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With sounds like singing; with a kind of tune; in a singing tone. G. North (1575).

A boxing match or prize fight marked rather by heavy hitting than skill. [Cant or Slang]

a. & n. from Sponge, v. Sponging house (Eng. Law), a bailiff's or other house in which debtors are put before being taken to jail, or until they compromise with their creditors. At these houses extortionate charges are commonly made for food, lodging, etc.

Growth; increase; also, that which springs up; a shoot; a plant. Thou blessest the springing thereof. Ps. lxv. 10. Springing line of an arch (Arch.), the horizontal line drawn through the junction of the vertical face of the impost with the curve of the intrados; -- called also spring of an arch.

A purging. [Obs.] B. Jonson.

A structure of posts and boards for supporting workmen, etc., as in building.

flicting acute pain as if with a sting, goad, or pointed weapon; pungent; biting; as, stinging cold; a stinging rebuke. -- Sting"ing*ly, adv. Stinging cell. (Zoöl.) Same as Lasso cell, under Lasso.

A brothel. [Obs.] Robert Greene.

In a tugging manner; with laborious pulling.

The act of gathering the vintage, or crop of grapes.

a. & n. from Wring, v. Wringing machine, a wringer. See Wringer, 2.

preposition an (which was used before the vowel sound); as in a hunting, a building, a begging. "Jacob, when he was a dying" Heb. xi. 21. "We'll a birding together." " It was a doing." Shak. "He burst out a laughing." Macaulay. The hyphen may be used to connect a with the verbal substantive (as, a-hunting, a-building)…

al purposes; the sea-ear. Several large species are found on the coast of California, clinging closely to the rocks.

The act of abasing, humbling, or bringing low; the state of being abased or humbled; humiliation.

Belonging to an abbey; as, abbatial rights.

Serving or tending to abbreviate; shortening; abridging.

Having abdominal fins; belonging to the Abdominales; as, abdominal fishes. Abdominal ring (Anat.), a fancied ringlike opening on each side of the abdomen, external and superior to the pubes; -- called also inguinal ring.

The act of bringing down or humbling. "The abjection of the king and his realm." Joe.

The act abridging, or the state of being abridged; diminution; lessening; reduction or deprivation; as, an abridgment of pleasures or of expenses.

Act of wiping clean; a cleansing; a purging. The task of ablution and abstersion being performed. Sir W. Scott.