"Mute" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the adverse fates Gave thy lyre to Mr. Yates[2], I have melted at thy strain When Bunn reign'd o'er Drury-lane; For the music of thy strings Haunts the ear when Romer sings. But to me that voice is mute! Tuneless kettle-drum and flute I but hear one liquid lyre— Kettle bubbling on the fire, Whizzing, fizzing, steaming out Music from its curved spot, Wak'ning visions by its song Of thy nut-brown streams, Souchong; Lumps of crystal saccharine— ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 7, 1841 • Various
... head, whether in dissent or agnosticism, but remained mute. A smell of hawthorn and of orchards came to them through the darkness, telling them that a wind was awake; the next moment it swayed their little boat and swelled their sail, and carried them ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... from the skylights' overhang to the alien's level and with looks as beseeching as his waved him back a step. Then with the same mute entreaty she faced Julian and Hugh. But there was a ludicrous contrast, visible to all, between Hugh's phlegm and her brother's pomp, and by a flash of feminine instinct she divined the best mood with which to match it. Grimly elated, Hugh saw what was ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... I had seen this hot love on the wing (As I perceived it, I must tell you that, Before my daughter told me), what might you, Or my dear majesty your queen here, think, If I had play'd the desk or table book;[20] Or given my heart a winking, mute and dumb;[21] Or look'd upon this love with idle sight;[22] What might you think? No, I went round to work,[23] And my young mistress thus did I bespeak: Lord Hamlet is a prince, out of thy sphere; This ...
— Hamlet • William Shakespeare
... low![1] She sinks, she falls, and her fond husband's breast Is the cold pillow to that marble rest! But softly tread upon the sacred ground, Where Britain's bards lie sepulchred round. Sons of the muse, who woke the magic spell, From the deep windings of "Apollo's shell!" Mute is each lyre, their silent strings are bound With willow, yew, and cypress wreath'd around. Their hopes, joys, sorrows, rest within the grave Admiring nations to their relics gave. Hail, mighty shades! bright spirits of the past; Here may your ashes ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 368, May 2, 1829 • Various
... sublime, Misty with eld, the mute of time, A castle, dawn-enchanted, there Above th' abyss sheer, shimmering fair, Hung like a perilous dream in air. Poised on a dizzy turret high, Enfolded with the gorgeous sky, We listened, she and I, In wonder, 'mazed. Without a word A soul had spoken, ...
— Iolaeus - The man that was a ghost • James A. Mackereth
... are hardly worthy of Tamoszius, the other two members of the orchestra. The second violin is a Slovak, a tall, gaunt man with black-rimmed spectacles and the mute and patient look of an overdriven mule; he responds to the whip but feebly, and then always falls back into his old rut. The third man is very fat, with a round, red, sentimental nose, and he plays with his eyes turned up to the sky and a look of infinite ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... laughed had you seen the varying expressions on Tom's face as he read Aunt Hepsy's epistle;—concern at first to hear Lucy was ill; relief to find her recovering; and, last of all, mute, dumfoundered ...
— Thankful Rest • Annie S. Swan
... scene the war cry is heard. The enemy has again broken into the country and has already taken and burnt the fortress of Belforad. All crowd round Diaz, beseeching him to save them. While he stands mute and deprived of his invincible sword, Chimene, mastering her own grief at the sight of her country's distress, lays down Tizona at Fernando's feet. Ruy Diaz now receives his sword back from the hands of the King, and brandishing it high above his head he leads the warriors forth to freedom ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... thy mouth was mute, thy face was hidden, And the lips and eyes that loved thee blind and dumb; Song forsook their tongues that held thy name forbidden, Light their eyes that saw the strange God's kingdom come. Fire for light and hell for heaven ...
— Poems & Ballads (Second Series) - Swinburne's Poems Volume III • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... from his cabin, completely armed and rigged for war. Giving a loud, fife-like whistle, he was instantly joined by a huge brindled dog of grim and formidable aspect. As he passed by the door where his mistress sat, in her mute, tearless, motionless grief, he turned to her for a moment, cap in hand, and with terrible sublimity said: "Miss Jemimy, you see me come back wid Bushie, or you neber see yo' ol' nigger ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... its mute beauty. "I must see it!" she said. "But we can't bridge this gap without more ropes and more people ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow
... went by, they ran on dark-padded feet in silence. He went to see Anna, but again there had come a reserve between them. Tom Brangwen was gloomy, his blue eyes sombre. Anna was strange and delivered up. Her face in its delicate colouring was mute, touched dumb and poignant. The mother bowed her head and moved in her own dark world, that was pregnant again ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... Mute before Penny's excited questions, the detective idly selected letters from the mass of face-up blocks on the table, and spelled out, in a long row, the names of all the guests at Nita's fatal bridge party. Suddenly, and with a cry that startled Penny, ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... our song of triumph,[1] Which proclaimed us proud and free— While breaking away the heartstrings Of our nation's harmony. Sadly it floateth from us, Sighing o'er land and wave; Till, mute on the lips of the poet, It sleeps in his Southern grave. Spirit and song departed! Minstrel and minstrelsy! We mourn ye, heavy hearted,— But we ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... and into the little chapel where his father lay buried. All night long the friar spent there: and Wamba the Jester lay outside watching as mute as the ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... speaks his name,—a complete confession in the one word so spoken. Passionately he calls hers,—confession for confession. She sinks overpowered on his breast. He clasps her ardently to him. Brangaene wrings her hands at sight of them locked in their long, mute embrace. Her work this, the work of her disobedient hands which, too weak for the stern task assigned them, poured out the love-potion in place of the death-draught. "Woe, woe," she wails, "eternal, irredeemable woe, instead of brief death! ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... eye of their brave leader was piercingly bent on the mute assemblage; the momentary gleam of hope that lighted his noble countenance faded away. There came a faint sound of rising voices—it swelled louder, and ...
