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GROPING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Acting with uncertainty or hesitance or lack of confidence
Example:
a groping effort to understand
Classified under:
Similar:
incertain; uncertain; unsure (lacking or indicating lack of confidence or assurance)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
-ing form of the verb grope
Context examples:
And the lawyer, scared by the thought, brooded awhile on his own past, groping in all the corners of memory, least by chance some Jack-in-the-Box of an old iniquity should leap to light there.
(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
This monster has done much harm already, in the narrow scope where he find himself, and in the short time when as yet he was only as a body groping his so small measure in darkness and not knowing.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
The puny plot of the story was so thin, however, when compared to the deep mystery through which we were groping, and I found my attention wander so continually from the action to the fact, that I at last flung it across the room and gave myself up entirely to a consideration of the events of the day.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
A cold sweat stood on her forehead, the manuscript fell from her hand, and groping her way to the bed, she jumped hastily in, and sought some suspension of agony by creeping far underneath the clothes.
(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)
Or else he probes them with the cruel hand of a vivisectionist, groping about in their mental processes and examining their souls as though to see of what soul-stuff is made.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
And yet she had caught an impression of power in the very groping of this mind.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
Mrs. Fairfax stayed behind a moment to fasten the trap-door; I, by drift of groping, found the outlet from the attic, and proceeded to descend the narrow garret staircase.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
“O God!” I screamed, and O God! again and again; for there before my eyes—pale and shaken, and half fainting, and groping before him with his hands, like a man restored from death—there stood Henry Jekyll!
(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
Him they had deserted, whether in sheer panic or out of revenge for his ill words and blows I know not; but there he remained behind, tapping up and down the road in a frenzy, and groping and calling for his comrades.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
By the light of the corridor-lamp I saw my sister appear at the opening, her face blanched with terror, her hands groping for help, her whole figure swaying to and fro like that of a drunkard.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
