Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A variety of bugle invented about 1815, having six keys and a complete chromatic compass of about two octaves. It is now superseded by valve-instruments. Also called Kent bugle.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • His sleep was exceedingly fitful and troubled; he saw Morgiana in a hundred shapes; he dreamed that he was dressing her hair; that he was riding with her to Richmond; that the horse turned into a dragon, and Morgiana into Woolsey, who took him by the throat and choked him, while the dragon played the key-bugle.

    Mens Wives 2006

  • With this formidable announcement, the old lady opened a prodigious leather bag, from which she never parted night or day, and took out an ear-trumpet of the old-fashioned kind — something between a key-bugle and a French horn.

    Armadale 2003

  • Another accomplishment, at which not a few of the fast fellows excel, is that of imitating upon a key-bugle various animals, in an especial manner the braying of an ass: when the fast fellows drive down to the

    Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 53, No. 327, January, 1843 Various

  • In the ophicleide, the bass of the key-bugle, the bore is sufficiently wide to produce the fundamentals of a satisfactory quality.

    Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" Various

  • Mahillon (op.cit. p. 117) points out that the tonality of the key-bugle and kindred instruments is determined by the second harmonic given out by the open tube, the first key remaining open.

    Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" Various

  • The notes of a key-bugle from one of them seemed to suggest Mr. Bob Sawyer and Mr. Ben Allen; but whether those young gentlemen were of the party or not I did not hear.

    Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 12, No. 33, December, 1873 Various

  • He played his key-bugle for them, showed them how to bark birches for the purpose of making canoes (he was building one for his own use) and finally gave them a supper of wild duck, served on birch-bark platters, and corn pone baked on a plank before the embers of a campfire and seasoned mildly with wood smoke.

    Nan Sherwood at Rose Ranch Annie Roe Carr

  • With the whip in one hand and the reins in the other, and a key-bugle behind, she would not exchange places with the Queen herself.

    Mr. Punch`s history of modern England, Volume I -- 1841-1857 Charles Larcom 1921

  • "An 'it keeps workin' up an 'down an' makin 'noises just like Billy Richard's key-bugle."

    Nicky-Nan, Reservist Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch 1903

  • And then very quietly and distinctly the notes of M. Trinquier's key-bugle rose outside on the frosty air.

    Wandering Heath Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch 1903

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