arch. and dial. Also 6 whyst(e, whiste. [f. WHIST int.1 Cf. HUST, WHISHT, WHUSHT adjs.] Silent, quiet, still, hushed; making no sound; free from noise or disturbance. (Usually predicative.)
Also advb. = silently, quietly, without noise.
14[?]. Chaucer’s Boeth., II. met. v. (MS. B. Mus.). Þo weren þe cruel clariouns ful whist [MS. Camb. hust] and ful stille.
1513. Lydgate’s Chron. Troy, I. viii. E j b. Than Pelleus whan al was whyste [MSS. huscht, hust, husshte] and styll, Began ryght thus.
1528. Roy, Rede me (Arb.), 65. Kepe thou silence and be whyst … For a lytell season.
1588. Greene, Pandosto, C 1 b. The Noblemen seeing the King in choler, were all whist. Ibid. (1590), Never Too Late, Wks. (Grosart), VIII. 228. The blythe and wanton windes are whist & still.
1610. Shaks., Temp., I. ii. 379. Curtsied when you haue, and kist the wilde waues whist.
1615. G. Sandys, Trav., 307. In nights whist calme.
1629. Milton, Hymn Nativ., v. The Windes, with wonder whist, Smoothly the waters kist.
1682. T. Flatman, Heraclitus Ridens, No. 70 (1713), II. 179. Some few Relations … stand whist and silent, expecting the minute when she should depart.
1700. J. Brome, Trav. Eng., Scot., ii. (1707), 83. All was very whist and still.
1819. J. R. Drake, Culprit Fay, ii. The winds are whist, and the owl is still.
1890. Bridges, Shorter Poems, IV. XXVIII. v. The huge unclouded sun, Surprising the world whist, Is all uprisen thereon.
1907. Daily Chron., 8 April, 4/6. The word ‘whist’ has still its … signification of silence in Kent, though it is pronounced ‘wist.’ This writer, not long ago, was threatening to come in late … to a country cottage lodging. ‘You’ll come in wist?’ said the lady of the house.
b. Keeping silence in relation to something; saying nothing about the matter.
1577. Stanyhurst, Descr. Irel., 6/1, in Holinshed. If he heard them, thinke you that he would haue beene whist, in hearing God so far blasphemed?
1609. J. Davies, Holy Rood, Wks. (Grosart), I. 8/1. The heau’ns are whist, whiles hell reuiles their Lord.
c. 1650. in 12th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm., App. IX. 140. Yet they can silent be, though, when they list, On Charles his Martyrdome they are all whist.
1880. Mrs. Whitney, Odd or Even? vii. 59. The Heybrooks were whist folks about their concerns.
c. transf. Attentive. nonce-use.
[1580. Lyly, Euphues (Arb.), 283. All were whist to heare my iudgement.]
1890. Bridges, Shorter Poems, IV. II. iv. My jealous ears grew whist.
Whist a.2 (dial.): see WISHT.
