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Trepidation   Listen
noun
Trepidation  n.  
1.
An involuntary trembling, sometimes an effect of paralysis, but usually caused by terror or fear; quaking; quivering.
2.
Hence, a state of terror or alarm; fear; confusion; fright; as, the men were in great trepidation.
3.
(Anc. Astron.) A libration of the starry sphere in the Ptolemaic system; a motion ascribed to the firmament, to account for certain small changes in the position of the ecliptic and of the stars.
Synonyms: Tremor; agitation; disturbance; fear.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Trepidation" Quotes from Famous Books



... the courtiers had hung about the anteroom, afraid to enter (for the king's disease was small-pox), yet afraid to take flight, lest by some chance he should recover. But now the doors of the royal apartments were flung wide open, and there was great trepidation among the crowd. The archbishop in his canonicals was seen standing by the bed of state; on one side of him stood the grand almoner, and on the other the minister, the Duke d'Aiguillon. At the foot of the bed knelt the daughters of the king, who ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... that the girl of the Red Mill felt some trepidation, but she had confidence in her companion's muscle and courage if not in his caution. Besides, she was very curious about the queer old man and the doings on ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson

... a huge stone chimney. Dismounting, Burr stepped upon the porch and knocked at the door. The summons was answered by Mrs. Smith, who, though a senator's wife, was country bred and untaught in artificial usages. She received the urbane stranger with a timidity amounting almost to trepidation. ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable

... room,' continued the merchant, 'but I must find the great book with clasps, so let me just take the light for one moment.' 'Certainly,' said the Devil, 'but I'll go with you.' He did so, and the merchant's trepidation was now on the increase. When in the next room he said on a sudden, 'Ah, now I know, the key is in the garden door.' And with these words he ran out with the light into the garden, and before the Devil could overtake him, threw it into the pit, ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske

... the people, less aristocratic and proud. It is difficult to tell his nationality—Servia and Austria come into my mind. There is a great empire about him. There seems to be some dissatisfaction in the country, some apprehension of invasion and disturbance. There's a good deal of trepidation. They do not want to go to war, though there is no cowardice there. They are uneasy and suspicious of other nations. He is not ambitious for war. I do not feel that there will be any war. The difficulty is ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, November 1887 - Volume 1, Number 10 • Various

... the iron dealer and passed back to the stove end of the store. Yes, there sat Mason. They recognized each other. The whiskey sneak rose in trepidation. But ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton

... wondered to find how unfamiliar were the fancies which ordinary images were stirring up. On one of the staircases, I met the physician of the family. His countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning and perplexity. He accosted me with trepidation and passed on. The valet now threw open a door and ushered me into ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various

... me, upon the floor, pacing to and fro, between the hearth and the bed in which I lay. A superstitious terror, which I could not combat, stole over me; with an effort I repeated my question, and drawing myself upright in the bed, expected the answer with a strange sort of trepidation. It came in terms and accompanied with accessories which I shall not ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various

... away to get on her things, and her husband waited, with some little trepidation, to hear what his aunt would say about her. He had ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various

... a corner of the building where lay a flat stone upon the ground. With great trepidation he removed the stone, threw out a shovelful or two of earth, and produced a small case or casket. This was at once opened by the baronet, and appeared ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various

... reached Chicago on Sunday. She had entered the city as a queen enters her domain, authoritatively, with no fear upon her, no trepidation, no doubts. She had gone at once to the Mendota Hotel, on Michigan Avenue, up-town, away from the roar of the loop. It was a residential hotel, very quiet, decidedly luxurious. She had no idea of making it her home. ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber

... highness," he answered. It was beginning to dawn upon him that she was amazingly ignorant and inconsequential for one who enjoyed the right to command these common soldiers. Her old trepidation returned with this brief answer. Something told her that he was beginning to mistrust her at last. After all, it meant everything to him and so ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... brook trout darted in phantom flashes, Ham Burton found Paul with his face tight-clasped in his nervous hands. Back there in the school-house had been only terror, but out here was something else. A specter of self-contempt had risen to contend with physical trepidation. The song of the water and the rustle of the leaves where the breeze harped among the platinum shafts of the birches were pleading with this child-dreamer, and in his mind a conflict swept backward ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck

... require volumes for the work, and I reluctantly let them all pass out without a word,—all but that sweet young blonde who arrives by most trains, and who, putting up her eye-glass with a ravishing air, bewitchingly peers round among the bearded faces, with little tender looks of hope and trepidation, for the face which she wants, and which presently bursts through the circle of strange visages. The owner of the face then hurries forward to meet that sweet blonde, who gives him a little drooping hand as if it were ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells

... of his truly Christian happiness, and might again be capable of intercourse with her sunny nature. Full of real happiness for Cowper were her visits to Olney; the announcement of her coming threw him into a trepidation of delight. And how was this new rival received by Mrs. Unwin. "There is something," says Lady Hesketh in a letter which has been already quoted, "truly affectionate and sincere in Mrs. Unwin's manner. No one can express more heartily than she does her joy to have ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith

... coming toward us—straight toward the hut. It must be a beast, then, and we might as well have saved our trepidation. I was going to step out, but the king laid his hand upon my arm. There was a moment of silence, then we heard a soft knock on the cabin door. It made me shiver. Presently the knock was repeated, and then we heard these words in ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... friend Mr. Hyatt Verrill, who is an authority on the subject of the lives of the pirates, is about to publish a book devoted to the love affairs of these gentry. I confess to looking forward with pleasure and a certain degree of trepidation to reading his book and to seeing how he will deal with so ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse

... at the paper for a while, and decided with some trepidation to take the columns one by one. Under Method, he put down: "Little bursts. Who knows cause?" Some more thought gave him another item, and he set it down under the first one: "Psionic. Look ...
— Occasion for Disaster • Gordon Randall Garrett

... children had vanished. What was the matter? It had been reported that all this labor was only a preparation to transport them to America, and the simple-minded mothers staid away with their children in great trepidation; but visits from house to house, during the week, dispelled their fears, and next Sabbath all were again in their places, and this pleasant labor ...
— Woman And Her Saviour In Persia • A Returned Missionary

... is," answered Miss Wingate as she blushed guiltily. "I—darned it." And she handed her handiwork over to Mother Mayberry with trepidation in ...
— The Road to Providence • Maria Thompson Daviess

... that lined the wheel-tracks which the Marquis was pleased to call the "highway" to the Black Hills. The horses which he had purchased in a dozen different places in the course of the summer were not such as to allay the trepidation of timid travelers. They had none of them been broken to harness before Packard's agents had found them and broken them in their own casual and none too gentle fashion. Packard would have preferred to have horses which had become accustomed to the restraining hand of man, but ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn

... at the end of that long beak sufficiently high to bolt it. Meanwhile, his friends collected about him and remonstrated, with many flops and gobbles, betting him all his fish to nothing that he would lose it after all; this way they chased that bag, and that way, while the bagger, in much trepidation and with many desperate heaves, wildly sought remote corners away from his persecutors. Now, by the corner of the club premises stands an appliance, the emblem of authority, the instrument of justice, and the terror of the evilly-disposed ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... trepidation, I did as he bade. Once more I saw the black emptiness of atomic space, saw the blazing nucleus with its whirling satellites. Above the roaring noise of the machine came Professor Reubens' voice. 'I am now intensifying the magnifying medium and focusing it on one ...
— The Seed of the Toc-Toc Birds • Francis Flagg

... out of the Civil War Mr. Greeley manifested great trepidation and reluctance to face the issue. He even advised in The Tribune that the "Erring Sisters" be allowed to depart in peace; but later he rallied manfully to the cause of the defence of the Union, and his newspaper rang with impassioned ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 • Various

... change our dress six times every day, but never to wear the same dress twice. We drove several families away by that manoeuvre; but you have no idea what fun it was to us, who entered into the spirit of the thing. For two days, though, we were in great trepidation. There were a couple of Baltimore girls there, great dashers, who would not enter into our agreement; and the spiteful things actually changed their dress seven times, the ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper

... out to look at them, they would stare for a minute or two and then make off. They take tremendous leaps from the branches of one tree to those at another a little lower, and it is very amusing when a one strong leader takes a bold jump, to see the others following with more or less trepidation; and it often happens that one or two of the last seem quite unable to make up their minds to leap until the rest are disappearing, when, as if in desperation at being left alone, they throw themselves frantically into the ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... girls as to which of them would exercise authority over the other,—not by force of age,—but by dint of character, will, and fitness. And this Mary Bonner, who now shone before him as a goddess almost, a young woman to whom no ordinary man would speak without that kind of trepidation which goddesses do inflict on ordinary men, had proposed to herself,—to go out as a governess! Indeed, at this very moment such, probably, was her own idea. As yet she had received no reply to the letter she had written other than ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope

... undertook to make that confession the thought of which had troubled her all the afternoon. Drawing O'Neil aside, she began with some trepidation, "Have you any idea why ...
— The Iron Trail • Rex Beach

