Also espionnage. [ad. F. espionnage, f. espionner, f. espion spy: see ESPIOUN.] The practice of playing the spy, or of employing spies.
1793. Ld. Auckland, Corr. (1861), II. 500. Military preparations, espionages, consultations, conferences [etc.].
1825. Bentham, Ration. Reward, 100. To the word espionage a stigma is attached.
1856. Froude, Hist. Eng. (1858), I. iv. 368. The system of espionage with which they [the ecclesiastical courts] had saturated English society.
1870. Deutsch, Lit. Rem. (1874), 283. The Dominicans … were especially singled out for the function of holy espionage.
