weave, to float backwards and forwards; ‘Amidst the billowes beating of her, Twixt life and death long to and fro she weaved’, Spenser, F. Q. v. 4. 10. See EDD.
weaver, a fish, having sharp spines; the Trachinus draco, or T. vipera. Drayton, Pol. xxv. 167. Cp. ME. wivere, a serpent (Chaucer, Tr. and Cr. iii. 1010); Anglo-F. wivre, a serpent, viper; esp. in blazon; L. vipera, a viper; see Dict. (s.v. Wyvern).
web and pin, a disorder of the eyesight. King Lear, iii. 4. 122; pin and web, i. 2. 291. From web, a film; and pin, a small spot. In E. Anglia ‘web’ is used for a film over the eye, see EDD. (s.v. Web, 4).
weel, a wicker trap or basket used for catching eels, &c. Heywood, Anna and Phillis, vol. vi, p. 309; Tusser, Husbandry, § 36, st. 31. In gen. prov. use in the Midlands (EDD.).
weeld, the ‘weald’ of Kent; ‘I was born and lerned myn englissh in Kente in the weeld’, Caxton, Historyes of Troye, preface. See Dict. (s.v. Weald).
ween, to suppose, think; wend, pt. t., Spenser, F. Q. vii. 6. 11. ME. wenen (Chaucer, C. T. A. 1655); OE. wēnan.
Weeping Cross. Nares notes that there were at least three crosses so named, near Oxford, Stafford, and Shrewsbury respectively. To come home (or return) by Weeping Cross, to repent of an undertaking, Lyly, Euphues, p. 243.
‘He that goes out with often losse,
At last comes home by Weeping Crosse,’
Howell, Eng. Prov.; Ray’s Proverbs (ed. Bohn, p. 22).