Also 8–9 longe, 9 lounge. [Aphetic var. of ALLONGE, ELONGE.]
1. A thrust with a sword (spec. in Fencing) or other weapon.
1748. Smollett, Rod. Rand., xii. (1804), 62. My adversary … made a great many half longes, skipping backward at every push.
1780. T. Davies, Mem. Garrick (1781), I. iii. 23. With the first lunge he killed his adversary.
1809. Roland, Fencing, 5. The distance between the two feet will be found to be … about two-thirds of the distance of the longe.
1823. Scott, Peveril, xxxii. A successful … lounge, by which Peveril ran his gigantic antagonist through the body.
1835. Lytton, Rienzi, I. iv. He made a desperate lunge at Adrian.
1880. Sir S. Lakeman, Kaffir-Land, 74. A lounge from an assegai through his thigh.
1885. Sat. Rev., 6 June, 758/1. If … parried lunges found their match In neat retorts.
b. (See quot.)
1817. Wilbraham, Gloss. Chesh. (1818), s.v. Lungeous, A lunge is common for a violent kick of a horse, though Dr. Ash has omitted it.
2. A sudden forward movement; a plunge, rush.
1873. G. C. Davies, Mount. & Mere, xvii. 149. A heavy lunge that told of a big fish.
1882. J. Walker, Sc. Poems, 127. With a lumbering lunge The freighted vessel left the quay.
1900. Longm. Mag., Aug., 455. The impatient farmer made a sudden lunge at them.
