[f. as prec. + -ING2.] That whitens; making or becoming white.
1641. J. Jackson, True Evang. T., II. 143. The bleaching, whitening,… cleansing quality of Christs blood.
1648. J. Beaumont, Psyche, VII. lv. Made not by scorching but by whitening light.
1704. Pope, Spring, 19. Two Swains … Pour’d o’er the whitening vale their fleecy care.
1821. Scott, Pirate, xxxvii. My whitening bones will swing in the gibbet-irons.
1859. Hawthorne, Fr. & It. Note-bks. (1871), II. 274. Marks of … coming age in many a whitening hair.
1902. J. Buchan, Watcher by Threshold, 88. I said nothing, but my whitening face must have told them a tale.
