English Dictionary |
AILING
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Dictionary entry overview: What does ailing mean?
• AILING (adjective)
The adjective AILING has 1 sense:
1. somewhat ill or prone to illness
Familiarity information: AILING used as an adjective is very rare.
Dictionary entry details
Sense 1
Meaning:
Somewhat ill or prone to illness
Synonyms:
ailing; indisposed; peaked; poorly; seedy; sickly; under the weather; unwell
Context example:
is unwell and can't come to work
Similar:
ill; sick (affected by an impairment of normal physical or mental function)
Context examples
"I wish't you'd listen to reason," she answered feebly, but with unwavering belief in the correctness of her diagnosis of what was ailing him.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
“He was ailing a long time—a shattered, broken man, these many years. When he knew his state in this last illness, he asked them to send for me. He was sorry then. Very sorry.”
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
He had been a bit ailing like the day before, but naught to signify; and when Mr. St. John asked if he would like either o' ye to be sent for, he fair laughed at him.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
Turning from Bessie (though her presence was far less obnoxious to me than that of Abbot, for instance, would have been), I scrutinised the face of the gentleman: I knew him; it was Mr. Lloyd, an apothecary, sometimes called in by Mrs. Reed when the servants were ailing: for herself and the children she employed a physician.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
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