In a passage that compares the "dim roar of London" to the "bourdon note of an organ," Wilde inserts the word "distant" before "organ," adding a twinge of far-off religious dread.

It was a far-off, dim roar at first, coming forward much too rapidly and from too high up.

In the distance was the dim roar of race cars, the muted bark of a PA system.

From all around them comes a dim roar, not of waves or wind, but of a million unchained human voices speaking in a confusion of tongues.

Outside, the gun battle is just a dim roar.

For both men, the people were a dim roar in the distance, and their attitude helps explain why most voters interviewed in exit polls said they disapproved of democracy as practiced here.

I lost myself in the dangerous waterfront shacks full of gambling and brawling flatboatmen and lovely dark-skinned Caribbean women, wandering out again to glimpse the silent flash of lightning, hear the dim roar of the thunder, feel the silky warmth of the summer rain.

The dim roar of London was like the burdon note of a distant organ.