"Mute" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the man's eyes seemed to get softer and more life-like, and he looked at us piteously and helplessly. From face to face he gazed in mute inquiry, and then, striking his chest feebly with his ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs
... fearful battle render'd you in music: Turn him to any cause of policy, The Gordian knot of it he will unloose, Familiar as his garter; that, when he speaks, The air, a charter'd libertine, is still, And the mute wonder lurketh in men's ears, To steal his sweet ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... miserable affair we were glad to offer up thanks, for the sake of the ponies. What labour for a few gallons of water, not so much as we use in our baths every morning in civilised countries! But no man could stand idly by and watch the mute longing of his faithful horses. So freeing the dwarf and the old gin, a fit pair, we set to work. All that afternoon and all through the night we dug and hauled and scraped, and by morning had the horses watered and twenty gallons to boot. There had ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... would second her, strike to her stroke, As when she was by, Aye, even from the ancient clamorous "Fall Of Paris," or "Battle of Prague" withal, To the "Roving Minstrels," or "Elfin Call" Sung soft as a sigh: But upping ghosts press achefully, And mute, mute, mute, you ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... long time the three people sat in silence, and then Lady Kingsmead rose. "I think I'll go upstairs," she said, "but if you two enjoy sitting as mute as fish, there is no reason why you shouldn't continue to do ...
— The Halo • Bettina von Hutten
... woodpecker in its nest when my arm became twisted and lodged in the deep hole so that I could not get it out without the aid of a knife; but we were a long way from home and my only companion was a deaf mute cousin of mine. I was about fifty feet up in the tree, in a very uncomfortable position, but I had to wait there for more than an hour before he brought me the knife with which I finally ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... most remarkable man. Though obviously suffering he shrinks from any declaration. Often we are alone for hours (I have asked dear Netta to give him the necessary opportunity to unburden himself) and he does nothing but stare at me in a fixed and dreadful way, and remains mute. Of course I know that I am to blame on account of my former indifference—even antagonism—to him. He is afraid of rebuff. I have extended encouragement to him by all the slight means in my power, and Netta has openly handed him my photo, ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... as your sister Topeka tells you, and remember what I said about your papa," Alida said to the younger children. Jim and Judy clasped each other's hands in mute compact at the edict. Their sister Topeka had a real genius for authority; they were minded all too well when she ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... If the beauty of Mrs. Leslie's protege first excited his coarser nature, her maternal tenderness, her anxious care for her little one, struck a congenial chord in the father's heart. It connected him with her by a mute and unceasing sympathy. Templeton had felt so deeply the alarm and pain of illicit love, he had been (as he profanely believed) saved from the brink of public shame by so signal an interference of grace, ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book X • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... must be fulfilled in the New? There was no need of your scholarship to establish that. But here you might make a great show and demonstrate by your ingenuity that this fulfilment occurs in Peter or in the pope. You are as mute as a stick when it is time to speak out, and a chatterbox when speech is unnecessary. Have you not learned your logic better than that? You argue your major premises, which no one questions, and assume the correctness ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther
... satisfied with their own achievements; ordinary men are not even content with the approbation they perceive in the eyes of others: it is too intermittent, too reserved, too mute; they need fame that is brilliant and noisy; they want to hear the constant hum of admiration and respect whenever they appear or whenever their name is mentioned. Even this does not suffice; they are unwilling that ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... and became unconscious of the shadow falling on the snow in front of him; and when he looked up about a quarter of an hour later and noticed that the shadow was still there, he smiled at the tribute such mute attention paid his work. When the sketch was finished he leaned back and closed one eye, and moved his head from side to side and surveyed it critically. Then he heard a voice over his shoulder say, in sympathetic tones, "Purty good, isn't it?" He turned ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis
... from approaching her. It was not pride, but rather a feeling of prejudice, as if Marian were in some way to blame for all the trouble which had come to them, while her peculiar position as the divorced wife of her brother made it the more embarrassing. But she could not resist the mute pleading of the eyes lifted so tearfully to her, as if asking for a nod of recognition, and stopping before her ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... God has neither tone nor articulation. It is mute, silent, and unutterable. It is Jesus Christ Himself, the real and essential Word who in the center of the soul that is disposed for receiving Him, never one moment ceases from His living, fruitful, ...
— The Autobiography of Madame Guyon • Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon
... abounds with seafaring characters in holiday rig, very picturesque to American eyes. They knuckle their foreheads and remove their pipes as we pass, and by attitudes and gestures which would inform a deaf-mute invite us to take a sail on the bay. They do not audibly offer their services, for the municipal laws forbid them to, but their figureheads are mutely eloquent. Here is one who might be put right on the stage as he stands as the typical jolly Jack Tar of the nautical drama. He ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... death. A couple of old ladies in white hoods were tugging and swaying about at two bell-ropes that came down into the middle of the church, and at least five hundred others in white veils were seated all round about us in mute contemplation until the service began, looking very solemn, and white, and ghastly, like an army ...
— Little Travels and Roadside Sketches • William Makepeace Thackeray
... her music, rather than with what is, or is to come. It is difficult to reconcile the eternal beauty of traditional Irish melody with the lack of musical interest and feeling that distinguishes the mass of modern Irish life. But, here and there, a string of the harp that has hung, mute, on Tara's walls for so many centuries, utters a sigh of sweet sound, and at Number 6, The Mall, Cluhir, the soul of music had still some ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... years shalt thou, under cloud of night, descend once, in black domino, like a black night-bird, and disturb the fair Antoinette's music-party in the Park: all Birds of Paradise flying from thee, and musical windpipes growing mute. (Campan, i. 197.) Thou unclean, yet unmalignant, not unpitiable thing! What a course was thine: from that first trucklebed (in Joan of Arc's country) where thy mother bore thee, with tears, to an unnamed father: forward, through lowest subterranean depths, and over ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... these pages, as those of a fresh leaf are transferred to 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 rapid alternations of feeling ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... all, and nodded to them as they passed him. He noted surprise in the faces of several as they saw him standing there. He wondered what it was all about, and determined to ask the next man who evinced even mute wonderment at his presence ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... thing."—Kames, El. of Crit., ii, 49. "The using a preposition in this case, is not always a matter of choice."—Ib., ii, 37. "To save multiplying words, I would be understood to comprehend both circumstances."—Ib., i, 219. "Immoderate grief is mute: complaining is struggling for consolation."—Ib., i, 398. "On the other hand, the accelerating or retarding the natural course, excites a pain."—Ib., i, 259. "Human affairs require the distributing our attention."—Ib., i, 264. "By neglecting this circumstance, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... come (Ah, love is come indeed!) Our limbs are numb Before his fiery need; With all their glad Rapture of speech unsaid, Before his fiery lips Our lips are mute and dumb. ...
— Hymen • Hilda Doolittle
... covenants Choose between too great or too small a recompense Regard the utterances and mandates of age as wisdom There is no 'never,' no surely Voice of the senses, which drew them together, will soon be mute ...
— Quotations From Georg Ebers • David Widger
... 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
... green The Bromian ivy weaves; But no more is the satyr seen Laughing out from the glossy leaves. Hushed is the Lycian lute, Still grows the seed Of the Moenale reed, But the pipe of Pan is mute! ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... ominously dark. She had never known a night since she came to Japat when the birds and insects were so mute. A sombre, supernatural calm hung over the island like a pall. Far off, over the black sea, pulsed the fitful glow of an occasional gleam of lightning, faint with the distance which it traversed. There was no moon; the stars ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... Washington? What would it avail me, in such an event, to plead an alibi—to assure my old friends that I was, during the whole of the campaign, in England—that I was never in America, or any other sea but between Dover and Calais, and that all my acts of piracy were committed on the mute creation? All this may be true, says a minister or a minister's understrapper, but you are for the present suspected, and that is sufficient. I know that you are fond of Scotland:—this is not the time for proofs; you may be, and very probably are innocent, but this bill cares not whether you are ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... was returned. His friend stood mute and motionless, with his left hand grasping his gun, and his right thrust into the waist of his coat. His eye grew upon the window, and his chest heaved, and his cheek paled and flushed alternately with the subdued emotion of his heart. A ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... the festal board. Von Ibn was mute and his companion felt that, the preceding remarks considered, she would be dumb herself. The entire meal was accordingly eaten in absolute silence, until, when she had finished, she could not refrain from stealing one amused ...
— A Woman's Will • Anne Warner
... scarce a Filipino, even the most enlightened, who does not tell marvelous things that have happened to him—wondrous visions, mute and speechless; ghosts, goblins, strange figures; dead people; dogs, and fabulous and never imagined animals; castles, and balls of fire, that have appeared to him; frightful noises of all sorts that have scared him; and, finally, the most improbable stories and bits of nonsense ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... as she finished speaking, and her hearers began to wonder if she really meant what she said. Anne rather liked the suggestion of having Eleanor go East with her, and Polly sat mute, wishing some one would persuade her mother that it was the only thing to do for ...
— Polly and Eleanor • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... we were to eliminate those with conspicuously bad moves, it may be we should find the number of reasonable games was limited enough, and that even our brilliant Lasker is but repeating the inspirations of some long-buried Persian, some mute inglorious Hindoo, dead and forgotten ages since. It may be over every game there watches the forgotten forerunners of the players, and that chess is indeed a dead game, a haunted game, played ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... animals do not think in any proper sense as we do, or have concepts and ideas, because they have no language. To be sure, a deaf mute thinks without language because a human being has the intelligence which language implies, or which was begotten in his ancestors by its use through long ages. Not so with the lower animals. They are like very young children in this respect; they have impressions, perceptions, ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... decades had passed away when that temple stood as a mute and piteous witness that Athens had been laid low in the dust, and that Victory, though she could never weave a garland for Hellenes who had conquered Hellenes, was no longer a living power upon her chosen citadel. By the eighteenth century the shrine had altogether ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 3, March, 1891 • Various
... the bereaved wives and mothers. The reader will find many of them in the good Chaplain's book, and they will bring the war closer than anything else. Sometimes they stand mute under the blow, looking on the dead face without a sound, and then dropping unconscious to the floor. Sometimes they cry wild things to heaven. The Chaplain's work in either case is not easy, and some of his most ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • 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 ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... broken, or gallipots were used instead of crucibles. The colored tests were not in the usual transparent vials, but were placed in ordinary black bottles. There is nothing more melancholy than to behold science or art in distress. A threadbare scholar, a tattered book, or a battered violin is a mute appeal to ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... pity, but gallant, fiery love. Modern ideals and ancient chivalry.... A young dark woman with a quivering mouth, with eyes bright in tears.... There was an old favorite print that portrayed her, a slim wistful figure resting a pale hand on a mute harp, a great elk-hound at her feet on guard, and back of her the rising sun shone on the antique round tower.... A pretty picture, but was it enough? He tried to envisage her close, concentrated.... There the dog, there the harp, there the slim form.... But the face.... It seemed to elude ...
— The Wind Bloweth • Brian Oswald Donn-Byrne
... of it all was difficult to foresee. On the waters of the city floated the English iron-clads, with their mute threat of war; around the walls Turkish troops were rapidly throwing up earthworks; leading officers in the Russian army chafed at the thought of stopping so near their longed-for goal, and burned with the desire to make a final end of ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... of them. They are there for us and we are here for them. Their lips, though temporarily mute, are more eloquent than ever before, and their voices, though silent, are ...
— The Debs Decision • Scott Nearing
... "Keep mute; you need tell me nothing. I can see into a mystery that is as deep as a well, to-night. Your companions are hirelings; perhaps your shipmates; or men to ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... to rock, with giant-bound, High on their iron poles they pass; Mute, lest the air, convuls'd by sound, Rend from above ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis
... proceeded towards the gate. Said Gwrhyr Gwalstawt Ieithoedd, "Is there a porter?" "There is. And thou, if thy tongue be not mute in thy head, wherefore dost thou call?" "Open the gate." "I will not open it." "Wherefore wilt thou not?" "The knife is in the meat, and the drink is in the horn, and there is revelry in the hall of Gwrnach the Giant, and except for a craftsman who brings his craft, ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest
... heard my footsteps, but would always come downstairs to meet me. When my evenings were unoccupied by the pursuit for which I had qualified myself with so much pains, and I was engaged in writing at home, she would sit quietly near me, however late the hour, and be so mute, that I would often think she had dropped asleep. But generally, when I raised my head, I saw her blue eyes looking at me with the quiet attention of which I have ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... E is always mute at the end of a word, except in monosyllables that have no other vowel, as the; or proper names, as Penelope, Phebe, Derbe; being used to modify the foregoing consonants, as since, once, hedge, oblige; or to lengthen the preceding vowel, as b[)a]n, ...
— A Grammar of the English Tongue • Samuel Johnson
... in man's heart for God. It is often a sort of dumb longing, not clearly defined nor well understood. It is a mute yearning of his heart for God, though often he doesn't think of it that way. But it is there; for these two, man and God, belong together. They were together until sin drove its ugly wedge in between. They are a part of each other. Neither ...
