[f. WALK v.1 + -ING2.] That walks, in senses of the verb.
1. Moving about from place to place, travelling, itinerant. Now only with implication of sense 3.
a. 1425. Cursor M., 17478 (Trin.). In þat tyme out of Iude Of walkynge men were comen þre To þat folke tolde þei al bidene Þat þei had wiþ her eȝen sene.
c. 1430. Pilgr. Lyf Manhode, I. vi. (1869), 4. For it is thing wel sittinge to eche walkinge pilgrime.
1567. Harman, Caveat (1869), 67. A Walking Mort.
1613. Purchas, Pilgrimage, IV. xv. (1614), 421. Townes they [the Tartars] plant none nor standing villages, but haue walking houses built vpon wheeles, like a Shepheards Cottage.
1653. Walton, Angler, vii. 149. I call that [bait] a ledger which is fix’d, or made to rest in one certaine place … and … I call that a walking bait, which you take with you, and have ever in motion.
1720. C. Shadwell, Hasty Wedding, III. i. I am what they call a Walking-Merchant, one that gets my Living by the Sweat of my Brows.
† b. Leading a wandering life, vagrant, strolling. Obs.
149[?]. Anc. Deed, A. 7494 (P.R.O.). The seid Robert ordend ther j. bedd for poor walkyng pepull to be harborowed therin.
1592. Goudhurst Parish Reg. (MS.). Buried a poore old walking man.
1602. Carew, Cornwall, II. 131 b. Wideslades sonne led a walking life with his harpe, to Gentlemens houses.
1628. Lydd Parish Reg. (MS.). John, the sonne of a walkinge woman, christened.
1641. Brome, Joviall Crew, II. (1652), G 1. See in their rags, then, dauncing for your sports, Our Clapper Dugeons and their walking Morts.
c. Having a roving commission, going about from place to place. Walking delegate, a trades-union official who visits sick members, interviews employers, etc.
1663. Gerbier, Counsel, 59. The King told him he would have no walking Master Workman.
1892. Howells, Mercy, 131. She decided that he must be a walking-delegate, and that he had probably come on mischief from some of the workpeople in her father’s employ.
1897. Encycl. Soc. Reform, 1381. Walking delegate.
1902. S. E. White, Blazed Trail, iii. I think M. & D. is rather full up just now…. I’m walkin’-boss there.
† 2. Of a disease: Migratory. Obs.
c. 1400. Lanfranc’s Cirurg., 79. A walkynge vlcus [marg. [vlcus ambulatiuum] is þat walkiþ hidirward & þidirward, & neþeles he profoundiþ nouȝt depe into þe ground.
3. That travels or goes about on foot by moving the legs alternately without running.
1697. Dryden, Æneis, III. 852. Oft from the Rocks a dreadful Prospect [I] see Of the huge Cyclops, like a walking Tree.
1832. Brewster, Nat. Magic, i. 5. The walking statues at Antium.
1848. Mrs. Gaskell, Mary Barton, vi. It was a simple walking funeral.
1859. Jephson, Brittany, iv. 42. A walking Englishman was, no doubt, a curiosity.
† b. Funambulatory. Obs.
1730. A. Gordon, Maffei’s Amphith., 321. The walking Elephants on Ropes.
c. Walking sickness, an illness in which the person is still able to get about and is not confined to bed.
1846. M’Culloch, Acc. Brit. Empire, II. 571. In other chronic diseases, slow inflammations of internal organs, reduced dislocations, rheumatisms, ulcerations, the patient can attend partially to his business: he is in possession of half his faculties…. This is walking sickness.
4. Theat. Walking gentleman: an actor playing a part requiring gentlemanlike appearance, but with little or nothing to say. Similarly walking lady.
1831. T. L. Peacock, Crotchet C., ii. A sort of serious comedy walking gentleman’s face.
1835. Colburn’s New Monthly Mag., XLIII. 360. The respectably-dressed and well-looking young fellows in comedies are called walking gentlemen, and this is the probationary line of business usually assigned to young actors.
1865. W. Donaldson, Recoll. Actor, 176. Miss Smithson … was neither more nor less than the ‘walking lady.’
1885. Jerome, On the Stage, 132. R——, our Walking Gent., got his eye cut out.
fig. 1815. Scott, Guy M., xvi. A d—d cake-house, the resort of walking gentlemen of all descriptions—poets, players, painters, musicians, who come to rave … about this picturesque land of ours.
1827. Barrington, Personal Sk., I. iv. 62. Nothing … could induce me to remain a walking gentleman: and so, every occupation that I could think of having its peculiar disqualification, I remained [etc.].
1867. Goldw. Smith, Three Eng. Statesmen (1882), 130. George III. tried unconstitutional monarchy, first by Lord Bute, a walking-gentleman, and failed.
5. That goes about in the semblance of a human being. Often in figurative or similative expressions; e.g., walking corpse, applied to a person hardly distinguishable from a corpse save by the power of movement; walking dictionary, encyclopædia, library, etc., said of a person who has great stores of information at command.
Cf. Eunapius, Vitæ Soph., Λογγῖνος βιβλιοθἠκη τις ἦν ἔμψυχος καὶ περιπατοῦν μουσεῖον.
1605. Shaks., Macb., V. v. 24. Life’s but a walking Shadow, a poore Player, That struts and frets his houre vpon the Stage, And then is heard no more.
1611. Beaum. & Fl., Maid’s Trag., III. i. Alas! I am nothing but a multitude of walking griefes.
a. 1625. Fletcher, Captain, II. ii. [His body is] a Trunk-sellar, to send wines down in, Or a long walking-bottle.
1691. Wood, Ath. Oxon., I. 337. Mathew Slade … was … a stiff Enemy to the Socinians, and a walking Library.
1693. J. Edwards, Author. O. & N. Test., I. 401. Wherever these walking Corpes, (these Carkases) were to be seen.
1775. Sheridan, Duenna, III. vii. Dare such a thing as you pretend to talk of beauty? A walking rouleau! a body that seems to owe all its consequence to the dropsy!
1818. Scott, Hrt. Midl., ii. Looking like a moving and walking corpse, while yet an inhabitant of this world.
1835. Lytton, Gipsy, v. Heaven deliver me from the proximity of a walking dictionary of technical terms!
1889. Rayne Butler, in Cornishman, 15 Aug., 6/1. ‘Feel like a walking encyclopædia?’ he asked kindly.
6. Of a spectre: That ‘walks’ or appears.
1607. Dekker & Webster, Northw. Hoe, III. E 1. Was there euer any walking spirit, like to my wife?
1709. Penn, in Pennsylv. Hist. Soc. Mem., X. 354. I have my old order of … 1685 … ratified and confirmed, which has laid those walking ghosts.
7. Of a bird: That walks, as distinguished from one that hops. Walking tyrant: a South American tyrant-flycatcher, Machetornis rixosa.
1837. W. Swainson, Nat. Hist. & Classif. Birds, II. 225. Chrysolophus, Sw. Walking Tyrants.
8. Walking Fern: (a) a club-moss (see quot. 1829); (b) a small tufted evergreen fern, Camptosorus rhizophyllus, native of eastern North America (Cent. Dict., 1891): = WALKING-LEAF 1 b. Walking Orchid: see quot.
1829. Loudon, Encycl. Plants (1836), 892. Lycopodium alopecuroides. Walking Fern.
1910. Friar Park, Henley, Guide (ed. 3), 244. Orchis maculata. The Walking Orchid. This Orchid, like several other species, seeks new pastures every year.
