Sentence:  A voice had called him forth to think in solitude—a voice he durst not resist, the awful one of the future. It fell on John's heart like the mutter of approaching desolation. He heard it coming on, as the spell-bound in a hideous dream await, wordless and shivering, the progress of some <WSD>chimera</WSD> monster, whose grasp is to crush and destroy. 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  Any fantastic creature with parts from different animals.