— Quiet Talks with World Winners • S. D. Gordon
... to a small wit, "Come, Mr. ——, tell us a lively anecdote," and the poor fellow was mute during the remainder of the evening. "Favor me with your company on Wednesday evening, you are such a lion," said a weak party-giver to a young author. "I thank you," replied the wit; "but on that evening I am engaged to eat fire at the Countess ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... wonderful! That these children of Montrose should have an element of music in their souls which Homer had not,—which a melos of David the Prophet and King had not,—which Orpheus and Amphion had not,—which Apollo's unrymed oracles became mute at ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... lamb, which might or might not be required for Her Majesty's troops. They walked slowly and dejectedly, though some took off their hats and gave one a rough "Good-day." Most of them had their eyes on the ground and a look of mute despair. Others, again, looked quite jolly and friendly, calling out a cheery greeting, for all at that time thought the war was really over. I was told that what caused them surprise and despair was the fact of their animals being required by the English: "requisitioned" ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... On her head she wore a bridal wreath and veil—the former of jewels, the latter falling round her like a cloud of mist. Everything was perfect, from the wreath and veil to the tiny sandaled feet and lying there in her mute repose she looked more like some exquisite piece of sculpture than anything that had ever lived and moved in this groveling world of ours. But from one shoulder the dress had been pulled down, and there lay a ...
— The Midnight Queen • May Agnes Fleming
... within her own and trotted upstairs to the bedroom, where Bella arrayed herself in total silence, and her friend, beyond a vigorous sigh or two, was mute also. ...
— If Only etc. • Francis Clement Philips and Augustus Harris
... singing and my voice, Thy life the thing that I would sing, Perfect past words of perfect choice, A lovely and a lasting thing. In every deed of thine, sweetheart, The poetry of heaven has part Beyond the gamut of all art, Leaving me mute and marvelling. ...
— Perpetual Light • William Rose Benet
... of the tempest, and the menacing voice of its approach, not a word was spoken, but all stood mute. Brandon alone appeared not to have noticed it. He still stood with folded arms and absorbed ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... reproduced the subject in several cells, always varying either the attitude of the Saviour, or the persons who adore Him, but the serene attitude of the Son of God is unalterable. Without exaggerated contractions or violent action He remains fixed on the cross, His head bowed in mute contemplation of the figures below Him. These, on the contrary, are the prey of sorrow and despair, they cover their faces, or ...
— Fra Angelico • J. B. Supino
... His hut was near a giant oak tree that sheltered him from the sun of summer and the biting winds of winter. In the constant waving of its branches, too, it seemed to converse with him, and so he said he had two intimate friends, one that could talk, and one that was mute. By the one that could talk he meant the vine-dresser's daughter who lived near by and who was very kind to him. By the mute one he ...
— Great Artists, Vol 1. - Raphael, Rubens, Murillo, and Durer • Jennie Ellis Keysor
... hall Shields gleamed upon the wall, Loud sang the minstrels all, Chanting his glory; When of old Hildebrand I asked his daughter's hand, Mute did the minstrels ...
— Poems Every Child Should Know - The What-Every-Child-Should-Know-Library • Various
... hand on Jet's leg as a signal for him to come back; but the boy paid no attention to the mute command. ...
— Messenger No. 48 • James Otis
... moment, both parties—hunters and game—seemed equally taken by surprise, and stood eyeing each other in mute wonder. It was but for a moment. The men made a rush for their rifles, and the animal, recovering from his trance of astonishment, tossed back his horns, and bounded across the platform. In a dozen springs ...
