Also 7 visite, visitt, visette, vizet. [ad. F. visite (= It., Sp., Pg. visita), or f. VISIT v.]
1. An act of visiting a person; a friendly or formal call upon, a shorter or longer stay with, a person as a feature of social intercourse.
1621. G. Sandys, Ovid’s Met., XIII. (1626), 274. To Nymphs of Seas,… She beares her vizets.
1638. R. Baker, trans. Balzac’s Lett. (vol. II.), 228. You know well, I have appointed you here a chamber, and that you are my debter of a visite, now a whole year.
1648. Nicholas Papers (Camden), 94. To … undertake … for a visitt to him by the Lord Jarmin (who I beleeve visited none else there).
1681. V’tess Campden, in 12th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm., App. V. 56. My Lady Skidmore and her lord was at Mr. Conisbys house upon a visette.
1711. Addison, Spect., No. 102, ¶ 8. Like Ladies that look upon their Watches after a long Visit.
1753. Scots Mag., XV. 36/1. Guilty of that most atrocious crime, the owing a visit.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), V. 246. If the monkey ventures to offer a visit of curiosity, the toucan gives him such a welcome, that he … is glad to escape.
1848. Thackeray, Van. Fair, i. On the solemn occasions of the visits of parents.
1887. Brit. Med. Jrnl., 2 April, 754/1. To call twice in one week, under the pretence … of a social visit.
1907. Verney Mem., I. 99. He is looking forward to a visit from Ralph in the summer.
fig. 1781. Cowper, Table-T., 411. ’Tis not … despondence and dismay Will win her [sc. Mercy’s] visits or engage her stay.
b. Freq. in the phrases to make, or pay (also † give) a visit, to return a visit.
(a) 1644. T. Prujean, Aurorata, II. E j. Romeo … going to give her a visit meetes Tybalt her kinsman.
1674. Essex Papers (Camden), I. 179. My Ld Shaftsbury did me ye honour ye other day to give me a visit.
1699. R. L’Estrange, Erasm. Colloq. (1725), 227. An Abbot gives a Lady a visit.
1709–10. Steele, Tatler, No. 128, ¶ 7. He came to give our Family a formal Visit.
(b) 1643. Caryl, Expos. Job, I. 636. There is no obligation but that of love, to make a visit.
a. 1699. Lady Halkett, Autobiog. (Camden), 3. I doe nott remember that I made a visitt to ye neerest neibour.
1710. Steele, Tatler, No. 124, ¶ 1. I went on Saturday last to make a Visit in the City.
1753. E. Moor, in World, I. No. 11, 87. She made him a visit of a month, and at his entreaty would have settled with him for ever.
1779. Forrest, Voy. N. Guinea, 224. Making him a visit, I found him in the great hall.
1823. J. Simpson, Ricardo the Outlaw, I. 241. She promised that in two years at longest, she would make them a visit.
1885. W. W. Story, Fiammetta, 195. You promised you would make me a visit in the autumn.
(c) 1654–66. Earl Orrery, Parthen. (1676), 503. Surena, by this visit, was in a few days able to pay me one.
1711. Steele, Spect., No. 24, ¶ 6. Let us pay Visits, but never see one another.
1725. De Foe, Voy. round World (1840), 33. The Dutch captain came off in his shallop… to pay his visit to me.
1781. Cowper, Conversat., 399. The visit paid, with ecstasy we come, As from a seven years transportation, home.
1835. Court Mag., VI. 186/1. I quitted Oxford, and paid a visit to a maiden lady dwelling in the Orange Grove.
1855. Tennyson, To Rev. F. D. Maurice, xii. When the wreath of March has blossom’d,… Or later, pay one visit here, For those are few we hold as dear.
fig. 1770. Goldsm., Des. Vill., 3. Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid.
(d) 1677. Lady Chaworth, in 12th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm., App. V. 37. I missed my nephew Anthony the other day who Lady Shaftesbery sent to see me, and I am now going to returne his visit.
1718. Lady M. W. Montagu, Lett. to C’tess Mar, 10 March. I returned my visits at three weeks’ end.
1766. [see RETURN v. 21 b].
c. transf. A place to which one goes only as a visitor.
