"Patter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... very well with the soft patter of her feet till they reached the foot of the staircase. "There, there, child," he said, "there's not the least need of ...
— Five Little Peppers Midway • Margaret Sidney
... between watching her and a dense black cloud which had appeared in the west, and was fast approaching the zenith. I was just thinking how nice it would be if the rain should drive her to our house for shelter, when patter, patter came the large drops in my face; thicker and faster they fell, until it seemed like a perfect deluge; and through the almost blinding sheet of rain I descried Nellie coming toward me at a furious ...
— Homestead on the Hillside • Mary Jane Holmes
... spot of the accident, but Irene was tugging desperately at the huge windlass, slowly winding up the heavy bucket, moaning all the while in a distracted undertone, while tears of fright trickled down her dirty face. So busy was she that she never heard the patter of Tabitha's feet behind her, and the first intimation she had of help at hand was when the older girl jerked her back from the mouth of the shaft, released the half-raised bucket, and sent it hurtling back into the ...
— Tabitha's Vacation • Ruth Alberta Brown
... smouldering scandal blazed—but he, My king, to the last put trust in me— Aye, well was his trust requited! Now priests may patter, and bells may toll, He will need no masses to aid his soul; When the angels open the judgment scroll, His ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... truth. Astern he might tow a small wife-boat, as a mariner should, with its passenger capacity carefully stamped on the bottom. And instead of Columbus, a honey-fed spirit of dream should stand in his prow and adjure him to sail on, to dreamland. "Dream on, dream on, dream on," she should patter, each time he grew restless. I could not take a turn in the prow myself, it would be too much honor; but I should be glad to take my stand in the gentleman's rear, and do all I could to accelerate ...
— The Crow's Nest • Clarence Day, Jr.
... thousands, either buying provisions for the coming holiday or attracted by the light and bustle. Heavy looking Russians, olive-skinned Italians, placid Germans, wild-eyed and pallid Czechs, lounged along the thoroughfare, chatting with compatriots, or gathering in amused groups to hear the strange patter of some voluble merchant retailing goods from a barrow. From the interiors of tiny shops and cellars came eldritch voices crying the nature and remarkable qualities of the wares within. Every hand-cart carried a flaring naphtha-lamp, and the glare of these innumerable torches ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... begins, the wind drops. The only sound is the patter of rain dropping like fine shot on the young rye and the ...
— The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... with Newfangle at once. He has scored his first point and given a capital send-off to the play by this comically-conceived illustration of the meaning of its strange title. Forthwith he rattles along with a string of patter about himself, who he is, what sciences he learnt in hell before he was born, and so on, until arrested by the abrupt entrance of another person. This newcomer somersaults on to the stage and cuts divers uncouth capers exactly as our 'second ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... cheers of sympathizing thousands who clustered upon every shed and pillar, and yearned forward as if to make their tumultuous feelings the motive power to carry those dear friends away. What an ardent and unquenchable emotion! Drums do not throb like these hearts, bullets do not patter like these tears. There is not a power of the soul which is not vitalized and expanded by these scenes. But long after the crowd vanishes, there stands a woman at the corner, with a tired child asleep upon her shoulder; the bosom does not ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various
... showers hover Over all the starry spheres And the melancholy darkness Gently weeps in rainy tears, What a bliss to press the pillow Of a cottage-chamber bed, And to listen to the patter Of ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... the table from him sits our old MacTavish, lisping, 'What is the Atlantic? Is it a herb?' I'll bet my soul they're in their billets at this moment, MacTavish mugging up some stable-patter out of NAT GOULD, and Blenkinsop imbibing a dose of ship-chatter from 'BARTIMEUS.' They'll come in for food presently, MacTavish doing what he imagines to be a 'cavalry-roll,' tally-hoing at the top of his voice, and Blenkinsop weaving his walk like the tough old sea-dog he isn't, ship ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 8, 1919 • Various
... the streets near the Swift house and shops could be heard the rattle of fire apparatus, the patter of running feet, and many shouts from ...
— Tom Swift among the Fire Fighters - or, Battling with Flames from the Air • Victor Appleton
... they could see a shower of ragged splinters and broken limbs fly when a two-hundred-foot fir smashed a dead cedar that stood in the way of its downward swoop. They could hear the pieces strike against brush and trees like the patter of shot on ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... voice of love. Men drawing near to an end of life's adventurous journey—maids thrilling with fear and curiosity on the threshold of entrance—women who had borne and perhaps buried children, who could remember the clinging of the small dead hands and the patter of the little feet now silent—he marvelled that among all those faces there should be no face of expectation, none that was mobile, none into which the rhythm and poetry of life had entered. "O for a live face," he thought; and at times he had a memory of Lady Flora; and at times he would ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... antique patter backstage, until I sometimes wonder whether I'm in Central Park, New York City, nineteen hundred and three quarters, or somewhere in Southwark, Merry England, fifteen hundred and same. The truth is that although he loves every last fat ...
— No Great Magic • Fritz Reuter Leiber
... bowed herself over him, and gathered his head softly to her bosom, whispering, "Poor, dear Orlando, you are glad, are you not, to see me?" Then, as the huge rapid drops of the thunder-cloud, which has hung overhead for a time in the midst of oppressive stillness, patter at first on the leaves one by one, and then break into a sweeping deluge, so did a storm of weeping pour from the eyes and heart of that crushed and spirit-broken sinner. Hardly daring to place a hand with its pressure of answering love on the neck which that same hand ...
— Amos Huntingdon • T.P. Wilson
... rap, rap! Rap, rap, rap! Rap, rap, rap! Lov'd ones are rapping to-night; Heaven seems not far away; Death's sweeping river is bright, Soft is the sheen of its spray. Magical changes those rappings have wrought, Sweet hope to the hopeless their patter has brought, And death is bridg'd over with amaranth flow'rs: Blest Spirits come back from their bright ...
