bear down on somebody/something• Yussuf bore down on her in a fury.• A stillness which seemed to bear down on her like a physicalpresence.• These thoughtsbear down on me as I sit here on this third night of writing.• His eyes bore down on me out of a somewhat hawklike face, and I immediately became flustered.• The Pequod bears down on the area and comes between the whale and the flounderingseamen.• For those who find Christmas suddenly bearing down on them, the build-up to the day is one blur of activity.• Five or six men, horsed, masked and well-armed, burst from a clump of trees and bore down on them.• Meanwhile, the New Zealand Interislander Ferry is bearing down on us like a 350-foot long, 40-foot tallaquaticfreight train.