impend

• The imagination of the beholder was subtly stimulated to conceive the ultimate worst of that which might impend, which is the climax of fear Cobden turned to Skipper Tom What does Terry Lute call it?" —  Harbor Tales Down North With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D.
• When the shades of night impend, the reproaches of the feeling, or the expostulations of the timid traveller no longer protect him from the lash; and the dread of Mr. Martin's act ceases to effect for a time its beneficent purpose; when the stiffened joints--the cracked hoofs--the greasy legs--and stumbling gait of the worn-out animal are all put into agonized motion by belabouring him upon the raw_! —  The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 20, No. 568, September 29, 1832
• But though what he recommended was to be done, it was not to be done as he recommended; yet there was a manliness about the course of action which he proposed which would of itself have won the queen's preference, if she had not been forced to consider not what was best and fittest, but what it was most easy to induce him on whom the final choice must impend, the king, to adopt. —  The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France
• But more than once did this felicity seem to impend, and I suspected that she might even have been more graciously endowed than with a mere Peavey capacity in general. —  The Boss of Little Arcady
• "What Adela apprehends may seem to impend, but we know that papa is incapable of doing it. —  Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith

Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms