[f. prec.]
1. = SPY-GLASS 1. Now rare.
1682. trans. Glanius’ Voy. Bengala, 28. Thus did they appear to us through our Spying-Glass, and every one … believed they saw very distinctly with it.
1739. Wks. of Learned, I. 85. From whence Servius might conclude that he knew the Use of Spying-Glasses.
1770. Baretti, Journ. Lond. to Genoa, I. x. 59. I saw through my spying-glass a ship that seemed to make towards us.
1803. Naval Chron., IX. 477. By the help of my spying-glass I had made a drawing.
1885. R. Buchanan, Annan Water, ix. I was up on the tower wi’ my spying-glass.
† 2. An opera-glass; an eye-glass. Obs.
1767. Warburton, in W. & Hurd, Lett. (1809), 405. I was accosted by a little, round, well-fed gentleman, with … a spying-glass dangling in a black ribbon at his button.
1780. Ann. Reg., II. 4. As they are masked, they do not scruple to reconnoitre the company with their spying-glasses.
1795. Wolcot (P. Pindar), Convention Bill, Wks. 1812, III. 380. And will it not be deem’d a daring thing To ogle through a spying-glass the King.
