Also (sense 3) 6 compest. [a. OF. compost, cumpost:—L. compositum (later compostum) neuter of pa. pple.: see COMPOST pa. pple.]
1. A composition, combination, compound.
a. 1640. Jackson, Creed, XI. viii. Wks. X. 134. To know what malice is … what villainy or treachery is, for Satan is but a compost of these.
1656. Earl Monm., Advt. fr. Parnass., 7. The skilful do … clearly discern in this Front … all the rules of Dorick, Ionick, Corinthian Architecture, and of Composts which are, and yet appear not.
1825. Coleridge, Aids Refl. (1848), I. 236. This is no compost, collectorium or inventory of single duties.
1863. Gladstone, Financ. Statem., 159. Some new composts are brought forward and delivered to a discerning public.
b. A literary composition, compendium.
1837. Whittock, Bk. Trades (1842), 359. A sort of jack-daw compilateur who has inflated his compost to a forty shilling volume.
† 2. Cookery. = COMPOTE. Obs. a. A stew of various ingredients.
c. 1420. Liber Cocorum (1862), 18. For to make a compost [with chickens, herbs, spices, etc.].
b. spec. A preparation of fruit or spice preserved in wine, sugar, vinegar, or the like.
c. 1430. Two Cookery-bks. (1888), 59. Le ij cours, Compost, Brode canelle, Potage. Ibid. (c. 1450), 87. Peris in compost, take pere Wardones … pare hem, and seth hem … and cast hem to the Syryppe … And then pare clene rasinges of ginger … and caste hem to the peres in composte.
1513. Bk. Keruynge, in Babees Bk. (1868), 268. Loke your composte be fayre and clene.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 159. White oliues … before they be put vp in their compost or pickle.
3. A mixture of various ingredients for fertilizing or enriching land, a prepared manure or mold.
Also † composs, COMPASS, sb. 2.
[1258. Charter St. Albans Abbey, in M. Paris (Rolls), V. 668. Cum composto … ad prædictum manerium meliorandum.]
1587. Harrison, England, III. viii. (1878), II. 54. That ground will serve well, and without compest for barleie.
1589. Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, III. xxv. (Arb.), 309. The good gardiner seasons his soyle by sundrie sorts of compost: as mucke or marle, clay or sande … bloud, or lees of oyle or wine.
1602. Shaks., Ham., III. iv. 151. Do not spred the Compost o[e]r the Weedes, To make them ranke.
1626. Bacon, Sylva, § 597.
1693. Evelyn, De la Quint. Compl. Gard., Gloss., Compost, is rich made Mold, compounded with choice Mold, rotten Dung, and other enriching ingredients.
1764. Grainger, Sugar-Cane, I. 151.
| Record the different composts; which the cold | |
| To plastic gladness warm? |
1784. Cowper, Task, III. 637. Turn the clod, and wheel the compost home.
1813. Bingley, Anim. Biog. (ed. 4), III. 70. The neighbouring farmers made them [herrings] up into composts, and manured their ground with them.
1861. Delamer, Fl. Gard., 30. The soil for hyacinths is a compost … consisting of light loam, leaf-mould, river-sand, and well-rotted dung.
fig. 1639. Fuller, Holy War, III. xix. (1840), 148. Martyrs ashes are the best compost to manure the church.
1831. Carlyle, Sart. Res., II. iii. Mind, which grows, not … by having its roots littered with etymological compost.
1858. Froude, Hist. Eng., III. 24/2, note. Stories like those … in Sanders grow like mushrooms in the compost of hatred.
4. attrib. Compost-heap (sense 3).
1780. Burke, Sp. Econ. Ref., Wks. I. 249. A new accession to the loaded compost heap of corrupt influence.
1884. Mrs. Ewing, Mary’s Meadow (1886), 43. We’ll have a compost heap of our own this autumn.