— Inez - A Tale of the Alamo • Augusta J. Evans
... every moment. She never even appeared to offer any resistance, but looked over at me languishingly every time to see what I would say. What could I say? I became pale with jealousy, but said nothing. At last I rushed from the hall, mute with despair, when I observed him finally draw her on his knee. I only heard the peal of laughter that followed my exit, and I was just near leaving the whole wedding-feast, and Stramehl for ever, when Sidonia called after me from the castle gates to return. This so melted my heart, that the tears ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V1 • William Mienhold
... justified that their advancement, rather than any stagnation or retrogression, is the true secret of the virulent Southern hostility to their rights, which has so influenced Northern opinion that it stands mute, and leaves the colored people, upon whom the North conferred liberty, to the tender mercies of those who have always denied ...
— The Wife of his Youth and Other Stories of the Color Line, and - Selected Essays • Charles Waddell Chesnutt
... through excess, Waves mute appeal and sore, Above the midriff's deep distress, For ...
— Songs from Books • Rudyard Kipling
... vicious excitement. Later, this was followed by mutism, refusal to eat, and stupor. On admission to this hospital he was in a deep stupor, absolutely oblivious to everything about him. Eyes were wide open and staring, pupils dilated, voluntary movements markedly in abeyance. He was mute except for an occasional incoherent mumbling to himself. He evidenced no initiative in feeding himself, but swallowed food when it was placed in his mouth. Habits were very untidy; involuntary evacuation of bladder and bowels were present. His mental content could not be determined at ...
— Studies in Forensic Psychiatry • Bernard Glueck
... the enemy. Surely, could the first male of the species have foreseen how, through the generations of his race to come, both their beauty and their song, which were meant to announce them to Love, would also announce them to Death, he must have blanched snow-white with despair and turned as mute as a stone. Is it this flight from the inescapable just behind that makes the singing of the red-bird thoughtful and plaintive, and, indeed, nearly all the wild sounds of nature so like the outcry of the doomed? He will sit for a long time silent and motionless in the heart of a ...
— A Kentucky Cardinal • James Lane Allen
... their blood in the doorway, while defending, sword in hand, the sacred apartments of their women. Nay, it seemed as if even the faint-hearted Bengalee, who had crouched at the feet of Surajah Dowlah, who had been mute during the administration of Vansittart, would at length find courage in despair. No Mahratta invasion had ever spread through the province such dismay as this inroad of English lawyers. All the injustice ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... why, then I'll tell her plain She sings as sweetly as a nightingale; Say, that she frown; I'll say, she looks as clear As morning roses newly wash'd with dew; Say, she be mute, and will not speak a word; Then I'll commend her volubility, And ...
— What Great Men Have Said About Women - Ten Cent Pocket Series No. 77 • Various
... envy neither your birth nor the fortune that awaits you, nor repine we that our fate condemns us to tug the unremitting oar against that tide of fortune upon which, with easy sail, you will float lightly down to death; the whole heart, the buoyant spirit, the conscience yet unstung by mute reproach of sin; these things we envy you—not the things so mean a world can give, but the things which, though it cannot give, soon—alas, how soon—it ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... born. He went further and became a lay brother, taking upon himself the obligation of silence. Though an old man, he stayed close to the advancing Grass, giving what assistance and comfort he could to the refugees. The anecdotes of his sudden appearance in typhusridden camps, mute and gaunt, hastening with water for the feverish, quieting the terrified with a light touch, praying silently beside the dying, sound improbable to me, but I mention them for ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... the Pony moves his legs, In Johnny's left hand you may see The green bough [7] motionless and dead: The Moon that shines above his head 80 Is not more still and mute ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth - Volume 1 of 8 • Edited by William Knight
... with the tips of my fingers. Her eyes turned toward me, and again I was sure that no madness was in them. You, too, would have said that, awakened from the intermittent coma, the little thing, though mute and helpless, was none the less still the mistress of ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child
... my brave boy, you cannot say more than that," chimed in Dad, with a pat of approval on my head, as my mother drew me towards her in mute caress. "By the way, I tell you what I'll do, Jack. I was asking my old friend Captain Gifford the other day about a good naval tutor for you, and you shall have the assistance of the same 'crammer' he had for his boys if I can get hold ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... nothing I have ever seen and of nothing I have read about except the city in the Arabian tale where all the inhabitants have been turned to brass and the traveler finds them after centuries mute, motionless, and still retaining the attitudes which they last knew in life. Here the Wagner audience dress as they please, and sit in the dark and worship in silence. At the Metropolitan in New York they sit ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... no one in the room when they entered, and Cosmo was yet staring in mute astonishment, when suddenly Mr. Simon was addressing his father. But the door had not opened, and how he came in seemed inexplicable. To the eyes of the boy the small man before him assumed ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... (Cataractes parasiticus), given to make other sea-birds mute through fear, and then eat their discharge—whence it is termed dirty aulin by the ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... sweeter, The voice so nearly mute, As beauty, dying, loses Her hold upon the lute; And like the harmonies that touch And blend with those above, Forever must an echo ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard
... psychological moment. Bucks regarded him in silence, and the dog perceiving no immediate danger of assault stood, in silence, returning Bucks's stare. Then watching the boy's eye carefully, the dog cocked his head just the least bit to one side. It was a mute appeal, but a moving one. Bucks continued, however, his non-committal scrutiny, recalling that the foreman had said nothing good of Scuffy, and the homeless cur stood in doubt as to his reception. But realizing, perhaps, that he had nothing to lose and everything to gain, the little vagabond ...
— The Mountain Divide • Frank H. Spearman
... down the line like a shiver, and the men stood mute, eying each other doubtfully. And now, if I could, I would get at your hearts, you who read this, and you should not read mistily, and hold the story at loose ends as it were, but feel by the answering throb within yourselves ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... her dark-blue slumbrous eyes, and met his keen scrutinizing look. A very slight tremulous smile flickered across her lips. She inclined her head gently, and in the same mute fashion ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... and the terraces and staircases of his dwelling were generally totally deserted,—only small detachments of spearmen guarding jealously the main entrances. But the remainder of the palace swarmed with the gorgeously dressed retinue of the court, with slaves of every colour and degree, from the mute smooth-faced Ethiopian to the accomplished Hebrew scribes of the great nobles; from the black and scantily-clad fan-girls to the dainty Greek tirewomen of the queen's toilet, who loitered near the carved marble fountain at the entrance to ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... Illileo—so low the leaves were mute, And the echoes faltered breathless in your voice's vain pursuit; And there died the distant dalliance of the serenader's lute: And I held you in my bosom as the husk may hold the fruit. Illileo, I listened. I believed you. In my bliss, What were all the worlds above me since I found you thus in ...
— Riley Love-Lyrics • James Whitcomb Riley
... The defence that the prisoner seemed to have been prepared to us?—that those who sat to judge him had shared in his offences, and his daring power of brow-beating them, as he had so often done before, as son of the man who sat in the King's seat—had utterly failed him now. He was mute; and the forms of the trial were gone through as of one whose doom was already sealed, but who must receive his sentence according to the strictest form of law, lest the just reward of his deeds should partake of their own violence. By the end of the day the ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the blank sheets which inclose it. It was the same thing which I remember seeing beautifully shown in a child of some four or five years we had one day at our boarding-house. This child was a deaf mute. But its soul had the inner sense that answers to hearing, and the shaping capacity which through natural organs realizes itself in words. Only it had to talk with its face alone; and such speaking eyes, such ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... would have been glad to waste half an hour or so in an animated conversation about the last new style in bonnets, or the shape of the fashionable winter mantle, or the popular novel of the month. But Margaret's pale face seemed a mute appeal for compassion; so Miss Lamberton drew on her gloves, settled her bonnet before the glass over ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... With strange desires, faint hopes, and longing feares, Vnheard of wishes, thoughts begetting teares, That ere she is aware she's farre in loue, Yet knowes no cause that should affection moue. I could be froward, techie, sullen, mute, And with loue-killing looks repell thy sute; Contemne the speaking letters which thou sends; Command thine absence, and reiect thy friends; Neglect thy presents, and thy vowes despise; And laughing at thy teeres, force teeres arise; Making thee spend a deale ...
— Seven Minor Epics of the English Renaissance (1596-1624) • Dunstan Gale
... will execute changes as delicate and complicated as those of human language and all the intricate web of what we call its effects, without sensitive impression, without sensitive impulse: there may be, let us say, mute orations, mute rhapsodies, mute discussions, and no consciousness there ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... for his office, to which he had gone with such high hopes and enthusiasm of late. There was no work for him to do there any longer, and the sight of his drawing-table and materials would, he knew, be intolerable in their mute mockery. ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... gentleness, and the thousand endearments lavished upon us, almost unheeded in the daily intercourse of intimacy; there it is that we dwell upon the tenderness, the solemn, awful tenderness of the parting scene; the bed of death, with all its stifled griefs, its noiseless attendance, its mute, watchful assiduities! the last testimonies of expiring love! the feeble, fluttering, thrilling,—oh! how thrilling!—pressure of the hand! the last fond look of the glazing eye turning upon us, even from the threshold of existence! ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... of silver. Philippa had never had such a dress in her life. She listened in mute surprise. Could it be possible that she was intended to appear as a daughter of the house at ...
