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Twang   /twɑŋ/   Listen
Twang

verb
(past & past part. twanged; pres. part. twanging)
1.
Cause to sound with a twang.
2.
Sound with a twang.
3.
Twitch or throb with pain.
4.
Pluck (strings of an instrument).
5.
Pronounce with a nasal twang.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Twang" Quotes from Famous Books



... head and made Falcon swerve, and heard therewith the twang of the bowstring and straightway the shaft flew past his ears. Falcon galloped on, and the carle cried out: "There is the highway toward the Burg! Do thy best, do thy best! ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris

... He was a tall, gaunt, long-headed man, with large features and spectacles, and a deep internal voice, with a twang of rusticity in it; and he goggled over his plate like a horse. I often thought that a bag of corn would have hung well on him. His laugh was equine, and showed his teeth upwards at the sides. Wordsworth, who notices similar mysterious manifestations on the part of ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... That rends the utter silence! 'tis the whoop Of battle, and a throng of savage men With naked arms and faces stained like blood, Fill the green wilderness; the long bare arms Are heaved aloft, bows twang and arrows stream; Each makes a tree his shield, and every tree Sends forth its arrow. Fierce the fight and short, As is the whirlwind. Soon the conquerors And conquered vanish, and the dead remain Mangled by tomahawks. The ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant

... be shot!" he burst out suddenly, with a plaintive twang. Then he grinned. The boy still in him had prompted the absurdity. And the rough warrior had laughed at it. Boy and warrior faced each other, either surprised that the other existed. The boy flushed resentfully at the veteran's contemptuous grunt. His eyes still had the ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle

... interpreter, or go-between in a purchase, and seems torn to pieces in the whirlwind of voices which assail him from the disputing parties, in each of whose languages he tries to explain; but, poor patient Jew! you never could speak any of them intelligibly, and your nasal twang, and drawling accent, so disguises what you do say, that nothing but a miracle could make you understood. The screams, the grimaces, the gestures which these people exhibit, during their unavailing efforts to render themselves understood, appear inexpressibly ludicrous to the indifferent spectator, ...
— Journal of a Visit to Constantinople and Some of the Greek Islands in the Spring and Summer of 1833 • John Auldjo

... glowing redly in the linstocks, a few of the bolder inhabitants summoned up courage enough to shout an inquiry as to what was amiss. And when at length the more persistent ones were told, in good Castilian, that yet had in it the suspicion of an alien twang, that nothing was amiss, and were advised to return to their beds and resume their interrupted slumber, suspicion at last began to awake, and instead of returning to bed the citizens proceeded to arouse their households, and to hurriedly ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood

... bloom of cheek and lips, Wrinkled scolds with hands on hips, Wild-eyed, free-limbed, such as chase Bacchus round some antique vase, Brief of skirt, with ankles bare, Loose of kerchief and loose of hair, With conch-shells blowing and fish-horns' twang, Over and over the Maenads sang: "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt, Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt By the women ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various

... sharp twang of a citerne was heard in the street below her window,—nothing new in these piping times of love and minstrelsy; but so sensitive was the ear now become to exterior impressions, that she started, as though ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby

... Moonlight. It was equally so to the Bounding Bullers, who, although mightily taken by surprise, were fully alive to the fact that here were two men and two women of their hated Blackfoot foes completely at their mercy. They had only to twang their bowstrings and the death-yells of the men would instantly resound in the forest. But burning curiosity as to what it could all mean, and an intense desire to see ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne

... turning at one and the same time to the fullest sincerity and to a perversity of the most "evolved"?—since I can not dispense with that sign of truth. Never was a young singer either less obviously sentimental or less addicted to the mere twang of the guitar; at the same time that it was always his personal experience or his curious, his not a little defiantly excogitated, inner vision that he sought to catch; some of the odd fashion of his ...
— Letters from America • Rupert Brooke

... with him,' said Miss Geraghty, who had still about her a twang of the County Clare, ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope

... the white people. One soon learns to know—a Bim. That is the name in which they themselves delight, and therefore, though there is a sound of slang about it, I give it here. One certainly soon learns to know a Bim. The most peculiar distinction is in his voice. There is always a nasal twang about it, but quite distinct from the nasality of a Yankee. The Yankee's word rings sharp through his nose; not so that of the first-class Bim. There is a soft drawl about it, and the sound is seldom completely ...
— West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas • J. J. (John Jacob) Thomas

... this country that I was rather agreeably surprised by the few specimens of native Americans that I have seen. They were for the most part, polite, well-behaved people. The only peculiarities I observed in them were a certain nasal twang in speaking, and some few odd phrases; but these were only used by the lower class, who "guess" and "calculate" a little more than we do. One of their most remarkable terms is to "Fix." Whatever work requires to be done it must be fixed. "Fix the room" ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill

... what with screaming, yelling, like the Indian war-whoop, cheering, and the thundering noise of the planks, grating along the deck, together with the ringing and clattering of their metallic vessels, they made altogether such a hideous "rattle-come-twang," that it was enough to raise all Chatham. All this was transacted in utter darkness. The officers doubtless saw, that bloodshed and promiscuous death would be the consequence of firing among the rioters, and ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse

... while Billy Grey and Ludwig Wolfen stood on the top of it and sang, or tried to sing, 'Home Sweet Home'; and the writer of this memory of those old Pacific days sat in a chair in the doorway and wondered where we should all be the next year. For, as we sang and danced, and the twang, twang of Sera's guitar sounded through the silent night without, Tom Devine, the American, held up his hand to MacBride, ...
— Ridan The Devil And Other Stories - 1899 • Louis Becke

... "could make this possible," when, looking up, he caught the face of a young man at a further table, full of enjoyment, ordering "spargetty" and half a bottle of "grayves," with a cockney twang, and an unutterable ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward

... at the head of the stairway looked straight ahead where a man with a strong bow held himself close in the shadow of a great rock. When the twang of the bow string sounded, she loosened not her hand from that of Ka-yemo as he fell, but with her other hand she pulled aside the robe from her breast—also the necklace of the white metal, ...
— The Flute of the Gods • Marah Ellis Ryan

... stage no one was safe. The war party might at any moment find itself ambushed by the very ones it hoped to surprise. The snap of a twig; the dropping of a fruit from some tall tree; each sudden sound was interpreted as the twang of a hostile bow. Overwrought nerves peopled the jungle with spectral enemies; they found relief ...
— The Black Phantom • Leo Edward Miller

... Suddenly the Philosopher looked up. He spoke to himself. "Everything is ready," he said, and pressed a button by his side. There was a sound as of a Continent expectorating, a distant nose seemed to twang, the door opened, and a tall lantern-jawed gentleman, wearing a goat-beard and an expression of dauntless cunning, stepped ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100. February 21, 1891 • Various

... laughing. He laughed too, good-humouredly, and his almond eyes almost closed as he did so. There were two or three American men, in black coats, rather yellow and dry of skin: they were theological students; Philip heard the twang of their New England accent through their bad German, and he glanced at them with suspicion; for he had been taught to look upon Americans ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham

... a wave, far ahead the boys could see the lights of the Brutus. Only for a second, however, for the next minute she would vanish in the trough of a huge comber, and then they could hear the strained towing cable "twang" like an overstretched ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton

... his mouth, put his left hand in his breeches pocket, clenched his right, and raised his arm, he begins his learned dissertation on well digested principles, ardent desire of truth, incessant struggles to shake off prejudices, and forth are chanted, in nasal twang and tragic recitative, his emanations of soul, bursts of though, ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft

... and forks broke the stiffness after the blessing. Mrs. Tanner bustled back and forth from the stove to the table, talking clamorously the while. Mr. Tanner joined in with his flat, nasal twang, responding, and the minister, with an air of utter contempt for them both, endeavored to set up a separate and altogether private conversation with Margaret across the narrow table; but Margaret innocently had begun ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill

... mules, are you?" The speech is a stately drawl very different from the nasal twang of Eliphalet's bringing up. "Reckon you don't come from anywhere ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... little bottles, and occasionally swore savagely at the boys, audible if invisible, outside the windows. In the corner by the fireplace lay the fragments of half a dozen smashed bottles, and a pungent twang of chlorine tainted the air. So much we know from what was heard at the time and from what was subsequently seen ...
— The Invisible Man • H. G. Wells

... voice. I know when it is low or high, clear or muffled, sad or cheery. The thin, quavering sensation of an old voice differs in my touch from the sensation of a young voice. A Southerner's drawl is quite unlike the Yankee twang. Sometimes the flow and ebb of a voice is so enchanting that my fingers quiver with exquisite pleasure, even if I do not understand ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller

... while they brush the First-Class hair twenty-seven ways), behind the bottles, among the glasses, bounded on the nor'west by the beer, stood pretty far to the right of a metallic object that's at times the tea-urn and at times the soup-tureen, according to the nature of the last twang imparted to its contents which are the same groundwork, fended off from the traveller by a barrier of stale sponge-cakes erected atop of the counter, and lastly exposed sideways to the glare of Our Missis's eye—you ask ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens

... with head slightly inclined, like that of a hunter sighting over his gun, were the gleaming eyes and face of the young Shawanoe. It looked as if he had turned his head to one side that he might catch the music made by the twang of the string when it should dart forward with the speed of the rattlesnake striking ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis

... where he was deserted by his troops. His wife saved the situation. She upbraided her husband as he was scaling the palisades to escape by night, fortified him with wine, girded his sword on herself, and caused her female attendants—of whom there were "several tens"—to twang bowstrings. Katana, taking heart of grace, advanced single handed; the Yemishi, thinking that his troops had rallied, gave way, and the Japanese soldiers, returning to their duty, killed or captured all ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi

... the answer, with the true cockney twang. "Trade ain't very brisk. There's too bloomin' many of ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux

... of common ills complain, Shot by a random shaft, a thoughtless swain? Unarm'd and unprepared to meet the foe, My naked bosom seem'd to court the blow. One cause, at least, to soothe my grief ensued; When I beheld the ruthless power subdued; And all unable now to twang the string, Or mount the breeze on many-colour'd wing. But never tawny monarch of the wood His raging rival meets, athirst for blood; Nor thunder-clouds, when winds the signal blow, With louder shock astound the world below; When the red flash, ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... hymn floated through the windows and wandered into the woods. The twang of the tuning-fork was drowned by a succession of cries. The smart young man's eyebrows went up to meet his roach while he stood in the aisle astonished to see a lady in trailing black clothes pounce upon a child strange to ...
— Old Caravan Days • Mary Hartwell Catherwood

... both busy, he repeating forms, noting shades and tints, and I studying without pictorial intent, when we heard a hail in the road below our bank. It was New Hampshire, near the Maine line, and near the spot where nasal organs are fabricated that twang ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... a rasp of metal friction, and a loud twang. The lever came free, a length of broken cable flopping into view. The tower fell over as the two on the ...
— Gambler's World • John Keith Laumer

... he unslung his bow, and fitted an arrow. There was a sharp twang, and the deer rolled over, struck to the heart. There was no movement in the tree, but Ned placed another arrow in place. Tom had ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty

... a lie then, and you believed her!' we heard a loud voice with a marked nasal twang say a minute later. 'To begin with, it wasn't at the big club ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... and the officers had their usual trouble in making the men go to sleep instead of spending the night in talking, singing, and gaming. In the peaceful camp of the Third Alabama, in that state, the scenes were similar. There was always "a steady hum of laughter and talk, dance, song, shout, and the twang of musical instruments." It was "a scene full of life and fun, of jostling, scuffling, and racing, of clown performances and cake-walks, of impromptu minstrelsy, speech-making, and preaching, of deviling, guying, and fighting, both real ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various

... God! his downy wing Was fluttering now, as quickly to depart; When twang'd an arrow from Love's mystic string, 30 With pathless wound it pierc'd him to the heart. Was there some magic in the Elfin's dart? Or did he strike my couch with wizard lance? For straight so fair a Form did upwards start ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... the quaint, the picturesque, the amusing side of life in the East. He was full of enthusiasm for the land of soft voices and smiling faces, where countless little shops spread their wares under the light of the evening lanterns, where the twang of the samisen and the geisha's song are heard coming from the lighted tea-house, and the shadow of her helmet-like coiffure is seen appearing and disappearing in silhouette against ...
— Kimono • John Paris

... pasted on a card. He gave Philip a glance but did not speak to him; he dictated a letter to the typist, a girl who sat at a small table in one corner; then he asked Philip his name, age, and what experience he had had. He spoke with a cockney twang in a high, metallic voice which he seemed not able always to control; Philip noticed that his upper teeth were large and protruding; they gave you the impression that they were loose and would come out if you ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham

... thought of that, invincible doctor. A misty English morning the imp hypostasis tickled his brain. Bringing his host down and kneeling he heard twine with his second bell the first bell in the transept (he is lifting his) and, rising, heard (now I am lifting) their two bells (he is kneeling) twang in diphthong. ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... merry brides are we: We will kiss sweet kisses, and speak sweet words: O listen, listen, your eyes shall glisten With pleasure and love and jubilee: O listen, listen, your eyes shall glisten When the sharp clear twang of the golden cords Runs up the ridged sea. Who can light on as happy a shore All the world o'er, all the world o'er? Whither away? listen and stay: mariner, mariner, ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson

... practice, in the main, was confined to the courts of justices of the peace. He was a shrewd, sensible old man, of a remarkably kind and genial disposition, but just about the homeliest looking individual I ever saw. And he had a most singular, squeaky sort of a voice, with a kind of a nasal twang to it, which if heard once could never be forgotten. He was an old friend of my father's, and had been his legal adviser (so far as his few and trifling necessities in that line required) from time immemorial. And for ...
— The Story of a Common Soldier of Army Life in the Civil War, 1861-1865 • Leander Stillwell

... her raised voice had a sudden twang in it—suggestive of the streets; of the People. "No—you needn't trouble to make soft eyes at me. I know you now—I know that what that man said was true. He called you a coward and a cad. You are worse! You are a ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman

... second voice, slurring his words together as young men do, and giving them that jolly twang peculiar to ...
— The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest - The Wig Wag Rescue • Lillian Garis

... though many had gone close to it, when Nicholas Alwyn stepped forward; and there was something so unwarlike in his whole air, so prim in his gait, so careful in his deliberate survey of the shaft and his precise adjustment of the leathern gauntlet that protected the arm from the painful twang of the string, that a general burst of laughter from the bystanders attested their ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... meet any friend of Mr. Saulsbury's," he drawled with a mournful twang. "We've got plenty o' bread and milk for strangers. Somebody's spread the idea we run a hotel here and we're pestered a good deal with folks that want to stop for a meal. We take care o' 'em mostly. The wife and little gal sort o' like havin' folks ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson

... The twang of a banjo trailed in above the voices, with a sound of scuffling. Loud laughter broke the thread of the song leaving "Mary Ann!" to soar out alone. Then the chorus took ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill

... those things. To-day was of a hard, glittering frost; the sun, like a round, red lacquer tray, fell heavily, slowly through a faint pale sky that was not strong enough to sustain it. The air had the cold, sweet twang of peppermints in the throat. Polchester was a painted town upon a blue screen, the Cathedral towers purple against the sky; the air was scented with burning leaves, and cries from the town rose up clear and hard, lingering and falling like notes of music. Somewhere ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole

... that if we were soft-hearted or soft-headed, they would say the whole family were prisoners. One thing that surprised and shocked us was to hear the little kids swearing; they would use the most frightful oaths, and the funny part of it was that they gave them the pure cockney twang; I suppose they had heard and were imitating the Imperial troops. Well, after travelling all day we finally arrived in C—— and we were marched off to our first billets. I belonged to "C" Company and we ...
— Into the Jaws of Death • Jack O'Brien

