spate

• On average, between 850 and 900 robberies of different types take place each year in Toronto, but this spate is unusual and had stirred wide concern within the local gasoline-retailing industry, said Staff Inspector Bruce Crawford, who heads the hold-up squad. —  Top Stories - Google News
• I thought he'd like a sketch of a Highland burn in spate--thought it would be cooling. —  From Edinburgh to India ; Burmah
• The Brak was in spate, and he could not cross it to Prieska. —  A Handbook of the Boer War With General Map of South Africa and 18 Sketch Maps and Plans
• It was held up for a time by two rivers in spate, the Wilge and the Liebenberg's, and when released it trudged on to the mountain range, where on April 5 its components were dissolved, having disposed of less than 100 of the enemy Yet one more drive, the fifth and last of the series, was called for. —  A Handbook of the Boer War With General Map of South Africa and 18 Sketch Maps and Plans
• This I have frequently ascertained by experience When the strength of the current in a spate is considered, and also the sinuous course a salmon must take in order to avoid the strong rapids, their power of swimming must be considered as extraordinary."--P. —  Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 333, July 1843

Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

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