dew

noun

1. 1

   Any moisture from the atmosphere condensed by cool bodies upon their surfaces.

2. 2

   Moisture in the air that settles on plants, etc in the morning or evening, resulting in drops.

   As therefore the morning devv, is a pavvne of the evenings fatneſſe, ſo, O Lord, let this daies comfort be the earneſt of to morrowes, […]

   Tree don't care what the little bird sings / We go down with the dew in the morning light / The tree don't know what the little bird brings / We go down with the dew in the morning

3. 3

   An instance of such moisture settling on plants, etc.

   There was a heavy dew this morning.

   On their entrance, Aylmer was greeted by a new surprise—his daughter Lucy, whom he very naturally supposed was quietly in her bed, lay on the window-seat, the casement open, and herself asleep; but the traces of tears were upon her cheek, and her long fair hair loose, and yet saturated with the dews of the night.

4. 4

   figurativeAnything that falls lightly and in a refreshing manner.

   the golden dew of sleep

5. 5

   figurativeAn emblem of morning, or fresh vigour.

   Thy people ſhalbe willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holineſſe from the wombe of the morning: thou haſt the dew of thy youth.

   the dew of his youth

verb

1. 1

   To wet with, or as if with, dew; to moisten.

   The grasses grew / A little ranker since they dewed them so.

2. 2

   To deposit dew.

   The former [substances extremely attentuated, or in a filamentous and downly state] collect dew copiously, while the latter [solids] so rarely indicate its presence, even when it is dewing freely on contiguous substances, that some observers have doubted whether it ever happened, and have been disposed to believe that they repel it.

   Yesterday she tied Kenneth to a tree and left him there for hours when it was dewing.

   Withdraw heat from a gas, and it will dew into a liquid. Subtract more heat, and a solid forms.

Forms

plural

dews

past tense

dewed

past participle

dewed

present participle

dewing

third person singular

dews