... and July have passed away, Like a tide. Doors are open, windows wide. Why in stuffy London stay?" Sing the Sirens (slyboots they!) With a Tennysonian twang, To the Tourist, (Not the poorest You may bet your bottom dollar, Which those Sirens aim to ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, August 6, 1892 • Various

... his heart Burning with wrath; behind his shoulders hung His bow, and ample quiver; at his back Rattled the fateful arrows as he mov'd; Like the night-cloud he pass'd, and from afar He bent against the ships, and sped the bolt; And fierce and deadly twang'd the silver bow. First on the mules and dogs, on man the last, Was pour'd the arrowy storm; and through the camp, Constant and num'rous, blaz'd ...
— The Iliad • Homer

... Sir Andrew; scout me for him at the corner of the orchard, like a bum-baily. So soon as ever thou see'st him, draw; and as thou drawest, swear horrible; for it comes to pass oft, that a terrible oath, with a swaggering accent sharply twang'd off, gives manhood more approbation than ever proof itself would have earn'd ...
— Twelfth Night; or, What You Will • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]

... given orders to make fast another line, when the sharp, twanging snap of a cord was heard. The six-inch hawser had parted, and they were swinging by the two others, with the gale roaring like a lion through the spars and rigging. Half a minute more and "twang, twang!" came another report, and the whale-line was gone. Only one rope now held them to the land, and prevented them being swept into the turmoil of ice, and wind, and water, from which the rocky ledge protected them. The hawser was a good one—a new ten-inch rope. It sang like the ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... buzzing enemies. All the persons concerned passed through her fancy with the mask and strut of caricature. The little mole on Sister Angela's nose—the slightly drooping eyelid that marred the Reverend Mother's left cheek—the nasal twang of the orphans' singing—Father Bowles pouncing on a fly—Father Leadham's stately ways—she made a mock or an offence out of them all, bitterly chattering and drawing pictures with herself, like a ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... finished his dinner the sun had set, and night had dropped down softly over the Bay. Capri had disappeared. The long serpent of lights had uncoiled itself along the sea. Down below, very far down, there was the twang and the thin, acute whine of guitars and mandolines, the throbbing cry of Southern voices. The stars were out in a deep sky of bloomy purple. There was no chill in the air, but a voluptuous, brooding warmth, that shed over the city and the waters a ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens

... I nodded; and as the executioner clapped his heels together, straightened himself, and drew the arrow to his ear, we heard a low twang! And saw the black hand of the Seneca pinned to his own bow ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers

... The nose may be "stopped up" from the swollen and thickened condition of the lining mucous membrane, so as to necessitate respiration through the mouth, giving to the voice a disagreeable nasal twang. From the nature of the obstruction in this condition, it is useless for the sufferer to endeavor to clear the passage by blowing the nose; this only tends to render a bad matter worse, by increasing the irritation and swelling of the already ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... he took hold of the yard rigged out on one side to keep the lugger upright, the others did the same on the other side, and as the cable was tightened once more with a jerk, which gave forth a musical deep bass twang, Smith shouted, "All together!" and with his companions, he began to give the hull a gentle rocking movement from side ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn

... fanaticism. In his journey he was attended by one whom he called his armor-bearer, and their entrance into each village was signaled by a loud hymn sung by the excited pair. The very tone in which Davenport preached has been perpetuated by his admirers; it was a nasal twang, which had great effect. A law was passed against those irregularities, and Davenport was thrown into Hartford jail, where he sang hymns all night, to the great admiration of his friends. On being released ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various

... so passed the car. As she went by, she heard Hegner's friend say in a kindly voice, and in excellent English, albeit there was a twang in it, "I hope you've not been cold, my boy. My business took a little longer than I thought it would." And the shrill, piping answer, "Oh no, sir! I have been quite all right, sir!" And then ...
— Good Old Anna • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... the most part we were Cockneys, born within the sound of Bow Bells. I had planned to follow the friendly advice of the recruiting sergeant. "Talk like 'em," he had said. Therefore, I struggled bravely with the peculiarities of the Cockney twang, recklessly dropped aitches when I should have kept them, and prefixed them indiscriminately before every convenient aspirate. But all my efforts were useless. The imposition was apparent to my fellow Tommies immediately. I had only to begin speaking, within the hearing of a genuine Cockney, when ...
— Kitchener's Mob - Adventures of an American in the British Army • James Norman Hall

... into the lane they heard the twang of Waddles's guitar from the cook shack, the booming voice raised in song in mid-afternoon, a thing heretofore unheard of in the annals ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts

... The colour all through is a mellow brown; the reed is of medium width, well developed, and nearly equal all over, and it is singularly bowed from bottom to top, meeting, when joined (for it is in two parts), just as will a string of a violin when you hold it in both hands, and twang it to test its ...
— Violin Making - 'The Strad' Library, No. IX. • Walter H. Mayson

... malachite, With bronze and purple pied, I march before him like the night In all its starry pride; LULLI may twang and MOLIERE write His pastime to provide, But seldom laughs the KING So much as when ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 24, 1917 • Various

