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disperse
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  • When a body—a tree or an animal, for instance—died and disintegrated, the atoms dispersed and could be used again in new bodies.   (source)
    dispersed = scattered (spread out)
  • The bell gave us the signal to disperse.   (source)
    disperse = leave (moving away from each other)
  • He had come up from deep down in the water as the dark cloud of blood had settled and dispersed in the mile deep sea.   (source)
    dispersed = spread
  • The trade routes that had once converged on the great harbours, and later on the great airports, had finally dispersed into an intricate web-work covering the whole world with no major nodal points.   (source)
  • There were days when they assembled and then promptly dispersed again, frankly admitting to one another that there was not really anything to be done.   (source)
    dispersed = scattered (stop being a crowd in one place)
  • The carriage moved off through the dispersing crowd.   (source)
    dispersing = scattering (moving away from each other)
  • They gave Pahom a feather-bed to sleep on, and the Bashkirs dispersed for the night, promising to assemble the next morning at daybreak and ride out before sunrise to the appointed spot.   (source)
    dispersed = scattered (left each other)
  • Men who before this change seemed to have been hid in caves dispersed themselves and were employed in various arts of cultivation.   (source)
    dispersed = spread out (scattered)
  • Miles of spent grasses, having dispersed their seeds, bowed their heads to the water in surrender.†   (source)
  • They never collect the bloodbath bodies until the killers have dispersed.†   (source)
  • Trying valiantly to laugh along with everyone else, he got up, his feet numb from the weight of the dwarf, as Percy Weasley did his best to disperse the crowd, some of whom were crying with mirth.†   (source)
  • Small travelling fairs pitched their booths and rides and tethered their ponies and donkeys, parades wound themselves up there, and dispersed into picnics.†   (source)
  • In two of the pens, he found straw still burning, the flames dispersed and yellow.†   (source)
  • The crowd dispersed in disappointment, but the experiment wasn't over.†   (source)
  • The crowd dispersed around them.†   (source)
  • There, it reached the sort of desk where with the swipe of a pen, matrons from the state orphanage could be dispersed.†   (source)
  • Whatever had been between us was dispersed like smoke on the wind.†   (source)
  • The crowd has begun to disperse.†   (source)
  • The Sixers had dispersed their grand army across the globe in a bold attempt to blockade all 512 copies of the Zork playing field.†   (source)
  • It was banana split in the wrong sense of the term: the sea dispersed them.†   (source)
  • Opus Dei is a personal prelature of Vatican City, and His Holiness can disperse monies however he sees fit.†   (source)
  • A tickle grew in Tally's throat as the pepper dust dispersed on the wind.†   (source)
  • We dispersed at the top of the stairs, each girl heading off to her own room.†   (source)
  • The crowd dispersed quickly.†   (source)
  • It had not lessened or dispersed with the coming of night.†   (source)
  • We dispersed around the village in search of the shooter.†   (source)
  • The students pressed against the door's glass abruptly disperse, and their shadows move aside to make room for a tall silhouette.†   (source)
  • Evergreen branches flared at random, dispersing their piney aroma.†   (source)
  • The tour ends and the children disperse and Marie-Laure is reinstalled in the Grand Gallery with her father.†   (source)
  • Programs scheduled to culminate in two years became outmoded in six months, and crowds of men gathered for them in one place were dispersed to twenty others.†   (source)
  • I watched the spectators disperse.†   (source)
  • The silence that followed as they settled and unfolded their napkins would easily have been dispersed by Jack Tallis introducing some barely interesting topic while Betty went around with the beef.†   (source)
  • And they dispersed.†   (source)
  • With grumblings and curses, the crowd started to disperse.†   (source)
  • And the crowd laughed and groaned, then began to disperse.†   (source)
  • From here, the Lord willing, you will disperse to families who need you and want you.†   (source)
  • So as the crowd began to disperse, a small group of us followed the farmers out to the scene of the crime.†   (source)
  • When at last Daenerys found the strength to raise her head, she saw the crowd dispersing, the Dothraki stealing silently back to their tents and sleeping mats.†   (source)
  • As a wave of musty air blew up to meet them, the android turned on her floodlight, dispersing the shadows from the sparse halogens.†   (source)
  • "Everyone please disperse," shouted a broad-shouldered man in a crisp blue coat and a sleek, freshly powdered wig.†   (source)
  • The stupid, the unintelligent, those who are dispersed, incapable of attention, of effort, have no right to a higher education.†   (source)
  • He looked down as if expecting his comrades to re-form, but their gold dust remains dispersed in the wind.†   (source)
  • Hana scans the beach anxiously, but everyone has dispersed: The old man has plodded on, halfway down the beach by now and out of earshot.†   (source)
  • Others start to disperse after him.†   (source)
  • Disperse there, I say.†   (source)
  • Reluctantly, the hooligans dispersed, leaving a trail of insults in their wake.†   (source)
  • I squatted low with my chin on my knees and watched my bare feet change slowly from dark auburn, to speckled, to white as the ants dispersed and forayed out into the bottom of the canoe.†   (source)
  • The pirates shadowed us as we dispersed through A- and B-Decks.†   (source)
  • The crowd dispersed even before the body was removed.†   (source)
  • That night, after the hoot-owl miners had descended into the mine and the evening shift dispersed, I slipped out the back door and up the tipple path.†   (source)
  • The message was clear enough; We are not to idolize Jesus, because his ideas stand alone, his church is no longer centralized in one person but dispersed among all the people.†   (source)
  • But the protesters refused to disperse.†   (source)
  • Deputies drove by often, pushing dudes against walls, detaining them and dispersing crowds of two or more.†   (source)
  • They were not yet ready to disperse, to reinhabit their earthbound bodies, but wanted to linger with their terror, keep it separate and intact for just a while longer.†   (source)
  • When Dustfinger bowed and put his balls back in the backpack the spectators were slow to disperse, but finally only Mo and Meggie were left.†   (source)
  • The mosquitoes dispersed and re-assembled tirelessly.†   (source)
  • From underneath, the mass of birds looked like a dirty cloud and then the cloud dispersed as the birds scattered, leaving the sky blue and clear again.†   (source)
  • He had, it seemed, been homeless for some time and his family dispersed.†   (source)
  • He had seen our foreign minister and the British and French ambassadors, he had cheered and sung along with everyone else, but then suddenly the crowd was asked to disperse as quickly as possible because there might be an air raid.†   (source)
  • We catch up to the Amity in front of us as we cross the courtyard to the dining hall and disperse among them.†   (source)
  • We engaged in the preliminaries: small talk about Betsy's family, college, career (all stellar, A-list, awesome), and drinks dispersed for everyone (soda pops and Clamato, which Go and I had come to believe was an affectation of Tanner's, a quirk he thought would give him character, like my wearing fake glasses in college).†   (source)
  • The catcalls ceased and the hostile groups dispersed.†   (source)
  • I thought, as I waded into Marley's puke zone, roiling the water with my feet as nonchalantly as I could to disperse the evidence.†   (source)
  • I poked my finger down into the mouth of my volcano, and it toppled, dispersing the golden grains into little swirls.†   (source)
  • But in the end no bullets were fired, the uniformed men simply stopped the crowd and stood their ground, and a few brave or desperate or enterprising souls tried to make it through, running at high speed on either side, where there were gaps, but these few were caught, and after an hour or so the crowd dispersed and most people headed back to the camp.†   (source)
  • Meanwhile, the economist Jeffrey Sachs was dispersing the Lancet article far and wide.†   (source)
  • The other peculiarity was that whereas Fredrik Vanger's descendants, including Henrik, had played leading roles in the business and lived primarily in or near Hedestad, Johan Vanger's branch of the family, which produced only daughters, had married and dispersed to Stockholm, Malmö, and Göteborg or abroad.†   (source)
  • After dispersing, some of the demonstrators organized shifts, and kept them tolling all over camp.†   (source)
  • The sun had risen higher, dispersing the haze.†   (source)
  • Much later, when the candles guttered in their sockets and the villagers began to disperse in twos and threes, Roran grasped Eragon's arm by the elbow and drew him through the back of the tent to stand by Saphira's side, where the others could not hear.†   (source)
  • The wedding over, the Clutter kinfolk dispersed.†   (source)
  • People began to disperse.†   (source)
  • They disperse pretty quick, thinking my rage level is high and they don't want to be caught in the crossfire.†   (source)
  • Others who had been at the funeral service looked briefly at Cass and Vivaldo, stood together a few moments, and then began to disperse.†   (source)
  • They kept us underground for more than half an hour, hoping people would disperse.†   (source)
  • The crowd disperses, moving from the big top to the parking lot and beyond, to the edges of the town.†   (source)
  • They had cleaned up the mess after the virus had wiped out everyone else, and now they were busy fogging the rooms with insecticide, in the hope that it might somehow disperse the virus.†   (source)
  • By the time they got home, the guests had dispersed.†   (source)
  • To feel the cloud that hung over us lift and disperse—the cloud that dulled the heart and made happiness no more than a memory!†   (source)
  • After cake and cafecitos, the cousins will disperse down these paths to their several compound houses.†   (source)
  • It's late in the day and the shops are closing and even the motorbikes at each corner have dispersed, leaving oil stains and ruts in the dirt.†   (source)
  • This is not real, this is not real, this is NOT REALClancy must have let go, or I must have found a way to twist away, because just as quickly as the fire came, it went back out, dispersing in three shaky exhales.†   (source)
  • They drove through the streets and made stops at little dimlit doorways and small houses and tiendas until nearly all the parcels in the bed of the truck had been dispersed and a few new ones taken aboard.†   (source)
  • The turbulent winds of the helicopter's blades were dispersing the fog, tearing it to shreds, as if the fog had been a massive cotton blanket.†   (source)
  • The group slowly dispersed, some off to hunt, some to while away the time with Carlisle's books or televisions or computers.†   (source)
  • The dew quickly died, and the light that filled the bushes like red dust dispersed, leaving clear, slightly bluish air.†   (source)
  • But we had advance warning, and so the teacher dispersed the children and turned the classroom into a regular room of the house.†   (source)
  • He walked on the balls of his feet, dispersing his weight evenly so he could strike out in any direction with a balanced effectiveness.†   (source)
  • Sher Takhi, who called Korphe's widely dispersed faithful to prayer five times a day without the benefit of amplification, filled the small room with his booming voice.†   (source)
  • In the distance, a heron broke from the trees and gracefully skimmed the surface, dispersing the light.†   (source)
  • The crowd began to disperse.†   (source)
  • By the start of the second round, everyone at our table is dispersing among the crowd.†   (source)
  • We just disperse.†   (source)
  • At daybreak, in the crowd that was finally beginning to disperse, Alba glimpsed the unmistakable figure of Miguel shouting and waving a flag.†   (source)
  • Throwing a sidelong scowl at Phillip, Cedric slips forward through the dispersing mob, in the midst of which Delante Coleman collects his dice and rises from a crouch.†   (source)
  • The young commander told the crowd that they had exactly one minute to disperse or he would give his soldiers orders to fire.†   (source)
  • After I sent the Lightwoods through the Portal, the Forsaken dispersed; they didn't seem interested in me.†   (source)
  • A rope lined with three security men now separated the platform from the dispersing audience.†   (source)
  • The teams began to disperse.†   (source)
  • Only local mail was postmarked in Clanton; all other was trucked to a regional center in Tupelo, sorted, marked, then dispersed.†   (source)
  • He would cry later, long after the family and neighbors had dispersed.†   (source)
  • At first the people I had sent away from the Fore-Temple water stood whispering in small groups on the street, and then dispersed when I approached, walking my regular rounds.†   (source)
  • I stood on the edge of the walk watching the crowd threatening to attack the man until a policeman appeared and dispersed them.†   (source)
  • The first page was as bad as any of them: THIS IS PAGE 1 OF 274 PAGES PROJECT: WILDFIRE AUTHORITY: NASA/AMC CLASSIFICATION: TOP SECRET (NTK BASIS) PRIORITY: NATIONAL (DX) SUBJECT: Initiation of high-security facility to prevent dispersion of toxic extraterrestrial agents.†   (source)
  • And in less than an hour after, the fog having dispersed, the enemy was visible on the shore we had left [behind].†   (source)
  • All I know is that, in an effort to disperse the crowd, one Haitian soldier started firing tear gas into the masses.†   (source)
  • … Get on the loudspeakers and disperse the crowds.†   (source)
  • A half-hour later everyone had dispersed.†   (source)
  • When Celia's parents divorced, they dispersed their children among relatives throughout the island.†   (source)
