"Chirping" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... wildest landscapes! AEtna's fires, Bebrycian rocks, Anapus' holy stream, And woods of ancient Pan; the broken crag 270 And the old fisher here; the purple vines There bending; and the smiling boy set down To guard, who, innocent and happy, weaves, Intent, his rushy basket, to ensnare The chirping grasshoppers, nor sees the while The lean fox meditate her morning meal, Eyeing his scrip askance; whilst further on Another treads the purple grapes—he sits, Nor aught regards, but the green rush he weaves. O Beaumont! let this pomp of light and shade ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... usually rose with the robins, when there were any in the neighborhood. There were plenty on the lawn around the Sagamore Club that dewy June morning, chirping, chirking, trilling, repeating their endless arias from tree and gate-post. And through the outcry of the robins, the dry cackle of the purple grackles, and the cat-bird's whine floated earthward the melody ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... short way down the path toward the stream, sat on a rock and became at once engaged in my favorite woodland game of counting birdcalls. Thrushes and robins, warblers, sparrows, finches, all engaged in the employment that Jerry had described as "hopping around a bit," or chirping, calling, singing until the air was melodious with sound. The birdman's surprise, a new note differing from the others, a loud clear gurgling song, brought me to my feet and I went on down the path listening. It was ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs
... my terrace, and enjoyed the fresh air of this autumnal spring. The palms are beautiful to look upon, and the Desert city has the aspect of an Hesperides. Are these the "fortunate isles" of the ancients? A few birds twittering and chirping about, pecking the ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... evening the old man came home. As usual, on the way back he looked forward to the time when he should reach his gate and see his pet come flying and chirping to meet him, ruffling out her feathers to show her joy, and at last coming to rest on his shoulder. But to-night the old man was very disappointed, for not even the shadow of his dear sparrow was ...
— Japanese Fairy Tales • Yei Theodora Ozaki
... you coming Forth to the fields with me? The very air is gaily ringing With hum of bird and bee, And crowds of swallows now are chirping Up in our ancient thorn, And earth and air are both rejoicing, ...
— The Poetical Works of Mrs. Leprohon (Mrs. R.E. Mullins) • Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon
... outlook on nature which these seers practised. For they were in truth the Roman seers. Their business was to look, at midnight, into the starry heavens; to observe thunder, lightning, meteors; the chirping or flying of birds; the habits of the sacred chickens; the appearance of quadrupeds; or casualties of various kinds, as sneezing, stumbling, spilling salt or wine. The last relics of these superstitions are to be found in the little books sold in Rome, in which the fortunate number in a ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... this; in fact, he took great pains to make the cloth as dirty as possible; and then laughing loudly, "Ho, ho, ho!" leaped on to the hearth, and began teasing the cat; squeaking like a mouse, or chirping like a cricket, or buzzing like a fly; and altogether disturbing poor Pussy's mind so much, that she went and hid herself in the farthest corner, and left him the hearth all to himself, where he ...
— The Adventures of A Brownie - As Told to My Child by Miss Mulock • Miss Mulock
... the children weeping, O my brothers, Ere the sorrow comes with years? They are leaning their young heads against their mothers, And that cannot stop their tears. The young lambs are bleating in the meadows, The young birds are chirping in the nest, The young fawns are playing with the shadows, The young flowers are blowing toward the west— But the young, young children, O my brothers, They are weeping bitterly! They are weeping in the playtime of the others, In ...
— Queen Victoria • E. Gordon Browne
... the window, a blackbird came and laid her four eggs in it; and the saint, pitying the bird, and unwilling to disturb her, never drew in his hand, but kept it stretched out until she had brought forth her young, and they were fully fledged and flew off with a chirping quartette of thanks to the holy man, for his convaynience." Another is of "how he was once going up Derrybawn, when he met a woman that carried five loaves in her apron. 'What have you there, good woman?' said the saint. 'I have five stones,' ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood
... to the kitchen-window two white doves, and after them some turtle-doves, and at last a crowd of all the birds under heaven, chirping and fluttering, and they alighted among the ashes; and the doves nodded with their heads, and began to pick, peck, pick, peck, and then all the others began to pick, peck, pick, peck, and put all the good grains into the dish. Before an hour ...
— Household Stories by the Brothers Grimm • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... is never tired of praising it. He says that he found trees and fruits of very marvellous taste; and adds that they must have cows or other cattle, for he saw skulls which were like those of cows.[133-1] The songs of the birds and the chirping of crickets throughout the night lulled everyone to rest, while the air was soft and healthy, and the nights neither hot nor cold. On the voyage through the other islands there was great heat but here it is tempered like the month of May. He attributed the heat of ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various
... doth my Lord of Suffolk comfort me? Came he right now to sing a raven's note Whose dismal tune bereft my vital powers, And thinks he that the chirping of a wren, By crying comfort from a hollow breast, Can chase away the first-conceived sound? Hide not thy poison with such sugar'd words; Lay not thy hands on me; forbear, I say! Their touch affrights me as a serpent's sting. Thou baleful ...
— King Henry VI, Second Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]
... came every morning to pay this tribute of affection to the departed. A weeping willow drooped its supple branches over the tomb; some honey-suckle and sweet-briar surrounded it, loading the air with their rich fragrance; not even the chirping of a bird disturbed the solemn silence that reigned around; everything seemed to conspire to suggest holy and melancholy thoughts, and I lingered awhile to indulge in them; but perceiving by the few footmarks that I was an intruder, hastened to retire, by no means sorry, however, ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes
... a thirsty sparrow gave her thoughts a pleasant turn, for, sitting motionless, she watched the little creature trip down to the pool, drink and bathe, then flying to a willow spray, dress its feathers, dry its wings, and sit chirping softly as if it sang its evening hymn. Warwick saw her interest, and searching in his pocket, found the relics of a biscuit, strewed a few bits upon the ground before him, and began a low, sweet whistle, which ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... would lead me to conclude something. Eh! has that Robin been chirping out her fancies? And do you mean to say that you are struck all of a heap by the awful discovery ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... simple creature, got up at a very cheap rate, his life is so consistent with his dress; he gives his genius a darkling swagger, and a romantic envelope, which, being removed, you find, not a bravo, but a kind chirping soul; not a moody poet avoiding mankind for the better company of his own great thoughts, but a jolly little chap who has an aptitude for painting brocade gowns, a bit of armour (with figures inside them), or trees and cattle, or gondolas and buildings, ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the Woods they heard the pleasing noise Of chirping Birds, and try'd to frame their voice, And Imitate, thus Birds instructed man, And taught them Songs before ...
— De Carmine Pastorali (1684) • Rene Rapin
... through your chirping bills, As you by me are bidden, To her is only known my love, Which from the world is hidden. Go, pretty birds, and tell her so, See that your notes strain not too low, For still methinks I see her ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... choruses, and his airs are almost always for a single voice: with these the scenes uniformly close, and with them the singer never fails to make his exit. It appears as if, proud of having played off this highest triumph of feeling, he left the spectators to their astonishment at witnessing the chirping of the passions in the recitatives rising at last in the air, to the fuller nightingale tones. At present we require in an opera more frequent duos and trios, and a crashing finale. In fact, the most difficult problem for the opera poet is to reduce the mingled voices of conflicting passions ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... palace," said Hildegarde to herself; "only the princess has grown old in the hundred years,—but so prettily old!—and the prince would have to be a stately old gentleman to match her." She went out on the lawn; still there was no sound, save the chirping of grasshoppers and crickets. It was still the golden prime of a perfect June day; what would be the most beautiful thing to do where all was beauty? Read, or write letters? No! that she could do when the glory had begun ...
— Hildegarde's Holiday - a story for girls • Laura E. Richards
... Kitty Blount kept her all this time? And why wasn't she married, a girl like that? She came next to Mrs. Scales, he supposed. Well, but there was another, younger still, married only the other day—to an army man. He remembered Welbore chirping about it at a Board meeting. What was that in the Bible—what was it? Ha!—"But thou hast kept the good wine until now." By George, he must remember that for old Welbore. And now he came to think of it, ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... memory. In the fall, on some long tramps, I had occasional glimpses of the little singer, solitary now and silent, stealing southward ahead of the winter. And in the spring he showed himself rarely in the underbrush on country roads, eager, restless, chirping, hurrying northward where the streams were clear and the big woods budding. But never a song in all that time; my ears were hungry for his voice as I leaped out to run eagerly to the big cedar. There were the stakes, and the tin plate, and the bark roof ...
