I have a question here, when I read an excerpt from the novel "The Crossing" written by Winston Churchill. I can not understand the following sentence
They occurred only when a passing traveler who hit his fancy chanced that way, or, what was almost as rare, a neighbor.
I have looked up the meaning of the word "chance (v.)", and I found 2 meanings of this word which are "risk" and "not planned" respectively. In this sentence I think the later meaning will be more appropriate. But they often use "to chance to do something = to do sth by chance". I've never seen anything like "to chance that way" before. I could not translate it. What does it mean?
Best Answer
Any dictionary should provide a perfectly reasonable definition for using chance as a verb. The OED provides several:
As sense 2 plainly explains, to chance that way means to happen to come that way, to come that way by chance.
The note “Somewhat archaic” tells you that the expression is today more apt to be encountered either in older works, or, if modern, in literary, oratorical, or poetic registers. Churchill is a modern writer albeit one well versed in English letters, and so to him it was not an inappropriate expression by any means. Indeed, he might well have used it not just in writing but in speech; after all, it is not all that archaic — merely “somewhat” so, a weak and tentative statement at most.