  • Or perhaps the coalesced power of his psychogeist was radiating away like the heat from a rock, as Rose had explained, but just wasn't dispersing fast enough to bring a quick end to this assault.†   (source)
  • We urged them to get away and disperse as soon as possible so that they would not be seen together, Michael, too.†   (source)
  • The servants bowed and dispersed, murmuring a little among themselves, and Attolia knew that the news of the mad Eugenides would percolate through the palace, like water through soil.†   (source)
  • The mourners dispersed.†   (source)
  • Lactic dispersion rate: eighty-four.†   (source)
  • On June 3, government troops once again attack Buddhists in Hue, using tear gas and dogs to disperse the demonstrators.†   (source)
  • The legion of winged men floating behind him dispersed with the panicked crowd, quickly disappearing into the smoky sky.†   (source)
  • The trunk was only an empty shell; its heart had rotted away long ago; there was nothing inside-just a thin gray dust that was being dispersed by the whim of the faintest wind.†   (source)
  • Now, we don't know yet what's driving the whole engine, but we know it's the same forces that have led to this tremendous dispersion of our language family.†   (source)
  • They quelled that small inconsequential revolt with ease as they dispersed us into smaller groups, shivering along the gallery.†   (source)
  • The rest of the villagers slowly started to disperse.†   (source)
  • He disperses the crowd but he cannot disband their convictions; the people talk in excited whispers still.†   (source)
  • Disperse.†   (source)
  • The road curved left and then back to the village by way of rocky shelves in the hills, but if you were to descend to the floor of the valley, cross the river, and go up again, you would come to the church and the piazza directly, after passing rows of olive trees, and stone walls, and through fields in which sheaves of silver-blond hay stood like dispersed infantrymen.†   (source)
  • But the variety of sects dispersed over the entire country secures the national councils against this danger.†   (source)
  • But the clan, disappointed in the delay, did not disperse.†   (source)
  • Dallas watched symbols and shapes form, disperse, realign.†   (source)
  • He told Taylor to ask the people outside to disperse.†   (source)
  • I stood there until the crowd had dispersed, and then, for some reason I didn't understand, I felt the impulse to bend down and kiss her casket.†   (source)
  • Later, the group would disperse to their cabins and Alan would sit on the top deck, almost invariably alone.†   (source)
  • Navot waved his hand as though he were dispersing a foul odor.†   (source)
  • -And we're talking about a dispersed population, dug in.†   (source)
  • They ran scared, and as they fled through the dispersed caribou herds the deer finally reacted, and the stampede of frightened animals which I had been expecting to witness all that afternoon became something of a reality.†   (source)
  • Ralph was as mad as anyone, if only because the anger drew him together; his doubts, on the other hand, dispersed him.†   (source)
  • Two years later her mother died of grief The family dispersed, brothers going to live with cousins, sisters spreading out among uncles and aunts, and the war continued, and Cholon became a combat zone, and in the end there was no choice but to leave.†   (source)
  • Or it may well be that they're resting happily in China, their spirits dispersed among the real Chinese, and not nudging me at all with their poles.†   (source)
  • But the tribe did not disperse, and he sensed there was something yet unfinished of which he had no part, and he said, "I will go back to the village now, Jim."†   (source)
  • We flew down yesterday on a pretty important job—figure out a way to disperse the wing on Ramey.†   (source)
  • I preferred not to dwell upon the matter, which was just as well, for the polychrome cloud went on its way eastward, allowing light to flood around us once again; Sophie smiled, as if the sun's rays had dispersed her moment of gloom, and hurling a final crust at Tadeusz, said that we should be getting back to Yetta's.†   (source)
  • And I am sure that, as all pendulums reverse their swing, so eventually will the swollen cities rupture like dehiscent wombs and disperse their children back to the countryside.†   (source)
  • The loaded capsules are heavy; they punch through the high, thin winds of the upper atmosphere without being blown too far out of position — but just the same a platoon is bound to disperse on the way down, lose some of the perfect formation in which it unloads.†   (source)
  • Two policemen were busy dispersing the crowd, or trying to.†   (source)
  • The image of his father, his own image, the image of his son merged, Kamala's image also appeared and was dispersed, and the image of Govinda, and other images, and they merged with each other, turned all into the river, headed all, being the river, for the goal, longing, desiring, suffering, and the river's voice sounded full of yearning, full of burning woe, full of unsatisfiable desire.†   (source)
