returnless en · ADJ
Pronunciation
- /ɹəˈtɜɹnləs/
Etymology
From return + -less.
Meanings
-
(not-comparable) from (or due to) which one will not, or cannot, return (of a journey, destination, situation, distance, etc.)
Seventeen years had rolled on their returnless flight since that night of withering sorrow.
1845, Mrs. F. Beavan, Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick:You must hear the judge's decision, remorselessly giving up the woman with her children born and unborn, into the hands of their claimants--by them to be carried to the slave prison, and thence to be sold to a returnless distance from the remaining but scattered fragments of her once happy family.
1872, William Still, The Underground Railroad:They would do an immensity of labor on their returnless journey to the ocean.
1857, S. H. Hammond, Wild Northern Scenes:
-
(not-comparable, of something that is gone) which will not return
—but now false Memory loosed Her time-worn cable from the wilder'd mind, Blotting the chart whereon it loved to gaze Mid the dim ocean of returnless years.—
1827, Lydia Sigourney, Poems, Visit to the venerable Charles Thompson, pages 94–95:Pass on, returnless year!
1895, Mary Baker Eddy, Pulpit and Press: