White a.

Forms: 1–3 hwit, (1 huit, 3 ȝwit, ȝwijȝt), 3–4 wit, wyt, 3–6 (7–9 dial.) whit, (4 whijt, whiȝt(e, huyt, with, wythe, wyht, quiht, quitte), 4–5 wyte, quyt(e, quite, (wyth), 4–6 qwyt(e, Sc. quhit, 4, 5–7 Sc. quhite, 4–6, 7 Sc. whyt, whyte, 4–8 Sc. quhyt, (5 hwyte, whiyt, whyȝte, why(g)th(e, wyghte, wytht, wytte, qwhyt(t)e, qwhite, qwhyet, qwyght, Sc. qwhit), 5–6 whitt(e, (whight, whyght(e, Sc. quhytt), 5–7 Sc. quhyte, 6 whytt(e, (whith, whyth, whiet, wyet, wyȝht, wight, whait, weit, weyte, Sc. vhyt, quhet), 6–7 wheat, 3– white. Comp. whiter, sup. whitest; also, with shortened vowel, 3 hwittere, -ore, -ure, 4–5 quitter, 4–6 whitter, (4 queþer, 5 qwhittar); 5 whyttest. [OE. hwít = OFris., OS. hwît, OHG. (h)wîʓ (MHG. wîʓ, G. weiss), ON. hvítr (Sw. vit, Da. hvid), Goth. hweits:—OTeut. *χwītaz.

  The shortened form whit (now dial.) was presumably generalized from the comp. whitter or from compounds like whitbred, whitþorn, where shortening is normal.

  The grade χwit- is represented by OFris. hwitt, (M)Du., (M)LG. wit (-tt-):—*χwittaz, prob.:—Indo-eur. *kwidnos, *kwitnos, the root of which is found also in Skr. *çvid (perf. çiçvinde) to be white, Lith. szvidùs bright, Lett. swīst to dawn, and Skr. *çvit to be bright or white, çvitrá- whitish, white, Zend spaeta white, Lith. szvintù to be bright, OSl. svētū light, svitatī to dawn.]

  1.  Of the color of snow or milk; having that color produced by reflection, transmission or emission of all kinds of light in the proportion in which they exist in the complete visible spectrum, without sensible absorption, being thus fully luminous and devoid of any distinctive hue.

c. 950.  Lindisf. Gosp., John xx. 12. Tuoeʓe engles in huitum ʓeʓerelum.

c. 1000.  Ags. Gosp., Matt. v. 36. Þu ne miht ænne locc ʓedon hwitne oððe blacne.

c. 1200.  Trin. Coll. Hom., 57. Sume bereð clene cloð to watere to blechen him, þat hit beo wit. Ibid., 163. Hire chemise is smal and hwit.

c. 1250.  Gen. & Ex., 2810. In hise bosum he dede his hond, Quit and al unfer he it fond.

1297.  R. Glouc. (Rolls), 2786. Tueye grete dragons … Þe on was red þe oþer wyt.

a. 1300.  Cursor M., 17288 + 216. Two aungels … Cled in white clothez.

c. 1300.  Havelok, 1144. An hold with couel.

13[?].  E. E. Allit. P., A. 220. Bornyste quyte was hyr uesture.

1340–70.  Alex. & Dind., 719. A swan swiþe whit.

c. 1380.  Wyclif, Wks. (1880), 357. Þe oost sacrid, whijt & round.

1423.  James I., Kingis Q., xlvi. Hir goldin haire and rich atyre … couchit were with perllis quhite.

1471.  Caxton, Recuyell (Sommer), 701. Myn eyen [are] dimmed with ouermoche lokyng on the whit paper.

1514.  Rec. St. Mary at Hill (1904), 20. Oon hole sute of vestymenttes, Whight or Blake.

1541.  Test. Ebor. (Surtees), VI. 135. A gowne … the one side blake and the other side whitt.

1556.  J. Heywood, Spider & F., lx. 5. With wheat tuskes fo[t]mde like a bore.

a. 1586.  Montgomerie, Misc. Poems, xxv. 1. The tender snow, of granis soft & quhyt [rhyme delyte].

1590.  Spenser, F. Q., II. iii. 26. She … was yclad … All in a silken Camus lylly whight.

a. 1650.  Norgate, Miniatura (1919), 52. Insteed of abortive parchment, by some called Gilding Vellum, make use of your pure white velim.

1733.  Budgell, Bee, II. 924. It proving a Maiden Assizes, the Sheriffs, according to Custom, presented the Judges with white Gloves.

1806.  Scott, Palmer, i. The glen is white with the drifted snow.

1833.  Tennyson, Miller’s Dau., 130. The lanes … were white with may.

1860.  Tyndall, Glac., II. i. 227. White light … is made up of an infinite number of coloured rays.

1912.  C. N. & A. M. Williamson, Guests of Hercules, xvii. 210. The moon had full power, a round white moon that flooded the night with silver.

  b.  Of the color of the hair or beard in old age; also transf. of the person, white-haired, hoary.

c. 1290.  S. Eng. Leg., 265/145. Hire her was hor and swiþe ȝwijȝi, as þei it were wolle.

1390.  Gower, Conf., I. 111. Here berdes weren hore and whyte.

c. 1440.  Partonope, 155. A knyghte, þe wyche hyte Nestor, Wyche for age was whyte and hore.

1448–9.  Metham, Amoryus & Cleopes, 1027. The qwyght herys Off sapyens.

1596.  Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., II. iv. 514. That hee is olde … his white hayres doe witnesse it.

1684.  Bunyan, Pilgr., II. Introd. Old Honest,… With his white hairs treading the Pilgrim’s ground.

1724.  Ramsay, Vision, v. His quhyt heid.

1887.  F. M. Crawford, Saracinesca, iii. His white hair and beard bristled about his dark face.

  c.  In comparisons usually hyperbolical.

  esp. as white as (or whiter than) snow, milk (cf. SNOW-WHITE, MILK-WHITE); as white as lily flower, glass, a swan (cf. SWAN-WHITE), whales bone, flour, a neap, wool, curds, and (in sense 5) a cloth, sheet, ghost.

c. 1000.  Ags. Gosp., Matt. xvii. 2. Hys rear wæron swa hwite swa snaw.

c. 1200.  Vices & Virtues, 83. Ðanne wurð ic iclansed of alle mine sennes, and hwittere ðane ani snaw.

c. 1290.  S. Eng. Leg., 85/80. A coluere … so ȝwijt so milk.

a. 1300.  Cursor M., 10380. Ten lambes, quitte als milk.

a. 1300.  K. Horn, 15 (Camb.). He was whit so þe flur [Harl. So whit so eny lylye flour].

c. 1330.  Syr Degarre, 15. The kynge had … A doughter as whight as whales bone.

c. 1330.  R. Brunne, Chron. Wace (Rolls), 2081. Scheo hadde a mayden childe: Sabren hit highte, as whit as glas.

13[?].  Seuyn Sages (W.) 78. Faire of chere and white as swan.

1375.  Barbour, Bruce, VIII. 232. Hawbrekis, that war quhit as flour.

c. 1480.  Henryson, Fox, Wolf & Husb., 165. Quhyte as ane Neip, and round als as ane schell.

1508.  Dunbar, Gold. Targe, 51. A saill, als quhite as blossum vpon spray.

1533.  Gau, Richt Vay, 63. Giff thay be reid as purpur neuertheles yai sal be quhit as wow.

1590.  Spenser, F. Q., I. i. 4. Vpon a lowly Asse more white then snow, Yet she much whiter.

a. 1732.  Gay, Songs, New Song of New Similes, xiii. As smooth as glass, as white as curds.

1885.  ‘Mrs. Alexander,’ At Bay, iv. I am as white as driven snow compared to some blackguards.

  d.  In allusive or proverbial phr., chiefly in collocation with black: cf. WHITE sb. 17 d.

1377.  Langl., P. Pl., B. X. 436. And wherby wote men whiche is whyte if alle þinge blake were?

c. 1403.  Lydg., Temple of Glas, 1250. White is whitter, if it be set bi blak.

1546.  J. Heywood, Prov. (1867), 56. Were not you as good than to say, the crow is whight.

1581, 1604.  [see BLACKAMOOR 1].

1662.  Stillingfl., Orig. Sacræ, I. v. § 5. I think they have striven if not to make an Ethiopian white, yet an Ægyptian to speak truth concerning his own Country.

  2.  In looser or wider senses. a. Of a light or pale color: applied to things of various indefinite hues approaching white, esp. dull or pale shades of yellow. (See also following senses, and WHITE BREAD, WINE, etc.)

c. 950.  Lindisf. Gosp., John iv. 35. Uidete regiones quia albæ sunt … ad messem, ʓeseað ða lond forðon huito sint ʓee … to hrippe.

c. 1300.  Havelok, 1729. Win hwit and red, ful god plente.

a. 1400–50.  Bk. Curtasye, 701, in Babees Bk. A qwyte cuppe of tre.

c. 1430.  Two Cookery-bks., 29. Hwyte Hony or Sugre.

1523–34.  Fitzherb., Husb., § 13. Sprot-barley hath a flat eare … and the cornes be very great and white.

1626.  Bacon, Sylva, § 874. Water of the Sea … looketh Blacker when it is moued, and Whiter when it resteth.

1664.  Evelyn, Sylva, xix. 42. Such [osiers] as are for White-work (as they call it). Ibid. (a. 1700), Diary, 22 Oct. 1685. The canal and fish ponds, the one fed with a white, the other with a black running water.

1769.  Falconer, Dict. Marine (1780), Cordage blanc, white, or untarred cordage.

1846.  G. Dodd, Brit. Manuf., VI. 196. When a rope is to be used in the open air, but under cover, it is left in the ‘white’ state; that is, it is not coated with tar or any other substance.

  (b)  spec. applied to crops of corn or grain, formerly called white corn (cf. CORN sb.¹ 3), which turn ‘white’ or light-colored in ripening, as distinguished from black and green crops: see CROP sb. 9. Hence transf. of land or soil adapted for such crops.

1523–34.  Fitzherb., Husb., § 27. The sherers of all maner of whyte corne.

1677.  Plot, Oxfordsh., 240. If it be of that poorest sort they call white-land, nothing is so proper as ray-grass mixt with Non-such, or Melilot Trefoil.

1780.  A. Young, Tour Irel., I. 197. Pease esteemed a refreshment, and enables them to have one or two crops of white corn.

1799.  J. Robertson, Agric. Perth, 451. By the alternate changes of white and green crops.

1805.  Forsyth, Beauties Scot., II. 66. The soils under tillage are commonly arranged into two kinds;… light and clayey. The former is called turnip or green soil; and the latter, white soil, because it is best adapted for growing oats, wheat, and other white grains.

c. 1830.  Glouc. Farm Rep., 4, in Libr. Usef. Knowl., Husb., III. No white or corn crop should be repeated in too rapid succession.

  b.  Of metal, or objects made of metal, of a light grey color and lustrous appearance. † Frequent in early use as an epithet of silver; hence = made or consisting of silver; also (of iron or steel armor) burnished and shining, without coloring or stain. See also white metal, money (in 11 c), rent (in 11 e), WHITE IRON

  Also technically applied to silver ware chased or roughened with the tool, as distinguished from burnished silver.

c. 1000.  Ælfric, Josh. vii. 21. Twahund entsena hwites seolfres.

a. 1225.  Ancr. R. 152. Read gold & hwit seoluer.

a. 1400–50.  Wars Alex., 129. Quadrentis coruen all of quyte siluyre.

1419.  Mem. Ripon (Surtees), III. 145. Et in D. de quytnayles empt. eod. temp.

1506.  Lincoln Wills (1914), I. 44. A whytepece with a coveryng.

1530.  Palsgr., 288/2. White harnesse, blanche armure.

1542.  Inv. Royal Wardr. (1815), 72. Quhyt Werk. Item ane greit bassing for feit wesching.

a. 1627.  Middleton, etc., Widow, IV. ii. A white thimble that I found i’ moon light.

1667.  Dryden & Dk. Newc., Sir M. Mar-all, V. Hang your white pelf.

1761.  Ann. Reg., Chron., 232. One of his majesty’s best suits of white armour.

1816.  Scott, Antiq., xi. Four white shillings and saxpence.

1856.  Miller, Elem. Chem., Inorg., xv. § 674. Tin is a white metal with a tinge of yellow.

  c.  Colorless, uncolored, as glass or other transparent substance.

c. 888.  Ælfred, Boeth., XXXII. § 3. Æʓðer ʓe hwite ʓimmas ʓe reade.

1398.  Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XVI. cii. (1495), M iv b/2. Those [sc. Zineth stones] that ben whyttest … ben not so precyous.

a. 1425.  trans. Arderne’s Treat. Fistula, etc., 54. Poudre of white glasse.

1662.  Merrett, trans. Neri’s Art of Glass, 147. The pots wherein Enamels are made must be glased with white glass and bear the fire.

1738.  Deering, Catal. Stirp., 128. I observed thousands of little white Bubbles filled with Water upon it which when exhaled by the Sun, shrink away and leave a kind of Pits behind nor unlike those of the small Pox.

1890.  C. H. Moore, Gothic Archit., x. 303. White glass is introduced here and there [in a stained-glass window] to heighten the effect.

  d.  Blank, not written or printed upon; † (of a document) unendorsed (cf. white-backed in 12 c).

1466.  Stonor Papers (Camden), I. 87. Ye seye þat ye have paid þe money: þer for y sende yowe the writte white.

a. 1550[?].  Faine wald I, 33, in Dunbar’s Poems (S.T.S.), 311. Gif lytil rewarde be in wryting, Bettir war leif my paper quhyle.

a. 1600.  Flodden Field, lviii. Sweet sonne Edward, white bookes thou make, And euer have pittye on the pore cominaltye.

1680, 1772, 1859.  [see white paper (b) in 11 e].

1683, 1770.  [see WHITE LINE 2].

  3.  Of or in reference to the skin or complexion: Light in color, fair. (Often as a poetic term of commendation.) Now rare or Obs. exc. as in 4.

a. 900.  Cynewulf, Elene, 73. Wlitescyne … hwit & hiwbeorht hæleða nathwylc.

a. 1225.  Ancr. R., 116. Hire sulf biholden hire owune honden hwite.

1297.  R. Glouc. (Rolls), 566. In þe worlde her pere nas, So ȝwit ne of suich color.

a. 1300.  Cursor M., 28010. Yee leuedis, wit your quite hals.

c. 1374.  Chaucer, Troylus, II. 1062. Þow Mynerua þe white, Yef þow me wit my lettre to deuyse.

1422.  Yonge, trans. Secreta Secret., 225. Pyteous and merciabill man tokenyth white coloure and cleene.

c. 1480.  Henryson, Thre Deid Pollis, 25. O ladeis quhyt, in claithis corruscant.

15[?].  Dunbar, Poems, lxxxviii. 46. Fair be their wives, right lovesom, white and small.

1598.  Marston, Pigmal., Reactio, 35. Ye Granta’s white Nymphs come.

1689.  N. Lee, Princess of Cleve, II. ii. He has … a Skin so white —— and soft as Sattin with the Grain.

  4.  Applied to those races of men (chiefly European or of European extraction) characterized by light complexion, as distinguished from black or negro, red, yellow, etc. Also transf. See also whitefellow, white slave, etc., in 11 e, and WHITE MAN.

  Poor white folks or trash: a contemptuous name given in America by negroes to white people of no substance (1836, etc. in Thornton, Amer. Gloss.).

1604.  E. G[rimstone], D’Acosta’s Hist. Indies, II. xi. 106. Under the same line … lies a part of Peru, and of the new kingdom of Grenado, which … are very temperate Countries,… and the inhabitants are white.

1680.  C. Nesse, Ch. Hist., 27. The White Line, (the Posterity of Seth,) … the black Line the Cursed brood of Cain.

1774.  Summary Acc. Tobago 29. The white inhabitants … do not exceed seven hundred. The negroes, amounting to about twelve thousand, are kept in awe by an active militia.

1852.  Mrs. Stowe, Uncle Tom’s C., xxiii. He had white blood in his veins.

1856.  Olmsted, Slave States, 84. I have been … told that the poor white people, meaning those, I suppose, who bring nothing to market to exchange for money but their labor,… are worse off in almost all respects than the slaves.

1865.  Whittier, Lesson & our Duty, Prose Wks. 1889, VII. 151. The negro is to be left powerless in the hands of the ‘White trash,’ who hate him with a bitter hatred.

1870.  Kingsley, At Last, xvi. Exclusive sugar cultivation had put a premium on unskilled slave-labour, to the disadvantage of skilled white-labour.

1896.  Baden-Powell, Matabele Campaign, xviii. The white power of South Africa.

1921.  Round Table, March, 312. The adoption of the White Australia policy—the determination to keep Australia white, a home for European races, is the first exercise of the national conscience.

  b.  slang or colloq. (by extension from WHITE MAN 3; orig. U.S.) Honorable; square-dealing. Also as adv.

1877.  Besant & Rice, Golden Butterfly, xviii. A good fellow is Rayner; as white a man as I ever knew.

1890.  Century Mag., Feb., 523/2. There ain’t a whiter man than Laramie Jack from the Wind River Mountains down to Santa Fe.

1913.  Edith Wharton, Cust. Country, ix. Well—this is white of you. Ibid., xviii. I meant to act white by you.

  5.  † a. In early use app. applied to illness marked by pallor. Obs. b. Pale, pallid, esp. from fear or other emotion. (Often in hyperbolical phr. as white as a sheet.) Also in allusive phrases expressing cowardice (cf. WHITE-LIVER, -LIVERED), and transf. (as in white rage, terror).

  Phr. To bleed white: (a) intr. (hyperbolically) to shed colorless blood (rare); (b) trans. to drain completely of resources.

c. 1403.  Clanvowe, Cuckow & Night., 41. I am so shaken with the fevers whyte, Of al this May yet slepte I but a lyte.

1412–20.  Lydg., Chron. Troy, IV. 2369. While he laie þus in his þrowes white.

a. 1508.  Dunbar, Tua Mariit Wemen, 426. Than lay I furtgh my bright buke on breid on my knee … And drawis my clok forthwart our my face quhit.

1592.  Shaks., Ven. & Ad., 643. Didst thou not marke my face, was it not white? Sawest thou not signes of feare lurke in mine eye? Ibid. (1596), Merch. V., III. ii. 86. How manie cowards … weare … The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars, Who inward searcht, haue lyuers white as milke. Ibid. (1605), Macb., II. ii. 65. I shame To weare a Heart so white.

1626.  Bp. Hall, Contempl., XIII. David & Gol. Now wee see … those, which haue giuen good proofes of magnanimitie, at other times, haue bewrayed white liuers.

1753.  Jane Collier, Art Torment., I. ii. 46. She … looks as white as a cloth.

1799.  Southey, Bp. Hatto, 35. He had a countenance white with alarm.

1841.  S. Warren, Ten Thou., I. x. He hurried down … white with rage.

1854.  Dickens, Hard T., I. ii. His skin was so unwholesomely deficient in the natural tinge, that he looked as though, if he were cut, he would bleed white.

1860.  Shirley Brooks, Gordian Knot, ii. The most gentlemanly millionaire of them all has since been transported, and another is in white terror of a similar destiny.

1866.  G. Macdonald, Ann. Q. Neighb., xxxii. She is as white as a sheet.

1885.  ‘F. Anstey,’ Tinted Venus, vi. He was in a white rage.

1897.  Hall Caine, Christian, III. xii. The man … turned white as a ghost.

  6.  a. Clothed or arrayed in white; spec. belonging to an ecclesiastical order distinguished by wearing a white habit (see also White Canons s.v. CANON² 1, and WHITE FRIAR, WHITE MONK).

  White ball: a ball at which all the ladies are dressed in white.

a. 1225.  Leg. Kath., 1576. Ha seh sitten þis meiden mid monie hwite wurðliche men.

a. 1400.  Prymer (1891), 22. The white [L. candidatus] oost of martires.

c. 1400.  Brut, 314. Þere aros anoþer cumpanye of diuers nacions þat was called ‘þe white companye,’ þe whiche, in þe parties & cuntre of Lumbardye, dede myche sorwe.

c. 1420.  Sir Amadace (Camden), xxxviii. Quod the quite knyȝte ‘Quat mon is this?’

c. 1450.  Holland, Howlat, 178. The Se Mawis war monkis, the blak and the quhyte.

1470–85.  Malory, Arthur, XIII. ix. 623. He came to a whyte Abbay.

1598.  Shaks., Merry W., V. v. 41. Fairies blacke, gray, greene, and white.

1659.  in Morris, Troubles Cath. Foref. (1872), I. vi. 316. Seventy-two … were Nuns of the Choir, the rest White Sisters and Lay-sisters.

1895.  E. M. Hewitt, in Pall Mall Mag., Sept., 140. A month after Mamie’s arrival Lidian gave a ‘white ball’ in her honour.

1903.  P. J. Chandlery, Pilgr.-Walks Rome, 126. They are like nuns, and are affiliated to the Olivetans, or white Benedictines.

  b.  From the 17th century white has been specially associated with royalist and legitimist causes (e.g., the white flag of the Bourbons), and hence in recent times white has been applied to certain constitutional or anti-revolutionary parties and the policy for which they stand. (See WHITE sb. 19, and cf. RED a. 9 b.)

1749.  J. Ray, Compl. Hist. Reb., 331. She got together all her Clan, and marched at their Head (with a white Cockade, &c.) and presented them to the Mock Prince. Ibid., 341. The Rebel Army were assembled with their White Flags displayed.

a. 1784.  Johnson, in Boswell, an. 1763, note. Boswell, in the year 1745,… wore a white cockade, and prayed for King James.

1848.  Redhead, Fr. Rev., II. 302. In suppressing the tricolour, and substituting in its stead the white flag, it inflicted a wound upon the sensibility of the meanest soldier.

1849.  W. C. Taylor, House of Orleans, III. 222. He had been one of the first to raise the White Flag in 1814; he had levied a regiment of Royalists during the hundred days.

1879.  J. Macdonell, France since 1st Empire, 117. The French ministers could show clemency at Paris, but they were not so well able to keep down the fury of the Royalists in the provinces. Thus was the Red Terror succeeded by the White.

1903.  Daily Chron., 20 June, 3/2. His position is that known in Italy as ‘White,’ or constitutional, as compared with the clerical ‘Blacks’ and the republican ‘Reds.’

1918.  Times, 9 April, 6/4. (Finland) Germany has secured a strong hold on the gratitude of ‘White’ public opinion, Ibid. The White Army as a whole is overwhelmingly pro-German.

  7.  fig. Morally or spiritually pure or stainless; spotless, unstained, innocent.

971.  Blickl. Hom., 147. Hwylc is of us Drihten þæt hæbbe swa hwite saule swa þeos haliʓe Marie?

a. 1225.  Ancr. R., 324. Vor euere so heo [sc. the soul] is hwitture, so þe fulðe is schenre.

c. 1450.  Capgrave, Life St. Aug., xv. Whech seruauntis our Lord God had bront fro þe grete blaknesse of synne on-to þe fair white vertuous lyuyng.

1603.  Shaks., Meas. for M., III. ii. 198. Back wounding calumnie The whitest vertue strikes.

1608.  Bp. Hall, Char., I. 21. Hee hath white hands, and a cleane soule.

1616.  B. Jonson, Epigr., xciii. I doe not know a whiter soule.

1645.  G. Daniel, Scattered Fancies, xxxiii. Dut Danger onlie gvilt attends; I bring White Thoughts.

1737.  Pope, Hor. Epist., II. i. 216. In our own [days] … No whiter page than Addison remains.

1859.  Hawthorne, Marble Faun, xxiii. There can be no harm to my white Hilda in one parting kiss.

1862.  Trollope, Orley F., xxxvi. It is I whose duty it is to see that your name be made white again.

  b.  Free from malignity or evil intent; beneficent, innocent, harmless, esp. as opposed to something characterized as black (cf. BLACK a. 8, 9): chiefly in phr. white lie (see LIE sb.¹ 1 b), white magic (MAGIC sb. 1 b; cf. BLACK ART); see also white paternoster s.v. PATERNOSTER 2, and WHITE WITCH.

1651.  C. Cartwright, Cert. Relig., III. 36. He did not know whether his admonisher were black or white … an evill or a good spirit.

1655.  Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. v. § 12. He made his Harp … make musick of it self; which no White Art could perform.

1718.  Bp. Hutchinson, Witchcraft, ii. 26. A Teacher of the White Magic, that pretends to deal only with Good Angels.

1749–50.  Richardson, in Mrs. Barbauld, Corr. (1804), IV. 316. Don’t you think … that I have reason to exclaim against white fibs?

1828.  Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. III. Admiral on Shore. Julia … asserted her female privilege of white-lying, and declared [etc.].

1855.  Kingsley, Westw. Ho! iv. They be mortal feared of witches,… and mortal hard on ’em, even on a pure body like me, that doth a bit in the white way.

1914.  Sir E. Shackleton, in Boston Globe, 29 Oct., 18/6. I send you my last cable as we start for the Antarctic. We are leaving now to carry on our white warfare.

  8.  (Chiefly of times and seasons) Propitious, favorable; auspicious, fortunate, happy. Now rare.

1629.  Shirley, Grateful Serv., II. i. Till this white houre, these walles were neuer proud, T’inclose a guest.

1638–56.  Cowley, Davideis, II. 830. Thy Fate’s all white.

1660.  Dryden, Astræa Redux, 292. And now times whiter Series is begun.

1728.  Ramsay, Bonny Christy, iv. He wisely this white Minute took, And flang his Arms about her.

1749.  Fielding, Tom Jones, VIII. xi. What is called by Schoolboys Black Monday, was to me the whitest in the whole Year.

1830.  Lytton, P. Clifford, xxix. I will not even press you to appoint that day, which to me will be the whitest of my life.

1855.  Macaulay, Hist. Eng., xvii. IV. 2. That was one of the few white days of a life, beneficent indeed … but far from happy.

  † 9.  Highly prized, precious; dear, beloved, favorite, ‘pet’; ‘darling.’ Often as a vague term of endearment. (See also white son in 11 e, and WHITE BOY.) Obs.

c. 1425.  Non-Cycle Myst. Plays (1909), 33. Take vp Isaac, þi son so whyte.

c. 1537.  in Ellis, Orig. Lett., Ser. III. III. 126. Master Pole … entred secretly in to a Monasterye … called Seynt Justyns, wheras he is ther wyte God and they his blacke angells.

1602.  2nd Pt. Return fr. Parnass., II. vi. I shall bee his little roague, and his white villaine for a whole weeke after.

1634.  Heywood, Lanc. Witches, I. i. Wks. 1874, IV. 184. A merry song now mother, and thou shalt be my white girle.

1646.  Extr. Kirk-Session Rec. Dunfermline (1865), 17. Jonet Wely … had slandered grissell walwood spouse to Joⁿ alisone, wright, calling hir white bird.

1647.  Trapp, Comm. Matt. xiv. 3. If Iohn touch Herods white sin … Iohn must to prison.

  † 10.  Fair-seeming, specious, plausible. Obs.

c. 1374.  Chaucer, Troylus, III. 901. I … feffe hym with a fewe wordes whyte. Ibid., 1567. For alle youre wordes whyte.

1412–20.  Lydg., Chron. Troy, III. 4272. Hir wordis white, softe, & blaundyshynge, Wer meynt with feynyng & with flaterie.

c. 1480.  Henryson, Cock & Fox, 205. Flatteraris with plesand wordis quhyle.

1513.  Douglas, Æneis, I. xi. 34. The schyning vissage of the god Cupyte, And his dissemelit slekit wordis quhyte.

1612.  Sir J. Davies, Why Ireland, etc., 93. The faire and white promises of Lewes the 11.

1613.  Chapman, Rev. Bussy d’Ambois, V. i. This bloud I shed, is to saue the bloud Of many thousands. Guise. That’s your white pretext.

1721.  Kelly, Sc. Prov., 158. The Scots call Flatteries Whitings, and Flatterers white People.

1825.  Jamieson, White-Wind, flattery, wheedling; a cant term.

  11.  Special collocations. a. In names of species or varieties of animals distinguished by their white color or coloring: as white ant, bear, fox, heron, herring, pelican, perch, shark, stork, trout, wagtail, whale, for which see the sbs.; also white-bird. (a) a name for the spotted flycatcher; (b) see quot. 1875; white game [GAME sb. 11], grouse = while partridge; white grub, the larva of the cockchafer or other scarabæid; white mouse (see e below); white partridge ? Obs., the ptarmigan; white slipper (limpet), snail (see quots.); white worm = white grub; see also WHITEBAIT, WHITEFISH, etc. b. In names of plants distinguished by white flowers or other parts, light-colored bark, wood, root, fruit, seed, etc.; also applied to such flowers, wood, etc.: as white beech, beet, bind, bine, birch, broom, cedar, clover, currant, dead-nettle, elm, grape, hellebore, honeysuckle, horehound, jasmine, lilac, mustard, oak, oats, peas, pepper, pine, poplar, raspberry, rot, rye, sanders, willow (see the sbs.); also white ash, (a) a species or variety of ash with light-colored wood; hence (colloq.) an oar; also attrib. (jocular) white-ash breeze, the impetus of the oar; (b) a S. African ornamental tree with white flowers, Platylophus trifoliatus, the white alder (ALDER sb.¹ 3); † white-bush = WHITETHORN; white corn (see 2 a b); white grass, (a) Holcus lanatus; (b) American species of Leersia, esp. L. virginica; † white plum. (a) = WHEAT-PLUM; (b) a plum of Barbados having whitish bark; white-tree, a name for different trees having light-colored wood; esp. Melaleuca Leucodendron of Australia and the Malay archipelago; white vine, (a) the common bryony, Bryonia dioica; (b) traveller’s-joy, Clematis Vitalba; white wheat, wheat with white or light-colored grain; white wood, (a) the alburnum, or lighter-colored outer wood of a tree; (b) any non-resinous wood. c. In names of minerals, and of chemical or other products, of a white color: as white amber, antimony, arsenic, copper, dammar, enamel, feldspar, (iron) pyrites, precipitale, salt, schorl, soap, tellurium, tin, tombac, vitriol, war, for which see the sbs.; also white ash, refined soda-ash as distinct from the crude black ash (ASH sb.² 2); white brass, an alloy of copper and zinc, containing a large proportion of the latter; white brick, app. Bath brick; white bronze, any light-colored bronze; white damp [DAMP sb.¹ 1 b], carbonic oxide as occurring in coal-mines; white leather (see LEATHER sb. 1 and WHITLEATHER); white lights Obs. exc. dial., candles; white metal, a name for various alloys of a light grey color (also attrib.); white money, silver money, silver coins; white nickel, a name for CHLOANTHITE or other native nickel arsenide; † white powder, a supposed kind of gunpowder exploding without noise; white rock, a name applied to intrusive basaltic rocks, altered to a light color, occurring in coal-measures; white-row (see quot.); white rubber, (a) caoutchouc whitened by admixture of a pigment; (b) the light-colored caoutchouc obtained from the white-rubber vine (Landolphia owariensis); † white straits (see quots. and STRAIT sb. 9); white trap = white rock; † white wire, iron wire coated with tin. d. In names of bodily parts or structures, and of diseases or abnormal bodily conditions, characterized by white color: as white blood, blood with an excess of white corpuscles, as in leuchæmia; † white bone, app. the costal cartilages; white corpuscle, a colorless blood-corpuscle, a leucocyte; white flood, leucorrhœa; white flux (see e below); white gangrene, a form of gangrene in which the affected parts become whitish; white haw, an affection of the eye (see HAW sb.³); white jaundice (see JAUNDICE sb. 1 b); white matter, the fibrous matter of the brain and spinal cord, as distinct from the grey matter; white softening, a variety of softening of the brain (see quot. 1873); white swelling (see SWELLING vbl. sb. 2); white (fibrous) tissue, white connective tissue, as distinct from yellow tissue (YELLOW a. C. 1 e).

1699.  Dampier, Voy., 127. Abundance of Ants of several sorts, and Woodlice, called by the English in the East Indies *White Ants.

1849.  Eastwick, Dry Leaves, 86. The never-to-be-sufficiently execrated white ants, who, if they had their will, would reduce all created things to impalpable dust.

1801.  Shaw, Gen. Zool., II. 315. The Leucoryx or *White Antelope.

1820.  T. Green, Univ. Herbal, II. 856/2. Fraxinus Americana, American Ash-tree.—There are several varieties of this, *White Ash, Red Ash, Black Ash, &c.

1851.  H. Melville, Whale, lxxxi. This clumsy lubber was striving to free his white ash.

1881.  Raymond, Mining Gloss., White-ash (Penn.). See Coal.

1882.  Garden, 23 Sept., 273/1. F. americana, the white Ash of the United States, may be taken as the type of most of the American kinds.

1906.  Kipling, Puck of Pook’s Hill, 101.

1892.  Labour Commission Gloss., *White Ash Finishers, men in the chemical industry … engaged upon the manufacture of soda ash … from salts derived from black ash.

1613.  Purchas, Pilgrimage, VIII. iii. 620. There were *white Beares, and stagges farre greater then ours.

1852.  Seidel, Organ, 169. The levers by which the tongues are kept upon the beaks are generally made of *white beech.

1805.  R. W. Dickson, Pract. Agric., II. 744. There is only one species of this plant [sc. hop] in cultivation, but which has several varieties, as the red-bind, the green-bind, the *white-bind, etc.

1875.  Melliss, St. Helena, 98. G[ygis] candida, Wagl.—*White-bird. One of the most abundant sea-birds in the Island.

1843.  R. J. Graves, Syst. Clin. Med., vii. 85. Abstracting [by blister] a considerable portion of *white blood from the system.

1863.  W. Aitken, Sci. & Pract. Med. (ed. 2), II. 270. White-cell blood, or White blood—Leucocythæmia.

1511.  Mem. Ripon (Surtees), I. 314. Quendam N. Wallez felonice percussit cum uno le dager in pectore super le *wythbone.

1538.  Bury Wills (Camden), 136. One lytle pot of *whyte brasse.

1875.  Knight, Dict. Mech.

1538.  Elyot, Dict., Leucantha, *white bryer.

a. 1756.  Eliza Haywood, New Present (1771), 252. Rubbing … with scouring paper, rotten-stone, or *white-brick.

1884.  C. G. W. Lock, Workshop Receipts, Ser. III. 28/1. This new kind of *‘white bronze’ is not to be confounded with the alloy used in America under the same name … which consists principally of zinc.

1882.  Garden, 3 June, 384/1. The *white Broom and a sulphur-coloured Cytisus with flowers as large as those of the common Broom are very fine.

1676.  M. Cook, Forrest-Trees, xxxii. 97. If you would make a Fence of one particular sort of Wood, the very best is your *White-bush, or White-thorn.

1781–2.  T. Jefferson, Notes Virginia (1787), 62. *White cedar, Cupressus Thyoides.

1847.  Leichhardt, Jrnl., iii. 60. The white cedar (Melia Azedarach) grows also along the Zamia Creek.

1686.  Plot, Staffordsh., 122. *White-clay, so called it seems though of a blewish colour, and used for making yellow-colour’d ware.

1875.  Knight, Dict. Mech., *White Copper, an alloy forming an imitation of silver.

1866, 1898.  *White corpuscles [see LEUCOCYTOSIS, LEUCOCYTE].

1578.  Lyte, Dodoens, I. lxxi. 107. The fifth … may be … called … *white Crowfoote, & water Crowfoote. Ibid., II. xxviii. 180 [see WATER-LILY].

1866.  Treas. Bot., *White dammer.

1881.  Raymond, Mining Gloss., *White-damp, a poisonous gas sometimes (more rarely than fire-damp or choke-damp, etc.), encountered in coal mines.

1770.  J. R. Forster, trans. Kalm’s Trav. N. Amer., I. 67. Ulmus Americana, the *white elm.

1800.  trans. Lagrange’s Chem., II. 67. To make *white enamel, a hundred parts of lead and thirty of tin are generally calcined … and … mixed with a hundred parts of sand and twenty of potash:… the result is a milky white opake glass, called White Enamel.

1839.  De la Beche, Rep. Geol. Cornwall, etc. vi. 180. Plates of black mica and crystals of *white felspar.

1578.  Lyte, Dodoens, I. lix. 86. Wilde Tansie … preuayleth … agaynst the *white floud, or issue of floures.

1774.  Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), III. 333. The fur of the *white fox is held in no great estimation.

1678.  Ray, Willughby’s Ornith., 176. The *white Game. erroneously called the white Partridge, Lagopus avis.

1886.  Buck’s Handbk. Med. Sci., III. 300/2 *‘White’ Gangrene seems to be simply a moist gangrene … in which there is a serous exudate.

1798.  Nemnich, Polygl.-Lex., II. 936. *White gold. The platina.

1780.  A. Young, Tour Irel., I. 382. Rye grass (lolium perenne) and *white grass (holcus lanatus) do well.

1891.  Cent. Dict., s.v. Leersia, Three species occur in the United States, and are known as white-grass, especially L. Virginica.

1797.  Bewick, British Birds, I. 303. *White Grouse.

a. 1817.  T. Dwight, Trav. New Eng., etc. (1821), I. 77. The *white-grub has … extensively injured meadows and pastures.

1551.  Turner, Herbal, I. I v. The leues also broken in oyle are good for the *whyte hawe, or the perle in the eye.

1857.  Miller, Elem. Chem., Org. (1862), i. § 3. 61. Blue indigo, under the combined action of protoxide of iron and alkalies, becomes converted into *white indigo.

1896.  Chester, Dict. Names Min., *White iron ore, an early name for siderite. Ibid., White iron pyrites, a popular name for marcasite.

1526.  in Househ. Ord. (1790), 162. One torch, one pricket, two sises, one pound of *white lights, ten talshides, eight faggotts. Ibid. (1610), 335. Halfe a pounde of white lightes … per diem.

1731.  Miller, Gard. Dict., 5 A b. The *White Lilac, or Pipe-Tree.

1882.  Garden, 6 May, 317/2. A brass bowl holds a large bunch of white Lilac with its own pale green leafage.

c. 1440.  Promp. Parv., 525/2. *Whyte marbulle, carnium.

1850.  Burke, Landed Gentry, III. 27/2. The splendid mausoleum erected over the ashes of St. John-Isajah, by his family, was still in good preservation, and was magnificently sculptured in white marble.

1839–47.  Todd’s Cycl. Anat., III. 695. A convolution [of the brain] consists of a fold of grey matter, enclosing a process of *white or fibrous matter.

1869.  Huxley, Elem. Physiol. (ed. 3), vi. 299. In the medulla oblongata,… [as] in the spinal cord … the white matter is external, and the grey internal. But, in the cerebellum and cerebral hemispheres, the grey matter is external and the white internal.

1613.  in Papers rel. Scots in Poland (1915), 71. A *white metal cup.

1710.  N. Blundell, Diary (1895), 86. We went to see y^m make White-Mettle Muggs.

1879.  H. Phillips, Addit. Notes upon Coins, 8. A number of medals in white metal and copper.

1884.  C. G. W. Lock, Workshop Receipts, Ser. III. 40/2. The term ‘white metal’ is applied to all alloys in which zinc, tin, or lead is in sufficient proportion to impart a white colour.

1482.  Cely Papers (Camden), 116. The goldys and *whyte mony … as they were corrant.

1593.  Greene, 3rd Pt. Art Cony Catching, C 3. There was seuen pound in Golde, beside thirty shillings and odde white money.

1611.  Cotgr., s.v. Blanc, Monnoye blanche, white money; coyne of brasse, or copper, siluered ouer.

1696.  Lond. Gaz., No. 3162/4. Where all Persons may be Accommodated with any of their sorts for white Money, either Half-Crowns, Shillings, or Sixpences.

a. 1700.  Evelyn, Diary, 9 March 1664. The fine new mill’d coin both of white money and guineas.

1809.  Bawdwen, Domesday Bk., 405. Rutland pays to the King one hundred and fifty pounds white money.

1820.  Blackw. Mag., May, 158. My hand has nae been crossed with white money but ance these seven blessed days.

1868.  Dana, Min. (ed. 5), 70. Chloanthite;… *White Nickel.

1896.  Chester, Dict. Names Min., 287. White nickel. A syn. of both rammelsbergite and chloanthite.

1770.  J. R. Forster, trans. Kalm’s Trav. N. Amer., I. 65. Quercus alba, the *white oak.

1721.  Bailey, *White oakham, a sort of Tow or Flax to drive into the Seams of Ships.

1674.  trans. Scheffer’s Lapland, 138. No bird abounds there more then the *white Partridge.

1678.  [see white game].

1747.  G. Edwards, Nat. Hist. Birds, II. 72.

1844.  Amer. Jrnl. Sci., XLVII. 58. Labrax mucronatus, Cuv., *White Perch, common in Stratford [CT].

1530.  Palsgr., 288/2. *White plome, prune blanche.

1696.  Plukenet, Almagestum, Opera 1769, II. 306. Prunus Sylvestris cortice albicante,… White Plumme Barbadensibus dicta.

1613.  Beaum. & Fl., Honest Man’s Fort., II. i. That you were kil’d with a Pistoll charg’d with *white Powder.

1689.  N. Lee, Princess of Cleve, II. ii. A Secret Lover’s like a Gun charg’d with white Powder, does Execution but makes no noise.

1887.  Buck’s Handbk. Med. Sci., IV. 743/2. Mercurammonic Chloride, NH₂HgCl. This salt, commonly known as *white precipitate, is officinal in the U.S.

1769.  Mrs. Raffald, Eng. Housekpr. (1778), 213. To make *White Raspberry Jam.

1885.  Geikie, Text-bk. Geol., IV. viii. § 2. 569. Microscopical examination shows that this *‘white-rock’ or ‘white-trap’ is merely an altered form of some diabasic or basaltic rock.

1712.  Phil. Trans., XXVII. 542. A blewish Bat, in which the following Iron-Stone lyes, called the *White-Row. Ibid. A hard blackish Iron Oar, lying in small Nodules, having between them a White Substance; and from thence by the Miners called the White-Row-Grains.

1875.  Knight, Dict. Mech., *White-rubber. Caoutchouc mixed with such quantity of any white pigment [so] as to give a dead white color to it.

1887.  Moloney, Forestry W. Afr., 90. The white-rubber vine … grows in profusion in this part of the country.

1859.  P. P. Carpenter, in Rep. Smithsonian Inst. (1860), 203. The *White Slipper [limpet] is known … by its shaggy light-green skin.

1523–34.  Fitzherb., Husb., § 54. *White snailes be yll for shepe in pastures.

1881.  E. Ingersoll, Oyster-Industry, 250. White-snails.—Small species of mollusks noxious to the oyster-beds, particularly Urosalpinx and Natica.

1854.  *White softening [see SOFTENING vbl. sb. 1 b].

1873.  T. H. Green, Introd. Pathol., 41. White Softening … is [mostly] a chronic condition, dependent upon disease of the capillaries and small arteries, which interferes with the circulation…. There is no hyperæmia, and the colour either resembles that of healthy brain tissue, or is an opaque dirty white.

1792.  Pennant, Arctic Zool., II. 157. *White Stork…. primaries black: the rest of the plumage white.

1513.  Act 5 Hen. VIII., c. 2. Where … Clothes called *White Straytes be … made within the seid Countie [of Devon].

1672.  Manley, Cowell’s Interpr., White Straits, a kind of course Cloth made in Devonshire, about a yard and half a quarter broad, raw.

c. 1430.  Two Cookery-bks., 7. Take *whyte sugre an caste þer-to.

1562.  Turner, Herbal, II. 106. Take the water & put white sugar vnto it.

1772.  D. Macbride, Meth. Introd. Physic, 194. Watery tumour of a joint, usually termed *White-swelling.

1610.  Holland, Camden’s Brit., I. 185. *White tinne, that is molten into mettall.

1843.  R. J. Graves, Syst. Clin. Med., xxviii. 361. The vitality of the *white tissues is low.

1863.  Bates, Nat. Amazons, ii. (1864), 38. Other grand forest-trees … were the Moira-tinga (the *White or King tree)—probably the same as, or allied to, the Mora Excelsa … in British Guiana [etc.].

1866.  Treas. Bot., White-tree, Melaleuca Leucadendron.

c. 1640.  J. Smyth, Hund. Berkeley (1885), 319. The Salmon, *wheat trout or suen.

1542.  Elyot, Dict., Amomum,… the leaues be lyke to the leaues of Withwynde or *whyte vyne.

1598.  [see BRYONY 1].

1607.  Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 188. Burne them with twigs of white vines.

1866.  Treas. Bot., 1217/1. Vine, White, Clematis Vitalba.

1545.  *White wax [see WAX sb.¹ 2 c].

1567.  Gude & Godlie B. (S.T.S.), 176. With bullis of leid, quhyte wax and reid, And vther quhylis with grene.

1815.  Kirby & Sp., Entomol., x. (1818), I. 329. The wax (called Pe-la, white wax, because so by nature,) begins to appear about the middle of June.

1523–34.  Fitzherb., Husb., § 34. *Whyte wheate is lyke polerde wheate … but it hath anis, and … wyll make white breed; and in Essex they call flaxen wheate whyte wheate.

1805.  R. W. Dickson, Pract. Agric., I. 540. Among the numerous varieties of … wheat, the white and the red are the most esteemed in general.

1463–4.  Rolls Parlt., V. 507/1. Cardes for Wolle, or *Whitewyre.

1587.  Mascall, Cattle, Hogges (1596), 374. Some doe ring them [sc. hogs] with red wyar … Others doe put rings of yron, some with horse nailes or strong white wyar, in the groine of their snoutes.

1678.  Lond. Gaz., No. 1303/1. It is Enacted … That no Iron Threed (commonly called White Wyer) nor Cards for Wooll, nor Card-Wyer, nor Iron-Wyer for making of Wooll-Cards, shall be Imported.

1765.  Newton (Lincs.) Enclosure Act, 13. Ash or other *white wood rails.

1812.  P. Graham, Agric. Surv. Stirling., 40. The oaks are almost entire; the white wood, as it is called, or the outermost circles of the tree, only are decayed.

1825.  J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 348. The workman breaks these pieces of pots on his anvil, and mixes the pieces with charcoal of white wood.

1883.  J. G. Wood, in Longman’s Mag., Dec., 169. Especially does it wage war against the terrible larva of the cockchafer, called, par excellence, the Grub, and sometimes known as the *White Worm.

  e.  Miscellaneous: white ale, a Devonshire drink made of ale with flour, milk, and other ingredients (see Eng. Dial. Dict.); white baker, † (a) a baker of white bread (also as one word); (b) a name for the spotted flycatcher; white bath, (a) an emulsion of oil and alkaline carbonates used in dyeing; (b) a name for white-flowered species of Trillium; white bonnet [BONNET sb. 8], a fictitious bidder at an auction; white book [trans. med.L. liber albus; cf. ALBUM], a book of official records or reports bound in white; † white broth, some kind of broth of a white or light color (see also BROTH sb. 3); white coal (see quot. 1913); † white colo(u)rs = white flag (a); white cooper (see COOPER sb.¹ 1); white death [after black death], a name for tuberculosis (? as specially a disease of white men); white ensign (see ENSIGN sb. 5); whitefellow, applied by Australian natives to a white man, in contradistinction to blackfellow; white flag, (a) a flag of a white color displayed in token of peaceful or friendly intention, desire for parley (= flag of truce, FLAG sb.⁴ 1 b), or surrender; (b) the national flag of France before the Revolution (see 6 b); white flux, (a) leucorrhœa; (b) see FLUX sb. 11, quot. 1826; † white-folding, some kind of cloth; white hass, hawse, Sc. = white pudding (a); white hen, fig. in proverbial phr. a white hen’s chick, etc., applied to a fortunate person or thing (cf. sense 8); White House, popular name for the official residence of the President of the United States at Washington; white joint (see quot.); † white joke, name of some dance; white leach (see LEACH sb.¹ 2); white letter, Printing [LETTER sb.¹ 2 b], an occasional name for the (now) ordinary or ‘roman’ style of type, as distinct from BLACK-LETTER; white lie, (a) see 7 b and LIE sb.¹ 1 b; (b) see quot.; white-loose (see quot.); † white mark = WHITE sb. 6; white mass (see quot.); † White Moors, a nickname for the Genoese; white mouse, (a) an albino variety or fancy breed of the common house mouse; (b) a name for the collared lemming, Cuniculus torquatus, also called show-mouse; (c) fig. applied to a person of mean or despicable character; white night (trans. F. nuit blanche), a sleepless night; white note, Mus. a note with an open head, as a semibreve or minim (opp. to black note); white paper, (a) paper of a white color (also fig.); (b) techn. blank paper, not written or printed upon; (c) an official document printed on white paper; white post (Paper-making), see POST sb.⁵ 1; white pudding, (a) a kind of sausage made of oatmeal and suet (cf. BLACK PUDDING and PUDDING sb. 1); (b) ‘a pudding made of milk, eggs, flour, and butter’ (Cent. Dict.); white rent (obs. exc. Hist.), rent payable in silver money (see sense 2 b, and cf. BLACK MAIL 3); spec. in Devon and Cornwall, a rent or duty of eight pence a year payable by every tinner to the Duke of Cornwall; white rod = WHITE STAFF; white rose, the emblem, and hence (with capitals) a designation, of the House of York in the Wars of the Roses (see ROSE sb. 6); also adopted by the Jacobites in the 18th c.; White Russian, (a) a member of that branch of the Russian stock inhabiting the western part of Russia; (b) the dialect of Russian used by these; white scourge, tuberculosis (cf. white death above); white-sewing = while-seam (SEAM sb.¹ 9); white sheet (see SHEET sb.¹ 1 b); white slave, a white person (sense 4) who is, or is treated like, a slave (cf. SLAVE sb. 3); so white slaver, white slavery (spec. in reference to prostitution); † white son, a beloved or favorite son; a boy or man who is specially favored or petted (see 9); white squadron, one of the three squadrons into which the Royal Navy was formerly divided; white squall (see SQUALL sb.³ 1 c); white steep, a process, or liquor, used in bleaching (see STEEP sb.¹ 1, 4, and cf. grey steep s.v. GREY a. 8); white stone, in prov. phr. to mark with a white stone, to reckon as specially fortunate or happy (in allusion to the use of a white stone among the ancients as a memorial of a fortunate event); White Sunday, an etymologizing modification of WHIT SUNDAY; white ware, white goods or stuff, esp. white earthenware; white window, a stained-glass window in grisaille (see GRISAILLE); white wings fig., sails; † white woman, name for a ‘female’ ingredient in alchemy.

1743.  London & Country Brewer, III. 195. Devonshire *White-Ale. About 60 years ago this Drink was invented at or near … Plymouth. It is brewed from pale Malt.

1806.  Wolcot (P. Pindar), Tristia, Wks. 1812, V. 341. Your birthplace Dodbrook deign’d to bless Famed for white ale.

1813.  Vancouver, Agric. Devon, 390. The brewing of a liquor called white ale, is almost exclusively confined to the neighbourhood of Kingsbridge.

1879.  N. & Q., 5th Ser. XI. 193/2.

1568.  in W. H. Turner, Select. Rec. Oxford (1880), 325. No baker, be he *white baker or browne baker.

1633.  Stow’s Surv., 624. The Company of White-Bakers … were a Company of this City in the first yeere of Edward the second.

1725.  Lond. Gaz., No. 6379/5. Samuel Fryer,… Whitebaker.

1862.  Johns, Brit. Birds, 625. White Baker, the Spotted Flycatcher.

1857.  Miller, Elem. Chem., Org. (1862), xi. § 2. 775. In this condition it [sc. the skin] is ready for the operation of tawing, or passing through the *white bath.

1891.  Cent. Dict., s.v. Trillium, The white species [are known] as wake-robin, white bath, birthroot.

1735.  in R. Bell, Treat. Coneyance Land (1815), 168. This too common practice of employing *white-bonnets at roups was a manifest cheat. Ibid. (1815). What is commonly called a white bonnet, that is, a person employed by the seller to raise the price, without any intention of buying for himself.

1866.  Carlyle, Remin. (1881), I. 205. Hazlitt … was at the Fonthill Abbey sale … ‘hired to attend as a white bonnet there,’ said he with a laugh.

1437.  Cal. Anc. Rec. Dublin (1889), 294. The *Whit Boke.

1891.  Times, 4 Feb., 5/3. Another White book on East African affairs has been presented to the Reichstag.

1895.  Law Times, C. 3/1. The judge and Master Macdonell hunted through the White Book, and unearthed a rule sufficiently elastic.

1911.  B. Nightingale, Ejected of 1662, II. 1027. The White Book of Preston gives the following.

1606.  Dekker, Seven Deadly Sins, D. Heere and there (like a Prune in *While-broth) is stucke a spruice, but a meere prating vnpractised Lawyers Clarke all in blacke.

1691.  Mrs. D’Anvers, Academia, 8. So she … In White-broath, and Canary steeps him.

1913.  Weston & Crew, Pitman’s Dict. Econ. & Banking Terms, 149. *White Coal, a fanciful name given to a glacier in so far as it is a reservoir of force.

1916.  Edin. Rev., Oct., 397. Envying the Italians the clear atmosphere their towns are able to enjoy through the use of ‘white coal’ in place of black.

1676.  North’s Plutarch, Add. Lives, 84. Sebastian … commanded one of his souldiers to hold up the *white colours at his Spears-end, in token of his surrendring.

1688.  R. Holme, Armoury, III. vii. 317/2. The *White Cooper and Barrel Cooper … are two distinct Trades.

1837.  Whittock, etc., Bk. Trades (1842), 162 (Cooper). The White-cooper makes all the wooden vessels required in household concerns, dairies, or private breweries.

1901.  Munsey’s Mag., XXV. 710/1. The *‘white death,’ as this most fatal disease is called, does not seem to horrify us as it should.

1879.  Queen’s Reg. H.M. Naval Service, 19. All Her Majesty’s Ships of War in Commission shall bear a *White Ensign.

1870.  J. O. Tucker, Mute, 52. The natives, believing him to be the spirit of their deceased king, welcomed him with every demonstration of joy; hence the well known expression ‘Go down blackfellow, come up *whitefellow.’

1600.  Holland, Livy, XXX. 765. There met him a ship of the Carthaginians, garnished with … *white flags of peace.

1695.  Lond. Gaz., No. 3101/2. The Enemy hung out a White Flag, and desired a Parley.

1815.  Ann. Reg., Gen. Hist., 129. A white flag was hung out as a signal that the troops … had surrendered.

1607.  Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 83. If a woman be troubled with the *white fluxe.

1827.  Faraday, Chem. Manip., xiii. (1842), 301. White flux is made by deflagrating a mixture of equal parts of nitre and cream of tartar.

c. 1423.  in Raine Ch. Yk. & Abps. (Rolls), III. 307. Pro xij. virgis de panno vocato *whytefalddyng.

1818.  Scott, Br. Lamm., xii. There is black pudding and *white-hass—try whilk ye like best.

1824.  Mactaggart, Gallovid. Encycl., White Hawse, a favourite pudding.

1540.  Palsgr., Acolastus, II. iii. L ij b. May not I … be estemed the sonne of a *whyte henne .i. maye not men … thinke, that I was borne in a good howre.

1630.  B. Jonson, New Inn, I. iii. All … are not sonnes o’ the white Hen.

1716.  Poor Robin, Feb. A 6. Money is a Chick of the white Hen, he that hath it, hath Fortune by the forelock.

1833.  T. Hamilton, Men & Manners Amer. (1843), 1300. The President, however, having politely intimated that he received company every evening, I ventured … to present myself, on one occasion, at the *‘White House.’

1882.  W. J. Christy, Joints used by Builders, 32. *White Joint.—One formed with ordinary mortar as distinguished from blue mortar. Or it is made by pointing with white putty.

1744.  Fielding, Tumble Down Dick, Wks. 1766, IV. 250. Tho’ all the earth was one continued smoke, ’Twould not prevent my dancing the *White Joke.

c. 1450.  Brut, 447. A leyche called *‘whyte leyche.’

1573, 1750.  [see LEACH sb.¹ 2].

c. 1700.  Pepys, in Rollins, Pepysian Garl. (1922), Pref. p. vii. The Form … of the Black Letter with Picturs, seems (for cheapness sake) wholly laid aside, for that of the *White Letter without Pictures.

1717.  Hearne, Collect. (O. H. S.), VI. 95. It is printing … in the white Letter, contrary to Mr. Urry’s mind, who was resolved upon the black Letter and would not hear of the white.

1879.  Chappell, Roxb. Ball., II. 450. Two of the copies were issued by Whitwood…, one by Norris in white letter.

1899.  J. Hutchinson, in Archives Surg., X. 146. The nail as it grows forms and exhibits white spots in consequence [of injury]—*‘white lies.’

1857.  J. Scoffern, etc., Usef. Metals, 344. The cutter’s chisels would often penetrate parts which were unsound, occasioned, apparently, by a white powder embedded in the steel: to distinguish this from the effects of imperfect welding, it was called *white-loose. Ibid., The files were without white-loose.

1603.  J. Davies, Microcosmos, Wks. (Grosart), I. 9. Thou blessed Ile, *white Marke for Envie’s aime.

1895.  Grace Howard Peirce, in Atlantic Monthly, March, 333/2. She was thinking of his *‘white mass,’—the first mass of a young priest.

1642.  Howell, For. Trav. (Arb.), 41. As it is proverbially said, there are in Genoa, Mountaines without wood, Sea without fish, Women without shame, and Men without conscience, which makes them to be termed the *white Moores.

1850.  H. Melville, White Jacket, II. xxvi. 167. A set of sly, knavish foxes among the crew…. In man-of-war parlance, they [are called] fancy-men and *white-mice.

1900.  Daily News, 10 March, 6/5. The sharp, ugly, low rat-faced, and the miserable, anæmic, shifty, human white-mice, are cursed ‘with soul to suit.’

1872.  Browning, Fifine, xxxiii. O the knotty point—*white night’s work to revolve.

1908.  Miss Broughton, Mamma, vii. 71. In the almost entirely white night she had just passed!

1569.  Aldeburgh Rec., in N. & Q., 12th Ser. VII. 184/3. ij quares of *whyte paper.

1680.  Debates in Parlt. (1681), 166. These Bills will … make your Banishing Bill, and Association-Bill too, as ineffectual as White Paper.

1683.  Moxon, Mech. Exerc., Printing, 394. Although the first Form be Printed off, yet Press-men … call that Heap White-Paper, till the Reteration be Printed.

1687.  Lond. Gaz., No. 2125/4. Linen Rags, and other Materials for making of White Paper.

1772.  Gentl. Mag., April, 192/1. She ’s fair White Paper, an unsully’d sheet.

1859.  Stationers’ Handbk., 27. Printing papers, sometimes spoken of in a trade sense, as ‘White papers.’

1899.  Daily News, 13 March, 5/1. An interesting White Paper has been published … giving reports from our Ambassadors and Consular officers abroad on the telephone services in the countries to which they are attached.

17[?].  ‘Get up and bar the door,’ vii. in Herd, Scot. Songs (1776), II. 159. And first they ate the *white puddings, And then they ate the black.

1463.  Bury Wills (Camden), 24. xijs. of *white rente.

1630.  Dodridge, Dvtchy of Cornewall, 99. White rent … is a dutie payable yeerely by euery Tynner in the County of Deuon,… that is, of euery Tynner 8.d.

1664.  Spelman, Gloss., Quietus redditus … Vulgo Quit rente, qui & alias White rente nuncupatur, quod in denariis & argento penditur.

1717.  Northumbrian Docts. (Surtees), 61. A white-rent of 13s. 6d. from two or three freeholds in Woodburne.

17[?].  Song, in Farquhar, Beaux-Strat., III. iii. *White rods are no trifles, I’m sure, Whatever their bearers may be.

1876.  Bancroft, Hist. U.S., I. x. 347. A chancery court and a court-leet, sergeants and white rods.

1558.  G. Cavendish, Poems, etc. (1825), II. 99. Adewe, my sonne Edward! sprong of the royall race Of the *wight rose and the red.

1622.  Bacon, Hen. VII., 4. The People, who … had beene fully made capable of the clearnesse of the Title of the White-Rose or House of Yorke.

1716.  Hearne, Collect. (O.H.S.), V. 237. Divers were destroyed by the Georgian Party, only for having white Roses, a way by which … the Cavaliers distinguished themselves.

1887.  F. M. Crawford, Saracinesca, i. Men flocked to the standards of the White Rose of York.

1912.  D. M. Wallace, Russia, xxxix. 726. It [the first Duma] was composed of many nationalities clustering round the dominant race. The chic ethnographical groups were the Great-Russians (265), the Little-Russians (62), the *White-Russians (12), the Poles (51), the Lithuanians (10), the Letts (6), the Esthonians (4), the Germans (4), the Jews (13), the Tartars (8), and the Bashkirs (4).

1909.  Osler, in A. C. Klebs, Tuberculosis, 7. Throughout the world the most intense interest has been stimulated in the fight against the *white scourge.

1922.  Christine Orr, Kate Curlew, ii. She learned *white-sewing from an aunt.

1594.  Zepheria, xxxvi. F 2 b. Thy face being vayld, this pennance I award, Clad in *white sheet thou stand in Paules Churchyard.

1901.  Rhys, Celtic Folklore, I. v. 351. Old people still living remember men and women clad in white sheets doing penance publicly in the churches of Man.

c. 1833.  M. T. Sadler, in Mem. (1842), 405. Their tender hearts were sighing As negro wrongs were told, While the *white slave lay dying Who gained their father’s gold!

1840.  T. Gordon, trans. W. Menzel’s Ger. Lit., IV. 87. Seume … like many thousands of ‘white slaves,’ that is, German subjects, who were then sold by their princes to the Dutch or English, had been shipped for the colonies.

1889.  [see SLAVE sb. 3].

1922.  Times Lit. Suppl., 27 April, 278/2. The villain of the piece … is a *white slaver [= procurer].

1828.  G. Smeeton, Doings in London, 83. Here is, indeed, the British white slavery [viz. of dressmakers]; only, with this difference, that their more fortunate sufferers [sic] in the West Indies have regular food and appointed hours of work.

1835.  Edin. Rev., July, 463. These representations of the ruinous effects of what has been called white slavery … were at length embodied in Mr. Sadler’s famous Factory Report.

1857.  W. Acton, Prostitution, 94. The natural question, ‘Why does not this woman escape from this white slavery?’ is best answered by other queries—Whither can she fly? What can she do?

1541.  Coverdale, Confut. Standish (1547), l ij b. Maruaill not … though (whan I se you folowe your vnholy mother…) I call you … her owne *whyte sonne.

a. 1553.  Udall, Royster D., I. i. Be his nowne white sonne.

1601.  Yarington, Two Lament. Trag., IV. vi. G 4 b. Young Allenso your white honnie sonne.

a. 1613.  Overbury, A Wife, etc. (1630), P 8 b. The Deuill cals him his white sonne.

1666.  Lond. Gaz., No. 85/4. To steer after the Enemy, with the *White Squadron in the Van, and the Blew in the Rear.

1840.  [see BLUE a. 5 b].

1891.  [see RED a. 16 d].

1815.  J. Smith, Panorama Sci. & Art, 546. The *White Steep. This part of the process is precisely the same with the last [sc. grey steep], except that the sheep’s dung is omitted in the composition of the steep.

c. 1645.  Howell, Lett., I. I. xiii. (1890), 38. You are one … whose Name I have mark’d with the *whitest Stone.

1748.  Smollett, Rod. Rand., lii. ‘God be praised! a white stone!’… he alluded to the Dies fasti of the Romans, albo lapide notati.

1885.  Hornaday, 2 Yrs. in Jungle, xxvii. 318. I have marked that day with a white stone as being the one on which I ate my first durian.

1655.  Vaughan, Silex Scint., II. (title), *White Sunday.

1577.  in Ellis, Orig. Lett., Ser. III. IV. 26. Theire canvas and *whiteware.

1843.  Ecclesiologist, II. 31. A mean and unecclesiastical composition Font, containing a white-ware hand basin.

1913.  F. S. Eden, Anc. Glass, 45. A small *white window, made up of quarries (panes) decorated in brown enamel set in a white and coloured border.

1813.  Byron, Corsair, I. iii. How gloriously her gallant course she [sc. the ship] goes! Her *white wings flying.

1880.  Black (title), White Wings: a Yachting Romance.

1610.  B. Jonson, Alch., II. iii. Your red man, and your *white woman, With all your broths, your menstrues, and materialls.

  12.  Combinations.

  a.  with other adjs. (or sbs.) of color (= whitish, light), as white-blue, -brown, -green, grey, † -hoar, -lyard (q.v.), -red, -russet. Also with other adjs., as WHITE-HOT, q.v.; white-sick (see quot.).

1608.  Sylvester, Du Bartas, II. iv. Schism, 935. The Eastern winde drives on the roaring train Of *white-blew billows.

1643.  Baker, Chron., James (1653), 615. Course paper, commonly called *white brown paper.

1825.  T. Hook, Sayings, Ser. II. Passion & Princ., v. A small packet of white-brown paper.

1578.  Lyte, Dodoens, V. xii. 561. The white garden Succorie … hath … *whitegreene leaues.

c. 1533.  in Ellis, Orig. Lett., Ser. I. II. 32. Some faire white, or *white gray palfreies.

1556.  Chron. Grey Friars (Camden), 28. The gray freeres chaungyd their habbetts from London rossette unto whytt gray.

1812.  J. Smyth, Pract. Customs (1821), 218. The hair of the wild Cat is very long, and of a fine white grey.

14[?].  Guy Warw. (Camb.) 4775. Hys fadur ys olde and *whytehore.

1577.  Googe, Heresbach’s Husb., 116. The best colours [for a horse] … the rone, the *white lyard, the bay, the sorell.

1607.  [see LYARD].

a. 1618.  Sylvester, Woodman’s Bear, xlv. Red-white hils, and *white-red plaines.

1601.  Holland, Pliny, XXXII. x. II. 446. A peece of cloth of a white russet colour.

1797.  Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3), XIII. 538/2. The female [oyster] *white-sick (as they term it), having a milky substance in the fin.

  b.  with vbs. and pples., usually in instrumental sense = ‘with white,’ ‘in white (clothing or covering),’ or with complemental force = ‘so as to be, become, or appear white’: as white-paint vb.; white-bordered, -churned, -clad, -clothed, -flecked, -marked, -painted, -salted (see HERRING 1 b), -set (SET ppl. a. 6 a), -spotted, -tinned, white-flowing, -glittering, -looking, -waving adjs.

1830.  Withering’s Brit. Pl. (ed. 7), IV. 303. *White-bordered Cupping Peziza.

1823.  Coll. Poems (ed. Joanna Baillie), 259. The *white-churn’d waters.

1886.  Cornh. Mag., Sept., 249. An official … hands us over to the mercies of some boat’s crews of bare-legged brown or *white-clad Arabs.

1897.  ‘A. Hope,’ Phroso, ii. 30. The street, empty again save for groups of *white-clothed women.

1900.  Mary E. Wilkins, Parson Lord, One Good Time, 196. Her black thibet gown was gold-powdered and *white-flecked to the knees with pollen and winged seeds of passed flowers.

1827.  G. Darley, Sylvia, 5. Beautiful Glen of the *white-flowing torrent!

1729.  Savage, Wanderer, I. 75. *White-glittering ice, chang’d like the topaz, gleams, Reflecting saffron lustre from his beams.

1870.  P. M. Duncan, Blanchard’s Transf. Insects, 121. A flabby,… *white-looking grub.

1887.  Amer. Naturalist, XXI. 581. The *white-marked tussock-moth.

1897.  Mag. of Art, Sept., 268/2. He whitewashed and *white-painted what was coloured.

1828.  P. Cunningham, N. S. Wales (ed. 3), II. 157. Four *white-painted tarpaulings.

1889.  Conan Doyle, Micah Clarke, xxviii. The pile of bodies … with their twisted limbs and *white-set faces.

1776.  Withering, Bot. Arrangem., 606. *White spotted Willow Lady-cow.

1903.  J. Conrad & Hueffer, Romance, I. iv. A red, white-spotted handkerchief.

1521–2.  Rec. St. Mary at Hill (1904), 313. A brase of iron for the sacryng bell that was *whight tynned.

1822.  Campbell, Song of Greeks, 47. Our maidens shall dance with their *white-waving arms.

  c.  Parasynthetic Combinations, chiefly adjectives in -ED², unlimited in number (many occurring in specific designations of animals or plants), as white-armed, -barred, -beaked, -bearded, -bellied, -billed, -bosomed, -breasted, -cheeked, -coated, -crested, -faced, -flannelled, -flowered, -frilled, -frocked, -fronted, -gloved, -handed, -hatted, -hoofed (-hooved), -horned, -leaved, -legged, -lipped, -listed (LIST sb.³ 5), -maned, -mantled, -plumed, -railed, -ribbed, -ribboned, -rinded, -robed, -roofed, -rumped, -shafted (SHAFT sb.² 4 b (a)), -sheeted, -shouldered, -sided, -skinned, -sleeved, -stoled, -strawed, -tailed, -throated, -tipped, -tongued (cf. 10), -toothed, -topped, -tufted, -tusked, -veiled, -veined, -waistcoated, -walled, -wanded, -whiskered, -wristed, etc., etc.; white-backed, having a white back; † in early use (of a document), blank on the back, unendorsed; white-blooded, having light-colored or colorless blood, without red corpuscles, as most invertebrate animals; white-crossed, bearing the figure of a white cross; white-eyed, having white eyes; having the iris of the eye white, or having white plumage around the eyes; white-favo(u)red, wearing white favors (FAVOUR sb. 7 b); white-hearted, (a) faint-hearted, timid, cowardly (cf. sense 5 and WHITE-LIVERED); (b) pure-hearted, saintly (cf. sense 7); white-horsed, (a) bearing the figure of a white horse; (b) having or driving a white horse or horses; white-looked, having a white or pale look or aspect; white-mouthed, (a) having the mouth white with foam, foaming; (b) having a white mouth or lip, as a shell; † white-rigged (whyt reged), white-backed (see RIGGED a.¹); see also WHITE-EARED, etc.; also white-flesher, a name for the ruffed grouse, from its light-colored flesh or meat.

1718.  Pope, Iliad, XV. 98. The *white-arm’d Goddess.

1466.  Stonor Papers (Camden), I. 87. Ye must gete lenger day of his parte, and þer for y sende yow þe writte *white backed.

1783.  Latham, Gen. Syn. Birds, II. I. 82. White-backed Thrush.

1869.  E. Newman, Brit. Moths, 16. The *White-barred Clearwing (Sesia Sphegiformis).

1811.  Shaw, Gen. Zool., VIII. 13. *White-beaked Hornbill.

1596.  Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., II. iv. 509. Falstaffe, that old *white-bearded Sathan.

1611.  Cotgr., Carpion, a kind of … *white-bellied Trout.

1774.  Phil. Trans., LXV. 271. The hirundo melba, or great white-bellied Swift of Gibraltar.

1872.  Coues, Key N. Amer. Birds, 82. White-bellied Nuthatch.

1782.  Latham, Gen. Syn. Birds, I. II. 553. *White-billed Woodpecker.

1802.  *White-blooded [see red-blooded, RED a. 14 a].

1835–6.  Todd’s Cycl. Anat., I. 165/1. The natural position of the white-blooded worms is by the side of those with red blood.

1793.  Coleridge, Compl. Ninathoma, 8. They blessed the *white-bosom’d Maid.

1756.  P. Browne, Jamaica (1789), 470. The *white-breasted Guinea-Hen.

a. 1593.  Marlowe, Ovid’s Elegies, II. xviii. *White-cheekt Penelope knewe Vlisses signe.

1781.  Pennant, Hist. Quadrup., 331. White-cheeked Weesel.

1838.  Dickens, O. Twist, xv. A *white-coated, red-eyed dog.

1866.  Howells, Venetian Life, xii. 168. The white-coated sentinels.

1678.  Ray, Willughby’s Ornith., 112. *White crested Parrot.

1848.  C. C. Clifford, trans. Frogs of Aristophanes, 34. Whitecrested morions.

1856.  Lever, Martins of Cro’ M., lviii. 545. The fast-flitting clouds, the breezy grass, the wind-shaken foliage and the white-crested waves, all were emblems of life.

1632.  Lithgow, Trav., VII. 329. *White cross’d.

1783.  Latham, Gen. Syn. Birds, II. II. 475. *White-eyed Warbler.

1831.  Audubon, Ornith. Biogr., I. 328. The White-eyed Flycatcher,… Vireo Noveboracensis.

1833.  Tennyson, Palace Art, lx. White-eyed phantasms weeping tears of blood.

1595.  Shaks., John, II. i. 23. That *white-fac’d shore.

1781.  Pennant, Hist. Quadrup., 82. White-faced Antelope.

1856.  Stanley, Sinai & Pal., vi. 255. The white-faced hill … is the ‘Blanche Garde’ of the Crusading chroniclers.

1898.  ‘H. S. Merriman,’ Roden’s Corner, i. The children, white-faced and melancholy.

1850.  Tennyson, In Mem., Concl. 90. The time draws on, And those *white-favour’d horses wait.

1884.  J. Hatton, in Harper’s Mag., July, 230/1. Like an enormous billiard-table, dotted with *white-flannelled cricketers.

1831.  Sir J. Richardson, Fauna Bor.-Amer., II. 342. Tetrao umbellus…. Ruffed Grouse…. *White Flesher.

1634.  T. Johnson, Merc. Bot., 40. *White flowred Rush-grasse.

1842.  Tennyson, Godiva, 63. The white-flower’d elder-thicket.

1837.  Carlyle, Fr. Rev., I. IV. iv. Gilt-edged *white-frilled individuals.

1891.  T. Hardy, Tess, ii. The *white-frocked maids.

1768.  Pennant, Brit. Zool., II. 450. *White Fronted Wild Goose.

1712–4.  Pope, Rape Lock, V. 13. Why round our coaches croud the *white-glov’d Beaux?

1897.  Flandrau, Harvard Episodes, 318. The big, white-gloved policeman at the door.

1588.  Shaks., L. L. L., V. ii. 230. *White handed Mistris, one sweet word with thee.

1634.  Milton, Comus, 213. O welcom pure-ey’d Faith, white-handed Hope.

1828.  Stark, Elem. Nat. Hist., I. 60. White-handed Lemur.—Inhabits Madagascar.

1835.  Dickens, Sk. Boz, Last Cab-driver. A brown-whiskered, *white-hatted, no-coated cabman.

a. 1617.  Bayne, On Eph. i. (1643), 8. Such *white-hearted Christians, who are ashamed of their Master.

1865.  Burritt, Walk to Land’s End, 407. If the painter were a devout, white-hearted man.

1832.  Tennyson, Œnone, 50. A jet-black goat *white-horn’d, *white-hooved.

1832.  J. Bree, St. Herbert’s Isle, 5. War … her *white-horsed banner furls.

1872.  Calverley, Fly Leaves, Morning, i. The hour when white-horsed Day Chases Night her mares away.

1822.  Hortus Anglicus, II. 465. Chinese *White-leaved Nettle.

1716.  Gay, Ep. to Earl Burlington, 16. Brentford,… For dirty streets and *white-legg’d chickens known.

1848.  Dickens, Dombey, xxxvii. As he rode away upon his white-legged horse.

1841.  Florist’s Jrnl. (1846), II. 78. Oncidium leucochilum, (*white-lipped).

1920.  W. J. Locke, House of Baltazar, xxii. She replied, white-lipped: ‘I’ll never forgive you till I’m dead!’

1859.  Tennyson, Merlin & V., 788. The tree that shone *white-listed thro’ the gloom.

1690.  Lond. Gaz., No. 2596/4. He is a short thin-faced *white-look’d Man.

1642.  in J. Wilson, Ann. Hawick (1850), 53. Ane foir meir, *quhyt mainet and quhyt taillet.

1825.  Scott, Betrothed, iv. The *white-mantled Welshmen.

1629.  Quarles, Argalus & P., III. Wks. (Grosart), III. 283/1. Whereat the angry Knight … forsooke His *white-mouth’d Steed.

1639.  G. Daniel, Ecclus. xliii. 64. The white-mouth’d Billowes of y^e vnsounded Deepe.

1815.  Burrow, Elem. Conchol., 200. Voluta Æthiopica, white-mouth’d Melon.

1627.  P. Fletcher, Locusts, II. iv. As when the angry winds with seas conspire, The *white-plum’d hilles marching in set array Invade the earth.

1915.  S. Lee, Life Shakespeare, xii. 149. A white-plumed helmet stands to the left on a table covered with a cloth of purple velvet embroidered in gold.

1909.  H. Begbie, Cage, iv. Its *white-railed cattle-pens for market day.

c. 1711.  Petiver, Gazophyl., viii. 80. Small *white rib’d Barbadoes Limpet.

1885–94.  R. Bridges, Eros & Psyche, Nov. xi. Taking his fair *white-ribbon’d herald’s wand.

1568.  Wills & Inv. N. C. (Surtees, 1835), 293. One *whyt reged cowe.

1874.  M. Collins, Frances, I. 214. Under a *white-rinded birch.

1625.  Milton, Death Fair Infant, 54. That crown’d Matron sage *white-robed Truth.

1816.  Wordsw., Ode, ‘Imagination—ne’er before content,’ 76. The white-robed choir.

1893.  W. Sharp, in Mem. (1910), 214. A white-robed Bedouin herding goats.

1863.  Miss Braddon, Eleanor’s Vict., i. The fruitful orchards and *white-roofed cottages.

1782.  Latham, Gen. Syn. Birds, I. II. 544. *White-Rumped Black Cuckow.

1832.  Rennie, Butterfl. & M., 230. The *White Shafted Plume [Moth] (Pt[erophous] tetradactylus).

1881.  E. F. Poynter, Among the Hills, II. 317. Among the still, *white-sheeted meadows, his mind found again the quiet that for a moment it had lost.

1892.  E. Reeves, Homeward Bound, 209. We found the street … blocked up with white-sheeted figures. These were Arab … ladies escorting an intending bride … to the bath.

1781.  Latham, Gen. Syn. Birds, I. I. 190. *White-Shouldered Shrike.

1870.  Bryant, Homer, I. I. 32. Juno the white-shouldered smiled.

1588.  Wills & Inv. Durh. (Surtees), II. 33. One *white sided why.

1864–5.  Wood, Homes without H., xiii. 234. That [nest] which is made by the White-sided Hill Star.

1523–34.  Fitzherb., Husb., § 68. A white horse, so that he be not al *white-skynned aboute the mouthe.

1579–80.  North, Plutarch, Agesilaus (1595), 656. They scorned their bodies, because they saw them white skinned, soft, and delicate.

1851.  Schoolcraft, Amer. Indians, 164. Their white-skinned, auburn-haired, and blue-eyed progeny.

1802.  Wordsw., Valley near Dover, 4. Boys … In *white-sleeved shirts.

1790.  Wolcot (P. Pindar), Rowland for Oliver, etc., 30. To clasp with kisses sweet his *white-stol’d Maid.

1805.  R. W. Dickson, Pract. Agric., I. 539. The *white-strawed wheat takes its name … from the colour of its ear.

1642.  *Quhyt taillet [see white-maned above].

1887.  I. R., Lady’s Ranche Life Montana, 45. This is the first wild animal I’ve seen, except antelope and white-tailed deer.

1776.  Pennant, Brit. Zool., II. pl. xcviii. *White throated duck.

1859.  Geo. Eliot, Adam Bede, xviii. A white-throated stoat … had run across the path.

1872.  Coues, Key N. Amer. Birds, 184. The outer feathers *white-tipped.

1637.  Rutherford, Lett. to Parishioners, 13 July. A heavie doom is for the liar and *white tongued flatterer.

1609.  Dekker, Gull’s Horn-bk., Proem. s The *whitest-toothd Blackamoore in all Asia.

1870.  Bryant, Homer, I. XI. 345. As when a hunter cheers His white-toothed dogs against some lioness.

1805.  R. W. Dickson, Pract. Agric., II. 639. The … *white topped,… and the Dutch turnip.

1867.  Morris, Jason, II. 624. The white-topped billows.

1650.  [W. Howe], Phytol. Brit., 1. *White Tuffted Wormwood.

1872.  Coues, Key N. Amer. Birds, 302. White-tufted Cormorant.

1820.  Shelley, Hymn Merc., xcvi. The wild *White-tusked boars.

1856.  Mrs. Browning, Aur. Leigh, I. 81. The *white-veiled, rose-crowned maidens.

c. 1711.  Petiver, Gazophyl., vii. 61. Common *white-veined Butterfly.

1828.  Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. II. Lost & Found. A rich trail of the white-veined ivy, which crept … over the ground.

1838.  Dickens, O. Twist, ii. The *white-waistcoated gentleman.

1816.  Byron, Pris. Chillon, 339. I saw the *white-wall’d distant town.

1812.  L. Hunt, in Examiner, 24 May, 321/2. He [Canning] shrinks in and puts on as submissive and penetrated a countenance as any *white-wanded Lord at a levee.

1819.  Stephens, in Shaw’s Gen. Zool., XI. 56. *White-whiskered Pigeon.

1916.  Cullum, Men who Wrought, x. 137. His dark eyes were on the white-whiskered face of his host.

c. 1611.  Chapman, Iliad, XX. 110. *White-wristed Iuno.

  d.  with sbs., forming adj. (or phrases used attrib.) in senses (a) ‘of, pertaining to, or consisting of (a) white ——,’ as white-brick, -flower, -linen; (b) ‘resembling (a) white ——,’ as white-dough, loaf, -rag, -sand, -satin; (c) ‘having or characterized by (a) white ——’ (equivalent to parasynthetic adjs. in -ed: see c), as white-berry, -eyelid, -nose, -underwing (see UNDERWING 2); white-bead bandstring, name for a species of coral resembling a string of white beads; white-blood disease (cf. white blood in 11 d) = LEUCHÆMIA; white hart silver (see quot. 1658); white-leaf, applied to a species of frog with white spots. See also WHITE-EAR, -LINE, -SKIN adjs.

1696.  Plukenet, Almagestum Bot., Wks. 1769, II. 118. Corallina fistulosa Jamaicensis,… Nostratibus *White Bead Bandstring dicta.

1814.  Lewis & Clark, Trav. Missouri, xxvi. (1815), III. 124. *Whiteberry honeysuckle.

1866.  Aitken, Pract. Med., II. 69. That the *‘white-blood’ disease proceeded from a primary affection of the spleen and lymphatic glands.

1909.  H. Begbie, Cage, v. A little *white-brick cottage.

1886.  Buck’s Handbk. Med. Sci., III. 273/2. Agaricus castus, *White dough mushroom.

1781.  Pennant, Hist. Quadrup., I. 189. *White-Eyelid Monkey … The upper eyelids of a pure white.

1818.  Keats, Endym., I. 669. Honey cells, Made delicate from all *white-flower bells.

1594.  Camden, Britannia (ed. 4), 150. Ipsa prædia quæ illi tenuerunt ad hanc vsque diem quotannis mulctæ nomine pecuniam in fiscum regium persoluunt, quæ *White hart Syluer .i. candidi cerui argentum appellatur.

1658.  Phillips, Blacklow Forrest, Called The Forrest of Whitehart from a very beautifull Whitehart, which King Henry the third … taking great care to spare, was killed by T. de la Linde, which so incensed the King, that he set a perpetual Fine upon the Land, which at this day is called Whitehart silver.

1802.  Shaw, Gen. Zool., III. 127. *White-leaf Frog…. Its colour is rufous above, variegated … with milk-white spots.

1756.  F. Home, Exper. Bleaching, 26. Lye which has been used to white linen, called *white-linen lye.

1813.  Vancouver, Agric. Devon, 161. The land sown … with the tankard and early *white loaf turnip.

1781.  Pennant, Hist. Quadrup., I. 190. *White Nose Monkey.

1882.  White-rag Worm [see LURG].

1822–7.  Good, Study Med. (1829), I. 326. Earthy or *white sand calculi.

1749.  B. Wilkes, Eng. Moths, etc., 21. The *white-satin moth. [Ibid., 23 The spotted red and *white underwing moth.]

1909.  Westm. Gaz., 9 Dec., 4/2. The common ‘white underwing’ moths.

  e.  sbs. in which the second element denotes a distinctive part or attribute of that which is denoted by the whole word: white-back, local name for (a) the canvas-back duck; (b) the white poplar (from the color of the under side of the leaves); (c) collectors’ name for a species of moth (see quot. 1832); white-bark, local name for various trees with white bark (see quots.); white-breech, trans. L. pygargus, PYGARG 1; † white-cloak, ? = WHITE MONK; white-comb, a form of favus attacking the combs of fowls; white-eye, name for various birds, either having a white iris, as the white-eyed pochard (Nyroca ferruginea) and the white-eyed fly-catcher (Vireo noveboracensis), or having white plumage around the eyes, as the species of the genus Zosterops, also called silver-eye; white-face, a name for Hereford cattle; white-front, the white-fronted goose, Anser albifrons; white-hat, one who wears a white hat (in quot., as quasi-proper name); white-hood, a regent member of the senate of the University of Cambridge (obs. exc. Hist.); white-leg, the disease phlegmasia dolens (see PHLEGMASIA); white-nose = white-nose monkey: see 12 d (c); white point, collectors’ name for a moth (Leucania albipuncta) having a white dot on each of the fore wings; white-root, the herb Solomon’s seal, from its white creeping rootstock; white-rump, (a) the wheatear, Saxicola ænanthe; (b) the Hudsonian godwit, Limosa hæmastica; white-sides, white-spot, collectors’ names for species of moths (see quots.); white-spur, title of a class of esquires who wore silvered spurs; white-stocking, one who wears white stockings; in quot. applied to a horse with white legs; white-straw, name for a variety of wheat; white-tip, an artificial fly; white-top, (a) a N. American species of bent-grass, Agrostis alba (cf. RED-TOP 2); (b) an Australian tree, the Flintwood (Eucalyptus pilularis); white-wig, one who wears a white wig. See also WHITEBEARD, -FEATHER, etc.

1814.  Alex. Wilson, Amer. Ornith. (1829), III. 341. Canvass-back Duck…. On the Potowmac [they are called] *White-backs.

a. 1825.  Forby, Voc. E. Anglia, White-back, the white poplar, Populus alba. So called from the whiteness of the under side of the leaves.

1832.  Rennie, Butterfl. & M., 199. The White-back (Y[ponomeuta] pruniella).

1700.  Plukenet, Mantissa, Opera 1769 III. 113. Lappula Althæoides Americana … *White-Barke, Barbadensibus vulgo.

1889.  Maiden, Useful Pl. Australia, 411. Cupania semiglauca,… White Bark. Ibid., 421. Elæocarpus cyaneus,… White Bark.

a. 1661.  Holyday, Juvenal (1673), 216. Trypherus … Carves … th’ Hare, Boar, the *White-Breech too, The Scythian Phesant,… And the Getulian Goat.

1621.  Lodge, Summary of Du Bartas, II. 22. The *white Cloakes, the Carmes, The Augustines, the Bernardines, the Iacobins, the Cordeliers.

1854.  Poultry Chron., II. 40. A list of diseases … Apoplexy, *white comb, cramp, [etc.].

1848.  Gould, Birds Australia, IV. 81. Zosterops Dorsalis,… Grey-backed Zosterops; *White-eye.

1862.  Johns, Brit. Birds, 625. White-eye, the Nyroca Pochard.

1860.  W. White, Wrekin, xi. 93. I journeyed down … into the fertile champaign of the *whitefaces.

1912.  E. T. Seton, Arctic Prairies, 277. Not less than 12,000 Waveys will be salted down this fall, besides Honkers, *White-fronts and Ducks.

1693.  C. Mather, in G. L. Burr, Narr. Witchcraft Cases (1914), 284. That spirit by them [sc. the Newfoundlanders] called *White-Hat, who ordinarily appears on the Shore, in a White-hat … a little before some dangerous Tempest.

1764.  Ann. Reg., Chron., 58. [Cambridge] There appeared among the black-hoods … placet, 103…. Among the *white hoods the proctors accounts differed.

1860.  Mayne, Expos. Lex., Phlegmatia Dolens … the disease *white-leg.

1774.  Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1824), II. ix. 157. The Seventh [monkey] is the Moustoc, or *White Nose.

1869.  E. Newman, Brit. Moths, 475. The *White-point (Leucania Albipuncta).

1578.  Lyte, Dodoens, I. lxix. 102. *White roote or Salomons seale is of two sortes.

1797.  Bewick, Brit. Birds, I. 229. The *White-rump. Wheatear.

1817.  Shaw, Gen. Zool., X. 568. The White-rump has a very pretty song.

1888.  G. Trumbull, Names of Birds, 209. Limosa hæmastica … [called] at West Barnstable, White-rump.

1832.  Rennie, Butterfl. & M., 177. The *White Sides (P[eronea] albicostana). Ibid., 56. The *White Spot (Gr[aphiphora] albimacula). Ibid., 144. The White Spot (M[acaria] unipunctata). Ibid., I. 148. Ennychia … The White Spot (E. octomaculata).

1600.  Camden, Britannia (ed. 5), 140. Rex … armigeros creat collum torque S. S. vel sigmatico argenteo, & candidis, & argentatis calcaribus exornans, vnde hodie in occidentalibus regni partibus vocantur *Whitespurres ad discrimen Equitum auratorum qui auratis calcaribus vti solent.

1706.  Lond. Gaz., No. 4219/4. A Plate to be run for,… by Galloways, not exceeding 13 hands and half high, (the Guilford *White-Stockings excepted).

1697.  Rector’s Bk. Clayworth (1910), 121. *White-straw & Joysting.

1805.  R. W. Dickson, Pract. Agric., I. 539. The white-strawed wheat … in other counties bears the appellation of the Kentish white-straw.

1867.  F. Francis, Bk. Angling, xii. 379. The *White Tip … is a standard Tweed pattern.

1819.  D. B. Warden, Acc. United States, II. 8. The grasses are: White clover, *white top and red top, [etc.].

1889.  Maiden, Useful Pl. Australia, 502. Eucalyptus pilularis,… a Mountain Ash of Illawarra…, Willow, or White Top … (New South Wales).

1673.  Dryden, Marr. à la Mode, Prol. *White-Wig and Vizard make no longer jar.

  f.  with sbs., forming vbs. (chiefly nonce-wds.): white-ball, to clean with a ball of whiting; white-mail, to seize or appropriate like blackmail, but for a good purpose; white-tooth, to show one’s white teeth at. See also WHITE-LINE v.

1780.  Mirror, No. 93, ¶ 12. The servants had their liveries new *white-ball’d.

1861.  Reade, Cloister & H., lii. He spent much of his gains … in … choice drugs, and would have so invested them all, but Margaret *white-mailed a part.

1876.  A. J. Evans, Through Bosnia, iii. 89. A dusky Ethiopian maiden *white-toothing us in the most coquettish fashion.

  g.  white-like a., whitish; somewhat pale.

1608.  Phil. Trans., XX. 379. The Petroleum which is found in Italy is a white-like Spirit of Turpentine.

1893.  Stevenson, Catriona, xxii. She looked white-like as she beheld the bursting of the sprays.