a. (adv.) Sc. and dial. [f. WISE a. + -LIKE 2.]
1. Reasonable, rational.
1816. Scott, Old Mort., xiv. It wad hae been lang or my Leddy Margaret … wad hae fund out sic a wise-like doctrine in the Bible!
1818. Susan Ferrier, Marriage, I. xii. It wad set her better to be carrying a wise-like wean in her arms, than trailing aboot wi’ thae confoonded dougs an’ paurits.
1893–4. Northumbld. Gloss., s.v., That’s a wise-like dog o’ yors.
2. Becoming, seemly, respectable, proper: esp. in appearance.
1820. Blackw. Mag., Nov., 148. Talking … o thrashing ripe rigs wi’ the west wind … may look very wiselike in rhyme.
1842. Aiton, Dom. Econ. (1857), 123. Make it something ‘wiselike’ and substantial, that it may remain as a monument of your own liberality and good sense.
1881. W. Wallace, in Academy, 15 Oct., 289/3. Jane, the chief of the ‘Frights,’ impatient, prone to command, wice-like rather than pretty or comely.
1894. Mrs. Oliphant, in Blackw. Mag., June, 754/1. He was considered by … many ladies of the parish to be a very personable man, comely…, and altogether a wyss-like man.
B. as adv. Fittingly, becomingly, respectably.
1822. Blackw. Mag., Sept., 315. They ought to hire a chaise, and gang in till Edinburgh wiselike.
1841. Fraser’s Mag., Jan., 109/2. Dinna gang ramstam in, saying, ‘Janet, here’s meal; and Janet, here’s butter’;… slip cannily and wiselike in.