... the subject reveals itself. The art that can convert a screech into pleasing cadences of soft sound is no trifle. Nasal resonance must not be confounded with nasal twang. The one is produced by vibrating the air in the cavities, the twang by expelling it from them. The part played by each organ in voice production may be briefly summarised:—The lungs send out a stream of air; the vocal chords, ...
— The Young Priest's Keepsake • Michael Phelan

... song had ended with a last resounding twang, And within the harp's dumb chambers murmurous echoes faintly rang, Up then sprang the guest, and straightway downward rolled his garment dun— There stood Harold, the ...
— Christmas in Legend and Story - A Book for Boys and Girls • Elva S. Smith

... any time for anybody's business but our own," quoth David Hautville, gruffly. He did not like his wife's uncle. He was tightening a string in his bass-viol; he pulled it as he spoke, and it gave out a fierce twang. Louis sat moodily over the fire with his painful arm in wet bandages. Richard was whittling kindling-wood, with nervous speed, beside him. Eugene and Abner were cleaning their guns. They all looked at the eager old man except Richard and Louis ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... acquainted with all the approved renderings of the Episcopal morning service, but when the clergyman who officiated at the Abbey began to twang out "Dearly beloved brethren," &c., in a nasal, drawling semi-chant, I was taken completely aback. It sounded as though some graceless Friar Tuck had wormed himself into the desk and was endeavoring, under the pretense of reading the service, ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley

... rescuer. Now he halted not ten paces from the unconscious Manyuema. The shaft was drawn back its full length at the height of the keen gray eye that sighted along its polished surface. There was a sudden twang as the brown fingers released their hold, and without a sound the raider sank forward upon his face, a wooden shaft transfixing his heart and protruding a foot ...
— The Return of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... drawbacks Lizzie recognised. But it was nothing against him in her judgment that he was a greasy, fawning, pawing, creeping, black-browed rascal, who could not look her full in the face, and whose every word sounded like a lie. There was a twang in his voice which ought to have told her that he was utterly untrustworthy. There was an oily pretence at earnestness in his manner which ought to have told that he was not fit to associate with gentlemen. There ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope

... however, was singularly pleasing to the discerning critic. An out of door, reckless, humorous, honest personality was stamped on every line of it and every movement of the man. When he spoke his voice had a marked tinge of the twang of the wild west that sounded a little oddly on the lips of a country gentleman in these northern parts. He wore an open flannel collar, a shooting coat, well cut riding breeches and immaculate leather leggings, finished off by a most substantial pair of shooting boots. Unlike Mr. Malcolm ...
— Simon • J. Storer Clouston

... the birds were fighting within thirty yards of the spot where the Bushman lay. The twang of a bowstring might have been heard by one of the koris, had he been listening. The other could not possibly have heard it; for before the sound could have reached him, a poisoned arrow was sticking through his ears. The barb had passed ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid

... along this strolling Longfellow minstrel," he continued, ignoring or not hearing my remark, "with his dreary hurdy-gurdy to cap the climax. Heavens! what a nasal twang the whole thing has to me. Not an original or cheerful note! 'Old Hundred' is joyful ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield

... quiet that had reigned through the building for the last two hours was suddenly broken in upon by sounds of mirth and jollity—merry boyish voices talking, singing, some accompanying themselves with the twang of a banjo or the tinkle of a guitar; but Max, closing and putting his book aside, kept his seat, his elbow on the desk, his head on his hand, while with a far-away look in his dark eyes, he indulged ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley

... an Indian of North or South America, instead of an Indian of the "East Indies," he would have pierced those fishes with an arrow at every twang of ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid

... "is the third night, and these fires must blaze yet eleven nights and days more, during which time the axe is not seen in the hand of the forester, nor doth the bow twang in the woods of Tarapajan; neither may he which seeth these rites depart till they ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various

... him, Vhite moths und vhite dofes shimmered round, All nature seemed seekin to lofe him, Mit perfume und vision und sound. De liddle oldt veller hat fanished, In a harp-like, melotious twang; Und mit him all sorrow vas panished Afay from ...
— The Breitmann Ballads • Charles G. Leland

... come to tell old Surefoot about his daughter's love," the letter goes on, "you should fall into a positive imitation of his manner: crest, motionless, and hands in front, and deliver your preambles with a nasal twang. But at the second invitation to speak out, you should cast this to the winds, and go into the other extreme of bluntness and rapidity. [Quite right!] When you meet him after the exposure, you should speak as you ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry

... of yellow beard on the end of his sharp chin, gave his face a comical expression resembling that which caricature bestows on Uncle Sam. His voice was pitched in a high key, and was modified by that nasal twang supposed to indicate Yankee origin; but a habit of giving his declarative sentences an interrogative finish, might denote that he came from the mountain regions of Pennsylvania or Virginia. A pair of linsey pantaloons, a blue hunting shirt with a fringe of red and yellow, moccasins of ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable

... Duprez is also a singer of no common stamp, and of whom any nation might be proud, and I have often met men in society sing together most delightfully, either duets, trios, or quartettos, and totally devoid of the nasal twang, or, as the reader will observe, delightful it ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve

... doin' i' heaven," he asked, "wi' a crown o' gowd on my heead and nowt to do all day but twang a harp, just as if I were one o' them lads i' t' band? What mak o' life's yon for a chap like me, that's allus bin used to tug ...
— Tales of the Ridings • F. W. Moorman

