▪ I. sidle, n.
[f. the vb.]
An act of sidling; a sidelong or oblique movement.
| 1853 R. S. Surtees Sponge's Sp. Tour xxi. 108 Turning the sidle into a stately sail, with a haughty sort of sneer. 1883 Harper's Mag. Feb. 394/1 The final sidle up to dock was a very inglorious effort of poling. 1900 Longman's Mag. Apr. 533 Susan coming forward with a coquettish sidle. |
▪ II. sidle, v.
(ˈsaɪd(ə)l)
Also 9 dial. siddle.
[Prob. a back-formation from sideling adv., on the analogy of verbs in -le 3.]
1. a. intr. To move or go sideways or obliquely; to edge along, esp. in a furtive or unobtrusive manner, or while looking in another direction; to make advances in this manner.
| 1697 Vanbrugh æsop iii, A crab-fish once her daughter told..She could not bear to see her go, Sidle, sidle, to and fro. 1708 Swift Abol. Chr. Wks. 1751 IV. 114 No more than one can get in at a time, and that not without stooping, and sideling, and squeezing his Body. 1753–4 Richardson Grandison (1781) IV. iv. 24 Sir Harry..sidled to the door,..and then slipped out. 1780 Cowper Progr. Error 562 Halting on crutches of unequal size;..They sidle to the goal with awkward pace. 1822 Lamb Elia ii. On Books & Reading, I used to admire how he sidled along, keeping clear of secular contacts. 1851 D. Jerrold St. Giles vii. 63 He sidled into a corner of the room. 1886 Ruskin Præterita I. v. 158, I was put on big horses that jumped, and reared, and circled, and sidled. |
| transf. and fig. 1765 Sterne Tr. Shandy viii. i, Ever and anon straddling out, or sidling into some..digression. 1821 Clare Vill. Minstr. II. 92 Ye know the foot-path sidles down the hill. 1841 L. Hunt Seer (1864) ii. 72 Till ‘Smith's Terrace’, or some such interloper, came sidling in front of it with forty new tenements. 1866 R. Chambers Ess. Fam. & Hum. Ser. i. 151 He sidles into conversation with some overseer of the workmen. |
b. To make one's way in a horizontal or transverse direction about an incline; spec. in Mountaineering = traverse v. 21. N.Z.
| 1950 N.Z. Jrnl. Agric. Oct. 295/1 Sowing was done following the contours and from higher to lower altitudes, as a man tends to climb when sidling. 1958 Tararua XII. 29 To sidle, to go around the side or across the face of a hill, is a characteristic New Zealand expression, strange to the Englishman or Australian. 1971 N.Z. Listener 19 Apr. 56/5 They got up the lower scree, sidled across the first face into a couloir, but they were getting bombed so they cramponed up to just below a gendarme. |
2. dial. a. To saunter, lounge about.
| 1781 J. Hutton Tour to Caves (ed. 2) 95 Sidle, to saunter. 1828 Carr Craven Gloss. s.v. ‘To sidle about a place,’ to lurk or skulk about. 1841 Foster in Life & Corr. (1846) II. 402 Just sidling about to see sights. 1866 J. E. Brogden Prov. Lincs., Sidle, to lounge about for some ulterior purpose. |
b. (See quot.)
| 1828 Carr Craven Gloss. s.v., ‘To sidle about a person,’ to attend him obsequiously. 1855 [see sidling ppl. a.]. |
3. trans. To move, turn, or direct sideways.
| 1779 T. Twining in Recreat. & Stud. (1882) 62 Let us at least..give it a little gloss of novelty, by spelling it Tuineing,..or something that shall sidle us away a little from those vulgar tribes of Western Twinings and Twynings. 1846 Mrs. Gore Eng. Char. (1852) 138 Shoving, sidling, and swerving the said ill-fitting drawer into its original position. 1855 Browning Old Pictures in Florence x. 7 Not sidling a glance at the coin of their neighbour. 1887 Jessopp Arcady iii. 90 He sidled his horse towards the fence and picked a rosy apple from the bough. |