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Paroxysm   Listen
noun
Paroxysm  n.  
1.
(Med.) The fit, attack, or exacerbation, of a disease that occurs at intervals, or has decided remissions or intermissions.
2.
Any sudden and violent emotion; spasmodic passion or action; a convulsion; a fit. "The returning paroxysms of diffidence and despair."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Paroxysm" Quotes from Famous Books



... cause to withdraw from all connection with it. Egmont denounced the proceedings as highly flagitious, and busied himself with punishing the criminals in Flanders. The Regent was beside herself with indignation and terror. Philip, when he heard the news, fell into a paroxysm of frenzy. "It shall cost them dear!" he cried, as he tore his beard for rage; "it shall cost them dear! I swear it by the soul of my father!" The Reformation in the Netherlands, by the fury of these fanatics, was thus made apparently to abandon the high ground upon which it had stood ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... has Lady Swiggs time to breathe freely, than she changes the wondrous kind aspect of the assembly, and sends it into a paroxysm of fright, by relating her curious adventure among the denizens of the Points. Brother Spyke nearly makes up his mind to faint; the good-natured fat man turns pale; the wise man in the spectacles is seen to tremble; the neatly-attired females, ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams

... repeated itself, on a larger scale, twenty-two years later, when Russia was in the paroxysm of a real revolution and when the ghastly massacres of Jews in Kishineff, Odessa, Kieff, and other cities were among the means employed in an effort to keep ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... shoulders of the maddened animal. The capeadores have not been idle, and the bull, repeatedly charging them and meeting only the empty flapping of the capas—the scarlet cloaks which the bull-fighters charged with this office wield—works himself into a paroxysm of rage, which must be seen to be understood. Oftentimes the capeadores are severely injured; sometimes killed in the act by a terrific stroke ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock

... cabinet, in order to recruit her strength against the evening, which was, as we have shown, to have been one of gaiety and gala, when her affrighted attendants hastened to convey to her the fatal tidings of her widowhood. In a paroxysm of uncontrollable anguish she rushed towards the door of the closet, and was about to make her way to the chamber in which the royal body had been deposited, when she was met by the Chancellor, to whom the fearful news had already ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... labour of years, and had prepared a Manual besides, he experienced the first convulsion of that jealousy which was to become his controlling passion in later years. Indeed, he established the habit with that first prolonged paroxysm, and he asked himself sullenly why a nameless stranger, from an unheard-of Island, should have the unprecedented success which this youth had had. Social victory, military glory, the preference of Washington, the respect ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton

... a filthy insult to the great presence whose sacred shrine the house should have been religiously kept. But Cervantes dead was as forgotten in Valladolid as Cervantes living had been. In some paroxysm of civic pride the tablet had been set in the wall and then the house abandoned to whatever might happen. I thought foul shame of Valladolid for her neglect, and though she might have answered that ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells

... the ends of the line of paroxysm-stricken people—not far, not near to that hallowed group for something held them back; but inward gradually until the line, no longer straight, was half a circle, crescent shaped. Louder came that harrowing medley of sounds, its component parts voicing the uttermost ...
— The Miracle Man • Frank L. Packard

... days before this, it is publicly alluded to at Versailles. On the 4th of October, at Paris, a woman proposes it at the Palais-Royal; Danton roars at the Cordeliers; Marat, "alone, makes as much noise as the four trumpets on the Day of Judgment." Loustalot writes that a second revolutionary paroxysm is necessary." "The day passes," says Desmoulins, "in holding councils at the Palais-Royal, and in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, on the ends of the bridges, and on the quays... in pulling off the cockades of ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... I tell you—it's Q," he raved and shrieked in his insane way as he rocked back and forth in bed. He was fighting his own conscience, and kept pushing some unseen thing from him as he shook in a paroxysm ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey

... events, after having taken Marchiali away from me, do you bring him back again?" cried the unhappy governor, in a paroxysm of ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... beauty with a look of sullen, impotent lustfulness that was near insanity. A spasm of coughing seized him; he gasped and choked, his wasted body shaken and racked, his dissipated face hideously distorted by the violence of the paroxysm. Wrecked by the flesh he had lived to gratify, he was now the mocked and tortured slave of the very devils of unholy passion that he had so often invoked to serve him. Repulsive as he was, he was an object ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright

... father! What curse could any superstitious mystic call down upon the head of Winifred? The heaven that would answer a call of that kind would be a heaven for zanies and tomfools!' I shouted, in a paroxysm of rage against the entire besotted human race. 'That for the curse!' I cried, snapping my fingers. 'I am Henry, and I am come to share the curse, if there ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton

... reasonable that Miss Spencer would back up Frankling and reduce Ole to an icicle when he asked her to go with him. But the next morning, when we saw Frankling, we were so happy that we forgot to worry. He was one large paroxysm. I never saw so much righteous indignation done up in one bundle. He cornered the class officers and declared in passionate tones that they had committed the outrage of the century. They had insulted one of the finest young women in the college. ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch

... three weeks later, when he caught sight of the car which was to bring him to me, and which he had not seen in the interval, he at once said, "Not eat my dinner." This child's father told me that the sight or sound of the preparation of a meal was enough to bring on a paroxysm of opposition. Now this force of opposition, as we have seen, only develops into a serious difficulty when the child's own will has been opposed too much, when authority has been too freely exercised, ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron

... horizon where so often he had imagined the adversary to be, and clenched his fists in a paroxysm of fury. His disordered mind believed that it saw the Beast, the Nemesis of humanity. And how much longer would the evil be allowed to go unpunished? ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... bed in such a paroxysm of grief that her husband, coming in unshod that he might not disturb the girl, apprehended that ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge

... off into a paroxysm of laughter. It seemed uncontrollable, for Eph had a strong sense of the ludicrous, and Hal's face, as Somers pictured it, must have been a tremendously funny sight at the instant when Millard ...
— The Submarine Boys for the Flag - Deeding Their Lives to Uncle Sam • Victor G. Durham

... communicated with the rooms below. Leaving his work, John hastened to his friend, and with some difficulty persuaded him to return to his bed; but no sooner had he got him into it and covered him up, than a new paroxysm came on, and the sick man arose in the strength of his agony and hurled his friend to the other side of the apartment. John sprang up, and grappled with him while he was rushing towards the door. It was an awful ...
— The Story of the Rock • R.M. Ballantyne

... night the girl passed from one paroxysm of pain to another with brief intervals of drug-induced sleep. During the quiet moments the nurse snatched what rest she could; but old Jeb Hawkins stuck to his post in the straight-backed chair, never nodding, never relaxing the vigilance of his watch. For Pop was doing sentry duty, much ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice

... a dreadful state—bores all his male acquaintance with his groans and his frenzy—rallies from the complaint—eats his dinner very kindly—takes an interest in the next turf event, and is found at Newmarket, as usual, bawling out the odds which he will give or take. Miss has her paroxysm and recovery—Madame Crinoline's new importations from Paris interest the young creature—she deigns to consider whether pink or blue will become her most—she conspires with her maid to make the ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray

... appeared, however, the ill-fated officer had struggled much in the agonies of death; for the left leg was drawn Up into an unnatural state of contraction, and the right hand, closely compressed, grasped a quantity of grass and soil, which had evidently been torn up in a paroxysm of suffering ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson

... turn I took out my note book and took the numbers of the policemen. The crowd had listened with great interest, and were evidently against the policemen. A boy looked under a policeman's arm and grinned; I winked at him covertly, and he went into a paroxysm of laughter. Then with dignity I got into the car and we drove off to the bank, leaving behind the discomfited policemen and a ...
— On the Fringe of the Great Fight • George G. Nasmith

... spectators, broke the circle, and set out with long strides towards the police station, which is situated at the extremity of the square, dragging the wretched woman after him. She yielded mechanically. Neither he nor she uttered a word. The cloud of spectators followed, jesting, in a paroxysm of delight. Supreme misery an occasion ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... in Itzig's eyes, which were fixed upon his, that he had the worst to apprehend from his anger, the paroxysm left him, he sank down powerless, and muttered in a low voice, while shuddering all over, "He ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... was that Dudley Venner noticed that his daughter was trembling,—a thing so rare, so unaccountable, indeed, under the circumstances, that he watched her closely, and began to fear that some nervous paroxysm, or other malady, might have just begun to show itself ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 41, March, 1861 • Various

... up, however, and he declared that he never would face the impending exposure. He gathered together a few articles of clothing while his sisters followed him from room to room with painful sobs. He was soon ready. His younger sister, Monroah, fell on his neck in a paroxysm of grief. Ezrom could utter but a few broken words when he essayed to bid them farewell. His favorite harp ...
— The Young Captives - A Story of Judah and Babylon • Erasmus W. Jones

... effervescence, ebullition; turbulence, bluster; uproar, callithump [U.S.], riot, row, rumpus, le diable a quatre [Fr.], devil to pay, all the fat in the fire. severity &c 739; ferocity, rage, fury; exacerbation, exasperation, malignity; fit, paroxysm; orgasm, climax, aphrodisia^; force, brute force; outrage; coup de main; strain, shock, shog^; spasm, convulsion, throe; hysterics, passion &c (state of excitability) 825. outbreak, outburst; debacle; burst, bounce, dissilience^, discharge, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... it, could rise in it up to the clouds, and travel through the heavens, the medicine, or mystery men of his tribe pronounced him to be an impostor; and the multitude vociferously declaring that he was too great a liar to live, a young warrior, in a paroxysm of anger, levelled a rifle and ...
— History, Manners, and Customs of the North American Indians • George Mogridge

... Revolution,—an event, by which the minds of men throughout all Europe were thrown into a state of such feverish excitement, that a more than usual degree of tolerance should be exercised towards the errors and extremes into which all parties were hurried during the paroxysm. There was, indeed, no rank or class of society, whose interests and passions were not deeply involved in the question. The powerful and the rich, both of State and Church, must naturally have regarded with dismay the advance ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore

... Such frantic excesses of this disgusting neurosis provoked a reaction against it; but the clamor for it by depraved persons never ceased, and was tolerated by a nation trained to it from childhood in the schools until last year (1913), when in what must be described as a paroxysm of sexual excitement provoked by the agitation concerning the White Slave Traffic (the purely commercial nature of which I was prevented from exposing on the stage by the Censorship twenty years ago) the Government ...
— A Treatise on Parents and Children • George Bernard Shaw

... conflict; she was no longer wrestling with her grief, but could sit down with it as a lasting companion and make it a sharer in her thoughts. For now the thoughts came thickly. It was not in Dorothea's nature, for longer than the duration of a paroxysm, to sit in the narrow cell of her calamity, in the besotted misery of a consciousness that only sees another's lot as ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot

... The first paroxysm of grief was scarcely over, when a carriage stopped in front of the house; Mrs. Le Bourgois, one of my kind patrons, got out of it and entered the door. She seemed to bring sunshine with her handsome cheery face. She came to where I was, and ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley

... after this paroxysm, remark that his patient's mind was chiefly occupied in computing the passage of the time, and anticipating the period when the return of her husband—if husband he was—might be expected. She consulted almanacks, enquired concerning distances, though so ...
— The Surgeon's Daughter • Sir Walter Scott

... acuta, sharp; sc. febris, fever), the common name given to a form or stage of malarial disease; the ague fit is the cold, shivering stage, and hence the word is also loosely used for any such paroxysm. Simple ague is of much the same type whether in temperate or tropical climates, and may take various forms (quotidian, tertian, quartan), passing into "remittent fever.'' The symptoms are discussed, together with causation, &c., in the article MALARIA. For "brow-ague'' ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... knew even the hardiest old seadogs are not proof against mal-de-mer under certain extraordinary conditions. Captain Kjellin, coming up on the bridge during Matt's watch, found the latter doing the most unseamanlike thing imaginable. Caught in a paroxysm at the weather end of the bridge, Matt, in his agony, was patronizing the weather rail! The captain heard him squawk, and ducked to avoid what instinct told him the gale would bring him ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne

... the thought of parting; you have trembled even at the leave-taking of a year, or of months, and have suffered bitterly as some danger threatened a parting forever. That danger threatens now. Nor is it a sudden fear to startle you into a paroxysm of dread: nothing of this. Nature is kinder,—or ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell

... favourable for the development, not of the higher, but of the lower sentiments, and of the propensities of the new being, the result will necessarily be a mean type of brain. Here, it will be observed, God no more decreed an immoral being, than he decreed an immoral paroxysm of the sentiments. Our perplexity is in considering the ill-disposed being by himself. He is only a part of a series of phenomena, traceable to a principle good in the main, but which admits of evil as an exception. We have seen that it is for wise ends ...
— Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation • Robert Chambers

... circumstances, the exasperated feelings of a whole people, thus spurred on to clamor and resistance, were excited by the poor and feeble influence of the Begums? After hearing the description given by an eye-witness of the paroxysm of fever and delirium into which despair threw the natives when on the banks of the polluted Ganges, panting for breath, they tore more widely open the lips of their gaping wounds, to accelerate their dissolution; and while their blood was issuing, presented ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick

... was thus vainly indulging in the paroxysm of grief, the duenna kept crossing herself with such active fervour, that the repeated and rapid motion of her hand at last caught the attention of ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio

... was a very comic dog, and it was well for me that I was reading a comic part of the book. But when he bounced out into the centre aisle again, in an entirely new place, and (still looking intently at me) tried the effect of a bark upon my proceedings, I was seized with such a paroxysm of laughter that it communicated itself to the audience, and we roared at one another, loud and long." Three days later the sequel came, in a letter to his sister-in-law. "I mentioned the dog on the first night here? Next night, I thought I heard (in ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... me by my name," said she, "and he attempts to disown me. Ha! ha! ha! ha!" and immediately fell off into a strong paroxysm of kicking, and pinching, and punching the bystanders, a malady well known under the name of hysterics; but being little more than a privileged mode, among certain ladies, of paying off some scores, which it is not thought decent to do ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)

... daughter. And Lady Susan Gresley, who had never met the rich iron-master's wife in this world, and would probably be equally exclusive in the next, was about to refuse, when Hester, who up to that moment had apparently taken no interest in the matter, suddenly cast herself on the floor in a paroxysm of despair and beat her head against the carpet. The tearful entreaties of her aunt gradually elicited the explanation, riddled by sobs, that Hester could never take an interest in life again, could never raise herself even to a sitting position, nor dry her eyes on her aunt's handkerchief, ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley

... back in her chair in an inextinguishable fit of laughter, that shook her whole frame. She laughed until the tears ran down her cheeks. She wiped her eyes and looked at Old Hurricane, and every time she saw his confused and happy face she burst into a fresh paroxysm that seemed to threaten ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth

... be dreamed about, not built, that this scheme suggested itself to Heathcliff. But one day, when he had been detected in an experimental courting of Isabel, Edgar Linton, glad of an excuse, turned him out of doors. Then, in a paroxysm of hatred, never-satisfied revenge, and baffled passion, Heathcliff struck with the poisoned weapon ready to his hand. He persuaded Isabel to run away with him—no difficult task—and they eloped together one night to ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson

... in a second paroxysm. "Don't make me rupture an artery. Love me?—worship me? Why, you ridiculous thing! you haven't known me ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming

... listened in silent submission, for she knew that her inheritance was passive obedience; but, when Scythrop, who had watched the opportunity of Mrs Hilary's departure, entered, and, without speaking a word, threw himself at her feet in a paroxysm of grief, the young lady, in equal silence and sorrow, threw her arms round his neck and burst into tears. A very tender scene ensued, which the sympathetic susceptibilities of the soft-hearted reader can more accurately imagine than we can delineate. But when Marionetta hinted ...
— Nightmare Abbey • Thomas Love Peacock

... a paroxysm of joy, he flung himself upon the motionless figure and cried his heart out. This, too, he soon conquered. Jim had just so much show—any delay might wipe it out. He searched the man's pockets until he found a match. By its light he saw the candle stuck into the post, and lit it. Then he ...
— The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch • Henry Wallace Phillips

... pointed out, but this second burst of opposition, coming at this especial time, deserves renewed attention. The splendid fleet and well-equipped troops of our ally were actually at our gates, and everybody was in a paroxysm of perfectly natural gratitude. To the colonial mind, steeped in colonial habits of thought, the foreigner at this particular juncture appeared more than ever to be a splendid and superior being. But he did not in the least confuse or sway the cool judgment that guided the destinies of the ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge

... public; her face contracted, her eyebrows knit, flames darted from her eyes, her mouth was all twisted. Her whole appearance was horrible; the devil was once more in possession. During this paroxysm, which lasted nearly a quarter of an hour, Lebrun, who stood near, got such a vivid impression of her face that the following night he could not sleep, and with the sight of it ever before his eyes made ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... your mother all alone!" was the reproachful rejoinder. "But you always loved him best; never cared particularly for me; and never will I suppose," she added, going into a stronger paroxysm ...
— The Two Elsies - A Sequel to Elsie at Nantucket, Book 10 • Martha Finley

