IMPRESS

To press, stamp, or print something in or upon; to mark by pressure, or as by pressure; to imprint (that which bears the impression). His heart, like an agate, with your print impressed. Shak.

To produce by pressure, as a mark, stamp, image, etc.; to imprint (a mark or figure upon something).

Fig.: To fix deeply in the mind; to present forcibly to the attention, etc.; to imprint; to inculcate. Impress the motives of persuasion upon our own hearts till we feel the force of them. I. Watts.

To take by force for public service; as, to impress sailors or money. The second five thousand pounds impressed for the service of the sick and wounded prisoners. Evelyn.

To be impressed; to rest. [Obs.] Such fiendly thoughts in his heart impress. Chaucer.

The act of impressing or making.

A mark made by pressure; an indentation; imprint; the image or figure of anything, formed by pressure or as if by pressure; result produced by pressure or influence. The impresses of the insides of these shells. Woodward. This weak impress of love is as a figure Trenched in ice. Shak.

Characteristic; mark of distinction; stamp. South.

A device. See Impresa. Cussans. To describe . . . emblazoned shields, Impresses quaint. Milton.

The act of impressing, or taking by force for the public service; compulsion to serve; also, that which is impressed. Why such impress of shipwrights Shak. Impress gang, a party of men, with an officer, employed to impress seamen for ships of war; a press gang. -- Impress money, a sum of money paid, immediately upon their entering service, to men who have been impressed.