munchings

Updated: May 12, 2025

Here the only sounds disturbing the stillness were steady munchings of many mouths, and stentorian breathings from all but invisible noses, ending in snores and puffs like the blowing of bellows slowly.

Thomas Hardy - Far from the Madding Crowd

"Yesterday morning; a fine dog-fox, with a dark brush," confided Mrs. Hoopington. "Aha, we'll have a good gallop after that brush to-morrow," said the Major, with a transient gleam of good humour. And then gloomy silence settled again round the teatable, a silence broken only by despondent munchings and the occasional feverish rattle of a teaspoon in its saucer.

Saki - Reginald in Russia and other sketches