SPY • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Spy

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/spaɪ/ Listen

noun

Spy n. (pl. spies)

1.

One who keeps a constant watch of the conduct of others. "These wretched spies of wit."

2.

(Mil.) A person sent secretly into an enemy's camp, territory, or fortifications, to inspect his works, ascertain his strength, movements, or designs, and to communicate such intelligence to the proper officer.

Spy money, money paid to a spy; the reward for private or secret intelligence regarding the enemy.

Spy Wednesday (Eccl.), the Wednesday immediately preceding the festival of Easter; so called in allusion to the betrayal of Christ by Judas Iscariot.

Synonyms: See Emissary, and Scout.

verb

Spy v. t. (past & past part. spied; pres. part. spying)

1.

To gain sight of; to discover at a distance, or in a state of concealment; to espy; to see. "One, in reading, skipped over all sentences where he spied a note of admiration."

2.

To discover by close search or examination. "Look about with your eyes; spy what things are to be reformed in the church of England."

3.

To explore; to view, inspect, and examine secretly, as a country; usually with out. "Moses sent to spy out Jaazer, and they took the villages thereof."

Spy v. i. To search narrowly; to scrutinize. "It is my nature's plague To spy into abuses."

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Etymology of 'Spy'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Spy" Quotes from Famous Books

... proceeded to do, much to his own satisfaction, but very little to his information, for scarcely a torn-up envelope was to be found to reward the spy for his trouble. The only thing that did attract his attention as likely to be remotely useful was a fragment of a pink paper with the letters "gerskin" on it—a relic Love would have recognised ...

— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed

... of his faults of character—especially his obstinacy and impatience of all opposition. He was constantly at conflict with the bishop, who was always asserting the supremacy of his Church, with the intendant Duchesneau, who was simply a spy on his actions, with the Jesuits, whom he disliked and accused of even being interested in the sale of brandy, and with traders like Governor Perrot of Montreal who eventually found himself in the Bastile for a few days for having defied the edict of the King against the coureurs ...

— Canada • J. G. Bourinot

... however, was not destined to remain long undisputed. In a short time after they had begun to act, their new recruit, Barty Burt, who could not forego his desire of remaining among the tories (where we left him acting the unsuspected spy on their movements) till they should look for their guns, that he might have the pleasure of witnessing their discomfiture on discovering their loss, now arrived with news, that the latter, as soon as they made the discovery that their arms had been abstracted, were thrown ...

— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... reason difficult to divine. It was not as an instructor but as a spy that Brother Fabian was to come. The whispers abroad—doubtless spread industriously by his vengeful foe—had not been without effect, and men had begun to suspect that his household was tainted with heresy. Brother Emmanuel was suspected, his sons were probably suspected as being ...

— The Secret Chamber at Chad • Evelyn Everett-Green

... the abolition of the Slave Trade, that they had cast me out of their own body, and that I had taken refuge in Paris, where I now tried to impose equally on the French nation. It was stated at another, that I was employed by the British government as a spy, and that it was my object to try to undermine the noble constitution which was then forming for France. This latter report, at this particular time, when the passions of men were so inflamed, and when the stones of Paris had not been long purified from the blood of Foulon ...

— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson

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