Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,

Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Hamlet. Act iii. Sc. 1.

How cruelly sweet are the echoes that start

When memory plays an old tune on the heart!

Eliza Cook (1817-1889): Old Dobbin.

And we, with Nature's heart in tune,

Concerted harmonies.

William Motherwell (1797-1835): Jeannie Morrison.

The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne,

Burn'd on the water; the poop was beaten gold;

Purple the sails, and so perfumed that

The winds were love-sick with them; the oars were silver,

Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made

The water which they beat to follow faster,

As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,

It beggar'd all description.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Antony and Cleopatra. Act ii. Sc. 2.

Faintly as tolls the evening chime,

Our voices keep tune and our oars keep time.

Thomas Moore (1779-1852): A Canadian Boat-Song.

Strange that a harp of thousand strings

Should keep in tune so long!

Isaac Watts (1674-1748): Hymns and Spiritual Songs. Book ii. Hymn 19.

A noise like of a hidden brook

In the leafy month of June,

That to the sleeping woods all night

Singeth a quiet tune.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834): The Ancient Mariner. Part v.