a. [f. FLOWER sb. + -Y1.] Abounding in or covered with flowers; producing flowers.
13[?]. E. E. Allit. P., A. 57.
| I felle vpon þat floury flaȝt, | |
| Suche odour to my herneȝ schot. |
c. 1374. Chaucer, Boeth., IV. metr. vi. 111 (Cambr. MS.). The floury ȝer [orig. florifer annus].
c. 1586. C’tess Pembroke, Ps. xcii. iii.
| The wicked grow | |
| Like fraile, though flowry grasse: | |
| And, falne, to wrack past help doe passe. |
1590. Shaks., Mids. N., IV. i. 1.
| Tita. Come, sit thee downe vpon this flowry bed, | |
| While I thy amiable cheekes doe coy, | |
| And sticke muske roses in thy sleeke smoothe head, | |
| And kisse thy faire large eares, my gentle ioy. |
1630. Milton, Song May Morn.
| The Flowry May, who from her green lap throws | |
| The yellow Cowslip, and the pale Primrose. |
a. 1751. Doddridge, Hymns (1758), 38.
| The flow’ry Spring at thy Command | |
| Embalms the Air, and paints the Land. |
1781. Cowper, Retirement, 179.
| The fruits that hang on pleasure’s flowery stem, | |
| Whate’er enchants them, are no snares to them. |
1808. J. Barlow, The Columbiad, I. 91.
| No more thy flowery vales I travel o’er, | |
| For me thy mountains rear the head no more. |
b. In plant-names, † Flowery Cole = CAULIFLOWER.
1578. Lyte, Dodoens, IV. vi. 554. The thirde kinde is called … in English, Flowrie Cole, or Cypres Colewurtes.
1853. G. Johnston, Nat. Hist. E. Bord., 171. Chenopodium bonus-Henricus. Flowery-Docken.
† 2. Flourishing, vigorous. Obs.–1
a. 1420. Hoccleve, De Reg. Princ., 877.
| Now age unorne away puttethe favour, | |
| That floury youthe in his cesoun conquerde! |
3. Composed of flowers; having the nature of flowers; proceeding from or characteristic of flowers.
1635–56. Cowley, Davideis, I. 236.
| The Silver Moon with Terror paler grew, | |
| And neighb’ring Hermon sweated flow’ry Dew. |
1647–8. Joseph Beaumont, Psyche, XIX. ccxl.
| Herby and floury Gallantry combine | |
| Their fairest powers to make her [Earth’s] mantle fine. |
1712. Pope, Ep. Miss Blount, 65.
| As flow’ry bands in wantonness are worn, | |
| A morning’s pleasure, and at evening torn. |
1727–46. Thomson, Summer, 212.
| Who can unpitying see the flowery Race, | |
| Shed by the Morn, their new-flush’d Bloom resign, | |
| Before the parching Beam? |
1791. Mrs. Radcliffe, Rom. Forest, i. As she viewed the flowery luxuriance of the turf, and the tender green of the trees, or caught, between the opening banks, a glimpse of the varied landscape, rich with wood, and fading into blue and distant mountains, her heart expanded in momentary joy.
1856. Kane, Arct. Expl., I. xxi. 266. The first warm snows of August and September falling on a thickly-pleached carpet of grasses, heaths, and willows, enshrine the flowery growths which nestle round them in a non-conducting air-chamber.
4. dial. (See quot.)
1674–91. Ray, N. C. Words, Flowry; Florid, handsom, fair, of a good complexion.
1787–90. in Grose, Provinc. Gloss.
1838. in Holloway, Dict. Provinc.
5. Ornamented with figures of flowers or floral designs.
1667. Milton, P. L., XI. 881.
| Or serve they as a flourie verge to binde | |
| The fluid skirts of that same watrie Cloud. |
1725. Pope, Odyss., III. 596.
| O’er his fair limbs a flow’ry vest he threw, | |
| And issu’d, like a god, to mortal view. |
1865. Dickens, Mut. Fr., I. v. There was a flowery carpet on the floor; but, instead of reaching to the fireside, its glowing vegetation stopped short at Mrs. Boffin’s footstool, and gave place to a region of sand and sawdust.
6. Abounding in flowers of speech; full of fine words and showy expressions, florid.
1603. Shaks., Meas. for M., III. i. 83.
| Thinke you I can a resolution fetch | |
| From flowrie tendernesse? |
1737. Pope, Hor. Ep., II. i. 145.
| The soldier breathed the gallantries of France, | |
| And ev’ry flowery Courtier writ Romance. |
1767. Sir W. Jones, Seven Fount., Poems (1777), 43.
| Not all the bowers which oft in flowery lays | |
| And solemn tales Arabian poets praise. |
1784. Bage, Barham Downs, I. 275. There were not wanting certain flowery gentlemen, who told us in very pretty language, not only that none of these grievances existed, except in our own crazy imaginations; but also, that neither this country at any former time, nor any other country at any time, was so well governed as our own by the present administration.
1824. Syd. Smith, Wks. (1867), II. 191. The answer, remember, was plain and practical; not flowery, not metaphysical, not doctrinal.
1879. Dixon, Windsor, II. xvi. 176. A man of flowery tongue and delicate fancy, he appealed to Isabel in sonnets.
7. Her. = FLEURY.
1681. T. Jordan, London’s Joy, 9. In his right hand the Arms of Scotland, which is Sol, a Lion Rampant within a Double Treasure flowry Counter flowry Mars.
1771. Kimber & Johnson, Baronetage Eng., III. 387. Florey, or Flowery. This word signifies flowered, or adorned with the French lily.
8. Comb., as flowery-kirtled, -mantled.
1621. G. Sandys, Ovid’s Met., II. (1626), 32.
| There from her shoulders shee her Quiuer takes, | |
| Vnbends her Bowe; and, try’d with hunting, makes | |
| The flowry-mantled Earth her happy bed. |
1634. Milton, Comus, 252.
| I have oft heard | |
| My mother Circe with the Syrens three, | |
| Amidst the flowery-kirtled Naiades, | |
| Culling their potent herbs and baleful drugs. |
1810. Associate Minstrels, 75.
| Here has the flowery-mantled Spring | |
| Her blushing bands arrayed, | |
| To deck the forest shade. |
Hence Flowerily adv., in a flowery manner. Floweriness, the quality of being flowery.
1730–6. in Bailey (folio), Floweriness.
1783. Blair, Lect., I. xx. 422. That agreeable floweriness of fancy and stile, which is so well suited to those pleasures of the Imagination, of which the author is treating.
1821. New Monthly Mag., II. 176. We may perpetuate the summer landscape by turning our glance inward, and recalling the floweryness and green overgrowth of the past season.
1886. Pall Mall G., 31 Dec., 4/2. The critical judgment so flowerily expressed.
1890. Annie Edwards, Pearl-Powder, in Temple Bar Mag., vol. 89, July, 440. All the neighbourhood, he remarked, flowerily, was talking this spring about Miss Arden’s tulip-beds.