— The Well in the Desert - An Old Legend of the House of Arundel • Emily Sarah Holt
... consternation, watched her swiftly draw away with her lithe, free step, wanting to follow her, wanting to call to her; but the resentment roused by her suddenly avowed hostility held him mute in his tracks. He watched her disappear, and when the brown-and-green wall of forest swallowed the slender gray form he fought against the insistent desire to follow her, and fought ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... long vowel before it, being composed of the c (the only mute that allows a long vowel before ...
— The Roman Pronunciation of Latin • Frances E. Lord
... something in the panting breath which issues from the nostrils of a tired horse, in the tension of their muscles, and the prodigious efforts of their loins, which gives us, in a high degree, the idea of strength; but the mute resignation of these animals, when we know them to be overladen, inspires us with pity, and makes us regret the ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... was that after a good deal of hesitation, the Holy Mother obliged, saying that as the god was dead she supposed nothing else mattered. First, however, she went to the back of the house and clapped her hands, whereon an old woman, a mute and a very perfect specimen of an albino native, appeared and stared at us wonderingly. To her Mrs. Eversley talked upon her fingers, so rapidly that I could scarcely follow her movements. The woman bowed till her forehead nearly touched the ground, then ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... government, whatever grievance is borne is denied to exist, and all mute despair and sullen patience is construed into content and satisfaction. But this general insurrection, which at every moment threatened to blaze out afresh, and to involve all the provinces in its flames, rent in pieces that veil of fraud and mystery that covers ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... pains to hide so sweet an eloquence with such careful dissembling, and had borne to live through so long a span of life without utterance or any intercourse of talk, so as to let men think him utterly incapable of speech, and a born mute. He replied that he had been hitherto satisfied with the protection of his father, that he had not needed the use of his own voice, until he saw the wisdom of his own land hard pressed by the glibness of a foreigner. The king ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... young sinner? Prithee why so mute? Will, when speaking well can't win her, Saying nothing do 't? Prithee ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... utmost. By this time Steenie could read a little, and his reading was by no means as fruitless as it was slow; he would sit reading, nor at all lose his labour that, every other moment when within sight of her, he would look up to see if she wanted anything. To this mute attendance of love the girl became so accustomed that she regarded it as her right, nor had ever the spoiled little creature occasion to imagine that it was not yielded her; and if at a rare moment she threw him glance or small smile—a crumb from her table to her dog—Steenie ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... six hours daily at home, with four dictionaries by me; attending six lectures a day, and going in the evening for three hours to the dissecting-rooms. I never conversed with any one in the boarding-house nor even asked for any thing at the table; but was supplied like a mute. This silence was fruitful to me. About New Year, I ventured to make my English audible; when, lo! every one understood me perfectly. From this time forward, I sought to make acquaintances, to the especial ...
— A Practical Illustration of Woman's Right to Labor - A Letter from Marie E. Zakrzewska, M.D. Late of Berlin, Prussia • Marie E. Zakrzewska
... For such a recompense—were horrible. It might have been more prudent to have had it Brought up at second hand by some good Christian In her own faith. But your friend's orphan child You would not then have loved. Children need love, Were it the mute affection of a brute, More at that age than Christianity. There's always time enough for that—and if The maid have but grown up before your eyes With a sound frame and pious—she remains Still in her maker's eye the same. For is not Christianity all built on Judaism? Oh, it has often vexed me, ...
— Nathan the Wise • Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
... acquired much applause. The great poet, the respected Athenian citizen, the man who had already perhaps been a General, appeared publicly in woman's clothes, and as, on account of the feebleness of his voice, he could not play the leading part of Nausicaa, took perhaps the mute under part of a maid, for the sake of giving to the representation of his piece the ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... lakes, which were once four cities, and that in these lakes were fish of various beautiful colours, who were once the inhabitants. If I recollect right, when the fish were caught and put into the frying-pan, they jumped up and made a speech; (so would fish now-a-days, if they were not mute;) and the story is told by a prince, whose lower extremities are turned into black marble, very convenient, certainly, if he dined out every day, as he had only his upper toilet to complete. This coincidence appeared to me to be very curious, and had I had time and opportunity I certainly should ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... had made another advance, and was gaining upon them. It seemed curious that he should stand forth as the champion of the herd, and do all the roaring and stamping, while the other bulls remained mute, and followed with the rest of the herd, yet so it was; but there seemed no reason to disbelieve the unpleasant fact that the monarch's example would be imitated by his subjects. The herd had now drawn so near, and the young ladies had made such a comparatively slow retreat, ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... not interest her in the least. It was only her pride, the priceless legacy of British womanhood, which enabled her to preserve her composure—which checked the hot tears that burned in her eyes. For the mute misery in Haredale's face was more than he could hide. With all his sang-froid, and all his training to back it, he was hard put to it to keep up ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... opportunities. A profound veneration for their parent and an unswerving faith in his doctrines had not amended their congenital incapacity to understand what he had written. Laura, who had her moments of mute rebellion against destiny, had sometimes thought how much easier it would have been if their progenitor had been a poet; for she could recite, with feeling, portions of The Culprit Fay and of ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... safe I sing with mortal voice, unchanged To hoarse or mute, though fallen on evil days, On evil days though fallen, and evil tongues. Paradise Lost, ...
