarcely knew the extent; she sat mute and bewildered—too bewildered to ask why ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... and still the suffering woman sat there, in mute, unutterable agony. A servant entering with lights at length aroused her to consciousness, and her eye fell on the folded letter lying on the stand. Hastily tearing away the envelope, she dropped on her knees, and ran over its contents with devouring ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... season of boyhood passes—the youth of sixteen becomes a young man of twenty, and smiles at the innocent emotions of his uneducated heart. He is no longer the mute adorer who worshipped in secrecy and in silence. Each season produces its own flowers. At twenty, the time for mute sympathy has passed away: it is one of the most eventful periods in the life of a lover; for should he then chance to meet a heart free to respond to his ardent passion, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, December 18, 1841 • Various
... behold what pleasure is pursuit, What life, what glorious eagerness it is, Then mark how full possession falls from this, How fairer seem the blossoms than the fruit,— I am perplext, and often stricken mute, Wondering which attained the higher bliss, The winged insect, or the chrysalis It thrust aside with unreluctant foot. Pursuit ...
— The World's Best Poetry — Volume 10 • Various
... tolled one, the lights were extinguished, and of the priestly train who had recently thronged the fane, all were gone, like a troop of ghosts evoked at midnight by necromantic skill, and then suddenly dismissed. Deep silence again brooded in the aisles; hushed was the organ; mute the melodious choir. The only light penetrating the convent church proceeded from the moon, whose rays, shining through the painted windows, fell upon the graves of the old abbots in the presbytery, and on the two biers within the adjoining chapel, whose stark ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... repast, he had not seen his father's eye pale. The cowering dog looked alternately at his dead master and at the elixir, as Don Juan regarded by turns his father and the phial. The lamp threw out fitful waves of light. The silence was profound, the viol was mute. Belvidero thought he saw his father move, and he trembled. Frightened by the tense expression of the accusing eyes, he closed them, just as he would have pushed down a window-blind on an autumn night. He stood motionless, lost in ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... this peculiar and puerile notion of government, be like the possession of a bomb, and we shall have to direct the passing of an Explosives Books Act. All this and its various sequels and complements make a policy if you please. But after such a policy had produced a mute, sullen, muzzled, lifeless India, we could hardly call it, as we do now the brightest jewel in the Imperial Crown. No English Parliament will ever permit ...
— Indian speeches (1907-1909) • John Morley (AKA Viscount Morley)
... Patrick, with all his relics, and his imprisonment among a Pagan host, in Irish waters. National humiliation could not much farther go, and as we read we pause, prepared for either alternative —mute submission or a brave uprising. King Nial seems to have been in this memorable year, 843, defending as well as he might his ancestral province—Ulster—against the ravagers of Lough Neagh, and still another party ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... the reins, and bade ascend Varshneya: so he started, headlong, forth. At cry of Vahuka the four steeds sprung Into the air, as they would fly with him; And when the Raja felt them, fleet as wind, Whirling along, mute sat he and amazed; And much Varshneya mused to hear and see The thundering of those wheels; the fiery four So lightly held; Vahuka's matchless art. "Is Matali, who driveth Indra's car, Our charioteer? ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... the wrist and ground his knuckles into the back of Pierre's clenched fist until he winced with pain. An Apache dagger similar to that which the little modiste had used to end her life tragedy clattered to the deck of the ship, a mute testimonial to the high class of society Pierre and his associates must ...
— The Poisoned Pen • Arthur B. Reeve
... in the old home was painful, for to me everything suggested the one for whom it had been established. The piano I had bought for her, the chair in which she had loved to sit, her spectacles on the stand—all these mute witnesses of her absence benumbed me as I walked about her room. Only in my work-shop was I able to find even momentary relief from my sense of irreparable ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... is the little rift within the lute That by and by will make music mute, And, ever widening, slowly silence all— The little rift within the lover's lute: Or little pitted speck in garnered fruit, That rotting inward, slowly ...
