The Collaborative International Dictionary
Patter \Pat"ter\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Pattered; p. pr. & vb. n. Pattering.] [Freq. of pat to strike gently.]
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To strike with a quick succession of slight, sharp sounds; as, pattering rain or hail; pattering feet.
The stealing shower is scarce to patter heard.
--Thomson. To mutter; to mumble; as, to patter with the lips.
--Tyndale. [In this sense, and in the following, perh. from paternoster.]-
To talk glibly; to chatter; to harangue. [Colloq.]
I've gone out and pattered to get money.
--Mayhew.
Wiktionary
n. Groupings of frequent irregularly repeated sounds of moderate magnitude and lower-than-average pitch. vb. (present participle of patter English)
Usage examples of "pattering".
Elsewhere the only sounds were the quick, nervous tramp of squads of constables and soldiers on night guard and patterings and chitterings that grew ever more bold and numerous.
He seemed unmindful of the faint patterings that came from behind the gorgeously figured draperies whenever a lull in the conversation and clink of eating tools let it be heard, or of the occasional small, hunchbacked, four-footed shadow cast by the tapers’ light.