— The World's Best Poetry — Volume 10 • Various
... stood thus stupid and mute, which she doubtless attributed to nothing more than a concern at parting, this idea procured me perhaps a slight alleviation of it, in the following harangue: "That now we were got safe to London, and that ...
— Memoirs Of Fanny Hill - A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) • John Cleland
... that while he was minutely studying and analyzing this gruesome object, the idea of the telephone first burst upon his mind. For years Bell had been engaged in a task that seemed hopeless to most men—that of making deaf-mutes talk. "If I can make a deaf-mute talk, I can make iron talk," he declared. "If I could make a current of electricity vary in intensity as the air varies in density," he said at another time, "I could transmit sound telegraphically." ...
— The Age of Big Business - Volume 39 in The Chronicles of America Series • Burton J. Hendrick
... anxious, called with loud cries for their champion, and opened their ranks that he might pass to the front. He did so, and, advancing before his red companions in arms, stood revealed to the gaze of the Iroquois, who, beholding the warlike apparition in their path, stared in mute amazement. "I looked at them," says Champlain, "and they looked at me. When I saw them getting ready to shoot their arrows at us, I leveled my arquebus, which I had loaded with four balls, and aimed straight at one of the three ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various
... look of mute gratitude. The girl with the long red cloak came tripping back with a tray. She placed it on his knees; then she whisked away the napkin which covered it. All he knew was that he smiled up into her eyes through his tears, ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon
... lusty greeting said, And forth his speckled harem led The oxen lashed their tails, and hooked, And mild reproach of hunger looked; The horned patriarch of the sheep, Like Egypt's Amun roused from sleep, Shook his sage head with gesture mute, And emphasized with stamp ...
— Whittier-land - A Handbook of North Essex • Samuel T. Pickard
... own decay. The pliant poplar bent beneath the blast; The moveless oak stood warring with the storm, Which bow'd the pensive willow's weaker form; And naught gave token that thy love would last, Save the mute eloquence of forcing tears; Save the low pleading of thy ardent sighs, The fervent gazing of thy glowing eyes; A firm assurance, spite of all my fears, That, as the sunshine dries the summer rain, Thy future smile should ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 387, August 28, 1829 • Various
... extraordinary promise was cut short by death, only a fortnight after his election to the Royal Society. ("Dict. of National Biography"; article Goodricke (John). The article is by Miss Agnes Clerke. It is strange that she did not then seem to be aware that he was a deaf-mute, but she notes the fact in her "Problems of Astrophysics", page 337, ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others
... occupy the time of two dots for each dash, and there are eight of these, eight more ought to be counted in a comparison of it with an alphabet composed wholly of dots, this would make forty-seven. To spell the same words in full by the mute alphabet referred to would require only twenty-three motions. A still greater disparity in rate would, we think, be found in an entire colloquial sentence. Thus the sentence "Hand me an apple" would require, by the mute ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... cranium. Loose tufts of dark vapor floated in the mist. Febrer's imagination pictured in it two frightful, black holes; a dark triangle like that which the wasted nose leaves in the skull of the dead; and below it an immense gash, tragic, identical with the mute grin of a mouth devoid of ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... after which she would turn to her and say, "When you are older, little Fan, you too may know what it is to have a broken heart." This trifling incident, transpiring as it now does for the first time, after nearly seventy years, from the intimate privacies of family life, bears its mute evidence to the truth of the last two witnesses, that Lady Nelson neither reproached her husband, nor was towards him unforgiving.[20] Nelson's early friend, the Duke of Clarence, who had given her away at the wedding, ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... I remember the simple old lady put down her gun and pulled the spectacles from her forehead to her nose, read my note that I was 'going to the front' and—kissed me! Possibly this was because of the suggestion of a retreat, whilst I, a mute, was going to the fighting line. Then she pointed towards the road and went off into a temper, rattling off a torrent of excited German, and again looking ...
— The Sequel - What the Great War will mean to Australia • George A. Taylor
... finished speaking the man glanced casually about the place, as if observing a passer-by. Ned and his companions exchanged quick looks of inquiry. Using the mute language in which the boys were adept, Ned flashed a question ...
— Boy Scouts Mysterious Signal - or Perils of the Black Bear Patrol • G. Harvey Ralphson
... grew in volume, grew less silken, and more threatening, while the light faded into mute, misty music like the purring of cats. A swelling roar assaulted their ears; nameless creeping things seemed to fill the tone. Yet it was in one tonality; there was no harmony, no melody. The man's quick ear ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... followed, during which I stared at him in mute fascination. Then an unaccountable impulse made me say abruptly: "Moeran, ...
