"Shriek" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... shattering the overwhelming tension of the moment, shrilled, suddenly, a horrible, prolonged, piercing shriek ending in a gasp and the sound of a heavy body falling to the floor! What, in God's name, had happened to the old man? And that yell was enough to awaken the ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... young Hammond was murdered completed the work of mental ruin, begun at the time her husband abandoned the quiet, honorable calling of a miller, and became a tavern-keeper. Reason could hold its position no longer. When word came to her that Willy and his mother were both dead, she uttered a wild shriek, and fell down in a fainting fit. From that period the balance of her mind was destroyed. Long before this, her friends saw that reason wavered. Frank had been her idol. A pure, bright, affectionate boy he was, when she removed with him from their pleasant cottage-home, ...
— Ten Nights in a Bar Room • T. S. Arthur
... the helpless wail, the shriek of woe; I see the muddy wave, the dreary shore, The sluggish streams that slowly creep below, Which mortals visit, ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... The piercing shriek of a steamboat whistle roused the woman just as the first harbingers of dawn spread over the river a crimson flush that turned it into a stream of blood. The child was asleep. Ana bent over her and left a kiss on her forehead. Then she stole out ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... "What do you think of that? I'm sure I could have heard that last shriek, if I'd been away over on the campus. Marian Seaton's cousin! Think what ...
— Jane Allen: Right Guard • Edith Bancroft
... white-livered wretch!" the scold again yelled. At this moment she went soaring off into the air. A piercing shriek came from her lips as she found herself swinging out over the pond. "I'll scratch ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny corner at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for every body, not forgetting themselves, and, mounting guard upon their posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shriek for goose before their turn came to be helped. At last the dishes were set on, and grace was said. It was succeeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs. Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving-knife, prepared to plunge it in the breast; but when she did, and when the long expected gush of ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various
... her knees with a shriek of terror. Mercy, without losing her self-possession, advanced to the window ...
— The New Magdalen • Wilkie Collins
... were proofs of blasting power. Cold, icy shiverings ran through my frame,—a cold, benumbing weight pressed down my heart,—a black abyss opened before me,—the earth heaved and gave way beneath me. With a shriek that seemed to breathe out my life, I fell forward at the feet of her whom I had so ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... There was a cry from below—a quick cry of alarm; and at the same moment they were startled by a wild whizzing and whirring around them, as if a legend of fiends had rushed out of the pit. With a shriek of fright Duncan sprang back from the edge of the dungeon; and that with such force that he knocked over his two companions. Moreover, in falling, they let go the rope; when they rose again they looked round in the twilight, but could find no trace of it. It had slipped over ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... The prince alighted at the same time, and cut off his enemy's head. Just then, the lady, who had been a spectator of the combat, and was still offering up her earnest prayers to heaven for the young hero, whom she admired, uttered a shriek of joy, and said to Codadad, "Prince (for the dangerous victory you have obtained, as well as your noble air, convinces me that you are of no common rank), finish the work you have begun; the black has the keys of this castle, take them and deliver me out of prison." ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 3 • Anon.
... were stayed by a shriek. The spirits of wine had run over the plate she held to the floor. She had the coolness to put the plate down on the table, while he stamped out the flame on the carpet. Again she shrieked: she thought she was on fire. He fell ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... a wail that rose as they listened and mounted to a shriek. In spite of her desire to remain cool and ...
— Rainbow Hill • Josephine Lawrence
... He and I were alone in that large room; I was sitting near the open window, looking into the dark night air. I fancied I saw something white move across it; and I heard a sound like low talking, that swelled into a discordant shriek—"Hoo-oo-oo! Bowes, the devil! Over your shoulder. Hoo-oo-oo! ha! ha! ha!" I started up, and saw, by the light of the candle with which Tom strode to the window, the wild eyes and blighted face of the idiot, as, with a sudden change of mood, he drew off, whispering and tittering ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... caressing, quarrelling—this was quite a society. When a chimney-sweeper once thrust out his black face from one of these chimneys, and shouted aloud to testify the accomplishment of his ascent, it was an event that brought a shriek ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... seeking to devour our tiny craft. Now the schooner hung poised for a moment on the edge of a mountainous wave; the next instant it seemed to be dashing headlong into a fathomless, black abyss. The wind tore on with a fierce shriek, and we scudded before it under ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens
... glancing down, beholds a hag hideous as sin, whose malicious and distorted countenance betrays baffled hate and rage. At the sound of a bugle she hurries away with a discordant shriek. Into the glade ride Roland's men, to see their lord clasping his rosary and kneeling in thanksgiving for his deliverance from the evils which beset him. He had been saved from breaking ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... was hardly given, before the attention of the listeners was called to Alice Dunscombe, who uttered a faint shriek, and rose from her seat involuntarily, while her eyes seemed to roll fearfully, and perhaps a little ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... voice of an angry, bloodthirsty lion burst upon my ear within a few yards of us, followed by the shrieking of the Hottentots. Again and again the murderous roar of attack was repeated. We heard John and Ruyter shriek "The lion! the lion!" still, for a few moments, we thought he was but chasing one of the dogs round the kraal; but, next instant, John Stofolus rushed into the midst of us almost speechless with fear and terror, his eyes bursting from their ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... before big shot pushing noisily through the consenting air—this was horrible! "Lie down, there!" a captain would shout, and then get up himself to see that his order was obeyed. "Captain, take cover, sir!" the lieutenant-colonel would shriek, pacing up and down in the most exposed position ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... control room then, and the effect of his mental dominance became more pronounced. Suddenly the dwarf let out a shriek of terror when he looked through the port and saw the brilliant body that now loomed so close. Blaine experienced a savage joy in the knowledge that ...
