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Trance   Listen
verb
Trance  v. i.  To pass; to travel. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Trance" Quotes from Famous Books



... joy to rage give way, And the soft dove becomes a bird of prey. May this our bold advent'rer break the spell, And drive the demon to his native hell. Ye slaves of passion, and ye dupes of chance, Wake all your pow'rs from this destructive trance! Shake off the shackles of this tyrant vice: Hear other calls than those of cards and dice: Be learn'd in nobler arts, than arts of play, And other debts, than those of honour pay: No longer live insensible to shame, Lost to your ...
— The Gamester (1753) • Edward Moore

... the last chest was shut again and locked, and I had exhausted my ingenuity at commendation, and my patience also, he turned to me as a man come out of a trance. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... the only party in the township who didn't understand. Kyle used to put vinegar in his coffee and things like that, and if you'd ask him, 'What's that fellow's name that runs the clothing store in town?' he'd come out of his trance and say 'Yes,' and smile very amiable, to show that he thoroughly ...
— Red Saunders • Henry Wallace Phillips

... always the image of his own guilty heart or bloody deed, or some image which derives from them its terror or gloom. These, when they arise, hold him spell-bound and possess him wholly, like a hypnotic trance which is at the same time the ecstasy of a poet. As the first 'horrid image' of Duncan's murder—of himself murdering Duncan—rises from unconsciousness and confronts him, his hair stands on end and the outward ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley

... the hill-folk say that St. Francis is not dead at all, but that he lives hidden in a secret crypt far down below the roots of wall and pillar. Standing there, pale and upright, with the blood red in the five wounds of his crucifixion, he waits in a heavenly trance for the sound of the last trumpet, when the nations of the earth shall see in the clouds Him whom ...
— A Child's Book of Saints • William Canton

... Ariadne's utter trance, Crazed by the flight of that disloyal traitor, Who left her gazing on the green expanse That swallowed up his track,—yet this would mate her, Ev'n in the cloudy summit of her woe, When o'er the far sea-brim ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood

... his own time. It is a fascinating theme as Henry James works it out—doubly fascinating as he talks about it to himself in the "scenario" that is published along with the story. In the latter we see the author groping for his story, almost like a medium in a trance. Like a medium, he one moment hesitates and is vague, and the next, as he himself would say, fairly pounces on a certainty. No artist ever cried with louder joy at the sight of things coming absolutely right under his hand. Thus, at ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd

... two; he was better, but still confined to the nursery, and he had heard Susy unlock the house-door, and could not imagine why she had not come straight up to him. He now began to manifest his indignation in a series of racking howls, and Susy, shaken out of her trance, dropped her cloak and umbrella ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton

... that fellow's voice," puzzled Sarle. April thought she did too, but she was in a kind of happy trance where voices did not matter. The next episode was Ghostie at the studio window blotting out ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley

... forget my very existence. He fell into a sort of trance, with his eyes fixed on vacancy. There was a dead hush in the place, nothing but the crackle of the fire and the steady drip of the rain. I endured it as well as I might, for though my legs were sorely cramped, I did not ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan

... next day, as they were pursuing their journey and had come nigh to the city, Peter went upon the house to pray, about the sixth hour. [10:10]And he was hungry and wished to eat; and while they were preparing a trance came upon him, [10:11]and he beheld heaven opened, and a certain vessel like a great sheet descending, let down by four corners to the earth, [10:12]in which were all the quadrupeds and reptiles of the earth, and birds of heaven. ...
— The New Testament • Various

... County Palurin. Alas! it is too true; At her bed's feet this traitor made me see Her shame, his treason, and my deadly grief— Her princely body yielded to this thief; The high despite whereof so wounded me That, trance-like, as a senseless stone I lay; For neither wit nor tongue could use the mean T'express the passions of my pained heart. Forceless, perforce, I sank down to this pain, As greedy famine doth constrain the hawk Piecemeal to rend and tear ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various

... melee of whispers now suffocated in a passion of inarticulate breaths; but at that moment one of Rebekah's chaperons, wandering out of time and place, stood at the alcove entrance, and they, smitten into two, sprang straight, awaked from trance, Rebekah with half a sob and ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel

... his hair back with a quick toss of the head. How gracefully he used his hands. And what lovely, distinguished table manners—she must practice that trick of lifting your napkin, delicately and swiftly, so as to barely touch your lips. She ate her own food in a kind of trance, unaware of what she was eating; yet it was like eating ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin

... which was about sixteen feet from the ground, and then he sat down on the roof of the cowshed and told the baker's boy exactly what he thought of him. I don't think the boy heard it all - he was in a sort of trance of terror. When Robert had said everything he could think of, and some things twice over, he ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit

... fell into a trance; the slaves made their cries; in short, there was that stir amongst them, that one would have thought they had heard the "blast of consternation from the trumpets ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier

... another. I saw the buildings; the architecture doubtless was the same, but the scene was changed! The beauties of Oxford were vanished! I was awakened from the most delightful of dreams to a disgusting reality, and would have given kingdoms to have once more renewed my trance. The friends of Hector, though not all of them his equals in turbulence profaneness and folly, were of the same school. Their language, though less coarse, was equally insipid. Their manners, when not so obtrusive, were more bald. They all cursed ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... less than that shall it find lasting fulfilment of itself. No single face, however beautiful, no single human soul, however vast, can absorb it. Silencieux, Beatrice, Wonder, himself, all faded away, in a trance-like sense of a stupendous passion, an august possession. He felt that within him which rose up gigantic from the earth, and towered into eyries of space, from whence that morning star seemed like a dewdrop glittering low down ...
— The Worshipper of the Image • Richard Le Gallienne

... enchanting beauty of the music; and they would come away saying the half had not been told. The musical critics, like all others in the audiences, were so lost in admiration, that they forgot to criticise; and, after recovering from what seemed a trance of delight, they could only say that this "music of the heart" was ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter

... clamorous sorrow of silent despair: fanaticism alone could suggest a ray of hope and consolation. "How can he be dead, our witness, our intercessor, our mediator, with God? By God he is not dead: like Moses and Jesus, he is wrapped in a holy trance, and speedily will he return to his faithful people." The evidence of sense was disregarded; and Omar, unsheathing his cimeter, threatened to strike off the heads of the infidels, who should dare to affirm that the prophet ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon

... more, but lay like one in trance, That hears his burial talked of by his friends, And cannot speak, nor move, nor make one sign, But lies and dreads his doom. She turned; she paused; She stooped; and out of languor leapt a cry; Leapt fiery Passion from the brinks of death; ...
— The Princess • Alfred Lord Tennyson

... further border; then caught the sharp pointed towers of a church or cathedral close by at my left hand, just within my picture; I could not see the whole church; then back to the soft veiled mountain. A more picturesque combination never went into a view. I sat still in a trance of pleasure, only my eyes moving slowly from point to point, and my heart and soul listening to the hidden melodies which in nature's great halls are always sounding. I do believe, for the matter of that, they are ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell

... the pulse loses in force and frequency, the nerves of special sense are almost inhibited, the eye is fixed and records no impression, the ear registers no sound, necessary motions are performed unconsciously, the condition approaches that of trance. There is also an alarming similarity at times between the action of genius and of madness, as is ...
— The Religious Sentiment - Its Source and Aim: A Contribution to the Science and - Philosophy of Religion • Daniel G. Brinton

... he seemed to be laughing, and he laughed in a paroxysm of tears. He tried to tear the devil out of the pulpit rails. When he was not a teetotum he was a windmill. His pump position was the most appalling. Then he glared motionless at his admiring listeners, as if he had fallen into a trance with his arm upraised. The hurricane broke next moment. Nanny Sutie bore up under the shadow of the windmill—which would have been heavier had Auld Licht ministers worn gowns—but the pump affected her ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie

... Sir Launcelot lay as in a trance. At the end of that time he came to himself, and found those about him that had tended him in his swoon. These, when they had given him fresh raiment, brought him to the aged king—Pelles was his name—that owned ...
— The Junior Classics, V4 • Willam Patten (Editor)

... much to perish, if that were all. But the world will be the worse for ever. Trance is deceived. She comes, in an error, to avenge herself, and to enslave the blacks. ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau

... forgetting the hand that bestowed them. As if to recall them to a better sense of things, events now occurred which it is our business to relate, and which aroused the whole colony from the sort of pleasing trance into which they had fallen, by the united influence of security, abundance, and ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper

... account of the karma veils this purity is sullied, and the veils are only worn out imperfectly and thus reveal this and that object at this and that time as ordinary knowledge (mati), testimony (s'ruta), supernatural cognition, as in trance or hypnotism (avadhi), and direct knowledge of the thoughts of others or thought reading (mana@hparyaya). In the state of release however there is omniscience (kevala-jnana) and all things are simultaneously ...
— A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1 • Surendranath Dasgupta

... spruce beds and screamed with fright. Barbara ran madly over the ground, back and forth, not certain where to hide. Eleanor stood shivering and Anne rushed over to ask Polly what had happened. Polly explained in a whisper, and Eleanor, as in a trance, watched her sister running about with something that seemed to cleave to her foot closer than a porous- plaster. Finally, Eleanor came to her senses and ran over to keep Barbara from rolling under the ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy

... the names of all the plants that should bloom on this day, whereof he kept account as a banker when his notes fall due. The Cypripedium not due till to-morrow. He thought, that, if waked up from a trance, in this swamp, he could tell by the plants what time of the year it was within two days. The redstart was flying about, and presently the fine grosbeaks, whose brilliant scarlet makes the rash gazer wipe his eye, and whose fine clear note ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau

... and flashing eyes eagerly gazing all around, but to Frank's horror, Morris did not pay the slightest heed, merely raised the amber mouth-piece of his pipe to his lips and inhaled more smoke, his eyes still half-closed, while he looked as if he were about to sink into a trance. ...
— In the Mahdi's Grasp • George Manville Fenn

... woke to see the sun shining upon the day of his execution could have been more profoundly wretched than the bailiff's daughter, as she dressed herself mechanically in her one smart silk gown, and stood in a kind of waking trance before the quaint old-fashioned looking-glass which reflected her pale hopeless face. She had no girlish companion to assist in that dismal toilet. Long ago there had been promises exchanged between Ellen Carley and her chosen friend, the daughter of a miller who ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon

... of that Lord of Herbs, she was slender and pale and wan, formed as it seemed of some new strange essence of pure clear ice and new dropt snow, and she loomed on the soul of Aja out of the blackness of his trance like a large white drooping lily, just seen in the gloom of an inky night. And her hair and brow were the colour of a thunder-cloud in the month of Chaitra[9], and like that cloud, the heavy sorrow hung in her great dark mournful eyes, drenching ...
— An Essence Of The Dusk, 5th Edition • F. W. Bain

... Raffaelle, creation is complete—Eve is presented to Adam, now awake; but neither the new-born charms, the submissive grace, and virgin purity, of the beauteous image; nor the awful presence of her Introductor, draw him from his mental trance, into effusions of love or gratitude; at ease reclined, with fingers pointing at himself and his new mate, he seems to methodize the surprising event that took place during his sleep, and to whisper ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various

... also be recollected what an important part in the production of hypnosis and the trance state, fixed and strained positions of these same ocular muscles have always been made to play. Many hypnotists can bring their subjects under their influence solely by having them gaze fixedly at some bright object like a mirror, ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson

... of the Zhack flitted by in a trance, And the Squidjum hid under a tub As he heard the loud hooves of the Hooken advance With a rub-a-dub—dub-a-dub—dub! And the Crankadox cried, as he lay down and died, "My fate there is none to bewail," While the Queen of the Wunks drifted over the tide With a long ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley

... Portsmouth, the burial service is read over them, and they are hidden in the earth. After poor Ivan has seen the faces of his wife and sister still and pale in their coffins, their ghastly wounds concealed as much as possible, flowers upon them and the priest praying over them, his trance of misery is broken, the grasp of despair is loosened a little about his heart. Yet hardly does he notice whether the sun shines or no, or care whether he lives or dies. Slowly his senses steady themselves from the ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various

... left the others absorbed in their trance of delight. He sought other sights. Directly he came to the Electricity building, with its marvels of light. It burst on his childish mind, seeking for novelties, as greater than the scenes outside. It was something that Fanny and Uncle and Aunt ...
— The Adventures of Uncle Jeremiah and Family at the Great Fair - Their Observations and Triumphs • Charles McCellan Stevens (AKA 'Quondam')

... little start, as if awakened out of a kind of trance. The sheer vacuity of his mind might ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon

... voice, started up like one awakened from a trance. "What is it?" said she in emotion, "what is it I behold? Art thou the departed shade ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various

... and trappings, club, and spear, were brought, The sword, and shield, with which the Stripling fought, These she embraced with melancholy joy, In sad remembrance of her darling boy. And still she beat her face, and o'er them hung, As in a trance—or to them wildly clung— Day after day she thus indulged her grief, Night after night, disdaining all relief; At length worn out—from earthly anguish riven, The mother's spirit ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous

... fluttering fancies that engage The vain pursuits of a degenerate age, . . . Would fain the shade of elder days recall, The Gothick battlements, the bannered hall; Or list of elfin harps the fabling rhyme; Or, wrapt in melancholy trance sublime, Pause o'er the working of some wondrous tale, Or bid the ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers

... enraptured with the beauty of light and mystery of shade, thrilling at the lonesome lament of the owl, I have no means to tell; but I was awakened from my trance by the touch of something crawling over me. Promptly I raised my head. The cave was as light as day. There, sitting sociably on my sleeping-bag was a great black tarantula, as large as ...
— The Last of the Plainsmen • Zane Grey

... seem peculiarly open to the hypnotic influence is that of the hystero-epileptics, whose tendencies are toward extreme suggestibility. Further, one may hypnotize himself—what we have called above Auto-suggestion—especially after having been put into the trance more than once by others. When let alone after being hypnotized, the patient usually passes into a ...
— The Story of the Mind • James Mark Baldwin

... Lord Brumpton and his servant Trusty enter. The former has wakened from his cataleptic trance, as the faithful Trusty watched beside him, and is horrified to learn of Lady Brumpton's lack of grief. But hush; he will conceal himself, for here comes my lady, accompanied by her ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins

... moistening my parched lips with my tongue, when I awoke from my momentary trance. The zemindar's eyes ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell

... Cay." Then he glanced at the other hand, still muttering, and made a sort of mark with his fingers on my forehead. Hugh told me afterwards that he seemed to trace a kind of zigzag on my left temple. All the time he was muttering he seemed to be half-conscious, almost in a trance, or as if he were mad: he frightened us dreadfully. After he had made the mark upon my brow he came to ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield

... silence so profound that Aunt Hester began to be afraid he had fallen into a trance. She did not try to rouse him herself, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... ceases, Simeon starts as from a trance and predicts in a few rapid couplets the sufferings and the crucifixion of the child. Mary falls overwhelmed into the arms of her attendants, and Simeon exclaims, "Most blessed and most unfortunate among women! thy heart is to be pierced with Seven ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay

... passing dream—its expression is frequently one of peculiar mildness and benignity; the breathing may be slow, but it is calm and uniform: the pulse not so rapid as in the waking state, but soft and regular; the composure of the whole body may continue trance-like and perfect. There is, indeed, no sign of innocence more touching than the smile of a sleeping infant. But, suddenly, this state of tranquillity may be disturbed; the dreamer changes his position and become restless; he moans grievously—perhaps ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various

... with her out- stretched hands and, after a dramatic pause, fell heavily on her pillow, where she instantly proceeded to fall into a deep and trance-like slumber—a slumber that prevailed through the terrified questionings, whimperings, and ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine

... it the likeness of Jeremiah, and the people began to stone it, believing that it was Jeremiah. And in the meantime he went on speaking to Baruch and Ebedmelech until he had committed to them all the mysteries which he had heard while he lay in a trance. ...
— Old Testament Legends - being stories out of some of the less-known apochryphal - books of the old testament • M. R. James

... the water thrice, rose like one in a trance, and advancing to Dingaan placed the brimming bowl ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard

... suddenly as though it had been stabbed and killed, and the woman whose eyes had been strained and lifted throughout as in a trance, and whose body had been rigid and quivering, sank down upon herself and let her eyelids fall, and her ...
— Hills and the Sea • H. Belloc

... society both as Lord Riversdale's daughter and as the author of many popular books, than the current of fashion set towards her. She was still a remarkably lovely woman, possessing irresistible attractions in her refined face and soft yet distant manners, as of one walking in a trance, and seeing and hearing things invisible and inaudible to less favored mortals. Quite unconsciously to herself she became the lion of the season, when the next season opened. She had been so difficult to know, that as soon as she was willing to ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton

... procession of Eglantine and Lysiart. Eglantine confesses that she helped to ruin Euryanthe in the hope of winning Adolar, and is promptly stabbed by Lysiart. Everything being satisfactorily cleared up, Euryanthe conveniently awakes from a trance into which she had fallen, and the lovers are finally united. Puerile as the libretto is, it inspired Weber with some of the finest music he ever wrote. The spectacular portions of the opera are animated by the true spirit of chivalry, while all ...
— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild

... night air aroused Beryl from her profound trance; and lighting the gas over her dressing table, she re-read the magical words that had transformed her narrow world. This was Monday the 26th, and next Saturday was the limit of the proposed interview. One day must suffice for necessary preparation, and starting by early morning express on Wednesday, ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... from his trance, and with a strangely leaping heart proceeded carefully to detach the big air plant from its resting-place. The wonderful flower, nodding to his touch, was no more perfect than this dryad ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach

... miracle, but the mere natural effect of natural causes! none the less, however, did he dread what might happen: he feared Isy herself, and what she might disclose! For a time he did not dare again go near the place. The girl might be in a trance! she might revive suddenly, and call out his name! She might even reveal all! She had always been a strange girl! What if, indeed, she were even being now kept alive to tell the truth, and disgrace him before all the world! Horrible as was the thought, might it not be well, in view ...
— Salted With Fire • George MacDonald