— Hydesville - The Story of the Rochester Knockings, Which Proclaimed the Advent of Modern Spiritualism • Thomas Olman Todd
... same hour every week-day morning Rickman was awakened by the same sounds, the click of the door-latch in the bedroom overhead and the patter of a girl's feet on the stairs. He knew it was Miss Flossie Walker going down to early breakfast. And when he heard it, he turned in his bed on the side farthest from the window and sighed. Such a ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... while, becoming conscious that my pipe was smoked out and cold, I reached up my hand to my tobacco-box upon the mantelshelf. Yet I did not reach it down, for, even as my fingers closed upon it, above the wailing of the storm, above the hiss and patter of driven rain, there rose ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... Elizabeth, busying himself as yet for the most part with the surface of it, with the humours and quixotisms, the wit and the whim, the unreality, the fantastic extravagance, which veiled its inner nobleness. Country-lad as he is, Shakspere shows himself master of it all; he can patter euphuism and exchange quip and repartee with the best; he is at home in their pedantries and affectations, their brag and their rhetoric, their passion for the fantastic and the marvellous. He can laugh as heartily at the romantic vagaries of the courtly world in which ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green
... the hips like a sailor, spat through his teeth, end eyed Festus Clasby through a slit in his half-closed eyes. There was a little patter of the feet on the road on the part of Mac-an-Ward, and Festus Clasby knew enough of the world and its ways to gather that these were scientific movements invented to throw a man in a struggle. He did not like the look of the Son of ...
— Waysiders • Seumas O'Kelly
... delightful Dooley, express themselves in pure and excellent English the moment they drop the mask of their personage. This is very characteristic. Many educated Americans take great delight, and even pride, in keeping abreast of the daily developments of slang and patter; but this study does not in the least impair their sense for, or their command of, good English. The idea that the English language is degenerating in America is an absolutely groundless illusion. Take them all round, the newspapers ...
— America To-day, Observations and Reflections • William Archer
... The patter of feet down the street told only too well where her protector had gone; but he was valiantly calling lustily for help as ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... an hour later the stunned troopers recovered their senses they found a sight which sent them to their knees to patter prayers. For over the arch of the bridge dangled the corpse of the Jacobin. And on its breast it bore a paper setting forth that this deed had been done by Gaspard de Laval, and the Latin words "O si ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... perilous in the extreme. I gathered up my supplies, that were collected at such an expenditure of labor, and scrambled over rocks and through sand towards the side of the mountain. I had not gone far when the rain commenced—first in large drops, and then in a steady patter; before many minutes the storm burst upon the mountain in all its fury. The rain fell in sheets, and literally deluged surrounding objects. My resting place was becoming untenable, and my life was momentarily ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... much as or more than he. At any rate she picked her way with admirable care, her hoofs made almost no sound upon the wet soil; only the complaint of the saddle leathers or the swish of a wet branch rose above the steady patter of the raindrops. It was not necessary to guide her; she selected the openings of her own free will, her small, sharp ears were alert, and her ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... in the neighbourhood—shy of each other, their late partnership being dissolved. The Sol skilfully carries a vein of the prevailing interest through the Harmonic nights. Little Swills, in what are professionally known as "patter" allusions to the subject, is received with loud applause; and the same vocalist "gags" in the regular business like a man inspired. Even Miss M. Melvilleson, in the revived Caledonian melody of "We're a-Nodding," points the sentiment that "the dogs love broo" (whatever the nature of that ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... the courtyard, followed by the patter of feet. Desmond heard Strangwise speak to the dog and reenter the house. Then silence fell again. With a tremendous effort Desmond swung his legs athwart the pipe, gripped it with his right hand, ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... mediaeval drama was the "estrif" or "flyting"—the scolding-match between husband and wife, or between two rustic gossips. This motive is glorified in the quarrel between Brutus and Cassius, degraded in the patter of two "knockabout comedians." Certainly there is nothing more telling in drama than a piece of "cut-and-thrust" dialogue after the fashion of the ancient "stichomythia." When a whole theme involving conflict, or even a single scene of the nature described as a "passage-at-arms," ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... development, and yet stirred by a faint thrill at her recognition of my affection. At the same time the sad "too late, too late," was knelled in my ears, and I thought of the might-have-been, and rode the merry-go-round of regret's banalities. I had grown old. Passion had died. Hope—the hope of hearing the patter of a child's feet about my house, the hope of pride in a quasi-paternity, of handing on, vicariously though it were, the torch of life—hope was dead and it was buried in a little white coffin. Only a great, quiet love remained. I was a tired old man, and Carlotta was to me an infinitely ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... Ranulph the troubadour had written for this little drama. It was based on the story of the ten virgins, and contained much by-play and shrewd comment on the follies and fashions of the day. Besides the written text Giovanni was wont to add some patter of his own, improvised according to the mood of his audience and the scene of the performance, but he ventured on very little of this impromptu comedy on such an occasion as this. ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey
... that long ago grew silent for all time, and to once familiar songs that nobody sings now. And as my reverie softened down to a sadder and sadder pathos, the shrieking of the winds outside softened to a wail, the angry beating of the rain against the panes diminished to a tranquil patter, and one by one the noises in the street subsided, until the hurrying footsteps of the last belated straggler died away in the distance ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... for sleep. Oh dear no! I just dragged the big easy-chair to the window, and sat there listening to the patter of ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... altered his pace. Once he had stopped; whereupon they too had paused. A moment he stood looking up at St. Paul's, immense, ominous, casting at that late hour a dim patch of shadow over scores of pigmy buildings and paltry byways; when he went on, patter!—patter!—the trailing of feet, inevitable as fate, followed through the darkness. But they came no nearer until, abruptly wheeling, he entered the short street where his chambers were located; at the same time two men, apparently sauntering from the river in that side thoroughfare, ...
— Half A Chance • Frederic S. Isham
... be inane in her patter and have little more than conventional grace and charm, I have been waited on by girls who added real mental celerity, wit and a power of skilful mimicry to that elusive and seductive quality that accounts for the impregnable position ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott
... a student at the university whose name was Gebhart, who was so well acquainted with algebra and geometry that he could tell at a single glance how many drops of water there were in a bottle of wine. As for Latin and Greek—he could patter them off like his A B C's. Nevertheless, he was not satisfied with the things he knew, but was for learning the things that no schools could teach him. So one day he came knocking at Nicholas ...
— Twilight Land • Howard Pyle
... increasing breeze rustles the leafy drapery of the forest. The gulls wheel round still, but in more rapid and uncertain flight, accompanying their motions with shrill and mournful cries, like the dismal wailings of the spirit of the storm. A few drops of rain patter on the boats, or plump like stones into the water, and the distant melancholy growl of thunder swells upon the coming gale. Uneasy glances are cast, ever and anon, towards clouds and shore, and grumbling sentences are uttered by the men. Suddenly a hissing sound ...
— Hudson Bay • R.M. Ballantyne
... afternoon: all the little flowers were stretching up their heads to catch the rain that was falling patter-spatter everywhere. Francis stood by the window pouting. He had been playing lovely games outside, and now the rain had ...
— Dew Drops - Volume 37, No. 18, May 3, 1914 • Various
... the demagogue and the mystagogue in Dr. Marigold: "Except that we're cheap-jacks and they're dear-jacks, I don't see any difference between us." Bernard Shaw is a great cheap-jack, with plenty of patter and I dare say plenty of nonsense, but with this also (which is not wholly unimportant), with goods to sell. People accuse such a man of self-advertisement. But at least the cheap-jack does advertise his wares, whereas the don or dear-jack ...
— George Bernard Shaw • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... and the day-light, When the night is beginning lo lower, Comes a pause in the day's occupation Which is known as the children's hour. 'Tis then appears tiny Irving With the patter of little feet, To tell us that worms become dizzy At a slight application of heat. And Norma, the baby savant, Comes toddling up with the news That a valvular catch in the larynx Is the reason why Kitty mews. "Oh Grandpa," ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... garment. He perceived that he had misjudged all sorts of things. The evening, for instance, was a splendid evening—not one of those awful dry, baking evenings which make you feel you can't breathe, but pleasantly moist and full of a delightfully musical patter of rain. And the barn! He had been all wrong about the barn. It was a great little place, comfortable, airy, and cheerful. What could be more invigorating than that smell of hay? Even the rats, he felt, must be pretty decent rats, when you came ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... He tried not to think of that apropos answer. He heard the beating, steady patter of the rain, and the lowing of the cows, and there was not even a star in heaven to look at him from its accustomed place with a friendly, twinkling promise for the future. There was nothing left. So far as he was concerned, the earth was without form and void. There was nothing ...
— The Master-Knot of Human Fate • Ellis Meredith
... an array! How varied a procession! The humours of the parlour, shop, and street; Philistia's every calling, craft, profession, Cockneydom's cheery cheek and patter fleet. ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., Jan. 17, 1891 • Various
... pine-branches tower; Backwards and forwards each to the other bends, Beckoning the tempest-cloud which hither wends Like a slow-laboured thought, heavy with power: Hark to the patter of the coming shower! Let me be silent while the Almighty sends His thunder-word along—but when it ends I will arise and fashion from the hour Words of stupendous import, fit to guard High thoughts and purposes, which I may wave, When the temptation cometh close and hard, Like ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... break the monotony of continuous sunshiny days. There is nothing that is so fascinating to a boy in camp as listening to the patter of the rain drops upon the roof of his canvas house, especially at night, if he is snug and warm in his blankets and the tent is waterproof. A rainy day is the kind of a day when the chess and checker enthusiasts get together. Games are rescued from the bottom of the trunk or box. Ponchos and rubber ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson
... it, "Run helter-skelter into Yankee." "For puttin' in a downright lick 'Twixt Humbug's eyes, there's few to metch it." Faith, how you used it; ever quick Where'er Truth dwelt, to dive and fetch it. Vernacular or cultured verse, The scholar's speech, the ploughman's patter You'd use, but still in each were terse, As clear in point as full in matter. You'd not disdain "the trivial flute," The rustic Pan-pipe you would finger, Yet could you touch "Apollo's lute" To tones on which Love's ear would linger. Farewell, farewell! Two countries loved, Two countries ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 22, 1891 • Various
... times and seasons—not only the civilised rooks, with their libraries of knowledge in their old nests of reference, but the stray things of the hedge and the chiffchaff from over sea in the ash wood. They go on without me. Orchis flower and cowslip—I cannot number them all—I hear, as it were, the patter of their feet—flower and bud and the beautiful clouds that go over, with the sweet rush of rain and burst of sun glory among the leafy trees. They go on, and I am no more than the least of the empty shells that strewed the sward of the ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... ingenious. And he had a streak of quick-witted audacity which made him an ornament to his chosen profession. His method of work was simple. Coming to a rural neighborhood, he would stop at some local hotel, and, armed with clever patter and a sheaf of automobile insurance documents, would make the rounds of the ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... proceeded. The singing was congregational and in it all the young people joined, making the familiar hymns seem uncommonly beautiful to the hearers; and it was not till the sermon was well under way that anything unusual happened to divert attention. Then there came a soft yet heavy patter on the uncarpeted aisle and two black animals stalked majestically forward and seated themselves upon their haunches directly beneath the pulpit. With an air of profound interest they fixed their eyes upon the speaker therein and, for an instant, ...
— Dorothy's House Party • Evelyn Raymond
... Brer Rabbit see dis, he say ter hisse'f dat he 'speck he better go see how Brer B'ar gittin' on; en off he put. En 't wa'n't long n'er 'fo' he 'uz ransackin' de premmuses same like he 'uz sho' 'nuff patter-roller. W'iles he wuz gwine 'roun' peepin' in yer en pokin' in dar, he got ter foolin' 'mong de shelfs, en a bucket er honey w'at Brer B'ar got hid in de cubbud fall down en spill on top er Brer Rabbit, en little mo'n he'd er bin drown. Fum head ter heels dat creetur wuz kiver'd wid honey; ...
— Nights With Uncle Remus - Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation • Joel Chandler Harris
... silence that then ensued we occasionally caught the alternate murmur of the skipper's and Bainbridge's voices: but they were speaking in ordinary conversational tones, and the multitudinous sounds of the ship—the faint rustle of canvas aloft, the patter of reef-points, the creaking of the yards and timbers, the wash of water alongside, and the subdued hum of many voices on deck—prevented us from catching a word of what was being said. However, we gathered that Captain Roberts had been protesting against turning so ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... after some while, I saw no one and wondered, for here was the main gun-deck. Ten great pieces a side I counted, with ports for divers more. I was yet wondering at the emptiness about me when I heard sudden uproar from the deck above my head, shouts, cries, a rush and patter of many feet, and above all ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... themselves of their rushing throngs, the patter of feet and the murmur of voices had given place to measured individual marches here and there, the dripping of cave-spouts and the flapping of awnings could be heard tattling of showers past and future, and the last organ-grinder had left the ungrateful ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... to pass. The outline of the window-frame became visible against a faint grey glimmer. The window was open, and a breath of the coming dawn wandered in with the fragrance of drenched roses. A soft rain was falling. The patter of it could be heard upon ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... his hour had come, and he began to patter his prayers in his throat, but the two Americans, the one before him, and the one who had grasped him from behind, did not slay him at once. Instead they said words together in their harsh tongue. Then they tore pieces from the sentinel's clothing, made a wad of it and pressed it ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... is sweeping O'er some scene of household mirth, The sickle hand is reaping O'er some ancient rural hearth— Where the mother and the daughter In the evenings used to spin, And where little feet went patter, Full often out ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... music quite so sweet As patter of a baby's feet. Who never hears along the hall The sound of tiny feet that fall Upon the floor so soft and low As eagerly they come or go, Has missed, no matter who he be, Life's most ...