— Wilderness Ways • William J Long
... in just then, took his seat at the head, looked mechanically for the banished dog and the cat, and Dusie, chirping madly in her cage to attract his attention to the fact of her cruel and unusual imprisonment. He cleared his throat and took up the carver—and immediately Miles Morgan was conscious of an unbending of the small Madigans—a cuddling together, so to speak, and a swift ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... the imprisoning crust, out flew half a score of live blackbirds, which, fluttering up and scattering over the dodging heads of the astonished guests, made for the open windows, and escaped, with loud chirping cries, to their native meadows! At first, a slight exclamation from the gentlemen, a half shriek from the ladies, then a momentary pause, and then one universal burst of uproarious laughter, followed this strange denouement of the little ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... tongs Jack Wonnell raised half a bushel of oysters in a few dips, and opened them for the party. Along the shores wild haws and wild plums still adhered to the bushes, and the stiff-branched persimmon-trees bore thousands of their tomato-like fruit. The partridges were chirping in the corn, the crow blackbirds held a funeral feast around the fodder, some old-time bayside mansions stretched their long sides and speckled negro quarters along the inlets, half hidden by the nut-trees, and in the air soared ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... already introduced him to the reader as a brisk old bachelor-looking little man; the wit and superannuated beau of a large family connection, and the squire's factotum. I found him, as usual, full of bustle; with a thousand petty things to do, and persons to attend to, and in chirping good-humour; for there are few happier beings than a busy idler; that is to say, a man who ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... dazzle their expected prey. The mist still hovered on the valleys, and concealed a part of the landscape from their view; and the occasional sound of the fall of water was mingled with the twittering and chirping of the birds, as they flew from spray to spray. The air was fresh, even to keenness, and anyone suddenly wafted to the scene would little have imagined that he was under ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... There was much chirping and fluttering those evenings in the homes of the Shippens, the Chews, the Achmutys, the Redmans, and others. In the midst of all this lived Elizabeth Danesford, and a very lively part of it ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... poor crippled sparrow fell to the ground, and fluttered about in a vain attempt to regain a place of safety. Some of its mates gathered around it, and seemed eager to help it; but they did not know what to do. Their chirping drew together a good many of the ...
— The Nursery, January 1877, Volume XXI, No. 1 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... the note of the nightingale suddenly ceased, to be succeeded by the mere chirping of the barn-door sparrows, the divine and melancholy voice began to be heard further north. It was during that most barren period of English poetry—extending from Chaucer's death till the beginning of Elizabeth's reign—that Scottish poetry arose, suddenly, splendidly—to ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... natural voices, and in detecting the counterfeit voices of companions; in arranging and classifying the elementary sounds of the language, and in determining all the different musical tones; in judging of the genus and species of birds by their chirping, of the distance and nature of sonorous bodies of various kinds, etc., etc. These are some of the direct means of improving this sense: others will suggest themselves to ...
— Popular Education - For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes • Ira Mayhew
... such pruning of coats, Such chirping, such whistling, such clearing of throats, Such polishing bills, and such oiling of pinions, Had never been known in the biped dominions! The Tailor-Bird[2] offer'd to make up new clothes For all the young Birdlings who wish'd to be Beaux: He made for the Robin a doublet ...
— The Peacock 'At Home' AND The Butterfly's Ball AND The Fancy Fair • Catherine Ann Dorset
... all good bagpipes, that, when they go to the counterfeiting of the chirping of small birds, by swinging a broom three times about a chimney, and putting his name upon record, they do nothing but bend a crossbow backwards, and wind a horn, if perhaps it be too hot, and that, by making it fast to a rope he was to draw, immediately after the sight of the letters, the cows ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... one summer's day a Grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. An Ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was ...
— Aesop's Fables • Aesop
... Lord of Suffolke comfort me? Came he right now to sing a Rauens Note, Whose dismall tune bereft my Vitall powres: And thinkes he, that the chirping of a Wren, By crying comfort from a hollow breast, Can chase away the first-conceiued sound? Hide not thy poyson with such sugred words, Lay not thy hands on me: forbeare I say, Their touch affrights me as a Serpents ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... rude camp their home, and share his crumbs. The squirrel nestles above his head, as the owl, moping about the camp entrance, suddenly hoots a warning and flutters its way into the thicket. Starting to his feet with surprise-the squirrel chirping at the sudden commotion-the tramp of horses breaks fearfully upon the old man's ear; bewildered he bounds from the camp. Two water oaks stand a few feet from its entrance, and through them he descries his pursuers bearing down upon him at full speed, the dogs making the very forest ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... too restless to sleep, the orphan passed the weary hours of the night in endeavoring to complete a chapter on Buddhism, which she had commenced some days before; and the birds were chirping their reveille, and the sky blanched and reddened ere she lay down her pen and locked up her MS. Throwing open the blinds of the eastern window, she stood for some time looking out, gathering strength from the holy calm of the dewy morning, resolving to watch her own ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... pathway, with the bright glow of noon, at certain points; in other places, there is a shadow as deep as the glow; but along the greater portion sunshine glimmers through shadow, and shadow effaces sunshine, imaging that pleasant mood of mind when gayety and pensiveness intermingle. A bird is chirping overhead among the branches, but exactly whereabout you seek in vain to determine; indeed, you hear the rustle of the leaves, as he continually changes his position. A little sparrow, however, hops into view, alighting on the slenderest twigs, and seemingly delighting in the swinging ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 • Various
... till her face was red. While she was tittering like a chirping bird, that little creature Cecilia came tripping into the room, with a blue silk dress, ruffled over with white lace, just reaching to her knees, her yellow hair a-rippling over that, clear down behind, and a wreath of pink roses on her head. ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... begin naturally by asking, "Cally, did you have a lovely summer?"—when of course they knew very well that she had had a perfectly frightful summer. Mattie came in before eleven o'clock on the first morning, chirping affectionate greetings; but neither then nor later did she manage to convey any real sense of sympathy with Cally, or of understanding what she had been through, or even of wanting to understand. Cally would have ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... the apple tree, a robin began to sing. A thrush joined him from a near-by thicket. Birds began chirping in ...
