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Webster’s Dictionary (1828)



20 words match “HOVER”

HOVER v. 3 definitions
a place or object; to be suspended in the air above something. Great flights of birds are hovering about the bridge, and settling on it. Addison. A hovering mist came swimming o'er his sight. Dryden.
HOVER-HAWK n.
The kestrel.
HOVERER n.
A device in an incubator for protecting the young chickens and keeping them warm.
HOVERINGLY adv.
In a hovering manner.
WINDHOVER n.
The kestrel; -- called also windbibber, windcuffer, windfanner. [Prov. Eng.]
ANGEL n.
e angels appear as God's messengers. O, welcome, pure-eyed Faith, white-handed Hope, Thou hovering angel, girt with golden wings. Milton.
BAIT v.
To flap the wings; to flutter as if to fly; or to hover, as a hawk when she stoops to her prey. "Kites that bait and beat." Shak.
CAROL v.
To sing, especially with joyful notes. Hovering awans . . . carol sounds harmonious. Prior.
GHOST n.
pean moth (Hepialus humuli); so called from the white color of the male, and the peculiar hovering flight; -- called also great swift. -- Holy Ghost, the Holy Spirit; the Paraclete; the Comforter; (Theol.) the third person in the Trinity. -- To give up or yield up the ghost, to die; to expire. And he gave up the ghos…
HANG v. 2 definitions
To hover; to impend; to appear threateningly; -- usually with over; as, evils hang over the country.
HAWK MOTH n.
rous genera and species. They are large, handsome moths, which fly mostly at twilight and hover about flowers like a humming bird, sucking the honey by means of a long, slender proboscis. The larvæ are large, hairless caterpillars ornamented with green and other bright colors, and often with a caudal spine. See Sphinx,…
HOVE v.
To hover around; to loiter; to lurk. [Obs.] Gower.
HUMMING n.
tly of very small size, and are not for their very brilliant colors and peculiar habit of hovering about flowers while vibrating their wings very rapidly with a humming noise. They feed both upon the nectar of flowers and upon small insects. The common humming bird or ruby-throat of the Eastern United States is Trochil…
KESTREL n.
wk. Its color is reddish fawn, streaked and spotted with white and black. Also called windhover and stannel. The name is also applied to other allied species.
RAKE v.
ed life. Shenstone. To rake out (Falconry), to fly too far and wide from its master while hovering above waiting till the game is sprung; -- said of the hawk. Encyc. Brit.
SHOOT v.
llowed by a word denoting the person or thing hit, as an object. When Roger shot the hawk hovering over his master's dove house. A. Tucker.
STEAM v.
To emit steam or vapor. My brother's ghost hangs hovering there, O'er his warm blood, that steams into the air. Dryden. Let the crude humors dance In heated brass, steaming with fire intence. J. Philips.
SYRPHUS FLY n.
genus Syrphus and allied genera. They are usually bright-colored, with yellow bands, and hover around plants. The larvæ feed upon plant lice, and are, therefore, very beneficial to agriculture.
TENDANCE n.
of attending or waiting; attendance. [Archaic] Spenser. The breath Of her sweet tendance hovering over him. Tennyson.
WRETCH n.
A miserable person; one profoundly unhappy. "The wretch that lies in woe." Shak. Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son, Wretch even then, life's journey just begun Cowper.