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Shrilly

adverb
1.
In a shrill voice.  Synonym: piercingly.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Shrilly" Quotes from Famous Books



... life. He sunk his head and redoubled his efforts, as with quirt in one hand and hackamore in the other the cowboy lashed his shoulders while his spurs raked the animal to a bloody foam. Slower and slower the outlaw fought, pausing now and then to scream shrilly as with bared teeth and blazing eyes he turned this way and that, sucking the air in great blasts through his ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx

... Darling in more attractive guise? The thunderous waves were leaping and foaming around the little boat; the dark clouds were lowering, and the winds blowing furiously. The afrighted sea-birds looked at them, and screamed shrilly as they saw the boat rocked to and fro, now leaping on the top of a wave that tossed it high, and now sinking down, down, as if it were going to the very bottom of the deep. But Grace was not afraid. She scarcely thought of the danger; ...
— Grace Darling - Heroine of the Farne Islands • Eva Hope

... in 1909 when they showed a fleeting desire to take a non-political and national view of this matter of defence, could not resist the temptation to profit by the campaign against the government's policy; and they joined shrilly in the derisive cry of "tin pot navy." These onslaughts from opposite camps were a factor in the elections of 1911; especially in Quebec where twenty-seven constituencies (against eleven in 1908) elected ...
— Laurier: A Study in Canadian Politics • J. W. Dafoe

... protested his lordship, shrilly. "It just proves what I say. If I had had a decent allowance, it wouldn't have happened. And you wouldn't give me enough to set me going in the diplomatic service. That's another thing. ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse

... "Of course he ought," she assented shrilly, "but what am I to do? He simply won't go, ...
— The Halo • Bettina von Hutten

... or he'll do us!" cried Raffles shrilly over his shoulder; and a gruff sardonic laugh came back over mine. It was pearly morning now, but we had run into a shallow mist that took me by the throat and stabbed me to the lungs. I coughed and coughed, and stumbled in my stride, until down I went, less ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung

... fall was so great that Matt cried out shrilly with pain. For the moment he imagined that both of ...
— Young Auctioneers - The Polishing of a Rolling Stone • Edward Stratemeyer

... council hall laden with chains and bilboes which he cast down at her feet. Then the angry impatience of the disappointed sloop's crew proved too intense, and Caliban bounded to the front, squealing shrilly: ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle

... Tuesday, Ross and his companion anxiously awaited the arrival of Vrouw Katje. At length the old lady—she was nearly eighty—drove up in style, shouting shrilly to her dogs from her perch on top ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman

... the spokesman. His voice rose shrilly, as it always did when he was laboring under stress of excitement ...
— Slaves of Mercury • Nat Schachner

... for a violinist," mused the old man; "if he were worth a million, I believe I'd advise Wallace to let him marry her. A fiddler! A million! Sounds funny," and he laughed shrilly. ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa

... my doze in time to see the old man in front of me wake up with a start at the sound and reach quickly for his hymn book, as if he supposed the sermon were over. Then the stamping of other children was heard on the walk. The scholars passed in groups, talking shrilly. I knew it must be nearly twelve o'clock. In the congregation there was a rustle of gathering restlessness; women put on their gloves, tried to glance back at the clock without seeming to do so, stirred in their seats. The last vestige ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton

... and slashing about in the gale, twisting into inextricable knots, and winding and wriggling round the main-topsail yard, rendering it a work of great danger to go out on it. The boatswain's whistle sounded shrilly through the storm a well-known note. "All hands shorten sail!" was echoed along the decks. "Rouse out there—rouse out—idlers and all on deck!" Everybody knew that there was work to be done; indeed, the clap made by the parting of the sail had awakened ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston

... into a rainbow's rivers, In streams of gold and purple he is drowned, Shrilly the arrows of his song he shivers, As though the stormy drops were turned to sound; And now he issues through, He scales a cloudy tower, Faintly, like falling dew, His ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various

... single window. Consciousness brought no confusion ... he was beginning to grow accustomed to sudden shifts in fortune and strange environments had long since ceased to be a waking novelty. Outside he could hear the genial noises of a thickly populated lane—shrilly cried bits of neighborhood gossip bandied from doorstep to doorstep ... the laughter of children ... the call of a junkman ... even a smothered cackling from some captive hen fulfilling its joyful function in spite of restraint. He did not rise at once, but ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie

... turned deaf ears to others— Me you shall hear. Out of the mouths of turbines, Out of the turgid throats of engines, Over the whistling steam, You shall hear me shrilly piping. Your mills I shall enter like the wind, And blow upon your hearts, ...
— Sun-Up and Other Poems • Lola Ridge

... well, it was neatly done; and completely done, with a single drawback. The men had not seized Flavia, and, white as paper, but with rage not fear, she screamed shrilly for help—screamed twice. ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman

... the wild-woods of Manhattan Saw your wheeling flocks of white and gray; Even so you fluttered, followed, floated, Round the Half-Moon creeping up the bay; Even so your voices creaked and chattered. Laughing shrilly o'er the tidal rips, While your black and beady eyes were glistening ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke

... out by an old wood road. A cool spiciness flowed though the green aisles, and as the tiny donkey struck into a dog trot, the man striding easily at her head, a far-away cock crowed shrilly and ...
— While Caroline Was Growing • Josephine Daskam Bacon

... rioters of our country, grafted onto the Mussulman fanatic- -kavasses were raining blows with their sticks on this crowd of volunteers (or thieves); firemen, bare-armed and turbanless, hurried along, with their fire pumps on their shoulders, shouting shrilly and knocking over people as they went; troops kept coming up from all quarters, horsemen trotted up at full speed, and packs of terrified dogs tore wildly through the streets, howling with pain. It was a ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville

... English camp a bugle rang out shrilly behind him, and a great stir arose in the lines. He glanced about him, and continued his way. Then he observed that the slopes of Beausejour were dark with battalions on the march, and he realized with a thrill that the lilies were advancing to give battle. In another moment, looking behind him, ...
— The Raid From Beausejour; And How The Carter Boys Lifted The Mortgage • Charles G. D. Roberts

... in, and soon the tent was crowded. Then the matinee began, with a grand parade all around the ring, horses prancing, whips cracking, the monkeys shrieking shrilly. For three hours the four little Blossoms were enthralled by the antics of the clever beasts and the men and women performers, and they could hardly believe it when Father Blossom said they must put on their hats, for the performance ...
— Four Little Blossoms at Oak Hill School • Mabel C. Hawley

... replied shrilly the old woman, "for Saidie, the star of the dancers, and not yet fifteen! No, Sahib, no! a Parsee will give more than that for ...
— Six Women • Victoria Cross

... him out there. With perfectly farcical unexpectedness he yelled shrilly: "Oh, you deceitful wretch! You won't escape me! I will have ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad

... na!" he shrilly commented. "Here it is wrong!" And, grabbing up a slice of chalk, he made a deft swoop toward the material. Suddenly his arm stayed in mid air and he laid down the chalk with a muscular effort. "I think I take this ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester

... shrilly cry the Muses, neglecting Paeon, and they lament Adonis aloud, and songs they chant to him, but he does not heed them, not that he is loth to hear, but that the Maiden of Hades ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang

... up a pillow, holding it out sharply in front of her, whirling it around like a steering wheel, while she pushed with both feet on imaginary clutches and brakes, and honked shrilly. ...
— Eve to the Rescue • Ethel Hueston

... Macnooder shrilly, as master of ceremonies, "we want to pull this off in fine shape. We're going to drive around the Circle. And I want this orchestra to keep together. Whose legs are those ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson

... darkness, the stranger stepped to the rear door of the room and opened it. Then he closed the door and stooping laid his saddle and blankets against it. "He can't make a break that way," he said to himself. As Sundown came in, the man noticed that the front door creaked shrilly when opened or closed and seemed pleased with the fact. "Too bad about Fadeaway," he said, helping himself to more coffee. "Wonder ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs

... ain't dead now, she'll die," Mandy answered him shrilly. "They ain't no flesh on her—she's run down to a pore little skeleton. That's what the factories does to women and children—they jest eats 'em up, and spits ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke

... morning. There has been no rain since the first of May, and how the jolly old miller will laugh till the tears fill his eyes when he sees the water rise in the milldam.' And some seized the winds and put horns to their mouths and blew sharply. 'And there!' said they shrilly, 'the merry winds go from every horn to clear the damp mildew from the blind old widow's corn. Though she has been blind for a long time she'll be merry enough when the corn stands up stiff and strong without any ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester

... his lips and whistled shrilly. Almost immediately sounds of footsteps broke out overhead, and a door opened somewhere with a loud crash. The cripple turned to the girl, who had crept reluctantly as ...
— The Mystery of the Four Fingers • Fred M. White

... screaming shrilly, violently, and continuously, is oftentimes owing to ear-ache; carefully, therefore, examine each ear, and ascertain if there be any discharge; if there be, the mystery ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse

... in the rear alley used to lean, sill-warming fashion on their windows, the children shrilly whistling the chorus, the men forgetting their pipes, the women sniffling as women do when they hear old ballads, for of course once Felice had started "pretending" she didn't stop. A moment after she'd been Janet she'd be Marthy, dear, lean, grizzled old Marthy, ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke

... to hurry!" the other wailed shrilly to a third girl who was hastening toward them. "The line is 'way beyond the Children's Hospital and around the corner now—and the ones there never ...
— Miss Billy's Decision • Eleanor H. Porter

... name shrilly, her face raised eagerly to the bobbing light. Not until hours afterward was Genevra to resent the use of her Christian name by the man ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon

... the alertness of a scurrying rabbit, she shrilly called out in a frenzy of warning: "Go the other way, Sol—up through the pawpaws! Them cherty rocks will cut ...
— Wolf's Head - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)

... mysterious Night, The cries of savage creatures wildly break Upon thy quiet; birds ill-omen'd shriek; Commotions strange disturb the rustling trees; And heavy plaints come on the passing breeze. Far on the lonely waste, and distant way, Unwonted sounds are heard, unknown of day. With shrilly screams the haunted cavern rings; And heavy treading of unearthly things Sounds loud and hollow thro' the ruin'd dome; Yea, voices issue from ...
— Poems, &c. (1790) • Joanna Baillie