... find my hair a terrible nuisance, with no Hortense to struggle with it every morning. As you know, it's as thick as a rope and as long as my arm. I begrudge the time it takes to look after it, and such a thing as a good shampoo is an event to be approached with trepidation and prepared for with zeal. "Coises on me beauty!" I think I'll cut that wool off. But on each occasion when I have my mind about made up I experience one of "Mr. Polly's" l'il dog moments. The thing that makes me hesitate is the thought that ...
— The Prairie Wife • Arthur Stringer

... one of some sort inside of five minutes and go with me to the scene to rescue my friends, and take them to safety, or you must take the consequences," and in his excitement John glowers upon the dapper Gaul until the latter actually trembles with trepidation. ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne

... With great trepidation did Mary Marshall set forth on her visit to Coles Kenton. She had made up her mind—and a determined mind it could be on occasion—that on it should turn her final acceptance of her ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge

... into the street, in an agony of trepidation he looked down it... at the house... and at ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... over the grave of her husband, and not very far away was a man who was guarding the corpse of a person who had been crucified. In the moment of mourning an affection sprung up between the two, and in the engrossment of it the corpse which the man guarded was stolen. He was in great trepidation for fear of the king's command. The woman said, "Don't be afraid; exhume my husband, and hang him up instead." This was accordingly done. (See Kiddushin, ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various

... intended that you should in some way, succeed in these properties. Before you developed, it was not possible to predict exactly how you might do it; but within the last few years you have surpassed our hopes; and I have no trepidation in putting before you my views of your future position. You may think I am strong in health, but ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair

... Darkness, folly, and great folly, angry passion, with timid fear. Indolent coldness is called darkness; birth and death are called folly; lustful desire is great folly; because of great men subjected to error, cherishing angry feelings, passion results; trepidation of the heart is called fear. Thus these foolish men dilate upon the five desires; but the root of the great sorrow of birth and death, the life destined to be spent in the five ways, the cause of the whirl of life, I clearly perceive, is to be placed in the existence ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various

... story was told me by a great friend of mine, whom we had come to know through his marriage with an early friend of the family. "Going to call at Hodeslea," he said, "I was in some trepidation, because I didn't know anything about science or philosophy; but when your mother began to talk over old times with my wife, your father came across the room and sat down by me, and began to talk about the dog which we had brought ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley

... left alone with the highwayman's corpse. It was no light thing in Venezuela to commit a homicide without testimony of innocence, and young Jose hastened homewards with his treasure, in a state of trepidation far greater than any the living highwaymen could have inspired. Even in his parents' dwelling, he dreaded, every moment, the arrival of an order for his arrest, and to appease his groundless anxiety his father shortly suggested that he should take refuge upon the ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various

... with great trepidation, by the Lord Lieutenant, to the British administration. At length Lord North thought it essential to make some concessions, and with this view he brought in resolutions, declaring the trade with the British colonies in America and Africa, and the free export of glass and woollens, ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee

... made his way down a long dim corridor in the rear portion of the Childress Barber College, in Mars City's eastern quarter. He stopped and hesitated, with some trepidation, before an unmarked door near the end ...
— Rebels of the Red Planet • Charles Louis Fontenay

... in the ladies' eyes I think they would have accepted my invitation and taken a drink if it had not been for the austere presence of the General. During the conversation I confided to them my trepidation about meeting the Queen, but they assured me that Her Majesty was a very kind lady and that I need have no fear, whatever, of any breach of court etiquette. After a warm handshaking, they bade me good-bye and said they would ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton

... Sundown was proud of his chickens. The cow, however, had been, at first, rather a disappointment to him. Milk had not heretofore been a conspicuous portion of Sundown's diet, nor was he versed in the art of obtaining it except over the counter in tins. With due formality and some trepidation he had placed a pail beneath "Gentle Annie" as he called her, and had waited patiently. So had Gentle Annie, munching a reflective cud, and Sundown, in a metaphorical sense, doing likewise. He had walked around ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs

... airs not suspected otherwhere. Go and stand by any crown of bloom and the tall stalks do but rock a little as for drowsiness, but look off across the field, and on the stillest days there is always a trepidation in the ...
— The Land Of Little Rain • Mary Hunter Austin

... however, altogether too late now to hesitate or alter our plans; we had plunged headlong and, as it were, blindfold into a hornet's nest from which nothing but the coolest courage and determination could extricate us, and, while I had long ago completely conquered the feeling of trepidation and anxiety that almost everybody experiences more or less when going into action for the first time, I could not altogether suppress a doubt as to whether Ryan, in his then very indifferent state of health, possessed quite ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood

... sheriff's office to give the alarm. Frequently she fired the blank cartridges, until Lite warned her that blank cartridges would ruin her gun-barrel; after which she insisted upon using bullets, to the secret trepidation of the villains who must stand before her and who could never quite grasp the fact that Jean knew exactly where those bullets were going ...
— Jean of the Lazy A • B. M. Bower

... profession. Moreover, I was very young; I had no responsibilities; I may have been in love, or have thought I was, but I was on my own, and my chief desire was to see as much as I could. I willingly admit that, when Gougeard's column was abruptly attacked at Droue, I experienced some trepidation at finding myself under fire; but firmness may prove as contagious as fear, and when Gougeard rallied his men and went forward to repel the Germans, interest and a kind of excitement took possession of me. ...
— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly

... cried Chandler, jumping up in great trepidation. "Let it be distinctly understood," he repeated, raising his voice in his anxiety to be heard—"yes, let it be distinctly understood, that I have resigned my commission as judge of ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... much deeper water; to my great fear, as I knew the cable was much eaten away and would stand but little strain. Well, we hooked the cable first dredge this time, and pulled it slowly and gently to the top, with much trepidation. Was it the cable? was there any weight on? it was evidently too small. Imagine my dismay when the cable did come up, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... other—occupied much more time than either mother or son had imagined. It was not till the clock in Mr. Blyth's hall struck, that Mrs. Thorpe discovered how much longer her absence from home had lasted than she had intended it should on leaving Baregrove Square. She rose directly, in great trepidation—took a hurried leave of Valentine, who was loitering about his front garden—sent the kindest messages she could think of to the ladies above stairs—and departed at once for home. Zack escorted her to the entrance of ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins

... that he was "all right," and Barnum led him behind the scenes, where he waited with considerable trepidation to watch his movements on the stage. La Rue began ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton

... and though she saw that Gillian was in an agony to speak about something, did not guess what an ordeal the girl felt it to have to begin with the father, unseen for four years, and whose searching eyes and grave politeness gave a sense of austerity, so that trepidation was spoiling all the elation at having a father, and such a father, ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge

... glade, and tied a rope round the top of the trunk. He then fastened another rope in the same fashion to a similar tree upon the other side. The two loose ends were now dangling down, and I waited with some curiosity, and just a little trepidation also, to see what they would do next. The whole band pulled upon one of the ropes until they had bent the strong young tree down into a semi-circle, and they then fastened it to a stump, so as to hold it so. When they had bent the other tree down in a similar fashion, the two ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle

... saw a Cibber—the applause was proportionate to the surprise: every mouth emitted her praise, and she performed several parts in Bath and Bristol, a phenomenon in the theatrical hemisphere." Though the trepidation inseparable from such an effort diminished her powers at first, the sweetness of her voice struck every ear like a charm: the applause that followed invigorated her spirits so far that in the reciprocation of a speech or two more, her fine clear articulation struck the audience ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold

... her apparent lack of warmth were mere matters of calculation. Her plan was to inspire him with trepidation, to keep him always at arm's length, for his own safety as well as hers. She knew something of men. Even the best, if suddenly thrown into an affair so strange as this, might commit an irreparable blunder; ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath

... and then looked round in trepidation as the inmates of the galley drew near and scowled ...
— Dialstone Lane, Complete • W.W. Jacobs

... homespun looked at one another with trepidation on their features. The red coat was not assuring, but they kept their peace and breathed hard, praying that the enemy had not captured the convention through strategy. Mr. Randolph's first suggestion was not revolutionary; it was that a secretary ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard

... of Mrs Greenow. But Mrs Greenow had found out that she was alone, not very rich, and in want of the solace of society. Therefore she had, from sheer good-nature, forced herself upon Mrs Green, and Mrs Green, with much trepidation, had consented to be taken to the picnic. "I know your husband would like it," Mrs Greenow had said, "and I hope I may live to tell him that I made ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope

... bell was rung, and Laura and Mrs. Peter Melcombe waited for the grandmother and her guests with no little trepidation. ...
— Fated to Be Free • Jean Ingelow

... illustration of an incident in which a boy found out, in great sorrow and trepidation, how fast ...
— Round-about Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy • Frank Richard Stockton

... summary dismissal from "Middie's Haven" the previous Saturday night, Ralph, Jean Paul, Durand, Bert, Gordon and Doug had been ordered to report at the office and had it not been for the hint given at the tea, would have gone in trepidation of spirit. But it so happened that the officer in charge was possessed of a flickering memory of his own midshipman days, and his twinkling eyes and cheerful grin were reassuring. The boys all openly adored him, and even though they had dubbed him Hercules ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson

... confess that I offer this romance to the reading public with no little trepidation. I am fully aware of having transcended the ordinary rules and paths of legitimate romance, and that I have presumed to broach fearlessly the deep things of God. The scope of the work is infinitely beyond the remotest thought of the writer when he began this labor; ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman

... way down the ladder to meet her and she took his hand with trepidation, while the Albemarle's crew leaned over and taunted ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... were peacefully returning homeward, with no other sensations than a little throaty warmth, Paul and Madame Evangelista were left a prey to the nervous trepidation, the quivering of the flesh and brain which excitable natures pass through after a scene in which their interests and their feelings have been violently shaken. In Madame Evangelista these last mutterings of the storm were overshadowed by a terrible ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac

... Commodore shunned all intercourse with the people, and systematically refused to expose himself to the profane eyes of the multitude. This unusual course took the Japanese quite by surprise, and, not without some feeling of trepidation, they bestirred themselves with unexampled alacrity to satisfy, so far as they were able, his reasonable demands. Of course it was impossible for them to set aside all their prejudices, and the record of their schemes to impede the Commodore's progress, all of which were ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... immense news gratefully but without losing her head, but with us others it was otherwise; we could not eat or sleep or do any rational thing for the excitement and the glory of it. During two days our pair of noble knights were in distress and trepidation on Joan's account, for the audience was to be at night, and they were afraid that Joan would be so paralyzed by the glare of light from the long files of torches, the solemn pomps and ceremonies, the great concourse of renowned personages, the brilliant costumes, and the other splendors ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain

... day, my uncle sent for me into the drawing-room to witness the transfer of some law papers. His clients were two ladies, young and agreeable. While I was writing from Mr. Moncton's dictation, I perceived, with no small degree of trepidation, that the younger was regarding me with earnest attention; and in spite of myself my cheeks flushed and my hand trembled. After my part of the business was concluded Mr. Moncton told me to withdraw. As I left the room, I heard Miss Mary Beaumont say, in ...
— The Monctons: A Novel, Volume I • Susanna Moodie

... to cause the fire of the Second musket to be thrown away in the same manner. He again exposed a part of his person. The eager Indian instantly fired, and Boone evaded the shot as before. Both the Indians, having thrown away their fire, were eagerly striving, but with trembling hands, to reload. Trepidation and too much haste retarded their object. Boone drew his rifle and one of them fell dead. The two antagonists, now on equal grounds, the one unsheathing his knife, and the other poising his tomahawk, rushed toward the dead body of the fallen Indian. Boone, ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint

... him—perhaps, also, of breaking the candelabrum over his head if occasion offered. Yet, though I considered the advisability of this last measure with some pleasure, it was not without a good deal of trepidation that I re-entered the main salon. As luck would have it, M. Kolpikoff was no longer there, but only a waiter engaged in clearing the table. For a moment I felt like telling the waiter the whole ...
— Youth • Leo Tolstoy

... a man of firmer courage a little trepidation might have been pardoned. As the unseen crowd, struggling and jostling, poured from the roadway of St. Aldate's into the narrow confines of Pembroke Lane, the sound of its hooting gathered sudden volume, and from an intermittent murmur, as of a remote sea, swelled ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman

... no more, obeyed her. She was mistress of the situation, and the crowd felt it. They made room for the dominant intellect, and awaited developments, watching, in suppressed excitement and trepidation, the figure—whom exhaustion was slowly ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes

... ferrets—his only good point; and it was evidently through the medium of this art that he was basely supplanting me, for her head was bent absorbedly over something he carried in his hands. With some trepidation I called out, "Hi!" But answer there was none. Then again I called, "Hi!" but this time with a sickening sense of failure and of doom. She replied only by a complex gesture, decisive in import if ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame

... unnatural if a young wife did not begin with an account of her wedding day," she says in one of her letters. "Mine was delightful enough. Boehmer breakfasted with me, and the morning hours passed gaily, and yet with quietness. There was no trepidation—only an intercourse of souls. My brother came. We were together till four, and when he left us he gave us his blessing with tears.... Lotte and Friederike wove the bridal wreath.... Then I had a talk with my father and dressed myself.... Meanwhile those dear Meiners ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick

... little boy, who was not capable of loving anything, had been much diverted with the trepidation of the sheep; but now he laughed heartily at the misfortune of his dog; and he would have laughed much longer, had not the other little boy, provoked beyond his patience at this treatment thrown a stone ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day

... main body of the toilers is the vanguard, a group of twenty of the acknowledged leaders of the men. It is at their suggestion that the cowed wretches have mustered up courage enough to cross the bridge and enter upon the interdicted boulevard. So it is incumbent upon them to show no trepidation. ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams

... night the hapless Bega was aroused by the sharp rattle of the curtain rings pulled violently along the rods. He sat up in bed, in the mechanical trepidation which we all feel on waking with such a start. He saw standing before him a Spaniard wrapped in a cloak, who fixed on him the same burning gaze that he ...
— The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac

... duty brings him in the neighborhood of Rocky Springs, and a dypsomaniac rancher and artist, to wit, Charlie Bryant. And how do you take it? You—a man-hunter? Why, you run like a rabbit from Fyles. Courage? Oh, dear. The mention of his name is enough to send you into convulsions of trepidation and maidenly confusion. And all the time you secretly admire him. As for the other, you have turned yourself into a sort of hospital nurse and temperance reformer. You've taken him up as a sort of hobby, until, in his lucid intervals, he takes advantage of your reforming ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum

... privileges. "But all this has nothing to do with me. My name is John Hamilton. See, it is engraved on the stock of the gun," catching it up and holding it under the spectacled eyes, which still observed it with some trepidation. "That is the name in my passports, in the book down stairs, in the lining of my hat. I am sorry, since you were only obeying orders, that my rough play has caused you alarm." He ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath

... knew little about the management of a boat, and was now depending entirely upon the nautical skill of my friend. The wind, too, had suddenly increased, as we were fast getting out of the lee of the land—still I was ashamed to betray any trepidation, and for almost half an hour maintained a resolute silence. I could stand it no longer, however, and spoke to Augustus about the propriety of turning back. As before, it was nearly a minute before he made answer, or ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... place. This term appears to describe the 'holy of holies' in the Babylonian temples where the oracles were obtained. The single word 'secret' was a sufficient indication for the priest that on the day in question he might enter the mysterious chamber of the temple without trepidation. ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow

... rolled, in due time, into the noisy station at Boston, and our traveller, after much exertion and trepidation, safely reached the platform, with her rhubarb pie unharmed. She looked anxiously around for her cousin Gregory, whom she had never seen, save in his carte de visite, and by that she found him in a few minutes. Gregory was a handsome man, quite ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... descriptions, were huddled together, and it was not by any means surprising that Lady Lucy failed in her search for the original account, by which to rectify the error in her shoemaker's bill. In the hurry and nervous trepidation which had latterly become almost a constitutional ailment with her, she turned out the contents of the writing-desk into an easy chair, and then kneeling before it, she set herself to the task of carefully examining ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... his easy-chair at the table behind a great inkstand, having first placed a chair on the other side of the table opposite his own seat, Mr. Wilding entered on his task with considerable trepidation. ...
— No Thoroughfare • Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins

... trepidation already on Leibel's countenance became a rosy glow of modesty, for he could not help overhearing what was being said, owing to the lull of the master ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various

... she could not avoid some feeling, if not of trepidation, at least of anxiety, at being thus exposed to midnight assassination, while her life was so ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett

... met me near the Exchange, and, with some trepidation, drew from an inner pocket an envelope containing the thousand-dollar bond. Without waiting to examine it, I walked off, saying: "I'll be back in ten minutes." He was evidently alarmed, and, like all rogues, suspicious of every one. He probably had some wild idea that I was laying a trap for him. ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell

... your children might like to go to Sunday-School," said Maria, with a great deal of trepidation; "and we just came to ask ...
— What She Could • Susan Warner

... the trap, they heard a great squawking and cackling and found that the cell, as Albert called the square inclosure, contained ten ducks and two geese swimming about in a great state of trepidation. They had come down the winding tunnel and through the apertures in the hoops, but they did not have sense enough to go back the same way. Instead they merely swam around the square ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler

... at Newgate, and found it in ruins, with the fire yet glowing As I went by, the protestants were plundering the Sessions house at the Old Bailey. There were not, I believe, a hundred; but they did their work at leisure, in full security, without sentinels, without trepidation, as men lawfully employed in full day. Such is the cowardice of a commercial place. On Wednesday they broke open the Fleet, and the King's Bench, and the Marshalsea, and Wood street Counter, and Clerkenwell Bridewell, ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson

... without great fear and trepidation that little Nell slipped off her shoes and gliding through the store-room of old curiosities, where Mr Brass—the ugliest piece of goods in all the stock—lay sleeping on a mattress, passed ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... in a little trepidation "we cannot judge of the quality of Master Seadrift's articles, by report. I dare to say, he has not landed without a sample ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper

... great trepidation to what they were saying; he experienced infinite surprise when presently one of them mentioned Grig ...
— The Young Mountaineers - Short Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock

... own decree of death; therefore they said: "We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God." What did it mean? That awe-inspiring title, Son of God, struck yet deeper into Pilate's troubled conscience. Once more he took Jesus into the judgment hall, and in trepidation asked, "Whence art thou?" The inquiry was as to whether Jesus was human or superhuman. A direct avowal of the Lord's divinity would have frightened but could not have enlightened the heathen ruler; therefore Jesus gave no answer. Pilate was further surprized, and perhaps somewhat offended at ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... with outward boldness, but a little inward trepidation; "I have not known anything distress him so much for a long time. He ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... quickly enough then, and stopping the pony, cried with some trepidation, "God bless me! ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser

... even if a house-full of numbsculls should gather, I deemed the experiment a dangerous one for me; but my editorial friend took the risk, remarking that he had calculated his chances, and knew what he was about. Nevertheless, it was not without some trepidation that I entered Grecian Hall by the private door, at a little before seven o'clock, and laid my hat behind the temporary curtain that had been erected for the accommodation of the great Humbug Troupe. Applying my eye ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... impression of my early days: they all told another story now, and most of them a sad one. Even the school-room was as a dead thing, though I sat on the old benches and mounted the rostrum whereon I was wont to "speak my piece" with much trepidation of spirit and an inexplicable weakness of the knees. I wrote my name on the wall in an obscure corner, simply because I didn't want it to be stricken off from the roll entirely, and then turned back into the street with less regret than I had ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various

... having that which was disappointing to say, he said it by degrees. Bates ordered a glass of cooling summer drink, and had his pipe filled while they discussed. The one tasted to him like gall, and the fumes of the other were powerless to allay his growing trepidation, and yet, in desperate ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall

... that prevailed which roused his indignation and called forth many a bitter phillipic in the House. These trenchant attacks of the young land-surveyor were greatly feared by the Executive, and were the cause of much trepidation and ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam

... last, quite informally, at Mrs. Clegg's dinner, a small and congenial affair. When the men came into the drawing-room, after the cigars, Mrs. Cable, with not a little trepidation, motioned to Mr. Bansemer to draw up his chair ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon

... saw the ears of the roebuck, and soon after the animal itself, pausing for a moment in his leisurely course, just where he ought to be for a good shot. But amazement and trepidation seized me. I fired in a hurry, and the deer bounded off unscathed. "How clumsy," said I to the Pere Seguin, as he emerged from the thicket, "and how unfortunate, for I have some friends coming to dine ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle

... some trepidation, the rebuke which had been given her, regarding her liking for this girl, and, not caring to provoke a repetition, did not mention the fact of her residence at Houghton. Thus it chanced that neither Lord Hope or his wife knew of the independent ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens

... departure for St. Petersburg, he would be glad to see the corps of tchinovniks at a private meeting. Accordingly all ranks and grades of officialdom repaired to his residence, and there awaited—not without a certain measure of trepidation and of searching of heart—the Governor-General's entry. When that took place he looked neither clear nor dull. Yet his bearing was proud, and his step assured. The tchinovniks bowed—some of them to the waist, and he answered their salutations ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

... the skipper a favorable omen that Miss Jewell descended the companion-ladder as though to the manner born; and her exclamations of delight at the cabin completed his satisfaction. The cook, who had followed them below with some trepidation, became reassured, and seating himself on a locker joined modestly in ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs

... he commanded never knew that he experienced a single thrill of fear. He conquered his trepidation by his wonderful will power, and always in battle he appeared perfectly unaware that there was the least danger. Indeed, he was sometimes criticised for his apparent recklessness in exposing ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish

... in his looks marks of displeasure, and, though unconscious of meriting it, my trepidation increased. He took a seat without speaking, and after some pause addressed ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown

... hesitation, and by the half-pronounced word, suggested the idea—'None but belles without petticoats can enter here,' said she, drawing her clothes tight round her; 'fortunately, I have but two, and Lady Langdale has but one.' Prevailed upon to venture in, she walked on with prodigious care and trepidation, affecting to be alarmed at the crowd of strange forms and monsters by ...
— The Absentee • Maria Edgeworth

... by a man called Benton or Henson, or something of that kind. She read the first few pages. We listened in silence. "But that's not a book," someone said. So she chose another. This time it was a history, but I have forgotten the writer's name. Our trepidation increased as she went on. Not a word of it seemed to be true, and the style in which ...
— Monday or Tuesday • Virginia Woolf

... back upon the detective, and facing Hemingway with his eyes close to his, Fearing began abruptly. His voice was sunk to a whisper, but he spoke without the slightest sign of trepidation, without ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis

... I proudly surveyed my five feet two inches of height, and wondered how I could have thought of such a thing! Still I had sense enough to know that such a supposition would never have entered my head, had there not been sufficient grounds for it; and, with no small trepidation, I prepared for ...
— A Grandmother's Recollections • Ella Rodman

... more time to contemplate the calamity and his own situation, his fear did not abate. Every little noise startled him, and his mind was constantly harassed with the idea that officers of justice were after him. One cause of his trepidation may be traced to the fact of his many and fearful crimes; he knew how deeply he had involved himself in guilt by the abduction of Eveline and the murder of her lover, as he believed, at his own instigation and command; and he felt well assured, now that his intended victim was at large, she would ...
— Eveline Mandeville - The Horse Thief Rival • Alvin Addison

... Shaver trotting at his side, advanced cautiously upon the house bearing the two baskets, one containing Shaver's chicks, the other the precious porcelains. In his survey of the landscape he noted with trepidation the presence of two big limousines in the highway in front of the cottage and decided that if possible he must see Muriel alone and make his report ...
— A Reversible Santa Claus • Meredith Nicholson

... few days later when strength was flowing back into the injured man's veins, he called his children to him. They went with something like trepidation in their hearts; but one look into the white face on the pillow told them that this was not the same man whom they had known and feared all their lives. It may have been the restored confidence in his friend, it may have been that the fever had burned out the austerity and ...
— Tabitha at Ivy Hall • Ruth Alberta Brown

... the fourth act, when the freedman Milichus discloses Piso's conspiracy, Nero's trepidation is well depicted. It is curious that among the conspirators the author should not have introduced the dauntless woman, Epicharis, who refused under the most cruel tortures to betray the names of her accomplices, and after biting out her ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various

... are all sympathetic, and none more so than this of trepidation. I cannot recollect what the ideas were that passed hastily through my mind; but I know he excited much alarm, doubt, ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft

... trepidation Mark paced up and down the parlor waiting for his mother, who came ere long, expressing her surprise to find him there, and asking if anything had happened that he seemed ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes

... insurrection. When they had reached a retired place in the forest, the man handed his gun to his master, informing him that he could not live a slave any longer, and requesting him either to free him or shoot him on the spot. The master took the gun, in some trepidation, levelled it at the faithful negro, and shot him through the heart. It is probable that this slaveholder was a Dr. Blunt,—his being the only plantation where the slaves were reported as thus defending their masters. "If this be true," said ...
— Black Rebellion - Five Slave Revolts • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

... intellectual labour. And Pierre, moved by it all, shaken in his theories of negation, thought that he could indeed hear a low but far-spreading murmur of the work of thousands of active minds, rising from laboratories, studies and class, reading and lecture rooms. It was not like the jerky, breathless trepidation, the loud clamour of factories where manual labour toils and chafes. But here, too, there were sighs of weariness, efforts as killing, exertion as fruitful in its results. Was it indeed true that the cultured young were still and ever ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... an easy, space-devouring stride. He had begun to think she would be too late; more than half to hope she would be too late. If she arrived on time there was, of course, no turning back. It should be recorded to his credit that no man had guessed at his inner trepidation. But the sullen swell of the thundering waters had beaten not only on his ears but on his heart as well—and dread had settled over him ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck

... filled a continental space in their young minds. The faces of all the scholars were turned silently and deferently to their books when the 'Squire banged with his whip-handle on the door. Aunt Olive was next seen coming down the timber. She was dressed in a manner to cause solicitude and trepidation. She wore knit mits, had a lofty poke bonnet, and a "checkered" gown gay enough for a valance, and, although it was yet very early spring, she carried a parasol over her head. There was deep interest in the books as her form also ...
— In The Boyhood of Lincoln - A Tale of the Tunker Schoolmaster and the Times of Black Hawk • Hezekiah Butterworth

... There are no symptoms of trepidation, although a hostile army of 150,000 men is now within two day's march of our capital. A few of guilty consciences, the extortioners, may feel alarm—but not the women and children. They reflect that over one hundred thousand of the enemy ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones

... courage to assault and wobble him—at that precise moment his conscience flares into function, and so finishes his business. First he sees difficulty, then he sees the danger, then he sees wrong. The result is that he slinks off in trepidation, and another vampire is baffled of ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken

... certain manner which the Honourable George was never known to achieve even in the days when I groomed him. The grayish rather aggressive looking side-whiskers first caught my eye, and a moment later I had taken his hand. Belknap-Jackson at the same time took his bag, and with a trepidation so obvious that his lordship may perhaps have been excusable for a momentary misapprehension. I mean to say, he instantly and crisply directed Belknap-Jackson to go forward to the luggage ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... day she waited to hear from Jim till she could endure the anxiety no longer. She ventured to call him at his father's home. She waited with trepidation while she was put through to his room, but his enthusiasm when he recognized her voice refreshed her hopes and her pride. She did not know that part of her welcome was due to the fierce rebuke Charity Coe had inflicted on him a ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes



Words linked to "Trepidation" :   apprehensiveness, apprehension



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