Also 7 sorti. [F. sortie a going out, etc., f. sortir SORT v.2]
† 1. (See quot. 1690.) Obs.
1690. ? Evelyn, Mundus Muliebris, 20. Sorti, a little Knot of small Ribbon, peeping out between the Pinner and Bonnet.
c. 1691. Songs & Poems Costume (Percy Soc.), 200. Her shabbarons next I’ll show, Her sortie, and patches of black.
2. A dash or sally by a besieged garrison upon an investing force. Freq. in phr. to make a sortie.
1795. W. Seward, Anecd., II. 217. If the enemy … thought fit to make any sortie from the town.
1811. Wellington, in Gurw., Desp. (1837), VII. 285. In case your sortie should succeed (which will place the war on its legs again in the best manner).
1843. Prescott, Mexico, VI. vi. (1864), 386. To repel the sorties, made … by the militia of the capital.
1874. Green, Short Hist., viii. § 9. A sortie from Dublin had already broken up Ormond’s siege of the capital.
transf. 1827. Scott, Jrnl., 2 Jan. The rheumatism, exasperated by my sortie of yesterday, has seized on my … knee.
1831. Greville, Mem. (1875), II. xiii. 119. She was mighty glorious about her sortie upon Lambton.
1859. Once a Week, I. 455. He made a sortie from the box like a lion rushing into the circus.
b. Without article.
1845. D. Costello, Tour Valley Meuse, 156. Subterraneous passages … used for sortie and retreat by the garrison of the castle.
c. attrib., as sortie corvette, party.
1887. A. Clarke, in Pall Mall Gaz., 11 Jan., 2/1. I am not … aware that Germany … proposes to employ ‘sortie corvettes’ in the absence of guns or submarine mines.
1895. A. Morrison, Child of the Jago, iv. 45. The defeated sortie-party from Jago Court.
3. a. A sally-port. b. An outlet (of a river).
1848. Lytton, Harold, XII. vii. Three sorties, whence the defenders might sally.
1879. 19th Cent., 1121. The Kalamas has its sortie opposite Corfu.
