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Moan   /moʊn/   Listen
Moan

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



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"Moan" Quotes from Famous Books



... of Devonshire in his early manner and in his late; and his early manner was about as detestable as a man's manner could have been. He had a habit of sinking his voice as he approached the end of a sentence, so that a sentence beginning on a high note gradually sank to a moan, and a murmur, and a gulp. The whole effect was mournful in the extreme, and gave you a sense of the weariness and the worthlessness of all human life such as the most eloquent ascetic could never succeed in imparting. In the House of Lords, the Duke of ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor

... upon the deep woods, It lets down curtains of mist And sheets of rain, that drip Crystal beads among the trees. Way above, the branches lash and moan And weave. Below, it is still, Still as the undersea. Soft fern and feathery bracken Loom through the mist Like branching coral, And drifting leaves float down Like snowy ...
— A Little Window • Jean M. Snyder

... time to ring the door was unbolted, and this time it was a gray-haired father who received them. Grim and silent was he, but ever and anon as they were passing up the stairs they heard a low heart-rending moan from the poor mother, who had left the window and buried her head among the cushions of the sofa. Theodore knew nothing about the sweet sleeping baby who had nestled so cozily in the great rocking-chair twenty-three ...
— Three People • Pansy

... sitting there by the firelight in the lonely barn, hearing the strange moan of the snow-wind. When Mrs Cottier finished her story we talked of all sorts of things; I think that we were both a little afraid of being silent in such a place, so, as we ate, we kept talking just as though we were by the fireside at home. I was afraid that perhaps the revenue officers would catch ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield

... fountain's warble In the courtyard sounds alone. As the water to the marble So my heart falls with a moan From love-sighing To this dying. Death forerunneth Love to win "Sweetest eyes ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various

... Its current. Naiad nymphs and Dryads wore Garments of sable tinge, with streaming hair. Wide scatter'd lie his limbs. His head and lyre Thou, Hebrus, dost receive; and while they glide, Wond'rous occurrence! down the floating stream, The lyre a mournful moan sends forth; the lips, Now lifeless, murmur plaintive; and the bank Echoes the lamentations. Borne along To ocean, now his native stream they leave, And reach Methymna on the ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid

... had not heard the last words of Buck Daniels, and not a man who had not seen the blow. Everyone of them had seen, or heard accurately described, how the slender stranger beat Jerry Strann to the draw and shot him down in that same place. Such a moan came from them as when many men catch their breath with pain, and with a simultaneous movement those who were in line with Buck Daniels and Barry leaped back against the bar on one side and against the wall on the other. Their eyes, fascinated, ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand

... had arisen, and lent an uncertain light to the outlines of hill, crag, and moorland, while it gilded the cornice above, where the wind seemed to linger and moan over departed greatness. The Druidical worship of olden days, the deluded worshippers now turned into dust, and the cruel rites of their bloodstained worship, older even than those of the ruined temple, rose before his imagination, until fancy ...
— Edwy the Fair or the First Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake

... dark trees along the road. He came to a little pine grove. It was very quiet. There was a hum of insects, and the familiar, sad, ever-present swishing of the wind through the trees. He listened to its soft moan, and it eased the intensity of his feelings. This emotion was new to him. Death, however, had touched him more than once. Well he remembered his stunned faculties, the unintelligible mystery, the awe and the grief consequent on ...
— The Day of the Beast • Zane Grey

... delicacy and importance. And being led and tempted on by this remorseful thought into a condition which the evil-minded class before referred to would term the maudlin state or stage of drunkenness, it occurred to Mr Swiveller to cast his hat upon the ground, and moan, crying aloud that he was an unhappy orphan, and that if he had not been an unhappy orphan things had never come ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... the boat onto the platform. A few boxes, a coil of rope, and other odds and ends stood about. He felt his way forward among them toward the bottom of the steps. He heard the moan again, and now he saw the outlines of a human figure ...
— The Fire People • Ray Cummings

... something like a low moan was heard. The negro's mouth opened, and the whites of his great eyes seemed ...
— The Madman and the Pirate • R.M. Ballantyne

... simply sat, with staring eyes, and clutched the arms of her chair as though to keep from slipping into some dreadful abyss. Once a low moan escaped from ...
— Dearest • Henry Beam Piper

... position where they could do nothing—helplessly bound, and laid on a bench in the main cabin, staring blankly up at the ceiling. Each one was gagged so effectively that he could not utter more than a faint moan. ...
— Tom Swift and his Aerial Warship - or, The Naval Terror of the Seas • Victor Appleton

... of other ladies there—beautiful ladies—only she didn't seem to like them any better than I did the girls. I wondered if maybe they bragged, too, and I asked her; but she only began to cry again, and moan, "What have I done, what have I done?"—and I had to try all over again to comfort her. But ...
— Mary Marie • Eleanor H. Porter

... impatiently waiting the day which was to bring her lover. There was only one more day of waiting and "to-morrow, to-morrow he comes," she sang. Early in the evening dark clouds formed in the sky, the wind began to moan, the waves beat high upon the shore, the murmuring winds changed to howling blasts, the waves rolled mountains high, the spirits of the sea and air seemed to have arisen in their fury, doors rattled, houses shook on their foundations—and to-morrow came, but no ...
— Bohemian Society • Lydia Leavitt

... through the forest, across the Moor of Loneliness, up the glens and gorges, and over the hills. Above glimmered the pale stars, around them was the screech and the moan of ...
— Celtic Tales - Told to the Children • Louey Chisholm

... fully cover all your need of power. He stands anew in our midst to-day, and putting His pierced hand gently upon your arm, His low, loving, clear voice says quietly, but very distinctly, "You—you shall have power." For every subtle, strong temptation, for every cry of need, for every low moan of disappointment, for every locking of the jaws in the resolution of despair, for every disheartened look out into the morrow, for every yearningly ambitious heart there comes to-night that unmistakable ringing promise of His—ye shall ...
— Quiet Talks on Power • S.D. Gordon

... shock the fearful earth hath grown! Reeling beneath the mighty plunge, it sighs with ceaseless moan; Now rush thy waves, with frenzy wild, in foam of dazzling white, Now, placidly they sweep along, with ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various

... and looked at us, from one to the other. I saw him look at me, very softly, as you'd say. At the same moment my lady came in on tiptoe; she came up to the bed and put in her head between me and the count. The marquis saw her and gave a long, most wonderful moan. He said something we couldn't understand, and he seemed to have a kind of spasm. He shook all over and then closed his eyes, and the doctor jumped up and took hold of my lady. He held her for a moment a bit roughly. The marquis was stone dead! This time there were ...
— The American • Henry James

... moan was all that came from the cook, nor would Hankinson have listened to more had there been more to hear, for simultaneously with the moan he became uncomfortably conscious of a presence. In trying to describe it afterwards, Hankinson said that at first he thought ...
— The Water Ghost and Others • John Kendrick Bangs

... sledge-hammer right hand shot out, landing on that fellow's face. With a moan the fellow collapsed on the sidewalk, ...
— The Young Engineers in Arizona - Laying Tracks on the Man-killer Quicksand • H. Irving Hancock

... moan?—No! He lies yonder, Caroline Lyndsay—mine, indeed, till the grave us do part. These hands have closed over him, and he rests in their clasp, helpless as an infant." Involuntarily Caroline recoiled. But looking into that ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... silence, even as it was at the Roman ruins, but suddenly I heard close to my very ear a coarse bargeman's laugh, and with a moan something dropped into the water and a gurgling sound followed.... I looked round: no one was anywhere to be seen, but from the bank the echo came bounding back, and at once from all sides rose a deafening din. There was a medley of everything in this chaos of ...
— Dream Tales and Prose Poems • Ivan Turgenev

... and a faint moan came from his lips. A numbness seemed to envelop his body from the waist downwards, and in the intervals of a stabbing pain in his head, he seemed to hear people whispering near by. A figure passed close to him, the figure of a girl with fair hair, ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile

... not vain; they do not err Who say, that, when the poet dies, Mute Nature mourns her worshipper, And celebrates his obsequies; Who say, tall cliff, and cavern lone, For the departed bard make moan; That mountains weep in crystal rill; That flowers in tears of balm distil; Through his loved groves the breezes sigh, And oaks, in deeper groan, reply; And rivers teach their rushing wave To ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain

... as I drew the curtain back, was a faint moan—"No light! I can't bear the light! Do let ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

... With a low moan Nell retreated and sank weak and trembling on the miserable cot, and for the next few minutes gave free rein ...
— Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective - Or, The Crime of the Midnight Express • Frank Pinkerton

... you have taken from me The Present, and I murmur not, nor moan; The Future too, with all her glorious promise; But do not ...
— Legends and Lyrics: First Series • Adelaide Anne Procter

... a person's lips and throat, I gain an idea of many specific vibrations, and interpret them: a boy's chuckle, a man's "Whew!" of surprise, the "Hem!" of annoyance or perplexity, the moan of pain, a scream, a whisper, a rasp, a sob, a choke, and a gasp. The utterances of animals, though wordless, are eloquent to me—the cat's purr, its mew, its angry, jerky, scolding spit; the dog's bow-wow of warning or of joyous welcome, its yelp of despair, and ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller

... her brother Henry. After a few days a relapse set in, and her stepmother was sent for. After the fever had passed away she suffered very severe pain. She remarked to her sister once, "Oh, Marie, if I might but have five minutes' ease from pain! I don't want ever to moan when gentle sister Ellen comes in. How ...
— Excellent Women • Various

... The service was almost more than one could bear, but she was composed, except at the references in the sermon to our state of intense anxiety, and the need of submission. At the special mention in the Litany of those in danger, I heard from beneath her hands clasped over her face, that low moan of "O, brother, brother!" Still I think when the worst comes, she will bear it better and ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge

... gives us the earliest hint of what has been done: "This house was his. . . ." But Ottima, whether from scorn of Sebald's mental disarray, or from genuine callousness, answers this first moan of anguish not at all. She gazes from the open lattice: "How clear the morning is—she can see St. Mark's! Padua, blue Padua, is plain enough, but where lies Vicenza? They shall find it, by following her finger that points at ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne

... ripened grain, and this they did gaily and with never a thought for the hardship that they might cause; and as they swept along, hot after the quarry, the poor, mistreated peasant, whether man or woman, dared utter no word of protest or make moan, nor did he or she dare to look boldly and unabashed upon this hunting scene, but rather from the cover of some protecting thicket. Scenes of this kind will serve to show the great gulf which there was between the great and the lowly; and as there was an almost total lack of any sort of education ...
— Women of the Romance Countries • John R. Effinger

... reflecting, she had the courage to summon the spirit, and presently, from the floor of the coach arose the appalling sound; it was repeated three times, in rapid succession, and died away in a hollow moan. When the door of the carriage was opened, both were found in a swoon, and it was some time before they were restored and could inform those present ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 332, September 20, 1828 • Various

... Here a moan diverted Winn's attention from his own unhappiness, and caused him to spring to the side of the little girl. She opened her eyes and looked at him. "Oh, Sabella!" he cried, "tell me who saved you? Was it Mr. Brackett—my Uncle ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe

... little hermit-crab, which crawls over the coral sand in his stolen shell, and keeps to his lonely course, and loves his life so well—sunshine, which is best of all for men; and the wind in the waving palms; and the lonely, wandering coast with the eternal moan out on the reefs, the sweet, fresh tang, the clear, antiseptic breath of salt, and always by the glowing, hot, colorful day or by the soft dark night with its shadows and whisperings on the beach, that significant presence—the sense of something ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey

... island. By day the broad hotel piazzas shelter such of the guests as prefer to let others make their excursions into the heart of the island, and around its rocky, sea-beaten borders; and at night, when the falling mists have brought the early dark, and from lighthouse to lighthouse the fog-horns moan and low to one another, the piazzas cede to the corridors and the parlours and smoking-rooms. The life does not greatly differ from other seaside hotel life on the surface, and if one were to make distinctions one would perhaps begin by saying that ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... and the little sister was gripping my arm with both hands. A third horseman shot into view out of the woods at tight angles, to stop them, and it seemed that the three horses must crash together in a heap. With a moan the Blight buried her face on my shoulder. She shivered when the muffled thud of body against body and the splintering of wood rent the air; a chorus of shrieks arose about her, and when she lifted her frightened face Marston, the Discarded, was limp on the ground, his horse was staggering ...
— A Knight of the Cumberland • John Fox Jr.

... She was passing Richford with her head in the air. It came to him suddenly that he had lost everything, that he was baffled and beaten. In a sudden spasm of rage he caught the girl by the shoulders in a savage grip. She gave a little moan of pain as she looked around for assistance. It ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White

... through it—whether he paced up and down by the sea in the blustering weather, or strolled away through the town and up the face of the tall white cliff, or lay awake in the dark night, listening to the rush and moan of the waves—all through these doubts and questions there was another and sweeter and clearer sound, that seemed to come ...
— Sunrise • William Black

... finish off his rocky steps, and make one piece of work complete. She paused at the summit of them, and was much inclined to descend and examine what was wanting, when she started at hearing a rustling beneath, then a low moan and an attempt at a call. The bushes and a projecting rock cut off her view; but, in some trepidation, she called out, 'Is any one there?' Little did she ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge

... entreats the men to tell him what they have seen. And the chief of the haymakers, father of seven sons, tells of an evil omen, how, for the first time in thirty years, at the beginning of his day's work, he had cut himself. The parents moan the more. Then a mower from Tarascon tells how as he began his work he had discovered a nest wherein the young birds had been done to death by a myriad of invading ants. Again "the tale of woe was a lance-thrust for ...
— Frederic Mistral - Poet and Leader in Provence • Charles Alfred Downer

... told a soul about my troubles or my trials, for long I could not bear to think of them myself. But lately I have seen it in its true light, and have come to the conclusion that I have no right to moan my life away. I'm past all that, there is nothing for me to live for in myself, but my life is spared for some purpose, and I propose to devote it to doing good to others'—'isn't she a ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady

... not go, came to his doom, And fell a molten mass; so, tempting Heaven, Saul died the death of disobedient Pride And self-willed Folly—curses of mankind! Sins against God which wrought the Fall, and sent, As tempests moan along the listening night, A wail of mournful sadness drifting down The annals of the world: unearthly strains! Cries of eternal ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning

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

... lantern, entered Mlle. de Gesvres's room and gagged her before she could cry out. Then, after binding her with cords, they softly opened the door of the room in which Mlle. de Saint-Veran was sleeping. Mlle. de Gesvres heard a stifled moan, followed by the sound of a person struggling. A moment later, she saw two men carrying her cousin, who was also bound and gagged. They passed in front of her and went out through the window. Then Mlle. de Gesvres, terrified ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc

... reminded of an electrifying performance of Macbeth he had once witnessed. A red glare from a ruby lamp at a fire-street corner splashed her frail fingers with vivid color as they passed it by. She gave a scream that ended in a moan, and mechanically wiped her hands back and forth, back and forth, upon her coat. Brencherly's heart ached for her. Over and over he repeated reassuring words in her deafened ears, striving to lay the awful ghost that had fastened like a vampire on her heart. But to no avail. She was ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford

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

... sorrow was, Helen Travers made no moan, exacted no sympathy. She had come alone to the parting of the ways, and she had thought only for the boy whom she had mothered tenderly and successfully. Ledyard did not interrupt the gentle flow of her thoughts. There was time; he would not startle ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock

... a rustling noise broke upon their ears close upon their right; and then there came a distinct moan, and Joan de Tany fled to the refuge ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... exceeding weak and from the day I wounded him he had remained unable to do her any service or to speak or do aught but drink; but he was still alive, because his hour was not yet come. She used to visit him morning and evening in the mausoleum and carry him wine and broths to drink and weep and make moan over him; and thus she did for another year, whilst I ceased not to have patience with her and pay no heed to her doings, till one day I came upon her unawares and found her weeping and saying, "Why art thou absent from my sight, O delight ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume I • Anonymous

... and turned away with a little moan, stumbling blindly towards the inner room, but as she reached the curtains his voice arrested her. He had thrown aside the magazine and was lying back on the divan, his long limbs stretched out indolently, his hands clasped ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull

... awakened with a sudden start by some sound, only the faintest echo of which remained in his consciousness. His nerves were tingling with a sense of excitement. He sat up in bed and listened. Suddenly it came again—a long, low moan of pain, stifled at the end as though repressed by some outside agency. He leaped from his bed, hurried on a few clothes, and stepped out on to the landing. The cry had seemed to him to come from the further end of the long corridor—in the direction, indeed, ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim

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

... and over it a yellow blanket with a brown edge. The body proved to be his, Kuzma Vassilyevitch's. He tried to cry out ... no sound came. He tried again, did his very utmost ... there was the sound of a feeble moan quavering under his nose. He heard heavy footsteps and a sinewy hand parted the bed curtains. A grey-headed pensioner in a patched military overcoat stood gazing at him.... And he gazed at the pensioner. ...
— Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... me praise and gold, And ever I moan my loss, For I struck the blow for my false love's sake, And not for the men at the ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... heaven, that madest this our heart Thine own, Dost pierce the broken language of its moan— Thou dost not scorn our needs, but satisfy! Each yearning deep and wide, Each claim, is justified; Our young illusions fail not, though they die Within the brightness of Thy Rising, kissed To happy death, like early clouds that lie About the gates of Dawn,—a golden mist Paling to blissful ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... stating how to produce the laugh, the sob, the sigh, the snarl, the moan, bell effects, ejaculations and "trick-singing," all of which come under the head of characterization, I would say that if an ultra thing is undertaken it must be done boldly. The spirit of the old rhyme above quoted must be acted upon, or fear will ...
— Essentials in Conducting • Karl Wilson Gehrkens

... unforgotten! wheresoe'er thou art— My heart's unfading sun! My guiding light beneath the storms and clouds; My solace when the woods and hills are lone; And the dark pine breathes out its saddening moan; And when the night the misty mountain shrouds, Breathe it still gently, wheresoe'er thou art, Light of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... my lord; she shall not moan; I answer for my Hannah's resolution; Be merciful; divide me not so soon From my true foster-mother, from my friend. She bore me on her arms into this life; Let her then gently lead ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... not I. Thou shalt have my younger sister. If I moan in my chilly dungeon, do thou in her arms think of me, of me wasting away and thinking only of thee; of me whom the earth is about to ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet

... him, unless it were his mother and Aunt Eunice. They seemed to like him, and he reckoned they did, but for the rest, who was there that ever thought of doing him a kindness? Poor Hugh! It was a dreary picture he drew as he sat alone that night, brooding over his troubles, and listening to the moan of the wintry wind—the only sound he heard, except the rattling of the shutters and the creaking of the timbers, as the old house rocked in ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes

... did happen in Edgefield," she said. "Marster los' his daughter and den his butler went to de cemetery and dugged her up. He was gittin' de jewelries off of her finger when she moan; 'Oh, you hurtin' my finger!' He runned back to de house and she got up out of de coffin and went to de Big House. She knock on de door and her father went, and he fainted. Her mother went, and she fainted. Everyone went to de door fainted. But her father come to himself and ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration

... in the centre of the garden. It was all over in a few seconds: even the thunder was hushed and the wind no longer bent the poplars or roared through the cloud-like elm-trees. A silence that could be felt succeeded, broken only by the low moan of terror that the Gauchos kept up; a silence that soon checked even that sound itself; a silence that crept round the heart, and held us all spellbound; a silence that was ended at last by terrible thunderings and lightnings and earth-tremblings, with all the same dizzy, ...
— Our Home in the Silver West - A Story of Struggle and Adventure • Gordon Stables

... Strange lights seemed to flash before her eyes—yes—surely—that was Gritzko coming towards her! She gave a gasping cry and tried to pull the trigger, but it was stiff.... The pistol dropped from her nerveless grasp.... She gave one moan.... With a bound ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett

... such an expression as a painter of hell might put into the face of a lost soul, and he said, faintly, in a kind of articulate moan: ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens

... say you to Philarchus now? Are you content to pardon his amiss? Dunstan, I promise thee, it grieves me much, To hear what piteous moan Philarchus makes: Methinks I see sad sorrow in his face, And his humility argues him penitent. But, father, for I will not be the judge, To doom Philarchus either life or death, Here, take my robes, and judge ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley

... three great festivals of the year into possession of an invitatory anthem of its own; and we should obviate on the fasting days, by the simple expedient of omission, the futile efforts of choir-master and organist to transform Venite from a cry of joy into a moan of grief. ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington

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

... A moan from the girl made him stop and look around at her. Emboldened by this, she came close to him ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden

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

... and boomerangs clash, And a spear through the darkness is driven— It whizzes along like a wandering flash From the heart of a hurricane riven. They turn to the mountains, that gloomy-browed band; The rain droppeth down with a moan to the land, And the face of a chieftain lies buried in sand— Oh, the light that ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall

... the revulsion. With an oath he threw her from him. Her hands went to her temples and a moan ...
— The Purple Parasol • George Barr McCutcheon

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

... the wood he lieth, Sleeping alone Where the wind of autumn sigheth, Making its moan, Where the golden beams are leaping Bright overhead, And the autumn leaves lie sleeping Over the dead, By the stream that runs forever, Hurrying past, 'Neath the trees that bend and quiver Wild in the blast;— Deep in the wood ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... motion told that the Bozra was under way. The sea-mouse creaked and groaned through all her timbers and her lading. The foul bilge-water made the hold stifling as a charnel-house. Lampaxo, Hib being absent, began to howl and moan. ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis

... Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere Revolving many memories, till the hull Look'd one black dot against the verge of dawn, And on the mere the wailing died away. But when that moan had past for evermore, The stillness of the dead world's winter dawn Amazed him, and he groan'd, "The King is gone." And therewithal came on him the weird rhyme, "From the great deep to the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester

... so ragged that it would never cling to him but for pure affection. — To watch him even now makes one feel how terrible is that dumb grief which has never learned to moan. ...
— Quotations from the Works of John Galsworthy • David Widger

... heard the despairing moan of a woman: he had already divined the sex of the futile questioner whom the station-master was bullying; but he had divined it without compassion, and if he had not himself been a sufferer from the man's insolence he might even have felt a ferocious satisfaction in it. In a ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells

... man threw out his arms upon the coverlet. His hands met those of Blanche and Guly, as they rested on the bedside. It might have been accident, but the trembling fingers clasped them tightly, and with a last effort folded them together above him. There came a shiver, a faint moan, and the grandsire was dead, with his chilling fingers still folding those two ...
— The Brother Clerks - A Tale of New-Orleans • Xariffa

... flew, but sorrow and wail Came up from his path, like the moan of the gale. His quiver was full, though his arrows fell fast As the sharp hail of winter when urged by the blast. He smiled on each shaft as it flew from the string, Though feathered by fate, and the lightning its ...
— Poems • Sam G. Goodrich

... mother. Durward would almost have laid down his life to prove her innocent, but he felt that could not be. So he made her no reply, and in his eye she read that he, too, was deceived. With a low, wailing moan she again covered her face with her hands, while Mrs. Graham repeated her question, "Shall ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes

... hard at first to find a single cheering feature. The prospect which seemed so bright in 1859 is quickly obscured by mist and storm. Guiding-posts are hard to find; the faces of friends seem hostile in the gloom; voices of appeal sound dim and confused amidst the moan of the tempest. ...
— A History of the English Church in New Zealand • Henry Thomas Purchas

... to be a tree, then you could wither in peace. Why don't you cry out like every living thing that suffers. You don't know how your calmness racks me. Even the trees cry and moan in the autumn gales— ...
— Modern Icelandic Plays - Eyvind of the Hills; The Hraun Farm • Jhann Sigurjnsson

... and he fairly rushed into the arms of a soldier who was entering. So surprised were both that they could only stare at each other for a brief second; but Calhoun recovered himself first, and dealt the soldier a terrific blow over the head with the butt of his revolver. The soldier sank down with a moan, and Calhoun sprang out over his prostrate body, only to meet and overturn another soldier who was just ascending the steps. The force of the collision threw him headlong, but he was up again in a twinkling, and disappeared in the darkness, followed ...
— Raiding with Morgan • Byron A. Dunn

... nearly nine o'clock when the distant moan of a hooter announced to Malcolm Sage's alert ears the return of Tims. He rose from the table and walked slowly to the door, where for some seconds he stood with his ...
— Malcolm Sage, Detective • Herbert George Jenkins

... step downward to the deck, and five minutes later Murguia groaned, for bale after bale came tumbling out of the hold. Then over they began to go, the first, the second, the third, and another, and another, and after each went a moan from Anastasio. He leaned through the window to see one tossing in the waves, then suffered a next pang to see the next follow after. It was an excruciating cumulus of grief. The trooper regarded him quizzically. Destruction of merely worldly goods had ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle

... in through the low portal, barred the door behind, and, soothing her with low whispers of tenderness, tied her to the further wall of the cabin, and crept back into bed. Then he lay and waited breathlessly for another cry, and thought all was well, till in a distant moan, far down the road, ...
— The Transformation of Job - A Tale of the High Sierras • Frederick Vining Fisher

... made her moan, and by the time she got home, was just in the mood to go to bed and cry herself to sleep, as girls have a way of doing when their small ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott

... of faithless men! 'Tis thus the false hyena makes her moan, To draw the pitying traveller to her den: Your sex are so, such false dissemblers all; With sighs and plaints y' entice poor women's hearts, And all that pity you are made ...
— The Orphan - or, The Unhappy Marriage • Thomas Otway

... tempests roar! The owlets flit in wild affright. Hark! Splinter'd are the columns that upbore The leafy palace, green for aye: The shivered branches whirr and sigh, Yawn the huge trunks with mighty groan. The roots upriven, creak and moan! In fearful and entangled fall, One crashing ruin whelms them all, While through the desolate abyss, Sweeping the, wreck-strewn precipice, The raging storm-blasts howl and hiss! Aloft strange voices dost thou hear? Distant ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... and the sheen of wit, The sweet, blue eyes, the voice of melting tone, That made all hearts as gentle as his own, The Actor's charm, supreme in royal thrall, That ranged through every field and shone in all— For these must Sorrow make perpetual moan, Bereaved, benighted, hopeless, and alone? Ah, no; for Nature does no act amiss, And Heaven were lonely ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter

... his eyes but saw nothing, and a low moan escaped him. She shot a fearful glance at the retreating figure of her father, whilst Gilles—the executioner—hissed sharply ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini

... the polished ivory fall in chips and shavings, large and small, on the stone floor, and leap up with an elastic rebound or shiver into splinters. She covered her face with her hands and hid her head in the curtain, weeping aloud. She could only moan and sob, and feel nothing, think nothing but that a momentous and sinister act had been perpetrated. An appalling uproar like the noise of thunder and the beating of surf rose up on every side, but she heeded it not; and when at length the physician called her by her ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... moan of the Niagara falls was audible, and this, together with what I had heard and read, made me very anxious to visit the spot. Accordingly, one splendid morning I started by train for the purpose. For some miles before we reached Niagara, we constantly heard ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell

... sometime called the maid of Astolat, Come, for you left me taking no farewell, Hither, to take my last farewell of you. I loved you, and my love had no return, And therefore my true love has been my death. And therefore to our Lady Guinevere, And to all other ladies, I make moan: Pray for my soul, and yield me burial. Pray for my soul thou too, Sir Lancelot, As thou art a ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson

... the child knew that some day she would write anything and everything because she was "too bashful to talk." How little any of us know what we are being made ready to do. And how we would stop to moan and weep in very self-pity if we did know, and thus hinder the work of preparation from ...
— Miss Prudence - A Story of Two Girls' Lives. • Jennie Maria (Drinkwater) Conklin

... A moan came to his lips, and the weight of his body grew so heavy that David had to exert his strength to keep ...
— The Flaming Forest • James Oliver Curwood

... low moan, he sank fainting upon the floor. He was lifted up and laid upon his bed. Tears were in every eye, but Trenck did not see them; he did not hear their low, whispered words of sympathy and friendship. Death, from ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach

... bowering summer, where from my hut-door I could see through the pearl-hues of opium the sea-lagoon slaver lazily upon the old coral atol, and the cocoanut-tree would droop like slumber, and the bread-fruit tree would moan in sweet and weary dream, and I should watch the Speranza lie anchored in the pale atol-lake, year after year, and wonder what she was, and whence, and why she dozed so deep for ever, and after an age of melancholy peace ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel

... autumn-tide, So many times over comes summer again, Stood Odd of Tongue his door beside. What healing in summer if winter be vain? Dim and dusk the day was grown, As he heard his folded wethers moan. Then through the garth a man drew near, With painted shield and gold-wrought spear. Good was his horse and grand his gear, And his girths were wet with Whitewater. "Hail, Master Odd, live blithe and long! How fare the folk at Deildar-Tongue?" "All hail, thou Hallbiorn the Strong! ...
— Poems By The Way & Love Is Enough • William Morris

... anything else; and the poor girl rises at peep of day, lest any one else should pick up her most precious and vigilant Valentine, and wakes thee with a grace which—so help me, St. Macgrider!—would have put life in an anvil; and thou awakest to hone, and pine, and moan, as if she had drawn a hot iron across thy lips! I would to St. John she had sent old Dorothy on the errand, and bound thee for thy Valentine service to that bundle of dry bones, with never a tooth ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... that lay sick in a small house adjoining to Margaret's, testified the next morning, that he had plainly heard the old creature calling for her granddaughter. All the night long she made her moan, and ceased not to call upon the name of Rosamund. But no Rosamund was there—the voice died away, but not ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb

... the words passed faintly and yet more faintly, like a moan, from her lips; her eyes were closing slowly, very slowly; and she slipped to her knees, her bleeding arms held out towards the man before whom she knelt, as the breeze blew her glistening hair this way ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest

... face into his hands with a low, long moan. Jack looked out upon the fleeting landscape dimmed by the tears he dared not wipe away. A long silence followed while, drop by drop, Barney drank his ...
— The Doctor - A Tale Of The Rockies • Ralph Connor

... towards this possible weapon, though I kept my own on the bell-rope which fortunately hung at my side. She looked quite capable of wounding herself with the knife, but after balancing it a moment in her hand, she laid it down again and turned with a low moan to the wall. She will not attempt death till she has accomplished ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green

... your hand too, Iras. My grief has weight enough to sink you both. Conduct me to some solitary chamber, And draw the curtains round; Then leave me to myself, to take alone My fill of grief: There I till death will his unkindness weep; As harmless infants moan ...
— All for Love • John Dryden

... the hut, the Russians kept guard by twos till nightfall, when, dragging a bidarkie down to the water, they loaded it with provisions and firearms, and pushed out in the dark to the moan and heave of an unquiet sea. Though weakened from loss of blood, the fugitives rowed with fury for the next spur of rock, ten miles away, where they hoped to find help. The tide-rip came out of the north with ...
— Pioneers of the Pacific Coast - A Chronicle of Sea Rovers and Fur Hunters • Agnes C. Laut

... the wall, and staggered to the table, leaning on it heavily. She was ashen. Her lips were gray. She heard them leave the house—heard the car start, and listened until the sound of it died away in the length of the street. Her strength failed. She sank to her knees. A moan of agony escaped her. ...
— The Crooked House • Brandon Fleming

... of the gentleman. Let us be glad for that, seeing we are enriched thereby. "Rab and His Friends" gives so strong a picture of stolid strength in love's fidelity, which knows to serve and suffer and die without a moan or being well aware of aught save love. And Dr. MacLure is a dear addition to our company of manhood, shouldering his way through Scotland's winter's storm and cold because need calls him; serving as his Master had taught him ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle

... far roused the pale young man from his lethargy that he laid his dirty pink paper on his knees. I kept hold of Carlotta's wrists. She began to moan incoherently. ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke

... these three, Death and the two men who, during the past fourteen months, had played so active parts in her life, she was surprised to find that she faced them steadily and in silence. As yet, she felt no wish to make any moan. That would come later, when her nerves had relaxed a little from the stretching strain. And, meanwhile, as she sat watching the face on the pillow, grieving for the waning life, now and then she raised her eyes to the other face on the opposite side of ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller

... never known the daylight of revelation. The history of un-Christian and anti-Christian Christendom is a terrible commentary upon these words of the Master, and the cries that we hear all round us to-day from men who will not follow the light of Christ, and moan or boast that they dwell in agnostic darkness, tell us that, of all the eclipses that can fall upon heart and mind, there is none so dismal or thunderously dark as that of the men who, having seen the light of Christ ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren

... language of the heart In which the answering heart would speak— Thought, word, that bids the warm tear start, Or the smile light up the cheek; And his that music to whose tone The common pulse of man keeps time, In cot or castle's mirth or moan, In ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton

... of mankind; but am I not free from the cares that obtrude on those of tougher texture of mind who find joy in the opposite to this peace and unconcern for the rewards and honours of the world? Better this isolation and moderation in all things than, racked with worries, to moan and fret because of non-success in the ceaseless struggle for riches, or the increase thereof; better than to bow down to and worship in the "soiled temple of Commercialism" that haughty and supercilious old idol Mammon; better than to offer continual sacrifices of rest, health, ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield



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



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