— Girls: Faults and Ideals - A Familiar Talk, With Quotations From Letters • J.R. Miller
... burned completely to the ground, they supposed that their victim had perished in the flames; but their guilty consciences had never permitted them to venture near the debris to see if her charred bones remained a mute witness ...
— Dainty's Cruel Rivals - The Fatal Birthday • Mrs. Alex McVeigh Miller
... this is older than the washout in the road by this morning's shower! The old red sandstone in which I hoed corn as a farm-boy dates back to Middle Palaeozoic time, or to the spring of the great geologic year, while the canon is of the late autumn. Could my native hills have replied to my mute questionings, they would have said: "We were old, old, and had passed through the canon stage long before the Grand Canon was born. We have had all that experience, and have forgotten it ages ago. No vestiges ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs
... palpitant with mute thanksgiving, in the hallway, which was made obscure rather than bright by a tiny pinprick of gaslight; and as thus he stood, fortifying himself with resolution for the embarrassing necessity of presenting himself, in all his show of quaint frivolity, before these ...
— The Life of the Party • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... had been resounding in glad celebration of the national triumph had ceased; public edifice and private mansion were alike draped with the insignia of grief; the flag of the Union, which had been waving more proudly than ever before, was now lowered to half-mast, giving mute but significant expression to the sorrow that was felt wherever on sea or ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... blue velvet and white stockings, stood like a mute beside his master's chair. He was very tall and very thin, and very red ...
— Fighting the Flames • R.M. Ballantyne
... Vengeance spoke in the sombre fire that blazed in every Scotsman's eye. Retribution was carved large and deep on every hard-set Scottish face; it spoke in silent eloquence in the grip of each hard, browned hand on rifle barrels; it found a mute echo in each knitted brow, and leapt to life in every deep-drawn breath; it sparkled in each tear that rolled unheeded and unchecked down war-scarred cheeks, and thundered in the echo of the men's tread across the veldt, right ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... compelled the fellows to laugh in uncontrollable bursts; but still Acton never turned a hair. When he arrived at the churchyard lines there was one universal howl of delight. Brown stopped dead at the end of the second last line, and Acton stopped dead too. Instantly all the fellows became as mute as fish. The singer straightened himself up, looked round the room with a mocking smile while one might count a dozen, and then winked to Brown, who recommenced softly on the piano. Then Acton sang slowly ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... the middle of a line. The banjo went silent in the middle of a bar. Racey looked in at the kitchen door and saw, sitting on a corner of the kitchen table, a very pretty girl. One knee was crossed over the other, in her lap was the mute banjo, and she was ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... had taken him into the big, red school-house, so familiar from the outside, but so full of unknown terrors within. After his dusty little shoes had stumbled over the threshold he had passed from ordeal to ordeal until at last he was torn in mute and white-faced ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly
... way than that," Lady O'Gara said on a sudden impulse. She had taken Stella's cold little hand in hers, and it made a mute appeal. She was sure Stella was unhappy, poor little motherless child. The two poor children, fretting and worrying each other about nothing at all! Her comprehending, merry, pitiful gaze went from one to the other ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... quartered in the finest hotel in Venusport and had just stumbled into bed when the room teleceiver signal buzzed. Tom shuffled over to the screen near the table where the remains of a huge supper gave mute evidence of their hunger. Switching on the machine, he saw Strong's ...
— The Revolt on Venus • Carey Rockwell
... were talking about them," whispered she, still with the same fascinated gaze in her eyes. "Ah, there, take care! Don't step on that violet. Don't you see how its mute eyes implore you ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... to alter," said Graham; "forgive me if my silence wronged my emotion; the truest eloquence is that which holds us too mute for applause." ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... zone here assigned to the materialist, he is equally helpless. If you ask him whence is this "matter" of which we have been discoursing—who or what divided it into molecules, and impressed upon them this necessity of running into organic forms—he has no answer. Science is also mute in regard to such questions. But if the materialist is confounded and science is rendered dumb, who else is prepared with an answer? Let us lower our heads and acknowledge our ignorance, priest and philosopher, ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... attendants, that follow the young orator from the bar, and watch his motions to his own house? With what importance does he appear to the multitude! in the courts of judicature, with what veneration! When he rises to speak, the audience is hushed in mute attention; every eye is fixed on him alone; the crowd presses round him; he is master of their passions; they are swayed, impelled, directed, as he thinks proper. These are the fruits of eloquence, well known to all, and palpable to every ...