... get out of these dismal woods." For a space she hesitated, looking up at me beneath her lashes, then reached out, and laid her fingers in mine; and, as we turned away, I knew that the Daemon had cast himself upon the ground, and was tearing at the grass in a paroxysm of rage ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol

... house. Hence, after some coughing and stamping, we elicited the shyster, who came timorously forth, for all the world like a man in fear of bodily assault, and then, recognising his guests, suffered from what I can only call a nervous paroxysm of courtesy. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... down in a paroxysm of grief, but unable to weep. "It is too late; and it is all your fault. What business had you to go away? You knew what was going to happen. You intended it to happen. You wanted it to happen. You are glad it has happened; and it serves you right. 'Pray forget her.' Oh, yes, poor ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw

... in public, but relieved to perceive that une Anglaise could laugh with such abandon. Monsieur they observed looked not sympathetic. Monsieur had an air injured, annoyed, on his dignity. On his cheeks was a flush, as of wounded pride. When at length the paroxysm showed signs of lessening, he spoke in cold ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... on the quay of Marseilles. Under the influence of old habit he was tempted to stop; then the remembrance of his infamies, of all the ill he had done the Nabob, that he was still occupied in doing him, came back to him suddenly with a horrible fear so strong that it amounted to a paroxysm, when an iron hand laid hold of him unceremoniously. A sweat of terror broke out over all his flabby limbs, his face became still more yellow, his eyes blinked in anticipation of the formidable blow which he expected to come, ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet

... made some steps from them. A terrible paroxysm of coughing came on, and Mrs. Egremont hurried towards her, but she waved back all help, shook her head, and insisted on going home. Alice kept her in sight, till she dived into a small ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge

... unfolding of a flower. But Pope was all jets and tongues of flame; all showers of scintillation and sparkle. Dryden followed, genially, an impulse of his healthy nature. Pope obeyed, spasmodically, an overmastering febrile paroxysm. Even in these constitutional differences between the two are written and are legible the corresponding necessities of 'utter falsehood in Pope, and of loyalty to truth in Dryden.' Strange it is to recall this one striking fact, that if once in his life ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey

... of anger against oneself, the more so because I believe them always to be evidence of consciousness of guilt. At least, I have never yet seen an innocent man fall into a paroxysm of rage against himself, nor have I ever heard that others have observed it, and I would not be able psychologically to explain such a thing should it happen. Inasmuch as scenes of this kind can occur perceivably ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... suggested to him a little more truth in this instance, by a celebrated remark which he made on the characteristic distinction of Caesar, in comparison with other revolutionary disturbers; for, said he, whereas others had attempted the overthrow of the state in a continued paroxysm of fury, and in a state of mind resembling the lunacy of intoxication, Caesar, on the contrary, among that whole class of civil disturbers, was the only one who had come to the task in a temper of sobriety and moderation (unum accessisse sobrium ...
— "De Bello Gallico" and Other Commentaries • Caius Julius Caesar

... again touched—"Oh!—oh!—oh! Caramighty! here comes anoder on dem," roared Pegtop, sticking the slice of melon, which was intended for Mademoiselle Eugenie, into his own mouth, to quell the paroxysm, if possible, (while he fractured the plate on the black aide's skull,) and immediately blew it out again, with an explosion, and a scattering of the fragments, as if it had been the blasting of ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott

... of strangulation, partly with a blind impulse to do something violent, Vibbard clutched himself about the throat, tore furiously at his collar till it gave way, and, in a paroxysm little short of madness, he turned and fled—he did not know ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various

... face on her knees and shook in a paroxysm of weeping. All the emotional side of her nature—so carefully repressed throughout these weeks and months of struggle—swept away their barriers. Now that she had spoken the fear that was in her heart, the reality of the danger that threatened their ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton

... This paroxysm at length exhausted itself. Presently after, I discovered a solitary shed, which I was contented to resort to for shelter. In a corner of the shed I found some clean straw. I threw off my rags, placed ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin

... dying woman, in the paroxysm of insane passion, a fit object of indignation? thought Belinda, and she stopped short. "No, Lady Delacour," cried she, "I will not yield to my humour—I will not listen to my pride. A few words said in the heat ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth

... to familiarize Virginia with the simple fact. When she was convinced of its truth, a paroxysm of delight appeared in her. She laughed, uttered cries of ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing

... nibbling a straw, till her paroxysm was over. 'One word, Miss Tuck—Mrs.—Margery,' he then recommenced gravely. 'You'll find me man enough to respect your wish, and to leave you to yourself—for ever and ever, if that's all. But I've just one ...
— The Romantic Adventures of a Milkmaid • Thomas Hardy

... summer of 1803, a girl at Amiens—some say a real enthusiast of Bonaparte's, but, according to others, engaged by Madame Bonaparte to perform the part she did demanded, upon her knees, in a kind of paroxysm of joy, the happiness of embracing him, in doing which she fainted, or pretended to faint away, and a pension of three thousand livres—was settled on her for ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... this confusion to Des Cartes's chaos of vortices, remarked, (1768,) in a letter addressed to Dr. Cooper,—"We have but one word,—I will not call it an idea,—that is, our sovereignty; and it is like some word to a madman, which, whenever mentioned, throws him into his ravings, and brings on a paroxysm." The Massachusetts crown officials were continually pronouncing this word to the Ministry. They constantly set forth the principle of local self-government, which was tenaciously and religiously clung ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... despair. Her face was hidden in his bosom, her pulse beat not, and the spark of life seemed extinct. Gomez Arias gently endeavoured to extricate himself from her firm embrace; she again became conscious of his intention, and in the paroxysm of ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio

... of water, gathering force in the narrow confines of the cove, became a torrent and threw a white spray in the faces of the boys as it beat against the fallen tree. It seemed strange that they could be so close to this paroxysm of the elements, in the very center of it as one might say, and yet be safe. Nature was in a mad turmoil all about them, yet by a lucky chance they stood upon a ...
— Tom Slade's Double Dare • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... that he was obliged to sit down on the sofa, where Madeleine fanned him with a sheet of music. He had been seized by a kind of paroxysm, and laughed on and on, in a mirthless way, till Avery Hill said suddenly and angrily: "Stop laughing at once, Heinz! You ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson

... hand, which rested on the windowsill, in such a paroxysm of anger as she had rarely felt. It was foolish of her to wait for him. Was he not old enough—eighteen? Did he still want waiting for like a boy coming home alone from a children's party for the first time? He had made an appointment with some other young fellows in ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig

... the book with a snap, and turned his chair towards the fire. When his friend sat one evening in that very chair, and told his story, Clarke had interrupted him at a point a little subsequent to this, had cut short his words in a paroxysm of horror. "My God!" he had exclaimed, "think, think what you are saying. It is too incredible, too monstrous; such things can never be in this quiet world, where men and women live and die, and struggle, and conquer, or maybe fail, and fall down under sorrow, and grieve and suffer strange fortunes ...
— The Great God Pan • Arthur Machen

... paroxysm of coughing which lasted until the elfish child shook her well, and took the cup ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume

... I was so long in reaching Tennyson, and I can only account for it by the fact that I was always reading rather the earlier than the later English poetry. To be sure I had passed through what I may call a paroxysm of Alexander Smith, a poet deeply unknown to the present generation, but then acclaimed immortal by all the critics, and put with Shakespeare, who must be a good deal astonished from time to time in his Elysian quiet by the companionship thrust upon him. I read ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... aside. The iron-ringed hoofs flashed past him, one biting along his cheek and ripping it an eighth of an inch deep. Phil staggered to the wall, as the horse continued to plunge and rear in a paroxysm of madness. Her owner tried to pacify her, but he made little headway ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson

... then led Philip to the side of the bed, and withdrew the curtain. Amine lay insensible, but breathing heavily; her eyes were closed. Philip seized her burning hand, knelt down, pressed it to his lips, and burst into a paroxysm of tears. As soon as he had become somewhat composed, Father Seysen persuaded him to rise and sit with him by the ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat

... The paroxysm passed and left its victim exhausted. With a longing for rest, he tottered out of the kitchen into the lean-to, but not to wash as its owner had suggested. He went directly to the now uncovered manhole of the cistern ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond

... The paroxysm of grief and indignation which followed my return to prison gradually subsided, and after a few days I became in some measure resigned to my fate, and determined as far as possible to make the best of it. Indeed, ...
— Six Years in the Prisons of England • A Merchant - Anonymous

... the paroxysm of your anger had subsided, you came in, and threw your arms around my neck, and said, 'My dear father, I am sorry I abused you so. It was not your loving son that did it. I was very ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous

... the dark hours. He heard night-cries in the forest, and once toward dawn the distant volcano seemed to undergo a fresh paroxysm of activity. Boomings and explosions rumbled in the night. There were flickerings in the sky. But there were fewer temblors after it, ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... thought broke off short there and was succeeded by a paroxysm of silent hatred towards Haldin, so intense that Razumov ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad

... episodes on the day when I took the wife and child, as well as the old godfather, of an Italian convict to visit him in the State Penitentiary. When we approached the prison, the sight of its heavy stone walls and armed sentries threw the godfather into a paroxysm of rage; he cast his hat upon the ground and stamped upon it, tore his hair, and loudly fulminated in weird Italian oaths, until one of the guards, seeing his strange actions, came to inquire if "the gentleman was having a fit." When ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams

... lungs, and thus become the cause of disease and death. The presence of carbonic acid in the lower bronchial tubes and cells, existing in quantities sufficient to prevent the natural combustion by breathing, was brought to my mind in March, 1847, while searching for the cause of an agonizing paroxysm of sick headache. The distressed feelings of obstructed life with which I was tossing and struggling, together with the agonizing pain in the head and pressure on the stomach, might well arise from such a cause. Standing (for position is ...
— Theory of Circulation by Respiration - Synopsis of its Principles and History • Emma Willard

... name among the first, and had been accepted, when he was suddenly stricken with fever, and forbidden by the doctor to think of carrying out his plan. In vain did he argue and entreat; the doctor was firm. 'You would be a hindrance, and not a help,' he said, and in a paroxysm of grief the young man hid himself among the bedclothes, ...
— The Red Book of Heroes • Leonora Blanche Lang

... the blow bravely; but it turned her face haggard like a paroxysm of physical pain. After a few moments' silence, ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke

... eyes fell on them she had a new paroxysm of sobs and pressed her handkerchief to her mouth to stifle them. Then with bare feet, not stopping to put on her slippers which had fallen off, she ran to the window out of which she leaned as she had done half the night ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... sort of Litany, to which the crowd replied in chorus. Soon the Litany turned into angry shouts, and the crowd, led by an old Negro Imaum, in a yellow robe, who seemed to have worked himself into a perfect paroxysm of fury, rushed at us with threatening gestures. This was by no means reassuring, but Hassan Bey was equal to the emergency. Seizing me by the arm, he put me behind him, with Bruat and the other gentlemen grouped round me. Then he ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville

... tongue, was not ready in seizing the moment; perhaps she would not let him speak; at any rate, she was aware of some design; since, baffling Phoebe's last attempt, she danced up to her bedroom after her, and throwing herself into a chair, in a paroxysm of laughter, cried, 'You abominable little pussycat of a manoeuvrer; I thought you were in a better school for the proprieties! No, don't make your round eyes, and look so dismayed, or you'll kill me with laughing! Cooking tete-a-tetes, Phoebe—I ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge

... story of the court-martial which had sat upon Lord George Germaine himself, after the battle of Minden, and made an insulting comparison between his conduct in that battle, and the conduct of the brave and enterprising Burgoyne. In a paroxysm of rage, Lord George asserted that he did not merit such an attack; that he would for once descend to a level with the wretched character and malice of his assailant; and that, old as he was, he would meet the fighting gentleman and be revenged. The house called to order, and the speaker ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... a paroxysm of terror and despair, rallied for the support of their prince and their religion. In a terrible tumult all the inhabitants rose and precipated themselves upon the embassador and his valiant body guard. From morning until night the battle raged in the streets of Tver. The Tartars, overpowered ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott

... a paroxysm of fury. Colonel Starbottle raved and swore. Mr. Bungstarter was properly shocked at their conduct. "Really, gentlemen, if Mr. Culpepper Starbottle declines another shot, I do not ...
— Mrs. Skaggs's Husbands and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... that Rastignac wished to joke and excite my curiosity, so that I was in a paroxysm of my extemporized passion by the time that we stopped before a peristyle full of flowers. My heart beat and my color rose as we went up the great carpeted staircase, and I noticed about me all the studied refinements of English ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac

... a month later that San Francisco was thrown into a paroxysm of horror and indignation over the assassination of a prominent citizen and official in the gambling-rooms of Madame le Blanc, at the hands of a notorious gambler. The gambler had escaped, but in one of those rare spasms of vengeful morality which sometimes overtakes communities ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte

... dear lord!" cried Halbert, throwing himself on his knees in a paroxysm of mental agony, "she remembers you where best her prayers can be heard. She kneels for her beloved Wallace, ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter

... Mr. Smith is a man of broad and deep human sympathies. Had he not happened upon that newspaper item, had his heart not gone out in passionate sympathy toward the bereaved Bolivar Bowers and his little ones, had he not wandered in an irresponsible paroxysm of grief in the direction of my house that evening, and had he not confided his sorrow to me—why, then we should not have known of the greatest of human benefactors, and Alice would not now be safe (so to speak) in ...
— The House - An Episode in the Lives of Reuben Baker, Astronomer, and of His Wife, Alice • Eugene Field

... the negro cried in a paroxysm of rage, as Omar was brought up. "This is because I was fool enough to allow your white-faced friend to accompany you. Our country is no place for whites, but he will make a good sacrifice to Zomara when our journey is ended. You have both refused to accompany us, therefore we must use ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux

... chair and fairly grovelled in his anguish on the floor. It was a pitiable sight, but one that moved the watchers with contempt. They waited patiently enough for the paroxysm of terror to pass and for Fenwick to resume something like the outer semblance of manhood. He drew himself up at length, and wiped the tears from his ...
— The Mystery of the Four Fingers • Fred M. White

... hands in a passionate fit of weeping. Violent sobs shook her entire frame; it seemed as if an overwhelming anguish was tearing at her heart—the physical pain of it was almost unendurable. And yet even through this paroxysm of tears her mind clung to one root idea: when she saw Percy she must be brave and calm, be able to help him if he wanted her, to do his bidding if there was anything that she could do, or any message that she could ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... cried, and I danced round in a paroxysm of delight at the idea of being a father. It seemed at once to elevate me to manhood, and puffed me up with pride. I rushed upon dear Mrs. V., embraced her most warmly, and pushing her back ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous

... reason to be alarmed, and the confessor was quite right in his surmises. The crisis of romanticism had commenced. It was to take an acute form and to reach its paroxysm during the Venice escapade. It is from this point of view that we will study the famous episode, which has already been studied by so many ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic

... reserve and modesty came over her; alone in this room among men, she felt overpowered, and she was about to make a precipitate retreat when the clock of the coffee-room sounded the half hour. In a paroxysm of nervous excitement she exclaimed, "Is there not one among you who will ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli

... of Nettleton's, being brought to an acute paroxysm of conviction of sin, ate nothing all day, locked himself in his room in the evening in complete despair, crying aloud, "How long, O Lord, how long?" "After repeating this and similar language," he says, "several times, I seemed ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James

... and the Pyrenees. Catholicism had rallied, and had driven back Protestantism even to the German Ocean. Then the great southern reaction began to slacken, as the great northern movement had slackened before. The zeal of the Catholics waxed cool. Their union was dissolved. The paroxysm of religious excitement was over on both sides. One party had degenerated as far from the spirit of Loyola as the other from the spirit of Luther. During three generations religion had been the mainspring of politics. The revolutions and civil wars of France, Scotland, ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... out the insult—nothing less;" and with her head held high, and her whole air full of scorn, she swept out of the room, leaving the marquis on his knees. Then he started up to follow her, but dared not; and he flung himself on the bed in a paroxysm of shame and vexation, and now of love, and he ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various

... of the assurance of the death was too much; and covering his face with his hands, he sank back in another paroxysm of violent sobs. Amabel could ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge

... noticed also that reproduction responds to conditions of advance or decline. In decline marriage and family become irksome. Celibacy arises in the mores. In times of advance sex vice and excess reach a degree, as in the Renaissance, which seems to constitute a social paroxysm. The sex passion rises to a frenzy to which everything else is sacrificed. The notion that mores grow either better or worse by virtue of some inherent tendency is to be rejected. Goodness or badness of the mores is always relative only. Their purpose is to serve needs, and their ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner

... and embraced it wildly, giving way to those pent-up emotions which her lover, in his moody humors, was wont to accuse her of not possessing. She kissed the forehead, the cheeks, the pallid, stern lips of the dead; and, for a time, there was the danger that her own spirit might pass away in the paroxysm of her grief. But it was morally impossible for Ghita to remain long under the influence of despair. Her gentle spirit had communed too long and too closely with her Heavenly Father, not to resort to his support in all the critical moments of life. She prayed, for the ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper

... applying leeches too close to the temporal artery, he was bled till he fainted. And now occurred the last of those striking incidents so frequent in his life, in reference to which we may quote the joint testimony of two witnesses. Colonel Stanhope writes, "Soon after his dreadful paroxysm, when he was lying on his sick-bed, with his whole nervous system completely shaken, the mutinous Suliotes, covered with dirt and splendid attires, broke into his apartment, brandishing their costly arms and loudly demanding their rights. Lord Byron, electrified by this unexpected ...
— Byron • John Nichol

... grin, smoothed my hand, and patted my cheek, and would in the excess of her conciliatory paroxysm have kissed me; but I withdrew, and she commented only with a little laugh, and a 'Foolish little thing! but you will be quite ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu

... old dotard!' she cried, in a paroxysm of rage—'were it not for him, I might revel in the arms of my handsome Italian, whose unaccountable scruples will not permit him to enjoy the bliss of love with me, while I have a husband.—Were ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn

... we have said, Marston ran down to the edge of the lake and yelled with delight—usually terminating each paroxysm with the Indian war-whoop, with which he was well acquainted. Then he danced, and then he sat down on a rock, and became suddenly aware that there were other hearts there, close beside him, as glad as his own. Another mother ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... was, as he said, crowded. There was a loud continued murmur of human voices. Traffic was intense, and had reached what might be supposed its acme. It seemed as if business was undergoing a paroxysm, or fit, rather than pursuing her steady, healthful course. Bodies of men were standing in groups—some were darting from corner to corner, pen in mouth—a few were walking leisurely with downcast looks—others quickly, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various

... akin to jealousy at what he termed Blonde Harry's impudence. It almost immediately gave way to a paroxysm of chuckling; for, the Girl, quickly taking the glass from Nick's hand, flung its ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco

... to his guests, Cursy strode up and down the boulevard between the Rue de Richelieu and the Rue du Mont Blanc, indulging in the most fearful imprecations, his unbounded language was most comical to hear. His paroxysm of fury in the street contrasted oddly with his peaceable demeanor in the house. Exercise assisted him to work off his nervous agitation and inward tempest. About two o'clock, on a sudden frantic impulse, ...
— A Prince of Bohemia • Honore de Balzac

... a device. "You'd better not come too near us," she cried, "for we've got the whooping-cough," and indeed just then by reason of the excitement she did have a paroxysm of coughing which plainly showed that ...
— Little Maid Marian • Amy E. Blanchard

... whole affair is a noisy paroxysm of nonsense, unreasonable excitement, witless mischief, and waste ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 2, April 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various

... paralitico paralytic. paramo desert, wilderness, icy region. parapeto parapet. parar to stop; vr. to stop. parecer to appear, seem; vr. to resemble. parecido resembling, like, alike. pared f. wall. parir to bring forth. paroxismo paroxysm. parricidio parricide. parte f. part, side, direction. participar to impart. particular particular, peculiar. partir to part, divide, cut, rend; depart. pasajero transitory, fugitive; m. traveler, ...
— Novelas Cortas • Pedro Antonio de Alarcon

... his hands were clenched, his lips parched, and his mummy-like cheeks sucked, as before, into his toothless jaws. In addition to all this, there was a bitter white smile of despair upon his features, and his thin gray locks, that were discomposed in the paroxysm by his own hands, stood out in disorder upon his head. We question, indeed, whether mere imagination could, without having actually witnessed it in real life, conceive any object so frightfully illustrative of the terrible dominion which the passion ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... and hurried nimbly out of the room so that she would not hear the chattering of his teeth. Mrs. Single was enjoying the paroxysm of a luxurious, comfortable yawn when she heard a shout of alarm from the sitting-room. She sat ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon

... ordained left the seminary than they got themselves recommended to the archbishops of Aix or of Auch, and went off in a great hurry. For, in short, we repeat it, men wish to be pushed. A saint who dwells in a paroxysm of abnegation is a dangerous neighbor; he might communicate to you, by contagion, an incurable poverty, an anchylosis of the joints, which are useful in advancement, and in short, more renunciation than you desire; and this infectious virtue is avoided. Hence the isolation ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... centre. Man will labor convulsively, night and day, for money; he will dry up the bloom and freshness of health, for earthly power and fame; he will actually wear his body out for sensual pleasure. But what is the intensity and paroxysm of this activity of mind and body, if compared with those inward struggles and throes when the overtaken and startled sinner sees the eternal world looming into view, and with strong crying and tears prays for only a little ...
— Sermons to the Natural Man • William G.T. Shedd

... it, readers have no sympathy; but the sad fact is, Britannic Majesty has NOT got out his sword; this second paroxysm of his proves vain as the first did! Those laggard Dutch, dead to the Cause of Liberty, it is they again. Just as the hour was striking, they—plump down, in spite of magnanimous Stair, into their ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... constant attendance upon my father. At times he would fly out in a most violent manner, but I invariably kept my temper, and when it was all over, would laugh at him, generally repeating and acting all which he had said and done during his paroxysm. I found this rather dangerous ground at first, but by degrees he became used to it, and it was wonderful how it acted as a check upon him. He would not at first believe but that I exaggerated, when the picture was held up to his view and ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat

... Seraphine, "She does, she does," she reiterated, and seemed disposed to fly at her tooth and nail. "She knows she is a bold and wicked creature,—she, she, she; she is a, a,—I don't know what she is;" she cried, spurting out the last words in a paroxysm of sorrow and vexation, and flung herself into a chair sobbing hysterically, with toilet and temper ...
— The Advocate • Charles Heavysege

... which Alexander prescribed. "Thus for colic, he guarantees by his own experience, and the approval of almost all the best doctors, dung of a wolf, with bits of bone in it if possible, shut up in a pipe, and worn during the paroxysm, on the right arm, or thigh, or hip, taking care it touches neither ...
— Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing • George Barton Cutten

... these campaigns not only an equivalent for the decision by battle which has been avoided, but even a higher art. In this way, in the present age, it came very near to this, that a battle in the economy of War was looked upon as an evil, rendered necessary through some error committed, a morbid paroxysm to which a regular prudent system of War would never lead: only those Generals were to deserve laurels who knew how to carry on War without spilling blood, and the theory of War—a real business for Brahmins—was to be ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz

... orthodoxy and military both under foot, in a violent and sanguinary manner; and was extremely frightened when it had done. Extremely frightened, not the Village only, but the schismatic mind generally in those parts, dreading vengeance for such a paroxysm. But the atrocious Russians whispered them, 'We are here to protect you in your religions and rights, in your poor consciences and skins.' Upon which hint of the atrocious Russians, the schismatic mind and population one and all rose; ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... had spent the day in the wood-shed, his master's return to the cottage was the signal for an undisguised explosion of ecstasy. Herein, as the noise of the roan's hoofs died away, he was unexpectedly joined by Anthony, and for a long two minutes the two wallowed in a pure paroxysm of glee. ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates

... trembling in all my limbs, and ah—ah, my God, I am a dead man! I have a burning here—a pain like hot coals in my vitals!" And, leaning against the wall, the unfortunate man clasped his arms round his body and bent himself up and down in a paroxysm of suffering. ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman

... some enlightenment. The process does not appear to me to be very obscure, though it has not yet received the blessing of orthodox science. According to my theory, any object which has been intimately associated with any supreme paroxysm of human emotion, whether it be joy or pain, will retain a certain atmosphere or association which it is capable of communicating to a sensitive mind. By a sensitive mind I do not mean an abnormal one, but such a trained and educated mind ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle

... his theory that artistic power was not an intellectual faculty, but I could not quite determine whether he was not putting it forth as mere paradox. One could fancy the paroxysm of rage into which Haydon would have been thrown had such a theory been advanced in his presence; or Fuseli, who, as Haydon reports, exclaimed, on first seeing the Elgin Marbles, with his strange accent, "Those Greeks, they were godes." ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various

... recalled what he had forgotten in his paroxysm of grief. His father was rich, and there must surely be some money about the place. Not wishing to prosecute his search in the presence of a stranger, however, he said carelessly: "Tell the man to wait, as may need the cab again ...
— A Cardinal Sin • Eugene Sue

... sheered off on the other, until they plunged down the side of the road. The stage was nearly overturned, and then it stopped with a sudden and heavy thump. Miss Mayhew was precipitated into Mr. Van Berg's arms, and she clung to him for a moment in a paroxysm of terror. His wits had not so far deserted him but that he perceived that the stage had struck against a tree, that the horses had broken away, and that he and his companion were perfectly safe. If the whole truth must be told, it cannot be said that he endured the young lady's embrace with only ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe

... of this paroxysm Agrippina bitterly reproached her son for what she termed his cruel ingratitude. It was altogether to her, she said, that he owed his elevation. For a long course of years she had been making ceaseless exertions, had submitted to the greatest sacrifices, ...
— Nero - Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott

... robe-de-chambre, with her cheek pressed against the blue velvet lining of the chair, Cornelia's face wore a sickly, sallow hue, which was rendered more palpable by her black, glittering eyes and jetty hair. She eagerly held out her hand, and a smile of sincere pleasure parted the lips, which a paroxysm of pain seemed to ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans

... to the reading, the quiet rhythm of the sentences, and the calm, deep music of his voice, sounding ineffably soothing, when a quaver, then a break in his voice, just as he repeated the last words, made me look toward him. The calm, strong man was weeping silently; and just then he broke into a paroxysm of sobs that shook his strong frame as by a palsy. Dear Lord! what hidden grief there is in the world! Who would ever dream that the calm exterior of this reasoning, cultivated atheist concealed such hidden fires? It was no time to talk; I let the poor fellow alone. After a few moments ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan

... awful to happen. Our ears were strained and our hearts beat loudly while the slightest noise startled us. Then the beast began to walk around the room, sniffing at the walls and growling constantly. His maneuvers were driving us mad! Then the countryman, who had brought me thither, in a paroxysm of rage, seized the dog, and carrying him to a door, which opened into a small ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne

... man behind the glass wall yawned again and again. He was helpless to stop it. If such a thing could be, he was in a paroxysm of yawning, though his eyes glared and he beat his fists together. The muscles controlling the act of yawning worked independently of the rage that should have made yawning impossible. And he was ashamed, and he was infuriated, and he yawned more violently ...
— The Hate Disease • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... came to him bewailing, and weeping, and embracing his knees in a paroxysm of grief, because of all his fortune little more than 50,000l. was left! "What did Epaphroditus do?" asks Epictetus; "did he laugh at the man as we did? Not at all; on the contrary, he exclaimed, in a tone of commiseration ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar

... sofa, in a richly furnished hotel suite, consisting of three of the best rooms. He received the lawyer gayly enough. He himself explained the circumstances to him, though every now and then compelled to stop by a paroxysm of pain, with difficulty repressing the groans which almost escaped him, in spite of all his efforts. During these heavy moments, Ivan Feodorovitch raised his eyes buried in fat to the sick man's ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne

... cannot long survive. In either event, its doom is fixed. Like one of those reptiles, which, in the supreme act of hostility, extinguish their own lives inflicting a mortal wound upon their victims, slavery, roused to the final paroxysm of its hate and rage, injects all its venom into the veins of the Union, exhausts itself in ...
— The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... the midst of that foolish paroxysm, I felt a light hand upon my shoulder, and looking up, saw a face bending over me, a face full of ...
— Milly Darrell and Other Tales • M. E. Braddon



Words linked to "Paroxysm" :   paroxysmal, fit



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