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Spasmodic   Listen
adjective
Spasmodic  adj.  
1.
(Med.) Of or pertaining to spasm; consisting in spasm; occuring in, or characterized by, spasms; as, a spasmodic asthma.
2.
Soon relaxed or exhausted; convulsive; intermittent; as, spasmodic zeal or industry.
Spasmodic croup (Med.), an affection of childhood characterized by a stoppage of brathing developed suddenly and without fever, and produced by spasmodic contraction of the vocal cords. It is sometimes fatal. Called also laryngismus stridulus, and childcrowing.
Spasmodic stricture, a stricture caused by muscular spasm without structural change. See Organic stricture, under Organic.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Spasmodic" Quotes from Famous Books



... brief, for the tumult came nearer and nearer; Apollodorus wrung his hands, and struck his fist against his forehead; his movements were violent—spasmodic. Terror had entirely robbed him of the elegant, measured demeanor which he had acquired among his Greek fellow-citizens, and mingling heathen oaths and adjurations with appeals to the God of his fathers, he flew first one way and then another. He searched for the key of the ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... accumulated excitability, which gives such a degree of irritability to the system, that the smallest irritation, whether external, such as heat, exercise, &c. or internal, as emotions of the mind, excite a strong spasmodic action, which brings on the symptoms of epilepsy and hysteria. This inordinate action however soon exhausts the morbid excitability, and thus suspends itself, a sleep often follows, from which the patient wakes with only a general sense of languor ...
— Popular Lectures on Zoonomia - Or The Laws of Animal Life, in Health and Disease • Thomas Garnett

... broad smile to the kind darkness—sheer luxury to facial muscles cramped and constrained to the cast of Nogam for eighteen hours a day. He was now at last to reap the reward of three months of preparation and three weeks of ingenious, but necessarily spasmodic, and at all times desperately dangerous, tampering with ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance

... into the arms of the police, who incontinently turned and fled the other way. When my friends passed by the house of the victim, the midnight air was ringing with the horrible curses of his bereaved sister, whose spasmodic face was visible at a window. But the cold-blooded artistic English felt no answering throb of sympathy—it was still a scene in a play to them, still a coup de theatre—they had lost the primary human instincts, corrupted by a long course of melodrama and comic opera. To-day I myself ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill

... quiet, after one wild roll of her eyes at him. The colour was returning to Adrianna's cheeks; her mother was drinking hot tea in spasmodic gulps. ...
— The Wind in the Rose-bush and Other Stories of the Supernatural • Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman

... interludes are very lovely. These are the principal features, to describe all the whims is of course impossible. You may call this work an extravaganza, and point out its grotesqueness; but you must admit that only by this erratic character of the form and these spasmodic movements, could be expressed the peculiar restiveness, fitfulness, and waywardness of thought and feeling that characterise Chopin's individuality. To these unclassical qualities—for classical art is above all plastic and self-possessed—combined ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... heard our speed, we saw it, we felt it as a thrilling; and this speed was not the product of blind insensate agencies, that had no sympathy to give, but was incarnated in the fiery eyeballs of an animal, in his dilated nostril, spasmodic muscles, and echoing hoofs. This speed was incarnated in the visible contagion amongst brutes of some impulse, that, radiating into their natures, had yet its centre and beginning in man. The sensibility of the horse, uttering itself in the maniac ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey

... but a kind of wondering weariness—weariness at the weary fate of men who could 'think so brainsickly of things.' So in like manner will all the emphasis and elaboration in the literature of sensuality become a weariness without meaning, also. Congreve's caustic wit will turn to spasmodic truism; and Theophile Gautier's excess of erotic ardour, into prolix and fantastic affectation. All its sublimity, its brilliance, and a large part of its interest, depend in art on the existence of the moral sense, and would in its absence be absolutely unproducible. The reason of this ...
— Is Life Worth Living? • William Hurrell Mallock

... the talking. Mrs. George Penhallow being rather out of it by reason of her newness. She was George Penhallow's second wife, married only a year. Hence, her contributions to the conversation were rather spasmodic, hurled in, as it were, by dead reckoning, being sometimes appropriate and sometimes savouring of a point of view ...
— Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... newspapers: the Honolulu Gazette, the Pacific Commercial Advertiser, Ka Nupepa Kuokoa (the "Independent Press"), and a lately started spasmodic sheet, partly in English and partly in Hawaiian, the Nuhou (News). {270} The two first are moral and respectable, but indulge in the American sins of personalities and mutual vituperation. The Nuhou is scurrilous and diverting, and appears ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird

... any country in the world equal to America in the irregularity and spasmodic nature of the demands which society makes upon its women? Are there any girls in the world so ready to rush headlong into all kinds of exercise, mental or physical, which may be recommended to them, as our American girls? ...
— The Education of American Girls • Anna Callender Brackett

... of their faces, against the more normal type, who would have passed unnoticed in an omnibus or an underground railway. It was notable that the talk was confined to groups, and was, at first, entirely spasmodic in character, and muttered in undertones as if the speakers were ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf

... That all spasmodic cerebral action is an evil is not perfectly clear. Men get fairly intoxicated with music, with poetry, with religious excitement, oftenest with love. Ninon de l'Enclos said she was so easily excited that her ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... by Moore ('Life', p. 110). Picking up a Turkish dagger on the deck, Byron looked at the blade, and then, before replacing it in the sheath, was overheard to say to himself, "I should like to know how a person feels after committing a murder." In 'Firmilian; a Spasmodic Tragedy' (scene ix.) the sentiment is parodied. Firmilian determines to murder his friend, in order to shriek "delirious at the taste of sin!" He had already blown up a church ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero

... a variety of cases, more or less severe spasmodic pains are felt in the chest. Angina Pectoris (literally, agony of the chest) is one of the worst of these. All these pains, as a rule, may be removed completely by treatment ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk

... the end, pressure of the brain became apparent; severe pain, succeeded by torpor and loss of power, and, after a short time, utter unconsciousness, proved that the sands of life had nearly run down. A few hours of spasmodic suffering followed, very trying to those who watched by; but suddenly, about four on the morning of October 13th, 1845, the silver cord was loosed, the pitcher broken at the fountain, and the spirit returned to God ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman

... It comes in man's own good time. It comes in the crack of a rifle, and the moose jolts round with a spasmodic jerk. In a moment a movement amongst the surrounding tree-trunks captures its gaze. There is a pause, breathless, silent. Savage wrath leaps anew, and down sweeps the great head till the spread of antlers is couched like a forest of lance ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum

... resolution supper was not a merry meal. Talk was spasmodic, interrupted by long silences. Mrs. McCrae—slight, gentle, motherly, with wavy silver hair—was plainly worried. Her husband brooded unconsciously over his plate. Sheila and Casey, conversing on topics which neither was thinking about, blundered ridiculously. And the son of the house, Alec ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm

... now afar off, and after waiting a few moments he made a snatch at it. As he did so he felt the fingers of his left hand gliding from the wet slippery niche into which he had driven them, and but for a violent spasmodic jerk of his body he would have been plunged headlong down to the bottom ...
— Menhardoc • George Manville Fenn

... bridegroom at Paris, or that he underrated the ultimate effects of what was taking place in the Iberian peninsula if the process were to go on. Still less is it probable that with the direction of all his energy toward that quarter he could not have quenched the uncertain and spasmodic efforts of Spanish patriotism, either by arts of which he was a master, or by making a desert to call it a peace. No; every indication is that his eye was still fixed on England at her vital point, and that he took his measures in the North to deal her such a thrust that the life-blood ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... off my cloak to shelter us in front, at the same moment we are blinded by a flash of lightning, and the electric fluid strikes the earth within one hundred yards of us. The horses plunge and prance with fear, and my companion falls in spasmodic convulsions. She throws herself upon me, and folds me in her arms. The cloak had gone down, I stoop to place it around us, and improving my opportunity I take up her clothes. She tries to pull them ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... of age and unappeasably timid, unaccountably strange, had, on her reduced scale, an almost Gothic grotesqueness; but the final effect of one's sense of it was an amenity that accompanied one's steps like wafted gratitude. More flurried, more spasmodic, more apologetic, more completely at a loss at one moment and more precipitately abounding at another, he had never before in all his days seen any maiden lady; yet for no maiden lady he had ever seen had ...
— Some Short Stories • Henry James

... Anne was dead. It was off-day at the paper, Parliament was not sitting, and the columns opposite the publishers' advertisements needed filling, or these gentlemen would grumble. The paper had a genuine, if somewhat spasmodic, attachment to letters. And from this John Arniston derived a considerable part of ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett

... large, a singularly speechless day, which my spasmodic efforts at entertainment had failed to cheer. The girl tried to respond, but her eyes were strained, eager, shadowed; her answers came at random. My talk, I suppose, teased her ears like the troublesome buzzing of ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti

... spasmodic movements of an ill-constructed automaton, he crossed the room, and stepping very carefully over the prostrate body upon the floor, and with a hesitating reluctance that he could in no degree master, he unlocked, unbolted, and opened ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle

... themselves in and along the battle line in many places, the hostile trenches were separated by only a few yards. At the end of the month the burrowing had been succeeded by tunneling, and both sides prepared for a winter of spasmodic action. It was a military deadlock, but a deadlock full of danger for the side that first developed a weak point in its ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell

... life is not to make a failure of it. And we know that we cannot make it a success unless we work toward that end. "The first great rule is, we must do something—that life must have a purpose and an aim—that work should be not merely occasional and spasmodic, but steady and continuous," says Lecky. "Pleasure is a jewel which will retain its luster only when it is in a setting of work, and a vacant life is one of the worst of pains, though the islands of leisure that stud a crowded, well-occupied life may be among the things ...
— The Girl Wanted • Nixon Waterman

... presents itself is what is laughter? and our answer must be that it is a change of countenance accompanied by a spasmodic intermittent sound—a modification of the voice—but that we cannot trace its physical origin farther than to attribute it to some effect produced upon the sympathetic nerve, or rather the system of nerves termed respiratory. These communicate with every ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange

... for Joel. He swept the blanket down upon the man, smothering his cries with fold on fold; and he grappled Varde, and crushed him, and beat at his head with his fists until the mate's spasmodic struggles slackened. Priss had heard the sounds of combat, swept out of her cabin, bent above them. He looked up and saw ...
— All the Brothers Were Valiant • Ben Ames Williams

... than natural causes were at work. There could be no other reason given that John Louder should miss his mark, than that his gun was "bewitched." It was an age when the last dying throes of superstition seemed fastening on the people's minds, and the spasmodic struggle threatened to upset their reason. The New Englander's mind was prepared for mysteries as the fallow ground is prepared for the seed. He was busied conquering the rugged earth and making it yield to his husbandry. His time was divided between ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick

... many years. He was a poet of the highest order, and his Execution of Montrose, and the Burial March of Dundee, are two noble historical ballads. He was author of the celebrated Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers, Bon Gaultier Ballads, Firmilian, a Spasmodic Tragedy, Bothwell, Poland, and other Poems, The Life and Times of Richard Coeur de Lion, etc. Died ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard

... throne to the dungeon, from the moment of the royal accession. The king had exhibited qualities of a very unexpected order in an African despot, and, under the guidance of the mission, had made some advances to justice, and even to clemency. At this period, he was suddenly seized with an alarming spasmodic disorder, and he apprehended that his constitution, enfeebled by the habits of his life, was likely to give way. On his recovery being despaired of by both priests and physicians, he suddenly sent ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various

... the shoulders of the saurian, and bending his thick muscular arms to the extent of their great strength, he was seen to give one grand wrench. There was a crashing sound, as of a tree torn from its roots, followed by a spasmodic struggle; then the hideous reptile lay extended along the earth, still writhing its body and flirting ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid

... recover him yet!" he broke out suddenly and aloud. As he spoke, a quick, darting, spasmodic pain ran shivering through his whole frame, and then fixed for one instant on his heart with a gripe like the talons of a bird; it passed away, and was followed by a deadly sickness. Brandon rose, and filling himself a large tumbler of water, drank with avidity. The sickness passed off ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... revival, if so it may be called, has in it the marks of death. It is a spasmodic struggle ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... stated on a former occasion, this young statesman has ample time to learn better and more useful knowledge than he has exhibited in many of his speeches upon this floor, and I again plead for him the statute of youth for the wild and spasmodic notions which he has endeavored to rivet upon his colleagues and this country. But I regret that Mr. Kitchin is not alone upon this floor in these peculiar notions advanced. I refer to another young member of Congress, hailing ...
— Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence - The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of - Slavery to the Present Time • Various

... state of deep despondence to one of hope, had Mrs. Warburton been raised, by the timely aid afforded through the persevering interference of the little playmate of her son. But she soon began to perceive, after a time, that the charity was only spasmodic, and entered into without a real consideration of her peculiar case. The money given her was the best assistance that could have been rendered, for with this she obtained a supply of wood, flour, meal, potatoes, and some warm clothing for her little ones. But this would not last always, and the ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur

... Vitus's dance if anyone had accused me of a smile. "Ha, ha, the automobile looks like nothing so much as a market-woman going home with the family provisions for a month. But will she ever get home?" Here he became spasmodic, and as he had made a present of his picturesque smile to all the lookers-on as well as to those whom it most concerned, a grin rippled over the faces of the various groups as a breeze ruffles the surface of ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... to make the sign of the cross over it, "O-oh, what a pity! O-oh, how it hurts! They are angry! They fly from me!" he exclaimed in a tearful choking voice as he glared at Woloda and wiped away the streaming tears with his sleeve, His voice was harsh and rough, all his movements hysterical and spasmodic, and his words devoid of sense or connection (for he used no conjunctions). Yet the tone of that voice was so heartrending, and his yellow, deformed face at times so sincere and pitiful in its expression, that, as one listened to him, it was impossible to repress a mingled ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy

... you want, anyway?" asked Gypsy, taking a few spasmodic stitches on a long, white seam; "I'm busy. I can't talk to little boys when ...
— Gypsy Breynton • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... families we must try to organize help that shall be as regular and systematic as possible. Next to having to depend upon charitable resources at all, the most demoralizing thing is to be dependent upon uncertain and spasmodic charity. ...
— Friendly Visiting among the Poor - A Handbook for Charity Workers • Mary Ellen Richmond

... bear even the little crosses that befell in an ordinarily quiet life! How she had lost the so-lately-gained influence over Alfred and Julia by a few cross words! How much reason she had given Sadie to think that her attempts at following the Master were, after all, only spasmodic and visionary! But Ester had been to that little clothes-press up stairs in search of help and forgiveness, and now she clearly saw there was something to do besides mourn over her failures. It was hard to do it, too. Ester's spirit was proud, and it was very humbling to confess herself in the wrong. ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)

... It is spasmodic and intermittent. It is impossible to keep it up, so it comes in fits and starts. When the morning comes men laugh at their terrors. It leads to wild endeavours to forget God—atheism—to insensibility. ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... is unapproached in its control of spasmodically contracted vessels and muscles. The relief its vapor affords in the collapse of chloroform anaesthesia, in which dissolution is imminent from paralyzed heart's action, is instantaneous, and its effect upon the spasmodic and suffocative sensations of hydrophobia are equally prompt. Moreover, without further discussing its physiological functions, it is the nearest approach to an antidote to certain zymotic poisons, and especially valuable ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 421, January 26, 1884 • Various

... hear of your indisposition, but thought the best thing I could do, was to make no formal calls when you were really ill. I have been suffering myself from another kind of malady—a severe, spasmodic, house-buying-and-repairing attack—which has left me extremely weak and all but exhausted. The seat of the disorder has been ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 3 (of 3), 1836-1870 • Charles Dickens

... There was the vast party of the Insurgents, or Confederates, including the whole Roman Catholic population of the island, both the old Irish natives, who had mainly begun the Rebellion, and the Catholics of English descent who had joined in it. Gradually the mere spasmodic atrocity of the first Rebels had been changed into something like an organized warfare, commanded in chief by Generals Preston and Owen Roe O'Neile, while the political conduct of the Rebellion and the government of Confederate Ireland had been ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... warned him that to faint where he was meant at once his death and burial. He could scarcely inflate his lungs with the poisonous air of the pit; his muscles quivered with increasing weakness and the warning spasmodic tremor which their unnatural strain induced; his head swam like ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various

... day he was charming the House of Lords with a speech of singular eloquence and statesmanlike grasp—the speech of a man in the prime of his powers. Such efforts as this, however, were but as the spasmodic flickerings of a candle that is burning to its end, and were followed by deeper plunges into the dissipations that were ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall

... been expected to have belonged to the 'Spasmodic school,' judging by his parental antecedents. His father was accused of having a share in Babington's conspiracy, but was released because he was godson to Queen Elizabeth. Soon after, however, he was imprisoned a second time, and condemned to death on the charge of ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan

... the moaning, and the spasmodic fighting which they could still hear going on up the trench, there sounded the officers' dinner call. Twice it blared forth from the British lines, and every man knew what it meant: "Come back, at once." The raid ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile

... Teranah, with the exception that the latter is only sung by men. The character of the Tuppah is not very clear, but the Ragni is a direct descendant of the old magic songs and incantations; in character it is rhapsodical and spasmodic. ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell

... up the broken door as best they could, the men left the apartment and when they were again alone Metak turned toward the girl. As he approached her, his face distorted by a hideous leer, his features worked rapidly in spasmodic twitches. The girl, who was standing at the entrance of the alcove, shrank back, her horror reflected in her face. Step by step she backed across the room, while the crouching maniac crept stealthily after her with claw-like fingers poised in anticipation ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... unsportsmanlike secret tricks and methods, over-emphasis of combative and too stalwart impulses, and a disposition to carry things by storm, by rush-line tactics; friction with faculties, and censure or neglect of instructors who take unpopular sides on hot questions; action toward license after games, spasmodic excitement culminating in excessive strain for body and mind, with alternations of reaction; "beefiness"; overdevelopment of the physical side of life, and, in some cases, premature features of senility in later ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall

... in tempo does not mean unsteadiness.... We must have in music the sense of equilibrium, of stability. A careless, spasmodic hurrying and retarding leads ...
— Essentials in Conducting • Karl Wilson Gehrkens

... friend from foe, they were hurrying to our right and rear intent only on their safety. Wright's (Sixth Corps) infantry, which was farther removed from the point of attack, fared somewhat better, but did not offer more than a spasmodic resistance." Nevertheless, they made Early "pay dearly for every foot gained and finally brought him to a stand," as Nicolay ...
— The County Regiment • Dudley Landon Vaill

... probable as she seemed to think—with a great deal more to the same effect. In a word, she passed with great decency through all the ceremonies incidental to such occasions; and being supported upstairs, was deposited in a highly spasmodic state on her own bed, where Miss Miggs shortly afterwards flung herself ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens

... results: First, that myriads of middle-aged men with families have been taken while unmarried slackers have been left; secondly, that invaluable war-workers have been drawn from necessary tasks while useless wastrels have remained at large; thirdly, that the rate of recruiting has been spasmodic and wholly incalculable, that our armies have never been quite strong enough for the successive operations assigned to them, and that consequently a vast, needless, and largely fruitless sacrifice of the very cream of our nation's manhood has taken place. ...
— Freedom In Service - Six Essays on Matters Concerning Britain's Safety and Good Government • Fossey John Cobb Hearnshaw

... 228; break the thread, snap the thread; disconnect &c (disjoin) 44; dissever. Adj. discontinuous, unsuccessive^, broken, interrupted, dicousu [Fr.]; disconnected, unconnected; discrete, disjunctive; fitful &c (irregular) 139; spasmodic, desultory; intermitting, occasional &c v., intermittent; alternate; recurrent &c (periodic) 138. Adv. at intervals; by snatches, by jerks, by skips, by catches, by fits and starts; skippingly^, per saltum [Lat.]; longo intervallo ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... disease, the child is restored to perfect health. Sometimes, however, particularly in the autumn, and at other seasons on the occurrence of easterly winds, the paroxysms of cough will return,—it will assume its spasmodic character, and be accompanied with the "whoop," after a month, or even two or three months, of perfect and apparent recovery. Errors in diet will sometimes alone have ...
— The Maternal Management of Children, in Health and Disease. • Thomas Bull, M.D.

... warily, and not taking her eyes from the feeble Graham. Of course her approach always galvanized him to new and spasmodic life: the game of romps was sure to be exacted. Sometimes she would be angry; sometimes the matter was allowed to pass smoothly, and we could hear her say as she led him up-stairs: "Now, my dear boy, come and take your tea—I am sure you ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte

... beaten out rather thin, and expressed in a great many words, as was the good man's wont. And in these days of the misty and spasmodic school, I owe my readers an apology for presenting them with poetry which they will have no ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd

... about right to say that little Whitie's spasmodic announcements directed Pee-wee in his idle wanderings on that morning when he was fearful ...
— Pee-wee Harris • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... Marquis with a start, as he made a spasmodic motion toward the pocket of his coat. But if his intention had been to draw a weapon, Tom was too quick for him. The Marquis found himself staring into the barrel of a pistol and heard the unpleasant click of the trigger as ...
— The Inn at the Red Oak • Latta Griswold

... their fellow creatures, poor exiles relegated to this land of ice, poor creatures who should have been Esquimaux, since nature had condemned them to live only just outside the arctic circle! In vain did I try to detect a smile upon their lips; sometimes by a spasmodic and involuntary contraction of the muscles they seemed to laugh, but they ...
— A Journey to the Interior of the Earth • Jules Verne

... strong, Necks that to the earth-supporting Atlas might full well belong. "But our strength un-scientific strives in vain thro' stagnant water, Every day, I blush to own it, Cambridge strokes are rowing shorter. With a short spasmodic impulse see the boats a moment leap, Starting with a flying motion, soon they stop and sink to sleep. Where are Stanley, Jones, and Courage? where is 'Judas' stout and tall, Where the Stroke named ''all' by Bargemen, known to Cambridge ...
— Sagittulae, Random Verses • E. W. Bowling

... after a while, and the risaldar drove to the right, toward where a Hindu temple cast deep shadows, and a row of trees stood sentry in spasmodic moonlight. In front of the temple, seated on a mat, was a wandering fakir of the none-too-holy type. By his side was ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy

... again and again without thought, animated only by frenzied brute instinct to find the throat of his tormenter, and ever and ever failing; till at length he crumpled and lay crushed and writhing, then subsided into insensibility, was quite still but for heaving lungs and the spasmodic clutchings of his broken ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph

... in her silken kerchief and burst into seeming spasmodic sobs of grief. "Sire!" was all the response the King could hear. He trembled violently and his face grew white. He did not know that Nell's tears ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.

... fitful—as wild as the breeze— It wandered about into several keys; It was jerky, spasmodic, and harsh, I'm aware; But still it distinctly ...
— The Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert

... reeking flanks and shoulders, pausing occasionally as the water-bars brace the wheels, and impatient only with the flies that vex their ears, and the insufficiency of their short and stumpy tails to protect their quivering sides. Some of these animals are not so patient, but are nervous and spasmodic and unhappy. I have noticed one among them particularly, that has a very bad time every morning with his first load. He is what the teamsters call "balky," though evidently an excellent horse. Much coaxing ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb

... lurching, wriggling, reeling, broken thing before them—following the Flopper, his right hand and arm curved piteously inward to his chin, his neck thrown sideways, his sagging leg seeming to hold only to his body by spasmodic jerks to catch up with the body itself, like the steel when detached from the magnet that bounds forward to re-attach itself again, his eyes starting from his head, his face bloodless with exertion and twisted as fearfully as were his limbs, but upon ...
— The Miracle Man • Frank L. Packard

... finest game-cocks in the District of Columbia. Among the Americans there is a distinct love for fair play, and such sports as "bull-baiting," "bull-fights," "dog-fights," and "cock-fights" have never attained any degree of popularity. There are spasmodic instances of such indulgences, but in no sense can they be included, as in England and Spain, among the national sports, which leads me to the conclusion that, aside from the many peculiarities, as taking up and dropping sports, America, all in all, is ...
— As A Chinaman Saw Us - Passages from his Letters to a Friend at Home • Anonymous

... part of its contents down his throat. A spasmodic contortion and a sudden rush to the open window surprised the hospitable bishop, who had anticipated a great treat for his guest: "My dear sir," he cried, ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie

... the carpenters and all three, shoving each other with their knees and their elbows, puffing and swearing at one another, bustle about the same spot. Lubim, the hunchback, gets a mouthful of water, and the air rings with his hard spasmodic coughing. ...
— The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... inspection Turner said in a lordly manner, "Good lord! what a crew," and the pair sought better things elsewhere. Turner and Roberts were very insignificant people during the daytime: they were little use at games, and even a year's spasmodic cribbing had only managed to secure them a promotion from the Second Form to the Third. But when the evening came they were indeed great men, and ruled over a small dormitory that contained, besides themselves, only four new boys ...
— The Loom of Youth • Alec Waugh

... shown in the book are astonishing, bewildering almost. Its faults are to be found in the enormous length allowed to digressions and episodical dissertations, in the exaggeration of all the combinations and all the theses, and, finally, in something strained, spasmodic, and violent in the style, which is very different from the style of natural eloquence or of essential truth. Effect is the misfortune of Victor Hugo, because he makes it the center of his aesthetic system; and hence exaggeration, monotony of emphasis, theatricality ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... waywardness of the Celt, as they met exactly the stronger nature of the Saxon. At intervals, when the government was exasperated by unusual outrages, some prince of the blood was sent across as viceroy; and half a century of acquiescence in disorder would be followed by a spasmodic severity, which irritated without subduing, and forfeited affection, while it failed to terrify. At all other times, Ireland was governed by the Norman Irish, and these, as the years went on, were tempted by their convenience ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude

... exclaimed, "I've been asleep!" It was still dark, but less dark than it was when he came to bed. He could just see the time by holding his watch close to his eyes. "Four," he murmured. It was strange that he should have slept at all, for there had been spasmodic firing all night. He got out of bed, and went across his room to the window, and looked out, and as he looked, the wounded horse struggled to rise, pawing the ground feebly, and then fell over on its side. "It isn't dead!..." When he had ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine

... some refreshment in the dining-room, and Mrs. Woodward sat with her arm round Katie's neck on the sofa, comforting her with kisses and little caressing touches, but saying nothing. Katie, still unconscious of her passion, gave way to spasmodic utterance of her ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope

... populated with men and women. Whether Caine meant John Storm for an ideal Christian we can not say. There is strength here, as in all he has written; but Storm's lacks are many and great. He is enthusiast, but flighty. He means well, but is spasmodic in its display. Storm might have grown into a hero had he lived longer, and, as a flame, leaped high at some point in his career. Both as man and Christian, he disappoints us. Red Jason, in "The Bondman," is a worthier contribution to the natural ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle

... short, sharp raid of General Early—penetrating to the gates of the Capital and with possible capabilities of even entering them—can hardly be considered an organized scheme of invasion. It was rather the spasmodic effort by a sharp, hard blow to loosen the tightening and death-dealing grip upon our throat, and give us time for one long, deep breath before ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon

... some shelf beneath which the foundations were being dug. At times a shovel reached out its five-yard steel jaw and gently cleared the rails of debris, or boosted some bowlder from the path with all the skill of a giant hand and fingers. Up and down the canon rolled spasmodic rumblings, like broadsides from a ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach

... and motionless, save for a horrible spasmodic twitching of his limbs. A profound silence ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells

... quick, spasmodic action, drew her to him. Never had he seen such a pair of eyes! They reminded him of Italian skies under which he had dreamed brave dreams—dreamed dreams which would ever be dreams. The end of them now was ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White

... Chimpanzee the requiem rang, Now the bell tolls for the Orang-Outang. Well may spasmodic sobs choke childhood's gorge, Now they who sighed for "Sally" grieve for "George." A "wilderness of monkeys" can't console, For Anthropoids defunct. Of Apedom's whole, One little Chimpanzee, one Gibbon small, (Who ought to write his race's "Rise and Fall,") ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 10, 1891 • Various

... with spasmodic contraction of the throat once went to a doctor in alarm and distress. The doctor told him that, in any case, nothing worse than fainting could happen to him, and that, if he fainted away, his throat would be relieved, because the fainting would relax the muscles ...
— The Freedom of Life • Annie Payson Call

... Retrograde motion of the capillaries. 2. Palpitatio cordis. Palpitation of the heart. 3. Anhelatio spasmodica. Spasmodic panting. ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin

... travellers that they were in for an unpleasant experience, in all probability, of a miserable night. The trio, however, still held on their way; the black boy, during the momentary illuminations caused by the repeated flashes of lightning, continued to discern the, but to him, evanescent path; and with spasmodic starts; and intervals of salient progression, proceeded ...
— Fern Vale (Volume 1) - or the Queensland Squatter • Colin Munro

... He closed his mouth with a spasmodic snap, and sat ruminating—the very picture of wretchedness. He was, indeed, to be pitied! For no patience, no kindness, no wooing could win from his bride one smile. That very afternoon, under the combined goadings of exasperated self-love and ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... follow without question, no lawmaker above, only ordinary men set to deal with heartbreaking perplexity. All weakness comes to the surface. We are homeless in a jungle of machines and untamed powers that haunt and lure the imagination. Of course our culture is confused, our thinking spasmodic, and our emotion out of kilter. No mariner ever enters upon a more uncharted sea than does the average human being born in the twentieth century. Our ancestors thought they knew their way from birth through all eternity; we are puzzled about ...
— The Mind in the Making - The Relation of Intelligence to Social Reform • James Harvey Robinson

... Kemble that he was never pathetic because he had no children. Talma says that when deeply moved he found himself making a rapid and fugitive observation on the alternation of his voice, and on a certain spasmodic vibration which it contracted in tears. Has not the actor who can thus make his feelings a part of his art an advantage over the actor who never feels, but who makes his observations solely from the feelings of others? It is necessary to this art that the mind should ...
— [19th Century Actor] Autobiographies • George Iles

... eat it, soon become delirious, whirling and dancing furiously about on the top of the water, and then die. Copperas tends to produce nausea, vomiting, griping, and purging. Grains-of-paradise, a large kind of cardamom, is "strongly heating and carminative" (i. e., anti-flatulent and anti-spasmodic.) Opium is known well enough. Stramonium-seed would seem to have been made on purpose for the liquor business. In moderate doses it is a powerful narcotic, producing vertigo, headache, dimness or ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum

... was off. "Yes, yes; but I want as much water as I can get," answered the manager; and so he held on till, I suppose, the tide had raised the river Dee to its very acme of height. At last the word was given; the ship began slowly to move; Mrs. ——— threw the bottle against the bow with a spasmodic effort that dashed it into a thousand pieces, and diffused the fragrance of the old port all around, where it lingered several minutes. I did not think that there could have been such a breathless moment in an ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... still concerned, with many unsettled problems of currency, and with the problems that centre about a standard of value. Gold is perhaps of all material substances the best adapted to the monetary purpose, but even at that best it falls far short of an imaginable ideal. It undergoes spasmodic and irregular cheapening through new discoveries of gold, and at any time it may undergo very extensive and sudden and disastrous depreciation through the discovery of some way of transmuting less valuable elements. The liability to such depreciations introduces an undesirable speculative ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells

... evolving world in which his heroes have grown up; of the ever-spreading suburbs stretching out their tentacles north and south and east and west, of the mushroom houses which arose without order or system, of the changing system of education, the changing ideas towards parents—everything spasmodic, growing, muddled. Similarly, Mr. E.M. Forster, in Howard's End, shows the old house so dear to the heart of Mrs. Wilcox, as the symbol of permanence in an unfixed society which is homeless, restless, changing. Even if ...
— Personality in Literature • Rolfe Arnold Scott-James

... ceased to be performed between Newcastle and Carlisle, even Hexham being deserted for a time. After the battle of Bannockburn, matters were worse, if possible, and all the north lay in fear of the Scots, but from time to time spasmodic efforts at retaliation were made by the boldest of the Northumbrian landowners. In the reign of Edward III., however, many of these great landowners thwarted the King's designs by making a traitorous peace with ...
— Northumberland Yesterday and To-day • Jean F. Terry

... as a candle, was conducting an invisible orchestra when Aline returned. The frightened maid tried to hold the lean, spasmodic arms as they traced in the air the pompous rhythm of a march that moved on silent funereal pinions through the chamber. The woman stared threateningly at the picture on the wall, the picture of the ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker

... a dear, faithful friend, and I thank you with all my heart for your kind letter. God reward you for your love to such a jaded, worn-out creature as I am! I can only assure you that I feel it deeply and gratefully, and that your words soothe many spasmodic annoyances. ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated

... Morgan derived his sense of the ghastly failure of the whole business, not so much from the demeanour of the audience as from that of one of the critics, who somehow summed it up for him. This critic, whose bald pate had fascinated his eye, had a curiously irritating, spasmodic chuckle, and Morgan in vain tried to be unaware ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill

... Every impulse given to the masses is, in its nature, spasmodic and transitory. No systematic enterprise to enlighten the masses ever can be carried out. Campaigns of education contain a fallacy. Education takes time. It cannot be treated as subsidiary for a lifetime and then be made the chief business for ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner

... George Hamilton had troubles of his own in this respect. When he left Frances Jennings at Sundridge, he was aglow with good resolutions, all of which were to be put into immediate practice, and many of which he carried out in part by strong though spasmodic effort when ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major

... they heard that "the American" had at last fulfilled their prophecies, the locataires showed a spasmodic warmth of interest. They offered their services promptly, and said to each other that he must have been a good fellow, after all—that it was a pity they had not known him better. They even protested that he should not be made an object of charity—that among themselves ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various

... to a considerably higher level and became suddenly hard and smooth. The driver urged the team into a series of brief and spasmodic trots, which lasted a couple of hours, when we again descended to a lower level, where the wearily slow gait was resumed. With the slower pace our spirits fell and our thirst increased. As Private Tom Clary expressed ...
— Captured by the Navajos • Charles A. Curtis

... I have received a good deal of news lately from Count Beust, Dingelstedt, Gille, and Stor. To the latter my answer will be little satisfactory; but I cannot continue with him on any other road, and let the overpowering Dominant of his spasmodic vanity serve as the Fundamental note of ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated

... words of Cecily, who had called him her tiger; by degrees, his mind again wandered; he imagined himself a tiger! Crouched in one of the corners of the room, as in his den, his hoarse, furious cries, the grinding of his teeth, the spasmodic contortions of the muscles of his forehead and face, his glaring look, gave him a vague and frightful resemblance to ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue

... is more difficult than ever; Choiseul having made a quite spasmodic effort towards Hanover, while negotiating for Peace. Two Armies, counting together 160,000 men, in great completeness of equipment, Choiseul has got on foot, against Ferdinand's of 95,000. Had a fine dashing plan, too;—devised ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... of peace, the administration of military affairs in the United States is somewhat spasmodic, resulting directly and unavoidably from the fact of our maintaining only the merest skeleton of a standing army compared to the vast territorial extent of the Union. As an incident of this system, Fort Moultrie had ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay

... me in their arms. I take great care of myself, and you may be quite at ease on my account. My cough is really a very odd one; for eight days it disappeared entirely; then, upon the 3rd (of March) a vile spasmodic attack returned before I reached Calais. Since that time it is quiet again. I cannot, with all the consideration I have given it, understand it at all. I sometimes deny myself every indulgence, and yet it comes. I eat ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, No. 477, Saturday, February 19, 1831 • Various

... point which might be termed midway between the three vessels thus described, were the two buoys, which moved with spasmodic jerks, due to the action of the imprisoned vessel below. As they looked along the bobbing buoys in either direction, small vessels were observed, patrolling to and fro, in the tiny mast, or lookout of each, being two or more men, with glasses, constantly scrutinizing the floats as the ...
— The Boy Volunteers with the Submarine Fleet • Kenneth Ward

... a spasmodic duo of delight and disdain. "Why look at her?" they cried. "Doesn't ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. Sep. 12, 1891 • Various

... repeated Maria inquiringly. "Why, how absurd! And, after all, what is the matter with the girl?" Dropping the curtain, she came over to the fire, and sat listening attentively while Miss Saidie told, in spasmodic jerks and pauses, the foolish ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow

... waiting to reply to requests for information, I doubt if I should have spoken. I felt like the spectator who is compelled to witness a tragedy which both wounds and bores him. I was obsessed by my own ill-luck and the stupidity of the rest of mankind. I was particularly annoyed by the spasmodic hymn-singing that went on in ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett

... five such years in England. The sanguinary struggles of the Roses, the grinding oppression of Henry the Seventh, the spasmodic cruelties of Henry the Eighth, were not to be compared with this time. Of all persecutors, none is, because none other can be, so coldly, mercilessly, hopelessly unrelenting, as he who believes himself to ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt

... a "mixed condition," a combination of retardation with elated mood. The condition is different from the depressive stupor in that activity is more frequent, either in constant fumbling with the bed clothes or in spasmodic scolding, joking, playing of pranks, assaultiveness, erotic behavior or decoration. The affect is usually apparent in surly expression or happy, or erotic, demeanor. They are usually fairly clear and oriented and often with good memory for the attack but with evasive ...
— Benign Stupors - A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type • August Hoch

... and were to pursue awhile further our chase of the alien, the somehow repeatedly postponed real opportunity; and the second, the comparatively cramped and depressed connection with the classic refuge, as it then was, of spasmodic thrift, when not of settled indigence, for the embarrassed of our race in the largest sense of this matter, was to be shuffled off at last with no scant relief and reaction. This is perhaps exactly why the whole picture of our existence at the Pas-de-Calais watering place pleads to me now for the ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James

... on asking, "Does Happiness help Progress?" Thus, I see in the New Age this week a letter from Mr. Egerton Swann, in which he warns the world against me and my friend Mr. Belloc, on the ground that our democracy is "spasmodic" (whatever that means); while our "reactionism is settled and permanent." It never strikes Mr. Swann that democracy means something in itself; while "reactionism" means nothing—except in connection with democracy. ...
— A Miscellany of Men • G. K. Chesterton

... hail along to the forecastle to avast heaving on the cable; for some of the watch had remained on deck, when the rest went below to pass up lines, and were now taking spasmodic, aimless jerks at the windlass. The mate drove his brown-skinned men to marvellous feats with coiling lines, determined to be ready with his part when the boat was ready. He had not heard Vandersee's ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle

... and we were soon alongside the ocean steamer whose iron sides rose above us like a city wall. There was nothing but an iron ladder, flat against this wall, by which to ascend. The heaving of the surf-boat was great. It approached the ladder and retreated from it in the most irregularly spasmodic manner. Only active men, accustomed to such feats, could get upon it. Kafirs, although active as kittens, are not accustomed to the sea, or to the motion of ships and boats. For them to ascend ...
— Six Months at the Cape • R.M. Ballantyne

... she exclaimed, with a sudden spasmodic movement. "Remember that you would have to renounce your identity, and in an ...
— Colonel Chabert • Honore de Balzac

... his word for it, and munched at tongue and biscuits. As for muscle, we were both in hard condition. He was fresh, and what distress I felt was mainly due to spasmodic exertion culminating in that desperate spurt. As for the fog. it had more than once shown a faint tendency to lift, growing thinner and more luminous, in the manner of fogs, always to settle down ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers

... activity was not simply an impulsive response to Prime Minister Kerensky's eloquence or the result of isolated local conditions. Gradually the fighting spread over more and more ground. It became more efficient and less spasmodic. Undoubtedly this was partly due to the fact that matters behind the front began to settle down somewhat and that supplies of ammunition and food again flowed more regularly and abundantly. Then too the new commander in chief seemed to be more capable of controlling ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... Marley Wood was not new to her. It had been a favourite spot of her brother Austin's, and the two had spent many a pleasant day beneath the umbrage of those old forest-trees; she, sitting and reading, neither of them talking very much, only in a spasmodic way, when Austin was suddenly moved by some caprice to pour out his thoughts into the ear of his little sister—strange bitter thoughts they were sometimes; but the girl listened as to the inspirations of genius. Here he had taught her almost all that she had ever learned of landscape art. ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon

... Ranald, shy, proud, and sensitive, felt this exclusion, and in return kept himself aloof even from the boys, and especially from the girls, of his own age. His attendance at school was of a fragmentary and spasmodic nature, and he never really came to be on friendly terms with his fellow-pupils. His one friend was Don Cameron, whom the boys called "Wobbles," from his gait in running, whose father's farm backed that of Macdonald Dubh. And though Don was a year older, he gave to Ranald a homage almost ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor

... there is no shadow of doubt. The people of the loyal States, who, by an immense majority, have just emphasized their determination to sustain the war, are firmly convinced that they are not laboring and suffering in vain. It is no spasmodic impulse of blind passion, or even of useless though just resentment against wrong, which impels them, after nearly three years of ruinous war, to redouble their sublime efforts to conquer the treason that still obstinately resists ...
— The Continental Monthly, Volume V. Issue I • Various

... table there were awkward silences, followed by spasmodic local bursts of talk. Sommers, who sat between Miss Hitchcock and Mrs. Lindsay, fell to listening to ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... disease, the only chances are to call in a physician at once. In genuine croup, the child seems to have a cold and is hoarse for a few days previous to the attack; but the fit generally comes on suddenly in spasmodic croup, which may be treated as follows. During the fit put the child in a warm bath, apply hot water to the throat, allow fresh air, and sprinkle the face and chest ...
— Young's Demonstrative Translation of Scientific Secrets • Daniel Young

... of those spasmodic waves of strikes passed over the country. Some northern road that wasn't earning enough money to pay the interest on its bonds, cut down the salaries of some of its employees, and they went out. Then the "sympathy" ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady

... the horizon, however. The lonely roads we learn to qualify in thought with occasional branches of railway; the dangerous trails, with certain cultivated highways; the dismal road-side inns, with spasmodic hotels, some even named confidently as "palatial." We read of spas and springs and French society, more than of chasms and banditti. We realize in surprise that over all the past of these mountains flows now in bracing contrast the easy, laughing tide of modern ...
— A Midsummer Drive Through The Pyrenees • Edwin Asa Dix

... was gathering, low-voiced and eager, in the Piazza San Nicolo: a crowd chiefly of the people, and the faces and costumes of many races came out grotesquely under the spasmodic glare of the torches which flared about the standard of Cyprus, in the centre of the square—the standard was tied with mourning and wreathed with cypress. There were many women—here and there a peasant with a child slumbering in her arms, or clinging sleepily to the ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... the present, he plunged into the memories of the war, as into a bath of oblivion, a strange oblivion, where he found all his patriotic regrets of other days. He read, with spasmodic eagerness, the books in which Georgei and Klapka, the actors of the drama, presented their excuses, or poured forth their complaints; and it seemed to him that his country would ...
— Prince Zilah, Complete • Jules Claretie

... given her a brief experience of how things should be done, and how they should look, and she had never forgotten; Penelope, on the other hand, had forgotten, or never noticed Angela and Poppy, fired by Esther's example, had spasmodic passions for improving the house or garden, during which every one suffered more or less, and they themselves were exhausted long before the huge tasks they had ...
— The Carroll Girls • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... was happy, because he had a good digestion and a kind heart. The sole shadow on his career was a spasmodic tendency to be bored. 'I miss the daily journey on the Underground,' he once said to his wife. 'I always feel that I ought to be going to the office in the morning.' 'You dear thing!' Geraldine caressed him with her voice. 'Fancy anyone with a gift ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett

... right was too slow in getting on his helmet; he sank to the ground, clutching at his throat, and after a few spasmodic twisting, went West (died). It was horrible to see him die, but we were powerless to help him. In the corner of a traverse, a little, muddy cur dog, one of the company's pets, was lying dead, with his two ...
— Over The Top • Arthur Guy Empey

... her to his heart again with almost a spasmodic pressure! How he kissed her as the tears fell like rain from his old eyes! How he blessed her, and called her by a hundred soft sweet names which now came new to his lips! How he chid himself for ever having been unhappy with such a treasure in his house, ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope

... into the depths without many a bitter outcry against its wrongs. It was with no slight effort that he drowned the memory of his early home and its good influences. During the first two or three years he occasionally had periods of passionate remorse, and made spasmodic efforts toward better things. But they were made in human strength, and in view of the penalties of evil, rather than because he was enamored of the right. Some special temptation would soon sweep ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe

... I think, greatly improved; I have had some returns of my spasmodic affection, but tolerable in degree, and yielding to medicine. I hope gentle exercise and the air of my hills will set me up this summer. I trust you will soon be out now. I have delayed reading the sheets in progress after Vol. I., that I might enjoy them ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart

... listening through the night-watches was the sound of a cough, and the anxious waiting to hear whether the next explosion had a "croupy" or brassy sound. It was, of course, early recognized that there were two kinds of croup, the so-called "spasmodic" and the "membranous," the former comparatively common and correspondingly harmless, the latter one of the deadliest of known diseases. The fear that made the mother's heart leap into her mouth as she heard the ringing croup-cough was lest it might be membranous, or, if spasmodic, might ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson

... fingers a stout sea-grass line was running out to the accumulated driftwood in the eddy below the wharf-boat. Suddenly there came a spasmodic ...
— Shawn of Skarrow • James Tandy Ellis

... scoundrel known to us pursued his work of sin with an absolute unconsciousness of all moral law until pain or death drew near; then the scoundrel cringed like a cur under the scourges of remorse. Thackeray, in a fit of spasmodic courage, painted the archetypal scoundrel once and for all in "Barry Lyndon," and he practically said the last word on the subject; for no grave analysis, no reasoning, can ever improve on that immortal and most moving picture of a wicked man. Observe ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman

... arms, came from the grocery store at the corner, and gathered them in. My little sister was put to nurse with Mrs. Cudlip next door, and when, at the end of the week, President went off to work somewhere in a mining town in West Virginia, my father and I were left alone, except for the spasmodic appearances of the red-haired slattern. Gradually the dust began to settle and thicken on the dried cat-tails in the china vases upon the mantel; the "prize" red geranium dropped its blossoms and withered upon ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow



Words linked to "Spasmodic" :   unsteady, fitful, convulsive, spasmodic laryngitis



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