[WATERING vbl. sb.]
1. A place in a river or lake where animals are brought to obtain water: also a pool or trough prepared for the use of cattle and horses.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 518/2. Watrynge place, where beestys byn wateryd … adaquarium.
1478. Botoner, Itin. (1778), 168. Ultra le Weere et le wateryng place.
1558. Nottingham Rec., IV. 119. For maykyng of wattryng places in the Cowpasture.
1769. Aclome Inclos. Act, 6. Such ground as the said Commissioners may set out for any common watering place or places.
1816. Scott, Old Mort., xxxix. The by-path … brought him … to the brink of the Clyde, at a spot marked with the feet of horses, who were conducted to it as a watering-place.
1819. Rees’ Cycl., VI. R 4, s.v. Canal, Watering places for cattle are generally directed to be made, especially where the fields have been deprived of their old ones by the cutting of their canal.
1890. ‘R. Boldrewood,’ Col. Reformer, xx. One of the best watering-places … on the run.
2. A place where a ship’s company goes to fill the ship’s casks with fresh water.
1613. J. Saris, Voy. Japan (Hakl. Soc.), 3. The 16th we anchored at the watering place called Tinga Jaua, being 14 leagues from Bantam.
1720. De Foe, Capt. Singleton, xii. (1840), 209. We sent the … boats … to the watering-place.
1815. Falconer’s Dict. Marine (ed. Burney), Watering-Place, a situation where boats can load with fresh water for the use of ships.
1919. Eng. Hist. Rev., July, 283. St. Helena … the chief remaining watering-place on the direct route between the Comoros and home waters.
b. gen. A place where a supply of water can be obtained.
1621. in Foster, Eng. Factories Ind. (1906), 288. Wee had all sortes of refreshments untill certayne Portingalls … forbid and defended the watering-place.
1856. Stanley, Sinai & Pal., vii. (1858), 287. It [the Jordan] is still the ‘Sheriat-el-Khebir’ the ‘great watering-place’ of the Bedouin tribes.
1908. Parish Councils, 15. At Gaydon (Warwickshire) the parish council was given a good supply of water…. The parish council of Humshaugh … has bought the freehold of a small piece of land,… so as to secure for ever a public watering place.
3. A resort of fashionable or holiday visitants, either for drinking or bathing in the waters of a mineral spring, or for sea-bathing.
1757. Foote, Author, I. Wks. 1799, I. 137. Tunbridge, Bristol, and the other watering places.
1806–7. J. Beresford, Miseries Hum. Life, xiv. § 33. A Watering Place does not want the help of the sea to make it execrable; the inland Spa is not a jot behind the Fishing-town in the article of tortures.
1822. W. Irving, Life & Lett. (1864), II. 80. I shall … go to a watering-place on the continent.
1855. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., xvi. III. 652. Teignmouth, now a gay watering place consisting of twelve hundred houses.
1891. T. Hardy, Tess, lvi. In a quarter of an hour the news … spread through every street and villa of the popular watering-place.
1899. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., VII. 461. The treatment for gout—including in one case a visit to Aix-les-Bains and other European ‘watering places.’
b. attrib.
1837. Ht. Martineau, Soc. Amer., III. 93. Such watering-place manners as I saw at Rockaway are considered and called vulgar on the spot.
1842. Lover, Handy Andy, xlviii. The Honourable Sackville Scatterbrain,… fortunately for himself, had knocked up a watering-place match.
1854. Surtees, Handley Cr., ii. (1901), I. 15. A watering-place public, ever ready for excitement, soon divided the place into Swizzleites and Melloites.
1890. Gunter, Miss Nobody, viii. (1891), 88. The long round of watering-place dissipations.
