Free TranslationFree Translation
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Moan   /moʊn/   Listen
Moan

verb
(past & past part. moaned; pres. part. moaning)
1.
Indicate pain, discomfort, or displeasure.  Synonym: groan.  "The ancient door soughed when opened"



Related search:



WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Moan" Quotes from Famous Books



... wide-awake, revolver in hand. It was Lockhart who spoke. We all strained our ears to listen. There was nothing to be heard but the moan of the wind and the dash ...
— Blindfolded • Earle Ashley Walcott

... only entrance. The girl was ahead of him and with a warning cry he swung the muzzle of his gun upward. In a moment she had pushed the bolt that locked the room from the inside, and had leaped back to him, her face white, her breath breaking in fear. She spoke no word, but with a moan of terror caught him by the arm and pulled him past the light and beyond the thick curtain that had hidden her when he had entered the room a few minutes before. They were in a second room, palely lighted by a mass of coals gleaming ...
— The Danger Trail • James Oliver Curwood

... steps of the portico, a performer on the Alpine horn was bellowing his modulated moan, that monotonous ranz des vaches on three notes, with which the Rigi-Kulm is wont to waken the worshippers of the sun and announce to them the rising ...
— Tartarin On The Alps • Alphonse Daudet

... but to the austere face of the old hunchback. "'What am I to do with the child?' I asked, and he stepped right out of the circus crowd, and answered 'Give me the child. I like children'—" An inarticulate moan followed, and then she repeated clearly and slowly. "Just like that—nothing more—'Give me the child. I like children.' That was the first time I ever saw him. He had come to see some of the people in the circus, and ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow

... benignant look Nature changes at that lorn season when, With tresses drooping o'er her sable stole, She yearly mourns the mortal doom of man, Her noblest work! So Israel's virgins erst With annual moan upon the mountains ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... still more strongly the other weight, and suddenly the bullfinch perched on the top of the clock began to flap its wings and pour forth one of its melodies. The bird, which had been artistically made, but was, unfortunately, out of order, began to moan and whistle, ever worse and worse. The guests burst out laughing; the Chamberlain had to break off again. "My dear Warden," he cried, "or rather screech owl,95 if you value your beak, ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz

... her a certain hardening of heart, and she was beginning to doubt the goodness of God. At first, most truly she had scarcely thought of herself at all, but it was impossible as the days went on for her not to make a moan over her own altered life. The path before her looked very dark, and Charlotte's feet had hitherto been unaccustomed to gloom. She was looking forward to the death, the inevitable and certainly approaching death of her father. That was bad, that was dreadful; but bad and dreadful ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade

... this the only effect 'Matilda's moan' has produced upon you? I expected your taste for grief would have been highly gratified by ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier

... head averted, and the nurse hurried into the room. The Girl on the bed was beginning to toss, moan, and mutter. Skilful hands straightened her, arranged the covers, and the doctor was called. In the living-room the Harvester paced in misery too deep for consecutive thought. As consciousness returned, the Girl ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter

... never sin and want and woe this earth will leave, And the bells but mock the wailing round, they sing so cheery. How long, O Lord! how long before Thou come again? Still in cellar, and in garret, and on moorland dreary The orphans moan, and widows weep, and poor men toil in vain, Till earth is full of hope deferred, though ...
— Christmas Entertainments • Alice Maude Kellogg

... A feeble moan rose from under the stones. A human limb was uncovered. The girl threw herself on the place, shrieking her father's name. Raphael put her gently back and exerting his whole strength, drew out of the ruins a stalwart elderly man, in the dress of ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley

... marquise heard her father moan; then she heard groans. At last, unable to endure his sufferings, he called out to his daughter. The marquise went to him. But now her face showed signs of the liveliest anxiety, and it was for M. d'Aubray to try to reassure her ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... within and from the action of the air outside; and by these signs it is not absurd to imagine that the deity may forewarn us. It may happen, also, that images and statues may sometimes make a noise not unlike that of a moan or groan, through a rupture or violent internal separation of the parts; but that an articulate voice, and such express words, and language so clear and exact and elaborate, should proceed from ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... oreads, 'who love to scale the most inaccessible tops of all uprightest rocks,' hurry down from the song of their wind-courting pines; while the dryads bend from the branches of the meeting trees, and the rivers moan for white Procris, ...
— Intentions • Oscar Wilde

... quickest way and best To gain the subject of my moan; We've neither spinsters nor relics out West— These do I ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field

... away into the forest toward the red west, its light staining his face like blood. The air of confidence with which he now strode along showed that he was on familiar ground; he had recovered his bearings. The dead on his right and on his left were unregarded as he passed. An occasional low moan from some sorely-stricken wretch whom the relief-parties had not reached, and who would have to pass a comfortless night beneath the stars with his thirst to keep him company, was equally unheeded. ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce

... though it seemed, the elephant actually regained his feet. But even as he did so the shattered fore-legs crumpled up again, and with a low muttering moan of pain he went down. A moment later Jack fired, twice, placing each bullet behind the ...
— The Rogue Elephant - The Boys' Big Game Series • Elliott Whitney

... honour, Haste, hide thy tears and thee in shades of alder! Haste to the still, the peace-accustom'd valley, Where lazy herdsmen dance amid the clover. There wet each leaf which soft the west wind kisses, Each plant which breathes around voluptuous odours, With tears! There sigh and moan, and the tired peasant Shall hear thee, and, behind his ploughshare resting, Shall wonder at thy grief, and ...
— George Borrow - The Man and His Books • Edward Thomas

... flows out of the Lake, As through the glen it rambles, Repeats a moan o'er moss and stone, For those seven lovely Campbells. Seven little Islands, green and bare, 60 Have risen from out the deep: The Fishers say, those Sisters fair By Faeries are all buried there, And there together sleep. Sing, mournfully, ...
— Poems In Two Volumes, Vol. 1 • William Wordsworth

... huddled in a corner on a little filthy straw, their sole covering being what seemed a piece of ragged horsecloth; their miserable shriveled limbs were hanging about as if they did not belong to their bodies. He approached them in breathless horror, and found by a slow whining moan that they were alive—four children, a woman, and what had once been a man—all in fever. Mr. Cummins met other cases as fearful, more especially one similar to that described by the writer quoted above, where a corpse ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke

... of fire from a rifle. Instantly there followed a fusillade. Flash after flash lit up the darkness. Staccato oaths, cries, a moan of pain, the trampling of frightened horses, filled ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine

... strangers alone, She hears in her anguish his piteous moan, As he eagerly listens—but listens in vain, To catch the loved tones of his mother again! The curse of the broken in spirit shall fall On the wretch who hath mingled this wormwood and gall, And his gain like a mildew shall blight and destroy, Who hath torn from his ...
— The Anti-Slavery Harp • Various

... farce of La Cibot's illness and recovery. Greed of every kind, ambition of every nature, is not easy to hide. The doctor examined his patient, found that every organ was sound and healthy, admired the regularity of her pulse and the perfect ease of her movements; and as she continued to moan aloud, he saw that for some reason she found it convenient to lie at Death's door. The speedy cure of a serious imaginary disease was sure to cause a sensation in the neighborhood; the doctor would be talked about. He ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac

... the passage. As soon as he was inside, a sound reached his ears at which his heart sickened and turned faint. No words can describe it in all the horror of its helplessness—it was the moan of pain from a dumb ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins

... said he, "to avoid a row. They would moan and wail and make such a fuss, if they knew they ...
— Step by Step - or, Tidy's Way to Freedom • The American Tract Society

... and wove, in love or strife, In mirth or pain, the mottled web of life But when at last came upward from the street Tinkle of bell and tread of measured feet, The sick man started, strove to rise in vain, Sinking back heavily with a moan of pain. And the monk said, "'T is but the Brotherhood Of Mercy going on some errand good Their black masks by the palace-wall I see." Piero answered faintly, "Woe is me! This day for the first time in forty ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... silent, not caring to break in upon her happy delirium. 'But I am not there,' she whispered, almost in a moan. 'Why should a dog be there and not I?' Still getting no word from me, she turned her eyes full on mine and repeated the question imperatively, almost indignantly. 'Why should it be a dog?—and not I, over whom you ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... sigh and moan, and whirl the falling snow in the darkness as they liked; waters congeal under the fingers of the frost king, closing the mouth of innumerable creeks, rivers, and bays; but here under cover we had ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan

... pain.] Lamentation. — N. lament, lamentation; wail, complaint, plaint, murmur, mutter, grumble, groan, moan, whine, whimper, sob, sigh, suspiration, heaving, deep sigh. cry &c. (vociferation) 411; scream, howl; outcry, wail of woe, ululation; frown, scowl. tear; weeping &c. v.; flood of tears, fit of crying, lacrimation, lachrymation[obs3], melting mood, weeping and gnashing of teeth. plaintiveness ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget

... a well of some sort just back of that shack," remarked Jack as if he too, shared in this moan over the absence of drinking water. "When we go back we'll try and snatch a drink apiece so as to take the rusty feeling out of our throats. Until then we'll have to put up with ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb

... without the ability to frame words. Then a feeble moan escaped him. He threw up his hands and his head fell back. The ghastliness of his face spread almost to his lips, and he sank back among the pillows. Laverick strode across the room to ...
— Havoc • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... the clash of armour and tramp of feet, beneath the creak and rumble of the long oars, came yet another sound, rising and falling yet never ceasing, a dull, low sound the like of which you shall sometimes hear among trees when the wind is high—the deep, sobbing moan that was the voice of our anguish as we poor wretches urged the great "Esmeralda" galleass ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol

... small boys as he slunk through byways of the big bazaar. A woman who had smiled at him but a day ago now emptied unseemly things on him from an upper story when he went to moan beneath her window. He decided to include that woman in his vengeance, too, if possible, but not to miss Ranjoor Singh on her account; there was not room for him and Ranjoor Singh on one rain- pelted earth, but, if needs must, the woman might wait ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy

... our Lady make we our moan, That she may pray to her dear Son, That we may to His bliss ...
— Our Lady Saint Mary • J. G. H. Barry

... so a low moan reached my ear. It came from the further end of the room. Again I held the match aloft; this time to discover a huddled-up figure in the corner opposite the door. One glance at it told me that it was none other than my young friend the Marquis of ...
— A Bid for Fortune - or Dr. Nikola's Vendetta • Guy Boothby

... never a moan, merely a little sigh now and then, but always that wonderful patience that seemed to me not without a touch ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton

... —like the moan of the sea in my heart, and it will not be still. Heart, body, and soul will call to you, Ruth, so long as the breath is in my body. I have not the courage to be your friend. I swear, with all the strength I have left, never to see you nor write you again. ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice

... low and solemn tone, Which, though all wings of all the winds seemed furled, Nor even the zephyr's fairy flute is blown, Makes thus forever its mysterious moan From out the whispering pine-tops' ...
— Songs from the Southland • Various

... had little time to think of these; for out of the only dark corner in the room came a white figure, flitting across the chaos of lights, bedewed, besprinkled, bespattered, as she passed, with their multitudinous colours. I was speechless, motionless, with something far beyond joy. With a low moan of delight, Lady Alice sank into my arms. Then, looking up, with a light laugh—"The scales are turned, dear," she said. "You are in my power now; I brought you here. I thought I could, and I tried, for I wanted so much to see you—and you are come." She led me across ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald

... moan as if she were still weeping. Her lips parted in desperate surrender. Her kiss took the ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht

... for concern. Once back at the hotel, with Albert's room locked off, and once more thrown open to the impersonal feet of transiency, she would only moan and wind her hands and go off into the light states ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst

... fierce flow Of fourteen hundred years has whelmed not thee! Still art thou singing, lavrock of her morn, Singing to heaven in that first golden glow, Singing above her mountains and her sea! Not older yet are grown Thy four winds in their moan For Urien. Still thy charlock blooms in ...
— The Lord of Misrule - And Other Poems • Alfred Noyes

... Did he moan an' sigh? Did he set an' cry An' cuss the harricane sweepin' by? Did he grieve that his old friends failed to call When the earthquake come and swallered all? Never a word o' blame he said, With all them troubles on top his head! Not him! He climbed on top o' the hill Whar stan'in' room wuz left ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street

... it was done, and the Supreme Question shall be spared them. (The acolytes only answer by moans.) Strange! They have done strangely. (To acolytes.) Why has your priest spoken falsely? (The acolytes only moan.) Why has he spoken falsely in the name of the gods? (The acolytes moan on.) Be silent! Be silent! May I not question whom I will? (To himself). They prophesied falsely in ...
— Plays of Near & Far • Lord Dunsany

... hundred now to get," remarked the count, who considered this moan, addressed to Pere Leger, a sort of letter of credit drawn ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac

... rivulets hurrying thro' the lawn, The moan of doves in immemorial elms, And murmuring ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton

... spoke peremptorily, for this special One Three-hundredth was her daily, almost hourly, thorn in the flesh. The table stopped eating to listen. There was a low moan for answer, but the head was not lifted. Number 206 took this opportunity to give her a dig in the ribs, and Number 205 crowded her in turn. To their ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller

... negress that resembled a human cry of grief less than it did the inarticulate moan of an animal in mortal pain. Then it stopped suddenly, strangled by that dull weight of usage beneath which the primal impulse in her was crushed back into silence. Instinctively, as if in obedience to some reflex action, she reached out and took ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow

... Before her stood, in the garb of a Benedictine monk, Sir Andrew Fleming, her husband. For a second she looked at him imploringly; then, with fearful strength, she rose from her recumbent position, and clasping her hands as if in the act of prayer, sank down upon her knees at his feet. A low moan escaped from her lips. She fell forward on the ground, and the spirit departed for ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... on the holy hearth, The lares and lemures moan with midnight plaint; In urns and altars round A drear and dying sound Affrights the flamens at their service quaint; And the chill marble seems to sweat, While each peculiar power forgoes his ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman

... O glory in the dust! Strong walls of faith, most basely overthrown! The crawling flames, like adders glistening Ate the white fabric of this lovely thing. Now from its soul arose a piteous moan. The soul that always loved the just and fair. Granite and marble loud their woe confessed, The silver monstrances that Pope has blessed. The chalices and lamps and crosiers rare Were seared and twisted by a flaming-breath; The horror everywhere did rage and swell, ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... to and beginning to stare wildly about her. A glass of water helped to revive her. She staggered across the hall, and then, with a moan of misery and horror at the sight, threw herself upon her knees, not beside the sofa where Burnham lay gasping, but on the floor where lay our poor old corporal. In an instant she had his head in her lap and was crooning over the senseless ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... Iseult of Brittany, knows that his death-longing is fulfilled, and that she, his "other" Iseult, has come to him at last—have they not the very echo in them of what such weariness feels when, only not too late, the impossible happens? Little he cares for the rain beating on the roof, or the moan of the wind in the chimney, or the shadows on that tapestried wall! He listens—his ...
— Visions and Revisions - A Book of Literary Devotions • John Cowper Powys

... Lambeth through Southwark and over London Bridge. Burnet preached the funeral sermon. His kind and honest heart was overcome by so many tender recollections that, in the midst of his discourse, he paused and burst into tears, while a loud moan of sorrow rose from the whole auditory. The Queen could not speak of her favourite instructor without weeping. Even William was visibly moved. "I have lost," he said, "the best friend that I ever had, and the best man that I ever knew." The only Englishman who is mentioned ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... away and took hope with him, disdain, despair and frenzy gushed from the thief's boiling bosom in one wild moan; and with that moan he dashed himself on his face on the floor, though it was as hard as ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade

... heroicks, and Lady Lambert and Lady Desborough represented as going to meeting, their large Bibles carried before them by their pages, and falling in love with two banished cavaliers by the way. The voice in which he shrieked out such words was powerfully horrible, but it was like the moan of an infant compared to the voice which took up and reechoed the cry, in a tone that made the building shake. It was the voice of a maniac, who had lost her husband, children, subsistence, and finally her reason, in the dreadful ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... this unnerved her again, and, with a moan of pain, she sank upon her knees and bowed her ...
— The Masked Bridal • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... long when he was startled by a sound close at hand; a sigh, much deeper than his own, and a half-suppressed moan—what ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various

... morning—it must have been: the cold dim dawn of to-day. Where have I been," he vaguely wailed, "where have I been?" He felt her hold him close, and it was as if this helped him now to make in all security his mild moan. "What a ...
— The Jolly Corner • Henry James