— All That Matters • Edgar A. Guest
... well in the sky, showing clear every detail in that scene of desolation, when they arrived. Patter, patter, patter sounded their hoof-beats in the distance. More and more loud they grew, muffled yet penetrating in the silence of night, always augmenting in volume. Out of the shadows figures came dimly into view, taking form against the background ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge
... the second voice in the other corner. And then, as if by a concerted movement, a series of bibular invitations and acceptances were rolled backwards and forwards with a volubility of utterance that threw Patter ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... hope and desire Till, rousing, I looked afresh on your face as you gazed— Behind you an old gnarled fruit-tree in one still fire Of innumerable flame in the sun of October blazed, Scarlet and gold that the first white frost would spill With eddying flicker and patter of dead leaves falling— looked on your face, as an outcast from Eden recalling A vision of Eve as she dallied ...
— Georgian Poetry 1920-22 • Various
... of high-toned voices, the quick patter of speech, the sense of hurry, the hyperbolical intimacy and enthusiasm were bewildering to a man who was naturally shy and at that moment mentally tired. Eric commended his soul to his humour and circumambulated the room, two steps at a time, until a sudden lessening of noise ...
— The Education of Eric Lane • Stephen McKenna
... in fancy, hear, Small feet in childish patter, Tread soft as they a grave draw near, And voices hush their chatter; 'Tis small and new; they pause in fear, Beneath the gray church tower, To consecrate it with a tear, And ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... will talk and laugh with you as long as it suits your respective humors and you are prosperous and happy,—the blessed butterfly-race who flutter about your June mornings, and when the clouds lower, and the drops patter, and the rains descend, and the winds blow, will spread their gay wings and float gracefully away to sunny southern lands where the skies are yet blue and the breezes violet-scented. They are not only agreeable, but deeply ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... front of the Nordenfeldt when a sentry's keener ears caught a peculiar whispering rustle. As Schultz turned his head to listen, the whisper grew in volume to the sound of a hail-storm—the patter of bare feet on sand. Faint light on spears rippled round the base of the hills. Schultz sprang inside the barrier barking at his men to open fire. He deflected the muzzle of his gun and began pumping nickel into the advancing mass of ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... to be disturbed that evening, . . no matter what visitors called for him, none were to be admitted. He had made up his mind to have a long and energetic practice, and he felt a secret satisfaction as he heard the steady patter of the rain outside, . . the very weather favored his desire for solitude,—no one was likely to venture forth ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... should have that opportunity just as if one woman desires a college education, she should not be held back because of the indifferent careless ones who do not desire it. Why should the mentally inert, careless, uninterested woman, who cares nothing for humanity but is contented to patter along her own little narrow way, set the pace for the others of us? Voting will not be compulsory; the shrinking violets will not be torn from their shady fence-corner; the "home bodies" will be able to still ...
— In Times Like These • Nellie L. McClung
... Chinaman now, and immediately he took up his trot, for a little while keeping up, dodging along between light and shadow, presently falling behind. At intervals she heard the patter, patter, patter of his footsteps following; at intervals she lost the sound, and shadows would engulf the figure, and she would wait in a panic for its reappearance. For she knew it was there somewhere, on one side of the street or the other. But, oh, not to see it! To expect ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain
... point Nepcote ceased speaking again, interrupted by a paroxysm of coughing, and when it passed his eyes turned towards the window, as though he were listening to the gentle patter of rain on the panes. For a space the two men sat with no sound in the room except Nepcote's laboured breathing. When he did resume he spoke with a quickened emphasis, like a man aware that he was entering upon the part of his narrative ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... lovely moonlight night four swains with their guitars stationed themselves under the windows of the handsome old house and sang plaintive love songs for an hour or more. Finally a shutter was pushed open very gently, and the four hearts went pitter-patter, anticipating the sight of a lovely young girl's face. Instead, appeared an old, black one, capped by a snowy turban, and these words floated down: "I'se sorrie, gen'le-men, but de young ladies is all gone out—but I sure is pleased wid you-all's music!" The quartet was composed of Summerfield ...
— A Portrait of Old George Town • Grace Dunlop Ecker
... with a frightful scowl and a faint aroma of garlic, "patter your pater-nosters as fast as you conveniently may. You have but ten minutes to exist. Has either ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... dwell on the miserable days that followed when the very sun in heaven seemed dark to poor Eric's wounded and crushed spirit. He hardly knew how they went by. And when they buried Vernon in the little green churchyard by Russell's side, and the patter of the earth upon the coffin—that most terrible of all sounds—struck his ear, the iron entered into his soul, and he had but one wish as he turned away from the open grave, and that was, soon to lie beside his beloved little brother, and to be ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... and disappointed. He was in a more than usually sentimental mood that afternoon, and had, indeed, at the moment of Archie's arrival, been dreaming wistfully of soft arms clasped snugly about his collar and the patter of little feet and all that sort of thing.-He gazed ...
— Indiscretions of Archie • P. G. Wodehouse
... she had added her voice to her rapping. Who opened this door Kendric did not know; for it was pitch dark as soon as the door was shut after them and they stood in a room either windowless or darkened by thick curtains. But the girl hastened on before him and he followed the patter of her soft moccasins, albeit with a hand under his left arm pit; all of this locking and unlocking of doors and the attendant mystery struck him as clap-trap and he set it down as further play for effect by the mistress of the place, but none the less he was ready ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... patter of soft feet, the converts, the doubtful, and the open scoffers, troop up to the veranda. You must be infinitely kind and patient, and, above all, clear-sighted, for you deal with the simplicity of childhood, the experience of man, and the subtlety ...
