MIRE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Mire

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/maɪr/ /mˈaɪər/ Listen

noun

Mire n. An ant. (Obs.) See Pismire.

Mire n. Deep mud; wet, spongy earth. "He his rider from the lofty steed Would have cast down and trod in dirty mire."

Mire crow (Zool.), the pewit, or laughing gull. (Prov. Eng.)

Mire drum, the European bittern. (Prov. Eng.)

verb

Mire v. t. (past & past part. mired; pres. part. miring)

To cause or permit to stick fast in mire; to plunge or fix in mud; as, to mire a horse or wagon.

Hence: To stick or entangle; to involve in difficulties; often used in the passive or predicate form; as, we got mired in bureaucratic red tape and it took years longer than planned.

To soil with mud or foul matter. "Smirched thus and mired with infamy."

Mire v. i. To stick in mire.

See images of 'Mire'

Etymology of 'Mire'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Mire" Quotes from Famous Books

... do as she is bid," he cut in wrathfully. "If she will drag my good name in the mire, I'm damned if she sha'n't pay the scot. And now about the settlements, Captain Ireton; you'll be ...

— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... alternative is horrible. I can't escape one conviction, however. It is turning out just as I expected and told her it would. Arnault's aid to her father has been delusive, and Wildmere is deeper in the mire than ever. This is a fine ending of my social career! The girl of my choice puts me off until she can end this Wall Street business more satisfactorily. She must wait and hear her father's reasons for further diplomacy before she can answer me. If Henry knew ...

— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe

... Major Smith Wyndham was falling back with his two guns, which had been advanced after the first charge, he found one of the other guns stuck in a water-course. The greatest efforts of the remaining horses were insufficient to draw it from the mire in which it was bogged. Lieutenant Hardy was killed by a shot through the head, and the gun was abandoned. The other three guns were taken back 400 or 500 yards farther. They were then stopped by a channel, deeper ...

— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston

... He rejoiced when he heard your oaths, the foul words, and all the corruption of your hearts. Did you not see his crooked claws when he set the bowl before you, that you might wallow in the debasing drink? Did you not hear him laugh, when you sat befouling yourselves in the mire of your sin, ripening for the pains ...

— Skipper Worse • Alexander Lange Kielland

... all, upon the wagon beame Rode Sathan, with a smarting whip in hand, With which he forward lasht the laesie teme, So oft as Slowth still in the mire did stand. Hugh routs of people did about them band, 320 Showting for joy, and still before their way A foggy mist had covered all the land; And underneath their feet, all scattered lay Dead sculs and bones of men, whose life had ...

— Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Book I • Edmund Spenser

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