... night she continued insensible, and the morning brought no change. Who she was they could not tell, but as Isabel sat watching her through the long night, she felt that she had seen her before, but where she could not recall. Late in the afternoon consciousness returned, and with a feeble moan she opened her eyes. "Where am I," she asked, "Oh, where is my little Izzie?" Isabel's only answer was a kiss. "Don't say it," she cried, grasping Isabel's hand convulsively, "O, not that, not that! but I see it is so—I see it in your ...
— Isabel Leicester - A Romance • Clotilda Jennings

... frosty-clear Thy mocking laughter thrills the atmosphere, And drifting on its current calls the rook To other lands. As one who wades, alone, Deep in the dusk, and hears the minor talk Of distant melody, and finds the tone, In some wierd way compelling him to stalk The paths of childhood over,—so I moan, And like a ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley

... floor, beginning to cry again. It was like listening to the moan of a damned soul, and Jurgis could not stand it. He smote his fist upon the table by his side, and shouted again at her, ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair

... more, until something else breaks loose. It's sort of a cross between the dyin' moan of a gyastacutus and the whine of a subway express ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford

... wounded by life, like himself, seeking consolation with his head under his wing, sadly huddled up on his perch, dreaming of wild flights into the light. A feeling that was something akin to instinctive confidence brought the boy closer to him: he felt the attraction of the silent soul, which made no moan and used no harsh words, a soul wherein he could take shelter from the brutality of the streets; and the room, thronged with books, filled with bookcases wherein there slumbered the dreams of the ages, filled him with an almost religious awe. He made ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland

... age, in its moments of highest reflection, that ever gave more than a passing bow to optimism. Even Christianity, starting out as "glad tidings," has had to take on protective coloration to survive, and today its chief professors moan and blubber like Johann in Herod's rain-barrel. The sanctified are few and far between. The vast majority of us must suffer in hell, just as we suffer on earth. The divine grace, so omnipotent to save, is withheld ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken

... as I sing for the story land Across the Syrian sea. The odorous winds from the musky sand Were breaths of life to me. They play with the plumes of the whispering palm For me, alas! no more; Nor more does the Nile in the moonlit calm Moan ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace

... came to his ear through the night a strange something. Whence or what it was he could not even conjecture. Was it a moan of the river from below? Was it a lost music-tone that had wandered from afar and grown faint? Was it one of those mysterious sounds he had read of as born in the air itself, and not yet explained of science? ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald

... I shall see that face no more; But pine in absence, and till death adore. When with cold dew my fainting brow is hung, And my eyes darken, from my falt'ring tongue Her name will tremble in a feeble moan, And love with fate divide my ...
— The Revenge - A Tragedy • Edward Young

... Grey, in her dowager seclusion at Brighton, contented herself with a general moan on the decadence of society, and the levelling up that made such an affair possible. She had been meditating a visit to Rockquay, to see her dear Lilias (who, by the bye, had run down to her at Brighton for a day out of the stay in London), but now ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge

... sun and rain And dicing time for gladness calls a moan ... These purblind Doomsters had as readily thrown Blisses about my ...
— Aspects of Literature • J. Middleton Murry

... gives to us his joy, That our grief He may destroy: Till our grief is fled an gone He doth sit by us and moan. ...
— Poems of William Blake • William Blake

... to enjoy the luxury of listening, amid the darkness, to the clashing rain and the roar of the wind high among the cliffs, or to detect the brushing sound of hasty footsteps in the wild rustle of the heath, or the moan of unhappy spirits in the low roar of the distant sea. Or, mayhap,—again to borrow from the poet,—as midnight ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller

... Danvers, informs me that "the Acadian Owl has another note, which we frequently hear in the autumn, after the breeding season is over. The parent birds, then accompanied by their young, while hunting their prey during a bright moonlight night, utter a peculiar note, resembling a suppressed moan or a low whistle. The little Acadian, to avoid the annoyance of the birds he would meet by day, and the blinding light of the sun, retires in the morning, his feathers wet with dew and rumpled by the hard struggles he has encountered in ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various

... soldiers were only a herd of cattle. They rode on to the next crossing, we following as we conveniently could. Each poor slave was busy with his thoughts and his prayers. Now and then one would hear a moan or a word from some of the party. All were scared, even though the soldiers were with us. We came to the next cross road, and passed that safely. Our fear was that the McGees might get the neighborhood to join them and pursue us, or send the home guards after us; ...
— Thirty Years a Slave • Louis Hughes

... the dead was a white-haired man. He glanced now at the one now at the other of the departed, and from time to time would press his clenched hands to his lips and moan softly like ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai

... give me the full half, I'll tell them all,' said the voice of the captain's brother; but almost as he spoke, his antagonist threw him heavily back. I knew it was upon poor Williams, for a low moan reached my ear, and I sprang forward just in time to intercept the victor, who stumbled over me as he rushed out, and a heavy bag rolled from him. The next moment the other was at my side, and I stood face to face with the ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444 - Volume 18, New Series, July 3, 1852 • Various

... circumstances, a child, as young as myself, feels no anxieties. Looking upon medical men as people privileged, and naturally commissioned, to make war upon pain and sickness, I never had a misgiving about the result. I grieved, indeed, that my sister should lie in bed; I grieved still more to hear her moan. But all this appeared to me no more than as a night of trouble, on which the dawn would soon arise. O moment of darkness and delirium, when the elder nurse awakened me from that delusion, and ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... expressing his piteous moan, Fair Ruth came unto him, and made herself known; He started to see her, but seemed not coy, Said he, 'Now my sorrows are ...
— Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of England • Robert Bell

... eye she would have ended a misspent life, was sorry for the trouble she was giving, and would like a military funeral. A few minutes later I violently exploded an air-filled paper bag on the landing, and gave a stage moan that could have been heard in the cellars. Then I pursued my original intention and went to bed. The noise those people made in forcing open the good lady's door was positively indecorous; she resisted gallantly, but ...
— Reginald • Saki

... bulletin was shouted back over the water in answer to the anxious inquiries of Marrows, the wife would clasp her fingers the tighter. She made no moan or outburst. Abram would blame her and say it was her fault,—everything was her fault ...
— The Veiled Lady - and Other Men and Women • F. Hopkinson Smith

... never saw a man's face change as the face of Angus Drummond changed then. It was plainly to be read there that he had never for a moment understood at what cost he had been purchased. A low moan of intense sorrow broke from him, and he hid ...
— Out in the Forty-Five - Duncan Keith's Vow • Emily Sarah Holt

... middle of the room. The wooden floor was splintered around the edges of the opening and several pieces of the chemical feed-line equipment lay close to the edge, with trailing lines leading down into the hole. They heard a low moan and rushed up to the hole, flashing their ...
— On the Trail of the Space Pirates • Carey Rockwell

... thoughts should in thy visage shine, And if that aught mischanced thou should'st not moan Nor bear the burthen of thy griefs alone; No, I would have my share ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various

... pilgrim feet, Who watch'd thee in thy sleep, who moan'd if miss'd, And sprung with such delight his Lord to greet, Imbu'd with death the hand he oft ...
— Poems • Sir John Carr

... solace could be found in the mere proximity of a man who did not love her, who had never loved her? The child was not enough; its fatherless estate enhanced the misery of her own solitude. When the leaves fell, and the sky darkened, and the long London winter gloomed before her, she sank with a moan of despair. ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing

... Bellows, and it was only necessary to come there on a March or November night to discover the forcible reasons for that name. On the present heated afternoon, when no perceptible wind was blowing, the trees kept up a perpetual moan which one could hardly believe to be caused ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy

... the nightness of a wood and the very fosterling of gloom; nor could the wind afflict his ear or his heart. There was no note in its orchestra that he had not brooded on and become, which becoming is magic. The long-drawn moan of it; the thrilling whisper and hush; the shrill, sweet whistle, so thin it can scarcely be heard, and is taken more by the nerves than by the ear; the screech, sudden as a devil's yell and loud as ten thunders; the cry as of one who flies ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • James Stephens

... human happiness to brighten the grey fabric of them. So it seemed to Will, and his temper chimed with the rough night. The wind howled and growled down the chimney, uttered many a sudden yell and ghostly moan, struck with claws invisible at the glowing heart of the peat fire, and sent red sparks dancing from a ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts

... saddest notes of woe, even the appalling shriek of despair, are softened, as it were, by the tempering dews of this visionary region, ere they fall upon the heart. Else how could we stand the smothered moan of Desdemona, or the fiendish adjuration of Lady Macbeth,—more frightful even than the after-deed of her husband,—or look upon the agony of the wretched Judas, in the terrible picture of Rembrandt, when he returns the purchase of blood to the impenetrable Sanhedrim? Ay, how could we ever ...
— Lectures on Art • Washington Allston

... beheld the deathly face and motionless form, stern as he was, he was greatly shocked. His heavy tread caused a moan, and when he said "What, Perry, how now?" there was a painful shrinking and twitching, which the surgeon greeted as evidence of returning animation, but which made him almost drag the Major out of the room for fear of ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge

... examined quaint denizens of the shallow water until her gloves were spoilt. We sprang from rock to rock and evaded the onrush of the foaming waves. We made aqueducts for inter-communication between deep pools. We basked in the sunshine, and listened to the deep moan of the sounding sea, and the solemn murmur of the shells. We drank in the deep breath of the ocean, and for a brief space we ...
— The Crack of Doom • Robert Cromie

... my reign, retiring Cynthia cry'd; Not till he left my breast, Tibullus dy'd. Forbear, said Nemesis, my loss to moan, The fainting trembling hand ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson

... coat, vest, all to shelter Sidney; and he felt a kind of strange pleasure through the dark, even to hear Sidney's voice wail and moan. But that voice grew more languid and faint—it ceased—Sidney's weight hung ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 2 • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... tears and howls and grimaces and clenchings of palms and beatings of the breast. She was lapped in a great ocean of sound that broke upon her consciousness like the waves upon a beach, now with a cooing murmur, now with a majestic crash, followed by a long receding moan. She lost herself in the roar, in its barren sensuousness, while the leaden sky grew duskier and the twilight crept on, and the awful hour drew nigh when God would seal what He had written, and the annual scrolls of destiny would be ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... limb, which lay now exposed in all the horrors of its inflammation. . . . The next instant there was a tense tightening of the muscles of the man on the table. There was a sigh of deep, intaken breath, followed, however, by no more than a faint moan as the knife went at ...
— The Purchase Price • Emerson Hough

... his comrade through the silent places, lying beside him under the serene luminous light of the stars, Cameron began to feel the haunting presence of invisible things that were real to him—phantoms whispering peace. In the moan of the cool wind, in the silken seep of sifting sand, in the distant rumble of a slipping ledge, in the faint rush of a shooting star he heard these phantoms of peace coming with whispers of the long pain of men at the last made endurable. ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey

... not come before. It burst forth now, hysterically, gaspingly, sounding more like a moan than the cry of a man pleading for ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer

... hear'st the wail of captives crushed and prone, And sett'st no sign in heaven! Shall naught atone For their wild pangs whose tale is yet scarce told, Women by uttermost woe made deadly bold, In the far dungeon's night that hid their moan? Why waits Thy shattering arm, nor smites this Power Whose beak and talons rend the unshielded breast, Whose wings shed terror and a plague of gloom, Whose ravin is the hearts of the oppressed; Whose brood are hell-births—Hate that bides its hour, Wrath, and a people's curse ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson

... I shall lie, low, deep, a-cold, And never hear him tread: Whether he weep, or sigh, or moan, I shall be passive as a stone, He living, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 439 - Volume 17, New Series, May 29, 1852 • Various

... door several times in the course of the evening, as if she expected to hear a plaintive moan behind it. But the room remained perfectly still; and accordingly, the last thing before retiring to her own couch, she applied for admittance. Catherine was sitting up, and had a book that she pretended to be reading. She had no wish to go to bed, ...
— Washington Square • Henry James

... given a little strangled cry, half-sob, half-moan, like some animal in mortal pain; for the moment she saw the world red; hardly knowing what she did, she lifted her hand and struck Micky across his ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres

... by night Through the moonless air on a courser white! Over the dreaming earth I fly, Here and there—at my fantasy! My frame is withered, my visage old, My locks are frore, and my bones ice cold. The wolf will howl as I pass his lair, The ban-dog moan, and the screech-owl stare. For breath, at my coming, the sleeper strains, And the freezing current forsakes his veins! Vainly for pity the wretch may sue— Merciless Mara no prayers subdue! To his couch I flit— ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth

... her grief stolidly. It was not in her to cry out or moan, but she felt her loss and sought to explain the strange ending to ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock

... is Cadwallo's tongue That hush'd the stormy main; Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed: Mountains! ye moan in vain Modrid, whose magic song Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-topp'd head. On dreary Arvon's shore[4] they lie, Smear'd with gore and ghastly pale; Far, far aloof the affrighted ravens sail; The famish'd eagle screams and passes by. Dear lost companions of my tuneful ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett

... but though I tried, I could not warm her little hands again: And so there in the icy dark she died. . . . The dawn came groping in with fingers gray And touched me, sitting silent as a stone; I kissed those piteous lips, as cold as clay— I did not cry, I did not even moan. At last I rose, groped down the narrow stair; An evil fog was oozing from the sky; Half-crazed I stumbled on, I knew not where, Like phantoms were the folks that passed me by. How long I wandered thus I do not know, But suddenly I ...
— Ballads of a Bohemian • Robert W. Service

... day and night! O day and night! the scene surrounding Grows dim and all unreal beneath the sunset glow; And all the heat and rage pass into peace abounding, I moan, I fear no more, but wait, while still tears flow. The warm sweet airs scarce move the flowerets slender, A pause and hush have settled on the sea, A bird trills forth its love-song low and tender: O bird rejoice! thy love and thou art free- ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand

... once more from long months of sleep, to find herself in a new home. For she had grown to be silently afraid of the old house, with the great chimney-stacks like hollowed towers within it, made, it seemed, for the wind to moan in; its deep embrasures and panelling, that harbored inexplicable sounds; its ancient boards that creaked all night as if with the tread of mysterious feet. Awake in the dark hours, she fancied there were really footsteps, really knockings, movements, ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods

... moan, and strove to unloose his burden from his back, behold another man came up to him, who also bare his burden upon his back; but, though it seemed larger and heavier than his fellow's, he wore a smiling countenance, and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various

... advocate; and the gown was partially withdrawn from the corpse by one of the spectators, and Claude with his male companions gazed upon it aghast, whilst Amanda turning away in terror and uttering a feeble moan, hid her face in the ...
— The Advocate • Charles Heavysege

... that the storm was longer making its appearance than it would have been had we been a swift clipper ship running down the Indian Ocean. For two days we were kept in suspense; but on the second night the gloom began to deepen, the wind to moan, and a very uncomfortable "jobble" of a sea got up. Extra "gaskets" were put upon the sails, and everything movable about the decks was made as secure as it could be. Only the two close-reefed topsails and two storm stay-sails were carried, so that we were in excellent trim for fighting ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen

... the funeral had noted her extreme pallor, but no one dreamed of the tremendous will power by which she had maintained her customary haughty bearing. When all had gone, she rose and attempted to go to her room, but in the hall she staggered helplessly and, with a low moan, sank unconscious to the floor. The screams of the chambermaid, who had seen her fall, summoned to her assistance the other servants, who carried her to her room, where she slowly regained consciousness, opening her eyes with an expression ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour

... grounded. He had barely finished the third of the series of cigars, which, like milestones, marked the progress of his afternoon, when the door opened and young Oakes entered. Mr. Snyder could not repress a faint moan at the sight of him. One glance was enough to tell him that his worst ...
— Death At The Excelsior • P. G. Wodehouse

... the sharp crack of a revolver, and even as it spoke Maenck lunged awkwardly forward, stumbled, and collapsed at Leopold's feet. With a moan the king shrank back from the grisly thing that touched his boot, and then two men were in the center of the room, and things were happening with a ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... seemed to be able to do nothing but weep and moan, recovered her energy when her husband was attacked. She discovered then how much she had loved him: and she and her two children, who had no idea what would become of them in the future, all agreed to renounce ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland

... a moan. There was no use in remonstrating with Rufe,—everything that came within his eccentric orbit seemed to realize that,—and the deedie was contentedly nestling down in his pocket, apparently resigned to lead ...
— Down the Ravine • Charles Egbert Craddock (real name: Murfree, Mary Noailles)

... the major sat down to mop a brow that was perspiring freely. From Lady O'MOY in the background came faintly, the sound of a half-suppressed moan. Terrified, she clutched the hand of Miss Armytage,—and found that hand to lie like a thing of ice in her own, yet she suspected nothing of the deep agitation under her companion's, outward ...
— The Snare • Rafael Sabatini



Words linked to "Moan" :   let loose, let out, emit, vocalization, utter, utterance



Copyright © 2024 e-Free Translation.com