[f. SMELL v.]
1. Giving out a smell or odor. Chiefly with qualifying term (see also SWEET-SMELLING).
13[?]. Cursor M., 3695 (Gött.). Quen he had felt his smelland clath…, ‘Þis voice,’ he said, ‘þat i here, Is of Iacob.’
13[?]. in Reliq. Antiq., I. 40. I lilie of the valeyes, that is most white chast love and moste smelȝene.
c. 1400. Maundev. (1839), ii. 11. Therfore thei made that pece [of the cross] … of Cypres; For it is welle smellynge.
1483. Cath. Angl., 346/1. Smellynge, odorabilis, odorifer.
1530. Palsgr., 324/2. Smellyng, that maye sone be smelled, odoratif.
1585. T. Washington, trans. Nicholay’s Voy., III. ix. 84 b. A … viall ful of sweete and smelling water.
1591. Florio, 2nd Frutes, Ep. Ded. Some … pronosticate of faire, of foule and of smelling weather.
1611. Cotgr., Regnard, a long-tailed, and ranke-smelling fish.
1848. Dickens, Dombey, viii. It was not, naturally, a fresh-smelling house.
1888. ‘J. S. Winter,’ Bootle’s Childr., x. A particularly nasty smelling ferret.
2. Having the sense of smell, or the faculty of perceiving by smell. rare.
1598. Marston, Pygmal., IV. 150. But Grillus subtile-smelling swinish snout Must sent,… and needes will finde it out.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts (1658), 121. Unto all these smelling Dogs, I may also adde the water Spagnel.
