[f. BORROW v.1] The action of the verb BORROW (senses 1, 2); taking on loan, taking at second-hand, etc.; also concr., that which is borrowed.
1539. Taverner, Erasm. Prov., 46. The Englysh prouerbe … testyfyeth that he that goeth a borowynge, goeth a sorowynge.
1562. J. Heywood, Prov. & Epigr. (1867), 15. Sauying by borowyng, tyll we be in det.
a. 1630. S. Page, in Spurgeon, Treas. Dav., Ps. li. 3. Our food and raiment, the necessaries of life, are borrowings.
1642. Fuller, Holy & Prof. St., II. xxiii. 147. Confession puts the difference betwixt stealing and borrowing.
1830. Coleridge, Table T., 111. So borrow as to repay by the very act of borrowing.
1882. J. W. Legg, Liturgical Colours, II. 14. These colours … seem to be a modern borrowing from Rome.
† b. In certain obsolete phrases: To do, give, lend borrowing: to lend. To take borrowing: to borrow. To ask in borrowing: to ask as a loan.
c. 1380. Wyclif, Wks. (1880), 277. Þat … borwyng and lynynge be frely don to pore men. Ibid. (1382), Prov. xxii. 7. He that taketh borewing, seruant is of the usurer. Ibid., Luke vi. 34. If ȝe ȝyuen borwynge to hem, of whiche ȝe hopen to take aȝen, what grace is to you?
c. 1570. Leg. Bp. St. Andrews, in Scot. Poems 16th C. (1801), II. 328. Sowmes of silver fra him [he] ast In borrowing.
1573. Sege Edinb., ibid. II. 287. Lend vs ane borrouing of ȝour auld blak bellis.
c. Borrowing days: the last three days of March (Old Style), said in Scottish folk-lore to have been borrowed by March from April, and supposed to be specially stormy. (So in Cheshire the first eleven days of May are called borrowed days, because in Old Style they belonged to April.)
1549. Compl. Scot., 38. The borial blastis of the thre borouing dais of marche.
1791. Statist. Acc. Scotl., I. 57. Born in the borrowing days.
1818. Scott, Hrt. Midl., xxviii. The bairns’ rime says, the warst blast of the borrowing days couldna kill the three silly poor hog-lams.
