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Wait   /weɪt/   Listen
verb
Wait  v. t.  
1.
To stay for; to rest or remain stationary in expectation of; to await; as, to wait orders. "Awed with these words, in camps they still abide, And wait with longing looks their promised guide."
2.
To attend as a consequence; to follow upon; to accompany; to await. (Obs.)
3.
To attend on; to accompany; especially, to attend with ceremony or respect. (Obs.) "He chose a thousand horse, the flower of all His warlike troops, to wait the funeral." "Remorse and heaviness of heart shall wait thee, And everlasting anguish be thy portion."
4.
To cause to wait; to defer; to postpone; said of a meal; as, to wait dinner. (Colloq.)


Wait  v. i.  (past & past part. waited; pres. part. waiting)  
1.
To watch; to observe; to take notice. (Obs.) ""But (unless) ye wait well and be privy, I wot right well, I am but dead," quoth she."
2.
To stay or rest in expectation; to stop or remain stationary till the arrival of some person or event; to rest in patience; to stay; not to depart. "All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come." "They also serve who only stand and wait." "Haste, my dear father; 't is no time to wait."
To wait on or To wait upon.
(a)
To attend, as a servant; to perform services for; as, to wait on a gentleman; to wait on the table. "Authority and reason on her wait." "I must wait on myself, must I?"
(b)
To attend; to go to see; to visit on business or for ceremony.
(c)
To follow, as a consequence; to await. "That ruin that waits on such a supine temper."
(d)
To look watchfully at; to follow with the eye; to watch. (R.) "It is a point of cunning to wait upon him with whom you speak with your eye."
(e)
To attend to; to perform. "Aaron and his sons... shall wait on their priest's office."
(f)
(Falconry) To fly above its master, waiting till game is sprung; said of a hawk.


noun
Wait  n.  
1.
The act of waiting; a delay; a halt. "There is a wait of three hours at the border Mexican town of El Paso."
2.
Ambush. "An enemy in wait."
3.
One who watches; a watchman. (Obs.)
4.
pl. Hautboys, or oboes, played by town musicians; not used in the singular. (Obs.)
5.
pl. Musicians who sing or play at night or in the early morning, especially at Christmas time; serenaders; musical watchmen. (Written formerly wayghtes) "Hark! are the waits abroad?" "The sound of the waits, rude as may be their minstrelsy, breaks upon the mild watches of a winter night with the effect of perfect harmony."
To lay wait, to prepare an ambuscade.
To lie in wait. See under 4th Lie.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Wait" Quotes from Famous Books



... is the Chaudiere, which the Indians follow to reach Quebec. On September 20th Champlain observed the mountains of Bedabedec, and after having proceeded for ten or twelve leagues further he decided to return to Ste. Croix and wait until the following year to continue his explorations. His opinion was that the region he had explored was quite as unfavourable for a ...
— The Makers of Canada: Champlain • N. E. Dionne
... civil and political equality were guaranteed to the inhabitants. Thus it marks the triumph of the principle first tentatively laid down for Holland and Belgium in Article II of the Protocol of June 1814. Though applied to Greece in the Protocol of February 1830, it had had to wait nearly fifty ...
— Notes on the Diplomatic History of the Jewish Question • Lucien Wolf
... a score of voices about him. One was saying, "Wait a bit"; another, "Pretty soon"; another, "In a minute"; another, "By and by"; and still another, louder than the rest, kept screaming as loud as it could, "Going to, going to, going to," till ...
— New National Fourth Reader • Charles J. Barnes and J. Marshall Hawkes
... have me, Mary Hann,' says he. 'I've saved money. We'll take a public-house and I'll make a lady of you. I'm not a purse-proud ungrateful fellow like Jeames—who's such a snob ('such a SNOB' was his very words!) that I'm ashamed to wait on him—who's the laughing stock of all the gentry and the housekeeper's room too—try a MAN,' says he—'don't be taking on about ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the trial of Nisi Prius actions. And you know as well as anyone, Mr. Bumpkin, that when you get a load of turnips, or what not, in the market town blocked by innumerable other turnip carts, you must wait. Patience, therefore, good Bumpkin. Justice may be slow-footed, but she is sure handed; she may be blind and deaf, but she is not dumb; as you shall see if you look into one of the "blocked Courts" where a trial has been going on for the last sixteen days. A case involving a dispute of no ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris


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