— The Copper-Clad World • Harl Vincent
... in which he uttered these words occasioned him to raise his voice. It caught the ear of Charlotte: she knew the beloved sound: and uttering a loud shriek, she sprang forward as Mr. Temple entered the room. "My adored father." "My long lost child." Nature could support no more, and they both sunk lifeless into the ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson
... thought Ivanhoe was into the Count with a thrust in tierce, which took him just at the joint of the armor, and ran him through as clean as a spit does a partridge. Uttering a horrid shriek, he fell back writhing; the King recovering staggered up the parapet; the rush of knights followed, and the union-jack was planted triumphantly on the walls, just as Ivanhoe,—but we must leave ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the girl, "you may do anything you please, if you will only do it in public. Lock your door to say your prayers, and the world will shriek out that you ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... folly we should blame," I answered. "We ought to have known that fool-girl would shriek, ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... is stimulating to intense excitement the multitude around him with the fervor of his words, and the wild, passionate manifestations of his manner, to see the crowd swaying to and fro, to hear the groans and sobs of the half-frenzied multitude, and, not unfrequently, the maddened shriek of hysterical fear, all coming up from the half-illuminated spot, is thrillingly exciting. And when the sermon is finished, to hear all this heated mass break forth into song, the wild melody of which floats, in the stillness of night, upon the breeze to the listening ear a mile away, ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... room?" rejoined Lin Tai-yue, with a cynical smile. "But I came out to have a look as I heard a shriek in the heavens; it turned out, in fact, to be a stupid ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... They take God's gracious gift of night. The stars are watchful over them. On Clifton as on Bethlehem The angels, leaning down the sky, Shed peace and gentle dreams. And I — I ride, I blasphemously ride Through all the silent countryside. The engine's shriek, the headlight's glare, Pollute the still nocturnal air. The cottages of Lake View sigh And sleeping, frown as we pass by. Why, even strident Paterson Rests quietly as any nun. Her foolish warring children keep The grateful armistice of sleep. For what tremendous errand's ...
— Trees and Other Poems • Joyce Kilmer
... a shriek; the last sounds came from the yard; all was still. But at the same instant several men talking loud and fast began noisily mounting the stairs. There were three or four of them. He distinguished the ringing voice of the young ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... was no dream! He was awake, he, Hammersmith, in this small solitary hotel in Ohio, and there was fire, real fire in the air, and in his ears the echo of a shriek such as a man hears but few times in his life, even if his lot casts him continually among the reckless and the suffering. Was it hers? Had these dreams been forerunners of some menacing danger? He was on his feet, his eyes ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... "—tell Horab to shut off that damnable machine!" The shriek of it was rising again to drown his voice. "Tell him his life depends upon it. Tell him to listen to what I say or ...
— Astounding Stories, March, 1931 • Various
... down the track which soon waxed into the headlight of the approaching train. It came on with an increasing roar; the engine bore down upon the ambushing desperadoes with a glare and a shriek like some avenging monster come to deliver them to justice. Black Eagle flattened himself upon the ground. The engine, contrary to their calculations, instead of stopping between him and Bud King's place of concealment, ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... arose, here a cry of fury, yonder a wail of grief, and, rising above all, a woman's shriek of anguish. It came from the lips of Cornelia, the murdered man's wife. Shouts of applause from the King's camp followed, then the blast of a trumpet; the Egyptians drew back from the shore. The scarlet cloak again appeared. Septimius, bearing in his hand a bleeding ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... turned at bay, and from the furious press The scuppered Paladin sent forth his famous S.O.S., Scared Roncesvalles rang loud with war, as misty legends tell, But echo's ear was spared the shriek and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 12, 1917 • Various
... His hands widely spread, His complexion like lead, Ev'ry hair that he had standing up on his head, As when, Agnes des Moulins first catching his view, Now right and now left, rapid glances he threw, Then shriek'd with a wild and unearthly halloo, Mon Dieu! v'la deux!! By the Pope there ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... he would have made to that piece of nonsense he sometimes wondered afterward, but circumstances prevented his making any. The words had only just passed her lips when she sprang to her feet with a wild shriek of horror, shaking ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... rough-and-tumble political life where the fine-fibred men are at a discount, where epithets find their subjects poison-proof, and the sting which would be fatal to a literary debutant only wakes the eloquence of the pachydermatous ward-room politician to a fiercer shriek of declamation. ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... when the iron doors of the mausoleum closed with a clanging sound upon the new inmate of that dark abode, Honoria's fortitude all at once forsook her. One long cry, which was like a shriek wrung from the spirit of despair, broke from her colourless lips, and in the next moment she had sunk fainting upon the ground before ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... that crammed me full, Gangs of the prying gull That shriek and scrabble on the riven hatches. For roar that dumbed the gale My hawse-pipes guttering wail, Sobbing my heart out ...
— The Seven Seas • Rudyard Kipling
... a commotion outside. A woman was heard to shriek, and then to fall heavily; a lad was heard to speak comforting words, choked with great sobs; and then, strangest of all, above this tumult came a very quiet English voice, demanding water—water to pour on the lips and face ...
— The Children's Pilgrimage • L. T. Meade
... am a sculptor, a mere artist. Art has become for me a tedious decoration of my impotence. It is clear I should have been a God. Then I could have had my way with people. To shriek at them obliquely, to curse at them through the medium of clay figures, is a preposterous waste of time. A wounded man groans. I, impaled ...
— Fantazius Mallare - A Mysterious Oath • Ben Hecht
... can we do with duck eggs?" inquired Beth, wonderingly, while Patsy and Louise tried hard not to shriek with laughter. ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Millville • Edith Van Dyne
... look. Early morning was certainly the best time for Joan to enter the town, for the cart had been its round, the dead had been removed from the streets, and the houses were quieter than they often were later in the day. Once in a way a wild shriek or a burst of demoniacal laughter broke from some window; and once a girl, with hair flying wildly down her back, flew out of one of the houses sobbing and shrieking in a frenzy of terror, and was lost to sight down a side alley before Joan ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... legs belonging to a respectable elderly woman who was too deep in her devotion to be aware of the intruder, and, being somewhat astonished by their size, she proceeded to test their quality with a pin, the consequence being an appalling shriek from the woman, which started a shrill treble cry from herself. The service was suspended, and Mr. Hamilton-Wells, the most precise of men, hastened down the aisle, and fished his daughter out, an awful spectacle of dust, from ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... squall is heralded by sudden gusts of wind. All at once the breeze increased into a gale. The corpse emphasized its dismal oscillations. It no longer swung, it tossed; the chain, which had been grinding, now shrieked. It appeared that its shriek was heard. If it was an appeal, it was obeyed. From the depths of the horizon came the sound of a ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... scourges one like invisible whips, and below, the sea churns itself into foaming waves, driving its "infinite squadrons of wild white horses" eternally toward the shore. It was calm and blue to-day, and no sound disturbed the quiet save the incessant shriek and scream of the rock birds, the kittiwakes, black-headed gulls, and guillemots that live on the sides of these high, sheer craigs. Here the mother guillemot lays her single egg, and here, on these narrow shelves of precipitous ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... to pray, and while his eyes were shut, two of Somerville's men threw a cord with a running loop round his body, and bound him to the stake. The fire was then kindled, and at the sight of the smoke the multitude uttered a shriek of anguish, and many ran away, unable to bear any longer the sight of that woful tragedy. Among others, my grandfather also ran, nor halted till he was come to a place under the rocks on the south side of the town, where he could see nothing before him but the lonely desert of the ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... they are inert. What can it mean? Surely my whole chain of reasoning cannot have been false. It is impossible! And yet this wretched dog is none the worse. Ah, I have it! I have it!" With a perfect shriek of delight he rushed to the box, cut the other pill in two, dissolved it, added milk, and presented it to the terrier. The unfortunate creature's tongue seemed hardly to have been moistened in it before it gave a convulsive shiver in every limb, and lay as rigid and lifeless ...
— A Study In Scarlet • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a minute, sitting bolt upright, as stiff as a stone, and making this fearful face. Then there came from his lips a low moaning like the wind, rising and falling by infinitely small gradations till it became almost a shriek, from which it descended and died away; after that, he jumped down from the bale and held up the extended fingers of both his hands, as one who should say "Ten," though I ...
— Erewhon • Samuel Butler
... yonder—his foot slipped and he broke his neck in the moat below. Consequence, Lady Kitty goes crazy and old Earl found dead a week later in his room. It was Christmas Eve when the boy was killed. That's the night his ghost's supposed to walk along the ramparts, give a shriek, and drop off—but the irritating thing about it all is, it ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... adjoining apartment, and had found the missing casket, when a shriek of horror from the lips of the Lady Adelaide smote his ear. He was in an instant at her bedside, supporting her in his arms; the attendants also came running in. "My dearest Adelaide, what is it that excites you thus?" But his inquiries were in vain. She lay in his arms, sobbing ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... in the dining-hall to their revel in about an hour's time, and went up to his fate in the bridal chamber. He knocked and opened the door softly: locked it, and went toward the bed. He leaned over it for a moment, and then a hoarse shriek of mingled rage and terror rang through the room. He flung the clothes off the bed. Where was the lovely bride he had wedded only a few hours before? What was this horrible thing lying where she should ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... of eldritch shriek and stepped back a pace, as though to place himself on his guard. "What—what do you know ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... advantage of that force. "Afterwards, when I read about the guillotine, I always thought of those saws," said the poet, whose earliest flight of fancy seems to have been this association of womanhood with the shriek ...
— Henrik Ibsen • Edmund Gosse
... sloping shore into the sunbright sea; And at the coast we paused, watching the waves Of our mixed waters dance into the main:— When suddenly I heard the thundering tread Of iron hoofed steeds trampling the ground, And a faint shriek that made my blood run cold. I saw the King of Hell in his black car, And in his arms he bore your fairest child, Fair as the moon encircled by the night,— But that she strove, and cast her arms aloft, And cried, "My Mother!"—When she saw me near She would have ...
— Proserpine and Midas • Mary Shelley
... and there great pieces of rock were lying about. Just over their heads they saw a great bird flying round and round, and every now and then, dropping lower and lower, till at last it flew down behind a rock. Immediately afterward they heard a piercing shriek, and running up they saw with affright that the eagle had caught their old acquaintance. the Dwarf, and was trying to carry him off. The compassionate children thereupon laid hold of the little man, and held him fast till the ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... waiting for, Grim realized that Rogers had "done" him to a turn. He shouted weird threats as he was hurried away, to the bubbling Rogers, and that young gentleman lifted his hat in ironical acknowledgment. There was the warning shriek from the engine, and then the train crawled out, taking toll of all the Amorians going north, and leaving the others to shout after them endearing epithets and ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... knowing only that. The medal turns, and lo! here is this 'cute Yankee a thinker, a mystic, fellow of the antique, Oriental in his subtilest contemplations, a rider of the sunbeam, dwelling upon Truth's sweetness with such pure devotion and delight that vigorous Mr. Kingsley must shriek, "Windrush!" "Intellectual Epicurism!" and disturb himself in a somewhat diverting manner. Pollok declaimed against the attempt to lay hold of the earth with one hand and heaven with the other. But ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... flash, a report; Friedel leaped back, staggered, fell; Ebbo started to a sitting posture, with horrified eyes, and a loud shriek, calling on his brother; Moritz sprang to his feet, ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... A quick little shriek came to his ears, and then the door of a cab that had been standing at the opposite corner ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... some reason to be standing tiptoe—against the starboard partition, near her stateroom door. Her fingers were clawing her cheeks, her eyes widely dilate with horror and fright, her mouth was agape, and from it issued, as by some mechanical impulse, shriek upon hollow shriek—cries wholly flat and meaningless, having no character of any sort, mere automatic ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... and in their stead were whispers and screams and shouts of triumph and bursts of laughter. Songs in chorus, somewhere miners hammering below the earth, somewhere storm at sea with the crash of waves on rocks and the shriek of wind through rigging, somewhere some one who dropped heavy loads of furniture so carelessly that I cursed him—and always these little patches of moonlight, so tempting ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... apelike travesties emitted a wild shriek of madness, and Koolau waited while the shrill cachination was tossed back and forth among the rocky walls and echoed distantly through ...
— The House of Pride • Jack London
... surges sweep, Like gathering hosts, against the steep, Sheeting, with clouds of snowy spray, Its lofty forehead, old and gray. With sudden shriek and cowering wing, To the wild cliff the sea-birds spring; Careering o'er the darken'd heaven, The clouds in warring heaps are driven; And crested high with lawny foam, ...
— Brannon's Picture of The Isle of Wight • George Brannon
... eleven o'clock, when, with almost a shriek, Christian placed Yeobright's last gleaming guinea upon the stone. In thirty seconds it had gone the way of ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... and the brown ran into the front sitting-room together, just as they heard a piercing shriek of terror from the child; then came the sound ...
— Amona; The Child; And The Beast; And Others - From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other - Stories" - 1902 • Louis Becke
... and rocky fragments, and a very shower of fiery arrows, each one a deadly comet as it falls! They descend on the swift-rowed boats. They fall as they will without mercy on man or thwart. The devils shriek out and drop their oars, and writhe horribly when they are hit. And some with bold hands sweep ...
— The Fall Of The Grand Sarrasin • William J. Ferrar
... a "thank-you-ma'am" in the middle of the road that caused Arabella's angry speech to end in a little shriek. ...
— Dorothy Dainty's Gay Times • Amy Brooks
... and dragged down into the deep water for some distance before he rose again, struggling wildly and calling for help. He would get his lips above water for a moment or two, and then be dragged under again. Then he would rise to the surface and shriek for help in tones which thrilled ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... and strong locks. He descended. Did any one question What was revealed in the cavern, then was he silent and shuddered. Bele at first heard strange music. It rang like the song of a goblin; Then was a clattering noise, like the clashing of blades in a combat, Lastly a hideous shriek,—then silence. Out staggered Thorstein, Confounded, bewildered, all pale was his face, for with death had he battled; Yet bore he the arm-ring a trophy. "'Twas dear bought," he often said frowning; "Once in my ...
— Fridthjof's Saga • Esaias Tegner
... death in his face; gave a shriek, drew his revolver, and fired at him with as little aim as he had at the lioness; then made for the open window. Staines seized a chair, followed him, and hurled it at him; and the chair and the ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... saw the end of the processions; far more carriages, wilder shouting, more madness,—bacchantic, stormy,—than last time. The whole length of the Corso was one shriek of laughter. And how many lovely faces at the windows, on the balconies and verandas! Large closed carriages with hidden music inside and graceful ladies on the top. As i preti (the Catholic papers) had said that all who took ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... orders to the man behind the bar. They had some loud talk, and something in her voice took my attention, and I looked at her; just then she turned 'round facing me, and great God! it was my mother! I knew her in spite of the blond hair and the paint, and she knew me. She gave one awful shriek, and then fell in a dead faint, and when she came to half an hour after, she went into hysterics, and screamed and raved ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... married before he married you," said Pen. "He has confessed it to-night. He will never come back." There came another shriek from Lady Clavering, as she flung her arms round Pen, and kissed him, and burst into tears ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... hand he clasped sank heavily from his touch. Then there was a spasmodic convulsion of the whole frame. Then there burst a piercing shriek from her lips, as she half raised herself in agony from the sofa, and then each limb was set and motionless in the stern ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... warning, sprang between Sullivan and the open furnace. He stooped, and with all the strength he could gather shoved the big stoker from danger. Then above the crashing sounds a shriek tore the steam-clouded air of the fire-room. ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... them, fowle goblins and shriek-owles With fearfull howling do all places fill, And feeble eccho now laments and howles, 285 The dreadfull accents of their outcries shrill. So all is turned into wildernesse, Whilest ...
— The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 • Edmund Spenser
... same things; but one, two, the men are out of the head-boat and into the tail-boat; one, two, they are out of the tail-boat and into the head-boat; and one, two, the men who belong in the tail-boat are back in it and we are dashing on. "Stop! you blankety-blank-blanks!" shriek the police-boats. "How can we?—blank the blankety-blank river, anyway!" we wail plaintively as we surge past, caught in that remorseless current that sweeps us on out of sight and into the hospitable farmer-country that replenishes our private commissary with the cream of its contributions. ...
— The Road • Jack London
... possessions? Rather, for me, restore the forest and the Indian village; in lieu of stars and stripes, let some poor feather flutter in the breeze; replace the streets and squares by wigwams; and though the death-song of a hundred haughty warriors fill the air, it will be music to the shriek of one unhappy slave. ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... must go on!" replied the boy. "Let me go! Take your hands off me!" And he raised his voice in a wild shriek. "There are thieves in the ...
— Samuel the Seeker • Upton Sinclair
... in the extreme stillness of a calm night. The sudden attack of a leopard is generally so unexpected that a dog has no time for self-defence, and being invariably seized by the neck, it is at once rendered helpless, and cannot utter a warning shriek before it is carried off. I was walking with a very powerful bull terrier at Newera Ellia in Ceylon, when the dog, who was running through the jungle within a few yards of me, suddenly disappeared without a cry, and was never heard of again; this same ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... the road, two fiery eyes burst into view, and through the night came the wild shriek of an ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... the broad corridor a piercing shriek was wafted to his ears, followed by the patter of flying feet, and a body was hurled violently against the door, while an ...
— Dainty's Cruel Rivals - The Fatal Birthday • Mrs. Alex McVeigh Miller
... had uttered that ringing shriek when some flustered maid blurted out that "the master" was dead, and her dazed brain had realized what the sheet covered. She lifted her eyes from that terrifying object when her son ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... look at Militona—one ineffable look of love and suffering. Then he remained motionless before the bull. The beast lowered its head. One of its horns entered the breast of the man, and came out red to the very root. A shriek of horror from a ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... kneel down, the soldiers levelled their muskets and another moment would have consigned the unfortunate wight to eternity, when Christina, forgetting everything but the feelings of her woman's heart, suddenly started forward with a shriek, exclaiming: "Hold, hold! I ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... appear. With bills distent from ear to ear, Each clamors for the bigger share; And whilst they clamor, climb—and, lo! Upon the margin, to and fro, Unsteady poised, one wavers slow. Stay, stay! the parents anguished shriek, Too late; for venturesome, yet weak, His frail legs falter under him; He falls—but from a lower limb A moment dangles, thence again Launched out upon the air, in vain He spread his little plumeless wing, A poor, blind, ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 1 July 1848 • Various
... the measure of its indispensability. There I beg the question. Is grace itself indispensable? Certainly, it has been dispensed with. It isn't reckoned with. To sit perfectly mute 'in company,' or to chatter on at the top of one's voice; to shriek with laughter; to fling oneself into a room and dash oneself out of it; to collapse on chairs or sofas; to sprawl across tables; to slam doors; to write, without punctuation, notes that only an expert in handwriting could read, and ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... finished speaking when the door did swing open, and a hand clutching a paint brush came through. Nyoda gave a fine shriek and fell over backwards as if fainting. The hand was followed by a body and a head. "What the devil!" said a voice. "Excuse me, ladies, what the devil!" Finding that the haunted house was haunted by a painter they ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Maine Woods - Or, The Winnebagos Go Camping • Hildegard G. Frey
... turned to a shriek of mortal terror. Quaking in every limb, crying out in a continuous frenzy of fright, he was up again on his knees seeking with quivering hands for the switch; pawing about then for matches with which ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... on the hearth, bright red cherry.... When you try to pick up cherry Celia's shriek sticks in you like ...
— Sun-Up and Other Poems • Lola Ridge
... and rosy, sailed swiftly across the pale blue sky, like huge birds frightened by the piercing shriek of the escaping steam. The mother watched the clouds, absorbed in herself. Her head was heavy, her eyes dry and inflamed from the sleepless night. A strange calm possessed her breast, her heart was beating evenly, and her mind dwelt ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... and face and voice together, thrilled out, "I look backward into the dim, distant past, but it is one night of oppression and despair; I turn to the present, but I hear naught save the mother's broken-hearted shriek, the infant's wail, the groan wrung from the strong man in agony; I look forward into the future, but the night grows darker, the shadows deeper and longer, the tempest wilder, and involuntarily I cry out, 'How long, O ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... hear him going along the dining hall to the head of the stairs. Then we heard him shriek. We all rushed out. The lighted lantern was there at the head of the stairs and our fellow guest at the bottom. ...
— Indian Ghost Stories - Second Edition • S. Mukerji
... to shriek any counter-advice, and while she was gone to find Jack, her mistress brushed herself in some places, soaped herself in others, and considered her toilet made. When Janice returned she caught up a loose lock ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... shook to the thunder of the Fiala's eight-inch gun, and a blinding spurt of flame leaped from the cruiser's bows. With a whining shriek a shell rose toward the moon. There was a quick flash followed by a dull concussion. The shell had not reached a tenth of the distance ...
— The Man Who Rocked the Earth • Arthur Train
... of Adam's race Shriek out, and howl beneath thy rod; Once they could scorn a Saviour's grace, But they incens'd ...
— Hymns and Spiritual Songs • Isaac Watts
... the clear voice of the cuckoo. It seemed to sing purposely in honour of the good man; and I fancied I could see a ravenous hawk upon a tree, abashed at Mr. Prigg's presence and superior ability; and a fluttering timid lark seemed to shriek, "Wicked bird, live and let live;" but it was the last word the silly lark uttered, for the hawk was upon him in a moment, and the little innocent songster was crushed in its ravenous beak. Still the cuckoo sang on in praise of Mr. Prigg, with ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... starting on his feet and tossing his arms wildly upwards, uttered a shriek of such appalling and despairing terror that it was almost too fearful for human endurance; and long after the sound had ceased it seemed to the terrified imagination of the old servant to roll through the deserted passages ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... Mrs. Miller had recourse to her handkerchief, and Miss Forrest stretched forth her hand as though to urge her say no more. There was intense silence in the parlor a moment. Then through the open windows came the sudden sound of a scuffle, a woman's shriek, a sudden fall, voluble curses and ravings in Celestine's familiar tones, and the rush of many ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... experimental bite. "Why, Katherine!" she exclaimed with a little shriek of laughter, "you haven't put any baking powder in them. I thought mine looked awfully flat when I was frying it. Did you think the dough would rise of itself, like ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey
... which is everywhere under our feet and among our hands; to whom the Universe is an Oracle and Temple, as well as a Kitchen and Cattlestall,—he shall be a delirious Mystic; to him thou, with sniffing charity, wilt protrusively proffer thy hand-lamp, and shriek, as one injured, when he kicks his foot through it?—Armer Teufel! Doth not thy cow calve, doth not thy bull gender? Thou thyself, wert thou not born, wilt thou not die? "Explain" me all this, or do one of two things: ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... other with double force. There was no lack of courage here at least. Whether the lady in green was borne up by the consciousness of virtue, whether she was too proud to retreat, or whatever may have been her animating reason, the blow fell, yet she stood her ground and gave no answering shriek. Enraged as much by her rival's cool resistance as by her own sense of injury, the Widder Bixby aimed full at the bonnet beneath which were the charms that had befuddled Jerry Todd's brain. To blast the fatal beauty that had captivated her wedded husband ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin
... considerably, its grating noise awakened one of the road kids, who fathoming the reason of Jim's opening the door and darting into the hallway, let out a piercing shout, "that Kansas Shorty's kid was making his get-away". This warning shriek not only awakened every one of the sleepers but sobered Kansas Shorty so suddenly that he made a headlong dive through the open door, beyond which Jim was running down the hallway trying to make his escape. He caught the lad before ...
— The Trail of the Tramp • A-No. 1 (AKA Leon Ray Livingston)
... seemed to me; with superstitious fear, again strove to shake it off, giving it artfully and with violence the appearance of offended dignity. His voice was a shriek rather than a human utterance, as he ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware
... she's at the window! and she's screaming for help!" as a wild shriek rent the air, a black face full of terror and despair showing itself at an upper window, where the fire's lurid light ...
— Grandmother Elsie • Martha Finley
... were all awake by now, and, finding their own staircase in flames, came swarming down the corridor to escape by the main way; when they found this also was impracticable, they began to shriek and moan, and to implore us to save them, and it was hard work to get them into one room and keep them quiet. The men crowded at the window, looking for help, and shouting directions to the coachmen and ...
— The Heart of Una Sackville • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... pace grew slower. The panther scratched along the reach nearer to the two human passengers, and Ruth saw its eyes blazing like huge carbuncles in the dusk. There was a fork of the roads at the foot of the hill. Fred Hatfield uttered a shriek of despair as the mules took the right hand road and struck into the bush itself—a narrow and treacherous track where the limbs of the trees threatened to brush all three passengers from the cart ...
— Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp • Alice Emerson
... him throughout their jolting journey over the prairie country into what seemed to her to be the Nowhere, listening to the wind chant, now requiems, now dirges, listening to its shriek and whistle, listening to it cry aloud and moan, die down to a whisper, then rise once more and wail like a living thing ...
— The Way of the Wind • Zoe Anderson Norris
... no more. The parrot had learned to discover my wishes very well, but with the monkey I supposed it would be a matter of some difficulty to make him comprehend me. He seemed to divine my thoughts, however, or else his own good sense came to his aid, for, almost immediately, he gave a little shriek, which the next monkey took up, and which went along the line until the sounds died away in the distance. After this a few more nuts rolled into the house, then the throwing and catching ceased, and the monkeys which had been in sight disappeared, with the exception of our little friend, who ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, January 1878, No. 3 • Various
... expressive habits by emitting with wide-open mouth an undifferentiated shriek of pain. A little later it yells in the same way at any kind of discomfort. It begins before the end of the first year to croon when it is contented. As it grows older it begins to make different sounds when it experiences ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... say?" cried my sister, beginning to scream. "What did you say? What did that fellow Orlick say to me, Pip? What did he call me, with my husband standing by? Oh! oh! oh!" Each of these exclamations was a shriek; and I must remark of my sister, what is equally true of all the violent women I have ever seen, that passion was no excuse for her, because it is undeniable that instead of lapsing into passion, she consciously and deliberately took extraordinary pains to force herself into it, and became ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... been induced by the inept name frenulwm, frein, Bandchen, given by anatomists to the object in question. According to H. Carstens the frenulum is called in Low German keekel-reem or kikkel-reem, which seems to be derived from kakeln, "to cry, shriek," and reem, "band, cord," so that the word really signifies "speech-band." If it is cut in children who have difficulty in speaking before the first year of life, or soon after, they will be cured of stuttering and made to speak well. To a man or woman who does a ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... are only just slackening for Reading. But we cannot wait. The "Flying Dutchman" has only done about thirty-six of his seventy-seven miles; he has been forty-two minutes already, and has got forty-five minutes left to reach Swindon. A long shriek, and Reading is behind us; then the river flashes out between ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... home lay in ruins; their beloved cause had been put to shame and defeat—yet they could bow their heads to every blast of misfortune, and could make a man welcome at their table whose every instinct and tradition of loyalty made him their enemy. The owls might shriek from the chimneys of Fairford, and the timid wild hares course up and down the weed-grown avenues on an autumn night like this, but a welcome from the Bellamys was a welcome still. It seemed to the young imaginative ...
— The Life of Nancy • Sarah Orne Jewett
... endeavoured to profit by it, though not soon enough; for the first moment I was too much alarmed. She could not feel pain or blows, and rose instantaneously. I forced the door some little way, and she then gave a single shriek!—It was a dreadful one—and was followed by a repulse which I could not overcome. The door was closed, and like lightning locked. I then heard her begin to pant and heave for breath—After a few seconds ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... uneatable roots, have been transformed by generations of culture into succulent vegetables or trees covered with delicious fruits. Thousands of highways and railroads furrow the earth, and pierce the mountains. The shriek of the engine is heard in the wild gorges of the Alps, the Caucasus, and the Himalayas. The rivers have been made navigable; the coasts, carefully surveyed, are easy of access; artificial harbours, laboriously ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin
... discernible; but it grew. It grew with paralyzing rapidity into a low but steady murmur, blended soon with voices raised in quick cries. There was one piercing, ragged shriek, and all the time an undertone of the indefinite, peculiar sound of something rustling, ...
— Hawk Carse • Anthony Gilmore
... How fast it spins! The beldams dance, the caldron bubbles; They shriek, they stir it for our sins, And we must drain it for our troubles. We toil, we groan; the cry for love Mounts up from this poor seething city, And yet I know we have above A Father, infinite ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... lunch, Alma set forth. Dora Leach joined her in the train, and thus they travelled, through sooty gloom, under or above ground, from the extreme north to the farthest south of London; alighting at length with such a ringing of the ears, such an impression of roar and crash and shriek, as made the strangest prelude to a feast of music ever devised in the world's history. Their seats having been taken in advance, they entered a few moments before the concert began, and found themselves amid a scanty audience; on either side of them were ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... She could not help it. If your pet canary was suddenly snatched from you by some mysterious power, I rather fancy you would shriek, too. "Jenny Lind!" ...
— Mary Rose of Mifflin • Frances R. Sterrett
... hill Looks hoary through the white electric rain, And from the glens beyond, in sullen strain, 125 The interrupted thunder howls; above One chasm of Heaven smiles, like the eye of Love On the unquiet world;—while such things are, How could one worth your friendship heed the war Of worms? the shriek of the world's carrion jays, 130 Their censure, or their ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... from the shop, only to meet an atrocious woman from "The Gables," who stopped me with a little shriek of joy. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 21st, 1920 • Various
... at last when the parrot thrust out a wicked and deceiving claw towards her, and said something in his unearthly shriek which seemed to have a distinct reference to her, and fired at her a volley of harsh "How do's" and "Good-mornings," and "Good-nights," and "Polly want a cracker's," then finished with a wild shriek of laughter, her note of human grief making a curious chord with the bird's ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... gave a loud shout! She was gone from where she had stood, and the echo of a smothered shriek—tribute of a woman's heart to death—came to our ears. We sprang to look over. There was a glimpse of the bright shawl ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... the part of his companions, seized the panful of boiling oil, and poured the whole contents into the gaping mouth of the spectre, exclaiming, "An echeis toson orexin, na to ladhi, Scheitan oglou!—If you are so hungry, take the oil, son of Satan!" A shriek which might have awakened the dead proceeded from the figure, followed by a succession of hideous groans. The friends of Michael rushed forward, but the lamp had fallen to the ground and was extinguished in the confusion. Some time elapsed ere it was found and lighted. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various
... stood dazed during this conversation, but with a shriek of horror, as she saw the flash of the blade, she threw herself upon her lover, and strove to wrench ...
— Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer - A Romance of the Spanish Main • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... so in my garden. I have made Your heart my garden. If I am a bud And only feel unfoldment—feebly stir Within my leaves: wait patiently; some June, I'll blush a full-blown rose, and queen it, dear, In your lov'd garden. Tho' I be a bud, My roots strike deep, and torn from that dear soil Would shriek like mandrakes—those witch things I read Of in your quaint old books. Are you content?" "Yes—crescent-wise—but not to round, full moon. Look at yon hill that rounds so gently up From the wide lake; a lover king it looks, In cloth of gold, gone ...
— Old Spookses' Pass • Isabella Valancy Crawford
... With a shriek of horror, Mehetabel sprang out of bed and rushed at him, stayed his arms, and unable to thrust them back, caught the cradle and plucked it to her, and released the babe, that gasped—seized it in her arms, glued it to ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... him place another glass on the table and I noticed then that it stood directly in front of a complicated mechanism. At first this gave out a low humming sound, but it soon rose to an unearthly whining shriek. I shrank from it involuntarily and a second later I was amazed at the sight of the glass, seemingly reduced to a thin vapor, being drawn into a funnel-like opening near the top of the device. I was too startled to speak and could only watch as Drayle ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, October, 1930 • Various
... a carrying-party coming up, and suddenly he crouched low. There was a horrible whine, growing to a shriek—and a shell burst a few yards away. Shaken and almost deafened, Durwent remained where he was until he saw an object roll nearly to his feet. It was a jar of rum that was being brought up for issue. He lifted the thing up, ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter
... the statue with such excessive force that he missed it. He thought that he had destroyed that monument of his madness, and thereupon he drew his sword again, and raised it to kill the singer. Zambinella uttered shriek after shriek. Three men burst into the studio at that moment, and the sculptor fell, ...
— Sarrasine • Honore de Balzac
... Virgilia, ducking her head into her cushion, with the effect of suppressing a shriek of laughter. "And more 'ladies' reading from scrolls to children standing at their knee. And all sorts of folks blowing trumpets and bestowing garlands; Commerce, Industry, Art, Manufacturing, Education, ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... quarrelled about it, and commenced fighting over it. Jack's hands were left at liberty. In an instant he had seized his rifle. He ran a few paces back, turned, took deliberate aim at the most powerful of his adversaries, who, with a shriek, fell to the ground. The other savage, scared by the report of the shot and its effects upon his companion, took to flight, but he carried ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... pair of blazing green eyes became fixed, sank lower and lower with frightful rapidity, and disappeared, throwing upward the green light which grew more and more vivid every moment. As the light sank into the noisome depths, there came a shriek which chilled Adam's blood—a prolonged agony of pain and terror which ...
— The Lair of the White Worm • Bram Stoker
... to come automatically from Jim's lips. It was only after he had spoken them that he realized they were true. For a moment Tode glared at him; then suddenly, with a shriek of insane rage, he leaped from the instrument board and swung the ray tube ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, May, 1930 • Various
... hands. As soon as I reached the fire-place, I snatched out the red-hot poker, and, brandishing it over my head, made for the door. They all jumped up to detain me, but I made a poke at the foremost, which made her run back with a shriek, (I do believe that I burnt her nose.) I seized my opportunity, and escaped into the street, whirling the poker round my head, while all the women followed, hooting and shouting after me. I never stopped running and whirling my poker until I was reeking with perspiration, ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... children were left at first in a sort of numb dismay after the shock, not even feeling that a heavy shower had begun to fall, till the baby, whom Patience had laid on the grass, set up a shriek. ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... which the agonized son had been listening! An old man's shriek, hoarse with the remorse of sleepless nights and days of unimaginable regret and foreboding! It cuts the night. It cuts its way into his heart. He feels his senses failing him, yet he must glance once more at the window and see with his last conscious look—But what is this! a change ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... the red blood is bright; there is no smell like the smell of new-shed blood. The lions shall lap it and roar, the vultures shall wash their wings in it and shriek with joy. ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... face of his physician for a slight ray of hope. They turn round to consult; you can almost hear the man's heart beat, as he bites the stalk of rosemary, with a desperate effort to appear composed. They resume their places—a dead silence prevails as the foreman delivers in the verdict—'Guilty!' A shriek bursts from a female in the gallery; the prisoner casts one look at the quarter from whence the noise proceeded; and is immediately hurried from the dock by the gaoler. The clerk directs one of the officers of the Court to 'take the woman out,' and fresh business is proceeded with, ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... to be seen and not even a puff of smoke to suggest his whereabouts. But the air was full of the booming of heavy guns and the rising eerie shriek ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 21, 1914 • Various
... her if she were only to weep and to cling to him? Then, while the idea was still in her mind, she knew that to a nature such as hers violence was impossible. It took passion to war with passion, and in this she was lacking. Though she were wounded to the death, she could not revolt, could not shriek out in her agony, could not break through that gentle yet invincible reticence which she ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... with an almost agonised reluctance which ceased to be mysterious to me when I heard him being sworn at menacingly with savage, suppressed growls, then audibly cuffed and finally kicked out without any concealment whatever; because he came back flying head foremost through the door with a stifled shriek. ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... said, holding it up; "it is full yet!" I glanced at Satan, and in that moment he vanished. Then Father Adolf rose up, flushed and excited, crossed himself, and began to thunder in his great voice, "This house is bewitched and accursed!" People began to cry and shriek and crowd toward the door. "I summon this ...
— The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories • Mark Twain |
