[ad. F. surveillance, n. of action f. surveiller: see next and -ANCE.] Watch or guard kept over a person, etc., esp. over a suspected person, a prisoner, or the like; often, spying, supervision; less commonly, supervision for the purpose of direction or control, superintendence.
[1799. Monthly Rev., XXX. 578. Vast depôts of … property … in the rooms belonging to the office of the committee of Surveillance.]
1802. Lemaistre, Rough Sk. Mod. Paris, xxix. 236. They are kept under the constant ‘surveillance of the police.’ [Note, Surveillance, Watch, or special care.]
1815. J. W. Croker, in Croker Papers, 19 July (1884), I. 67. General Becker—the officer who was charged with the surveillance of Buonaparte.
1825. T. Hook, Sayings, Ser. II. Man Many Fr. (Colburn), 84. A tour under the surveillance of a tutor.
1834. Marryat, P. Simple, xx. Not to allow parole or permission to leave the fortress, even under surveillance.
1853. Humphreys, Coin-coll. Man., xxii. (1876), 301. The copper [coinage] remained under the surveillance of the Senate.
1882. J. C. Morison, Macaulay, i. 6. No Puritanic surveillance directed his choice of books.
1884. Manch. Exam., 2 May, 4/7. He says that Portugal will carry out the provisions of the Treaty under the surveillance of England.
