mare; ‘the blues’, melancholy; ‘Away the mare’, Skelton, Elynour Rummyng, 110; ‘Let pass away the mare’, Calisto and Melibæa, in Hazlitt’s Dodsley, i. 57.
mare, a term in wrestling; a particular kind of grip. Drayton, Pol. i. 244. Also called the flying mare; see NED.
mareyse, a marsh. Morte Arthur, leaf 113. 5; bk. vi, c. 14; lf. 217. 17; bk. x, c. 1. OF. mareis; Med. L. mariscus (Ducange).
margaret, margarite, a pearl. Greene, Orl. Fur. i. 1. 76; p. 90, col. 1; A Looking-Glasse, i. 1. 100 (Rasni). F. Marguerite, ‘Margaret (a woman’s name); also a (Margarite) pearl’ (Cotgr.). L margarita, Gk. μαργαρίτης, a pearl.
marge, margin, brink, border. Spenser, F. Q. iv. 8. 6. Drayton, Pol. ii. 25. F. marge.
margery-prater, a hen (Cant). Fletcher, Beggar’s Bush, v. 1 (Higgen); Harman, Caveat, p. 83. Prater = cackler.
marginal finger, an index-hand in the margin of a book (☞); used to direct attention to a striking passage. Massinger, Fatal Dowry (Romont; towards the end).
mark, a coin worth 13s. 4d., or 2/3 of the £ sterling. Measure for M. iv. 3. 7; King John, ii. 530.
mark-white, white mark, centre. Phr. at the marke white, at the white mark in the centre of a target, Spenser, F. Q. v. 5. 35; cp. the white, Tam. Shrew, v. 2. 186. And see [rove].
marle, to marvel, wonder. Eastward Ho, iii. 2 (Gertrude); B. Jonson, Ev. Man out of Humour, Induct. (Carlo); a marvel, B. Jonson, Silent Woman, iii. 1 (Mrs. Otter). A Devon and Somerset pronunc., see EDD. (s.v. Marl, vb.3).