Also 6 sounde. [f. SOUND v.2, or ad. F. sonde (Sp. and Pg. sonda) in the same senses, app. f. OE. or ON. sund SOUND sb.1 Cf. OE. sund-ʓyrd, -líne, -ráp, sounding-pole, -line, -rope.]
1. a. An act of sounding with the lead; also fig., power of sounding or investigating. rare.
1584. B. R., trans. Herodotus, II. 70 b. At euery sounde with the plummet, you shall bringe vppe great store of mud [etc.].
a. 1624. Bp. M. Smith, Serm. (1632), 168. Man hath but a shallow sound, and a short reach, and dealeth onely by probabilities and likely-hoods.
b. A sounding-line or -lead.
It is possible that sonde in Chaucer’s Dreme 1149 is to be taken in this sense.
c. 1620. Z. Boyd, Zion’s Flowers (1855), 19. Ho! Pilot, cause cast out the sound…, And try how deepe wee draw.
† 2. A hole or excavation. Obs.–1
1603. Knolles, Hist. Turks (1621), 581. The Rhodians … sunke divers deepe sounds in many places of the citie neere vnto the wals, to discouer the enemies mines.
3. Surg. An instrument for probing parts of the body, usually long and slender and having a slightly enlarged end.
1797. M. Baillie, Morb. Anat. (1807), 319. The disease may be ascertained by the introduction of the sound into the urethra.
1809. S. Cooper, Dict. Pract. Surg., 453/1. Having previously introduced a metallic instrument, called a sound, into the bladder, and plainly felt the stone.
1846. Brittan, trans. Malgaigne’s Man. Oper. Surg., 71. Of Cauterization…. Heat in the candle a finely-pointed metallic sound.
1895. Arnold & Sons’ Catal. Surg. Instrum., 444. Utering Sound and Syringe, combined. Ibid., 629. Lithotomy Sound…, auscultatory, with India-rubber tubing and ear mount.
4. Sound-line, ‘the tow-line carried down by a whale when sounding’ (Cent. Dict.).