— The Hunters' Feast - Conversations Around the Camp Fire • Mayne Reid
... Lydgate stood mute, and unconsciously pressed his hat on while he looked at her. He saw this woman—the first to whom he had given his young adoration—amid ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... torture. Resting thus, her shoulder pressed against the hand that lay on the top of the chair, but he did not move a finger; and some magnetic influence drew her gaze to meet his. He felt the tremor that crept over her, understood the mute appeal, the prayer for forbearance that made her mournful gray eyes so eloquent, and a sinister ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... a mightier Power than yours In chains upon the shore of Europe lies; The sceptred throng whose fetters he endures Watch his mute throes with terror in their eyes; And armed warriors all around him stand, And, as he struggles, tighten every band, And lift the heavy spear, with threatening hand, To pierce the victim, should ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant
... mute with astonishment, as, seeing Amyas, she uttered a cry of joy, quickened her pace into a run, and at last fell panting ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... joust, or pious pilgrimage, Lived in his vivid speech. Oh! 'twas my joy, In that bright glow of rapid words, to see Clear pictures, as the slow procession coiled Its glittering length, or stately tournament Grew statelier, in his voice. Now he sits mute— His serious eyes bent on the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... informed him in answer to that mute question; and as the fellow moistened his thumb to turn back the pages, Mr. Caryll saved him the trouble. "It says, I think, that the man should be on your right hand and the woman on your left. Ye seem to have reversed matters, Mr. ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... oaken club, the sage looked on every side, to see if he could discern any who yet breathed. He drew nearer, and thought he saw, at the first glance, the unclosed eyes glare; but soon perceived that they were a mere glassy substance, mute as the tongue; the jaws were fallen, and, in some of the tangled locks, hands were clinched; nay, even the nails had entered sharpened by despair. The blood flew rapidly to his heart; it was flesh; he felt he was still a man, and the big tear paced down his iron cheeks, whose ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... dressed most provokingly correct on these occasions. The first act swept by, solemn and silent. It went off, as G. assured M., exactly as the opening act of a piece—the protasis—should do. The cue of the spectators was to be mute. The characters were but in their introduction. The passions and the incidents would be developed hereafter. Applause hitherto would be impertinent. Silent attention was the effect all-desirable. Poor M. acquiesced,—but in his honest, friendly face I could discern a working which told how much ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... her married life such a charge would have held her mute with horror. Its effect now was not quite the same; she could face the thought, interrogate herself as to its meaning, with a shudder, indeed, but a shudder which came of fear as well as loathing. Life ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... they may have been found, anyway," added Mrs. Ford, gently leading Mollie toward the house, Betty at her side, while Grace and Amy followed, mute with sympathy. ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... children; and the acts of affection, discipline, industry, and self-control, which they daily exemplify, live and act when all else which may have been learned through the ear has long been forgotten. Hence a wise man was accustomed to speak of his children as his "future state." Even the mute action and unconscious look of a parent may give a stamp to the character which is never effaced; and who can tell how much evil act has been stayed by the thought of some good parent, whose memory their children may not sully by the commission ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... feet and of chairs pushed back and they all stood in mute acclaim of Lindsey's sentiments, subscribed with him to the Major's refusal to believe that ill had befallen him whom they had assembled to avenge. Seated again they watched Lindsey, who remained standing while the Chino refilled ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... man stood firm against all their arguments, he was unmoved by all their pleading. It was only when his anxious kindred had given up the battle for lost that Gustave wavered. Their mute despair moved him more than the most persuasive eloquence; and the end was submission. He left Beaubocage the plighted lover of that woman who, of all others, he would have been the last to choose for his wife. It had all been settled ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... soon comforting. I know that I should weep were I the loser, and I let the tears have their way. Sometimes a word or two I can muster: a 'Sigh no more!' and 'Dear lady, do not grieve!' but further I am mute and useless." ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... been so garrulous a few moments before, were silent now. They lingered in the room, exchanging glances of mute consternation. Their faces were pale and sad, and there were tears in the eyes of some of them. What was passing in their minds? Perhaps they were overcome by that unconquerable fear which sudden and unexpected death always provokes. Perhaps they unconsciously loved this master, whose bread ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... wondered whatever was coming. It plucked by their tails the grave matronly cows, And tossed the colts' manes all about their brows, Till offended at such a familiar salute, They all turned their backs and stood silently mute. ...
— Required Poems for Reading and Memorizing - Third and Fourth Grades, Prescribed by State Courses of Study • Anonymous
... me not my later cadence singing, The souls to whom my earlier lays I sang; Dispersed the throng, their severed flight now winging; Mute are the voices that responsive rang. For stranger crowds the Orphean lyre now stringing, E'en their applause is to my heart a pang; Of old who listened to my song, glad hearted, If yet they live, now ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... she stood on her feet and questioned him: "Whence are you, unknown young man?" But he held his tongue. She questioned him again: "Who are you? Why have you come?" and much else of all sorts; but he was as mute as a stone, making signs with his hands, as if he were deaf and wanted help. Then she told him to sit down on her skirt. He did not wait for any more orders, but sat down, and she bent down her head to him, that he might examine it. Turning over the hair of her head, as if to ...
— Folk Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... in a condition to make any such pretensions. Love is not to be controuled, it is not to be repelled.—But in some measure to punish his temerity, he condemned himself to an eternal silence; yet, though his tongue was mute, the princess, who had as great a share of sensibility as beauty, soon perceived the effect of her charms written in his eyes, and imprinted in all his motions, and, in secret, rejoiced at the conquest she had gained. But the same reasons ...
— The Princess of Ponthieu - (in) The New-York Weekly Magazine or Miscellaneous Repository • Unknown
... as she seems. He adorns her with beauty not her own, and presents her thus adorned to men, to admire and to love. It is by interweaving human sympathies and feelings with the objects of the material world, that they lose their character of 'mute insensate things,' and acquire the power to charm and to soothe us, amidst all the cares and anxieties of our life. The intellectual process which here takes place is so interesting and important that we shall make no apology for ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various
... a 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 ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... and breaks upon the heart In sorrow rather than in sound, a chime Strange as a streak of sunset to the moon, Strange as a rose upon a starlit grave, Strange as a smile upon a dead man's lips; A chime of melancholy, mute as death But strong as love, uttered in plangent tones Of honeysuckle, jasmine, gilly-flowers, Jonquils and aromatic musky leaves, Lilac and lilies ...
— The New Morning - Poems • Alfred Noyes
... to his? They dare not leave him alone lest he do himself an injury. He is perfectly mute and listless; he cannot weep, he can neither eat nor sleep. He sits like one in a horrid dream. "Oh, my poor, poor brother!" Maren cries in tones of deepest grief, when I speak his name to her next day. She herself cannot rest a moment ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... every one her breath failed her, and she had to stand still and press her hands against her heart. Then the weight on her breast lifted, and she went on again, upward and upward, the great dark building dropping away from her, in tier after tier of mute doors and mysterious corridors. At last she reached Dick's floor, and saw the light shining down the passage from his door. She leaned against the wall, her breath coming short, the silence throbbing in her ears. Even now it was not too late to turn back. She bent over ...
— Sanctuary • Edith Wharton
... morning at ten o'clock, we returned to the Clara Bell in one of the latter's small-boats, and the corvette steamed slowly out to sea, her officers waving their hats from the quarter-deck in mute farewell, and her band playing the Pirate's Chorus—"Ever be happy and blest as thou art"—as if in mockery of our lonely, cheerless exile! It was a gloomy party of men which returned that afternoon to a supper of reindeer-meat and cabbage in the bare ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... has travelled all that time— Thought has not a swifter flight— Through a region where no faintest gust Of life comes ever, but the power of night Dwells stupendous and sublime, Limitless and void and lonely, A region mute with age, and peopled only With the dead and ruined dust Of ...
— Alcyone • Archibald Lampman
... friend of all my days Even since they cast off boyhood, I salute The song saluting friends whose songs are mute With full burnt-offerings of clear-spirited praise. That since our old young years our several ways Have led through fields diverse of flower and fruit, Yet no cross wind has once relaxed the root We set long ...
— Sonnets, and Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650) • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... rift within the lute That by and by will make the music mute, And ever widening slowly silence all. The little rift within the lover's lute, Or little pitted speck in garner'd fruit, That rotting ...
— Leaves of Life - For Daily Inspiration • Margaret Bird Steinmetz
... their livers and lights helps to an understanding of the anatomy and physiology, and particularly of the pathology, of man. They are necessary aids in devising and manufacturing many remedial agents, and in testing the virtues of those already devised; out of the mute agonies of a rabbit or a calf may come relief for a baby with diphtheria, or means for an archdeacon to escape the consequences of his youthful follies. Moreover, something valuable is to be got out of a mere study of ...
— Damn! - A Book of Calumny • Henry Louis Mencken
... chanced to stumble up against him. The shock seemed equally unexpected on both sides; but my tailor (as being a dun) was the first to recover self-possession; and, with a long preliminary hem!—a mute, but expressive compound of remonstrance, apology, and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 323, July 19, 1828 • Various
... elder child trudged after with the cradle, all seeming weary and all happy. We shall not see such a procession as this to-day; for the harvest is nearly over, the fields are deserted, the silence may almost be felt. Except the wintry notes of the redbreast, nature herself is mute. But how beautiful, how gentle, how harmonious, how rich! The rain has preserved to the herbage all the freshness and verdure of spring, and the world of leaves has lost nothing of its midsummer brightness, ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... a mute, And taught Vanessa to dispute. This topic, never touched before, Displayed her eloquence the more: Her knowledge, with such pains acquired, By this new passion grew inspired. Through this she made all objects pass, Which gave ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift
... course I took my hat, and placed myself at her service. Mr. Engelman got on his feet, and lifted his plump hands in mute and melancholy protest. "Don't be uneasy," Madame Fontaine said to him, with a faint smile of contempt. "David ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... mute, and, taking this for a sign of the impressionable moment, Sherwood talked on, ardently, lyrically, until Hyde Park Corner ...
— Will Warburton • George Gissing
... thy wooings, gentle June? Thou hast a Naiad's charm; Thy breezes scent the rose's breath; Old Time gives thee her palm. [5] The lark's shrill song doth wake the dawn; The eve-bird's forest flute Gives back some maiden melody, Too pure for aught so mute. ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... appearance, a letter was put in his hand, which he perused, and immediately after left the ship, without even going below for his clothing. While in the boat he waived his hand, and bade us be of good cheer. We could only return a mute farewell; and in a few minutes the boat had left the ship, and was on its way ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... 'mere pomp of words'—thou dost designate 'Dear Sensibility,' did not 'vibrate' to the case of this 'well-known Violinist'—until 'twas too late to vibrate to any useful purpose. He was 'found lying dead in his bed, fully dressed, with the exception of his hat and boots,' mute as the untouched strings of his own violin. 'He had died suddenly from syncope, or heart-failure.' Heart-failure, EUGENIUS. Doth not thy gentle heart fail at the thought? 'Dr. COLLEY found the body in an advanced stage of decomposition, and life had probably been ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 10, 1892 • Various
... "I will be mute," said Nello, laying his finger on his lips, with a responding shrug. "But it is only under our four eyes that I talk any ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... The twain who first were sent in this pursuit Of their wise friend well knew the aged face: But when the wizard sage their first salute Received and quitted had with kind embrace, To the young prince, that silent stood and mute, He turned his speech, "In this unused place For you alone I wait, my lord," quoth he, "My chiefest care ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... Kazan lay mute and motionless, his gray nose between his forepaws, his eyes half closed. A rock could have appeared scarcely less lifeless than he; not a muscle twitched; not a hair moved; not an eyelid quivered. ...
— Kazan • James Oliver Curwood
... look and an extended, tremulous arm. It was for her now to take the hand of that wronged man more helpless than a child. But where could she lead him? Where? And what was she to say to him? What words of cheer, of courage and of hope? There were none. Heaven and earth were mute, unconcerned at their meeting. But this other man was coming up behind her. He was very close now. His fiery person seemed to radiate heat, a tingling vibration into the atmosphere. She was exhausted, careless, afraid to stumble, ready ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... had drawled the Adjutant thereupon—pointing his whip at Trooper Henry Hawker, whose trap-like mouth incontinent fell open with astonishment. "It's got up in an imitation of the uniform of the Queen's Greys, I do believe!... It's not a rag doll either.... It's a God-forsaken undertaker's mute in a red and black shroud with a cake-tin at the back of its turnip head and a pair of chemises on its ugly hands.... Sergeant of the ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... ease Britannia shirks; But haply, near these sundering ditches, Some mute inglorious miler lurks Under a morning ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 28, 1914 • Various
... the mute tribute untroubled; but there was a suggestion of puzzlement in the frown which ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... be mute there; they will cry and wail, and gnash their teeth, and, perhaps, too, sometimes at God; but I do not think but that the justice that they have deserved, and the equal administration of it upon them, will, for the most part, prevail with them to rend and tear ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... of his art, and attaining a result which, though clearly imperfect, is strangely moving. He gets great effects from the use of children in several tragedies, though he seldom lets them speak. They speak in the Medea, the Andromache, and Suppliants, and are mute figures in the Trojan Women, Hecuba, Heracles, and Iphigenia in Aulis. We may notice that where his children do speak, they speak only in lyrics, never in ordinary dialogue. This is ...
— Alcestis • Euripides
... yo' get out?" The words came anxiously and with difficulty, like the words of a deaf mute that had been ...
— The Shield of Silence • Harriet T. Comstock
... mute and moveless frame A radiant spirit arose, All beautiful in naked purity. 110 Robed in its human hues it did ascend, Disparting as it went the silver clouds, It moved towards the car, and took its seat ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... away from the breath of life, even as their pigeons were far from earth; at this moment they are merely children, knowing neither envy nor anger; free from everything, they are near to one another, they are mute, judging their feelings by the light in their eyes—and they feel as happy as the birds ...
— Foma Gordyeff - (The Man Who Was Afraid) • Maxim Gorky
... somewhere, how, driven by the roar of street-fighting, into the calm cool galleries of the Louvre, sick and exhausted in mind and body, he fell down at the feet of the Goddess of Beauty there, standing, as she still stands, at the end of that corridor of mute witnesses, and as he looked to her for help, he knew that she could never bend down to him, or lift him up out of his weariness, for they had broken her long ago, and she ...
