[f. FRESH a. + -NESS.] The quality or condition of being fresh in senses of the adj. Also concr. (nonce-use) a fresh stream.

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1398.  Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XIII. xxi. (1495), 451. Fressh water rysyth vpwarde for fresshnes and lyghtnes, and salte water fallyth dounwarde for his heuynesse.

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1493.  Petronilla (Pynson), 138.

        Petronilla virgyn of great vertue
Clad all in floures of spirituall fresshnesse.

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a. 1500.  Cuckow & Night., 155.

        For therof truly commeth all goodnesse …
Jollitie, pleasaunce, and freshnesse.

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a. 1533.  Ld. Berners, Huon, lv. 184. Ye fresshenes of his aparyll.

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1626.  Bacon, Sylva, § 824. The Kite affecteth not so much the Grossenesse of the Aire as the Cold and Freshnesse thereof.

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1683.  Boyle, in Phil. Trans., XVII. 628. My way of examining the Freshness and Saltness of Waters.

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1712.  Budgell, Spect., No. 425, 8 July, ¶ 1. When the Hour was come for the Sun to set, that I might enjoy the Freshness of the Evening in my Garden, which then affords me the pleasantest Hours I pass in the whole Four and twenty.

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1768–74.  Tucker, Lt. Nat. (1852), I. I. vi. § 32. 72. Though our employments often fatigue and nauseate, let but some new desire give play to a quite different set of organs, and the mind runs after it with as much freshness and eagerness as if it had never done anything.

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1803–6.  Wordsw., Intimations Immort., i.

        The earth, and every common sight,
To me did seem
Apparelled in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream.

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a. 1821.  Keats, ‘I Stood tip-toe upon a little hill.’ 69.

        Why, you might read two sonnets, ere they reach
To where the hurrying freshnesses aye preach
A natural sermon o’er their pebbly beds.

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1844.  H. H. Wilson, Brit. India, III. 164. The impression produced by the splendid triumphs of the Pindari war had already lost much of its freshness.

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1870.  Morris, Earthly Par., I. I. 13.

        And now the freshness of the open sea
Seemed ease and joy and very life to me.

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