From depth and height by measurers left immense,
Through sound and shape and colour, comes the unsure
Vague utterance, fitful with supreme suspense.英文原著 · 《A Century of Roundels》
Mistress Anne did not sleep well that night, having much to distract her mind and keep her awake, as was often in these days the case. When at length she closed her eyes her slumber was fitful and broken by dreams, and in the mid hour of the darkness she wakened with a start as if some sound had aroused her. Perhaps there had been some sound, though all was still when she opened her eyes; but in the chair by her bedside sat Clorinda in her night-rail, her hands wrung hard together on her knee, her black eyes staring under a brow knit into straight deep lines.英文原著 · 《A Lady of Quality》
"That poet you spoke of to me -- the one you said was a friend of yours -- he is my friend now too, and I have learned to sing some of his songs. I am going to sing one now." She seemed to have no timidity at all, but stood quietly, with a half smile, while a young man with a Russian name played a strange minor prelude. Then she sang, her voice a wonderful contralto, cold at times, and again lit up with gleams of pas- sion. The music itself was fitful, now full of joy, now tender, and now sad:英文原著 · 《A Mountain Woman》
Then, seeing her loss, she sprang to her feet, and bursting into tears, called aloud to the stream, "Bring back my flowers!" But the stream danced along, regardless of her sorrow; and as it bore the blooming burden away, her words came back in a taunting echo, along its reedy margin. And long after, amid the wailing of the breeze and the fitful bursts of childish grief, was heard the fruitless cry, "Bring back my flowers!"英文原著 · 《A New England Girlhood》
"No, I don't think so," returned the Marchesino, quite seriously. He had a sense of humor, but it did not always serve him. Occasionally it was fitful, and when summoned by irony remained at a distance. "It is true, Emilio, you have never seen me angry," he continued, reverting to the remark of Artois; "you ought to. Till you have seen a Panacci angry you do not really know him. With you, of course, I could never be angry--never, never. You are my friend, my comrade. To you I tell everything."
A sudden remembrance seemed to come to him.英文原著 · 《A Spirit in Prison》
The Chevet shrugged his shoulders with pity. Vizard shrugged his too, to soothe him; and, after a few more hurried words, took the lover of color into the garden. It was delicious, with green slopes, and rich foliage, and flowers, and enlivened by bright silk dresses, sparkling fitfully among the green leaves, or flaming out boldly in the sun; and, as luck would have it, before Zoe had taken ten steps upon the greensward, the band of fifty musicians struck up, and played as fifty men rarely play together out of Germany.英文原著 · 《A Woman-Hater》