Breed , n.
1. A race or variety of
men or other animals (or of plants), perpetuating its special or distinctive characteristics by inheritance.
Twice fifteen thousand hearts of England's breed.
Shak.
Greyhounds of the
best breed.
Carpenter.
2. Class; sort; kind; -- of men, things, or qualities.
Are these the
breed of wits so wondered at?
Shak.
This courtesy is not of the right breed.
Shak.
3. A number produced at once; a brood. [Obs.]
&fist; Breed is usually applied to domestic animals; species or variety to wild animals and to plants; and race to men.
Breed , v. i. 1. To
bear and nourish young; to reproduce or multiply itself; to be
pregnant.
That they breed abundantly in the earth.
Gen. viii.
17.
The mother had never bred before.
Carpenter.
Ant. Is your gold and
silver ewes and rams?
Shy. I can not tell.
I make it
breed as fast.
Shak.
2. To be formed in the
parent or dam; to be
generated, or to grow, as young before birth.
3. To have birth; to be
produced or multiplied.
Heavens rain grace
On that which breeds between them.
Shak.
4. To raise a breed; to get
progeny.
The kind of animal which you wish to
breed from.
Gardner.
To breed in and
in, to breed from animals of the same stock that are closely related.
Breed (&?;), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Bred (&?;); p. pr. & vb.
n. Breeding.]
[OE. breden, AS. brēdan to nourish, cherish, keep warm, from brōd brood; akin to D.
broeden to brood, OHG.
bruoten, G. brüten. See Brood.] 1. To produce as
offspring; to bring forth; to bear; to procreate; to generate; to beget; to hatch.
Yet every mother breeds not sons alike.
Shak.
If the sun breed maggots in a dead dog.
Shak.
2. To take care of
in infancy, and through the age of youth; to bring up; to nurse and foster.
To bring thee
forth with pain, with care to breed.
Dryden.
Born and bred on the
verge of the wilderness.
Everett.
3. To educate; to instruct; to form by education; to train; -- sometimes followed
by up.
But no care was taken to breed him a
Protestant.
Bp. Burnet.
His farm may
not remove his children too far from
him, or the
trade he breeds them up in.
Locke.
4. To engender; to cause; to occasion; to originate; to produce; as, to breed a storm; to
breed disease.
Lest the place
And my quaint habits breed astonishment.
Milton.
5. To give birth
to; to be the native place of; as,
a pond breeds fish; a northern country
breeds stout men.
6. To raise, as any kind of stock.
7. To produce or
obtain by any natural process. [Obs.]
Children would breed their teeth with less danger.
Locke.
Syn. -- To engender; generate; beget; produce; hatch; originate; bring up; nourish; train; instruct.
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