... substituted as the castle confessor, not without some misgivings in his ghostly bosom; but he was more allured by the sweet savour of the good things of this world at Arlingford Castle, than deterred by his awe of the lady Matilda, which nevertheless was so excessive, from his recollection of the twang of the bow-string, that he never ventured to find her in the wrong, much less to enjoin any thing in the shape of penance, as was the occasional practice of holy confessors, with or without cause, for the sake of pious discipline, and what was in those ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock

... impertinences which, issuing from a big and barbarous mouth in a peculiar patois, pass for pleasantry amongst those who are not over-nice about the quality of that article. The tone of voice is peculiar; it is pitched in the usual savage key, modified by the twang of the chapel and by the cantilene of the Yankee—originally Puritan Lancashire. Hence a 'new chum' may hear the women talking for several days before he finds out that they are talking English. And they speak two different dialects. The first, used with strangers, ...
— To the Gold Coast for Gold - A Personal Narrative in Two Volumes.—Vol. I • Richard F. Burton

... who had come to Georgia in search of a precarious livelihood. He obtained permission to build him a little log hut by the side of a running stream; and, for a year or two, people going along the road could hear the snap and twang of his bowstring as he whipped wool or rabbit fur into shape. Some said he was from North Carolina; others said he was from Connecticut; but whether from one State or the other, what should a hatter do away off ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris

... the cloth of their garments was somewhat coarse, but stout and serviceable. I knew, somehow, that they had been shooting at the butts, and, indeed, I could still hear a noise of men thereabout, and even now and again when the wind set from that quarter the twang of the bowstring and the plump of ...
— A Dream of John Ball, A King's Lesson • William Morris

... servants, consisting of a son of the steward, footman, and page, were all buried in profound slumber. Genji called to them loudly, and they awoke with a start. "Come," said he, "bring a light. Valet, twang your bow-string, and drive away the fiend. How can you sleep so soundly in such a place? But has ...
— Japanese Literature - Including Selections from Genji Monogatari and Classical - Poetry and Drama of Japan • Various

... And cast his purple garment on the ground. A trench he open'd: in a line he placed. The level axes, and the points made fast (His perfect skill the wondering gazers eyed, The game as yet unseen, as yet untried). Then, with a manly pace, he took his stand: And grasp'd the bow, and twang'd it in his hand. Three times, with beating heart, he made essay: Three times, unequal to the task, gave way; A modest boldness on his cheek appear'd: And thrice he hoped, and thrice again he fear'd. The fourth had drawn it. The great sire with joy ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope

... Charlie Maxfield by name, though known simply as "Chatz." He possessed all the traits to be found in boys who have been born and raised south of Mason and Dixon's line, was inclined to be touchy whenever he thought anyone doubted his honor, talked with a quaint little twang that was really delightfully musical, and taken in all had grown to be a prime favorite ...
— Afloat - or, Adventures on Watery Trails • Alan Douglas

... fair complexion, with little beard, save a slight blush on his upper lip. He was not ill-favoured, but there was altogether something boyish and effeminate throughout his appearance, which seemed not of the hue to win a lady's love. He could twang the guitar, and had at times made scraps of verse, which he trolled to many a damsel's ear, ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby

... comply. Before they could get out of their canoe, a savage seized the rifle belonging to Potts. Colter sprang on shore, wrestled the weapon from the hands of the Indian, and restored it to his companion, who was still in the canoe, and immediately pushed into the stream. There was the sharp twang of a bow, and Potts cried out that he was wounded. Colter urged him to come on shore and submit, as his only chance for life; but the other knew there was no prospect of mercy, and determined to ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... still talking of his plans to seize Tell, and without a dream of danger, for the pass was silent and seemed deserted. But suddenly to his ears came the twang of the bow he had heard before that day; through the air once more winged its way a steel-barbed shaft, the heart of a tyrant, not an apple on a child's head, now its mark. In an instant more Gessler fell from ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris

... wounded animal could turn to charge this new assailant an answering twang sounded from among the trees and a second arrow, sent with unerring precision, imbedded itself in the deer's body. As the stag fell, a lad of some sixteen years, clad in the dress of a forester, ran hastily forward and reached the animal at the ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison

... stale stock of poetry; the introduction of St Peter on a stage thronged with nymphs and river gods was blasphemous, absurd, and, in the worst taste; there were touches of greasy Puritanism, the twang of the conventicle was only too apparent. And Lycidas was probably the most perfect piece of pure literature in existence; because every word and phrase and line were sonorous, ringing and ...
— The Hill of Dreams • Arthur Machen

... natures too strong to be mere trimmers and conformers, too well poised and thoughtful to fling off into intemperate protest and revolt. Laughter is genuine which has in it neither the shrill, hysterical note of mere excitement nor the hard, metallic twang of the cynic's sneer— which rings in the honest voice of gracious good humor, which is innocent and unsatirical. Speech is genuine which is without silliness, affectation, or pretense. That character is genuine which seems built by nature rather than by convention, which is stuff ...
— On Being Human • Woodrow Wilson

