mule bell

English

Alternative forms

• mulebell

Noun

mule bell (plural mule bells)

1. A bell hung on a mule. [from 19th c.]
   • 1850, John Greenleaf Whittier, Derne:

     The sounds of Moslem life are still; / No mule-bell tinkles down the hill; / Stretched in the broad court of the khan, / The dusty Bornou caravan / Lies heaped in slumber, beast and man […].

   • 1852, Washington Irving, Tales from the Alhambra:

     There is something wildly pleasing in listening to these ditties among the rude and lonely scenes that they illustrate, accompanied, as they are, by the occasional jingle of the mulebell.