| / English Dictionary |
TRAILING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
The pursuit (of a person or animal) by following tracks or marks they left behind
Synonyms:
tracking; trailing
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("trailing" is a kind of...):
chase; following; pursual; pursuit (the act of pursuing in an effort to overtake or capture)
Domain category:
animal; animate being; beast; brute; creature; fauna (a living organism characterized by voluntary movement)
Derivation:
trail (go after with the intent to catch)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
-ing form of the verb trail
Context examples:
In the cold hour the fire began to die, and I was about stepping forth to replenish it, for now the snow came in flying sweeps and with it a chill mist. Even in the dark there was a light of some kind, as there ever is over snow; and it seemed as though the snow-flurries and the wreaths of mist took shape as of women with trailing garments.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
It seemed a glow to him, a warm and trailing vapor, ever beyond his reaching, though sometimes he was rewarded by catching at shreds of it and weaving them into phrases that echoed in his brain with haunting notes or drifted across his vision in misty wafture of unseen beauty.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
A belated gig was coming at full gallop down the road which led from the south, and a few pedestrians were still trailing up from Crawley, but nowhere was there a sign of the missing man.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Not a very splendid show, but there was a great deal of love done up in the few little bundles, and the tall vase of red roses, white chrysanthemums, and trailing vines, which stood in the middle, gave quite an elegant air to the table.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
The fog seemed to break away as though split by a wedge, and the bow of a steamboat emerged, trailing fog-wreaths on either side like seaweed on the snout of Leviathan.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
The water scarcely reached my waist; the sand was firm and covered with ripple marks, and I waded ashore in great spirits, leaving the HISPANIOLA on her side, with her main-sail trailing wide upon the surface of the bay.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
Whenever he ventured away from his mother, the bully was sure to appear, trailing at his heels, snarling at him, picking upon him, and watchful of an opportunity, when no man- animal was near, to spring upon him and force a fight.
(White Fang, by Jack London)
When he rose, however, Alleyne observed that his robe was much too long and loose for him in every direction, trailing upon the ground and bagging about his ankles, so that even with trussed-up skirts he could make little progress.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
As Meg went rustling after, with her long skirts trailing, her earrings tinkling, her curls waving, and her heart beating, she felt as if her fun had really begun at last, for the mirror had plainly told her that she was 'a little beauty'.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
Strings of pedestrians, most of them so weary and dust-covered that it was evident that they had walked the thirty miles from London during the night, were plodding along by the sides of the road or trailing over the long mottled slopes of the moorland.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
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