— Visions and Revisions - A Book of Literary Devotions • John Cowper Powys
... was their sadness that made seem sinister a spell actually benignant. For, of a sudden, while they still stood mute, Brant raised a hand to command attention, and pointed toward the verge ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... on the earth's bosom in holy solitudes, with fasting and great prayer, and send my soul forth in one great mute, hungry demand for light. I, a man, with some of the Father God stirring the awful mysteries of my nature, go yearningly naked, empty, and alone, and clamor to know the way. And sometimes deep, sweet, hollow voices answer in ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... vanity would not let them always or promptly acknowledge it. When Chief Justice Taney died, the President had already planned to fill up the vacancy and at the same time shelve that thorn in his side, Salmon P. Chase. But always keeping his own counsel, he was mute on that head, when an important deputation attended to recommend Chase. After hearing the address, the President asked for the engrossed memorial to be ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... ten seconds more of mute and agonised suspense, and men's fingers tightened their grip on the revolvers. Then the upturned straining eyes looked upon such a sight as human eyes will never see again save perchance those which, in ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... domestic drama which the coming of Jacques Brigaut was destined to bring about in the Rogron family it is best to explain how the lad came to be in Provins; for he is, as it were, a somewhat mute personage on ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... following morning they were still more mute at breakfast. The time was coming in which Mr. Prendergast was to go to work and even he, gifted though he was with iron nerves, began to feel somewhat unpleasantly the nature of the task which he had undertaken. Lady Fitzgerald did not appear at ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... door flew open, and a beautiful fair creature tripped in, and said, playfully: "Well, father, you made game of me; where is your guest?" The next moment she perceived the Knight, and stood fixed in mute admiration; while Huldbrand gazed upon her lovely form, and tried to impress her image on his mind, thinking that he must avail himself of her amazement to do so, and that in a moment she would shrink away in a fit of bashfulness. But it proved otherwise. After looking at him a good ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... not begun to dress for church until Cecily and Felicity were ready. Felicity was her prettiest in flower-trimmed hat, crisp muslin, floating ribbons and trim black slippers. Poor Cecily stood beside her mute and pale, in her faded school garb and heavy copper-toed boots. But her face, if pale, was very determined. Cecily, having put her hand to the plough, was not ...
— The Golden Road • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... a hand was unceremoniously laid upon my shoulder, and turning round I saw behind me one of the official watch—a class of men so powerful that at a gesture from their uplifted hands even the fiercest untamed horse will not infrequently stand upon its hind legs in mute submission. ...
— The Mirror of Kong Ho • Ernest Bramah
... out;" while the third rose from his chair and stood still without saying a word. Chwen Hih (Fu-kiu) explains this point in unequivocal terms: "Night after night I sleep with Buddha, and every morning I get up with Him. He accompanies me wherever I go. When I stand or sit, when I speak or be mute, when I am out or in, He never leaves me, even as a shadow accompanies body. Would you know where He is? Listen to that ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... friend amongst you all? And could ye stand by, and see my hands tied behind me like a thief's? What signifies such a party—all mute?" ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... rode along among them, guiding my horse this way and that way, lest he should profane with his hoofs what seemed to me the sacred dead, and as I looked on their bronze faces upturned in the shining sun, as if in mute appeal against the wrongs of the country for which they had given their lives, whose flag had only been to them a flag of stripes, on which no star of glory had ever shone for them—feeling I had wronged them in the past, and believing what was the future of my country ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... great when it came to denying their horses; and men whose discipline kept faith with my guards during the roasting-ear period now fell from grace. Their horses were growing thin, and few could withstand the mute appeals of their suffering pets; so at night the corn, because of individual foraging, kept stealthily and steadily vanishing, until the field was soon fringed with only earless stalks. The disappearance was noticed, and the guard ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... month of July, 1789, while finishing the portrait of the Marchioness of Hereford, he felt a sudden decay of sight in his left eye. He laid down the pencil, sat a little while in mute consideration, and never lifted it more. His sight gradually darkened, and within ten weeks of the first attack his left eye was wholly blind." (Allan Cunningham.) For some time after this he attended to his duties as President of the Royal Academy, and he delivered his last address to the students ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... door-way, the picture of mute helplessness. Yes, there was one other thing he could do; he could laugh. It would have been hard to avoid it sometimes, there were such ludicrous sights,—such slips and sprawls into the water; so there he stood in that peculiar isolation that deaf people content ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable |
