"Titter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for you, but it's becoming all the same," she said, enthusiastically. "If mamma came in now she would not know you. But then there would be a nice how-do-you-do if she did." She gave a titter which rolled through my very heart. "Well, Mr. Gymnasist, [note] are you ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... motions, accompanied by good-natured grunts of grotesque wrath, became a sort of household figure. The dorsal breadth of pronunciation with which he would expose Mr Ivory's Erskine, used to produce a titter which he was always at a loss to understand. Though not the fashionable mart where all the thorough libraries in perfect condition went to be hammered off—though it was rather a place where miscellaneous collections were sold, and therefore bargains might ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... She did titter right out in protracted meetin', Sister Henn don't deny it, and she felt dretful bad about it, and so did I. But Metilda said, and stuck to it, that she couldn't have helped laughin' if it had been to save her life. And though I realized the awfulness of it, still, when some ...
— Samantha Among the Brethren, Complete • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... gallery. The officers of the court looked aghast, and the strangers tittered with ill-suppressed laughter. "Who are you?" said the Judge, looking suddenly up, but with imperturbable gravity. The court was convulsed; the titter broke out into a laugh, and it was several minutes before silence and decorum could be restored. When the Ushers recovered their self-possession, they made diligent search for the profane transgressor; but he was not to be found. Nobody knew him; nobody had seen him. After a while the business ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... The titter that swept over the listeners brought the hot blood to Cameron's face. A deliberate insult a Highlander takes with calm. He is prepared to deal with it in a manner affording him entire satisfaction. Ridicule rouses ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... spring out upon him oppresses him, and, indeed, such a feeling is not altogether without justification. Many eyes look out at him at these corners as he goes by, and once the deadly silence is broken by a titter, evidently forcibly suppressed! Rylton takes no notice, however. His wrath is still so warm that he thinks of nothing but the picture-gallery, and that screen at the end of it—where she, his ...
— The Hoyden • Mrs. Hungerford
... back the melody that slips In lazy laughter from the lips That marvel much if any kiss Is sweeter than the apple's is. Blow back the twitter of the birds— The lisp, the titter, and the words Of merriment that found the shine Of summer-time a glorious wine That drenched the leaves that loved it so, In orchard lands of ...
— Riley Farm-Rhymes • James Whitcomb Riley
... stranger from Chicago, that her husband had deserted her and she didn't know but she would jump into the lake. Pa looked in my chum's eye and sized her up, and said it would be a shame to commit suicide, and asked if she didn't want to take a walk, My chum said he should titter, and he took Pa's arm and they walked up to the lake and back. Well, you may talk about joining the church on probation all you please, but they get their arm around a girl all the same. Pa hugged my chum till he says he ...
— Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa - 1883 • George W. Peck
... objected to on account of a lack of respect. The rather bitter Mr. Carlyle wrote satirically of the manners of young ladies. He even had his fling at their laugh: "Few are able to laugh what can be called laughing, but only sniff and titter from the throat outward, or at best produce some whiffling husky cachinnations as if they were laughing through wool. Of none such comes good." A young lady must not speak too loud or be too boisterous; she must even tone down her wit, lest ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... to send us some towels, then," growls one of the number, a black-browed, surly-looking fellow with ponderous, bent shoulders and a slouching mien. Some of his companions titter encouragingly, others are silent. The sergeant of the guard flushes angrily and ...
— A War-Time Wooing - A Story • Charles King
... his humour was infectious. We were next neighbours and met daily, yet our salutations lasted minutes at a stretch—shaking hands, slapping shoulders, capering like a pair of Merry-Andrews, laughing to split our sides upon some pleasantry that would scarce raise a titter in an infant school. It might be five in the morning, the toddy-cutters just gone by, the road empty, the shade of the island lying far on the lagoon: and the ebullition ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the summit, you will perceive the full extremity of the second cataract, embracing wild natural beauties of the most dreadful variety. Here all very famous people carve their names—and so you will carve your names also." Mansoor waited expectantly for a titter, and bowed to it when it arrived. "You will then return to Wady Halfa, and there remain two hours to suspect the Camel Corps, including the grooming of the beasts, and the bazaar before returning, so I wish ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle
... produce the authorised version of the Bible in court in a few minutes, as he had a copy in his chambers. This remark elicited a smile from Lord Coleridge, a broad grin from the lawyers in Court, and a titter from the crowd. It was perfectly understood that a gentleman of the long robe might prosecute anybody for blasphemy against the Bible and its Deity, but the idea of a barrister having a copy of the "sacred volume" in his chambers was really ...
— Prisoner for Blasphemy • G. W. [George William] Foote
... taken a musket on her shoulder, and was pacing up and down the edge of the flat in imitation of a sentry. She was soon pointed out, and a titter ran through the whole line: at last, as the major approached, she ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... from some of the half-grown boys, and a titter from some of the misses, attracted the attention of the audience, and looking round they saw Joe Digg standing up in ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... I cried angrily; for my temper seemed to have suddenly grown painfully acid, and a titter rose from ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn
... China-ink, representing Miles asleep after dinner, and which my friend Bunbury would not disown, I found a rude picture of myself going over my mare Sultana's head, and entitled "The Squire on Horseback, or Fish out of Water." And the fellow to roar with laughter, and all the girls to titter, when I came upon the page! My wife said she never was in such a fright as when I went to my book: but I can bear a joke against myself, and have heard many, though (strange to say, for one who has lived among some of the chief wits of the age) I never heard a good one in my life. Never ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of a strange figure in his ill-fitting and inappropriate clothes amongst a gathering of smart people. A lady looking at him through raised lorgnettes turned and whispered something with a smile to her companion—once before he had heard an audible titter from a little group of loiterers. He returned the glance with a lightning-like look of diabolical fierceness, and, turning round, stood upon the ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... quickly with fright and relief the White Linen Nurse burst forth into one maddening cackle of hysterical laughter. "Ha! Ha! Ha!" she giggled. "Hi! Hi! Titter! Titter! Titter!" ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... trembling in spirit for his future. Some of the men whom I have seen in prison, condemned to death or a life of confinement, have begun their careers just in this way, showing disrespect for their elders and for the church. Beware, young people, who think you are smart and laugh and titter in the sanctuary; there is a prison waiting for you, there is a hell yawning for you. Behold, there ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... looked along her own side of the table, at every schoolmate in turn; every one had joined in the trick. The teachers strove to be grave, but she saw they enjoyed the joke. The servants could not suppress a titter. ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... once referred to Devers as reminding her of a Hercules on horseback, which prompted Blake to respond, "Hercules! yes, by Jove, of the Farnese variety," whereat there was a guffaw among the men present who knew anything of art, and a general titter on every hand, for no one was ignorant of Devers's wide physical departure from artistic lines. But Tom Hollis and others of his ilk only caught the "far knees" part of it, which, however, was quite enough. Blake would have been a comfort to old Stone this breezy, wintry December, ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... longer to make her selection and again in counting out her money she made quite an unnecessary display. A spill of the coins brought an ill-concealed titter from Cleo and Grace, and this the girl so sharply resented that Louise edged her chums to the other side of the ...
— The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest - The Wig Wag Rescue • Lillian Garis
... titter still continuing below and Irving standing there stern and red, Westby disappeared into the loft. There was a moment's silence, then a sudden clicking of a ratchet wheel, and Allison began to rise rapidly towards ...
— The Jester of St. Timothy's • Arthur Stanwood Pier
... him the moment that I saw him, because he had a hooked nose and very small ferrety eyes. As we were pulling on board he asked me a great many questions of all kinds, particularly about the captain and officers, and to amuse myself and the boat's crew, who were on the full titter, I exercised my ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... becoming dignity. He never unbent; he never indulged in a joke or joined in the laughter of his neighbours. When I remarked on his immovable features, I was told that he slept in starched sheets—and I believed it. At one of these dinners, Prince Louis Lucien Bonaparte caused a titter during a speech about the freedom which people enjoyed in England. "In France," he said, "with all the declamations about Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite, there is very little freedom, and, with all the trees of liberte which are being planted along the boulevards, there is very little of ...
— My Autobiography - A Fragment • F. Max Mueller
... world tittering, and the midwife tittered, and the gossips spilt their caudle with tittering; and when I was brought to the font, the parson could not christen me for tittering. So I was never more than half baptized. And when I was little Joey, I made 'em all titter; there was not a melancholy face to be seen in Pogis. Pure nature, Sir. I was born a comedian. Old Screwup, the undertaker, could tell you, Sir, if he were living. Why, I was obliged to be locked up every time there was to be a funeral ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... the wall, mamma," he asked aloud. She hushed him with a smile, and he heard some one in another box titter. ...
— The Soul of a Child • Edwin Bjorkman
... the evening. There was nothing exceptional in his behaviour, but I could never forget the conversation in which he had offered to cut Orlov out. He was regaled with tea and red wine, and he used to titter and, anxious to say something pleasant, would declare that a free union was superior in every respect to legal marriage, and that all decent people ought really to come to Zinaida Fyodorovna ...
— The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... got hotter and hotter; and the Rev. I. R. Glass on "Fools".... There'd be all the cheap morality—"It's better, my young friends, to be good than to be bad. It pays better in the end"—and there'd be little stories, sentimental some of them and humorous some of them. There'd be a general titter of laughter at the humorous ones.... And the carbon prints, the "Ruysdael" always pointed out to visitors ... and after the war it will all be going on again. At Polchester, too, they'll be having cheap lectures in the Town-Hall and ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... But in the direction of the dead rhinoceros the air was hideous with the plaints of the waiting hyenas. Their peculiarly weird moans came in chorus; and every once in a while arose the shrill, prolonged titter that has earned them the ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al
... she'll have no gentlemen; they need not trouble themselves to come near her; nor," he added, with difficulty suppressing a titter, "any ladies either, except ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... children; and his humour was infectious. We were next neighbours and met daily, yet our salutations lasted minutes at a stretch—shaking hands, slapping shoulders, capering like a pair of Merry-Andrews, laughing to split our sides upon some pleasantry that would scarce raise a titter in an infant-school. It might be five in the morning, the toddy-cutters just gone by, the road empty, the shade of the island lying far on the lagoon: and the ebullition ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson
... last words a titter was heard from Ferdishenko; Lebedeff laughed too. The general grunted with irritation; Ptitsin and Totski barely restrained their smiles. The rest all sat ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... examined at Utica, he was told he was deficient in the organ of color, his eyebrow showing it. He immediately remembered that his mother often told him: 'Theodore, it is of no use to send you to match a skein of silk, for you never bring the right color.' When relating this, he observed a general titter in the room, and on inquiring the reason a candle was put near him, and, to his amazement, all agreed that the legs of his pantaloons were of different shades of green. Instead of a ridge all around his eyebrow, he has a little ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... old man had prepared so carefully and rehearsed until he knew every word by heart. He stepped forward, and gazed appealingly at the silent audience; but no word came from his dry lips. He swallowed convulsively, and appeared to be struggling with himself. A titter of laughter sounded from the back of the room. The old man's face became fiery red and then deathly pale. He looked helplessly and pitifully from side ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe
... lucky thing Wray has got you to set things right for him," snarled Pembury, amid a general titter. ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... discharged at him from some unknown quarter. The master steals very cautiously and quickly to the rear of the stooping boy, dreadfully exposed by his unfortunate position, and inflicts a stinging blow. A weak-eyed little scholar on the next bench ventures a modest titter, at which the assistant makes a significant motion with his ruler,—on the seat, as it were, of an imaginary pair of pantaloons,—which renders the weak-eyed boy on a sudden very insensible to the ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell
... what I've dreamed about for the last ten years. It's the wide open spaces filled with all the variations in old Nature's book of scenery. And best of all, there's no mob of nit-wits to titter and smirk. It's ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney
... encounters between himself and the opposing counsel, Mr. Sullivan. During Parson's speech Sullivan picked up Parson's large black hat and wrote with a piece of chalk upon it: "This is the hat of a d—d rascal." The lawyers sitting round began to titter, which called attention to the hat, and the inscription soon caught the eye of Parsons, who at once said: "May it please your honour, I crave the protection of the Court, Brother Sullivan has been stealing my hat and writing his own ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... moment when some of his audience commenced to titter at the poor success the appeal seemed to have, forcing his way through the crowd came a half drunken, shaggy bearded and poorly dressed man, who, when he reached the open center of the meeting, pleaded with the Salvation Army's leader to pray for him. ...
— The Trail of the Tramp • A-No. 1 (AKA Leon Ray Livingston)
... Ticklemouse," said the servant, very loudly and distinctly—ushering in Titmouse; on whom the door was the next instant closed. He felt amazingly flustered—and he would have been still more so, if he could have been made aware of the titter which pervaded the fourteen or twenty people assembled in the room, occasioned by the droll misnomer of the servant, and the exquisitely ridiculous appearance of poor Titmouse. Mr. Quirk, dressed in black, with knee breeches and silk stockings, immediately bustled up to him, shook him cordially by ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... orator. While he was talking, some of Abe's friends would worry. Would Old Abe be able to answer? Would he be able to hold his own? Then Abe would unfold his long legs and stand up. "The Giant Killer" towered so high above "the Little Giant" that a titter ran ...
— Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance • Frances Cavanah
... floor polished to such a glass-like slipperiness by the daily application of beeswax that I first ran foul of a chair, and then very nearly foundered in the endeavour to preserve my balance. I thought I caught a sound somewhat like that of a suppressed titter, but could not be certain. I, however, heard a very ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... meals he talked loudly, kept the two apprentices in a titter with his stories of campaigning, spoke slightingly of the city authorities, and joked the bailie with a freedom and roughness which scandalized her. Andrew was slow to notice the incongruity of his brother's demeanour and bearing with the atmosphere ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... to titter, forgot Lake's grapes; so he helped himself, and leaning against the table, looked superciliously upon Sir Harry, who was not to be deterred by the drowsy gaze of contempt with which the ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... duffer! I can get up right enough on my own cheek," I said with a titter, though my mouth was full of the brackish water into which I had plunged at first head and ears over, while my teeth were chattering with cold, the frosty November air being chilly. "I shall fancy I'm climbing the greasy pole at a regatta and that you're the pig on ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... Company, Chicago, who said during his remarks: "I believe you ladies are not prepared to pass on such a vital matter as this proposed legislation; it is a mighty complicated and intricate subject." A decided titter ran around the room. Women who had been making a study of the question from the home side for a number of years did not resent being told that they did not understand it but they smiled at a man's coming to tell them so. To show that they were fair, when he said that the packers did a great amount ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... from his brother's hand and replaced it in the stand, with the result that cook uttered a titter and hurried down-stairs, followed by Mary, bearing a ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... one has presence of mind to listen, he can distinctly hear a fine metallic titter along the tops of the furniture and a hasty scamper, as ...
— Moriah's Mourning and Other Half-Hour Sketches • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... The titter of the crowd spurred his rage into fury. He took his whip between his teeth, and grasping the hand-rods, was about to lift himself into the cab. Parker put his gloved hand ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... wagged up and down in assent, but not a word did she utter. At this a subdued titter came from Frances and Jessica. Mary Ethel's face grew red and she frowned ...
— Dickey Downy - The Autobiography of a Bird • Virginia Sharpe Patterson
... titter, all of you!" Mrs Polsue glared about her. "But if ever there was hole-and-corner sectarianism in this world—And this is what we've come to ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... the audience were in a titter; and he sat down amidst a burst of incontrollable laughter. Said Spencer to him frowningly, (I sat by the side of the judges on the bench, and both Hamilton and Spencer were within arm's length of me,) 'What do you ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... the more active animals being thus frustrated, Chappewee knew not what to do, nor could any one in the great council tell him. After a long period of silence, the ground-mole got up, and said he would make the attempt. Whereupon, there was a loud and general titter among all the beasts, that such an awkward and grovelling creature as he was should propose to himself such a dangerous and distant task. The wolf laughed in the shape of a hideous growl; the fox chuckled as much as if he had committed ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 2 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... a titter about the two. It spread and swelled till the whole assembly was in a gale of laughter. Miss Sessions's becoming blush deepened to the tint of angry mortification. She looked about and assumed the air of a schoolmistress with a room full of noisy pupils; but Johnnie, ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... 's times fu' bein' pleasant an' fu' goin' smilin' roun', 'Cause I don't believe in people allus totin' roun' a frown, But it's easy 'nough to titter w'en de stew is smokin' hot, But hit's mighty ha'd to giggle w'en ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... shining in mail, dragging a two-handed sword, and mouths the grandiloquence which poets have put into the speech of heroes, the dress-circle requires all its good-breeding and its feigned love of the traditionary drama not to titter. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... was a little titter, but M'gobo, the uncle of B'chumbiri, grimacing now in his rage, was ...
— Bones - Being Further Adventures in Mr. Commissioner Sanders' Country • Edgar Wallace
... contented him with sundry grave shakes of his big head, which shakes, being subject to diverse interpretations, were the least compromising expressions of opinion which his genius could suggest to him. No sooner, however, had the door closed on the clergyman than a titter went round the table. Matthew was still at a white heat. Accustomed as he was to "tum'le" his neighbors at the Red Lion, he was now profoundly agitated. It was not frequently that he brought down such rare ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... HE'LL excuse you. I've told him you had a headache. Why, of course you can't come! It would be too barefaced But you needn't be troubled, Irene; I'll do my best to make the time pass pleasantly for him." Here the cat gave a low titter, and the mouse girded itself up with a momentary ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... rose, but remained in a hovering position, between which and the chair Mr. Todd, flushed and dishevelled, extricated himself in all haste. A shrill titter of laughter and a clapping of hands greeted his appearance. He turned furiously on the ...
— Deep Waters, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... up her work early in January: it was now two months later, and she was still being rebuked for her inability to sew spangles on a hat-frame. As she returned to her work she heard a titter pass down the tables. She knew she was an object of criticism and amusement to the other work-women. They were, of course, aware of her history—the exact situation of every girl in the room was known and freely discussed by all the others—but ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... was startled by an audible titter from Patty, who hastily composed her face and assumed a look of vacuous innocence—but too late. She had caught the instructor's ...
— When Patty Went to College • Jean Webster
... mind their own business. A third complained that on Sunday afternoons the old man sat on his front porch and played Die Wacht am Rhein on a slide-trombone, to the great annoyance of his neighbours. Here Nat Wheeler slapped his knee with a loud guffaw, and a titter ran through the courtroom. The defendant's puffy red cheeks seemed fashioned by his Maker to give voice ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... point of the joke at first, although there was a general titter round the lower part of the table where the young surgeon was seated; when Master Bob did, however, he blushed pretty ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... there is no prohibition in the table of consanguinity against male ancestors, she would certainly have stepped back towards the Deluge, and ransacked her pedigrees on both sides for some kinsman of the patriarchs. I could titter a plusieurs reprises; but I am too old to be improper, and you are too modest to be impropered to: and so I will drop the ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... a titter all over the room. The name was very odd, and an oddity is always to be laughed at by the average person, boy or man. Did you ever think of that, my dear pedagogue; you who would fain amuse children, and yet will spit them upon the spear of public ridicule by asking them to tell their names out ...
— The Evolution of Dodd • William Hawley Smith
... Tuesdays and Saturdays; for then there is always the best company, and one is not expected to undergo the fatigue of listening. Aman. Does your lordship think that the case at the opera? Lord Fop. Most certainly, madam. There is my Lady Tattle, my Lady Prate, my Lady Titter, my Lady Sneer, my Lady Giggle, and my Lady Grin—these have boxes in the front, and while any favourite air is singing, are the prettiest company in the waurld, stap my vitals!—Mayn't we hope for the honour to see you added to our society, ...
— Scarborough and the Critic • Sheridan
... grand-baby, the titter of talk, the tissue paper of unpacking outside my door, and the miawling of "Minnie" the cat, prevented me from resting upon my arrival in the morning, and when I went to the Senate after lunch I could hardly keep awake. The Four Power Treaty was being ...
— My Impresssions of America • Margot Asquith
... accompaniment of a titter or two, Ray and Doe came up, I trying to look defiantly indifferent to the fact that he was going to read my silly remarks, and Doe with his lips firmly together, and his fair hair the fairer for the blush upon his forehead ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... Urquhart's uncle, with his agreeable laugh that was too attractive to be described as a titter, a name that its high, light quality might have suggested. But to that Peter said "No." He had been asked to Astleys for the cricket week; he was going to play for Urquhart's team. Not that he was any good; but to scrape through without disgrace (of course ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... Mrs Bowldler in a kind of hysterical titter, snatching at her bodice somewhere over the region of her heart. Fancy paid ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... oscillation lent itself to everything they saw. John zigzagged, it is true, but otherwise he was fairly steady on his pins. Unluckily, however, failing to see a stone before on the road, he tripped, and went sprawling on his hands and knees. A titter went. ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown
... A titter of amusement passed over the three yachtsmen. It was tinged with resentment, though, and only curiosity, aroused by shock upon shock, prevented an angry rejoinder to Milo's speech that could only have ended one way: in physical ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... redolent of hyson and pekoe; muffins and marmalade, newspapers, and Finnan haddies, left little room for observation on the character of Charles's warlike "turn-out." At length a look from Caroline, followed by a smile that nearly ripened to a titter, caused him to turn abruptly and address his neighbor. It was Miss Simpkinson, who, deeply engaged in sipping her tea and turning over her album, seemed, like a female Chrononotonthologos, "immersed in cogibundity ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... pasteboard square and a titter ran through the crowd. To her alarm, the little girl noticed that the colonel's son did not laugh. Instead, he opened his mouth and stared wildly. Another instant and the square was turned toward her. She gave a cry when she saw the figure drawn ...
— The Biography of a Prairie Girl • Eleanor Gates
... though the Nixy's mysterious melody still sounded vaguely through the water's roar, and the Hulder seemed to titter behind the tree-trunks and vanish in the underbrush, a real, unmistakable view was never vouchsafed to Nils, and the three wishes which were to make his fortune he had ...
— Boyhood in Norway • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... heart is thawed into melting pleasure after being so long frozen up in the Greenland bay of indifference, amid the noise and nonsense of Edinburgh. Miss seems very well pleased with my bardship's distinguishing her, and after some slight qualms, which I could easily mark, she sets the titter round at defiance, and kindly allows me to keep my hold; and when parted by the ceremony of my introduction to Mr. Somerville, she met me half, to resume my situation.—Nota Bene—The poet within a point and a half of being ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... lordship be thankful that such is not your own case," returned Mr. Caryll, with imperturbable good humor, and sent a titter round ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... of every personal resource—except her voice. The ladies admired, the gentlemen applauded. Nobody heard anything but the words "Speak up, miss," whispered by the same voice which had already entreated "Fag" and "the Coachman" to "come off." A responsive titter rose among the younger spectators; checked immediately by magnanimous applause. The temperature of the audience was rising to Blood Heat—but the national sense of fair play was not boiled out of ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... the multitude changed. The people began to titter, and after that to laugh openly. They wagged their heads at Israel; they derided him; they made merry over his sorry plight. Where he was now he seemed to be not so much a fallen tyrant as a silly sham and an imposture. Look at him! Look at his bony and ...
— The Scapegoat • Hall Caine
... somehow—those feet of hers still twice their size—and stepped out toward the edge of the platform. A thousand spots of black and white that were eyes and noses and hats danced before her; she heard a suppressed titter from the front row. Then, out of it all came Gyp's strained face. Gyp was leaning a ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... well-equipped nineteen as social equipments went in the circle she had entered. Being a schoolgirl was no drawback; there are few New-Orleans circles where it is; and especially not in her case, for she needed neither to titter nor chatter,—she could talk. And then, her violin made victory ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... third writ of inquiry, in the same cause, should not be executed; and if your Lordships choose to hear me I will do so to the best of my ability." "Well, go on," was the answer, in a very rough uncouth voice, and with a frown, and a roll upon the bench, which set all the learned friends in a titter. ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt
... me; for though I couldn't see her face for the horrid veil she kept over it, I saw from the anxiety she was in to hide it, from the shaking, of her whole figure, that she was in the convulsions of a suppressed titter. I'll shoot him ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... walked over to the corner indicated with his head up, his hands in his pockets, and a roll in his gait full of defiance, and took his seat on the end of the bench and looked straight before him. He could hear the titter around him, and a lowering look came into his blue eyes. He glanced sideways down the bench opposite. It happened that the next seat to his was that of Vashti Mills, who was at that time just nine. She was not laughing, ...
— The Burial of the Guns • Thomas Nelson Page
... Lottie, which she returned with a look of serious expectation, then dropped her eyes and veiled a different expression under the long lashes. But he was sorely embarrassed, and stammered out he scarcely knew what. A suppressed titter from Addie Marchmont and the young men was the only response he heard, and it was not re-assuring. He heartily wished himself back in Michigan, but was comforted by seeing Lottie looking gravely and reproachfully ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... however, is a libel upon his fair character. I cannot believe that Wren ever slept on duty. He kept near to him a long hazel stick, wherewith to overawe any of the younger members of the congregation who were inclined either to speak or titter. On Wednesdays and Fridays in Lent, when the school attended morning service, and, in the absence of older people, occupied the principal seats instead of their Sunday places in the gallery, Wren's rod was frequently called into active play, and I have heard the stick resound ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... on his arrival at school, Keith found the door fastened on the inside. A titter from within revealed the fact that it was no accident, and the guffaw of derision that greeted his sharp command that the door should be opened immediately showed that the Dennison boys were up ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... round and attempting to be calm, "what is it you have to say? Really this incident may seem ridiculous," he added, seeing that there was still a suppressed titter going on, "but I detest the sight of a wig block since—you ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... evening. The house was profoundly silent; the first wandering chords of a harp were heard behind the scenes; and Duprez began. In the very midst of one of his finest and tenderest sostenuto passages, Josephine sneezed—and such a sneeze! you might have heard it out in the lobbies. An audible titter ran round the house. I saw Madame de Marignan cover her face with her handkerchief, and yield to an irrepressible fit of laughter. As for the tenor, he cast a withering glance up at the box, and made a marked pause before resuming ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... time of calling her by her Christian name, and done for the sake of making the equal intimacy apparent. In fact, Mary was behaving herself better than the visitors, as Lady Kenton absolutely told her when a sort of titter was heard in the hall, where they were expressing to Freda their horror at the scrape, and extorting that Miss Marshall was really ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... end punctually at eleven. The only realistic scene is in Paul Astier's room, when he is dressing for dinner, and washes his hands with real soap, uses real towels, and puts real studs and links into his shirt, and then suddenly reminded, as it were, by a titter which pervades the house, that there are "ladies present," he disappears for a few seconds, and returns in his evening-dress trowsers and nice clean shirt, looking, except for the absence of braces, like a certain well-known ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, October 4, 1890 • Various
... evil brought its own cure. The pageant went on, as its actor thought, most successfully for three days or so; but at last the dupe, unable to contain herself longer, appealed to Amyas,—"Ayacanora quite English girl now; is she not?"—heard a titter behind her, looked round, saw a dozen honest faces in broad grin, comprehended all in a moment, darted down the ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... moved; for on the staircase in the lower hall, and at the front of the house, they were joined by throng after throng, each man of which, like the commander-in-chief, was armed with a flambeau. This was bad enough of itself, but the count's body-guard were all in a titter, and every man enjoyed ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... stillness came and wrapped itself about her, a soft and velvety stillness; to shut out gasp or murmur or stifled titter. ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... curved point, when seen sideways. The rest of his gait was in proportion to this unhappy amble; and the implied mixture of bashful rear and self-satisfaction was so unutterably ridiculous that Leicester's friends did not suppress a titter, in which many of Sussex's partisans were unable to resist joining, though ready to eat their nails with mortification. Sussex himself lost all patience, and could not forbear whispering into the ear of his friend, ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... accommodate him, or require That service for him at some other hand, Addressing thus the family, began. Hear now, Eumaeus, and ye other swains His fellow-lab'rers! I shall somewhat boast, By wine befool'd, which forces ev'n the wise To carol loud, to titter and to dance, And words to utter, oft, better suppress'd. 570 But since I have begun, I shall proceed, Prating my fill. Ah might those days return With all the youth and strength that I enjoy'd, When in close ambush, once, at Troy we lay! Ulysses, Menelaus, and myself Their chosen coadjutor, ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... did laugh, I am afraid. Even the Cardinal—well, his smile was perilously near a titter. He took a ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... envied, were now about to despise her. To the impatient spirit, once so strong—so insolent in its strength—what a pang—what a humiliation was here! In her dreams she saw the young maidens of the village stand aloof, as she had once stood aloof from them:—she heard the senseless titter of their laugh; and she had no courage to resent the impertinence. Her courage was buried in her shame. No heart is so cowardly as that which is conscious of guilt. Picture after picture of this sort did her fancy present to her that ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... angry and disappointed, at my refusal to accept of his hospitable invitation. He directed the attention of his women towards me, and I saw that they were attempting to titter and sneer at my expense;—but the effort was a total failure, for there was not a better-dressed person in the house than I was. Having honored the envious party with a smile of scorn,—which, ...
— My Life: or the Adventures of Geo. Thompson - Being the Auto-Biography of an Author. Written by Himself. • George Thompson
... amusement. She hid it at first, was properly attentive and helpful, but to see Lorry trying to tell lies, worrying and struggling over it, was too much. A day came when she forgot both manners and sympathy, began to titter and then was lost. Lorry was vexed at first, looked cross, but when the sinner gasped out, "Oh, Lorry, I never thought I'd see you come to ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... he had been! She was as they were. The nodding of their towering hats was before his eyes; the subdued titter that accompanied their whispered comments was in his ears; the lavender, white rose, and violet essences with which they perfumed their baths and sprinkled their clothes were in his nostrils; suffocatingly, as his Counsel went on pleading. The intention of ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... A titter ran over the court room. People strained to the utmost are always glad of an excuse to smile. The laughter of a wrought-up crowd always seems to ...
— The Case of Jennie Brice • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... A titter ran from seat to seat. The girls, unable to stifle their amusement any longer, seized their bags and hurried down the aisle to the dressing-room, where, under cover of the rattle of the train, they could laugh as freely as ...
— The Little Colonel's Christmas Vacation • Annie Fellows Johnston
... to turn away, for yonder, apart from commodore, judge, and bishop, but with Madame Hayle at his side, stood the captain, giving him a sign which he promptly passed on up to the pilot. "By the hind leg," he repeated, whereat a titter broke from the averted face of old Joy, while Ramsey ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... titter, played very prettily with his interrupter, the lecturer went back to his picture of the past, the drying of the seas, the emergence of the sand-bank, the sluggish, viscous life which lay upon their margins, the overcrowded lagoons, the tendency ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
... I were he," said Wrinstone, putting himself into an attitude of great authority and importance, setting out his paunch, at the same time, something like unto the knight himself. Another laugh, or rather titter, went through the courtyard at this exploit; a suspicious glance, however, was directed towards the casement above, some apprehensions evidently existing lest Sir Roger should have been eye-witness ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... understood the position. The women at the other stalls began to titter, and he felt that he was surrounded by covert rebellion, which a word might cause to blaze forth. He therefore restrained himself, and in person drew the refuse-pail from under the stall and dropped the skate into it. Old Madame Mehudin had already ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... the posse gave himself to a job of scientific profanity. He was spurred on to outdo himself because he had heard a titter or two behind him. When he had finished, he formed a procession. He, with Elliot hand-cuffed beside him, was at the head of it. It marched ...
— The Yukon Trail - A Tale of the North • William MacLeod Raine
... it, too, at least the crying part, but a titter from one of the girls in the back of the room saved her. She was no longer afraid, ...
— Billie Bradley at Three Towers Hall - or, Leading a Needed Rebellion • Janet D. Wheeler
... climbed into the witness-box (as though he were going up a rick), which was situated between the Judge and the jury. His appearance again provoked a titter through the Court; but it was not loud enough to call for any further measure of suppression than the usual "Si—lence!" loudly articulated in two widely separated syllables by the crier, who had no sooner pronounced it than he turned his face from the learned Judge and pressed his hand tightly ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... of Professor Wesley, told his story glibly and with perfect coolness, interspersing the heavier details with amusing anecdotes, which made the ministers smile, and brought out a loud titter of laughter from the ministers' wives, and tremendous applause, inclusive of stamping and the banging of hymn books, from the ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... aloft and gazed at some object attentively for a moment. All eyes followed the direction of the Speaker's, and then there was a general titter. The Speaker said: ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... she should drop her glasses. . . . He heard two girls gasping and muttering behind him. . . . There was a titter across the house. ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... was making this oration, there was a general titter behind him in the schoolroom. The orator had his back to the door of this ancient apartment, which was open, and a gentleman who was quite familiar with the place (for both Major Arthur, Pen's uncle, and Mr. John Pendennis had been at the school) was asking the fifth-form ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... cause (like Lady GODIVA), but I daresay you have some odds and ends stowed away that you would contribute; for instance, that delightful old topper that you were wont to go to church in before the War, and that used to cause a titter among the choir—can't you get the moths to let you have it? Neckties, again. Where are the tartans of '71? Surely there may be some bonny stragglers left in your tie-bins. And who fears to talk of '98 and its fancy waistcoats? All ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 26, 1917 • Various
... arms she knew not what to do with, but apprehending open laughter, held them rigidly to her sides, shooting anxious glances at the opposite mirror. She encountered a battery of eyes. At the same time she heard a suppressed titter. It was only by an effort of will that she refrained from running out of the room, and she felt as if she had been dipped in the hot springs of Nevis. It was at this agonising moment that the amiable Lord Hunsdon presented the ...
— The Gorgeous Isle - A Romance; Scene: Nevis, B.W.I. 1842 • Gertrude Atherton
... grew mellow, and the succeeding sentences were in the most pathetic and lugubrious tones], "you all know-ah that your humble speaker-ah has got-ah jest the best yoke of steers-ah in this township-ah." [Here Betsey Short shook the floor with a suppressed titter.] "They a'n't no sech steers as them air two of mine-ah in this whole kedentry-ah. Them crack oxen over at Clifty-ah ha'n't a patchin' to mine-ah. Fer the ox knoweth his owner-ah and the ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston
... Sure enough, father is playing it now, if he only knew it. Much of our time in life we go about blindfolded, stumbling over mistakes, trying to catch things that we miss, while people stand round the ring and titter, and break out with half-suppressed laughter, and push us ahead, and twitch the corner of our eye-bandage. After a while we vehemently clutch something with both hands, and announce to the world our capture; the blindfold is taken from our eyes, and, amid the shouts of the surrounding ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... she described it afterwards 'didn't those wretched beings all grin and titter, even the ladies, who ought to have had more manners, and that old Miss Mellon, who is a real growth of the hotbed of gossip, simpered and supposed we must look for such things now; and, though ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... that Mr. Thompson had overlooked much lawlessness in the conduct of the younger people, in his abstract contemplation of some impending event. When the cloth was removed, he rose to his feet, and grimly tapped upon the table. A titter, that broke out among the Jones girls, became epidemic on one side of the board. Charles Thompson, from the foot of the table, looked up in tender perplexity. "He's going to sing a Doxology," "He's going to pray," "Silence for a speech," ran round ...
— Mrs. Skaggs's Husbands and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... back part of the church suggested trinity as a substitute and started a titter, but the preacher had already got his dramatic momentum, and was sweeping along in a tumultuous tide of oratory. Right at his three victims did he aim his fiery eloquence, and ever and again he came back to ...
— The heart of happy hollow - A collection of stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... once put very much to the blush, being at a friend's house, and by him required to salute the ladies. I kissed the chamber-jade into the bargain, for she was as well dressed as the best. But I was soon undeceived by a general titter, which gave me the utmost confusion; nor can I believe myself the only person who has ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... An audible titter ran around the room as this announcement was made, and every eye was fastened upon Katherine, who instantly suspected the situation had been planned for the sole purpose of making her uncomfortably conspicuous and bringing her beloved Science ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... up in the white-house kitchen, where were also the reek of scorched hair and the laughing expostulations of the Little Doctor and the boyish titter of Pink and Irish, who were curling laboriously the chaps of Miguel with the curling tongs of the Little Doctor and ...
— Flying U Ranch • B. M. Bower
... protest of his Excellency, who forgot his noble presence," replied Cattrina bowing back. "Seeing that his King, who is not a cut-throat"—here a titter of laughter went through the company, though it was evident from the frown upon his face that the Doge liked the jest ill—"has chosen to make a knight of this de Cressi. Or so he says, which will show you, friends all, how hard it must be ...
— Red Eve • H. Rider Haggard
... opening scene of the second act, something in a velvet case, or frame, that may look like a large miniature of Mabel, such as one of Ross's, and eschew that picture. It haunts me with a sense of danger. Even a titter at that critical time, with the whole of that act before you, would be a fatal thing. The picture is bad in itself, bad in its effect upon the beautiful room, bad in all its associations with the house. In case of your having nothing at hand, I ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... they are always being shoved back into a drawer. You have only to rout about in their minds for a bit. They pretend at first to be quite correct, and then out comes the nasty little courage of the darkness. Sometimes there is even an apologetic titter. They are quite emancipated, they say; I have misunderstood them. Their emancipation is like those horrid white lizards that grow in the Kentucky caves out of the sunlight. They tell you they don't see why they shouldn't do this ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... came down heavily and squelched the titter which threatened to be something more. "Mr. Brickhouse has the floor, ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher |
