Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Impress \Im"press\, n.; pl. {Impresses}.
   1. The act of impressing or making.

   2. 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.

   3. Characteristic; mark of distinction; stamp. --South.

   4. A device. See {Impresa}. --Cussans.

            To describe . . . emblazoned shields, Impresses
            quaint.                               --Milton.

   5. [See {Imprest}, {Press} to force into service.] 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.