MUSE

A gap or hole in a hedge, hence, wall, or the like, through which a wild animal is accustomed to pass; a muset. Find a hare without a muse. Old Prov.

One of the nine goddesses who presided over song and the different kinds of poetry, and also the arts and sciences; -- often used in the plural. Granville commands; your aid, O Muses, bring: What Muse for Granville can refuse to sing Pope.

A particular power and practice of poetry. Shak.

A poet; a bard. [R.] Milton.

To think closely; to study in silence; to meditate. "Thereon mused he." Chaucer. He mused upon some dangerous plot. Sir P. Sidney.

To be absent in mind; to be so occupied in study or contemplation as not to observe passing scenes or things present; to be in a brown study. Daniel.

To wonder. [Obs.] Spenser. B. Jonson.

To think on; to meditate on. Come, then, expressive Silence, muse his praise. Thomson.

To wonder at. [Obs.] Shak.

Contemplation which abstracts the mind from passing scenes; absorbing thought; hence, absence of mind; a brown study. Milton.

Wonder, or admiration. [Obs.] Spenser.