Firing

vbl. sb. [f. FIRE v. + -ING¹.]

  1.  a. The action of setting on fire or alight.

1548.  Hall, Chron., 18 b. Perceyving by the firyng of the beacons that the people began to assemble in plumpes to encounter with him.

1677.  Yarranton, Engl. Improv., 16. The ruine of some thousand Families since the firing of London.

1817.  Cobbett, Wks., XXXII. 1 Feb., 150/2. Those meetings led to burnings in effigy: to the firing and pulling down of houses; to the ducking of people in horse-ponds; and to all sorts of outrages.

  b.  The action of catching fire or becoming ignited. Obs. or rare.

1588.  G. Fletcher, in Hakluyt’s Voy. (1598), I. 480. The greatest inconuenience of their wodden building is the aptnesse for firing, which happeneth very oft and in very fearful sort, by reason of the drinesse and fatnes of the fir.

1641.  H. Best, Rural Economy in Yorkshire in 1641 (Surtees), 61. Then doe wee drawe up a leape aboute the middle of each roomstead; and soe by this meanes the storme getteth a vent by the leap-holes, whearby the dainger of firing is prevented, and the corne allsoe much bettered.

1677.  Hale, The Primitive Origination of Mankind, I. iii. 95. By the eruption of Bituminous and Sulphureous Vapours, and the firing thereof, these protuberances of Mountains and Hills may be made, and have been made in many parts.

1750.  W. Ellis, Mod. Husbandm., III. i. 87. Firing, the spontaneous combustion of hay when stacked damp.

  2.  The action of subjecting to the operation of fire; preparation, baking, or curing by heat.

1782.  Wedgwood, in Phil. Trans., LXXII. 307. Their use is confined to a particular structure of furnaces, and mode of firing.

1839.  Stonehouse, Axholme, 228. This window has had four firings at a very high temperature, producing combinations of tints which even Albert Durer never attempted.

1885.  R. Riordan, A Collection of Chinese Porcelains, in Harper’s Mag., LXX. April, 679/1. From a period as remote as that of Charlemagne down to quite modern times, the glazing and firing of pottery has been a fine art in China.

1888.  Times (weekly ed.), 23 Nov., 9/4. The process called ‘firing’ [of tea] … is a kind of roasting.

  3.  Farriery. Cauterizing. (See FIRE v. 10.)

1644.  Prynne & Walker, Fiennes’ Trial, 65. Mercy and compassion are doubtlesse commendable vertues in a Govournour, who should not use cauteries or firing till the utmost extremity.

1866.  Rogers, Agric. & Prices, I. xv. 282. We see in 1385 that at Eastchurch firing was used to cure horses of spavin.

1891.  Daily News, 21 April, 5/4. Firing, for curb especially, need not be a severe operation.

  4.  Applied to a disease in tobacco and in flax: see quots. and cf. FIRE v. 4 b.

1688.  J. Clayton, in Phil. Trans., XVII. 947–8. What they call Firing is this: When Plants are of small Substance as when there has been a very wet and cold Season, and very hot Weather suddenly ensues, the Leaves [of tobacco] turn brown, and dry to dust.

1812.  Dubourdieu, Agric. Surv. Antrim, 197. Flax is subject to a disease called firing, which often attacks it when near ripe; it appears on the stalk like a mildew.

1888.  Paton & Dittmar, in Encycl. Brit., XXIII. 424/2. Tobacco plants … have been subject to … a disease called ‘firing,’ caused by the long continuance of very wet or very dry weather, and from the occurrence of autumn frosts while the crop is yet in the field.

  5.  The action of supplying with fire; the feeding and tending of a fire or furnace.

1892.  Labour Commission Gloss., Firing, attending to the fires and keeping them up to the required heat for carbonising coal.

  6.  The discharging a fire-arm, a mine, etc.

1603.  Knolles, Hist. Turks (1638), 69. All things being now in readinesse for the fiering of the mine, it was thought good by generall consent, that an assault should also at the same time be giuen vnto the citie.

1684.  Scanderbeg, Rediv., vi. 143. The fierce Firings of the said Battalions.

1790.  Beatson, Nav. & Mil. Mem., I. 157. Night coming on, the firing on both sides ceased.

1885.  Manch. Exam., 3 Oct., 4/7. The train drew up … amid … the firing of guns.

  b.  transf. in Bell-ringing. The ringing of all the bells in a peal at once.

1788.  W. Jones, etc., Clavis Campanalogia, 4. Those clamberings and firings (as it is called) that destroy all music.

1880.  in Grove, Dict. Mus.

  7.  concr. Material for a fire, fuel.

a 1555.  Ridley, in Contemporary Review (1878), XXXI. March, 771. To give him both meat, drink, clothing, and firing.

1591.  Greene, Disc. Coosnage (1592), 23. Fewel or fiering being a thing necessarie in a comon-welth.

1667.  Pepys, Diary, 24 Aug. At night the bells rung; but no bonfires that I hear of any where,—partly from the dearness of firing, but principally from the little content most people have in the peace.

1796.  Morse, Amer. Geog., II. 212. Want of firing is the greatest inconveniency that both islands labour under.

1833.  Ht. Martineau, Brooke Farm, ii. 18. Their mother explained that the boys cut firing on the common and drove home the cow.

  † b.  A quantity of burning fuel. Obs. rare.

c. 1485.  Digby Myst. (1882), II. 433. Here shall entere a-nother devyll, callyd Mercury, with a fyeryng, comyng in hast, cryeng and rorying.

  8.  attrib. and Comb., as (sense 1) firing-chamber; (sense 3) firing-iron; (sense 5) firing-door, -hole, -machine, -tool, etc.; (sense 6) firing line, party, -pin, etc.; firing-place, a fire-place (obs.); also, the place from which a gun is fired; firing-point, the temperature at which an inflammable oil is liable to spontaneous combustion.

1892.  Lockwood, Dict. Mech. Engin., *Firing Chamber or Lighting Chamber, the small cavity or chamber through which the charge of a gas engine is ignited.

1892.  Pall Mall G., 13 Dec., 6/2. A small but well-preserved hypocaust, with its *firing-door.

1892.  Lockwood, Dict. Mech. Engin., *Firing Hole, the door in the side of a reverberatory furnace through which the fuel is introduced to the grate area.

1753.  Chambers, Cycl. Supp., s.v., When the farrier has made his *firing-iron red hot in his forge, he applies the thinnest part to the horses skin.

1881.  Ld. Hartington, in Daily Tel., 6 May, 2. General Stewart was obliged to put every reserve man into the *firing line.

1859.  F. A. Griffiths, The Artillerist’s Manual (1862), 48. The ranks are closed, and the *Firing party move to the grave, where they take up their position at Open order.

1867.  Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., Firing-party, a detachment of soldiers, marines, or small-arm men selected to fire over the grave of an individual buried with military honours.

1890.  J. G. Smith, in Upland Shooting, 138. Carry an extra *firing-pin, as you may break one.

1715.  Leoni, Palladio’s Archit. (1742), II. 99. Hearths and *Firing-places.

1879.  Browning, Martin Relph, 77.

1878.  Ure’s Dict. Arts, IV. 570. Mineral oil, one or two degrees above the standard *firing-point, may, if stored in a populous locality, cause sad disaster.