  • If he but touch its base against a contact within his glove, the Universal Fire will leap forward with a blinding brilliance, obliterating matter and dispersing energies which lie in its path.†   (source)
  • The crowd dispersed and Pasha, who had been too frightened to utter a sound, rushed to Marfa Gavrilovna.†   (source)
  • Then the junior officers dispersed to go about their business, and she was left with Dwight and Peter.†   (source)
  • [The dust disperses.†   (source)
  • I waited till the crowd dispersed, then I followed.†   (source)
  • (NEBULAE, CLUSTERS, STREAMS, BINARIES, GIANTS, MAIN SEQUENCE, AND WHITE DWARFS) DISPERSE.†   (source)
  • After walking through the house, looking briefly at the body, and dispersing down the front of the little hill the house stood on, they saw Moses himself rise out of a tangled ant heap in front of them.†   (source)
  • A few people lingered round and praised her playing, but finding that she made no reply, dispersed to their rooms to write up their diaries or to sleep.   (source)
    dispersed = scattered and left
  • The morning was rather favourable, though it had rained all night, as the clouds were then dispersing across the sky, and the sun frequently appeared.   (source)
    dispersing = spreading (moving away from each other)
  • Then suddenly, like a crowd dispersed by a single gunshot, the voices were gone.†   (source)
  • Imagine having to concentrate just to keep yourself from dispersing to nothing.†   (source)
  • Once the crowd had dispersed, Chiron gave me his bow.†   (source)
  • The clouds dispersed and the sky lightened a bit.†   (source)
  • After a few minutes the small crowd dispersed.†   (source)
  • The dispersed figures had come together on the sand and were a dense black mass that revolved.†   (source)
  • They rose, spilled open, and dispersed, covering the ashes of the dead.†   (source)
  • Then they rapidly dispersed in agitation.†   (source)
  • The other demonstrators dispersed into the crowd.†   (source)
  • Awash of bluish light dispersed the dimness of the storage room.†   (source)
  • People quickly dispersed to continue their lives.†   (source)
  • But when the service ended and we all dispersed to our tents, a funereal gloom hung over Base Camp.†   (source)
  • The crowd began dispersing, with two people coming to help the woman up.†   (source)
  • Then I summoned a good strong wind and dispersed it completely.†   (source)
  • The crowd outside the Gansevoort had mostly dispersed with the coming darkness.†   (source)
  • At Chiron's urging, the remaining campers dispersed back to their cabins.†   (source)
  • They were not to be had; Marie saw that for herself as the crowd dispersed.†   (source)
  • With a lot of grumbling, the crowd dispersed.†   (source)
  • Finally the lichen dispersed into smaller clumps like burned marshmallow sofas.†   (source)
  • After that, the men dispersed to walk their rounds, and Eragon heard nothing more from them.†   (source)
  • Then the darkness dispersed with a massive sigh, like the last breath of a dying god.†   (source)
  • Such exercise, he believed, roused "the animal spirits" and "dispersed melancholy."†   (source)
  • People thronged the bar and tables; crowds formed and dispersed around the pool tables.†   (source)
  • Finally, the lambent groups dispersed and filtered back into the tents and houses.†   (source)
  • Her voice echoed from tower to tower, dispersing itself through the city.†   (source)
  • The storm died out and dispersed, and sunlight broke over the track.†   (source)
  • The sky began to lighten in the east as the group dispersed.†   (source)
  • The crowd had dispersed, and the crows had returned to resume their feast.†   (source)
  • Most of the giants dispersed, going back to their mead-swilling or their bowling or their Ms.†   (source)
  • In a few minutes, everyone is dispersed.†   (source)
  • When the dust mushrooms toward them, they back off, spreading out, looking sparse and dispersed.†   (source)
  • They all dispersed slowly when Cesar yelled, "Boys, don't sit in the aisle!†   (source)
  • Which was dispersed throughout the body, or else led to bleeding, insanity, and death.†   (source)
  • Amid nervous laughter, the audience dispersed.†   (source)
  • And it's so dispersed…. we can't even figure out the infection method.†   (source)
  • He looked through the windshield, through the patches of clear space left by the dispersing fog.†   (source)
  • He waited until the muttering crowd slowly dispersed.†   (source)
  • Hazel let the talk run on as long as it would, until at last they dispersed and slept.†   (source)
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