— Bobby of Cloverfield Farm • Helen Fuller Orton
... sat swinging and chirping on the tall lilac-bush, but no other living thing was in sight. "Birds don't sneeze, do they?" asked ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... winter, vast flocks of the common linnets; more, I think, than can be bred in any one district. These, I observe, when the spring advances, assemble on some tree in the sunshine, and join all in a gentle sort of chirping, as if they were about to break up their winter quarters and betake themselves to their proper summer homes. It is well known, at least, that the swallows and the fieldfares do congregate with a gentle twittering before they make ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... story Johnnie stops and looks up at the sky most mournful-like. Springtime it was, mind you, and fine weather, with the sun shining and the waters of the inlet rolling up on the rocks gentle-like, and the first of the birds were up from the south and singing and chirping, and, I s'pose, nesting overhead—a bran'-new spring day in a piny grove on a pretty little island off the coast of British Columbia, when anybody should 'a' been happy, 'specially with a ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly
... when the sun had hidden itself beyond the woods, this cooing under the roof and chirping in the birch tree became gradually quiet. The sparrows and the doves shook the dew from their wings and prepared to sleep; sometimes one of them gave voice once more, but more rarely, more softly, more drowsily, and then all ...
— Sielanka: An Idyll • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... garnished with Flora's wealth, And overspread with party colored flowers, Do yield sweet contentation to my mind. The airy hills enclosed with shady groves, The groves replenished with sweet chirping birds, The birds resounding heavenly melody, Are equal to the groves of Thessaly, Where Phoebus with the learned Ladies nine, Delight themselves with music harmony, And from the moisture of the mountain tops, The ...
— 2. Mucedorus • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... caterwauling of a panther, followed by that cunning arch-dissembler's inimitable imitation of a child in distress. As though awed and paralyzed by this revelation of the panther's dread presence, the chirping and juggling and p-r-r-r-ring and yelping of inferior creatures cease as if by mutual impulse moved, and the pitter-patter of little feet are heard on the clay floor of my bungalow. The cry of the forest prowler is ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... room was full of the young girls of the district, with here and there a Sister out of another world entirely. Some were reading, some conversing, some laughing, some playing a piano, and some singing. Their voices filled the air like the chirping of birds, and their faces were bright and happy. "Good-evening, Father," they said on entering, and "Good-night, Father," as they ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... on the tip of Joyce's tongue to tell him that everybody knew that song; that it was as familiar to the children at home as the chirping of crickets on the hearth or the sight of dandelions in the spring-time. But some instinct warned her not to say it. She was glad afterwards, when she found that it was sacred to him, woven in as it was with his one beautiful ...
— The Gate of the Giant Scissors • Annie Fellows Johnston
... such a laudatory buzzing of tongues and such a cordial shaking of hands that one might have easily mistaken the meeting for a successful political rally or a religious revival. The Youngest and Prettiest Trustee fluttered about him, chirping ecstatic expletives, while the Disagreeable Trustee watched ...
— The Primrose Ring • Ruth Sawyer
... Anna," said the old woman; "little girls can't study in the woods, with the birds singing and the grasshoppers chirping around them. Better attend ...
— Parker's Second Reader • Richard G. Parker
... The hen, in an accidental perambulation round a spacious room, accompanied by an only chicken, the sole surviving offspring of a numerous brood, was roused to madness by an unprovoked attack made by a voracious cowardly rat on her unsuspecting chirping companion. The shrieks of the beloved captive, while being dragged away by the enemy, excited every maternal feeling in the affectionate bosom of the feathered dame; she flew at the corner whence the alarm arose, seized the lurking enemy by the neck, writhed ...
— A Hundred Anecdotes of Animals • Percy J. Billinghurst
... While she waited, tapping a long, precise pencil-point on the desk-tablet, he half identified her with the fairy girl of his dreams. He imagined their eyes meeting with terrifying recognition; imagined touching her lips with frightened reverence and—She was chirping, "Any more, Mist' Babbitt?" He grunted, "That winds it up, I guess," and turned ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... inferior creatures; they understand magic and are possessed of much knowledge, and may assist the Tarahumares in making rain. In spring, the singing of the birds, the cooing of the dove, the croaking of the frog, the chirping of the cricket, all the sounds uttered by the denizens of the greensward, are to the Indian appeals to the deities for rain. For what other reason should they sing or call? For the strange behaviour of many animals in the early spring the Tarahumares ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz
... stillness of the autumn afternoon presently became almost oppressive to her. There was the far-off, sweet low murmur of a placid sea rolling in upon the base of the cliffs, the constant chirping of ground insects, and the occasional scurrying of a rabbit through the undergrowth. Once a great lean rat stole up from the ditch, and—horrible—ran across his body; but at the sound of her startled movement it paused, sat for a moment quite ...
— The New Tenant • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the spark of the town:—"Old crony, give me leave to be a little free with you: how can you bear to live in this nasty, dirty, melancholy hole here, with nothing but woods, and meadows, and mountains, and rivulets about you? Do not you prefer the conversation of the world to the chirping of birds, and the splendor of a court to the rude aspect of an uncultivated desert? Come, take my word for it, you will find it a change for the better. Never stand considering, but away this moment. Remember, we are not immortal, and ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... the great world. Never can I forget or describe the sensations of that moment; and, as promise rapidly culminated in performance,—as the eggs ceased to be eggs, and analyzed themselves into shattered shells and chirping chickens,—it seemed as if I had been transported back to the beginning of creation. Right before my eyes I saw, in my hands I held, the mystery of life. These eggs, that had been laid under my very eyes as it were, that I had my own self hunted and found and confiscated ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865 • Various
... superstitious person. I smile at those whimsical fancies which figure so conspicuously in many people's lives, such as the howling of dogs, the flickering of a candle, the arrangement of the grounds in a cup, the cracking of a mirror, the sudden stopping of the clock, the crowing of hens, the chirping of crickets, the hooting of an owl, the fall of a family portrait, the spilling of salt, a dream of the toothache, etc., etc., etc. If this particular cat had been black instead of tabby I should have regarded her ...
— The House - An Episode in the Lives of Reuben Baker, Astronomer, and of His Wife, Alice • Eugene Field
... absolute owner and disposer, you would perhaps realise, just as Tom did, how few there were that you would feel at all comfortable in being made over to. Tom saw abundance of men, great, burly, gruff men; little, chirping, dried men; long-favoured, lank, hard men; and every variety of stubbed-looking, common-place men, who pick up their fellow-men as one picks up chips, putting them into the fire or a basket with equal unconcern, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 455 - Volume 18, New Series, September 18, 1852 • Various
... loosed his grip of the sword, and the weapon, impelled by the force his arm had given it, flew from his hand, and falling upon the slippery ice skated along for many yards, making a noise like the chirping of a vast ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... responded, never leaving off smiling, 'I'm calling the little birds to sing.' He showed me his little cups. 'The chaffinches answer splendidly! You, at your tender years, take delight, no doubt, in the feathered songsters' notes! Listen, I beg; I will begin chirping, and they'll answer me directly—it's ...
— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... absurd optimist, and dreamed the donkiest of dreams. But, one day, as he carried the girl who was really a star through the spring lanes, a young man walked beside her, and though our donkey thought very little of his talk—in fact, felt his plain "hee-haw" to be worth all its smart chirping and twittering—yet it evidently pleased the maiden. It included quite a number of vowel-sounds—though, if the maiden had only known, it didn't mean half so much as ...
— Prose Fancies (Second Series) • Richard Le Gallienne
... great night. Its last hours before day were very dark and sorrowful, and by the time a golden gleam shot out of the east Quackalina knew that her first glance into the nest must bring her grief. The tiny restless things beneath her brooding wings were chirping in an unknown tongue. But their wiry Japanesy voices, that clinked together like little copper kettles, were very young and helpless, and Quackalina was a true mother-duck, and her heart went ...
— Solomon Crow's Christmas Pockets and Other Tales • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... a few steps, scattered the crumbs on the gravel, and clapped her hands. A loud chirping instantly succeeded, and numbers of birds shot down, hopping boldly about, and picking up the crumbs close to her feet. They were not a very distinguished company—finches, linnets, and a whole nation of sparrows. Sabine gently stepped back to the door, and said, "Can you see ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... by a little door, partly ajar; you ascended to the second storey without meeting anyone, and found a little chapel, through whose windows trees were visible, rocking to the chirping of ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... and herons, ibises and cranes, bitterns and lapwings, flew in dark flocks of manifold forms from all directions. Countless multitudes of waterfowl darkened the air as they alighted upon the uninhabited islands, and with ear-splitting croaking and cackling, whistling and chirping, clapping and twittering, dropped into the sedges and bushes which concealed their nests, while in the city the doors of the houses opened, and men, women, and children, after toiling at the loom and ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... at the Point but everything was quiet there, if the wildest chirping of birds, and fluttering of all feathered creatures be overlooked. Before the human world moves birds seem happiest, and surely wildest, so that on the dewy summer morning, Grace and Cleo stepped onto the Point and into a ...
— The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest - The Wig Wag Rescue • Lillian Garis
... Miss Bell. 'She's very good, and she's plucky. A fellow once followed her home from rehearsal, chirping to her all the way. She said nothing, but went right on into the livery stable next door. The fellow went in after her, and she snatched a carriage whip out of the office, and, oh my! didn't she thrash him? Nobody interfered, and she whipped him till her arm ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... poet was not abed—he was pacing the room in a fine burst of poetic fervor, composing "More Songs From Vagabondia." The songs told of purling streams, hedgerows, bathers lolling on the river-bank, nodding wild flowers, chirping pewees, and other such poetic properties, which the singer conjured forth from boyhood's days, long ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... sank, soon the sun would be up; the birds were moving as well as chirping, the east was brightening, and already the tip of Pilot Peak, far away behind us with Kit and Jed sleeping at his base, was touched with pink, when we ...
— Pluck on the Long Trail - Boy Scouts in the Rockies • Edwin L. Sabin
... on the FIFTH DAY of Creation that the silence was broken by the voice of birds. We are so accustomed to the various cries of animals, the buzzing of insects, and above all to the chirping and twittering and singing of birds, that we can hardly imagine what a voiceless world would ...
— Twilight And Dawn • Caroline Pridham
... music. Higher and ever higher rose the little sun-worshipper, pouring out his rapturous hymn to Apollo. Swallows, who but lately had crossed the battlefields of southern Europe, glided around Hatton Towers, describing mystic figures in the air, whilst the high feeble chirping of the younger generation sounded from the nests beneath the eaves. Amid the climbing roses bees were busy, their communal labours an object-lesson for self-seeking man; and almost at Mario's feet a company of ants swarmed over the yet writhing body ...
— The Orchard of Tears • Sax Rohmer
... town with that glittering cavalcade without saying good-by to any one, and though my patron was not a diplomaed doctor, as I found out, he was a man of excellent habits, and the whole company was made up of good straight boys, jolly chirping vagabonds like myself. It was delightful to bowl over the country in that way. I laughed all the time. Miles and miles of somber landscape were made bright with merry song, and when the sun shone and all the golden summer lay spread out before ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... know that I saw him," she said in a whisper, but her voice had the penetrating quality of the chirping of ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various
... thoughtfully at his cigar. The two, uncle and niece, were sitting on the wide verandah of Fernley House; it was a soft, fair June evening, and the fireflies were flitting through the trees, and one or two late birds were chirping drowsily. There were only the two of them at Fernley now, for one day, some two months ago, the beloved Aunt Faith had fallen quietly asleep, and passed in sleep away from age and weakness and weariness. Margaret missed her sadly indeed; but there was no bitterness ...
— Margaret Montfort • Laura E. Richards
... paper covers Fenitchka herself had written in big letters 'Gooseberry'; Nikolai Petrovitch was particularly fond of that preserve. On a long cord from the ceiling a cage hung with a short-tailed siskin in it; he was constantly chirping and hopping about, the cage was constantly shaking and swinging, while hempseeds fell with a light tap on to the floor. On the wall just above a small chest of drawers hung some rather bad photographs of Nikolai Petrovitch in various attitudes, taken by ...
— Fathers and Children • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... of confused, multitudinous chirping or twittering issued from them at intervals as long as they were moving; but sometimes they ceased from motion, and then all ...
— Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (Illustrated) • Edwin A. Abbott
... calculation and control. And by a pleasant compensation, our aesthetic life may become freer, more self-sufficing, more humbly happy in itself: and without trespassing in any way beyond the modesty of nature, we may consent to be like little children, chirping our human note; since the life of reason in us may well become science in its validity, whilst remaining poetry in ...
— Some Turns of Thought in Modern Philosophy - Five Essays • George Santayana
... with a start it was broad day. The birds must have finished their morning song, for there was only happy, comfortable chirping in the branches above her. She rose stiffly. Her legs, her whole body, ached; and her feet were burning and blistered. But ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... don't think of such a thing, he could not bear it. The least noise makes him worse, even the chirping of the birds and squirrels in the trees overhead, irritates him; and only an hour ago, I had to lead the goat and her kid farther away to tether them; for, at every bleat they made, he started nervously, and moaned," said Jane, who had great faith in quietness, ...
— The American Family Robinson - or, The Adventures of a Family lost in the Great Desert of the West • D. W. Belisle
... anecdotic. The last is perhaps what we look for; it is perhaps the more instructive. An old gentleman, well on in years, sits handsomely and naturally in the bow-window of his age, scanning experience with reverted eye; and, chirping and smiling, communicates the accidents and reads the lesson of his long career. Opinions are strengthened, indeed, but they are also weeded out in the course of years. What remains steadily present to the eye of the retired veteran in his hermitage, what still ministers to his content, what ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... that inadvertently passed too near him; never during the whole time had either bird been long absent, and both had been seen together daily at all hours. I made certain that they had not even begun to sit, and behold there were four fine young ones a full week old chirping in the nest! Clearly these birds are not close sitters down here; but I well remember a pair at Mussoorie, some 6000 feet above the level of the sea, the most exemplary parents, one or other being on the eggs at all hours of the day and night. The morning's sun ...
— The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 • Allan O. Hume
... he climbed came out delightfully in a garret musical with rain and the plaintive chirping of wet birds huddled under dripping eaves. Unlike the rooms he had left below it was swept and clean. There were trunks in one corner, a great many, and a cedar chest. There should be a cedar chest. It was ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... our domicile a domain—a kingdom. We should not care to be confined to it all the rest of our days. Seldom, indeed, do we leave our own door—yet call on us, and ten to one you hear us in winter chirping like a cricket, or in summer like a grasshopper. We have the whole range of the house to ourselves, and many an Excursion make we on the Crutch. Ascending and descending the wide-winding stair-cases, each broad step not above two inches high, we find ourselves on spacious landing-places ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... modern flimsy drawing-rooms was Miss Whichello's, but a dear, delightful, cosy room full of faded splendours and relics of the dead and gone so dearly beloved. From the yellow silk fire-screen swinging on a rosewood pole, to the drowsy old canary chirping feebly in his brass cage at the window, all was old-world and marvellously proper and genteel. Withal, a quiet, perfumed room, delightful to make love in, to the most beautiful woman in the world, as Captain George Pendle ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... bosom of that old cedar of Lebanon, Clara relented a little, and allowed Hepworth to kiss her hand. It was impossible to hold out longer, with all the leaves quivering in that soft air, and the little birds hiding away among them, chirping to each other, and setting a ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... the young grass was a bright green. The birds were beginning their chirping, although it was not yet light. As the dawn came, they saw the early morning mist sweeping over the mountain and forest near Arthur's city of Camelot. Sometimes the mist drew away and showed in the distance the towers ...
— King Arthur and His Knights • Maude L. Radford
... wan and pallid face, that now was low upon the horizon. In silent rivalry long and velvet-black shadows skulked across the ample breadths of dew-drenched grass. Somewhere a bird stirred on its unseen perch, chirping sleepily; and in the rapt silence the inconsiderable interruption ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... the Indians rose, and, standing close to the fire, bent in a very attentive attitude over the kettle; and, after listening a little while, took up one of the eggs and broke it, when out came a young gull with a monstrous head and no feathers, squeaking and chirping in a most indefatigable manner! "So much for our dinner!" thought I, as he threw the bird into the lake, and took out a handful of eggs, which all proved to be much in the same condition. The warmth of the water put life into the little birds, which, however, ...
— Hudson Bay • R.M. Ballantyne
... the principle of the tax, and the policy of its imposition, by those on whom its pressure falls heaviest, namely, the great capitalists and landed proprietors of the kingdom. "The grasshopper," said Mr Burke, "fills the whole field with the noise of its chirping, while the stately ox browses in silence." The clamour against the income-tax comes mainly from those who are unscathed by it; those who suffer most severely from it, suffer in silence. The inferior machinery ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... morning when Red awoke, arrows of gold were shooting through the holes in the old barn, and outside, the bird life, the twittering and chirping, the fluent whistle and the warble, the cackle and the pompous crow, ...
— Red Saunders • Henry Wallace Phillips
... immediately flew open, and out of it a surprizing Flight of Birds of various Colours. These, all amaz'd at their sudden Liberty, which I took to be the Emblem intended, hover'd a considerable space of time over and about their Place of Freedom, chirping, singing, and otherwise testifying their mighty Joy ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... thing that used to know your rap at the kitchen window, and come tripping out like a bird chirping in the night, and go linking down the lane ...
— Capt'n Davy's Honeymoon - 1893 • Hall Caine
... permanent residents, and some of them visitors from the far north, yet there is but one genuine snow bird, nursling of the snow, and that is the snow bunting, a bird that seems proper to this season, heralding the coming storm, sweeping by on bold and rapid wing, and calling and chirping as cheerily as the songsters of May. In its plumage it reflects the winter landscape,—an expanse of white surmounted or streaked with gray and brown; a field of snow with a line of woods or a tinge of stubble. It fits into the scene, ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... It caught a fly at every shot. A hedgehog trotted about in the dried, rustling beech leaves. Dragonflies darted about with glittering wings. The people sat down around the luncheon-baskets. The piping, chirping crickets tried to make their ...
— Invisible Links • Selma Lagerlof
... joined her, it was not long till we had the tarred cloth off, and, through the interstices of the iron bucket, the little blue and yellow flames began chirping and chattering. But as I pulled the basket up to the height of its iron crane, the wind of the night sent the fire off with a mighty roar. The tops of the nearer trees stood out, every leaf hard and distinct, but the main body of the woods all about Marnhoul remained dark ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... the turf of good old Garrard, Now in sight, perchance in hearing, Of the birds and beasts and reptiles, Roaming wild and roaming lonely, In the groves of fair Lancaster. Now in sight, perchance in hearing Of the melancholy plover, Of the bluebird's thrilling whistle, Of the redbird's gentle chirping, Of the blackbird's noisy chatter, Of the whippoorwill's soft pleading, And the ringdove's tender cooing. All these sounds, I trow, were welcome, To the pioneer hunter, Daniel Boone, the practiced hunter. On the plains and hills I'm singing, He has pitched his tent at nightfall, And has ...
— The Song of Lancaster, Kentucky - to the statesmen, soldiers, and citizens of Garrard County. • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... they thought she was going to die after the winter was gone. And she kept wishing the birds would come back, 'cause she thought she'd die before they comed. But at last one morning she heard a little squeaking—no I don't mean squeaking—I mean chirping, just outside her window, and she called the servants, and told them she was sure her bird had come back, and they must catch it. And her nurse catched it some way, and brought it to her, and what do you think? when she looked under its wing, there was the weeny ribbon she ...
— The Boys and I • Mrs. Molesworth
... or hairy men are common in the Archipelago, as in many other regions. Kazwini tells of the hairy little men that are found in Ramni (Sumatra) with a language like birds' chirping. Marsden was told of hairy people called Orang Gugu in the interior of the Island, who differed little, except in the use of speech, from the Orang utang. Since his time a French writer, giving the same name and same description, declares that he saw "a group" of these hairy people ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... bird not yet fledged, that hath hopped out of his nest to be chirping on a hedge, and will be straggling abroad at what peril soever. His backwardness in the university hath set him thus forward; for had he not truanted there, he had not been so hasty a divine. His small standing, and time, ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various
... complex combinations, and with half-imitations, as of the Blue-Bird, so that it seemed almost impossible to doubt that there was some specific meaning, to him and his peers, in this endless vocabulary. Yet other birds, as quick-witted as the Robins, possess but one or two chirping notes, to which they seem unable to give more than the very ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... night. She used to say I was like a bird, having something birdlike in my small dark head and the way I held it up. Certainly I remember myself as a swift little thing, always darting to and fro on tiptoe, and chirping about our ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... please, aunty," I called back, gathering up the reins, chirping to Fan, and taking the road to the Curtis girls' house. Certainly I had no time to ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... light is seen to fall on Florence, kneeling at the altar with her timid head bowed down. The morning luminary is built out, and don't shine there. There is a meagre tree outside, where the sparrows are chirping a little; and there is a blackbird in an eyelet-hole of sun in a dyer's garret, over against the window, who whistles loudly whilst the service is performing; and there is the man with the wooden leg stumping away. The amens of the dusty clerk appear, like Macbeth's, ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... extremity rises the massive light-house tower, 170 feet high. The walls toward the sea were covered with companies of idle anglers, fishing with cane rods of enormous length. On the open, waste spaces between the bastions, boys had spread their limed cords to catch singing birds, with chirping decoys placed here and there in wicker cages. Numbers of boatmen and peasants, in their brown jackets, studded with tags and bugles, and those round black caps which resemble smashed bandboxes, loitered about the walls or lounged on the ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor |
