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offers some illusory advantage or benefit. Also used as an adj.: Barmecidal. "A Barmecide feast." Dickens.

To revel; to feast. [Obs.] A pack of clergymen [assembled] by themselves to bellycheer in their presumptuous Sion. Milton.

contract for a future marriage between the persons betrothed; betrothment; affiance. "The feast of betrothal." Longfellow.

Celebration of the nuptial feast. [Obs.] "In honor of this bridalty." B. Jonson.

A rustic wedding feast; a bridal. See Ale. The man that 's bid to bride-ale, if he ha' cake, And drink enough, he need not fear his stake. B. Jonson.

A tabular statement of the dates of feasts, offices, saints' days, etc., esp. of those which are liable to change yearly according to the varying date of Easter.

The second day of February, on which is celebrated the feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary; -- so called because the candles for the altar or other sacred uses are blessed on that day.

Flesh of slain animals or men. A miltitude of dogs came to feast on the carnage. Macaulay.

Any merrymaking, feasting, or masquerading, especially when overstepping the bounds of decorum; a time of riotous excess. Tennyson. He saw the lean dogs beneath the wall Hold o'er the dead their carnival Byron.

A song of joy, exultation, or mirth; a lay. The costly feast, the carol, and the dance. Dryden It was the carol of a bird. Byron.

A jovial feast or festival; a drunken revel; a carouse. The swains were preparing for a carousal. Sterne.

A drinking match; a carousal. The early feast and late carouse. Pope.

That which promotes good spirits or cheerfulness; provisions prepared for a feast; entertainment; as, a table loaded with good cheer.

louded with passion; serene; cheerful. With a countenance as clear As friendship wears at feasts. Shak.

A feast for the benefit of the parish clerk. [Eng.] T. Warton.

loathing; to surfeit. [Who can] cloy the hungry edge of appetite By bare imagination of a feast Shak. He sometimes cloys his readers instead of satisfying. Dryden.

ommonwealth which . . . chooses the most flagrant act of murderous regicide treason for a feast of eternal commemoration. Burke.

on; continuous; unceasing; lasting; abiding. He that is of a merry heart hath a continual feast. Prov. xv. 15.

pertaining to a feast or to festivity; convivial. [Obs.] "A convival dish." Sir T. Browne.

To feast together; to be convivial. [Obs.] "There, in the full, convive we." Shak.