[f. prec. + -ING1.] The act or practice of making verses; an instance of this; the art of composing verse; versification.
c. 1450. Cov. Myst. (Shaks. Soc.), 189. No clerke abyl to bere oure book Of versyfyeng, nor of other scyens.
1479. Paston Lett., III. 241. I lake no thynge but wersyfyynge, whyche I troste to have with a lytyll contynuance.
a. 1568. Ascham, Scholem., II. (Arb.), 147. Yet neither of them hath fullie hite perfite and trew versifying.
1580. Spenser, Lett. to Harvey, Wks. (1912), 636. I perceiue you other whiles continue your old exercise of Versifying in English.
a. 1653. Gouge, Comm. Hebr. v. 14. A scholar exercised in versifying will readily distinguish between a true and false verse.
1675. E. Phillips, Theatrum Poetarum, 192. William Drummond of Hawthornden … who imitating the Italian manner of Versifying, vented his Amours in Sonnets, Canzonets and Madrigals.
1677. J. Peter (title), Artificial Versifying; a New Way to make Latin Verses.
1740. J. Clarke, Educ. Youth (ed. 3), 61. Of what Use Versifying is…. I do not understand.
1830. Southey, Bunyan, p. xlix. In versifying he was attempting an art which he had never learnt, and for which he had no aptitude.
1892. Athenæum, 6 Aug., 190/1. What really genuine poetic inspiration he showed is lost in the commonplace of too idle versifyings.
b. attrib., as versifying dialogue, etc.
1686. in Verney Mem. (1907), II. 424. As to y[ou]r Versifying Dialogue with Him, I like it very well.
1725. Watts, Logic, III. ii. § 3. I confess some of these logical Subtilties have much more Use than those versifying Tables.
1737. Gentl. Mag., VII. 148/1. I shall exemplify by a Text, where a Singing, or mere Versifying Repetition, is literally express’d.
1787. Skinner, Lett., in Wks. Burns (1800), II. 127. I know a classical education will not create a versifying taste.
1811. Byron, Hints fr. Hor., 839. If free, all fly his versifying fit.
1885. Athenæum, 11 July, 50/1. Godwin desired Wordsworth to undertake the versifying part of the business.