— A Dialogue Concerning Oratory, Or The Causes Of Corrupt Eloquence • Cornelius Tacitus
... grim chuckle. 'I swore I'd be revenged on 'em all when they locked me up and sent me out here for a paltry hare; broke my old mother's heart, so it did. I've had a pound for every hair in her skin, and I shall go on till I die. After all, if a man goes to work cautious and runs mute it's not so easy to catch him in this country, ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... to catch a yellow-winged woodpecker in its nest when my arm became twisted and lodged in the deep hole so that I could not get it out without the aid of a knife; but we were a long way from home and my only companion was a deaf-mute cousin of mine. I was about fifty feet up in the tree, in a very uncomfortable position, but I had to wait there for more than an hour before he brought me the knife with which ...
— Indian Child Life • Charles A. Eastman
... of the "silence" may approach a gathering of a hundred or more cadets, all talking animatedly until they perceive his approach. Then, all in an instant, they become mute. The officer may remain in their neighborhood for an hour, yet, save upon an official matter, no cadet will speak until ...
— Dick Prescotts's Fourth Year at West Point - Ready to Drop the Gray for Shoulder Straps • H. Irving Hancock
... Under whose sapphirine walls, June, hesperian June, Robed in divinity wanders. Daily and nightly The turquoise touch of her robe, that the violets star, The silvery fall of her feet, that lilies are, Fill the land with languorous light and perfume.— Is it the melody mute of burgeoning leaf and of bloom? The music of Nature, that silently shapes in the gloom Immaterial hosts Of spirits that have the flowers and leaves in their keep, Whom I hear, whom I hear? With their sighs of silver and pearl? Invisible ghosts,— ...
— Poems • Madison Cawein
... stationed with his lyre Supreme among the Elysian quire, Is, for the dwellers upon earth, Mute as ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers
... fine, moonlight night, and a three-cornered contest soon started between donkeys braying, jackals howling and dogs barking; but we were very tired, and they made no more impression on us than would Raff's Cavatina played on the violin with a mute. ...
— A Fantasy of Mediterranean Travel • S. G. Bayne
... insisted on considerable alterations in the text, so as to obtain a favourable medium for singing. My knowledge of the scores of Auber and Boieldieu had misled me into assuming that the French people were entirely indifferent as to whether the mute syllables in poetry and singing were to be sounded or not. Vauthrot maintained that this was only the case with composers, but not with good singers. He was always feeling misgivings about the length of my work, which I met with the observation ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner
... underwriters did "specs" in her; woe-begone women began to haunt the Liverpool office for news of husbands and sons; the love-lorn Dickey wore Verity to a shadow of his former self by alternate pleadings and threats; but the Andromeda remained mute, and the fanciful letters from Iris became fewer and more fragmentary as David's imagination failed, and his excuses ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... suburb without exchanging a word, but enjoying the mute delight of their warm embrace. Their hearts were heavy; the joy which they felt in being side by side was tinged with the painful emotion which comes from the thought of approaching severance, and ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... the way, the logic of his phonetic writing: contrary to his habit, he strikes the mute E after the W, because it is indispensable; but, finding it included in the D, he considers it superfluous and suppresses it with a ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck
... the distance dials. With the growth had come an immense augmentation of velocity. A hundred thousand miles an hour—that had been accelerated a hundred fold now. Ten million miles an hour.... Through the window-lens Lee gazed, mute with awe. The size-change was beginning to show! Far down, and to one side the crescent Earth was dwindling ... Mars was far away in another portion of its orbit—the Moon was behind the Earth. There were just the myriad blazing giant worlds of the stars—infinitely ...
— The World Beyond • Raymond King Cummings |
