epiploce
A figure of speech by which one striking circumstance is added, in due gradation, to another; escalation to a climax.
uncountable
In dress making Ram Rutton certainly excelled; but, from a curious idiosyncracy or obtuseness of intellect, he could not be made to comprehend "the unities," nor how an epiploce could be so graduated as to superinduce tears artificial; yet would he weep like an infant when mulcted for unauthorised absence from his professional labours.
Where it comes from
From Latin epiplocē (“(rhetoric) connection”), from Ancient Greek ἐπιπλοκή (epiplokḗ, “plaiting together”), from ἐπιπλέκω (epiplékō, “to interweave”), from ἐπι- (epi-, “upon”) (see epi-) + πλέκω (plékō, “to plait”).
Adapted from the Wiktionary entry epiploce (CC BY-SA 4.0).