vbl. sb. and gerund.
1. The action of gathering fragments of wool torn from sheep by bushes, etc.
1581. J. Bell, Haddon’s Answ. Osor., 424 b. Your Diuinitie raungeth very much at randon, as if it were strayed and runnyng in some wildernes a wollgatheryng.
1878. E. Peacock, in Archaeologia, XLVI. 384. Wool-gathering yet goes on in many places even on enclosed lands.
1889. H. Johnston, Chron. Glenbuckie, xxii. 261. I got it by working for it—hard ’oo’-gathering and hard spinning.
2. In fig. phr. to go (run, be) wool-gathering, formerly always a (or † on, † of) wool-gathering: to indulge in wandering fancies or purposeless thinking; to be in a dreamy or absent-minded state: said esp. of ‘the wits,’ etc. Similarly, to send or set (a) wool-gathering.
1553. T. Wilson, Rhet., II. 59. Hackyng & hemmyng as though our wittes and our senses were a woll gatheryng.
1577. trans. Bullinger’s Decades (1592), 652. Their mindes goe a wool-gathering.
1579. Gosson, Sch. Abuse (Arb.), 42. To busy the wittes of his people, for running a woolgathering.
1601. W. Percy, Cuckqueanes & Cuckolds Errants, IV. i. (Roxb.), 46. My Husband … [had] so drawne mee, after him, on woole-gathering, in search of him, as now you see mee.
1607. R. C[arew], trans. Estienne’s World of Wonders, xxxix. 349. This gentle Frier (whose wit was not gone of wool-gathering).
1625. Bp. Mountagu, App. Cæsar., 23. If you read them, but marked them not, your wits went on wooll-gathering at that instant.
1652. Gaule, Magastrom., 41. He … sends his father-in-law almost a wooll-gathering.
1748. Richardson, Clarissa, VII. 326. That my wits may not be sent a wooll-gathering.
1796. Girlhood of M. J. Holroyd (1896), 386. I suppose you thought my Brains were Wool gathering!
1845. Carlyle, Cromwell (1873), I. i. 7. Sacred Poets have … gone a woolgathering after ‘Ideals’ and suchlike.
1890. J. Hatton, By Order of Czar, II. xii. You are wool-gathering a little, eh?
b. Hence, Indulgence in idle imagining or aimless speculation.
1607. Middleton, Fam. Love, V. iii. Ha’ you summoned your wits from wool-gathering?
1824. Lady Granville, Lett. (1894), I. 279. A great deal of wool-gathering about what it will bring.
1859. Geo. Eliot, Adam Bede, xxvii. There never was such a chap for wool-gathering.
1893. Patmore, Religio Poetæ (1898), 90. The crazy wool-gathering which is ordinarily regarded as thought.
So Wool-gathering a., indulging in wandering thoughts or idle fancies.
1850. Mrs. Stowe, in Life (1889), 140. If my wits are somewhat wool-gathering and unsettled.
1859. Geo. Eliot, Adam Bede, i. It was Seth Bede, as was allays a wool-gathering chap.
1893. E. H. Barker, Wand. Southern Waters, 259. At those moments when the wool-gathering mind has to be hurried back and fixed upon the sacredness of the ritual.