— Soldiers Three • Rudyard Kipling
... over them both. With the wave went a broken rail and part of the splintered house. Following the crashing of the wood and glass came the frightened questions and the patter of excited people running out of their rooms. The story-telling group from the barroom came as one man. The glass of the window over their heads had been showered on to their table. The bartender stopped only to empty his ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly
... meant to send the nuts first; for a sudden shower of hickory nuts and leaves swept away every boy from the tree near which Faith and her mother stood, and threw them all into its vortex. Drop, drop, the nuts came down, with their sweet patter upon the grass; while the golden leaves fell singly or in sprays, or floated off upon ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... attention, and addressed it with a rapid flow of words, each phrase beginning "O Bali Bouin." The pig's throat was then cut by an attendant, and Tama Bulan, standing up, diluted its blood with water and scattered it abroad over all of us as we stood round about him, while he still kept up the rapid patter of words. Then he pulled off the head of a fowl and concluded the rites by once more sprinkling us all with blood and water. Everyone seemed relieved and well satisfied to have got through this important business, and to have secured ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... Something aroused me—a patter of footsteps or a rustle of skirts. Then a soft thud behind me gave me at once a start and a thrill. First I saw Sally's little brown hands on my shoulders. Then her head, with hair all shiny and flying and fragrant, came round over my shoulder, softly smoothing my cheek, until ...
— The Rustlers of Pecos County • Zane Grey
... changed to a rattle and a crackle. The rain had turned to hail, and it was like the patter of rifle fire on the stout ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... round the empty hall and at the windows, black against the night. Under the patter of the rain he heard footsteps—distinctly. He went hastily clumping down the hall, and along the passage to ...
— Arsene Lupin • Edgar Jepson
... lonely patter and Kenny told him tales of Ireland, delighted at the sympathetic quiet of his mood. Unbrandied, the evenings, ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... bitterly. "All men are savages under the skin," he said. "How do YOU know what I think and feel? If I fail to come through with the conventional patter, I am called an Indian—because my mother was a half-breed." He threw up his head proudly, let his eyes rest for a moment upon the moon, swimming through a white river of clouds just over the tall poplar hedge planted long ago to ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... Patty, and nothing for them. They pretend to wisdom, knowledge, and genius that they don't possess. They fake up a lot of patter talk and pass it off for philosophy, or psychology, or lord knows what! And there isn't an ounce of brains in the whole fool bunch of them! That's what makes me mad! They fool you into believing their drivel is wisdom, and ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... camp-fire at bed-time, when I heard a distinct patter on the leaves. "Something coming," I whispered. All held still, then out of the gloom came bounding a snow-white Weasel. Preble was lying on his back with his hands clasped behind his head and the Weasel fearlessly jumped on my colleague's ...
— The Arctic Prairies • Ernest Thompson Seton
... little man. He began with what is known as 'patter,' then gave melodious account of a romantic meeting with a damsel whom he had seen only once to lose sight of for ...
— Thyrza • George Gissing
... The patter of the raindrops on the deck of the houseboat could still be heard, and the wind still blew hard. But the thunder and lightning were not so bad, and gradually the ...
— The Bobbsey Twins on a Houseboat • Laura Lee Hope
... heard a kind of pitter-patter above my head. Sometimes this noise increased and became a continuous crackle. I soon realized the cause. It was a heavy rainfall rattling on the surface of the waves. Instinctively I worried that I might get soaked! By water in the midst of water! I couldn't help smiling at this outlandish ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... "truly, they are large enough for any man to see, even were his sight as foggy as that of Peter Patter, who never could see when it was time ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... wind, a tremendous sea, that, as the evening advanced, rose higher and higher against the neighbouring precipice, had been rolling ashore since morning. The wind now began to blow in long hollow gusts among the cliffs, and the rain to patter against the ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... in volumes over the mountain tops; their summits still bright and snowy, but the lower parts of an inky blackness. The rain began to patter down in broad and scattered drops; the wind freshened, and curled up the waves; at length, it seemed as if the bellying clouds were torn open by the mountain tops, and complete torrents of rain came rattling down. The lightning leaped from cloud to cloud, ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... his eyes were old and wise, and he had evidently seen life. He was dark-haired and a little below medium height. The red scar of a wound appeared just below his left ear. After marking time with his feet, he began a kind of patter song about having a telephone, every verse of which ended, "Oh, la la, j'ai le telephone chez moi" (I've a telephone in my house). "I know who is unfaithful now—who have horns upon their brow," the singer told of surprising ...
— A Volunteer Poilu • Henry Sheahan
... was as stupidly simple. She had known "Missy" from a chile! She had just traipsed over to see her that afternoon; they were walking together when the sojers stopped her. She had never been stopped before, even by "the patter rollers."* Her old massa (Manly) had gib leaf to go see Miss Tilly, and hadn't ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte
... there were, and there were twenty-two of us; so we told off men to each row, and then made for them at a moment when no man was about—hacking at the ropes, and laughing to see the tents fall. It was strange to watch the shadows start up and stand motionless, as the first patter of feet came and the first blows fell, and then bustle, helpless and confused, with savage shouts and curses, as the heavy canvas and ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... their asseverations of veracity; the truth shone through their uncouth stories. They were widely different from the glib patter that runs out of a crook's mouth in the presence of an official. Some of these men were seasoned criminals; often they did not themselves understand how iniquitous was the "deal" that had been given them, being too much ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... example, abandoned the Rosenkavalier waltz, having never succeeded in struggling through more than about ten bars of it, and those the simplest. But her French dances she had notably improved in. She knew some of them by heart and could patter them off with a very tasteful vivacity. Instead of practising, she now played gently through a slow waltz from memory. If the snoring man was wakened, so much the worse—or so much the better! She went on playing, and evening continued to fall, until she could scarcely ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett
... little time for conjecture. A patter of footsteps interrupted me from the next room, and a frightened, feminine voice broke the stillness of the outer study. Even before the owner of that voice stepped in to my ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... There was a patter of rapid feet. A small body hurled itself against Doble's leg and clung there, beating his thigh ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine
... yellow, brown, and red, And nuts come pitter, patter down; When days are short and swiftly sped, And Autumn wears her colored gown, I'm up before old Mr. Sun His nightcap has a chance to doff, And have my day's work well begun When others kick ...
— Happy Jack • Thornton Burgess
... Rhythm swells and throbs in every sun and star, In mighty ocean's organ-peals and roar, In billows bounding on the harbor-bar, In the blue surf that rolls upon the shore, In the low zephyr's sigh, the tempest's sob, In the rain's patter and the thunder's roar; Aye, in the awful earthquake's shuddering throb, When old Earth cracks her bones and trembles to ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... accepted the towering peaks of the Wind River mountains, with their snowy mantles all shadowy in the whitening dawn, and the warmer grays of huddling foot-hills, as one receives, without question, the fantastic visions of sleep. The faint tinkling grew nearer, mingled with a light pitter patter and a far off baa-ing and bleating; then, as shadowy as the sheep in dreams, a great flock came winding round the hill; in and out through the sage-brush they went and came, elusive as the early morning ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... on with absorbed attention. I did not hear the dripping on the roof, nor the patter-patter of the drops from the ceiling, nor the beating of the storm against the glass. My candles blew in the draught, and shadows crossed and recrossed the page. Do you remember the book's ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... for perhaps five minutes, and the men watched each other, one white in the face and quivering a little, his adversary impassive as a statue, but quietly observant. Then there was a patter of hasty footsteps, and the fraeulein stood in the lantern light with a flushed, plump face and somewhat scanty dress. She apparently recognized the man, and her colour deepened, but that was the only sign of confusion she ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... entered into a long low bottom, heavily timbered—sometimes called Wolf Valley. It was a dreary and frightful place. As I walked on, I heard on all sides the howling of the wolves, and the quick patter of their feet on the leaves and sticks, as they ran through the woods. At daylight I laid down, but had scarcely closed my eyes when I was roused up by the wolves snarling and howling around me. I ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... aware that a cool stir in the darkness was growing into a breeze. After a time, the thin crowing of game-cocks in distant villages, the first twitter of birds among the highest branches, told us that night had turned to morning. A soft patter of bare feet came along the deck, a shadow stood above us, and the low voice of ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... sky The late swallows fly, The low red willows In the river quiver; From the beeches nigh Russet leaves sail by, The tawny billows In the chill wind shiver; The beech-burrs burst, And the nuts down-patter; The red squirrels chatter ...
— In Divers Tones • Charles G. D. Roberts
... taken up on their return, because, in the rush of waters about the base of the rock, was a haunt of a small fish esteemed particularly, and because the girl was one of the little tribe's adepts with hook and line She raised her eyes as she heard the patter of footsteps upon the shore, but did not exhibit any alarm when she saw the two young men. The ordinary young woman of the Shell People did not worry when away from land. She could swim like an otter and dive like a loon, and of wild ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... death, and at thirty years! Just one phrase, and a man gets off it; Look at that mongrel clerk in his tears Whining aloud the name of the prophet; Only a formula easy to patter, And, God Almighty, ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... rain-cradles, and when my children sing slumber songs and rock the clouds gently to and fro, the drops grow sleepy and forget to fall. But sometimes they are too restless to remain in their beds, and then they fall to earth; and if we could wait so long we might hear the children teach them their patter-song. But we have much else to see, and must go ...
— Dreamland • Julie M. Lippmann
... have me now a fool? Nay, yet had I liever be captain of Calais; For, and I should do after your school, To learn to patter to make me peevish, Yet had I liever look with a face full thievish: And therefore, prate no lenger here, Lest my knave's fist hit you under the ear. What, ye daws, would ye reed me For to lese my pleasure in youth and jollity, To bass and kiss ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume I. • R. Dodsley
... the basket old By the hearth there's a vacant seat; And I miss the shadows from off the wall, And the patter of many feet; 'Tis for this that a tear gathered over my sight, At the one pair of stockings to ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... lay silent in the heat My thoughts would be so full of you, my sweet, That dreaming half—I seemed to hear once more Your little fingers fluttering at the door, The pitter patter of your childish feet In joyous rhythm cross ...
— The Adventures of Akbar • Flora Annie Steel
... of men, known as the "Patter-Rollers", whose duty it was to see that slaves were not allowed to leave their individual plantations without passes which [HW: they] were supposed to receive from their masters. "A heap of them got whippings for being caught off ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... packed ourselves away in our boxes, and, the sun soon setting his last for us upon the Cashmere mountains, left us to make our way down to the miserable plains as fast as the flaring and spluttering light of a couple of pine torches would allow our bearers to patter along. ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... that a slight sound at the window made her look up. It was almost an instinctive movement on her part. She could not have said that she actually heard anything besides the falling rain which had died down to a soft patter among the trees in the compound. But something induced her took up, and so doing, she caught a glimpse of a figure on the verandah without that sent all the blood in her body racing to her heart. It was but a momentary glimpse. The next instant it was gone, gone like ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... learn to notice outdoor sounds—the songs of the birds, the noises that the animals make, the wind in the trees, and the patter of the rain. The old Norsemen have a story that their god Heimdall had such keen ears that he could hear the grass growing in the meadow and the wool growing on the backs of the sheep! Your ears can never be so keen as ...
— The Child's Day • Woods Hutchinson
... a patter of feet in the passage, the door-handle turned softly, and a little girl came in. She was a sweetly-pretty child, with that rare combination of dark-lashed brown eyes and golden hair. Here, if anywhere, was Laurence Stanninghame's soft place. His other progeny ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... later a knock came at the door, and here we made the one serious mistake for which I blame myself. Instead of opening the door ourselves, we allowed the girl to do so. We heard her say, 'Mother, there are two men in the house waiting to see you,' and an instant afterwards we heard the patter of feet rushing down the passage. Forbes flung open the door, and we both ran into the back room or kitchen, but the woman had got there before us. She stared at us with defiant eyes, and then, suddenly recognizing me, an expression ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... freedom of the fair blue sky, rich in the freedom of the limpid ocean of air above and around them. But within the close and gloomy lanes of this city within a city, through which many lovely women are wont to come and go, many little feet to patter, and many baby citizens to be borne in the arms of their dodging slaves, there is but cloud and chill, and famishing and stinting, and beating of wings against golden bars. In the order of nature, evening melts softly into night, and darkness retreats with ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... had been eaten, the storm voices had dwindled from boisterous violence to exhausted quiet, and even the soft patter of warm rain died away until through the door, which now stood ajar, the visitor could see the moonlight and the soft stars that seemed to hang just out ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... nothing was audible but the gasping breath of all four, the patter of the rain; the old woman emitted frequent rattles from her throat, and her eyes were starting from ...
— Cuore (Heart) - An Italian Schoolboy's Journal • Edmondo De Amicis
... that he will declare himself incapable of ever loving again, and may actually be so. Having no rivals and a deeper soil, love can ripen better in such a constant spirit; it will not waste itself in a continual patter of little pleasures and illusions. But unless the passion of it is to die down, it must somehow assert its universality: what it loses in diversity it must gain in applicability. It must become a principle of action and an influence ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... of rain, and Berta stirred uneasily, tossing her head as if striving subconsciously to shake off a vague irritation of hearing. Another heavier sound was mingling with the steady patter. Rub-a-dub-dub, rub-a-dub-dub! Robbie Belle glanced up and listened, her ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... Joe of old, His free wild words and his laughter bold: So high and low all gathered together By the village well in the autumn weather, Lured by the gipsy's bargain-chatter And the reckless lilt of his hare-brained patter. And there the Revd. Salvyn Bent, The parish church's ornament, Stood, as it chanced, in discontent, And eyed with a look that was almost sinister The Revd. Joshua Fall, the minister. And the Squire, it happened, was riding by, With an angry look in his ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann
... swift patter of feet over the crisp surface, and the grey beast came and halted suddenly not three yards from us, and on his haunches he sat up and howled, and I heard the answering yells in no long space of time coming whence we had come. His eyes glowed green with a strange light of ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... precision that not even the rustle of a leaf or the crackling of a twig would have warned the sharpest ear of his approach. The wind was in his favor, too, blowing from the creek toward him. The doe, which he could not yet see but the patter of whose light hoofs he had heard as she trotted with her fawn to the drinking place, could not possibly have discovered his presence; yet she continued to raise her muzzle at intervals ...
— With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga • W. Bert Foster
... What cools your usual zeal, And makes your helmed valour down i' the mouth? Why dimly glimmers that heroic flame Whose reddening blaze, by civic spirit fed, Should be the beacon of a happy Town? Can the smart patter of a Bobby's tongue Thus stagnate in a cold and prosy converse, Or freeze in oathless inarticulateness? No! Let not the full fountain of your valour Be choked by mere official wiggings, or Your prompt consensus of prodigious ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. Sep. 12, 1891 • Various
... gladdened her heart, during her brief sojourn, no longer smiled upon her, but was obscured in storm and gloom. The thunder which had only muttered at a distance, now roared among the cloud-capped hills, and heavy drops of rain began to patter slowly upon the earth and sea. These bright globules in advance of the heavy shower whose approach they announced, made small dimples in the waters, spreading anon into large circles, until the surface of the salt ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie
... guttersnipes dipped their legs in the slimy basin round about it, splashing one another, rolling like little colts in the grass. From the cafes and the wicker chairs and tables, clink of glasses and dominoes, patter of voices, scuttle of waiters with laden trays, shouts of men selling shrimps, prawns, fried potatoes, watermelon, nuts in little cornucopias of red, green, or yellow paper. Light gleamed on the buff-colored disk of a table in front of me, on ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... girth of his saddle two holes tighter, threw away his pistols, coat and hat, and rode away, on a gentle patter. After two miles this was increased to a stiff gallop. He knew his horse—he was turning off each mile in just five minutes. He rode sixty miles in five hours, using up three horses. The messenger to whom he tossed his saddlebags asked no questions, but leaping astride ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 11 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Businessmen • Elbert Hubbard
... storm has come up. The river, they said, was wide, and the wind was strong. And so I had to stay the night at the hut.... I remember the night. The snoring of the ferry-men and my driver, the roar of the wind, the patter of the rain, the mutterings of the Irtysh.... Before going to sleep I wrote a letter to Marya Vladimirovna; I was ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... gardens. Here and there clusters of elms made delicate groves of shade, contrasting strangely with the tough masses of pine forest that held the hills in a grip of dark-blue green. Even as John looked he saw three fawns in single file patter out from one clump about a half-mile away and disappear with awkward gaiety into the black-ribbed half-light of another. John would not have been surprised to see a goat-foot piping his way among the trees or to catch a glimpse of ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... all the row connected with their rush, the cowardly assailants were themselves unable to hear the patter of swiftly-approaching footsteps, coming from the rear. They evidently shouted, in order to keep their courage up, and prevent Ralph from ...
— The Boys of Columbia High on the Gridiron • Graham B. Forbes
... contemptuous unbelief would have filled his soul, if he had been told that any letter of hers could have struck him cold with the vague apprehension of coming misfortune. He tore off the envelope and threw it into the fire. But before he could glance at the letter there was the quick patter of his wife's feet upon the stair, and she burst, full of girlish health and high spirits, into the little room. She wore a pink crepon dressing-gown, with cream guipure lace at the neck and wrists. Pink ...
— A Duet • A. Conan Doyle
... his own way of expressing relief and delight; but it was Maria who stood longest by the door, hearkening to the sweet patter of the rain, watching the indistinct movement of cloud in the dark sky above the darker mass of the forest, breathing the mild air ...
— Maria Chapdelaine - A Tale of the Lake St. John Country • Louis Hemon
... fled away, driven by the waves of cool, fresh air that came out of the west. Washed by the rain the dry grass straightened up, and the dying leaves opened out, springing into new life. Faster and faster came the drops and now the sound they made was like the steady patter of musketry. Henry opened his mouth and breathed the fresh clean air, and he felt that like the leaves and grass he, too, was ...
— The Young Trailers - A Story of Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... palpitating with the feverish pulse of war, and already the still half-frozen clods of the common highway were beaten into frosty dust by the tread of marshaled men; and the shrill shriek of the fife, and the hoarse boom and jar and rattling patter of the drums stirred every breast with something of that rapturous insanity of which true patriots and heroes ...
— Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley • James Whitcomb Riley
... which she was hemming. The bird was hopping about, pecking at a banana which they had thrown to him; a light breeze made the shadow of the artu leaves dance upon the grass, and the serrated leaves of the breadfruit to patter one on the other with the sound of rain-drops falling ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... the whole Seaton had come to share in it. Men and women were all out of doors; and, late as it was when the sun set, to judge by the number of red legs and feet that trotted in and out with a little shadowy flash, with a dull patter pat on earthen floor and hard road, and a scratching and hustling among the pebbles, there could not have been one older than a baby in bed; while of the babies even not a few were awake in their mothers' arms, and out with them on ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... night we were there, we went to bed and to sleep early; but I awoke at the end of two or three hours, and lay a comfortable while listening to the soothing patter of the rain against the balcony windows. I took it to be rain, but it turned out to be only the murmur of the restless Neckar, tumbling over her dikes and dams far below, in the gorge. I got up ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... ended. I could hear a patter of feet on the rear stairs; I could hear some one near me on the floor, breathing heavily; then fell silence. I tried to yell to Stodger to be up and after them, but the result was only a painful wheezing in my throat. Then the gasping form on the floor groaned, and I managed ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... left alone, Ruth followed. But, before either of the girls had time to look about and see if it were possible to kindle a blaze in the old stove, they heard a noise in the room they had just left. It was the patter, as of bare feet, on the wooden floor. Startled, the two gazed at one another. Then they clasped their ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Oak Farm - or, Queer Happenings While Taking Rural Plays • Laura Lee Hope
... into two classes, one purely emotional, the other sensuous; the one arising from the language of heroes, the other from the swaying of the body and the patter of feet. To both of these elements, if we may call them so, metre and melody brought their power; to declamation, metre brought its potent vitality; to the dance, melody added its soft charm and lulling rhyme. The intellectual ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell
... and the Commandant followed him indoors to the kitchen, where they found Ruth stooping over the great hearth, already busy with the morning fire. Across the planching overhead sounded the patter of the children's ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... in the wild rush to Egmont town, the final wild rush, on the nag's last strength, with my pursuers, now going their fastest, trailing away behind, as their beasts foundered. The air came singing past. I heard behind me the patter of the turf sent flying by Old Blunderbore's hoofs. The excitement of the ride took vigorous hold on me. I felt on glancing back that I should do it, that I should carry my message, that the Dutchman should see my mettle, before they stopped me. They were coming up fast on horses still pretty ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... found it again spotted with gold, although it was too late for primroses. It was all soft and dark with pillars of purple light that struck through the fretted blue, and the dark shadows of the leaves. All hushed and no living thing—save the hesitating patter of some bird among the fir-cones. He struck through the wood and came out on to the Common. You could smell the sea finely here—a true Glebeshire smell, fresh and salt, full of sea-pinks and the westerly gales. On the top of the Common he paused and ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... knew where she was. In fact she was at Mainstairs, and with Faversham. She had mistaken a phrase in Tatham's note of the morning, and did not expect him till later. He had waited an hour for her, under the soft patter of Mrs. Penfold's embarrassed conversation; and had then ridden home, sorely disappointed, but never for one ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... handle of his cavalry revolver as he guided Buford down to the right where there seemed to be a hollow among the slopes. Just as he came trotting briskly round a little shoulder of the nearest ridge there was a rush and patter of hoofs on the other side of it, an exclamation, half-terror, half-menace, a flash and a shot that whizzed far over his head. A dark, shadowy horseman went scurrying off into space as fast as a spurred and startled horse could carry him; ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... to Petersburg wid Capt. Douglas, dat Miss Janie's second husband. Our train went dat fast, dat it took my breaf away. But de cars goes much faster, gwine to Patter-a-rac now. ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... a strange rustling of the leaves in the near thicket. It was an odd, continuous sound, and though it went this way and that way and came ever nearer, there was no patter of feet with it. Rag had lived his whole life in the swamp (he was three weeks old) and yet had never heard anything like this. Of course his curiosity was greatly aroused. His mother had cautioned him to lay low, but that was understood to be in case of danger, and ...
— Lobo, Rag and Vixen - Being The Personal Histories Of Lobo, Redruff, Raggylug & Vixen • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... worlds to mingle her tears with his, but no moisture came to her burning eyes; and there these two, soon to separate, passed the remaining hours of that long wretched night of watching. The stormy day lifted her pale, mournful face at last, and with it came the dreary patter and sobbing of autumn rain, making it doubly harrowing to commit the precious form to its long, last resting-place. Electra stood up beside her cousin and ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... great glory of clearness after rain, boy and girl moved along together under the trees. The fisherman's path which they followed wound where wet granite shone and ivy glimmered beneath the forest; and the leaves still dripped briskly, making a patter of sound through the underwood, and marking a thousand circles and splashes in the smooth water beneath the banks of the stream. Against a purple-grey background of past rain the green of high summer shone bright and ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... heart that repelled her, And the cold hand that turned her away, And take, from the lips that denied her, This answerless prayer of to-day! Take Lord, from my mem'ry forever That pitiful sob of despair, And the patter and trip of the little bare feet, And the one piercing cry on ...
— Afterwhiles • James Whitcomb Riley
... she shrinking from them in horror while her poor, white face turned to me for rescue in desperate pleading—oh! I must find her at all costs; and leaping from bed I snatched up those trousers without which the best of heroes is nothing, and had hardly got into them when there came the patter of light feet without and a Martian, in a hurry for once, with half a dozen others behind him, swept aside the curtains of ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... soul; And ever the hastening of infantry shifting positions—batteries, cavalry, moving hither and thither; The falling, dying, I heed not—the wounded, dripping and red, I heed not— some to the rear are hobbling; Grime, heat, rush—aides-de-camp galloping by, or on a full run: With the patter of small arms, the warning s-s-t of the rifles, (these in my vision I hear or see,) And bombs bursting in air, and at ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman
... European under ordinary circumstances would tackle under the glaring heat of the afternoon's sun. Mosquitoes—harbingers of malaria—and fire-flies buzzed in swarms, snakes and lizards, their hitherto undisturbed solitude rudely shaken by the stealthy patter of three score pairs of bare feet, wriggled across the swampy ground, while overhead thousands of frightened birds flew in large circles, chattering the while in a way that would alarm every Boche within a radius of ...
— Wilmshurst of the Frontier Force • Percy F. Westerman
... the circle of light, paused while my lips moved in a vague smile of response, then moved on into the shadow. The low, deep quiet of the corridor resumed its hold on me. The patter of reflection ...
— A Diary Without Dates • Enid Bagnold
... ears save the soft puff now and then of a porpoise, the slow creak of the masts as we swayed gently on the swell, the patter of the reef-points, and the occasional flap of the hanging sails. An awning covered the fore and after parts of the schooner, under which the men composing the watch on deck lolled in sleepy indolence, overcome with ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... interruption of the formula Kal' al-Rawi quotes the reciter; dice Turpino. Moreover, The Nights read in many places like a hand-book or guide for the professional, who would learn them by heart; here and there introducing his "gag" and "patter". To this "business" possibly we may attribute much of the ribaldry which starts up in unexpected places: it was meant simply to provoke a laugh. How old the custom is and how unchangeable is Eastern life is ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton |
