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Mew   /mju/   Listen
Mew

verb
(past & past part. mewed; pres. part. mewing)  (Written also meaw, meow)
1.
Cry like a cat.  Synonym: meow.
2.
Utter a high-pitched cry, as of seagulls.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Mew" Quotes from Famous Books



... "Mew! Mew!" interrupted Simpkin, and he scratched at the door. But the key was under the tailor's pillow, he could not ...
— The Tailor of Gloucester • Beatrix Potter

... sign that should warn his disciples to fly from approaching ruin."—Keith's Evidences, p. 62. "In one she sets as a prototype for exact imitation."—Rush, on the Voice, p. xxiii. "In which some only bleat, bark, mew, winnow, and bray, a little better than others."—Ib., p. 90. "Who represented to him the unreasonableness of being effected with such unmanly fears."—Rollin's Hist., ii, 106. "Thou sawedst every action."—Guy's ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... which was a Fox. The gentleman with the bushy tail was in a far corner. He crouched low; his eyes glowed. The Kitten wandered, sniffing, up to the bars, put its head in, sniffed again, then made toward the feed-pan, to be seized in a flash by the crouching Fox. It gave a frightened "mew," but a single shake cut that short and would have ended Kitty's nine lives at once, had not the negro come to the rescue. He had no weapon and could not get into the cage, but he spat with such copious vigor in the Fox's face that he dropped the Kitten and returned to the corner, ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton

... curious expression in her eyes which seemed to say, "Please don't bother me now for this is my busy time," I brought three little kittens from their basket in the wood-shed and put them under her. The kittens felt the warmth of her body and began to mew and stir about. I shall never forget the look of astonishment in the little hen as she slowly rose in her nest and peered beneath her body at the kittens. She looked at me as if to say that she really couldn't ...
— The Light in the Clearing • Irving Bacheller

... The foam-white mew, the green-black scart, The famishing hawk, the wailing tern, All birds from the sand-building mart To ...
— Christmas in Legend and Story - A Book for Boys and Girls • Elva S. Smith

... convulsions when she heard the rustling of oiled silk. Boyle, the father of chemistry, could not conquer an aversion he had to the sound of water running through pipes. A gentleman of the Court of the Emperor Ferdinand suffered epistaxis when he heard a cat mew. La Mothe Le Vayer could not endure the sounds of musical instruments, although he experienced pleasurable sensations when he heard a clap of thunder. It is said that a chaplain in England always had a sensation of cold at the top of his head when he read the 53d chapter of Isaiah and ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... thought that she had gone a long way, and felt quite sure that she could not be very far from the railway station which led to Rosebury, the Pink awoke, and twisting and turning in her narrow basket began to mew loudly. ...
— The Palace Beautiful - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade

... that our master looks coldly at you. Perhaps you don't know that in England a white cat is supposed to mew twenty times longer and to purr twenty times louder than a cat of any ...
— Pussy and Doggy Tales • Edith Nesbit

... arose full of darkness and groanings, and the trough, driven by a furious wind, flew like a sea-mew through the mist and ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France

... sails; o'er the blue waters thronging, In barks like the sea-mew that skims o'er the lave; All you to the Royal Yacht squadron belonging, Come, muster at Cowes, for true sport on the wave.{1} First our king,{2} Heaven bless him! who's lord of the sea, And delights in the sport of the circling ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle

... wreathing slowly across the deserted streets. The unexpected collapse of a wall or cornice is frightful. So is the silence which follows. A starved kitten, which shapes out of nothing and is there complete and instantaneous at your feet—ginger stripes, and a mew which is weak, but a veritable voice of the living—is first a great surprise, and then a ridiculous comfort. It follows you about. When you miss it, you go back to look for it—to find the miserable object racing frantically to meet you. Lonely? ...
— Old Junk • H. M. Tomlinson

... mew! Why don't they let me in? I have been here on these cold steps for three days. I am very hungry and unhappy. Why do they shut me out in ...
— Friends and Helpers • Sarah J. Eddy

... this distressing dilemma was already becoming plain to the marauder herself. Her mewings grew louder and more frequent. A few more contortions brought the climber nearer his victim. A little judicious urging with the rake and she was within reach. The rake came down to me, and a long, wild mew ...
— More Jonathan Papers • Elisabeth Woodbridge

... virtue cries out, is it not because it feels the approach of death? O wretch! those far off voices that you hear groaning in your heart, do you think they are sobs? They are, perhaps, only the cry of the sea-mew, that funereal bird of the tempest, whose presence portends shipwreck. Who has ever told the story of the childhood of those who have died stained with human blood? They, also, have been good in their ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset

... the amazement of the guests who had heard Genovese out of doors, when he began to bray, to coo, mew, squeal, gargle, bellow, thunder, bark, shriek, even produce sounds which could only be described as a hoarse rattle,—in short, go through an incomprehensible farce, while his face was transfigured with rapturous expression like that of a martyr, as painted by Zurbaran or Murillo, Titian or Raphael. ...
— Massimilla Doni • Honore de Balzac

... in the door-way with her dolly on one arm and her kitten hanging over the other. Kitty didn't look comfortable, but she bore up bravely, only once in a while giving a plaintive mew. Carry gazed into the bright ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various

... "Mew! mew! mew! Why don't they let me in? I have been here on these cold steps for three days. I am very hungry and unhappy. Why do they shut ...
— Friends and Helpers • Sarah J. Eddy

... like the wind, And o'er the boundless land. His wand he took, Wherewith he softly seals the eyes of men, And opens them at will from sleep. With this In hand, the mighty Argos-queller flew, And lighting on Pieria, from the sky Plunged downward to the deep, and skimmed its face Like hovering sea-mew, that on the broad gulfs Of the unfruitful ocean seeks her prey, And often dips her pinions in the brine. So Hermes flew along the waste of waves. But when he reached that island, far away, Forth from the dark-blue ocean-swell he stepped Upon the sea-beach, ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant

... The King would fain with friendly force Urge him anew to mount his horse, Turn from the piteous sight away, And fresh begin life's saddened day, His loved ones looking yet to greet, Where ne'er shall part the blest who meet. Just then a voice that well he knew, A sound that mixed the purr and mew, Went to the father's heart. On a large stone King Alfred sat Against his buskin rubbed a cat, Snow-white in every part, Though drenched and soiled from head to tail. The poor Thane's tears poured down like hail— "Poor puss, in vain thy loving ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge

... has a large family down there, and they will come swarming up and be as disagreeable as my own sisters and brothers. And how exceedingly mean of her not to give notice that she was coming. I should have heard the faintest mew, for everything is so quiet here. It is evident that her intentions are hostile, or she would not steal up like a thief. But I will certainly not stand ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... "Hem!" of annoyance or perplexity, the moan of pain, a scream, a whisper, a rasp, a sob, a choke, and a gasp. The utterances of animals, though wordless, are eloquent to me—the cat's purr, its mew, its angry, jerky, scolding spit; the dog's bow-wow of warning or of joyous welcome, its yelp of despair, and its contented snore; the cow's moo; a monkey's chatter; the snort of a horse; the lion's roar, and the terrible snarl of the tiger. Perhaps I ought to add, for the benefit of the critics ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller

... little kitten that tries to look like me, But though I'm round and fluffy, he's as flat as flat can be; And when I try to mew to him he never makes a sound, And when I jump into the air ...
— The Kitten's Garden of Verses • Oliver Herford

... freshening western blast Aside the shroud of battle cast; And, first, the ridge of mingled spears Above the brightening cloud appears; And in the smoke the pennons flew, As in the storm the white sea-mew. Then marked they, dashing broad and far, The broken billows of the war, And plumed crests of chieftains brave Floating like foam upon the wave; But nought distinct they see: Wide raged the battle on ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott

... sitting up, "come here," and Belinda with a plaintive mew made one last effort, pulled herself into the room, and flew to ...
— Judy • Temple Bailey

... however, and have let off a tremendous amount of steam in the operation. Any wholesome device which accomplishes this result is worthy of being perpetuated.... A draggled, forsaken little street-cat sneaks in the door, with a pitiful mew. (I'm sure I don't wonder! if one were tired of life, this would be just the place to take a fresh start.) The children break into the song, "I Love Little Pussy, Her Coat is so Warm," and the kindergartner asks ...
— Children's Rights and Others • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin

... story. - Now she, too, Reclines within that hoary Last dark mew In Mellstock Quire with ...
— Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy

... my young brave," cried the captain, slapping his favorite boy on the shoulder, "you are worth a dozen such girl-boys as your brother. Let him be a kitten and cry mew, if he will, while you climb the topgallant-mast and make ladders ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... with white bells the clover-hill swells High over the full-toned sea: O hither, come hither and furl your sails, Come hither to me and to me: Hither, come hither and frolic and play; Here it is only the mew that wails; We will sing to you all the day: Mariner, mariner, furl your sails, For here are the blissful downs and dales, And merrily merrily carol the gales, And the spangle dances in bight [1] ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson

... the sea-mew pipes, or dives In yonder greening gleam, and fly The happy birds, that change their sky To build and brood; that ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs

... a remarkably stingy woman. During her lifetime she used to get up at night and mew, so that the neighbours might think she kept a ...
— What the Moon Saw: and Other Tales • Hans Christian Andersen

... a Prince's child, I but a Viking wild, And though she blushed and smiled, I was discarded! Should not the dove so white Follow the sea-mew's flight? Why did they leave ...
— Poems Every Child Should Know - The What-Every-Child-Should-Know-Library • Various

... Away in the distance a huge mass of rock stood out to view, its rugged lines transfigured into ethereal loveliness by a misty veil of tender rose pink,—a hue curiously suggestive of some other and smaller sun that might have just set. Absolute silence prevailed. Not even the cry of a sea-mew or kittiwake broke the almost deathlike stillness,—no breath of wind stirred a ripple on the glassy water. The whole scene might well have been the fantastic dream of some imaginative painter, whose ambition soared beyond the limits of human skill. ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... priests, unquestionably," said Cromwell. "It is seldom that such ancient houses lack secret stalls wherein to mew up ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott

... them, by their praising and admiring them: but, Lord! the strangest ayre that ever I heard in my life, and all of one cast. But strange to hear my Lord Lauderdale say himself that he had rather hear a cat mew, than the best musique in the world; and the better the musique, the more sicke it makes him; and that of all instruments, he hates the lute most, and next to that, the baggpipe. Thence back with my Lord to his house, all the way good discourse, informing of myself ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... all funny, and I don't see anything to laugh at," spoke pussy, and then Susie saw that the white kitten had a large tear in each eye. "That was a mew," the ...
— Sammie and Susie Littletail • Howard R. Garis

... the moan Of the billows' foam, Laving with surges thy silv'ry beach! Night's dewy eye, The sea-mew's lone cry, Witness my ...
— Poems • Mary Baker Eddy

... Uncle Roger's back door, laid his head on his black paws, and refused to take any notice of anything or anybody. In vain we stroked and entreated and brought him tidbits. Only when the Story Girl caressed him did he give one plaintive little mew, as if to ask piteously why she could not do something for him. At that Cecily and Felicity and Sara Ray all began crying, and we boys felt choky. Indeed, I caught Peter behind Aunt Olivia's dairy later in the day, and if ever a ...
— The Story Girl • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... adieu! My native shore Fades o'er the waters blue. The night winds sigh, the breakers roar, And shrieks the wild sea-mew." ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick

... athirst for blood. Why such a thing am I?—Where are these men? I need the sympathy of human faces, To beat away this deep contempt for all things, Which quenches my revenge. O! would to Alla, The raven, or the sea-mew, were appointed To bring me food! or rather that my soul Could drink in life from the universal air! It were a lot divine in some small skiff Along some Ocean's boundless solitude, To float for ever with a careless course, And think myself ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... for him meanwhile. Now when he had reached the hut and was going to take away his gloves, he heard the voices of the Snake's wife and daughters, who were talking with each other. So he turned himself into a cat, and began to mew outside the door. They let him in, and he listened to everything they said. Then he got his ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston

... repay you to make my acquaintance. I am such a jolly bird. Sometimes I get all the dogs in my neighborhood howling by whistling just like their masters. Another time I mew like a cat, then again I give some soft sweet notes different from those of any ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photography [December, 1897], Vol 2. No 6. • Various

... peace!" quoth Resolution. "Mew not and hark to the words o' Davy: 'The Lord is known to execute judgment, the ungodly is trapped in the work ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol

... cavern it was dark, and it was as if he were trying to tell Neewa that he was a dunce to lie there still thinking it was night when the sun was up outside. But he failed. Neewa was in the edge of his Long Sleep—the beginning of USKE-POW-A-MEW, the dream land of ...
— Nomads of the North - A Story of Romance and Adventure under the Open Stars • James Oliver Curwood

... opening the wood-shed door, for the hinges were rusty, and it creaked with a terrible noise. But Hungry was in there. She could not go without Hungry. She went in, and called in a faint whisper. The kitten knew her, dark as it was, and ran out from the wood-pile with a joyful mew, to rub itself ...
— The Junior Classics • Various

... something very nice in the bundle, but what it was they could not guess. Taro thought, "Maybe it's a puppy." He had wanted a puppy for a long time. And Take thought, "Perhaps it's a kitten! But it looks pretty large for a kitten, and it doesn't mew. Kittens always mew." And they both thought, ...
— THE JAPANESE TWINS • Lucy Fitch Perkins

... visit became the means of adding considerably to our knowledge of the surrounding country. One of the immediate consequences was the discovery of several small streams of fresh water. The principal of these, which we named Mew River (after its first finder, the sergeant of marines on board) has its mouth in a small mangrove creek three quarters of a mile to the eastward of Evans Bay. About five miles further up its source was found to be a spring among rocks in a dense calamus scrub. It waters ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray

... was the young man at the window who came over on the plank, sitting on it and pulling himself along; they said he brought the kitten, as he had promised, having first choked the life out of it lest it should mew, and wake the house. They said that when they caught the robber, Willy and I would have to go and look at him and say, "That is the man." We used to lie shaking in our beds at night, dreading the hour when we should be called on to do ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann

... went on, for it was no business of his; only he could not help saying that in his country if the kitten could not get in at the same hole as the cat, she might stay outside and mew. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester

... in a trice. The whole court said no cat ever ate with a better appetite. There were excellent ragouts, and the prince made use of the cat's paw to taste them; but he sometimes pulled his paw too roughly, and Bluet, not understanding raillery, began to mew and be quite out of patience. The princess observing it, "Bring that fricassee and that tart to poor Bluet," said she; "see how he ...
— The Fairy Book - The Best Popular Stories Selected and Rendered Anew • Dinah Maria Mulock (AKA Miss Mulock)

... Her weakness was an enormous tom-cat which had a bell round its neck and slept in a basket in the kitchen, the best-behaved and most moral cat in the parish. At half-past nine every evening it was let out into the back-yard and vanished. At ten precisely it was heard to mew and was immediately admitted. Not once in a twelvemonth did that cat prolong its love making after five ...
— Clara Hopgood • Mark Rutherford

... as he sprang softly into the room; but the prince did not heed him. "Mew," again said the cat; but again the prince did not heed him. "Mew," said the cat the third time, and he jumped up on ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy

... him to her breasts, as only mothers know how to hug children, with a spiritual force that is felt only in their hearts. If you doubt this, watch a cat carrying her kittens in her mouth, not one of them gives a single mew. The youthful gallant, who had certain fears about watering this fair, unfertile plain, was reassured by this speech. He thought then that it would only be following the commandments of God to win this saint to love; and he thought right. At night Bertha asked her cousin—according ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac

... still; no one has entered here." The ogre began to snore, and Thirteenth pulled the coverlet a little. The ogre awoke and cried: "What is that?" Thirteenth began to mew like a cat. The ogress said: "Scat! scat!" and clapped her hands, and then fell asleep again with the ogre. Then Thirteenth gave a hard pull, seized the coverlet, and ran away. The ogre heard him running, recognized him in the dark, and said: "I know you! ...
— Italian Popular Tales • Thomas Frederick Crane

... four miles in circuit. Their sides are steep, but their height is inferior to that of the main. The largest is the lowest. The smaller isles are little more than large lumps of rock, of which that named by Captain Cook the mew stone is the southernmost. Their aspect, like that of the main, bespeaks extreme sterility; but, superior to the greater part of it, they produce a continued covering of brush; and upon the sloping sides ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 2 • David Collins

... his whole nervous frame. Opening his eyes, he put down his hand and stroked it. Susannah liked Ephraim the better for this. The kitten was not to be comforted; it looked up in his face and gave a piteous mew. Susannah tittered; then she ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall

... Nether-mark were the Salmon, and the Lynx, and the Ling worm, the Seal, the Stone, and the Sea-mew; the Buck-goat, the Apple-tree, the Bull, the Adder, ...
— The House of the Wolfings - A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse • William Morris

... come from one of you Out of some Connaught rath, and would lap up milk and mew; But if he so loved water I ...
— The Green Helmet and Other Poems • William Butler Yeats

... eleven; Anne Putnam, twelve; Mary Walcot; and Mary Lewis, seventeen; Elizabeth Hubbard, Elizabeth Booth, and Susannah Sheldon, eighteen; and two servant girls, Mary Warren, and Sarah Churchill. Tituba taught them to bark like dogs, mew like cats, grunt like hogs, to creep through chairs and under tables on their hands and feet, and pretend to have spasms.... Mr. Parris had read the books and pamphlets published in England ... and he came to the conclusion that they were bewitched. ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday

... with high expectation, Throbbed till great Jove thus pronounced the decree: "Son of my father, thou mighty, broad-breasted Poseidon, the doom that I utter is true; Great is the might of thy waves foamy-crested When they beat the white walls of the screaming sea-mew; Great is the pride of the keel when it danceth, Laden with wealth, o'er the light-heaving wave— When the East to the West, gayly floated, advanceth, With a word from the wise and a help from the brave. But earth—solid earth—is the home ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson

... Robin Redbreast jumped upon a wall, Pussy-cat jumped after him, and almost got a fall; Little Robin chirped and sang, and what did pussy say? Pussy-cat said naught but "Mew," and Robin flew away. ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various

... answered himself, as though he knew he was being talked about. He came out from under the back steps, rubbed up against Flossie's fat, chubby legs with a mew and a purr, and then, seeing a place where the sun shone nice and warm on the steps, the cat curled up there and began to wash its face, using its paws as ...
— Bobbsey Twins in Washington • Laura Lee Hope

... round, fat, oily man of GOD Was one I chiefly marked among the fry; He had a roguish twinkle in his eye And shone all glittering with ungodly dew, If a tight damsel chanced to trippen by; Which when observed he shrunk into his mew, And straight would recollect his ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various

... to abjure Forever the society of men. Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires. Know of your youth, examine well your blood, Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice, You can endure the livery of a nun, For aye to be in shady cloister mew'd, To live a barren sister all your life, Chanting faint hymns to the cold, fruitless moon, Thrice blessed they that master so their blood, To undergo such maiden pilgrimage; But earthlier happy is the rose distill'd Than that which withering on the ...
— Shakespeare's Christmas Gift to Queen Bess • Anna Benneson McMahan

... brought home his Joan, And she sat in a chair, When in came his cat, That had got but one ear. Says Joan "I've come home, Puss, Pray how do you do?" The cat wagg'd her tail And said nothing but "mew." ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole

... [man], mew like a [cat], bark like a [dog]. She can cry and laugh. When Jimmy says "Caw, caw!" Pepper says "C-a-w, c-a-w!" and then laughs. [Jimmy crow] doesn't like to be laughed at. Once he flew at Pepper, and pushed her off her [perch]. But Pepper scratched him with her [talons] and pulled ...
— Jimmy Crow • Edith Francis Foster

... sometimes, when I'm naughty, I climb upon the stand, And eat the cake and chicken, Or any thing at hand; Ah! then they hide my saucer, No matter if I mew; And that's the way I'm punished ...
— The Nursery, May 1873, Vol. XIII. - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest People • Various

... There—you—are," as Archie, with a final careful twist, drew off the can. Once out of its tin bondage, the little creature seemed too frightened to move, and suddenly curled down under the protecting table-cover, to restore its ruffled fur, with many a piteous mew. ...
— Cricket at the Seashore • Elizabeth Westyn Timlow

... against the right portal of the hut, talking and laughing, handkerchief in hand, to a hundred or more of his admiring wives, who, all squatting on the ground outside, in two groups, were dressed in mew mbugus. My men dared not advance upright, nor look upon the women, but, stooping, with lowered heads and averted eyes, came cringing after me. Unconscious myself, I gave loud and impatient orders to my guard, rebuking them for moving ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... Motion! Philologically speaking, we should all be at sea, drifting, like a set of deaf-mutes, on a wide and inaudible ocean—all inarticulate, tongue-tied, voiceless—with only the screeching of the sea-mew, or some other sepulchral bird of the night, to greet us as in wide-mouthed derision ...
— Life: Its True Genesis • R. W. Wright

... for meadows green, And woods, where shadowy violets Nod their cool leaves between; I long to see the ploughman stride His darkening acres o'er, To hear the hoarse sea-waters drive Their billows 'gainst the shore; I long to watch the sea-mew wheel Back to her rock-perched mate; Or, where the breathing cows are housed, Lean dreaming o'er the gate. Something has gone, and ink and print Will never bring it back; I long for the green fields again, I'm ...
— Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes • Walter de la Mare

... stair. Here and there, too, it got darker, so that they could only just find their way, step by step. And it really seemed as if they had climbed a very long way, when from above came faintly and softly the sound of a plaintive "mew." "Mew, mew," it said again, whoever the "it" was, ...
— The Tapestry Room - A Child's Romance • Mrs. Molesworth

... little Robin Redbreast— Catch me if you can. Little Robin Redbreast jumped upon a spade, Pussy-Cat jumped after him, and then he was afraid. Little Robin chirped and sung, and what did pussy say? Pussy-Cat said Mew, mew mew,—and Robin ...
— The Only True Mother Goose Melodies - Without Addition or Abridgement • Munroe and Francis

... language he understood completely. But the ordinary observer seldom attains farther than to comprehend some of the cries of anxiety and fear around him, often so unlike the accustomed carol of the bird,—as the mew of the Cat-Bird, the lamb-like bleating of the Veery and his impatient yeoick, the chaip of the Meadow-Lark, the towyee of the Chewink, the petulant psit and tsee of the Red-Winged Blackbird, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various

... the verandah; and always looking clean and white and pretty, with a bit of blue ribbon which Lily had tied round its neck, as if on purpose to provoke me. Even when I did not see it, I heard it mew; and when I did not hear it, I ...
— Cat and Dog - Memoirs of Puss and the Captain • Julia Charlotte Maitland

... "O scream, squeak, mew, gurgle, groan, agonize, quiver, quaver, just as much as you please, Madam,—I have my foot on the fortissimo pedal, and thunder myself deaf! O Satan, Satan! which of thy goblins damned has got into this ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... into the teeth of the gale, and her cry was driven back into her own ears as weak as the mew ...
— Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp • Alice Emerson

... mammoth skull, Thrown up by Titan spade, From out those caves Where saurians with mastodons had played, Before the sea had made their homes their graves, And scared their ghosts with screech of sea-born mew ...
— Rowena & Harold - A Romance in Rhyme of an Olden Time, of Hastyngs and Normanhurst • Wm. Stephen Pryer

... the cane must grunt, disguising her voice if possible. If the blindfolded one guesses who she is, they exchange places, and the game goes on as before, but if she fails, she has another turn and may tell the player to "Bark like a dog" or "Mew like a cat" until she guesses ...
— Games for Everybody • May C. Hofmann

... fine in that neighbourhood as Juan Fernandez, as lonely too, when the Fishing boats are not out; I have sat for hours, staring upon the shipless sea. The salt sea is never so grand as when it is left to itself. One cock-boat spoils it. A sea mew or two improves it. And go to the little church, which is a very protestant Loretto, and seems dropt by some angel for the use of a hermit, who was at once parishioner and a whole parish. It is not too big. Go in the night, bring it away ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas

... said it was bewitched. Perhaps it was; I don't know; but a very wonderful cat it was. It had a strange way of knowing, when people were talking, whether what they said was right or wrong. If people said what they ought not to say, wee Widow Wiggins' wonderful cat would mew. Perhaps the cat had lived so long with the wee, wiry, weird widow woman, who was one of the best in the world, that it had gotten her dislike to things that were wrong. But the wee widow's neighbors were afraid of that cat. When Mrs. Vine, a very ...
— Queer Stories for Boys and Girls • Edward Eggleston

... the flood, She mew'd to every watery God, Some speedy aid to send. No Dolphin came, no Nereid stirr'd: Nor cruel Tom, nor Susan heard. 35 A ...
— Select Poems of Thomas Gray • Thomas Gray

... case there is a large mnemic element in all the common perceptions by means of which we handle common objects. And, to take another kind of instance, imagine what our astonishment would be if we were to hear a cat bark or a dog mew. This emotion would be dependent upon past experience, and would therefore be a mnemic phenomenon ...
— The Analysis of Mind • Bertrand Russell

... down and tried to clutch his papa's shining lip. After every three or four sips the father bent down to his son and kissed him on the head. A grey cat with its tail in the air was rubbing itself against one of the table legs, and with a plaintive mew proclaiming its desire for food. Liza hid behind the verandah curtain, and fastened her eyes upon the members of her former family; her face was radiant ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... sure, sir," replied the little plain one, with an inquiring frown at the chandelier, "but I know it 'ad somethink to do with cats. P'r'aps it was Mew Street; but I'm quite sure it ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne

... untied by the mite's busy fingers there crawled out a tiny tortoise-shell kitten, with its diminutive little tail erect like a young bottle-brush, which gave vent to a "phiz- phit," as if indignant at its long confinement, and then proceeded to rub itself against Jupp's leg, with a purring mew on recognising a friend. ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson

... is impossible they should understand, and by his sophistries alienating them from their venerable parent? Not so, by Hercules! I should ill deserve my office of supreme guardian of the honor and liberties of Rome, did I not mew him up in the Fabrician dungeons, or send him lower still to the ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware

... "Mew-mew," said the white kitty. "I've done lots of work to-day. I unwound a big ball of green worsted for my little mistress, and I'm tired. Let somebody else ...
— Harper's Young People, November 4, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... cave. It was now dark, and they saw the basket waiting below; the fox assisted the poor cat into it. "There is only room for one," said he, "you must go first!" Up rose the basket; the fox heard a piteous mew, and no more. ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Yet think not of the surge, that soon may sweep Ourselves unnumbered to the oblivious deep. Yet time has been, as mouldering legends say,[56] When all yon western tract, and this bright bay, 110 Where now the sunshine sleeps, and wheeling white The sea-mew circles in fantastic flight, Was peopled wide; but the loud storm hath raved, Where its green top the high wood whispering waved, And many a year the slowly-rising flood Raked, where the Druids' uncooth ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles

... Do you think I would be accessory to bringing a Papist into favour in these times, when, as my good Lord said in the House, there should not be a Popish manservant, nor a Popish maid-servant, not so much as dog or cat, left to bark or mew about ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott

... was at supper that evening, the cat came in, as she usually did, to see what was going. I had always been accustomed to think that cats talk when they mew, dogs when they bark, and so on. It is not so at all. Their talking is almost all done (except when they are in a great state of mind) in a tone which you cannot possibly hear without help. Mewing is for the most part only shouting without saying any ...
— The Five Jars • Montague Rhodes James

... hazel spring May sharply to the night-air sing, But there no more shall withered hags Refresh at ease their broomstick nags, Or taste those hazel-shadowed waters As beverage meet for Satan's daughters; No more their mimic tones be heard, The mew of cat, the chirp of bird, Shrill blending with the hoarser laughter Of the fell demon following after! The cautious goodman nails no more A horseshoe on his outer door, Lest some unseemly hag should fit To his own mouth her bridle-bit; The goodwife's churn ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... found that the poor cat was not only blind, or nearly so, but extremely deaf, as it did not hear our footsteps until we were quite close behind it. Then it sprang round, and putting up its back and tail, while the black hair stood all on end, uttered a hoarse mew and a fuff. ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne

... company in the evening, and my interesting patient was put into another room. Once, in the midst of conversation, I thought I heard a plaintive mew, but could not go to see, and soon forgot all about it; but when the guests left, my heart was rent by finding Czar stretched out before the door ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott

... Major Flint. "Perhaps a hundred years hence—the date I have named in my will for their publication—someone may think them not so uninteresting. But all this toasting and buttering and grilling and frying your friends, and serving them up hot for all the old cats at a tea-table to mew over—Pah!" ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson

... excited it at all, for now the sleek fellow had arched its body neatly and was calmly licking its sides with a long forked tongue. After a moment it halted the operation long enough to rub its jaw against a bar of its cage, and gave vent to a sociable mew! ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various

... with the white spots on its sides—Val called her Mary Arabella, for some whimsical reason—came into the kitchen, looked inquiringly at the huddled figure upon the floor, gave a faint mew, and went slowly up, purring and arching her back; she snuffed a moment at Val's hair, then settled herself in the hollow of Val's arm, and curled down for a nap. The sun, sliding up to midday, shone straight in upon them through ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower

... woman seemed to listen to the strokes of the oars; her dead eyes rested immovably on the sea. A sea-mew passed close to her in its flight. "That was a bird!" said she. "Is there no one here ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen

... prancing, to her stall, White Face walked demurely off with a bellow, which Spotty, the calf, running at her heels, tried to imitate; the little lamb skipped bleating away; Piggywig walked off with a grunt; Pussy jumped on the fence with a mew; the squirrel still sat up in the tree cracking her nuts; Bunny hopped to her snug little quarters; while Rover, barking loudly, chased the chickens back to their coop. Such a hubbub of noises! Mamma said it sounded as if they were trying to say "Merry Christmas ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various

... Haunted deserts. Havret, Father H. Hawariy (Avarian), the term. Hawks, hawking in Georgia, Yezd and Kerman; Badakhshan; Etzina; among the Tartars; on shores and islands of Northern Ocean Kublai's sport at Chagannor; in mew at Chandu; trained eagles; Kublai's establishment of; in Tibet; Sumatra; Maabar. Hayton I. (Hethum), king of Lesser Armenia, his autograph. Hazaras, the, Mongol origin of, lax custom ascribed to. Hazbana, king of Abyssinia. Heat, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... spread themselves about the shelves of Mr. Mugg's shop, and the China Cat, whose shiny coat was as white as snow, was just getting ready to run after the Trumpeter when suddenly the toy pussy gave a loud mew. ...
— The Story of a China Cat • Laura Lee Hope

... pounds was equivalent to a sum between one hundred and twenty-five and one hundred and fifty dollars now. Ursula was of course poor, or she would not have been sentenced to be whipped. The fine was therefore extremely heavy.] or be whipped for the lighter crime of saying "she had as lief hear a cat mew" [Footnote: Frothingham, History of Charlestown, p. 208.] as Mr. Shepard preach. The daily services in the churches consumed so much time that they became a grievance with which the government was ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams

... haunts "dark forests" and loves to listen to "hollow winds and ever-beating waves" and "sea-mew's clang." Milton appears at every turn, not only in single epithets like "Lydian airs," "the level brine," "low-thoughted cares," "the light fantastic dance," but in the entire spirit, imagery, and diction of the poem. A few lines illustrate ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers

... a handsome but a very thievish bird. It's very clever, too, in imitating all kinds of sounds that it hears. It will bleat like a lamb, mew like a cat, neigh like a horse, and imitate the ...
— Woodside - or, Look, Listen, and Learn. • Caroline Hadley

... at my spot of thought In the white-stoned Garth, brooding thus her wrong, Her husband neared; and to shun his view By her hallowed mew I went from the ...
— Wessex Poems and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy

... hardly follow what you say. It's so complicated—a bit over my head, you know. But you astonish me! Are they in the habit of hindering you in your changeful moods? You mew, and they open the door. You lie on the paper—the sacred paper He's scratching on—He moves away, marvelous condescension!—and leaves you his soiled page. You meander up and down his scratching table, obviously ...
— Barks and Purrs • Colette Willy, aka Colette

... the Catskills from a certain hospitable mansion on the east side of the Hudson is better than any mew from those delectable hills. The artist said so one morning late in June, and Mr. King agreed with him, as a matter of fact, but would have no philosophizing about it, as that anticipation is always better than realization; and when Mr. Forbes went on ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... considered safe at this time of the year, the ship was taken into Owen's anchorage under the guidance of Mr. Usborne. We first steered for the Mew Stone, bearing south, until the leading marks could be made out; they are the western of two flat rocks lying close off the west side of Carnac Island and a large white sand patch on the north side of Garden ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes

... The thrashers sing in the hedgerows beyond the garden, the catbirds everywhere. The catbirds have such an attractive song that it is extremely irritating to know that at any moment they may interrupt it to mew and squeal. The bold, cheery music of the robins always seems typical of the bold, cheery birds themselves. The Baltimore orioles nest in the young elms around the house, and the orchard orioles in the apple trees near the garden and outbuildings. ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt

... began to mew piteously, struggling to get out with all her might. Down went the desk-cover ...
— Gypsy's Cousin Joy • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... and servants, but because he knew the gentlemen to be loyal and conformable, and that he should have fair quarter amongst them;" and so much favor did he win amongst the loyal and conformable gentry that old Bishop Mew—the prelate of Winchester, popularly known as Bishop Patch, because he always wore a patch of black court-plaster over the scar of a wound which he received on one of his cheeks, whilst fighting as a trooper for Charles I.—used ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson

... "this Sumner, this false thief, Had scouts in plenty ready to his hand, Like any hawks, the sharpest in the land, Watching their birds to pluck, each in his mew, Who told him all the secrets that they knew, And lured him game, and gat him wondrous profit; Exceeding little knew his master of it. Sirs, he would go, without a writ, and take Poor wretches up, feigning ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley

... own strength; unless they be otherwise wanting unto themselves. As for mercenary forces (which is the help in this case), all examples show, that whatsoever estate or prince doth rest upon them, he may spread his feathers for a time, but he will mew them soon after. ...
— Essays - The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. - Verulam Viscount St. Albans • Francis Bacon

... hide-away on The Blessed Isle—that's her name. Can you beat that for a monaker? This sailor of mine goes good to grub me, but he never shows for forty-eight hours—or years, I forget which. Anyhow, I stand it as long as I can, then I dig my way up to a hatch and mew like a house-cat. It seems they were hep from the start, and battened me down on purpose, then made book on how long I'd stay hid. Oh, it's a funny joke, and they all get a stomach laugh when I show. ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach

... relief he found Van Rycke out. He shoved the tape back in its case and pulled out the next one. Sinbad was there, not in his own private hammock, but sprawled out on the Cargo-master's bunk. He watched Dane lazily, mouthing a silent mew of welcome. For some reason since they had blasted from Sargol the cat had been lazy—as if his adventures afield there had sapped much of ...
— Plague Ship • Andre Norton

... seclusion and obscurity! and the best society whom the King introduced to us, was a Bohemian vagabond, by whose agency he directed us to correspond with our friends in Flanders.—Perhaps," said the lady, "it is his politic intention to mew us up here until our lives' end, that he may seize on our estates, after the extinction of the ancient house of Croye. The Duke of Burgundy was not so cruel; he offered my niece a husband, though he ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott

... by hire beddes hed she made a mew And covered it with velouettes blew, In signe of trouth, that is in woman ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 66, February 1, 1851 • Various

... of Waterford. Thou hadst a slave lass once, I think; Mew: they called her Mew, her skin it ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley

... have a rare bit of fun!" He then spoke in a low voice in Saunders's ear, and the young man stole round to the opposite side of the crowd. When the hymn had been sung, and the speaker was in the very act of commencing his discourse, a loud mew from Gregson, who was affecting to look very solemn, made the good man pause. He made a second attempt; but now a noise as of two cats fighting violently came from the opposite side of the concourse. The poor preacher looked sadly disconcerted; but when the pretended mewing and ...
— Amos Huntingdon • T.P. Wilson

... not fear, Nor make that plain-tive mew; Don't be a-fraid, but ven-ture near, And lap the milk we bring you here, For none will ...
— The Infant's Delight: Poetry • Anonymous

... so want to speak to them! Haven't you? Do you know how I got out? I was only going to get the cat in for the night. I chased it out myself, and hid it so nicely under the wooden tub out in the shed. If only it doesn't mew." ...
— One of Life's Slaves • Jonas Lauritz Idemil Lie

... sea-mew Swam, dipped, and dropped, and grazed the sea: And one with me I could not dream you; And one with you I ...
— Poems & Ballads (Second Series) - Swinburne's Poems Volume III • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... attaching my name to that of one so worthy the esteem of his co-dogs, ay, and co-cats too; for in spite of the differences which have so often raised up a barrier between the members of his race and ours, not even the noblest among us could be degraded by raising a "mew" to the honour of ...
— The Adventures of a Dog, and a Good Dog Too • Alfred Elwes

... counter-tenor, that I wish I had such another at Brambleton-hall, to wake the maids of a morning. Do you know where I could find one of his brood?' 'Probably in the work-house at St Giles's parish, madam; but I protest I know not his particular mew!' My uncle, frying with vexation, cried, 'Good God, sister, how you talk! I have told you twenty times, that this gentleman's name is not Gwynn.' — 'Hoity toity, brother mine (she replied) no offence, I hope — Gwynn is an honorable name, of true old British extraction — ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett

... affections,' retorted Mr Boffin, with ineffable contempt, 'and possess her heart! Mew says the cat, Quack-quack says the duck, Bow-wow-wow says the dog! Win her affections and possess her heart! Mew, ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens



Words linked to "Mew" :   utter, genus Larus, let loose, Larus, gull, seagull, sea gull, miaou, emit, mew gull, let out, cry



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