winter-ground, to cover up in the ground so as to protect plants from the winter; ‘Furr’d moss . . . To winter-ground thy corse’, Cymbeline, iv. 2. 229.
wirt, a smart box on the ear. North, Plutarch, M. Brutus, § 6 (in Shaks. Plut., p. 112). See [wherrit].
wis; see [iwis].
wish, to commend one to another. Tam. Shrew, i. 1. 113; Match at Midnight, iv. 1 (Sim).
wishly, with eager desire; ‘To putte on his spectacles and pore better and more wishely with his olde eyen on Saynt Johns ghospell’, Sir T. More, Works, p. 1134 (Richardson); Palsgrave, p. 613.
wisket, a small basket; ‘Wysket, sportula’, Levins, Manipulus. In prov. use in various parts of England; see EDD.
wistly, attentively, observingly; ‘She . . . wistly on him gazed’, Lucrece, 1355; Venus and Ad. 343; Passionate Pilgrim, 82; Richard II, v. 4. 7. Perhaps the same word as whistly, silently, and so, with mute attention. See [whist].
wit: The five wits, the five faculties of the mind, common sense, imagination, fancy, estimation, memory, Much Ado, i. 1. 67; Sonnet cxli, 9. See Nares.
wit, to know. Greene, James IV, iv. 2. 3; Pericles, iv. 4. 31; 1 Hen. VI, ii. 5. 16. ME. witen (Chaucer, Tr. and Cr. v. 1324). OE. witan. See wist, [wot].
wite, to blame. Spenser, F. Q. ii. 12. 16; Shep. Kal., Aug., 136; wite, blame, F. Q. vi. 3. 16. In prov. use in Scotland, Ireland, and in the north of England (EDD.). ME. witen (wyten), to blame, reproach (Chaucer, Tr. and Cr. i. 825), OE. wītan.