... shrill and jubilant, called down the blessings of all the saints upon her—of Santa Caterina—her own name-saint, fair patron of Betrothals; of charming San Luigi—the blessed guardian of love; of San Nicolo, Saint of the Sea; of Messer San Marco and San Tadoro; and shrilly, above them all, rose the babel of women's voices, invoking the Madonna, "Star ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... as facts went, the crime lay between those two—and he could not shake off the impression that Mrs. Brace, shrilly asserting Russell's innocence, had known that she ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay

... been plunged into a bath of blazing fire; but whilst Antonio, completely forgetful of all his unhappiness, was standing gazing with wonder and delight, the gleams of the sun grew more bloody and more bloody. The wind whistled shrilly and harshly, and a hollow threatening echo came rolling in from the open sea outside. Down burst the storm in the midst of black clouds, and enshrouded all in thick darkness, whilst the waves rose higher and higher, pouring in from the thundering sea like foaming hissing monsters, threatening ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann

... slowly out of the station the pipers, piping more and more shrilly, swung round and marched beside it to the end of the platform. The band ceased abruptly, and the men answered with shout after shout of violent joy; they reared up through the windows, straining for the last look—and ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair

... his outcries were drowned in the wild trumpeting of the elephants. The human notes had disturbed them, and they trumpeted shrilly and moved uneasily away from the neighbourhood of the pad-elephant. Then the wild herd set off at a trot, went a mile or more up the ravine, and came to a halt near another feeding-place, a clump of young bamboos. The tame elephant with its burden had followed steadily, and now Jack shouted no more. ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore

... then the dark, And safety in the thick forestial night, But nearer still she hears the bloodhounds bark, And horses panting in impetuous flight, And hunters without pity for the slain, Halloing shrilly ...
— The Five Books of Youth • Robert Hillyer

... caught the ruler by surprise. He gasped and his lips fell apart. Then it must have occurred to him that the question could be answered by no one save the person to whom it was so plainly addressed. He lifted his chin and piped up shrilly, and with a fervour that startled even ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... fish patrol fallers never ban so lucky as when you sail with Ole Ericsen," he was saying, when a rifle cracked sharply astern, and a bullet gouged along the newly painted cabin, glanced on a nail, and sang shrilly onward into space. ...
— Tales of the Fish Patrol • Jack London

... corner of Rector street, down near the river, a loud drum was beating. A guitar and a tambourine competed shrilly with the drum's dull booming. Slowly a careless crowd gathered round the Salvation ...
— Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers • Arthur Brisbane

... wild tales of glamour concerning Goliath's Land; and for though the rocks were the same, and though the conies still stood gazing at the doors of their dwellings, though the hawks still cried out shrilly, though the fern still shook in the wind, yet beyond, oh such a land! not to be described by any because of its great beauty, lying, a great hollow land, the rocks going down on this side in precipices, then reaches and reaches of loveliest country, ...
— The Hollow Land • William Morris

... He paid the cabman while they got out, and then hurried them across the platform and into a first-class carriage that he had engaged; the door was shut with a loud bang, and in another moment the engine whistled shrilly, and the train went out of the station. Mr. Murray held all their tickets in his hand, and in such a way that even Bertie's keen eyes could not detect their destination, but as they got completely into the country the places seemed ...
— Little Folks (December 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... drawn by oxen and well filled, toils up the hill, and not long after follows one drawn by a big dog. At a pump two tiny girls are busily employed filling stone jars, which by the beauty and purity of their outlines might have been Etruscan. Mothers beat mats at their cottage doors, and shrilly scream at their children to get out of the way of the passing carts; and the world in this remote village goes on pretty ...
— A War-time Journal, Germany 1914 and German Travel Notes • Harriet Julia Jephson

... deafening report of a gun, whose shot again passed between the schooner's masts, but without doing the slightest harm. Then, almost mingled with the bass roar of the cannon, the captain's orders rang out; the boatswain's pipe sounded shrilly, and as the Nautilus was thrown up into the wind, and her sails began to shiver, down went the boat with its crew, Mark, at a sign from the captain, who gave him a friendly smile, having sprung in. Then there was a quick thrust off by the coxswain, the oars fell ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn

... would surely collide with the motor-boat. When scarcely more than a length Away from the Fortuna, the schooner was brought sharply about on the other tack. As she came about a clear cut whistle sounded shrilly in ...
— Boy Scouts in Southern Waters • G. Harvey Ralphson

... Nikolaevitch back to the other part of the room at last. There was some commotion in all our company. The lady from our carriage, probably intending to relieve the situation, loudly and shrilly asked the saint for the third time, with an ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... I say is," her grandmother cried shrilly, "your cats were nearly the death of me, and I'll trouble you to keep ...
— The Making of Mona • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... — in a low voice. — And what time will you do the thing I'm asking, holy father? for I'm thinking you'll do it surely, and not have me growing into an old wicked heathen like herself. MARY — calling out shrilly. — Let you be walking back here, Sarah Casey, and not be talking whisper-talk with the like of him in the face of the Almighty God. SARAH — to the priest. — Do you hear her now, your reverence? Isn't it true, surely, she's an old, flagrant heathen, would destroy the world? PRIEST ...
— The Tinker's Wedding • J. M. Synge

... came the clattering of an opening door, and then Betty Martin's voice broke the silence, harshly, shrilly: "Sal!—Sal!—Sally Martin! You, Sally Martin! Come ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle

... she not only believed in the injunction "Let your light shine before men," but felt that it behooved her to attract Father Dominic's attention to the fact that it was shining. Clearer and higher rose her voice; deeper and louder sounded Larry's; more shrilly piped Claire. ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley

... of the party who resolved not to obey the command, and that was Pixy. He, too, heard the noise outside, and sprang against the door, barking shrilly. ...
— Pixy's Holiday Journey • George Lang

... so the sound was repeated more shrilly, and by and by a pair of hands forcibly pulled the blankets ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hill • Margaret Vandercook

... yelled shrilly, and a volley of short arm blows commenced to rattle on the big Swede's stomach. For at least seven seconds Matt worked ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne

... Dinner, called shrilly by the Countess, interrupted her, and she flitted out of the room looking as little like a lovelorn maiden as she did like a ...
— Chip, of the Flying U • B. M. Bower

... before; then a Kangaroo, with a smart bonnet and shawl, in the same style as Mrs. Jumper's; then a Wild Boar, looking like a country lout in a smock-frock; then a Beaver, no better dressed than one of our navvies, and who stamped on the Cat's toes, and made her squeak out so shrilly, that she made my ears tingle; then came a Parroquet, dressed like a dandy, and with him were two fashionable birds, Miss Cockatoo and Miss Snowy Owl; then followed an old Crocodile, looking like one of those withered Indian nurses, and in ...
— Comical People • Unknown

... birches. Here I found a delightful old man, who came a little way with me in the rain to put me safely on the road for Cheylard. He would hear of no reward, but shook his hands above his head almost as if in menace, and refused volubly and shrilly in unmitigated patois. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... let go. She was puffing hard, and the perspiration was standing out upon her forehead. "I'm going to call the Policeman," she threatened shrilly. ...
— The Poor Little Rich Girl • Eleanor Gates

... with terror; he had only that moment been brought out of the bar, and was pleading shrilly ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing

... on his hook and flicked it toward the brook. A second after it struck the water there was a splash, and Lew's reel sang shrilly. ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss

... from the same place, and another of the grazing ponies flung up its head, neighing shrilly, before springing forward to gallop for a couple of hundred yards ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn

... tired of my society, and left for his mistress, I whistled shrilly, and was happy to hear a response, in the shape of a deep bay, back of the hut. We hurried where we could get a view of him, and, to my surprise and delight, I saw that he was standing over the prostrate ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes

... you doing with my father? Where you going to take him to? Let him alone, I say. Let him alone!" Her voice rang out shrilly, as she came forward, trembling with anger, and her knight-errant looked up at her in a daze of wonderment. ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... silver whistle from his waistcoat pocket and blew on it shrilly. The blue and white door of the pavilion was opened, and a slight old man in a blue livery appeared on the step and came ambling down the path. The weight of an enormous head, on the top of which his grey wig seemed to be balanced rather than fitted, bowed ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... "Yes," she said shrilly, "I am—ill because of you and your lies, and your hateful deception; ill because you've broken my heart and ruined my life. You swore to me that you'd never see Cynthia Farrow again. You swore to me that it was all over ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres

... him. At last she died, and his friends congratulated him, telling him that now he would enjoy peace. But it was the peace of the desert, and the man did not enjoy it. For two-and-twenty years her voice had filled the house, penetrated through the conservatory, and floated in faint shrilly waves of sound round the garden, and out into the road beyond. The silence now pervading everywhere frightened and disturbed him. The place was no longer home to him. He missed the breezy morning insult, the long ...
— Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green • Jerome K. Jerome

... burden. Now, just as he was crossing the big river in front of his house, the old hen-sparrow, in her gay dress, looked out of the window, and when she saw her old husband bringing home his young bride in such a sorry plight, she burst out laughing shrilly, and called aloud, 'That is right! that is right! Remember what the ...
— Tales Of The Punjab • Flora Annie Steel

... bride giggled, gratified, and Caroline went out; but the next minute she was startled to hear Lillie call shrilly from the little window: "Carrie! Carrie! You've forgotten your umbrella, and on a day like this! You ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose

... gone, that it was replaced by a look of scorn, incredulity, pity, contempt—he did not know what—that an instant later she had wrenched away the hand he had taken, had burst into a laugh that rang out shrilly in the gloom, and that he was standing alone, bewildered, thinking that her laugh had sounded like an echo of the laugh that he had heard last night in that mysterious house—the laugh of the gray-haired man with the scar upon ...
— A Bachelor's Dream • Mrs. Hungerford

... opened with a bang, and a blast from a police whistle pierced the air shrilly. Deering started to run, but Hood upset him with a thrust of his foot. Two men were already creeping up behind them in the alley; the owner of the grocery stole out of the front door in a long nightgown and began howling dismally ...
— The Madness of May • Meredith Nicholson

... gets drunk and beats me. I've bitten him till he's learned to remember." He laughed a shrill, squeaking laugh. "He hasn't tried it for three months—even when he was drunk—and he's always drunk." Then he laughed again still more shrilly. "He's a gentleman," he said. "I'm a gentleman's son. He was a Master at a big school until he was kicked out—that was when I was four and my mother died. I'm thirteen now. How old ...
— The Lost Prince • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... out on the porch to worship at the shrine of the mountain, or to enjoy the marvelous picture that nature presented to the eye. She went out in obedience to the shrilly ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris

... of Falmouth"—the woman by the lamp-post lifted her voice more shrilly—"what shall I testify of the hardness of your hearts? Shall I testify that your Mayor sending his crier round, has threatened to whip us through Falmouth streets at the ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... lights went out in the bedchambers; faint flickerings stole through the chinks of doors and windows. The watchman cried out the hour, and the gleam of a lantern flashed here and there, illuminating the open court-yard. The cocks crowed shrilly into the night air. A halberdier turned in his sleep where he lay, on some straw beneath the coach-shed, his halberd rattling as it struck the cobbles. And over the whole—over the gentle slumber of the great ladies and the sleep of beast and man—there fell the peace ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd

... fading rushes along the river drooped wearily over their dry beds. The yellowing leaves of the trees hung dejected; they were mute petitioners for cool breezes and rain. The grasshoppers chirped monotonously, the locusts screeched shrilly, both being products of the long hot summer, and survivors of the heat, inclined to voice their exultation ...
— The Day of the Beast • Zane Grey

... with her or say or do rough things. A basket of corn stood just within the door of the shed, and running to it Clara took an ear of the yellow corn and threw it at the farm hand. It struck a post of the barn just above his head. Laughing shrilly Clara ran into the shed among the wagons, and the farm ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson

... had passed that way. A woodcock floated silently on the bosom of the tiny lake. He did not note the ripple which showed that a powerful animal was swimming towards him. A scream, and the woodcock, trumpeting shrilly, is ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, June 17, 1914 • Various

... looked towards the stranger, quavered, faltered, nearly broke down, then, as if with an effort, raised her voice more shrilly and defiantly, exaggerated her meaningless gestures and looked away. A moment later she finished her song and turned to strut off the stage. As she did so she shot a sort of fascinated glance at the dark man. He took his cigar from his mouth and puffed the smoke towards her, ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens

... Every mind instantly conjured up the picture of a vivid figure in a frock that gleamed blue as sulphurous flames. A hysterical woman sprang up screaming shrilly, and had to be taken away; a solitary sea gull, its plumage shining with a weird blueness in the electric light, chose this moment to fly low along the deck, crying its wailing cry. That was enough. Another woman began to scream; the music stopped, and there was almost a panic to get away from a ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley

... time and place. There was no one to hear me save a bluejay which for an hour or more kept me company. He sat on a twig just across the brook, cocking his head at me, and saucily wagging his tail. Occasionally he would dart off among the trees crying shrilly; but his curiosity would always get the better of him and back he would come again to try to solve the mystery of this rival whistling, which I'm sure was as shrill and as ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker

... stood beside the throne with her hair down. She sang something mournfully, addressing the queen, but the king waved his arm severely, and men and women with bare legs came in from both sides and began dancing all together. Then the violins played very shrilly and merrily and one of the women with thick bare legs and thin arms, separating from the others, went behind the wings, adjusted her bodice, returned to the middle of the stage, and began jumping and striking one foot rapidly against the other. In the stalls everyone clapped and shouted ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... and battered chest of drawers and clung there, clutching it so firmly that it would have been impossible to remove her without also taking the piece of furniture . She did not weep nor moan nor indeed make any human sound, but between her broken gasps for breath she squealed shrilly like a frightened animal caught in a trap. The little group of women and children gathered at her door stood aghast at this realization of the black dread which always clouds the lives of the very poor when work is slack, but which constantly grows more imminent and threatening as old age approaches. ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams

... that you are sorry for, Enderby?" said Mrs. Abercorn shrilly, having caught some of his remarks. "And how do you come to be talking about gentry of all things! My good man, if you are alluding to Miss Clairville, let me tell you she ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison

... She could see he was relieved, was indeed in cheerful spirits, as he gave his furred hand to the children's mittened ones. They thanked him shrilly and Hansen smiled warmly upon Harriet as he touched his cap. Then they were gone. Linda, watching from the window, thought that the chauffeur's obvious respect for Harriet was rather impressive. She came to the porch, and Richard waved his ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris

... where the battalion of Guienne had taken up its position. Nothing could have been stronger than the contrast which the two armies afforded. On the one side was the red English line, quiet and silent, save that the war pipes of the Highlanders blew loud and shrilly; on the other were the white-coated battalions of the regular army of France, the blue-clad Canadians, the bands of Indians in their war paint and feathers, all hurried and excited by their rapid march, and by the danger which had ...
— With Wolfe in Canada - The Winning of a Continent • G. A. Henty

... began to whistle shrilly through the air, and the sky became so black they could scarcely see a hundred yards in any direction, Then came some distant flashes of lightning and rolling thunder, and soon the patter ...
— The Rover Boys on Land and Sea - The Crusoes of Seven Islands • Arthur M. Winfield

... his lameness, and estimated his father's words. Dangerous blood—tainted? Ostermoor had feared her tongue; the women in his household talked shrilly and long upon far less provocation. But she only sat ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans

... mutineers—for Peter had taken care to summon those he most suspected—lingered below; but the boatswain's whistle sounded shrilly along the decks, and one more glance at the determined eye of the captain sent them flying up to obey its summons. I shall never forget the appearance of that dauntless man as he sat still and alone ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston

... without wincing; and a breath of the sunrise breeze sweeping down from the eastern hills was like a draught of invigorating wine. As he leaned out for an instant to make sure that not even the height would bring a return of the vertigo, the wail of the nearest newsboy became shrilly articulate: "Here's yer Morning Plainsman! All ...
— The Honorable Senator Sage-Brush • Francis Lynde

... invaders lost no time in stating their business, but as they both spoke at once and shrilly, the unfortunate Commissary learnt little of the matter at issue between them. Not until the united efforts of all the men present had silenced feminine vociferation was it possible to understand what in the world the ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West

... suddenly, for he saw that the woman was laughing at him. She had snatched the basin of stew as it were from his very mouth; and as she laughed loudly and shrilly, she pointed at the Prince with her ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam

... platform turned and trailed off down the street, the women sagging under the weight of their bags, the men, for the most part, hurrying on ahead. When the 'bus lurched past them the woman who had screamed the oath after Blanche LeHaye laughed shrilly and made a face, like a naughty child, whereupon the others laughed ...
— Roast Beef, Medium • Edna Ferber

... of letting a country school get you. We need you right in town. You see, I happen to be president of the school board, and if I were to let a perfectly good teacher get away, I'd deserve to lose my job." Stepping to the door, he whistled shrilly, and a moment later the piebald cayuse trotted to his side. When the horse stood saddled and bridled, the man turned to Patty: "Oh, about the Samuelsons—do you know how to get to ...
— The Gold Girl • James B. Hendryx

... But where or when I'll never know, Parrots of shrilly green With crests of shriller scarlet flying Out of black cedars as the sun was dying Against ...
— Georgian Poetry 1918-19 • Various

... moved himself, unconsciously imitating the movements of his comrades—he did everything as they did. But on boarding the platform of the car, he stumbled, and a gendarme took him by the elbow to support him. Vasily shuddered and screamed shrilly, drawing back ...
— The Seven who were Hanged • Leonid Andreyev

... that sweips the chimelies in France we discovered to be litle boyes that come out of Savoy wt a long trie over the shoulders, crying shrilly thorow the cityes, je vengeray vos cheminees haut en bas. Its strange of thir litle stirrows,[182] let us or the Frenchmen menace them as we like we can never get them to say, Vive le Roy de France, but instead of it, ay Vive la Reine ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder

... the mark. He caromed into Rowdy's one recalcitrant leg—it usually happens that way—and Rowdy stepped on him. Pete was also not mentally prepared to dismount at the moment, but he did so as Rowdy crashed down in a cloud of dust. The pup, who imagined himself killed, shrieked shrilly and ran as hard as he could to the distant stables to find out if ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs

... slatish tinge, were moving fast and crowding up the sky, insomuch that the sun was leaping from one edge to another and darting a keen and frosty light upon the scene. The wind was bitterly cold, and screamed shrilly in my ears when I met the full tide of it. The change was sudden, but it did not surprise me. I knew these seas, and that our English April is not more capricious than the weather in them, only that here the sunny smile, though sparkling, ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell

... does its expected victim, springing to his feet, threw his arms round the Frenchman's neck, while he at the same moment shoved a large lump of oakum into his mouth before he could even utter a cry. Dan, quick as lightning, joined him, while Gerald whistled shrilly the promised signal to his father and Owen. It was heard too by Tim, who pulling the line, the rest of the Ouzel Galley's crew sprang up, some throwing themselves on the two Frenchmen slumbering under the weather bulwarks before they had time to draw their pistols. ...
— The Missing Ship - The Log of the "Ouzel" Galley • W. H. G. Kingston

... half-century, and seen none but the Cauldstaneslap children twice in the twenty-four hours on their way to the school and back again, an occasional shepherd, the irruption of a clan of sheep, or the birds who haunted about the springs, drinking and shrilly piping. So, when she had once passed the Slap, Kirstie was received into seclusion. She looked back a last time at the farm. It still lay deserted except for the figure of Dandie, who was now seen to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson

... and cowboy yells I ever heard. The Indians had the advantage, since they burdened their mounts with neither saddle nor bridle. Stretched flat along the pony's back, the rider guided him by knee pressure and spurred him to victory by whistling shrilly in a turned back ear. I was amused to see how the wily Indians jockeyed for the inside of the track, and they always got it too. Not a white man's horse won a dollar in the race. It might have been different, probably would ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith

... those letters instantly," she cried shrilly. But I marched from behind the counter ...
— Where There's A Will • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... said shrilly, "I'll be up to-morrow as gay as ever. Vive l'amour! vive la joie! It was a merry ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham

... for a doctor; there's one in the house, and—and the police, too." Lorelei voiced her first impulse, then shrilly appealed to Lilas to do something. But Lilas remained petrified in her attitude of retreat; from the pallor that was whitening her cheeks now it might have been she who was in danger ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach

... dance round the combatants, screamed shrilly, and made dangerous, ineffectual darts at Tray. The servant girl neither danced, nor screamed, nor made darts; she stood stolidly still, with something between a gape and a grin on her broad red face. She had not the passion ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler

... voice was scarcely more than a whisper, "Tobey!" but it rose shrilly as she cried, "Where you been? What ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... has a youthful shamelessness in seeking their fulfilment. One of his most exasperating peculiarities is the manner in which he querulously harps upon the single string of his wants. He sits down before the refusal of his mother and shrilly besieges it. He does not desist for company. He does not wish to behave well before strangers. He desires to have his wish granted; and he knows he will probably be allowed to succeed if he insists before strangers. He is distinguished by a brutal frankness, ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead

... his voice again, as if ashamed of the rather gentler tone of his last words, and concluded, harshly and shrilly: "Besides, it really is a bad habit, putting one's fingers in ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein

... her head and glanced behind. As she did so she uttered an exclamation and called shrilly to the dogs, at the same time ...
— Through the Air to the North Pole - or The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch • Roy Rockwood

... dark. And he was swinging back and forth through this total darkness. He was a ball, a blast bomb being tossed from hand to hand through the dark by painted warriors who laughed shrilly at his pain, tossed through the dark. Fear such as he had never known, even under the last acceleration pressure of the take-off from Terra, beat through Raf's veins away from his laboring heart. He was ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton

... already out of ear-shot. Chloe glanced about her for her revolver. An evil-faced half-breed, dragging his body from the hips, pulled himself toward it, hunching along with his bare hands digging into the crust of the snow. The girl reached it a second before him. The man cursed her shrilly and sank into the snow, crying ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx

... help it. They all laughed. Even the little boys and girls on the outskirts giggled shrilly, and stole the opportunity to draw nearer to the magic circle. Almost at once, however, Cordelia regained ...
— The Sunbridge Girls at Six Star Ranch • Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman) Porter

... a hand with all her fingers spread out. "Five! Five!" she demanded shrilly. "Every one of you give one gulden. All this you gave is to my friends. Not enough for me. I have more. I always have more. One gulden ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson

... urns, mute springs Pour out the river's gradual tide, Shrilly the skater's iron rings, And voices ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston

... of the desperate criminal they screamed with one accord. In truth I must have given them fair cause, though my mask was now torn away and hid nothing but my left ear. Rosenthall answered their shrieks with a roar for silence; the woman with the bath-sponge hair swore at him shrilly in return; the place became a Babel impossible to describe. I remember wondering how long it would be before the police appeared. Purvis and the ladies were for calling them in and giving me in charge without delay. Rosenthall ...
— The Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung

... contracted towards his breast; and his head was peaked[96] towards the top, and thin woolly hair was scattered over it. To Achilles and Ulysses he was particularly hostile, for these two he used to revile. But on this occasion, shouting out shrilly, he uttered bitter taunts against noble Agamemnon; but the Greeks were greatly irritated against him, and were indignant in their minds. But vociferating aloud, he reviled Agamemnon ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer

... that I was unaffected by the threat and the villainous hint which underlay the words, but that, fully expecting them, I was ready with my answer. 'We will see about that.' And therewith I raised my fingers to my lips, and, whistling shrilly, cried 'Maignan! Maignan!' in ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman

... to buzz again. The Indians were making another charge. A dense cloud of smoke hung over the ambushed coach. White powder spurts blossomed out from the brush, and the war cry came shrilly. The rush brought a line of half-naked warriors to within a few yards of the coach. Then they fell back again, leaving four of their number dead or wounded on ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens

... seized a fourth glass, and the final catastrophe would have been infallibly brought about, had not providence intervened in the person of the call-boy, who, thrusting his head through the half-open doorway, cried, shrilly: ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa

... he was beginning—and all at once he piped out shrilly: 'The little master of Troitsky (my grandmother's property was called Troitsky)! Can it be the ...
— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... faculties, her face and neck were aflame. She almost felt that she had been detected in some fault. Her confusion was not lessened by hearing a muttered curse from her companion. Careless of the stinging sleet, she leaped down to a broad tier of rock below the plateau of the hut and cried shrilly: ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy

... background of many curious yearling and two-year-old colts, against which, in the middleground, he saw his hostess, on the back of the bright bay thoroughbred, The Fop, who, on hind legs, was striking his forefeet in the air and squealing shrilly. They reined in ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London

... collected their winnings and his own, sought Dade and Jack, where they were lying under the shade of a sycamore just beyond the rim of the crowd chattering shrilly of the later events. With a grunt of relief to be rid of the buzzing, Bill flung himself down beside them and plucked a cigar ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower

... doubt you'll walk strictly according to law! You will not run the risk of a lawsuit, much less prosecution, even for Miss Swendon. You will have no trouble in gaining your freedom from me," shrilly. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various

... great beast was tearing around, trumpeting shrilly and breaking off trees Mr. Durban fired. The creature sank down, instantly killed, and was out of his misery, for often it is great pain which makes an otherwise peaceable ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton

... servants' quarters, leaving Gustavus on the mat. Mrs. Merillia's other bell now pealed shrilly downstairs. Gustavus paused and pulled himself together. He was by nature a fairly intrepid youth, and moreover, he had recently made a close study of Carlyle's Heroes and Hero-worship, which greatly impressed him. He therefore resolved in this moment of peril ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens

... top of her shabby old fly, while behind it was a long line of handsome carriages whose drivers vituperated the driver of the cab, in his broken hat. At the window was Bessie's face. Bessie's excited voice was heard shrilly calling on ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann

... salon Carminatti was doing sleight-of-hand to entertain the ladies. Afterwards the Neapolitan was seen pursuing the Marchesa Sciacca and the two San Martino girls in the corridors. They shrieked shrilly when he grabbed them around the waist. The devil of a Neapolitan was an expert ...
— Caesar or Nothing • Pio Baroja Baroja

... askance at her; but the women—who could bridle their tongues or blunt their scornful glances? Briareus, armed to the teeth, would not affright our modern dowagers, or deter them from their prey. Wherever the carcass of a fair fame lies, thither they flock, screaming shrilly in triumph, vulture-eyed, ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence

... pouring over the ridge—a disorderly mob—horse, foot, and guns mixed, while from every hollow of the ground about rose small boys cheering shrilly. The outcry was taken up by the parents at the railings, and spread to a complete circle of cheers, handclappings, ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling

... urged it to greater speed. "I save myself; myself," he shrieked shrilly and unhinged by deadly terror, "get ...
— Red Money • Fergus Hume

... you are too kind, I am sure you know what I mean; it is your excessive kindness that permits the visits of a foolish boy— wearying, I am sure, to a lady so accustomed to the world. I will ask you to forbid those visits. Do you hear me?" he cried shrilly, pounding the gravel with his cane. "Gad-a-mercy! Do you hear me? You ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland

... the quagmire. Close beside her lay a little calf. It was still alive, but so much exhausted that it could not move. Karr was standing beside the calf, now bending down and licking it, now howling shrilly for help. ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof

... noisome filth. Beside the body are stretched two naked stumps of flesh, on one the remnant of a foot. The wounds are not new wounds, but they are open and they fester. There are flies on them. The Thing is whining, shrilly, hideously. ...
— Profiles from China • Eunice Tietjens

... herself. "I'll congratulate nobody," she cried shrilly. She burned with a sense of intolerable outrage. Only a few hours before she had been befooled into believing herself to be the mistress of the destinies of two men. Both had offered her their love. Both had kissed her. The memory lashed ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke

... with Towser's, but it was not a dog's head. As Birt caught a glimpse of it, he called out hastily, "Stand back thar, Tennessee!" And then it was lost to view, for at the sound of his voice all the dogs came huddling over the bars, shrilly ...
— Down the Ravine • Charles Egbert Craddock (real name: Murfree, Mary Noailles)

... little for this, or for anything; he was in a wonderfully jubilant mood. He rambled through the tenantless rooms, whistling shrilly, and with his hands in his pockets. He commanded the servants like a Baron of old. He drank wine in the library, and smoked a segar in the drawing room, and when these pleasures palled upon him, he ascended the stairs, ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch

... individual contentment into one collective expression of contentment, or general grace during meat. Every now and again a big peacock would separate himself from the mob and take a stately turn or two about the lawn, or perhaps mount for a moment upon the rail, and there shrilly publish to the world his satisfaction with himself and what he had to eat. It happened, for my sins, that none of these admirable birds had anything beyond the merest rudiment of a tail. Tails, it seemed, were out of season just then. But they had their necks for all that; and by their necks alone ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson

... train was slackening speed and two whistles rang shrilly through the roar of wheels when Miss Barrington laid down the book with which she had beguiled her journey of fifteen hundred miles, and rose from her seat in a corner of the big first-class car. The car was sumptuously upholstered and its decorations tasteful ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss

... with flaxen curls and patched overalls on screamed and rushed up to the man, gripping him furiously around the legs just above the knees and trying her little best to shake him. "You leave my mamma alone!" she cried shrilly. ...
— Casey Ryan • B. M. Bower

... mountains, They are rising white around me, Snow peaks like patriarchs That Winter has enthroned. I'm tramping up the valleys Where the cataracts sound me Thunders they have shrilly From eternity intoned. ...
— Many Gods • Cale Young Rice

... sides of the cave in the swash or backflow, until he arrived at a grand archway of limestone, riven from a mass of slate. A voice from the roof of the archway, whispering like a sigh of pain, articulated shrilly, ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend

... M'riar replied without a moment's hesitation. "Don't you bother lovin' hanythink but just the guvnor, and—and—Mr. Vanderlyn." She looked down at blushing Anna who, upon her knees, was astonished almost into full paralysis. And then she shrilly laughed. ...
— The Old Flute-Player - A Romance of To-day • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey

... "Hurrah!" shrilly screamed Waldo, as he dashed out into the storm, fairly revelling in the sudden change. "Who says this isn't 'way up in G?' Who says—out of the way, Bruno! Shut that trap-door in your face, so another fellow may get at least a share of the good ...
— The Lost City • Joseph E. Badger, Jr.

... Anne! when midnight wind careers, And the gust pelting on the out-house shed 30 Makes the cock shrilly in the rainstorm crow, To hear thee sing some ballad full of woe, Ballad of ship-wreck'd sailor floating dead, Whom his own true-love buried in the sands! Thee, gentle woman, for thy voice remeasures 35 Whatever tones and melancholy pleasures The ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... confounded; he had never been used to argument like this, and stared at Mrs. Gunilla with open mouth; whilst little Pyrrhus, excited by the warmth of his mistress, leapt upon the table, and barking shrilly seemed disposed to spring at the Candidate's nose. All this appeared so comic, that Elise could no longer keep back the merriment which she had felt during the former part of the dispute, and Jacobi himself accompanied her hearty laugh. Mrs. ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer

... by warriors on horseback and on foot, and by harsh Assyrian music, produced by trumpets, drums, metallic plates, and pipes squealing shrilly. ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus



Words linked to "Shrilly" :   shrill, piercingly



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