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More "Footstep" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... conviction that I should sleep as usual till six in the morning, I was soon lost in a comfortable slumber. Suddenly I was aroused, and on raising my head to listen I heard a sound certainly resembling the light, soft tread of a lady's footstep, accompanied with the rustling as of a silk gown. I sprang out of bed and lighted a candle; there was nothing to be seen and nothing now to be heard; I carefully examined the whole room, looked under the bed, into the fireplace, up the chimney, and at both the doors, ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... heels, cocking his head to listen. It was no footstep outside the compartment slide. It was not that kind of sound at all. And it was faint—so faint indeed that perhaps the noises of the storm since they had left port had quite ...
— Navy Boys Behind the Big Guns - Sinking the German U-Boats • Halsey Davidson
... compeer. He is a perfect gentleman; cleanly in his habits, obedient, unobtrusive, incapable of smallness, affectionate, very sensitive to rebuke or to unkindness, and amusingly jealous. As a watch he is excellent, quick to detect a strange footstep, valiant to defend the threshold, and to challenge with deep voice any intruder, yet sensibly discerning his master's friends, and not annoying them with prolonged growling and grumbling as many terriers do when a stranger ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... heard a footstep, Heard a rustling in the branches, And with glowing cheek and forehead, With the deer upon his shoulders, Suddenly from out the woodlands Hiawatha stood ...
— The Song Of Hiawatha • Henry W. Longfellow
... returned just in time; will you please hand me my two pistol' from yonder?—thank you." He laid one beside each thigh. "Now please turn the head of my bed a little bit, to face the door—thank you; and now, good-bye. You hear those footstep' there in the room behind? she is dressing to go; the other ladies they are helping her. Richard, I place them in your charge; have them all ready to get into her wagon at a moment's notice, with you on your horse—and ...
— The Cavalier • George Washington Cable
... living thing to be seen, and Marion's heart sank within her. She was cold, tired, and homesick; and she saw at once that around the small front door, before which Cousin Abijah in his gallantry had stopped, no footstep had left a mark. The snow-bank reached to the handle, clung to it, and as absolutely refused entrance, as did a shrill voice which at once made itself heard, but from whence Marion could not conjecture. It said, however, "Go round to the back door! What's good enough for me, is good enough ...
— Miss Ashton's New Pupil - A School Girl's Story • Mrs. S. S. Robbins
... Oft, when my little ones at play, Were in youth's natural lightness gay, Or if they listened to some tale 265 Of travellers, or of fairy land,— When the light from the wood-fire's dying brand Flashed on their faces,—if they heard Or thought they heard upon the stair His footstep, the suspended word 270 Died on my lips: we all grew pale: The babe at my bosom was hushed with fear If it thought it heard its father near; And my two wild boys would near my knee Cling, cowed and cowering ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... gave the king a large Cashmere scarf, also one of red printed cotton, and a dozen small harness bells, which he immediately arranged as anklets. His usually unchangeable countenance relaxed into a smile of satisfaction as he took leave, and the bells tinkled at every footstep as ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... bones,' said the Cobbler, I sat at my tic-tac-to; And a footstep came to my door and stopped, And a hand groped to and fro; And I peered up over my boot and last; And my feet went cold as stones: I saw an eye at the keyhole, Susie! ...
— Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes • Walter de la Mare
... The fire, before which I mused, was burning clear without flame, and its intense glow, which alone lighted my apartment, cast a red tint on the furniture and walls. Outside the streets were muffled deep with snow, in which no footstep was audible. All was quiet as death, silent as the grave, save for the faint murmur of my own breathing. Time and space seemed annihilated beyond those four narrow walls, and I was as a coffined living centre ...
— Arrows of Freethought • George W. Foote
... door, and shut his mouth from a further word till he heard Rhoda's returning footstep. He closed the door again behind her, and went up to the square deal table, leaned his body forward on the knuckles of his trembling fist, and said, "We're pretty well broken up, as it is. I've lost my ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... priests scowled at him as a Calvinist, and where even the Protestant Jacobites cautioned one another in whispers against the old Republican. Sometimes he lay hid in the garrets of London, imagining that every footstep which he heard on the stairs was that of a bailiff with a writ, or that of a King's messenger with a warrant. He now obtained access to Shrewsbury, and ventured to talk as a Jacobite to a brother Jacobite. Shrewsbury, who was not at all inclined to ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... made to be sung rather than to be played. The "cantabile" of its heading was superfluous—it was a Song without Words, evidently one of a new set, for I knew it was none of the old. But the sound of a footstep startled me and I guiltily replaced the sheet. The door opened, and I was warmly greeted in excellent English by the man who entered. I had no need to be told that it was Felix Mendelssohn ...
— A Day with Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy • George Sampson
... Boy who now his words can freely sound, And with a steadier footstep prints the ground, Places in playfellows his chief delight, Quarrels, shakes hands, and cares not wrong or right: Sway'd by each fav'rite bauble's short-liv'd pow'r, In smiles, in tears, all humours ev'ry hour. Imberbus juvenis, tandem custode remoto, Gaudet ...
— The Art Of Poetry An Epistle To The Pisos - Q. Horatii Flacci Epistola Ad Pisones, De Arte Poetica. • Horace
... boulders, and threatens the intruder with poisonous looks and snapping jaws. Innumerable bright-coloured fish shot hither and thither in the flat pools, there were worms, sea-stars, octopus, crabs. The wealth of animal life on the reef, where each footstep stirs up a hundred creatures, is incredible, and ever so many more are hidden in the rocks ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... Angelina pressed on in a haste that grew into anxiety. Not a sound came back to them from those others ahead. Not a voice. Not a footstep. ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley
... footstep in the room above, and then a creak from the steps, and then another creak, and another. I saw Jim's face as if it had been carved out of ivory, with his parted lips and his staring eyes fixed upon the black square of the stair opening. He still ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a few minutes, and repeated to himself a few formal words. Had he stayed longer on his knees, he might have given way to a burst of penitence and supplication—but he heard Bull's footstep, and getting up, he ran down stairs to breakfast; ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... lichen, light and shadow, played with each other in wildering combinations. But Rollo did not look at valley of hill; his eyes were seeking a gleam of colour which they had seen that morning once before; and seeking it with the spy of an eagle. No grass here gave sign of a footstep. Soft lichen and unbending ferns kept the secret, if they had one; the evergreens were noisy with birds, but otherwise mute; the fog still settled down in the ravines ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... echoing, echoing footstep, Over the bridge I walk; The moon breaks out of the waters, And looks as ...
— Adela Cathcart - Volume II • George MacDonald
... other side, the lad turned again to his left and doubled back. He went more cautiously now, making sure of each footstep that he might not warn the unseen foe of ...
— The Boy Allies in the Balkan Campaign - The Struggle to Save a Nation • Clair W. Hayes
... temporary concealment. He then undertook to exculpate himself from blame, assuring me that as soon as I should discountenance the expectations of Mr. Boyer, and discontinue the reception of his address, his intentions should be made known. He was enlarging upon this topic, when we heard a footstep approaching us, and, looking up, saw Mr. Boyer within a few paces of the arbor. Confusion seized us both. We rose involuntarily from our seats, but were mute as statues. He spoke not a word, but casting ...
— The Coquette - The History of Eliza Wharton • Hannah Webster Foster
... he ascended to the city, up the steep hill, the side of Mount Moriah, to St. Stephen's Gate; and there, on his left, was the entrance to Omar's mosque, guarded by fierce dervishes against pollution from stray Christian foot. Hence to his hotel every footstep was over ground sacred in some sense, but now desecrated by traditionary falsehoods. Every action of our Saviour's passion has its spot assigned to it; of every noted word the locale is given. When once you are again within the ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... by the western light, and casting long purple shadows), in a vine-embowered pergola. He was leaning forward, legs crossed, brow wrinkled, as one deep in thought. But of course at the sound of her footstep he jumped up. ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... consumed two more hours, and glad was I to come in view of the little chill-looking sheet of water on its summit, which is called the Lake of the Dead. The path was filled with snow, at a most critical point, where, indeed, a misplaced footstep might betray the incautious to their destruction. A large party on the other side appeared fully aware of the difficulty, for it had halted, and was in earnest discussion with the guide, touching the practicability ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... promises a draught of life. As I passed along the broad aisle of the village street, arched by the venerable trees of an older generation, I seemed to be in dreamland; no sound broke the repose of midday, no footstep echoed far or near; the cattle stood motionless in the fields beneath the sheltering branches. I turned into the dusty country road, and saw the vision of the great encircling hills, remote, shadowless, and dreamlike, ...
— Under the Trees and Elsewhere • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... This was panic, and loss of judgment. For the interview was palpable to anyone approaching down the Court. Micky must have felt this, but he only said:—"I'll square him how I can, missis," and withdrew from the door. Mr. Wix's lurching footstep, with the memory of its fetters on it, approached at its leisure. He stopped and looked round, and saw the boy, who acknowledged his stare. "I ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... sword is fallen, and he lies outworn and wan Who dared to rise against his God in wrath, being but man. And I uprose and left him, and in all peace took my path Force to my Chosen, recking light of Pentheus and his wrath. But soft, methinks a footstep sounds even now within the hall; 'Tis he; how think ye he will stand, and what words speak withal? I will endure him gently, though he come in fury hot. For still are the ways of Wisdom, and her temper trembleth ...
— Hippolytus/The Bacchae • Euripides
... was an ornamental sculptor, and executed those wonderful decorations on the outside of houses in which builders delight. The trade is not a pleasant one, for it necessitates working at dizzy heights, on scaffolds that vibrate with every footstep, and exposes you to the heat of summer and the frosts of winter. The business, however, is well paid, and Andre got a good price for his stone figures and wreaths. But all the money he earned went in the study of the painter's ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... his glistening habitation has been destroyed by some ruthless footstep, goes patiently to work to rebuild it, so the Moor in Granada, with his imperishable instinct for beauty, was making of his little kingdom the most beautiful spot in Europe. The city of Granada was lovelier than Cordova; its Alhambra more enchanting than ...
— A Short History of Spain • Mary Platt Parmele
... intensity for five dark minutes behind the tub; but then the need of being loved, the strongest need in poor Maggie's nature, began to wrestle with her pride, and soon threw it. She crept from behind her tub into the twilight of the long attic, but just then she heard a quick footstep ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... in such a bed would have given him so severe a cold in his head, that he would have nearly sneezed and snuffled it off. Not so in Senegal. Still there were other inconveniences, for Harry had not rested for five minutes, when he heard a stealthy footstep; his heart began to beat. He had learned in his Geography that Senegal was full of wild beasts, as well as the sugar plums the treacherous sailor talked about. He began to wish he had staid in the ...
— The Big Nightcap Letters - Being the Fifth Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... the paper aside and began walking up and down his room, anxious for Nestor's return, anxious for a breath of mountain air—for the freedom of the high places, for the sniff of a camp-fire. It was then that he heard a footstep at his door. ...
— Boy Scouts in Mexico; or On Guard with Uncle Sam • G. Harvey Ralphson
... heads were bent over fifty different schemes for mischief, and fifty sibilant whispers delivered forbidden messages. The teacher was writing on the board, and turned suddenly at the sound of a heavy footstep in the hall. The door was open, letting in the breeze from the lake, and in it stood a big hairy man with a bushy black head and wild blue eyes. Helen stood and stared at ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... evening came the dinner; and I as a guest, a nervous, self-conscious guest, who started at every footstep. I was presented to the King, who eyed me curiously. Seeing that I wore a medal such as his Chancellor gives to men who sometimes do his country service, he spoke to me and inquired how I had obtained it. It was an affair similar to the Balkistan; only there ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... myself, even though I was now a great way off. Sometimes I fancied it must be the devil, and reason joined in with me in this supposition, for how should any other thing in human shape come into the place? Where was the vessel that brought them? What marks were there of any other footstep? And how was it possible a man should come there? But then, to think that Satan should take human shape upon him in such a place, where there could be no manner of occasion for it, but to leave the print of his foot behind him, and that even for no purpose too, for he could not be sure I should ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... which, when there was no company, she always carried on in the dining-room till tea-time. Maggie was stooping to caress the tiny silken pet, and comforting him for his mistress's absence, when the sound of a footstep on the gravel made her look up, and she saw Mr. Stephen Guest walking up the garden, as if he had come straight from the river. It was very unusual to see him so soon after dinner! He often complained that their dinner-hour was late at ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... I was really a-dreadin' to set here by myself," and for some minutes nobody spoke and the needles clicked faster than ever. Suddenly there was a strange sound outside the door, and they stared at each other in terror and held their breath, but nobody stirred. This was no familiar footstep; presently they heard a strange little cry, and still they feared to look, or to know what was waiting outside. Then Mrs. Thacher took a candle in her hand, and, still hesitating, asked once, "Who is there?" and, hearing no answer, slowly opened ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... when the reinstated captain pointed to the ship, riding within half a mile of the shore, that was to bear him away, in the nine-and-twentieth year of his seclusion in that lonely place. So is the sandy beach on which the memorable footstep was impressed, and where the savages hauled up their canoes when they came ashore for those dreadful public dinners, which led to a dancing worse than speech-making. So is the cave where the flaring eyes of the old goat made such a goblin appearance in the dark. So is the site of the hut where Robinson ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... world, no more? Return, thou virgin-bloom on Nature's face; Ah, only on the Minstrel's magic shore, Can we the footstep of sweet Fable trace! The meadows mourn for the old hallowing life; Vainly we search the earth of gods bereft; Where once the warm and living shapes were rife, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... to Ann interminably long. Insensibly she was keyed up to a delicate pitch of expectancy, her ear nervously alert for the sound of a familiar footstep on the flagged path. And as the leaden moments crawled by, and the warm, sunshiny silence which enfolded the Cottage remained unbroken, a vague sense of apprehension crept into her heart. The glamour of those moments alone with Eliot at the gate, the pulsating sweetness ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... and her great black eyes were staring beyond me as if she saw something through the wall of the room. Once more her face altered to the former scornful indifference, and she vanished. Keen of hearing as I was, I had never yet heard the footstep of ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... to tidy up the house, Edna helping all she could. Then they stationed themselves by the window to see if by any chance there might be someone coming along whom they could hail. But the road was not much frequented and there was not a footstep nor a track in the deep snow. Only the smoke from neighboring chimneys gave any evidence of life. Once they heard sleigh-bells in the distance and concluded that the ...
— A Dear Little Girl at School • Amy E. Blanchard
... silent for evermore. For my part, I won't say that Lord Bacon would have explained any question to a child even without feeling it to be an act of condescension. I won't hint under my breath that Lord Bacon reverenced every fact as a footstep of Deity, and stooped to pick up every rough, ungainly stone of a fact, though it were likely to tear and deform the smooth wallet of a theory. I, for my part, belong, you know, not to the 'eminent men of science,' nor even to the 'intelligent ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... my noble brother! 'Tis hard to think that thou art not; To realize that never other Footstep like thine shall share my cot, And think of all thy heart endured, By sore besetments often tried. But,—Heaven be thanked,—all now is cured And thou, fair boy, ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... few dark green snakes, from five to seven feet long; a dead ounce, that had been stripped of its skin; and a lizard, three feet in length, which ran timidly across our path. I met with no apes; they appear to conceal themselves deeper in the woods, where no human footstep is likely to disturb them ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... doorway in this, but the inside is pretty dark, and Shinondi, taking my hand, raised the reed curtain bound with hide, which concealed the entrance into the actual house, and, leading me into it, retired a footstep, extended his arms, waved his arms inwards three times, and then stroked his beard several times, after which he indicated by a sweep of his hand and a beautiful smile that the house and all it contained ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... sacred Ikshumati(344) came, Their ancient kings' ancestral claim. They saw the learned Brahmans stand, Each drinking from his hollowed hand, And through Bahika(345) journeying still They reached at length Sudaman's hill: There Vishnu's footstep turned to see, Vipasa(346) viewed, and Salmali, And many a lake and river met, Tank, pool, and pond, and rivulet. And lions saw, and tigers near, And elephants and herds of deer, And still, by prompt obedience led, Along the ample road they sped. Then when their ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... grown so timorous, every trifling noise Scatters my spirits, and announces to me The footstep of some messenger of evil. 5 And can you tell me, sister, what the event is? Will he agree to do the Emperor's pleasure, And send the horse-regiments to the Cardinal? Tell me, has he dismissed Von Questenberg ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... pace almost to a run. The day was too warm for rapid movement, and she soon stopped and listened. There were the usual woodland sounds; leaves rustling, grasshoppers chirping, and birds singing; but not a human voice or footstep. She began to think that the god-like figure was only the Hermes of Praxiteles, suggested to her by Goethe's classical Sabbat, and changed by a day-dream into the semblance of a living reality. The groom must have been one of those incongruities characteristic of dreams—probably a reminiscence of ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... storms afeard, she shared my life's distress, A singing Miriam, alway, in God's poor wilderness; The wretched at her footstep smiled, the frivolous were still; A bright path marked her pilgrimage, from Blackbird ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... pay his respects. But come," said the boy, astonished, "you don't tell me you know Old Han's footstep—begging his ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... this was brought to an end. At about mid-day Lord Chetwynde returned. Hilda heard his footstep and his voice. A great joy darted through her, and her first impulse was to fling herself upon him, and weep tears of happiness upon his breast. But that was a thing which was denied her—a privilege which might never be hers. After the first wild impulse and the first rush of joy she restrained ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... he interrupted, not hearing her. "It would not have done any good, for I have loved you from the first minute when I saw your blue drapery flutter in your flight from me. Some deeper sense than mortals have told me that every footstep was falling on my sleeping heart and waking it to life. You were not running away; in some divine sense you were coming toward me. Daphne, Daphne, I cannot ...
— Daphne, An Autumn Pastoral • Margaret Pollock Sherwood
... materials with me into the street, under a lamp-post. I opened the door, and went up to get my papers. When I descended once more I locked the door from the outside, and planted myself under the light. All around was quiet; I heard the heavy clanking footstep of a constable down in Taergade, and far away in the direction of St. Han's Hill a dog barked. There was nothing to disturb me. I pulled my coat collar up round my ears, and commenced to think ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... insistent to my door, Calling my name; Nor voice nor footstep have I heard before, Yet clear the calling sounds and o'er and o'er— It seems the sunlight burns along ...
— Fires of Driftwood • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... his bride would meet them both beneath the laburnum arch at the gate. He would be cunning as he approached the door of Kilbogie Manse, and walk on the grass border lest the Rabbi, poring over some Father, should hear the crunch of the gravel—he did know his footstep—and so he would take the old man by surprise. Alas! he need not take such care, for the walk was now as the border with grass, and the gate was lying open, and the dead house stared at him with open, unconscious eyes, and knew him not. ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... long ago looking in on you. We'll get a room over in the Main Building to-day. It costs more, but the accommodations are so much better. We are directly on the path from the street, so we hear every passing footstep." ...
— Sunny Slopes • Ethel Hueston
... your nets around robbers; for it is easier to guess the riddles of the Sphinx than to detect the whereabouts of a flying thief. He looks round him on all sides, ready to start off at the sound of an advancing footstep, trembling at the thought of a possible ambush. How can one catch him who, like the wind, tarries never in one place? Go forth, then, under the starry skies; watch diligently with all the birds of night, and as they seek their ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... known a place with such echoes. They shook from a footstep like nuts rattling out of a bag; a mouse behind the skirting led a whole camp-following of them; to ask a question was, as in that other House, to awaken the derisive shouts of an Opposition. Yet, in the intervals of silence, there fell a deadliness of quiet that was quite appalling ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... to sleep! We neither of us closed an eyelid, so alert were we for the expected footstep on the other side ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... am so glad you have come," she said, hastily rising upon hearing the familiar footstep in the hall. "I have been waiting a ...
— Rosa's Quest - The Way to the Beautiful Land • Anna Potter Wright
... Letty was lying high against her pillows, waiting for him. Suddenly, after she had sent her maid away, she had felt depressed and miserable, and had begun to cry. And for some reason hardly clear to herself she had lain pining for George's footstep. When he came in she looked at him with eyes still wet, reproaching ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... following passage, to whose truth the added years have only added confirmation, "There is still another sweet mercy which has been vouchsafed to me in the true heart that has never faltered and the gentle footstep that has never wearied in the pathway of life for two and thirty years. From how many mistakes and hasty indiscretions her quick sagacity has kept me, you can never know. If you have any tribute of thanks for any good which I have done you, do not offer it to me; go carry ...
— Recollections of a Long Life - An Autobiography • Theodore Ledyard Cuyler
... ye children of gladness, come! Where the violets lie may now be your home. Ye of the rose-cheek and dew-bright eye, And the bounding footstep, to meet me fly, With the lyre, and the wreath, and the joyous lay, Come forth to the ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... meant; we are quite alone here. I have not heard a horse-hoof or a footstep or the hoot of a train for miles. So I think we might stop here ...
— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... Osama ibn Zeid to Abu Bekr as he accompanied the Syrian army a little way on its march, out of Medina. "Nay," replied the caliph, "I will not ride, but I will walk and soil my feet a little space in the ways of the Lord. Verily, every footstep in the ways of the Lord is equal in merit to manifold good works, and wipeth away a multitude of sins."[42] And of the "martyrs," those who fell in these crusading campaigns, Mohammed thus described the ...
— Two Old Faiths - Essays on the Religions of the Hindus and the Mohammedans • J. Murray Mitchell and William Muir
... agitated girls dashed back over the sands and into the dark tunnel, and hurried as fast as they could up the underground passage, expecting every moment to hear a footstep behind them and a voice demanding to know what they were doing trespassing upon the premises. At the top of the tunnel a horrible surprise awaited them. The door through which they had entered was shut and bolted. ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... treasured scalp- locks, the spear and war-club, and shield of whitened bull-hide, that hung by each warrior's resting-place. Such was the weird scene that lingered on the dreamy eyes of Joutel, as he closed them at last in a troubled sleep. The sound of a footstep soon wakened him; and, turning, he saw at his side, the figure of a naked savage, armed with a bow and arrows. Joutel spoke, but received no answer. Not knowing what to think, he reached out his hand for his pistols; on ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... the staircase, the sound of a hurried footstep, and yet he waited long enough to feel ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... Drever's fireside talking of Jarl Haffling's talisman, Thora Quendale told us how, when one day after her illness she was sitting in an armchair, with the stone dangling by a string from her hand, she fell asleep before the warm fire. She was awakened by hearing a footstep in the room; it was Tom Kinlay's. She felt for the stone, but it was gone. Tom had stolen it. This was how it came into his possession. Evidently it was by a mere accident that he left it at the top of the cliff, before going down ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... wonderfully quick-sighted, that they will swiftly pursue by Eye the Track of any Thing among the Trees, in the Leaves and Grass, as an Hound does by the Scent, where we can't perceive the least Mark or Footstep. ...
— The Present State of Virginia • Hugh Jones
... Porky, and laughed aloud. Just then he heard a light footstep and turned to see who was coming. It was old Granny Fox. She had seen Bowser run away, and now she was anxious to find out if Reddy ...
— Old Granny Fox • Thornton W. Burgess
... slipped back to Hazelwood, and shortly before the sun set was prowling about in the neighbourhood of the bush which stood just outside the gate of Hazelwood Manor. Before he had been there many minutes, a light, tripping footstep was heard; and poor, foolish Kate, with the blue drops in her ears, came like a giddy fly into the web ...
— The White Lady of Hazelwood - A Tale of the Fourteenth Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... could have done it. He thought he would give him another minute. There was a footstep behind, and he fell back. It was Sir William Harcourt. Lord Randolph heard him, and, seeing who it was, increased ...
— Better Dead • J. M. Barrie
... tenderest care we spend Upon the grave: and mourners go With solemn dirge and footstep slow— Love's last sad ...
— The Hymns of Prudentius • Aurelius Clemens Prudentius
... pluck at your raiment, We stroke down your hair, We faint in our lament, And pine into air. Fare-ye-well—farewell! The Eden scents, no longer sensible, Expire at Eden's door! Each footstep of your treading Treads out some fragrance which ye knew before: Farewell! the flowers of Eden Ye shall smell ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... vows, have trodden in the shade of its walks, trying with the rigours of monastic life to crush out the memories of love and home left behind among the sun-kissed vineyards of France. For two hundred years and more no woman's footstep had fallen here among the flowers, until recently the wife of a Governor-General was admitted on a special occasion. On the cobble-stones of the courtyard, pilgrims, penitents, priests and soldiers have trodden, the echoes of their footsteps passing ...
— Famous Firesides of French Canada • Mary Wilson Alloway
... the summons, and staggering back from each other stood leaning upon their swords and panting desperately, while Billington dexterously stepping backward behind an elder bush made his way forest-ward with a stealthy footstep, and a shrewd use of cover, suggestive ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... situated directly under M. Madeleine's chamber. He paid no heed to the portress's words, but went to bed and to sleep. Towards midnight he woke up with a start; in his sleep he had heard a noise above his head. He listened; it was a footstep pacing back and forth, as though some one were walking in the room above him. He listened more attentively, and recognized M. Madeleine's step. This struck him as strange; usually, there was no noise in M. Madeleine's chamber until he rose in the morning. A moment later the ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... perhaps, in its red embers new scenes of persecution yet to be encountered. The snow still drifted hard against the windows, and sometimes, as the blaze of the logs had gradually sunk, came down the spacious chimney and hissed upon the hearth. A cautious footstep might now and then be heard in a neighboring apartment, and the sound invariably drew the eyes of both Quakers to the door which led thither. When a fierce and riotous gust of wind had led his thoughts by a natural association ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... member of the Free Church, with an abhorrence of anything that could in any way be contorted into Papist practices, Letty crossed herself. As she did so, a noise in the passage outside augmented her terror. She strained her ears painfully, and the sound developed into a footstep, soft, light, and surreptitious. It came gently towards the door; it paused outside, and Letty intuitively felt that it was listening. Her suspense was now so intolerable, that it was almost with ...
— Scottish Ghost Stories • Elliott O'Donnell
... heard his footstep, and the door opened. Mr. Widemann was a very handsome young man, of thirty or thirty-two, with black whiskers entirely surrounding his manly and expressive face; his morning dress showed a certain rural elegance. He seemed at first not only embarrassed but ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... over me, I got up, walked up and down the floor, and then drew up the blind, and gazed out into the deserted street. Not a footfall to be heard, neither man's nor beast's; nothing but patter, patter, patter. At length, after standing fully fifteen minutes—oh, joyful sound!—a coming footstep, firm and quick. My first thought was that those steps would stop at our door. But, directly after, I felt that very improbable, for who was there that would come such a night? Papa was up north with mamma; Nell and Floy were visiting ...
— Edna's Sacrifice and Other Stories - Edna's Sacrifice; Who Was the Thief?; The Ghost; The Two Brothers; and What He Left • Frances Henshaw Baden
... on the mantel, dropped his forehead upon it and stood so, the wonderful glowing colors of the painting seeming to shimmer on his bronze hair. At last, at the sound of Jonas's footstep in the hall, he lifted his head, turned off the light above the painting, crossed to his desk and, dropping the still unopened envelope into a secret drawer, locked it and put the key ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow
... the head of the island by means of a skiff, and, ascending the high grounds on the shore of the mainland, proceeded in a northwesterly direction, through a tract of country excessively wild and desolate, where no trace of a human footstep was to be seen. Legrand led the way with decision; pausing only for an instant, here and there, to consult what appeared to be certain landmarks of his own contrivance ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... have even entered vessels by night. One dark evening the mate of a vessel, hearing a heavy but peculiar footstep on deck, went up to see what it was, and was immediately met by a jaguar, who had come on board, seeking what he could devour; a severe struggle ensued, assistance arrived, and the brute was killed, but the man lost the use of the arm which had been ...
— Forest & Frontiers • G. A. Henty
... A footstep was now heard in the apartment, which seemed to silence all the varied sounds of woe that filled it. The cribbage party hid their cards, and ceased their oaths; other wretches, whose complaints had arisen to frenzy, left off their wild exclamations and entreaties for assistance. Agony ...
— The Surgeon's Daughter • Sir Walter Scott
... large pot-hole called Loee, which has the reputation of having given exit to all the animals in South Africa, and also to the first progenitors of the whole Bechuana race. Their footsteps attest the truth of this belief. I was profane enough to be sceptical, because the large footstep of the first man Matsieng was directed as if going into instead of out of this famous pot-hole. Other huge pot-holes are met with all over the country, and at heights on the slopes of the mountains far above the levels of the ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume II (of 2), 1869-1873 • David Livingstone
... snoring over a folio edition of Montaigne. And upon the table stood a small stone pitcher, containing a residuum of whisky punch, now grown cold. Frank started up in great consternation upon hearing Ned's footstep beside him, and, from that time, almost entirely deserted the library. Mr. Chub, however, was not so easily drawn away from the career of his humor, and still shows his hankering ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... penetrate each other's most secret thoughts. This would continue forever in the calm of an enduring affection. It seemed to her that she felt him there beside her. And an unusual sensation came over her. She remained long musing thus, when suddenly she thought she heard a footstep behind the house. "If it were he." But it passed on and she felt as if she had been deceived. The air became cooler. The day broke. Slowly bursting aside the gleaming clouds, touching with fire the trees, the plains, the ocean, all the horizon, ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... upstairs again," said Dick cheerfully. But he met Nell in the passage. There was the sound of a thud, a clear, low voice expostulating, and a girl's footstep on the stairs, as Nell, smoothing her hair, ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... doctrine are unknown to them; and the religion of thousands of Buddhists lies more in veneration of the Holy Tooth or some such object, or the vessel that contains it, or the Holy Bowl, or the fossil footstep, or the Holy Tree which Buddha planted, than in the thorough knowledge and faithful practice of his high teaching. Petrarch's house in Arqua; Tasso's supposed prison in Ferrara; Shakespeare's house in Stratford, with his chair; Goethe's house in Weimar, with its ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer
... open till he heard her footstep just outside. She came in without a word, not even looking at him. And he, too, said not a word till he had closed the door, and made sure of her. Then they turned to each other. Her breast was heaving a little, under her thin frock, but she was calmer than he, with that wonderful composure of ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... and was both joyful and sorry . . . . Why? . . . I seemed to hear a whisper near me. I turned swiftly. She was not there! And as we trudged wearily from stone city to stone city I seemed to hear a light footstep near me. A time came when I heard it always, and I was glad. I thought, walking dizzy and weary in sunshine on the hard paths of white men I thought, She is there—with us! . . . Matara was sombre. ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... of a hammer is as rich as a symphony. It is like the little word of a great man, great in its great relations. When the spirit is waked and the man within the man is listening to it, the sound of a hoof on a lonely road in the great woods is the footstep of cities to him coming through the trees, and the low, chocking sound of a cartwheel in the still and radiant valley throngs his being like an opera. All sights and echoes and thoughts and feelings revel in it. It is music for the smoke, rapt and beautiful, rising from the chimneys ...
— The Lost Art of Reading • Gerald Stanley Lee
... elongated upwards in a cuplike form, c, the better to hold the oil, and keep it from flying; d is the wharf, which has attached to it the sleeve, m, and which is situated loosely in the space between the spindle and the footstep, e. Above the wharf the spindle is hexagonal in shape, and to this part is attached the friction plate, a. Between the latter and the upper surface of the wharf a cloth or felt washer is inserted, to ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... a sound, a faint, soft creeping on the ground somewhere near him, and he knew that it was the sound of a human footstep, ...
— The Flemmings And "Flash Harry" Of Savait - From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other - Stories" - 1902 • Louis Becke
... going down stairs quietly, in the darkness of the early spring morning. The clerk's quick ear caught the sound of a stealthy footstep; and in the next minute they were face to face with a man who was ascending ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... I went to her bower to tell her of the matter, but she was not there. Then the snow began to fall, and still I clambered up the cliff, and waited at the end of the valley every hour of the day and far into the night. But no light footstep came to meet me, and no sweet voice was in the air. At last I resolved upon a desperate and difficult enterprise, for I was well-nigh mad with anxiety. I would go to Lorna's house, and find out at all costs what had befallen her. But though I knew fairly well where her house was in Doone ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... sorrow; the beasts of the fields crouched and moaned in their desolation; the great trees, that had put on their robes of green at Balder's command, sighed as the wind wailed through them; and the sweet flowers, that waited for Balder's footstep and sprang up in all the fields to greet him, hung their frail blossoms and wept bitterly for the love and the warmth and the light that had gone out. Throughout the whole earth there was nothing but weeping, ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... again the awful sounds came to her. She was hysterical when she heard his footstep approach once more, shrieked aloud for ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... Old Year's gone away To nothingness and night: We cannot find him all the day, Nor hear him in the night: He left no footstep, mark, or place, In either shade or sun: The last year he'd a neighbour's face, In this he's ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... again, and he re-lit it. The clock on the mantelpiece struck twelve with a silvery clang, and almost at the same instant he heard the rustle of a silk gown and a light footstep,—the door ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... dances by moonlight on the lawn, but never since he came from Rome did Donatello's presence deepen the blushes of the pretty contadinas, or his footstep weary out the most agile partner or competitor, as once ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume II. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... voices of men mingled with thuds and cracking of straps and flopping of saddles on the ground. After that the heavy tread of boots sounded on the porch of the cabin opposite. A door creaked on its hinges. Next a slow footstep, accompanied by clinking of spurs, approached Ellen's door, and a heavy hand banged upon it. She knew this person could not be ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... after the great exile the Acadian lands lay deserted, and the fogs that gathered morning by morning on the dark top of Blomidon looked down on a waste where came and went no human footstep. All the while the fated amethyst lay hidden, as far as tradition tells, beneath the red ooze and changing ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... not Fate, that, on this July midnight— Was it not Fate, (whose name is also Sorrow,) That bade me pause before the garden-gate, To breathe the incense of those Slumbering roses? No footstep stirred; the hated world all slept, Save only thee and me. (Oh, Heaven!—oh, God! How my heart beats in coupling those two words!) Save only thee and me. I paused—I looked— And in an instant all things disappeared. (Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!) The pearly luster of ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... for some time, and was still pacing along with my back to the house, when I heard a light footstep behind me, and for a foolish moment fancied it was the girl whose aspect and kind words had lately put me in such a commotion. But on turning about, I felt relief and disappointment mingled (the disappointment was, I think, the ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... damp earth was gone, and as the sun shone out the air was filled with the scent of warm roses and the faintly sweet odour of wistaria. Marcello heard a light footstep close to him, and met his mother's ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... neglected corner, the hand of affection had been busy in decorating the hired house. Most of the graves were surrounded with a slight wooden paling, to secure them from the passing footstep; there was hardly one so deserted as not to be marked with its little wooden cross, and decorated with a garland of flowers; and here and there I could perceive a solitary mourner, clothed in black, stooping to plant ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... or two little passages, that looked so dark, narrow, and brambly, that they appeared inaccessible. But Netta managed to push aside some briars with her parasol and enter one. Almost at her first footstep she tore her pretty muslin dress, but folding it closer round her, she pushed her way. The smart pink bonnet was in great ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... rushes and tussocked grass and juniper bushes which grew along the wilding shore, along the edge of the wood. Coming from the town, I could not but admire the emptiness of the country; hardly ever did I hear the sound of a human voice or a footstep; only once did I meet some wood-gatherers, poor women carrying bundles of faggots, bent under their loads. And thinking that perchance I knew them—they were evidently from the village; if so, I must have known ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... to start and look suspiciously at him. Supper was brought, but Harry noticed that the landlord, who himself brought it in, glanced several times at Jacob. They were eating their supper when they heard his footstep again coming along the passage. Harry dropped on one knee, and was in the act of handing the jug in that attitude to Jacob, when the landlord entered. Harry rose hastily, as if in confusion, and the landlord, ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty
... said a plaintive voice, "if we only can learn where he is. Hush, there is a footstep! Ah, it is not my poor ...
— The Doctor's Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... very words he had suggested. But a sudden, apprehensive recollection came over him. He listened; and, with an exclamation of dismay, he seized his hat, and ran out of the house, but too late. At the same moment a quick, nervous footstep was heard upon the veranda; the French window flew open, and, with a light laugh of greeting, ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... had left the room. The piano being near the door, which was open, and no one sitting between the door and the piano, when Penloe ceased playing he quietly left the room and sat in a chair on the porch. About five minutes later, a soft footstep was heard on the porch and the sound of a light rustle of a dress, for Stella had taken a seat beside Penloe. His performance at the piano had stirred the dear girl's nature to its greatest depths and also ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge
... of his footstep on the gravel Sophia snatched the book from Tristram and looked desperately round. It was too late. Her father was glaring down upon them both, with his hands behind him and his chin ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the inn. There I sat for a long-time, lone and solitary, staring at the fire in the grate. I was the only guest in the house; a great silence prevailed both within and without; sometimes five minutes elapsed without my hearing a sound, and then, perhaps, the silence would be broken by a footstep at a distance in the street. At length, finding myself yawning, I determined to go to bed. The freckled maid as she lighted me to my room inquired how I liked the sermon. "Very much," said I. "Ah," said she, "did I not tell you that Mr Pugh was ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... of his strength with a rival. He stood alone amid his thoughts that rustled and quivered round him like leaves in a summer breeze, and sang the Song of the Flute. He had in his mind the vision of an image that had taken its shape from a shadow, and the echo of a faint tinkling sound of a distant footstep. ...
— The Hungry Stones And Other Stories • Rabindranath Tagore
... made struck a chill to the mother's heart. She had fancied that life would be easier without Violet; that her union with her husband would be more complete; and now she found herself looking wistfully towards the door of her morning-room, listening vaguely for a footstep; and the figure she looked for at the door, and the footsteps she listened for in the corridor were not Conrad Winstanley's. It was the buoyant step of her daughter she missed; it was the bright frank face of her daughter she ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon
... to be seen. Not a sound of voice or footstep. A crowd of gods and goddesses in draperies of azure and crimson, purple and orange, looked down from the ceiling. Curtains of tawny velvet hung beside the shuttered windows. A great brazen candelabrum, filled ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... the Valley of Silence — Down the dim, voiceless valley — alone! And I hear not the fall of a footstep Around me, save God's and my own; And the hush of my heart is as holy As hovers where angels ...
— Poems: Patriotic, Religious, Miscellaneous • Abram J. Ryan, (Father Ryan)
... mornings after, there was the sound of a strange footstep in Miss Slopham's kitchen, and Bridget emitted a half-shriek. "Mither of Moses! what's that?" It was Ogla-Moga, who had just arrived. His costume was an extraordinary mixture of blanket and trousers and coat, hardly consistent with the requirements of civilization. ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... break off! I hear a footstep not our own approaching this place. Run to your places lest you frighten the traveler whoever ...
— Dramatic Reader for Lower Grades • Florence Holbrook
... as a cloak when on his guard. I caught my breath sharply and took my way toward them, resolved to make as brave a front as I might. It was my uncle, whose ear was ever open, that first heard my footstep and ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... and that none should know was in this moment a greater weight than the burden itself. Nellie was exploring the ancient hollows where Danes and Saxons had once fought, and had ceased to call forth her discoveries when Mrs Shepherd's bitter meditation was broken by the sudden sound of a footstep. ...
— Victorian Short Stories, - Stories Of Successful Marriages • Elizabeth Gaskell, et al.
... days before Molly could ask Roger any questions; and meanwhile Mrs. Hamley's state had materially altered. At length Molly came upon Roger sitting in the library, his head buried in his hands. He did not hear her footstep till she was close beside him. Then he lifted up his face, red, and stained with tears, his hair all ruffled up ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... and lilies and lilies and roses again, Tangle of leaves and white magic of blossoming trees, Sunlight that lay where, last moment, your footstep had lain— Was not the garden enchanted that proffered ...
— The Rainbow and the Rose • E. Nesbit
... a footstep sounded outside, and Dr. Mackey appeared, carrying a knapsack filled with provisions, and a canteen ...
— Young Captain Jack - The Son of a Soldier • Horatio Alger and Arthur M. Winfield
... been long indoors after her look at the moonlight when a soft footstep came up to the house, and Thomasin was announced by the ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... Charles's enemies, that she was in correspondence with them, and that she gave them information. When any of the country gentlemen who followed his Majesty's cause met here, it is said that my Lady was always nearer to the door of their council-room than they supposed. Do you hear a sound like a footstep passing along ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... properly listen to every interesting and recondite detail. Rachel sobbed and sympathized with the classic tale. And both women, as it was unrolled, kept well in their minds the vision of the vile man, mysterious and implacable, alone in the parlour. Occasionally Mrs. Tams listened for a footstep, ready discreetly to withdraw at the slightest symptom on the stairs. Once when she did this, Rachel murmured, weakly, "He won't—" and then lapsed into new weeping. And after a little time Mrs. ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... the fruits (in the form of joys and griefs) of their acts. Thou art thyself those fruits which thou distributest. Thou art the most ancient (having existed from a time when there was no other existent thing). Thou art competent to cover with a single footstep of thine all the three worlds. Thou art Vamana (the dwarf) who deceived the Asura chief Vali (and depriving him of his sovereignty restored it unto Indra). Thou art the Yogin crowned with success (like Sanatkumara and others). Thou art a great Rishi ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... window was heard to shut, and his heavy footstep sounded loudly on the floor in the silence of the night, while ...
— Dick o' the Fens - A Tale of the Great East Swamp • George Manville Fenn
... follow in order, mind," Captain Pond commanded. "As soon as the first boat takes ground, you challenge: then count five, and up goes the rocket. Eh?" The Captain swung round at the sound of another footstep on the shingle. "Is that you, Clogg? Man, ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... mankind. A magnificent church was erected on that mystic ground, by the first Christian emperor; and the effects of his pious munificence were extended to every spot which had been consecrated by the footstep of patriarchs, of prophets, and of ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... door, and the click of the lock as it closed behind them. The footsteps ceased. He drew his watch and waited. Noises from the street reached him, sounding far off and muffled, but the store was silent as a tomb. Twelve minutes ticked away. A footstep sounded. Wentworth could trace it descending the stairs, and walking the length of an aisle. Followed the sound of the opening door, and the click of the latch. Some belated department head, he thought. Possibly Hedin, himself—and he ...
— The Challenge of the North • James Hendryx
... a bit of a song came from lips that had scolded so much. Having finished her work she spent nearly an hour at the looking-glass doing up her hair (grand hair it was, too) with her ears listening for a footstep. Now and again she would run to the pot to see were the potatoes doing all right—"The children will be in shortly," said she, "and hungry to the bone, ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens
... had he followed the line of conduct he had adopted at first; but he stood thoughtfully silent instead, which did not by any means please his companion as well. He had a vague notion that this was a mistake; but the anger he did not show was too strong for him. Then, he fancied he heard a footstep on the stairway, and laughed in a somewhat ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... jingling of spurs was heard on the stairs. Some voices passed and faded away, and the sound of a single footstep ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... crash and sprawl in dying thunders from ledge to ledge into the river below. All these noises, big and little, were familiar to Laramie's ears. He could hear them in his sleep without losing the thread of a dream; but the echo of a single footstep would ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... from five to six inches deep, with an impalpable dust, so fine that the lightest footstep, or breath of air, sent it in clouds above our heads. So dense was it, that it completely enveloped our whole party, making it impossible for us to distinguish one another, at a distance even of ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens
... soft fall of an almost noiseless footstep and he could distinguish a shadow a little darker than the surrounding shade, moving quickly along the wall. He rose to his feet and crossed the street, not believing, indeed, that the newcomer could be the man he wanted, but anxious to be fully satisfied that he was ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... was soliloquising in this way he heard a footstep near him, and looking up saw his brother Dan, whose appearance and actions surprised him not a little. His face wore a smile instead of the usual scowl, he had no coat on, his sleeves were rolled up, and he carried a frow ...
— The Boy Trapper • Harry Castlemon
... the conqueror, fled thee in his fear; That hoary giant, who, in lonely pride, So long had ruled the world, that nations fell 25 Beneath his silent footstep. Pyramids, That for millenniums had withstood the tide Of human things, his storm-breath drove in sand Across that desert where their stones survived The name of him whose pride had heaped them there. 30 Yon monarch, in his solitary pomp, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... yet asking myself this, when I heard distinctly through the silence of the night the sound of a footstep behind me, and astonished that any one else should have been beguiled at this hour into a walk so dreary, I slipped into the shadow of a tree that stood at the wayside and waited till the slowly advancing figure should pass and leave ...
— The Old Stone House and Other Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... her head to speak—but paused, And then moved on again with rapid pace; Then slacken'd it, which is the march most caused By deep emotion:—you may sometimes trace A feeling in each footstep, as disclosed By Sallust in his Catiline, who, chased By all the demons of all passions, show'd Their work even by the ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... mute. I would sit in silence, covering my head. A sanctified atmosphere seems to fill the place and to penetrate my soul when I enter, as if I were in a holy temple. 'Thou standest in a holy place,' I would say. A loud word, a heavy footstep, makes me shudder, as if an infidel were desecrating the place. I stand speechless, in a magical atmosphere that wraps my whole being, scarcely daring to lift my eyes. A perfect stillness comes over my soul; it seems to be soaring on the ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... entire wardrobe, this cottage would have looked as empty as the others. The aged peasant woman upon her knees was devoting all her attention to keeping the sufferer's feet in a tub filled with a brown liquid. Hearing a footstep and the clank of spurs, which sounded strangely in ears accustomed to the plodding pace of country folk, the man turned to Genestas. A sort of surprise, in which the old woman shared was ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... option and waited. He waited in the overpowering heat, amid the low humming of bees. The minutes passed; there was neither sound among the vines nor footstep beside him; and so, with head bent and eyes streaming and head aching and nerves unstrung and conscience clamoring reproachfully, he turned and went ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... his footstep in the dance And firm his stirrup in the lists, And O! he had that merry glance That ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... loved, in which he lived and died. Here is the Kaiserquelle, bubbling out of Buechel in which, centuries ago, he laved his lordly limbs. Going down into my bath this morning I observed in the dim light the imprint of a footstep ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 3rd, 1891 • Various
... whom it was told by my mother's mother. My brother hears—'tis well— Nor may he doubt my speech; The red man's mind receives a tale As snow the print of a mocassin; But, when he hath it once, It abides like a footstep chisell'd in rock, The hard and flinty rock. The pale man writes his tales Upon a loose and fluttering leaf, Then gives it to the winds that sweep Over the ocean of the mind; The red man his on the evergreen Of his trusty memory(1). When he from the far-off ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 3 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... and to go back, but I could do neither until some streaks of day strayed in and showed me where to lay my hands. During the whole interval, whenever I went to the bottom of the staircase, I heard her footstep, saw her light pass above, and heard ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... is hidden forever. The gold which has lain for centuries unsuspected in the ground, reveals itself one day on the surface. Sand turns traitor, and betrays the footstep that has passed over it; water gives back to the tell-tale surface the body that has been drowned. Fire itself leaves the confession, in ashes, of the substance consumed in it. Hate breaks its prison-secrecy in the thoughts, through the doorway of the eyes; and Love finds the Judas ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... knocker. "Here it is," said B., and he lifted it and knocked hard. What a dismal sound it made in that sleeping town! I felt as though we had just committed an act of sacrilege. We listened, and heard, through the door, the noise of chairs dragged over the stone floor; then a light footstep approaching, a sound of keys and bolts, and the door was gently opened ...
— In the Field (1914-1915) - The Impressions of an Officer of Light Cavalry • Marcel Dupont
... attacked an angel mother's fame. O my mother! could they not spare thee even in thy grave, where the wicked are said to cease from troubling and the weary are at rest? Could they not let thee sleep in peace, thou tempest-tost and weary hearted, even in the dark and narrow house, sacred from the footstep ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... half of the afternoon without any word from Miss Kendall. Kennedy was plainly becoming uneasy, when a hurried footstep in the hall was followed by a more hurried opening of ...
— The Ear in the Wall • Arthur B. Reeve
... "Advance a footstep," rejoined Leonard, who had never relinquished his grasp of Chowles, "and I pass my sword through this man's body. Speak, villain," he continued, in a tone so formidable that the coffin-maker shook with apprehension—"is she here or not?" Chowles gazed from him ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... before Molly could ask Roger any questions; and meanwhile Mrs. Hamley's state had materially altered. At length Molly came upon Roger sitting in the library, his head buried in his hands. He did not hear her footstep till she was close beside him. Then he lifted up his face, red, and stained with tears, his hair all ruffled ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... the waning moon, When skies proclaim night's cheerless gloom, On tower, fort, or tented ground, The sentry walks his lonely round; And should a footstep haply stray Where caution marks the guarded way, Who goes there? Stranger, quickly tell, A friend. ...
— Charles Dickens and Music • James T. Lightwood
... father. He was sadly changed: the fire was gone from his eyes and his footstep was heavy and slow. With a full heart she embraced him, feeling that words of ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... lonely hermit plac'd Where never human footstep trac'd, Less fit to play the part, The lucky moment to improve, And just to stop, and just to move, With self-respecting art: But ah! those pleasures, loves, and joys, Which I too keenly taste, The solitary can despise, Can want, and ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... last step of the Escalier de Sainte-Marie, must indeed have turned the corner of the rue Andre de Sarte before the creaking of a footstep or the opening of a door disturbed the silence of the fifth floor; but, due time having expired—due deference having been paid to taste and the proprieties—the handle of M. Cartel's door was very softly turned, and Jacqueline slipped forth into ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... at every passing footstep. Those who can imagine the kind of expression there would be upon the face of a hunted thief, who, finding himself encompassed and brought to bay by his pursuers, looks wildly around in a vain search for some way of ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... "One instant, my Lord—" Then he dropped his voice; and I saw what he was at. I slipped back as quick as I could; drew out the sliver of wood from beneath the other door, and sat down. Then I heard his footstep outside. ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... sound save the ticking of the clock and the noise of falling cinders for ten minutes, and then he heard something which brought him to the alert, all his senses awakened and concentrated. It was the sound of a light and stealthy footstep on the terrace outside. He wondered whether it was a servant and whether he would see that one of the windows was unshuttered. He had half a mind to investigate, when there came another sound—a lumbering foot in the passage. Suddenly the ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... beside the desk. Edward sat down and was about to say something, when, instead of seating himself, Emerson walked away to the window and stood there softly whistling and looking out as if there were no one in the room. Edward's eyes had followed Emerson's every footstep, when the boy was aroused by hearing a suppressed sob, and as he looked around he saw that it came from Miss Emerson. Slowly she walked out of the room. The boy looked at Miss Alcott, and she put her finger to her mouth, ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... Come down from yonder lattice where you bide Like a charmed princess in a Persian song! I look up at your yellow window-panes, Set in the night with far-off wizardry. Come down, come down; the night is fain of you, The garden waits your footstep on its walks. ...
— More Songs From Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey
... and geologists of the world come and see the footstep of God in crystals of alum and sulphur and salt. Here is the chemist's shop of the continent. Enough black indelible ink rushes out of this well, with terrific plash, to supply all the scribes of the world. There are infinite fortunes for those who will delve for the borax, ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... hours since they had heard footstep or other sound upstairs or anywhere. There had been a brisk interval—and then an end—of more or less distant hansom-bells and motor-horns. There was no longer even a certain minute intermittent trembling of trifles on the walnut-tables, to which Pocket had become ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... the evening breeze floated sweet remembered odors of jessamine and orange. Again the ideal beauty of the lovely portrait met my gaze and seemed to melt into my heart; and once more, softly, lightly, fell a footstep, and the Presence by which I had never been forsaken, which I could never forsake, stood before me in 'palpable array of sense.' It was indeed the living Blanche, calm and stately as of old,—no longer radiant with the flush ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... her breath that she had been drinking, she ate shallots and garlic, and concealed the fumes of liquor with their offensive odors. She even trained her intoxication, her drunken torpor to awake at her mistress's footstep, and remain awake ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... the upper part of this tenement-house, and no one ever came up the creaking stairs except to visit her. The children therefore knew that if there was a footstep they would be in danger. Connie, however, assured Ronald that she could put out the light and be innocently seated by the fire if Mammy ...
— Sue, A Little Heroine • L. T. Meade
... enveloped the dark valleys and mountain slopes of the island, Denison, the supercargo of the trading schooner Palestine, put off from her side and was pulled ashore to the house of the one white trader. The man's name was Handle, and as he heard the supercargo's footstep he came to the door ...
— "Old Mary" - 1901 • Louis Becke
... on the eighth day, leaving Gamelyn alone, and very sorrowful, in the hall where he had held high revel. As he stood there, musing sadly, he heard a timid footstep, and saw his brother creeping towards him. When he had attracted Gamelyn's attention he spoke out loudly: "Who made thee so bold as to ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt
... answer to my silent call, a footstep! My hands dropped into my lap. A man stood near. I did not look up; I knew who he was. We need hear but once the footfall of certain people and always after know instantly if they are near. A voice: "Miss ...
— The Inner Sisterhood - A Social Study in High Colors • Douglass Sherley et al.
... to deceive her; the second had done his best to frighten her. Why? If there was really nothing to be afraid of—why? The hours of the early morning came; and still she listened in vain for the sound of my lord's footstep on the stairs; still she failed to hear the cautious opening of his dressing-room door. Leaving her chair, Iris rested on the bed. As time advanced, exhaustion ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins
... enough, though, not to tremble at the sound of a footstep at the door, and that's exactly what we sit here doing day after day. The joy of the hoped-for client is driven away by the fear of the collector." He was silent for a moment, and then he said: "I don't feel that there's any advantage in being ...
— Old Ebenezer • Opie Read
... up long ago looking in on you. We'll get a room over in the Main Building to-day. It costs more, but the accommodations are so much better. We are directly on the path from the street, so we hear every passing footstep." ...
— Sunny Slopes • Ethel Hueston
... cried Mr. Clifford gladly, looking round at the light sound of a footstep, very different from Mrs. Nixey's heavy tread; "my dear child, you can't tell what a pleasure this ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... blazing fire, and, while the kettle was boiling, swept the untidy floor, while Johnnie dusted, placed his grandmother's chair, got the cradle ready for the baby and spread the table. Just as everything was in order they heard their father's footstep on the stairs. "Run!" whispered Tommy, "or he will see us." So the boys scampered away to their bed in the loft and pretended to be fast asleep when their father called them ...
— A Kindergarten Story Book • Jane L. Hoxie
... sometimes is overcome by the majesty.[AG] Besides, when he comes to penetrate the Divine species, he passes it like a ray. Whence say the theologians that the Divine word is more penetrating than sharp point of sword or knife. Hence is derived the form and impression of His own footstep, upon which nothing else can be imprinted and sealed. Therefore, that form being there confirmed and the new strange one not being able to take its place unless the other yields, consequently he can say, that he has no power of taking any other, if there is one who replaces it or scatters ...
— The Heroic Enthusiast, Part II (Gli Eroici Furori) - An Ethical Poem • Giordano Bruno
... the heaven of home vanishes then; all is sunshine and joy; and it must be bad indeed if they do not find one another lovelier and improved, for when everything goes on right here, every advancing footstep in life must tend in a ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... stolen goods have been smitten with God's wrath; the horses, mules, and donkeys in their unlawful possession are steeds upon which the Gipsies are riding to hell; and the fortune-telling cards are burning the fingers of the Gipsy women; in one word, the curse of God is following them in every footstep on account of their present sins, and not on account of their past traditions. Immediately they alter their course of life, and "cease to do evil and learn to do well"—no matter whether they are Jews or barbarians, bond or free—the blessing of God will follow, and ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... city walls That outshut the sunlight, In a foggy dun light, Where the footstep falls With a pit-pat wearisome In its cadency On the flagstones drearisome ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... manhood, and, to-morrow, One blast upon my horn, among her hills, Would draw three thousand of her sons around me. You shudder,—think upon it. Will you tread The shores, woods, mountains, with me, among men Like the dark spirits of your haunted dreams,— Suspect all eyes, all voices, every footstep,— Sleep on the grass, drink of the torrent, hear By night the sharp hiss of the musket-ball Whistling too near your ear,—a fugitive Proscribed, and doomed mayhap to follow me In the path leading to ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... phantoms of the necromantic tower, or the injured Florinda, pale and dishevelled, imprecating the vengeance of Heaven upon his head. In the mid-watches of the night, when all was silent except the footstep of the sentinel, pacing before his tent, the king rose from his couch, and walking forth looked thoughtfully upon the martial scene before him. The pale crescent of the moon hung over the Moorish camp, ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... turn'd and slowly clomb The last hard footstep of that iron crag; Thence mark'd the black hull moving yet, and cried, "He passes to be King among the dead, And after healing of his grievous wound He comes again; but—if he come no more— O me, be yon dark Queens in yon black boat, Who ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... sand, the bodies of bold men and tender maidens; and their imploring hands are raised toward Heaven, and the world which floats, unheeding, on the surface. There lies, entombed, the son whose mother knows not of his death; and there the husband, for whose footstep, even yet, the wife is listening—here, the mother with her infant still clasped fondly to her breast; and here, united in their lives, not separated in their death, lie, side by side, the bride and bridegroom of a day;—and, hiding the dread secrets from ...
— Western Characters - or Types of Border Life in the Western States • J. L. McConnel
... the relics of a saint whose life and doctrine are unknown to them; and the religion of thousands of Buddhists lies more in veneration of the Holy Tooth or some such object, or the vessel that contains it, or the Holy Bowl, or the fossil footstep, or the Holy Tree which Buddha planted, than in the thorough knowledge and faithful practice of his high teaching. Petrarch's house in Arqua; Tasso's supposed prison in Ferrara; Shakespeare's house in Stratford, with his chair; Goethe's house in Weimar, ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer
... snakes, from five to seven feet long; a dead ounce, that had been stripped of its skin; and a lizard, three feet in length, which ran timidly across our path. I met with no apes; they appear to conceal themselves deeper in the woods, where no human footstep is likely to disturb them in their sports ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... and listened. Yes, Kate's quick ears had not deceived her. There was the sound of a footstep advancing towards them along the lonely tangled path. Philip instinctively felt for the pistol he always carried in his belt, for there were often doubtful and sometimes desperate men in hiding in woods and lonely ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... back to the library together. Mrs. Agar looked back over her shoulder at every other footstep. She took no notice of her son. Her affection for him seemed suddenly to have been absorbed and lost in ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... neither take food nor rest, but moved uneasily in her stall, and seemed to be waiting for some one that never came. No man knows what a horse or a dog understands and feels, for God hath not given them our speech. If any footstep was heard in the courtyard, she began to neigh, and was always looking round as the door opened. But nothing would tempt her to eat, and in the night-time Drumsheugh heard her crying as if she expected to be taken out for some sudden journey. The Kildrummie veterinary came to see her, and said ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren
... chintz-covered chair; Aunt Merce sat by the window, in a straight-backed chair, that rocked querulously, and likewise covered with chintz, of a red and yellow pattern. Before the lower half of the windows were curtains of red serge, which she rattled apart on their brass rods, whenever she heard a footstep, or the creak of a wheel in the road below. The walls were hung with white paper, through which ran thread-like stripes of green. A square of green and chocolate-colored English carpet covered the middle of the floor, and a row of straw chairs stood around it, on the bare, lead-colored ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... voices on the lower gallery, readily divined that Mr. McLean must be sitting up and taking the air. Five minutes after the men were gone, and as that young gentleman was wondering about what time the carriage would return, he heard a quick, light footstep along the wooden floor, the rustle of feminine skirts, and almost before he could turn, the cordial, musical voice of the ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... blackness around and over us. We tried to make Nettle go first, intending to follow his lead, and trusting to his keeping the track; but Nettle's place was at my heels, and neither coaxing nor scolding would induce him to forego it. A forlorn hope was nothing to the dangers of each footstep. First one and then the other volunteered to lead the way, declaring they could find the track. All this time we were trying to strike the indistinct road among the tussocks, made by occasional wheels to our house, but the marks, never very distinct in daylight, became perfect will-o'-the-wisps ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... limestone-loving shrub, the amelanchier. In the centre of the valley stretched the marsh, flaming gold with flags and caltha, and dotted with white valerian. The green frogs leapt into the pools and runnels, burying themselves in the mud at the shock of a footstep; but the tadpoles sported recklessly in the sunny water, for as yet their legs as well as their troubles were to come. I confess that this long morass by the sparkling Bene, frequented by the heron, the snipe, the water-hen, and other creatures that ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... the dinner; and I as a guest, a nervous, self-conscious guest, who started at every footstep. I was presented to the King, who eyed me curiously. Seeing that I wore a medal such as his Chancellor gives to men who sometimes do his country service, he spoke to me and inquired how I had obtained it. It was an affair similar to the Balkistan; only there was not an ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... to wake at nights with nothing but sad thoughts for company, and it is ill wearing out the long days with only a silly old body to cheer one up; and when there is nothing fresh to say, and nothing to expect, and not a footstep or a voice to break the silence, then it seems to me that a young voice—that is, a kind voice—would be welcome. Take this hint, my dear, and keep my counsel, for I am only a silly old woman, as ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... just consulted his watch and, seeing it wanted but ten minutes to tea-time, had got up and was moving away, when a sudden rustle near him, a pause, a quick, evasive footstep, warned him of some presence as anxious for ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... hear, to observe, to think, and to do, may be completely transformed in these ways by the playing of games. The sense perceptions are quickened: a player comes to see more quickly that the ball is coming toward him; that he is in danger of being tagged; that it is his turn; he hears the footstep behind him, or his name or number called; he feels the touch on the shoulder; or in innumerable other ways is aroused to quick and direct recognition of and response to, things that go on around him. ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft
... quick-sighted, that they will swiftly pursue by Eye the Track of any Thing among the Trees, in the Leaves and Grass, as an Hound does by the Scent, where we can't perceive the least Mark or Footstep. ...
— The Present State of Virginia • Hugh Jones
... to see and admire. Not a rich flower upon her head, not a single leaf, but had had its prototype in Drowne's wooden workmanship, although now their fragile grace had become flexible, and was shaken by every footstep that the wearer made. The broad gold chain upon the neck was identical with the one represented on the image, and glistened with the motion imparted by the rise and fall of the bosom which it decorated. A ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... along the dark polished surface that reflected a thousand lights in its undulations,—feeling the awfulness of the dense, suppressed life that was wrapt within the gloom and calm of the hour. I suddenly saw a shadow, a human shadow, that at the sound of my footstep quickly crossed my dreamy vision—quickly, noiselessly came and went before my eyes until it stood up high and outlined against the strangely-mingled haze. It looked like the ghost of a slight-formed man, hatless and coatless, and for a moment I saw at its upper extremity the dull ...
— Ginx's Baby • Edward Jenkins
... this it has been necessary to effect by the exclusion of light; consequently the church is dark, mysterious, and almost cold. On the morning in question, as we entered, it seemed to be filled with gloom, and the distant sound of a slow footstep here and there beyond the transept inspired one almost with awe. Maria, when she first met me, had begun to talk with her usual smile, offering me coffee and a biscuit before I started. "I never eat biscuit," I said, with almost a severe tone, as I turned ...
— John Bull on the Guadalquivir from Tales from all Countries • Anthony Trollope
... straining after the vision of God, startled by every footstep, intently listening till the very atmosphere shall become audible, expecting an overwhelming spectacle? In all likelihood you will miss all. The kingdom comes not with outward show. When men expected Christ to come by the front door, He stole in at the back. Whilst Philip was waiting for the Father ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... the soft fall of an almost noiseless footstep and he could distinguish a shadow a little darker than the surrounding shade, moving quickly along the wall. He rose to his feet and crossed the street, not believing, indeed, that the newcomer could be the man he wanted, but anxious to be fully satisfied that he was ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... opportunity must be his guide in the riddle with which he was confronted. He must rush nothing, and he felt, somehow, that the opportunity would come. He turned his eyes in the direction of his home, and as he was about to move off he became aware of a footstep crossing the market-place toward him. He waited. The sound came from the direction of the saloon, and, as he gazed that way, he saw the lights in the building go out one by one. The person approaching was one of the "boys" ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum
... are peace and comfort, Wives and children, with fair, thoughtful faces, Waiting, watching For a well-known footstep ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... in my life; I shall run into Mrs. Morton's for ten minutes; let me find you here, Mr. Delafield, when I return." Her footstep was heard tripping along the passage, and in a moment after, the street door of the house opened and shut. Charlotte perceiving that her friend was determined, for some inexplicable reason, to be alone, quietly resumed her seat. Her musing air was soon changed to one of surprise, by the following ...
— Tales for Fifteen: or, Imagination and Heart • James Fenimore Cooper
... form, so drearily promising of physical power, he heard a light footstep at the outer door, which he had left unbarred. On turning he caught the look of relief that passed over Mrs. Preston's face at the sight of the man lying quietly in his bed. What a state of fear ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... and noiseless footstep Comes that messenger divine, Takes the vacant chair beside me, Lays her ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... him again. He was still watching the approaching cavalcade intently, and smiling to himself. Miss Langham drew in her breath and raised her head and shoulders quickly, like a deer that hears a footstep in the forest, and when Hope presently stepped out upon the porch, she turned quickly toward her, and regarded her steadily, as though she were a stranger to her, and as though she were trying to see her with the eyes of one who looked at ...
— Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... has come to pay his respects. But come," said the boy, astonished, "you don't tell me you know Old Han's footstep—begging ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... following night she thought she heard his footstep. She started up, her heart beating violently. But the footsteps did not stop at her door, they passed by; it was probably some one going home late from the tavern. Alas! nobody came to her house, and a nameless longing arose ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... young and artless couple did not talk of love with their lips during that time, but their eyes beamed with a mutual passion. When the mother entered, so much were they interested in each other, that they did not hear her approaching footstep. She surprised them leaning toward each other in ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... Dachshund has perhaps no compeer. He is a perfect gentleman; cleanly in his habits, obedient, unobtrusive, incapable of smallness, affectionate, very sensitive to rebuke or to unkindness, and amusingly jealous. As a watch he is excellent, quick to detect a strange footstep, valiant to defend the threshold, and to challenge with deep voice any intruder, yet sensibly discerning his master's friends, and not annoying them with prolonged growling and grumbling as many terriers do when a stranger is admitted. Properly brought up, he is a perfectly safe ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... strange task. The room was noisy, fifty little heads were bent over fifty different schemes for mischief, and fifty sibilant whispers delivered forbidden messages. The teacher was writing on the board, and turned suddenly at the sound of a heavy footstep in the hall. The door was open, letting in the breeze from the lake, and in it stood a big hairy man with a bushy black head and wild blue eyes. Helen stood ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... love what matters Passing time or tide? On my ear your footstep patters, Still my babe you bide. All the others moving, moving, Still disturb my breast; But the dead have done with roving, You alone ...
— A Celtic Psaltery • Alfred Perceval Graves
... away, and it was a warm, breathless Southern night. There was no sound but the faint swash of the coming tide, the noises of the reed-birds in the marshes, and the occasional leap of a fish; and it seemed to my overstrained ear as if every footstep of my own must be heard for miles. However, I could have no more postponements, and the thing must be ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... Richling, putting on his hat and disappearing in the corridor. Each footstep could be heard as he went down ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... her the option and waited. He waited in the overpowering heat, amid the low humming of bees. The minutes passed; there was neither sound among the vines nor footstep beside him; and so, with head bent and eyes streaming and head aching and nerves unstrung and conscience clamoring reproachfully, he ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... jealous. The thought never entered my head. But I dropped my fish and whipped round to the doorway in time to catch him as he turned to go, having heard my footstep belike. ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... climbs, Spreading a shade what time the dog-star glows; And thou, returning to thine hearth and home, Art as a genial warmth in winter hours, Or as a coolness, when the lord of heaven Mellows the juice within the bitter grape. Such boons and more doth bring into a home The present footstep of its proper lord. Zeus, Zeus, Fulfilment's lord! my vows fulfil, And whatsoe'er it be, work ...
— The House of Atreus • AEschylus
... he stood trembling, listening to the infernal racket of the dogs, and waiting for the first footstep within ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert Chambers
... indeed delightful. A background of hills, the green, waving grass, the pleasant groups of trees stretching here and there to the water's edge, formed a lovely prospect. On the smooth sand we searched carefully for any trace of our hapless companions, but not a mark of a footstep ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V3 • Charles H. Sylvester
... causeway. It was aye pit-mirk; the flame o' the can'le, when he set it on the grund, brunt steedy and clear as in a room; naething moved, but the Dule Water seepin' and sabbin' doon the glen, an' yon unhaly footstep that cam' plodding' doun the stairs inside the manse. He kenned the foot ower-weel, for it was Janet's; and at ilka step that cam' a wee thing nearer, the cauld got deeper in his vitals. He commended his soul to Him that made an' keepit him; "and, ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various
... station, now quiet and deserted. A footstep occasionally echoed under the vault, or a voice sounded from a distance. The gas was lowered; out at either end gleamed the coloured signal-lights, and above them ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... his head and his footstep lightened, and deep in some secret place the thought came proudly, "She shall see that to renounce the world is to possess the world—that a man may be poor and have all the kingdom of the world at ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... on his way down into the village Thursday evening, Rackliff saw a light in the carriage house, which led him to fancy he might find Roy there. In this he was not mistaken; Hooker was puttering over his motorcycle by the light of a lantern. Hearing a footstep on the gravel outside, he looked up and perceived the visitor ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott
... never crossed the desert and felt its burning sands scorch his feet, the stifling reflection of the sun from its rocks oppress him, how can he fully enjoy the coolness of a beautiful morning? How can the perfume of flowers, the cooling vapor of the dew, the sinking of his footstep in the soft and pleasant turf, enchant his senses? How can the singing of birds delight him, while the accents of love and pleasure are yet unknown? How can he see with transport the rise of so beautiful a day, unless imagination can paint all the transports ...
— Emile - or, Concerning Education; Extracts • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... lights. As soon as she was in bed she blew out the candle. She lay in the darkness, shivering with fear, regretting what she had done. Every now and then a board cracked in the corridor outside the room, as though beneath a stealthy footstep. And once inside the room the door of a wardrobe sprang open. She would have cried out, but terror paralysed her throat; and the next moment she heard the tread of the sentry outside her window. The sound reassured her. There was safety in the heavy regularity of the steps. ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason
... they stood, O'er sacred Ikshumati(344) came, Their ancient kings' ancestral claim. They saw the learned Brahmans stand, Each drinking from his hollowed hand, And through Bahika(345) journeying still They reached at length Sudaman's hill: There Vishnu's footstep turned to see, Vipasa(346) viewed, and Salmali, And many a lake and river met, Tank, pool, and pond, and rivulet. And lions saw, and tigers near, And elephants and herds of deer, And still, by prompt obedience led, Along the ample road ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... clank of echoing steel was heard As off the rider bounded; And slowly on the winding stair A heavy footstep sounded. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... her when she came near him, and even when she changed the water in his tin cup. As he only drank three or four drops in a day, it probably seemed to him a work of supererogation. While his mistress was out he rarely uttered a sound; but when he heard her footstep in the short passage outside, he gave vent to his feelings and hailed her return with boisterous shouts and unearthly whistling of old French military tunes. Even the noise he made did not disturb Angela; she hardly heard him, for her nerves were not overwrought, but ...
— The White Sister • F. Marion Crawford
... recalled to ourselves when presently, along the passage outside our door, there resounded a footstep which instinct told us belonged to the Henniker. Not much chance of feeling comfortable with that sound in ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... when he had passed the windows, I opened them to look after him. The street was empty - the gay constant gala of a Parisian Sunday was changed into fearful solitude : no sound was heard, but that of here and there some hurried footstep, on one hand hastening for a passport to secure safety by flight ; on the other, rushing abruptly from or to some concealment, to devise means of accelerating and hailing the entrance of the conqueror. Well in tune with this air of an impending crisis, ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... excitement, when the noise of a light footstep is distracting. In such a condition were the authors of the Tracts in 1833, and all their subsequent proceedings have shown that the disorder was still upon them. Beset by their horror of the nineteenth century, they sought for something most opposite ...
— The Christian Life - Its Course, Its Hindrances, And Its Helps • Thomas Arnold
... house, and declared that her budget of news should be opened there, which at once silenced Lily's assumed pleasantry. Her mother had been away fully two hours, during which Lily had still continued her walk round the garden, till at last she had become impatient for her mother's footstep. Something serious must have been said between her uncle and her mother during those long two hours. The interviews to which Mrs Dale was occasionally summoned at the Great House did not usually exceed twenty minutes, and the upshot would be communicated to the girls ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... sound of a footstep, and saw a young man approaching. He wore a coat like the Duke's, and in his hand he dangled a handkerchief. He bowed awkwardly, and, holding out the handkerchief, said to her "I beg your pardon, but I think you dropped this. I ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... Chinese[97] porcelain bowl, catches his eyes. There the little beauties sit in a circle, like Buddhist priests in religious meditation! "Oh, goodness! how nice!" and just as he is dipping his finger and thumb in, he hears his master's footstep; and knowing that he is doing wrong, he crams his prize into the pocket of his sleeve, and stoops down to take away the wine-kettle and cups; and as he does this, out tumble the cuttlefish from his ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... 'There's a footstep coming; O sister, look.'— 'The ripple flashes, the white foam dashes; No one cometh across ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... right of the fireplace now opened, and from the aperture there came the form of an aged woman. In her hand she held letters,—the very letters over which I had seen the Hand close; and behind her I heard a footstep. She turned round as if to listen, and then she opened the letters and seemed to read; and over her shoulder I saw a livid face, the face as of a man long drowned,—bloated, bleached, seaweed tangled in its dripping hair; and at her feet lay a form as of a corpse; and beside ...
— Haunted and the Haunters • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... almost precipitously for perhaps a thousand feet to the tops of the pines below. Part of it was smooth rock, but long banks of gravel lay resting in the hollows at so steep a slope that it was evident that a footstep would be sufficient to dislodge them. Indeed, without that, every now and then some of them broke away and plunged down into the valley. Close behind the party a wall of crags rose sheer for a hundred feet at least. Kinnaird glanced up at ...
— The Gold Trail • Harold Bindloss
... neglected corner the hand of affection had been busy in decorating the hired house. Most of the graves were surrounded with a slight wooden paling, to secure them from the passing footstep; there was hardly one so deserted as not to be marked with its little wooden cross and decorated with a garland of flowers; and here and there I could perceive a solitary mourner, clothed in black, stooping to plant a shrub on the grave, or sitting ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various
... no movement. He did not even turn his head from his contemplative regard of the white ashes of the fire. There was a sound. The sound of some one approaching through the trees. It was the sound of a shod footstep. It was ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... sleeves tucked up over the baby in the bath. Hearing her husband's footstep, she turned towards him, summoning him to her with her smile. With one hand she was supporting the fat baby that lay floating and sprawling on its back, while with the other she squeezed the sponge ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... was the babe that slumbered on thy breast. —And, sister, mine the lips that called thee bride. —Mine were the silvered locks thy hand caressed, That faithful hand, my faltering footstep's guide! ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... as if either he was not quite deaf, or he had some gift that went toward compensation. To all motion about him he was sensitive as no other man. I am afraid to say from how far off the solid earth would convey to him the vibration of a stag's footstep. Bob sometimes thought his cheek must feel the wind of a sound to which his ear was irresponsive. Beyond a doubt he was occasionally aware of the proximity of an animal, and knew what animal it was, of which Rob had no intimation. His being, corporeal and spiritual, seemed, to the ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald
... utterly quiet—so quiet that the stillness became oppressive. Meanwhile the young girl sat in her bower of luxury, softly humming a favorite air, and very happy in thoughts of her approaching marriage. While deep in her smiling reverie, a stealthy footstep distinctly sounded outside ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
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