a. Obs. exc. dial. Also 6 sortible, 9 dial. soortable. [a. F. sortable (15th cent.), or f. SORT v.1 + -ABLE.]
† 1. Suitable, appropriate; fit or befitting. Usu. const. to (or unto). Obs.
1586. Ferne, Blaz. Gentrie, 339. To serue him in anye seruice or office,… suche as be sortible to his degree.
1603. Holland, Plutarch’s Mor., 1329. The Moone: which they seeing to be so subject to growing and decreasing,… thought … to be sortable unto the mutability of the Dæmons kinde.
1621. Sanderson, Serm., I. 196. There are generous and ingenuous and liberal employments, sortable to the greatest births and educations.
a. 1663. Sir K. Digby, Priv. Mem. (1827), 17. Recreations … sortable to their age.
1818. Scott, Rob Roy, xxxiv. It’s a pity his Excellency is a thought eldern. The like o’ yoursell, or my son Hamish, wad be mair sortable in point of years.
2. north. dial. Capable of going together.
1641. Best, Farm. Bks. (Surtees), 110. In the choise of good deales,… that they bee sortable, i. e. all of one length, all of one breadth, and all of one thicknesse.
1876. Robinson, Whitby Gloss., 180/1. Soortable,… accordant or companionable.
† 3. Of a cargo: Properly assorted; composed of suitable sorts. Obs.
1727. De Foe, Tour Gt. Brit., Scotl., 90. The Scots Merchants are at no Loss how to make up sortable Cargoes to send with their Ships to the Plantations. Ibid. (1727), Eng. Tradesm., viii. (1732), I. 84. When merchants send adventures to our British colonies, ’tis usual with them to make up to each factor what they call a sortable cargo.
1818. Scott, Rob Roy, xxvi. The facilities which Glasgow possessed of making up sortable cargoes for that market.
Hence † Sortably adv. Obs.
1607. in Plomer, Abstr. fr. Wills Eng. Printers (1903), 42. If … Nicholas Bourne shall … take so manie books … sorteablie thorough out all my warehouses as they shall arise.
1608. Hieron, Defence, III. 7. Shall not he who is a coheir with Christ at his table cary himselfe sortably to the said person of coheir?
1611. Cotgr., Sortablement, sortably, fitly.
