v. rare. [f. SWIFT a. + -EN5.]
1. trans. To make swift or swifter, hasten.
1638. Sir T. Herbert, Trav. (ed. 2), 202. Our Ambassador to swiften his dispatch, visited … the grand Favorite Mahomet Ally-beg.
1647. Boyle, in Birch, Life, B.’s Wks. 1772, I. p. xxxix. The dictionary, whose edition, had my wishes the power to swiften it, should be very sudden.
2. intr. To become swift or swifter; loosely, to move swiftly, hasten, hurry. Hence Swiftening ppl. a.
1839. Bailey, Festus, ii. 8. The thought comes swiftening over us Like a small bird winging the still blue air.
1848. Lytton, K. Arthur, II. lxxviii. Still, while he sped, the swifter wings that lead Seem’d to rebuke for sloth the swiftening steed.
1889. Scribner’s Mag., May, 603. High places where on quiet afternoon A shadow swiftens by.
