franticity

They clambered over fences, waded through ditches, burst, heedless of briars and nettles, recklessly through hedges, and with all the speed and franticity of despair, they urged themselves towards the village, hoping and thinking that there, at least, they should find shelter from what Lord Bacon would have called “wild justice.”

1842, [James Malcolm Rymer], chapter LXVIII, in Phœbe; or, The Miller’s Maid. A Romance of Deep Interest., London: […] E. Lloyd, page 407

The Republicans are reaching out their negro stained hands and welcoming to their embrace everything of the whole country who will swear eternal vengeance upon the Democracy; while their offering are grasped by the Southern American-know-nothing-whigs as eagerly and with the same franticity as drowning men are said to catch at straws.

1859 May 24, The Daily Delta, volume 1, number 43, New Bern, N.C.

Until therefore aught more substantial than sheer franticity of speech is brought forward, the writer finds it needful to hold to the truth of what he has repeated after other reputables about Darwin’s deathbed.

1933 September, Moody Monthly, volume XXXIV, number 1, page 6

It reminds me that time is so short and the wonder of the world is so great that I have to suppress a growing hysteria of franticity, which is a feeling of frustration over missing so many of the marvels that are to be seen, smelled, tasted, felt and enjoyed.

1956 November 10, Don Blanding, “Don Blanding says aloha”, in Hawaiian Life Weekly Magazine (The Saturday Star-Bulletin), page 2

What I say is how the hell would she know or anybody know, male or female, about if it's ever love that first time out or just a concentrated distillation of all the atavistic desires and needs and hungers piling up for years and painful and then being released at last all at once—now!—thank God oh Jesus what a sweet miracle thank you dearest oh oh that felt good so comfortable so com fort able and the tension gone and franticity less and why not.

1959, Garson Kanin, Blow Up a Storm, New York, N.Y.: Random House, →LCCN, pages 156–157