... de s, empezar a decir lo que sigue a esta relacin de Juana, de suerte que los dos hablarn al mismo tiempo; y ambos irn progresivamente esforzando ms la voz y expresndose con mayor rapidez y vehemencia, como si cada uno de ellos quisiera a todo trance ser odo del otro.) Pero qu importa? En cumpliendo ustedes su gusto, arda Troya, y salga el sol por Antequera.[1] Y luego, si una se deja llevar del despecho y da algn tropezn, ser cosa de alquilar ventanas para orlos a ...
— Ms vale maa que fuerza • Manuel Tamayo y Baus

... and do strange feats: [1602]these vapours move the phantasy, the phantasy the appetite, which moving the animal spirits causeth the body to walk up and down as if they were awake. Fracast. l. 3. de intellect, refers all ecstasies to this force of imagination, such as lie whole days together in a trance: as that priest whom [1603]Celsus speaks of, that could separate himself from his senses when he list, and lie like a dead man, void of life and sense. Cardan brags of himself, that he could do as much, and that when he list. Many times ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... will be fortunate far beyond its deserts if it tempts a few readers to extend the circle of their visionary acquaintances, of friends who, like Brahma, know not birth, nor decay, "sleep, waking, nor trance." ...
— Old Friends - Essays in Epistolary Parody • Andrew Lang

... about himself; his early hardships, his first success, his habits of work, his troubles with his wife, his liaison with Lady Blank, his tastes in fruits and wines, his handwriting, his very teeth and boots. He passed his life in a sort of trance, an ecstacy of self-absorption; he had fallen in love with his own conception of himself, like a metaphysical Narcissus. This idiosyncrasy was the means of defeating various conspiracies, in which Chalks, of course, ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland

... ajar. The waiters paused midway in their desperate gaming with victuals, and for a moment the place was wholly given over to music. The mounting unison passage and the smashing chords at the close awakened the diners from the trance into which they had been thrown by the magnetic fluid at the tips of the pianist's fingers; the bustle began, Harry and Billy ordered more beer and drew ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker

... had come near, and heard. But John Ball said no more. He swallowed a few spoonfuls of soup and fell again into his death-like trance. ...
— The Gold Hunters - A Story of Life and Adventure in the Hudson Bay Wilds • James Oliver Curwood

... from her trance—a heavy footstep, mayhap, in the street below, the distant roll of a drum, or only the clash of steel saucepans in Aunt Marie's kitchen. But suddenly Jeanne was alert, and with her alertness ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... hearts, and scorn to leave! Come shall the day—and come it may full soon— When thou, more splendid than the moon, Shalt rise; and, triumphing o'er night, Turn ebon darkness into silver light: The glory of thy brightness shall be shed Around each faithful head: Rising from thy long trance, earth shall behold Thee loftier yet, and lovelier than of old; And portion'd with the saints in bliss shall be All who, through weal and woe, were ever true ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various

... of the drums was hypnotic. As if in a trance he saw, at the side of the way they must go, the form of the head priest beckon them on. The two victims at his side took one step on the path to their death. And the same stiff rigidity held Jerry as he, too, moved onward and up the ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various

... you thinking of, Mis' Davidson?" asked Wid, smiling. "You was all in a trance. Something on your mind, huh? I bet I know. You're sending out a ad ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough

... blame them. But he's had good wind and fast legs, and they've always failed to run him down or get him into a corner, where, dazed and breathless, he's mechanically muttered 'Yes' to certain interrogatories and come out of the trance to find himself, roped, thrown, branded, and married. Forget him, Ernestine. Stick by golden youth and let it drop its golden apples. Pick them up, and golden youth with them, making a noise like stupid failure all the time you are snaring ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London

... home and got to her room she undressed, suffering her clothes to lie as they slipped from her. She got into bed, moving there and then lying there as one in trance. ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson

... tremulous as it was wont to be, but firm and dull, monotonous in tone like that of one who speaks whilst in a trance. Squire Boatfield had uttered an exclamation of boundless astonishment. Mechanically he took the packet of papers from the Quakeress's hand and after an instant's hesitation, and in response to an appealing look from Richard, he broke ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy

... for the frequent attendance of the trader, who ministered to his needs with the ease and certainty of long practice, rousing him now and then to give him nourishment, and redressing his frozen members when necessary. As for Balt, he slept like an Eskimo dog, wrapped in the senseless trance of complete physical relaxation. Being a creature of no imagination, he had taxed nothing beyond his body, which was capable of tremendous resistance, wherefore he escaped the nerve-racking torment and ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach

... along the trance towards an open room, and on entering it they met a fair damsel in the garb of a handmaid, to whom the knight spoke in familiarity, and kittling her under the chin, made her giggle in a wanton manner. By her ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt

... bright mulatto women was dozing in a rocking-chair, and the cook, having "fixed" his dinner ready for the stove, had rolled himself in his blanket on the kitchen floor. Silence and dusk were every-where, the dwelling might have been an enchanted one, and life in it held in a trance. ...
— The Hallam Succession • Amelia Edith Barr

... said, taking a deep breath as if rousing from a trance, "that is best. Child—see to it, and have your way. Senor, will you arrange that the senora has what comfort there is here? Our horses wait, ...
— The Treasure Trail - A Romance of the Land of Gold and Sunshine • Marah Ellis Ryan

... your kind eyes looked languishing on mine, And wreathing arms did soft embraces join, A doubtful trembling seized me first all o'er; Then, wishes; and a warmth, unknown before: What followed was all ecstasy and trance; Immortal pleasures round my swimming eyes did dance, And speechless joys, in whose sweet tumult tost, I thought my breath and ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden

... departed. Slowly the priest uplifted the lifeless head, and the maiden Knelt at her father's side, and wailed aloud in her terror. Then in a swoon she sank, and lay with her head on his bosom. Through the long night she lay in deep, oblivious slumber; And when she woke from the trance, she beheld a multitude near her. Faces of friends she beheld, that were mournfully gazing upon her, Pallid, with tearful eyes, and looks of saddest compassion. Still the blaze of the burning village illumined the landscape, Reddened the sky overhead, and gleamed on the faces around her, ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck

... like one in a trance for some considerable time, and it is said that all arrangements were made for her funeral. Presently, however, she gave signs of life, and in course of time ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking

... mind's eye; such stuff as dreams are made of [Tempest]. ideality, idealism; romanticism, utopianism, castle-building. dreaming; phrensy^, frenzy; ecstasy, extasy^; calenture &c (delirium) 503 [Obs.]; reverie, trance; day dream, golden dream; somnambulism. conception, Vorstellung [G.], excogitation^, a fine frenzy; cloudland^, dreamland; flight of fancy, fumes of fancy; thick coming fancies [Macbeth]; creation of the brain, coinage of the brain; imagery. conceit, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... day or two after his absence, the sultana invited Koout al Koolloob to an entertainment, and having mixed a strong soporific in some sherbet, presented it her to drink. The effect of the potion was instantaneous, and she sunk into a trance; when the sultana putting her into the chest, commanded it to be given to a broker, and sold without examination of the contents, for a hundred deenars; hoping, that whoever might be the purchaser, he would ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 4 • Anon.

... our Hero in a trance, Beneath the alders, near the river; The Ass is by the river-side, And, where the feeble breezes glide, Upon the ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth

... now bandaged up again by the prison surgeon, who happened to be in the place; and the governor's wife and servant, kind people both, were with the patient. Esmond saw his mistress still in the room when he awoke from his trance; but she went away without a word; though the governor's wife told him that she sat in her room for some time afterward, and did not leave the prison until she heard that Esmond ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray

... trance seemed to have its influence upon the awe-inspiring shadow outside the door: for, after giving utterance to another specimen of shrill piping, it withdrew with as much silence as if it had been but the shadow ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid

... adventures in Purgatory. Gilbert and his companions subsequently returned to England, and there he repeated the story, and some one said he thought it was all a dream, to which Gilbert answered: 'That there were some who believed that those who entered the Purgatory fell into a trance, and saw the vision in the spirit, but that the knight had denied this, and declared that the whole was seen and felt really in the body.' Both Gilbert, from whom Henry of Salterey received the story, and the bishop of the diocese, assured ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier

... drawing a long breath, as if reviving from a trance, raising her face, and shaking back her shining veil, with a kindling eye, that contradicted the death-like paleness of her countenance; "but why—it is not permitted us to inquire. There is yet one of thine own ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper

... what the spirit says is true. You may rely upon it. I do not know what it said, for when I return from the trance state I remember nothing I have heard or seen while I have been in it. If you wish to ask more, you must have the kindness to come again. It is very fatiguing to me. You can see that I am not in good health. The hours are from ten ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford

... Out of his trance Jim seemed quickly to wake. He enfolded his Della. For ten seconds let us regard with discreet scrutiny some inconsequential object in the other direction. Eight dollars a week or a million a year—what is the difference? A mathematician or a wit would give you the wrong answer. The ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith

... came on the Delavie party. The Major went up stairs, and sat by Aurelia's bed gazing with eyes dazzled with tears at the child he had so longed to see, and whom he found again in this strange trance. A doctor came, and quite confirmed Mr. Wayland's opinion, that the drug would not prove deleterious, provided the sleep was not disturbed, and Betty continued her watch, after hearing what her father knew of Mr. Belamour. She was greatly struck with the self-devotion that had gone with open eyes ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge

... in unimaginable trance And agony that cannot be remember'd, Listening with horrid hope to hear a groan! But I had heard his last;—my ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge

... the next witness, who declared she had sought a spell to make the man, she was forced into marrying, fall into a trance, just before the marriage ceremony was to take place; and that, instead of bringing this about, the spell Edward Curtis had sold her had caused her to have St. Vitus's Dance,—was adroitly trapped ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell

... year. I was pleased. I told him, yes sir! and then I lay down and went to sleep. He had a boss man on his plantation then and next morning he called me, but I just couldn't wake. I seemed to be in a trance or something, I had recently lost so much sleep. He called me the second time and still I di [HW: d] not get up. Then he came in and spanked my head. I jumped up and went to work feeding the stock and splitting wood for the day's cooking and fires. I then went in and ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States • Various

... Waked from her trance, foresaken, speechless, sad, Armida wildly stared and gazed about, "And is he gone," quoth she, "nor pity had To leave me thus twixt life and death in doubt? Could he not stay? could not the traitor-lad ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... I was walking away from the hotel I perceived Rosa's victoria drawing up before the portico. She saw me. We exchanged a long look—a look charged with anxious questionings. Then she beckoned to me, and I, as it were suddenly waking from a trance, raised my ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett

... he told; and the pilgrim heard In a trance of voiceless pleasure; For the depths of his inmost soul were stirred, By the sad and solemn measure: "I give thee my blessing,"—was his word; "It is all I have ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... time, quite dazed; partly because his pupil was so dilated he could hardly see—partly (he thinks) because he in some way became unconscious; although when he woke from this little seeming trance, which may have lasted for more than a minute, he found himself still standing upright on his legs. What woke him was the sudden consciousness of the north, which he hadn't felt for many years; and this gave him extraordinary confidence in himself, and such a wholesome sense ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier

... of panic, the trampling rush, the pitiful screams, boats swamped—all the appalling incidents of a disaster at sea he had ever heard of. He might have been resigned to die but I suspect he wanted to die without added terrors, quietly, in a sort of peaceful trance. A certain readiness to perish is not so very rare, but it is seldom that you meet men whose souls, steeled in the impenetrable armour of resolution, are ready to fight a losing battle to the last; the desire of peace waxes stronger as hope declines, till at last ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad

... savage's love of snuff, and when not eating or sleeping he was taking pinches of that narcotic from an old kodak tin. In consequence he had the chronic appearance of being full of dope. He walked along as though in a trance. He never seemed to be looking anywhere except at the stretch of trail directly in front of him. His thoughts were far away, or else there were no thoughts at all. I often watched him and wondered what ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon

... as if for inspiration, and helped himself to salad. 'It's this,' he said. 'Isn't it possible, isn't it even probable that being ill, and overstrung, moping a little over things more or less out of the common ruck, and sitting there in a kind of trance—isn't it possible that you may have very largely IMAGINED the change? Hypnotised yourself into believing it much worse—more profound, radical, acute—and simply absolutely hypnotizing others into thinking so, too. Christendom is just beginning to rediscover ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare

... our tourist, recovering from his trance, walks upon the rim and descends the trail to the water's edge to join a launch-party around the lake. Here he finds a new and different experience which is quite as sensational as that of his original discovery. Seen close by from the lake's ...
— The Book of the National Parks • Robert Sterling Yard

... tribes, then living in Louisiana, now removed to the far West, and was permitted to witness some fantastic rites, half warlike, half religious, in which, however, there was nothing noticeable except this trance-like condition, which some of the warriors seemed to command at pleasure, manifested by a tense rigidity of the features and muscles, and a mental exaltation which proved to be both clairvoyant and clairoyant: a state analogous to that of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... done so! But let me do my duty as I ought—let me repress the horror which one scene of this dreadful drama never fails to throw over my spirit—that I may tell my story as a man—and my confession at least be clear. When the felon awoke out of the death-like trance into which this assault had thrown him, his hardihood was gone; and he was reconveyed to the cell, in which he was destined agonisingly to struggle out his last hideous and distorted hours, in a state of abject horror which cannot be described. He who felt nothing, ...
— Tales from Blackwood, Volume 7 • Various

... lived again in the sunny light Of the heart's unbroken truth. Yet felt I then, as we always feel, The sweet grief o'er me cast, When a chord is waked of the spirit's harp, Which telleth of the past. And what could it be, that blissful trance? What caused the soul to glide? Forgetting alike both time and change, So far o'er memory's tide. Oh! could that deep mysterious power Be but the breath of an earthly flower? 'Twas not the rose with her leaves so bright, That flung o'er my soul such dazzling light, ...
— Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick • Mrs. F. Beavan

... on 2 Cor. xii. 14 and xiv. 1); he attributes the words, "It is good for a man not to touch a woman" (1 Cor. vii. 1) to St. Paul, not to those who wrote to him; and he thinks the history of the Last Supper was revealed to the Apostle directly in a trance—as to which he might be corrected by Professor Plumptre's explanation of St. Paul's "going up to Jerusalem by revelation" in the note on Acts xv. 2. But these are comparatively small blots, if they be blots, in an exposition which is well worthy ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various

... if in a trance, her eyelids drooping over almost sightless eyes. The last blow had fallen upon her, and she knew that she must go. That she could ever be forced away thus without her brother, that Horace could be given no chance to help her, had never crossed her mind. Through her imagination drifted Lon's ...
— From the Valley of the Missing • Grace Miller White

... o'clock on the morning of the 18th, with my brother officers, the captain of the ship, and General Humbert. They treated us with great humanity on board the cutter, giving us a little weak brandy and water every five or six minutes, and after that a bason of good soup. I fell on the locker in a kind of trance for near thirty hours, and swelled to such a degree as to require medical aid to restore my decayed faculties. Having lost all our baggage, we were taken to Brest almost naked, where they gave us a rough shift of clothes, and in consequence of our sufferings, and the help we afforded in saving ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous

... after Lincoln sat down and calm had succeeded the tempest, I waked out of a sort of hypnotic trance, and then thought of my report for the paper. There was nothing written but an ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure

... seemed to have gone from the air we breathed, something electric and vitalizing. There was an immediate let down of the nervous tension that had gripped us, a common sigh, and a half-hysterical snigger from some fellow behind me. Mister Fitzgibbon seemed to come out of a trance; he shook himself, and stared at Sails and then at Chips. He glared across the deck at us of the starboard watch. He even swore. But there was no life to his curse, and he made no step to follow the defiant stiff into the foc'sle. ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer

... fire from heaven and paid it back to an eternal death. The old cattleman was refusing his payment. It was no state of coma in which he lay; it was no prolonged trance. He was vitally, vividly alive; he was concentrating with a bitter and exhausting vigour day and night, and fighting a battle the more terrible because it was fought in silence, a battle in which he could receive no aid, no reinforcement, a battle in which ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand

... The shoemaker struck Jesus with his fist, saying: 'Go; why tarriest thou?' The Messias answered him: 'I indeed am going; but thou shalt tarry until I come'; thereby condemning him to live until the day of judgment. He lives forever, but at the end of every hundred years he falls into a fit or trance, on recovering from which he finds himself in the same state of youth in which he was when Jesus suffered, being then about thirty ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry

... know what a sterilising, petrifying influence his trance-like contemplation of the Infinite had upon his life. Amiel was simply hypnotised by the universe, as a man may hypnotise himself by gazing ...
— Prose Fancies (Second Series) • Richard Le Gallienne

... her head. The savage, inexorable music still surges and thunders round her. And just as Achilles is about to leave her, in order to throw himself on the spears of his own men, her trance breaks. ...
— The Coryston Family • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... opened and he gazed stodgily, his widening eyes like sun-dogs coming out of a fog. He did not recognize her escort; did not see him at all until they had passed, after which Mr. Flitcroft experienced a few moments of trance; came out of it stricken through and through; felt nervously of his tie; resolutely fell in behind the heeling mongrel and followed, at a distance of some forty paces, determined to learn what household this heavenly visitor honored, and thrilling with the intention ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington

... And when that sympathy was given to suffering, to widespread misery, to crying wrongs; joined also with an intense passion for justice, which had already shown itself in the defence of slighted genius and neglected art; and to the Celtic temperament of some highstrung seer and trance-prophesying bard; it was no wonder that Ruskin became like one of the hermits of old, who retreated from the world to return upon it with stormy messages of awakening and flashes of truth more impressive, more illuminating ...
— The Life of John Ruskin • W. G. Collingwood

... flame, and put into his hand a broad piece of silver, looking into his eyes. A man with a broken nose thrust a copper coin into his palm; others followed. For a moment he stood staring at the fire-lit faces around him like one foolish or in a trance, with his own face quite white. That he might receive money for his soul had never entered his head. Then he broke away from them all and ran—ran as though for his life—back to the house of Tobias, and clambered through the low window and flung himself upon the bed, laughing ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor

... book in his hand, seemed to waken from a trance, then, with a muffled sound of apology, dropped the book ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand



Words linked to "Trance" :   mental condition, fascination, beguile, captivation, mental state, possession, enchant, psychological condition, psychological state, becharm, spell, charm, attract, capture, appeal, entrance, ecstatic state, hypnotic trance, bewitch, catch, enamor, enamour, hold, unconsciousness, fascinate, work, enchantment



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