perisystole

English

Etymology

peri- +‎ systole

Noun

perisystole (uncountable)

1. (physiology) The interval between the diastole and systole of the heart.
   • 1956, Anthony Burgess, Time for a Tiger (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 127:

     And so, borrowing cards of membership of the Lanchap Turf Club, they had gone, the four of them, to sit in a dilatation of hope, a contraction of despair, a perisystole of speculation.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “perisystole”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

Anagrams

• proselytise