DRAINING • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Draining

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/drˈeɪnɪŋ/ Listen

verb

Drain v. t. (past & past part. drained; pres. part. draining)

To draw off by degrees; to cause to flow gradually out or off; hence, to cause the exhaustion of. "Fountains drain the water from the ground adjacent." "But it was not alone that the he drained their treasure and hampered their industry."

To exhaust of liquid contents by drawing them off; to make gradually dry or empty; to remove surface water, as from streets, by gutters, etc.; to deprive of moisture; hence, to exhaust; to empty of wealth, resources, or the like; as, to drain a country of its specie. "Sinking waters, the firm land to drain, Filled the capacious deep and formed the main."

To filter. "Salt water, drained through twenty vessels of earth, hath become fresh."

Drain v. i.

To flow gradually; as, the water of low ground drains off.

To become emptied of liquor by flowing or dropping; as, let the vessel stand and drain.

Draining n. (Agric.) The art of carrying off surplus water, as from land.

Draining tile. Same as Draintile.

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Etymology of 'Draining'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Draining" Quotes from Famous Books

... with putrid exhalations, which produced fevers and pestilential disorders among the inhabitants. Touched with compassion for the evils which they endured, I persuaded them to undertake the task of draining the soil and letting off the superfluous waters. This I instructed them to do with such success that, in a short time, an unwholesome desert became covered with the most luxuriant harvests, and was deprived of all its noxious influence. By thus rendering my services useful to my fellow-creatures, ...

— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day

... the most critical period of her development, when she was emerging young and strong during the most fertile period of the Middle Ages, by the fanaticism of priests and inquisitors, and the folly of some of her kings, who, with utterly inadequate means, wished to revive the empire of the Caesars, draining the country for this mad enterprise. Those people who had broken with the Papacy, turning their backs for ever on Rome, were far happier and more prosperous than that Spain, which slept like a beggar at the door of ...

— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... worsening with the area's growth. On the North Fork of the Shenandoah similar effects have been wrought by heavy organic loads from poultry processing and other things. The list could be extended: aside from a few happy exceptions like the prized Cacapon, draining rugged, forested, thinly peopled hill country, nearly all the Basin's flowing streams of any size receive damaging loads of ...

— The Nation's River - The Department of the Interior Official Report on the Potomac • United States Department of the Interior

... very busy, the sails whirling round and round and doing their duty with all earnestness, as duty ought to be done. When the wind slackened it was not their fault if they did not go as fast. They could distinguish the flour mills, which generally had a balcony running round half-way up; but the draining mills were smaller, and had no balcony. Zaandam, however, did not look like a town, it more resembled a straggling village; the houses—small, painted a bright green, with red roofs— peeping out on the banks of the river amid the ...

— Voyages and Travels of Count Funnibos and Baron Stilkin • William H. G. Kingston

... the Chasseurs d'Afrique," she said. "But he's not with his regiment. He's an expert in making desert wells, and draining marshes. That's the business which has brought him to the far South, now. He's living at Oued Tolga—the town, I mean; not the Zaouia. A well had to be sunk in the village, and he was superintending. I watched ...

— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

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