... aside as if terrified at the glittering figures that dashed upon them so fearlessly. As they swept through, Menna had enough to do to manage his steeds, which were wild with excitement; but Ramses' bow was bent again and again, and at every twang of the bowstring a Hittite champion fell from his chariot. Behind the King came his household troops, and all together they burst through the chariot brigade of the enemy, leaving a long trail marked by dead and wounded men, overturned chariots, and ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Ancient Egypt • James Baikie

... telephone. His magnetized telegraph wire stretched from one room to another located in a remote part of the building. One day Watson accidentally plucked a piece of clock wire that lay near this telegraph wire, and Bell, working in another room, heard the twang. A few seconds later Watson was startled when an excited and somewhat disheveled figure burst into his room. "What was that?" shouted Bell. What had happened was clearly manifest; a sound had been sent distinctly over an electric wire. Bell's harmonic telegraph ...
— The Age of Big Business - Volume 39 in The Chronicles of America Series • Burton J. Hendrick

... Lance heard a twang of Scotch in the "very rare" which pleased him. But he kept his position by the doorway, and he continued bashfully turning his big hat round and round against his chest,—though the action went oddly ...
— Rim o' the World • B. M. Bower

... and sentimental Christianity is very defective in this respect. You cannot love Jesus Christ too much, but you can love Him with too little reverence. And if you take up some of our luscious modern hymns that people are so fond of singing, I think you will find in them a twang of unwholesomeness, just because the love is not reverent enough, and the approaching confidence has not enough of devout awe in it. This generation looks at the half of Christ. When people are suffering from indigestion, they can only see half of the thing that they look ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren

... voice, exquisitely modulated, yet resonant as the twang of a harp, now seemed of itself to draw and hold each listener; while a certain extravagance of gesticulation—a fantastic movement of both form and feature—seemed very near akin to fascination. And so flowed ...
— Pipes O'Pan at Zekesbury • James Whitcomb Riley

... Loud twang'd thy bow, mighty youth, in the foray, Dread gleam'd thy brand in the proud field of glory; And when heroes sat round in the Psalter of Tara, His counsel was sage as was fatal ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... "Well, we dream our dreams, sentimental little girls that we are! And after a time we open our eyes like kittens on life. I have opened mine, Larry,—very wide open. There isn't a sentimental chord in my being that you can twang any longer.... But we can be good-tempered and sensible about it. Run along now and have your cigar, or go over to the country club and find some one to play billiards,—only let me finish what you are pleased to call my rotten reading,—it ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)

... peculiar to these mountaineers, who talk to each other from hill tops half a mile asunder, announced that "our lady" was approaching. Whereupon a great hubbub arose; dogs barked, and feminine voices responded eagerly. Two or three muskets were presently discharged, and the twang of the balls as they passed near gave my nerves rather an unpleasant shock. I did not then know that the Black Mountaineers always receive their friends thus; in this instance female hands had loaded ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston

... brought to a crisis. The secretary of all the governors Lower Canada had yet had, corresponded, most confidentially, with his home masters, somewhat, perhaps, to the prejudice of his honor the administrator. As general Simcoe loathed the nasal twang, attenuated appearance, and the vulgar republicanism of a downeast American, so Mr. Witsius Ryland abominated Romanism. Speaking of the Roman Catholic clergy of Canada, he says:—"I call them Popish to distinguish them from the ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger

... bland, He yields them to her curious hand, When, instant, twang! the arrow flew, So just her aim, it pierced him through, Right through his heart, the luckless lad! (A heart, to do him right, he had); All prone he lies, in throbbing anguish, Through many an hour to pine and languish, And what made all his ...
— Poems (1828) • Thomas Gent

... pond-lilies, peopled with bullfrogs and water snakes, and haunted by two white cranes. Oh! the terrors of that pond! How our little hearts would beat as we approached it; what fearful glances we would throw around! And if by chance a plash of a wild duck, or the guttural twang of a bullfrog, struck our ears, as we stole quietly by—away we sped, nor paused until completely out of the woods. Then, when I reached home, what a world of adventures and imaginary terrors would I have to relate ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving

... language which a Roman Catholic of the lower class does not understand, is the one in which it is disposed to pray. As for him he had lots of English prayers, though he was totally ignorant of that language. The twang from the nose, the loud and rapid tone in which he spoke, and the malaproprian happiness with which he travestied every prayer he uttered, would have compelled any man to smile. The priests laughed outright before the whole congregation, ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton

... Dirce,[230] and any body who thinks it worth while may contradict him. At Castri we drank of half a dozen streamlets, some not of the purest, before we decided to our satisfaction which was the true Castalian, and even that had a villanous twang, probably from the snow, though it did not throw us into an epic fever, like poor ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron

... should take exception to the guffaw? Ten years ago I too guffawed, though I hope with not quite the Kensingtonian twang. The first Cezannes I ever saw seemed to me to be very funny. They did not disturb my dreams, because I was not in the business. But my notion about Cezanne was that he was a fond old man who distracted ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett

... and the Tommies used to sing 'em. There was one song with a chorus, and it said something like this." The Infant dropped into the true barrack-room twang: ...
— This is "Part II" of Soldiers Three, we don't have "Part I" • Rudyard Kipling

... would sound far, far off, from some farmhouse away among the hills—but it was like a dreaming sound in his ear. No signs of life occurred near him, but occasionally the melancholy chirp of a cricket, or perhaps the guttural twang of a bull-frog from a neighbouring marsh, as if sleeping uncomfortably and turning suddenly ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie

... hopped-up layout anyway, fellah, if it ain't on Earth?" broke in a voice with a decided East Side twang. Blake quickly turned and saw that the gangster had remained with them in that eery flight in the green net. There was an expression of dumfounded amazement upon the man's heavy face, and he was obviously anxious to ...
— Zehru of Xollar • Hal K. Wells

... were flat and dull, as a rule, but a few cracked viciously as though fired close at hand. These last followed the vacuum of low-flying bullets and had a spat and twang of their own. ...
— The Boy Allies with the Cossacks - Or, A Wild Dash over the Carpathians • Clair W. Hayes

... affections, no longer in Maraquita's power to give, for they had already been transferred with all the other treasures of a young and loving heart, to the keeping of a dark-eyed youth of Manilla. He had been rudely repulsed by her parents, but often would the cautious twang of his guitar bring her to a midnight interview. These clandestine meetings were interrupted. Her dark-eyed lover no longer came, and she was told she would never see him more. A marriage with the Don was urged, she resisted—the alternative was a convent! In pity she ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay

... his "Hudibras" poured insult on the past with a pedantic buffoonery for which the general hatred, far more than its humour, secured a hearing. Archbishop Sheldon listened to the mock sermon of a Cavalier who held up the Puritan phrase and the Puritan twang to ridicule in his hall at Lambeth. Duelling and raking became the marks of a fine gentleman; and grave divines winked at the follies of "honest fellows" who fought, gambled, swore, drank, and ended a ...
— History of the English People, Volume VI (of 8) - Puritan England, 1642-1660; The Revolution, 1660-1683 • John Richard Green

... safer guide than Thomas Johnson. Words cannot produce a eulogium sufficient for his merits. But, as I have since learned, he was not quite so Spanish as I had imagined. Three years among the bodegas of Xeres had taught him, no doubt, to appreciate the exact twang of a good, dry sherry; but not, as I now conceive, the exactest flavour of the true Spanish character. I was very lucky, however, in meeting such a friend, and now reckon him as one of the stanchest allies of the house of ...
— John Bull on the Guadalquivir from Tales from all Countries • Anthony Trollope

... then, in the middle of a favorite two-step, a mandolin string snapped with a sharp twang, and Bud came as close to swearing as a well-behaved young man may come in the presence ...
— Cow-Country • B. M. Bower

... priest should have a larger commission to bestow upon him. With the advent of the dry season, peace settled over the sequestered town, while its artless folk drowsed away the long, hot days and danced at night in the silvery moonlight to the twang of the guitar and the drone of the amorous canzonet. Jose was deeply grateful for these days of unbroken quiet, and for the opportunity they afforded him to probe the child's thought and develop his own. Day after day he taught her. Night after night he visited the members ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... strained alertness, in that way which is peculiar to the children of the wild, but has been lost by their domestic degenerates. The sun was shining full in at the little diamond-paned window. The window was open, and a late fly of metallic hue was shooting about with a pinging noise, like the twang of some instrumental string. But neither fly, nor sun, nor the tick of the little clock on the mantelpiece had awakened the cat. It was the click ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars

... slovenly hiatus, coming from intrinsic genius, and not "put on," that secretly pleases the soul more than the wrought and re-wrought polish of the most perfect verse?) Mark the native spice and untranslatable twang in the very names of his songs-"O for ane and twenty, Tam," "John Barleycorn," "Last May a braw Wooer," "Rattlin roarin Willie," "O wert thou in the cauld, cauld blast," "Gude e'en to you, Kimmer," "Merry hae I been teething a Heckle," "O ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman

... came. Murphy and his party were gone. The beacon still blazed at the westward pass. The twang of the guitar had ceased. Silence reigned about the ranch. Old Plummer with anxious face plodded slowly up and down the open space in front of the deserted bar. Feeny, with three loaded carbines close at hand and his ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King

... Thrace were, we know, called mimes. In the fragment of his lost play, AEschylus, after describing the din made by the "mountain gear" of the Mother, the maddening hum of the bombykes, a sort of spinning-top, the clash of the brazen cymbals and the twang of ...
— Ancient Art and Ritual • Jane Ellen Harrison

... little spice of deviltry lends not an unpleasantly titillating twang to the great mass of respectable flour that goes to make up the pudding of our modern civilization? And pertinent to this question another—Why is it that the pirate has, and always has had, a certain lurid ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle

... gentlemen, good morning!" he said, in a perfectly good Yankee twang. "Can I do anything for you to-day in my line? Step in, gentlemen; I'm John Higginbotham." They entered and, behind the desk, sighted a stout woman of medium size, middle ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton

... joke is—she does not know it! My "Co." has also been much amused by a brightly-written Novel, in one volume, called A Bride from the Bush. Mr. E. W. HORNUNG evidently knows his subject well, and has caught the exact tone, or rather nasal twang of our Australian cousins. My "Co." says that "the Bride" is a particularly pleasant young person, thanks to her youth, good heart, and beauty. However, it is questionable—taking her as a sample—whether her "people" would "pan out" quite so ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 25, 1891 • Various



Words linked to "Twang" :   nasality, pluck, enunciate, throb, plunk, nasal twang, sound out, pronounce, go, say, sound, pick, articulate, enounce



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