She broke off, nervously trying to recall some of the Club's discussions; but her faculties seemed to be paralysed by the petrifying stare of Osric Dane. What HAD the club been absorbed in lately? Ballinger, with a vague purpose of gaining time, repeated slowly: "We've been so intensely absorbed in--"英文原著 · 《Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton-Part 2》
MARLOW. Why, George, I can't say fine things to them; they freeze, they petrify me. They may talk of a comet, or a burning mountain, or some such bagatelle; but, to me, a modest woman, drest out in all her finery, is the most tremendous object of the whole creation.英文原著 · 《She Stoops To Conquer》
"Upon my word," said he, "that is a solution which I do not at all accept. I defy the gods ever to petrify my heart."英文原著 · 《The Nabob》
How is that letter signed?"
"YOUR WIFE," whispered Nurse Rosemary. There was a petrifying quality about the silence which followed. It seemed as if those two words, whispered into Garth's darkness, had turned him to stone. At last he stretched out his hand. "Will you give me that letter, if you please, Miss Gray? Thank you. I wish to be alone for a quarter of an hour. I shall be glad if you will be good enough to sit in the dining-room, and stop any one from coming into this room.英文原著 · 《The Rosary》