1784. Cowper, Task, I. 251. Society for me! thou seeming sweet, Be still a pleasing object in my view, My visit still, but never mine abode.
d. An excursion to a place for the purpose of sight-seeing; a short or temporary stay at a place. Also transf. of animals or birds (cf. VISIT v. 10 d).
1800. (title) Visits to the Aviary. For the instruction of youth.
1839. Miss Mitford, in L’Estrange, Life, III. vii. 97. There is an account of a visit to Lyme in Miss Austen’s exquisite ‘Persuasion.’
1860. Clough, Poems, etc. (1869), I. 245. We had a visit to Fryston in Yorkshire, and after passing through the Highlands to Oban, made a three week’s stay in Morven.
1872. Ruskin, Fors Clav., xxi. 20. I spend five hundred in Paris in the two visits I make there.
transf. 1831. T. Nuttall, in Mem. Amer. Acad. Arts & Sci. (1833), I. 101. Crossbills … pay irregular visits to the northern and middle States.
1843. Penny Cycl., XXV. 7/1. [The black-cap titmouse] probably extending its visits into Mexico.
e. An occasion of going to a dentist, doctor, etc., for examination or treatment.
1884. Thompson, Tumours of Bladder, 10. After two or three visits [to a hospital], he took a sea voyage for his health.
1902. R. Bagot, Donna Diana, xxviii. 356. He felt that he would far prefer a visit to the dentist to the interview before him.
2. a. An instance of going to see, and assist or comfort, persons in distress.
1709. (title) A charitable Visit to the Prisons, containing counsel to those who are confined there.
1792. [R. Cecil] (title), A Friendly Visit to the House of Mourning.
b. A call made by a clergyman as part of his pastoral duties.
1724. A. Shields, Life J. Renwick, 114. No place did more desire his frequent Visits than those that were most persecuted for him.
1727. Hurrion, Funer. Serm. J. Nesbit, 41. His visits were generally short, but very agreeable, and useful.
c. A professional call made by a doctor on a patient.
1719. Boyer, Dict. Royal, I. s.v., The visit of a Physitian, or Surgeon.
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Visit, the attendance of a surgeon or physician, inspector, etc.
1861. Flor. Nightingale, Nursing, 35. For a doctor … to leave the patient and communicate his opinion on the result of his visit … within hearing … of the patient [etc.].
1890. J. W. Martin, Quest. & Answ. Nursing, 92. To report anything that may appear unusual to the Doctor at his next visit.
3. a. Surgical examination (of a wound). rare–1.
1796. Charlotte Smith, Marchmont, IV. 17. I am faint after a visit to my wound.
b. An instance (or the action) of going to a place, house, etc., for the purpose of inspection or examination.
1787. Burns, Lett. to M. Chalmers, Wks. (Globe), 352. I have been at Dumfries, and at one visit more shall be decided about a farm in that country.
1815. J. C. Hobhouse, Substance Lett. (1816), I. 29. The Emperor … examined the new manufacture of Arms…. Napoleon was accompanied only by three officers when he made this visit.
1861. M. Pattison, Ess. (1889), I. 48. Sir Thomas More made, as Chancellor, a domiciliary visit in search of heretical books.
1897. J. S. Risley, Law of War, III. viii. 265 (heading). The right of visit and search. A belligerent has the right … to visit and search every merchant ship at sea in time of war.
† 4. An occurrence of menstruation. Obs.
1653. T. Brugis, Vade Mecum (ed. 2), 112. Philonium Persicum … is good against the overmuch flowing of womens naturall visits. Ibid., 127. Myrrhe … procureth womens monthly visits.
1721. Bradley, Philos. Acc. Wks. Nat., 95. The Females of these have periodical Visits like Females of the Human Race.
5. attrib. and Comb., as visit-day, -paying; † visit-leg, a posture of politeness in paying a visit (cf. LEG sb. 4).
1673. Wycherley, Gent. Dancing-Master, IV. i. Blackamoor (teaching postures to M. de Paris). Now let me see you make your visit-leg—thus.
a. 1717. Parnell, Elegy to old Beauty, 29. With better Strength, on Visit-days she bears To mount her fifty Flights of ample Stairs.
1849. Thackeray, in Scribner’s Mag., I. 552/2. I have been most remiss in visit-paying.
