[f. as prec. + -ING1.]
1. The action of the vb. FINISH.
a. 1535. Fisher, Prayer, E iij/1. The Smyth … vseth the hammer … towardes the finishyng of his worke.
1614. T. Jackson, Comm. Apostles Creede, II. 216. The accomplishment or finishing of his glory.
1672. C. Manners, in 12th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm. App., v. 24. I haesten on Mr. Cooper all I can to the finishing of my Lady Exesters picture.
1757. Foote, Author, I. Wks. 1799, I. 135. Spri. A sketch can never convey him. His peculiarities require infinite labour and high finishing.
1886. Athenæum, 18 Dec., 832/1. The cuts are, for popular purposes, the same in both versions of the work, and as good as photography, delicate finishing, and choice modern cutting can make them.
2. concr. That which completes or gives a finished appearance to any kind of work. In Building and Carpentry, decoration, ornamental work. In Bookbinding, the lettering and ornamental work on the covers.
1663. Gerbier, Counsel, 15. If the Builder … will have the Building to have no other finishing.
1712. Addison, Spect., No. 285, 26 Jan., ¶ 3. Give the last Finishing to every Circumstance in so long a Work.
1766. Entick, London, IV. 286–7. The walls are brick; the wainscot and finishing very neat.
1785. J. Phillips, Treat. Inland Navig., 25. To have a lawn terminated by water, with objects passing and repassing upon it, is a finishing of all others the most desirable.
c. 1850. Rudim. Navig. (Weale), 118. Finishings. The carved ornaments of the quarter-galleries.
1884. H. P. Spofford in Harper’s Mag., Jan., 181/1. The house is of wood, as most dwellings are in that part of the country, of a pale cream-color, with white finishings, standing in an inclosure a couple of rods or so from the street.
3. attrib. and Comb., as finishing governess, machine, master, mortar, wood. Also finishing-card (see quot.); finishing cloth, calico prepared for ‘finishing’; so finishing goods, linens; finishing-coat, in Building, the last coating of plaster; finishing-hammer, the last hammer used by the gold-beater; finishing-press (Bookbinding), a small press used in the process of ‘finishing’; finishing-rolls, a second set of rolls in a rolling-mill; finishing-school, a school where a pupil’s (usually a young lady’s) education is ‘finished.’
1874. Knight, Dict. Mech., I. 848/2. *Finishing-card. A machine in which the process of carding is repeated.
1892. Daily News, 19 March, 5/5. Printers’ and *finishing cloths slow. Ibid. (1892), 6 Aug., 6/4. Printing and *finishing goods slow.
1862. Times, 2 Jan. A *finishing daily governess wishes to devote three or four hours every afternoon to the instruction of pupils.
1892. Daily News, 5 March, 2/7. Cross Channel demand for … *finishing linens. Ibid. (1869), 10 Dec. Double-blast thrashing and *finishing machines.
1799. Han. More, Fem. Educ. (ed. 4), I. 79. All perhaps, in their turn, either yield to, or have the honour to co-operate with a *finishing master.
1662. Gerbier, Princ., 19. Nor do good Builders affect partitions of Lime and Hair in their Houses, nor any of their Bricks to be daubed over with *finishing Morter.
1703. Moxon, Mech. Exerc., 250. The finishing Morter to represent Stone, should be made of the strongest Lime.
1881. Raymond, Mining Gloss., *Finishing-rolls. The rolls of a train which receive the bar from the roughing-rolls, and reduce it to its finished shape.
1836–7. Dickens, Sk. Boz (1850), 204/2. I ’ll bring in a bill for the abolition of *finishing-schools!
1863. Miss Braddon, Eleanor’s Vict., I. iii. 45. He sent his daughters to the most expensive finishing school in Paris.
1887. West Shore, 427/1. In the extreme north is found the white, or Alaska, cedar, a splendid *finishing wood, of which but little has ever been cut.