— Uncanny Tales • Various
... es, ex, (or, as Priscian will have it, ix,) eds." See p. 9. This mostly accords with the names given in the preceding paragraph; and so far as it does not, I judge the author to be wrong. The reader will observe that the Doctor's explanation is neither very exact nor quite complete: K is a mute which is not enumerated, and the rule would make the name of it Ke, and not Ka;—H is not one of his eight semivowels, nor does the name Ach accord with his rule or seem like a Latin word;—the ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... were quite still and speechless; no throbbings of fright; no extraordinary circulation, as far as I could discover. It was at this time, however, that on looking closer, I observed a strange expression of countenance; a wild look in the eye; a kind of mute horror there expressed; wondering at which, the popular belief flashed upon me at once, and I gave small Bob a look which puzzled him exceedingly. 'Can it be then,' said I, chasing this thought about in ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various
... would like to do that, and he asked at the door whether Westover was going to the tea at Mrs. Bellingham's. He said he had to look in there, before he went out to Cambridge; and left Westover in mute amaze at the length he had apparently gone in a road that had once seemed no thoroughfare for him. Jeff's social acceptance, even after the Enderby ball, which was now some six or seven weeks past, had been slow; ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... day became dark like the twilight of evening and that the birds which from the break of day had been singing became mute. The middle of the eclipse was at ...
— The Story of Eclipses • George Chambers
... by beauty and physical grace. Then the one who is first struck begins a regular courtship: frequent walks in the garden when the other is likely to be at the window of her class-room, pauses on the stairs to see her pass; in short, a mute adoration made up of glances and sighs. Later come presents of beautiful flowers, and little messages conveyed by complacent companions. Finally, if the 'flame' shows signs of appreciating all these proofs of ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... the ball-room door, His moighty Excellincy was, He smoiled and bowed to all the crowd, So gorgeous and immense he was. His dusky shuit, sublime and mute, Into the door-way followed him; And O the noise of the blackguard boys, As they hurrood and ...
— Ballads • William Makepeace Thackeray
... that he may hear Her answering whistle, soft and clear; Out of the greenwood, leafy, mute, Pipes her mimicking, silver flute, And, though her mellow measures are Always behind him half a bar, 'Tis sweet to hear her falter so; And Ted calls back, "Bravo, bravo!" "Bravo, bravo!" Comes from ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various
... a fish's, and of no particular color. His chief personal characteristics seemed to be too much feet and not enough teeth. His sharply cut, but rather simple face, as he turned it towards me, wore a look of interrogation. I replied to his mute inquiry by taking out my pocket-book and handing him my business-card, which he held up to the candle and perused ...
— Miss Mehetabel's Son • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... now is to dress the severe wounds it has made and which are still bleeding, with as little torture as possible, for it has cut down to the quick, and its amputations, whether foolish or outrageous, have left sharp pains or mute ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... the garden wakes to sound, for not a bird is mute: The robin pipes the piccolo; the blackbird plays the flute; While high upon a cedar-top a thrush with bubbling throat Lifts up to this accompaniment her ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... bridegrooms, with lips and with breath, Drank the first kiss of Danger and clasped her in death; And the heart of brave WINTHROP grew mute, with his lyre, When the plumes of his genius lay moulting in fire,— ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... of the Arctic will forever look barren and unfinished to me after this. Even the sailors, who know too well what a menace they are to their craft, yield to their beauty a mute and grudging homage. To sit in the sun or the moonlight, and watch a heavy sea hurling mountains of water and foam over one of these ocean monarchs is a never-to-be-forgotten experience. So too it is to listen to the ...
— Le Petit Nord - or, Annals of a Labrador Harbour • Anne Elizabeth Caldwell (MacClanahan) Grenfell and Katie Spalding
... haters meet In the crowded city's horrible street; Or thou step alone through the morass Where never sound yet was Save the dry quick clap of the stork's bill, For the air is still, and the water still, When the blue breast of the dipping coot Dives under, and all is mute. So at the last shall come old age, Decrepit as befits that stage; {670} How else wouldst thou retire apart With the hoarded memories of thy heart, And gather all the very least Of the fragments of life's earlier feast, Let fall through eagerness to find The ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... physical, is the pursuit of an ideal happiness. But he is too wise to affirm or to deny the existence of another world. For life beyond the grave there is no consensus of mankind, no Catholic opinion held semper, et ubique, et ab omnibus. The intellectual faculties (perception and reflection) are mute upon the subject: they bear no testimony to facts; they show no proof. Even the instinctive sense of our kind is here dumb. We may believe what we are taught: we can know nothing. He would, therefore, cultivate that receptive mood which, ...
— The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi • Richard F. Burton
... the mute pain of sleepless love: in the blush of the chaste: in the tears of the night of the desolate: in ...
— Fruit-Gathering • Rabindranath Tagore
... not their young compassions by such lore, But hold you mute, and read the battle yonder: The ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... is a bacchanal; they have been drinking, those magnificent brutes, there is wine firing their blood and weighing down their heads. But here all is different, in this so-called Bacchanal of Mantegna. This heavy Silenus is supine like a mass of marble; these fauns are shy and mute; these youths are grave and sombre; there is no wine in the cups, there are no lees in the vat, there is no life in these magnificent colossal forms; there is no blood in their grandly bent lips, ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... Still Deacon Enos remained mute; and Uncle Jaw, after waiting a while, recommenced with, "But, railly, deacon, I should like to ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... was one that any man might envy, his courage was shared by humbler martyrs. In the same year in which he was beheaded thirteen Dutch Anabaptists were burnt, as he would have approved, by the English government. Mute, inglorious Christs, they were led like sheep to the slaughter and as lambs dumb before their shearers. They had no eloquence, no high position, to make their words ring from side to side of Europe and echo down the centuries; but their meek endurance ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... I bowed a mute acceptance of it; and mademoiselle, conscious from our manner we were not particularly amiable toward each other, hastened to avert any ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... look and she tried to speak, but her glance faltered and fell before his and the words would not come. She could feel the blood rushing to her cheeks. She put up her hands in mute protest, but the protest was unavailing. His arms were about her, his kisses were upon her lips, and he was telling her the things which are told in times like these. And she struggled no longer, but permitted herself to listen, to believe, to accept, and to be swept away by the wonderful current ...
— Mary-'Gusta • Joseph C. Lincoln
... and morasses, haunted only by the so-called Mountain Wanderers, the dragoons that came in chase of them, the women that wept on their dead bodies, and the wild birds of the moorland that have cried there since the beginning. It is a land of many rain-clouds; a land of much mute history, written there in prehistoric symbols. Strange green raths are to be seen commonly in the country, above all by the kirkyards; barrows of the dead, standing stones; beside these, the faint, durable footprints and handmarks of the Roman; and ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... The confessors scrutinized and alarmed the conscience of their votaries, and a rigorous penance was imposed on those who had received the communion from a priest who had given an express or tacit consent to the union. His service at the altar propagated the infection to the mute and simple spectators of the ceremony: they forfeited, by the impure spectacle, the virtue of the sacerdotal character; nor was it lawful, even in danger of sudden death, to invoke the assistance of their prayers or absolution. No sooner ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... fastened the door, that he might not be followed, shot the President, then—waving his pistol shouted "Sic Semper Tyrannis" (so be it always to tyrants), and leaped to the stage in front As he jumped, the American flag draped before the box—mute avenger of the nation's chief—caught his spur and, throwing him heavily, broke his leg The assassin, however escaped from the house in the confusion, mounted a horse which was waiting for him, and fled into Maryland He was at length overtaken ...
— A Brief History of the United States • Barnes & Co.
... Mute, casual, they tramped out of the house together, and down the hill to a region of shabby old brown houses like blisters on the hillside. They had little to say, and that little was a polite reminiscence of incidents in ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... his lair, and Slid shall dive from the Threshold into the sea to see if it be there, and coming up when the fishermen draw their nets shall find it not, nor yet discover it among the sails. Limpang Tung shall seek among the birds and shall not find it when the cock is mute, and up the valleys shall go Umborodom to seek among the crags. And the hound, the thunder, shall chase the Eclipse and all the gods go seeking with Their stars, but never find the ball. And men, no longer having light of the golden ball, shall pray to the gods no more, who, having no worship, ...
— Time and the Gods • Lord Dunsany [Edward J. M. D. Plunkett]
... that had moved it before; gradually calmed; came back from being a stranger to being at home, at least in one presence; and ended, her action even before her look told him where, as her other hand unconsciously was joined to the one already on his arm. A mute expression of feeling, the full import of which he read, even before her eye, coming back from its musings, was raised to him, perhaps unconsciously, too, with all the mind in it; its timidity was not more apparent than its simplicity of clinging affection and dependence. Mr. Carleton's ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell
... here, lecher? O intemperate king! Wilt thou not see me? Come, come, show your face, Your grace's graceless, king's unkingly face. What, mute? hands folded, eyes fix'd on the earth? Whose turn is next now to be murdered? The famish'd Bruces are on yonder side, On this, another I will name anon; One for whose head this garland I do bear, And this fair, milk-white, spotless pendant too. Look up, King John! see, yonder sits thy ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... impatiently from his seat at the unwelcome interruption. He stood regarding the intruder with mute, ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... the fable o'er, Which mute attention had approv'd before; Though under spirits love th' accustomed jest, Which chases sorrow from the vulgar breast; Still hearts refin'd their sadden'd tints retain— The sigh gives pleasure and the jest is pain: Scarce have they smiles ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... down upon her. A vast compassion shone in the grey eyes, that she had only seen hard and penetrating. The gesture of mute abandonment, the ready compliance had appealed to his complex nature, which he kept hidden under an armour of coldness and cynicism. For an instant his years of outlawry and poverty were blotted out and he had gone back to the days in Russia when he had first come ...
— The Hippodrome • Rachel Hayward
... passage, and any lady who might be able to accompany her. He would, however, consult Commander Babbicome and ascertain whether the Tudor could be got ready for sea in time. Commander Babbicome was mute. When the colonel had gone, he expressed himself somewhat ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... moments at the door, Gerard Douw at length found breath and collectedness to bid him welcome, and, with a mute inclination of the head, the stranger stepped forward ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume II. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... ungainly, hairy paws behind him, stood mute, like the great pitiful elephant he was, and looked at the tucks and the rest—stupidly. "Where before did y'ever see such tucks and frills and lace on a night-shirt? Why, you'd think 't were for goin' to picnics in, 'stead ...
— On Our Selection • Steele Rudd
... sharpens them too much, my dear," said Mrs. Westfield coldly. She looked around the room helplessly as if seeking in some mute object tangible evidence of ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs
... Sigurd's bed. Then they take the man beloved, and bear him forth to the hall, And spread the linen above him, and cloth of purple and pall; And meekly Gudrun followeth, and she sitteth down thereby, But mute is her mouth henceforward, and she giveth forth no cry, And no word of lamentation, though far abroad they weep For the gift of the Gods departed, and ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs • William Morris
... she had no acknowledged admirers, while there was not a young man in the district who did not show signs of adoration for Bryda—mute signs, perhaps, but not the less sincere—a flower presented as she passed under the porch of the village church, or a fairing brought from Bristol, left with no words on the stone seat under ...
— Bristol Bells - A Story of the Eighteenth Century • Emma Marshall
... prince, steadily. "This is a decisive hour between you and me, my brother. It is a strife of intellect, of spirit; and although I know I am too weak to conquer, I will at least fall with honor—with my sword in my hand! I shall fall, but you shall not consider me a cowardly mute who does not dare to defend himself. I know that I have been slandered to you; I know that those whom you honor with your friendship are spies upon my every word and look, and report to your majesty what they hear and what they do not hear—what is true and what is not ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... convinced that you are in her arms. It is your part to pave the way for this deception; mine to maintain it. You will not have much difficulty in making her understand that you will have to leave her before dawn. Nor need you be at a loss for a pretext as to the necessity for perfectly mute caresses when you return at night, as you will promise to return. To avert all danger of discovery at the last moment, I shall, when the time comes for me to leave, act as if I heard a suspicious noise outside the window. Seizing my cloak,—or rather yours, which you ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler
... handle and put the receiver to his ear. There was no response. Impatiently he rang again. Still he got no reply. A feeling of alarm took possession of him. Frantically he rang and rang, but the receiver at his ear was mute. ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... read the paper once, then read it over again. Extreme satisfaction beamed over his countenance, and he sat mute for some seconds seemingly in utter astonishment. But soon after, the expression of his face changing, he opened the envelope and threw the enclosure down, jocularly saying to the astrologer, "Here, Sir, is the original of which ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... laugh, however, that made her music suddenly mute. It was Lory de Vasselot who was laughing, as they carried him into the little church. He was explaining to the baron that he had heard of his hospital, and had caused himself to be carried thither as soon as he could be moved from the cottage, where he had ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... as one of its first members. She had part in the defeat of the strong lobby that sought to abolish the existing State Board of Public Examiners, which prevents incompetents from practicing medicine. She introduced a bill compelling the State to educate the deaf, mute and blind; another requiring seats for women employes; what was known as the Medical Bill, by which all the sanitary measures of the State are regulated and put in operation; and another providing for the erection ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... lunch outside of a small town and I climbed on foot to the hilltop castle where mediaeval and modern were mixed in mute melange. A drawbridge crossed a long dry moat to cracked walls of rock covered with ivy. For all its well preserved signs of artistic ruin, it was occupied and well fitted within. From the topmost parapet of one rickety looking tower, a wire stretched out through the air to an old, ruined mill which ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... never over the sailless sea Came messenger bark or schooner With news from the far-off realm whence we Set sail for that isle of mystery, Or a whisper of apology From our mute, malign marooner. ...
— God and Mr. Wells - A Critical Examination of 'God the Invisible King' • William Archer
... Prince of Conde should restrain his ardor, and let himself be vaguely regarded as the possible leader of the enterprise if it were to take place, but without giving it, until further notice, his name and co-operation. He was called the mute captain. ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... they could get rid of him by talking him to death; but it didn't work. He shut 'em up in the very barrack where they did their talking, and those who didn't jump out of the windows he enrolled in his suite, where they soon became mute as fish and pliable as a tobacco-pouch. This coup made him consul; and as he wasn't one to doubt the Supreme Being who had kept good faith with him, he hastened to fulfil his own promise by restoring the churches and reestablishing ...
— Folk-Tales of Napoleon - The Napoleon of the People; Napoleonder • Honore de Balzac and Alexander Amphiteatrof
... Reformation! Now, the making of images was forbidden, and no picture was permitted to appear even on the walls of the sacred edifice: [470:4] then, a church frequently suggested the idea of a studio, or a picture-gallery. Now, the whole congregation joined heartily in the psalmody: then, the mute crowd listened to the music of the organ accompanied by the shrill voices of a chorus of thoughtless boys. Now, prayers, in the vernacular tongue and suited to the occasion, were offered with simplicity and earnestness; then, petitions, long since antiquated, were muttered in a dead ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... I know by face four of the guests: Maupertuis, Voltaire, Algarotti, Keyserling;—Rasfeld, Rambonet can sit as simulacra or mute accompaniment. Voltaire arrived on Sunday evening; stayed till Wednesday. Wednesday morning, 14th of the month, the Party broke up: Voltaire rolling off to left hand, towards Brussels, or the Hague; King to right, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle |
