[f. prec. sb.; or a. F. augure-r (14th c.), ad. L. augurāri, f. augur; see prec.]
1. trans. To prognosticate from signs or omens; to divine, forbode, anticipate.
1601. B. Jonson, Poetaster, I. i. I did augur all this to him beforehand.
1775. Burke, Sp. Conc. Amer., Wks. III. 56. They augur misgovernment at a distance and snuff the approach of tyranny.
1827. Scott, Surg. Dau., i. 25. The Docter … hastened down stairs, auguring some new occasion for his services.
1849. D. G. Mitchell, Battle Summer (1852), 70. There were those who augured from the very fact, a state of quietude.
b. Of things: To betoken, portend, give promise of.
1826. Scott, Mal. Malagr., i. 54. It seems to augur genius.
1843. Lytton, Last Bar., I. i. 32. Whose open, handsome, hardy face augured a frank and fearless nature.
2. intr. (or with subord. cl.) To take auguries; to conjecture from signs or omens; to have foreknowledge or foreboding.
1808. Scott, Marm., III. xv. Not that he augur’d of the doom, Which on the living closed the tomb.
1840. Gen. P. Thompson, Exerc. (1842), V. 119. What have the cock-sparrows to do with it; do we augur from them, as the Romans did from chickens?
1877. Sparrow, Serm., xxiii. 308. He may augur the gust is coming, but cannot prevent it.
3. esp. (with well or ill) a. Of persons: To have good or bad anticipations or expectations of, for.
1803. Wellington, in Gurw., Disp., II. 275. I augur well from this circumstance.
1849. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., I. 544. Fletcher, from the beginning, had augured ill of the enterprise.
1859. Jephson, Brittany, vi. 69. As I looked at his good-natured face I augured well for my reception.
b. Of things: To give good or bad promise. [Perh. ill was orig. a sb. = evil.]
1788. T. Jefferson, Writ. (1859), II. 506. One vote, which augurs ill to the rights of the people.
1810. Scott, Lady of L., III. vii. All augured ill for Alpine’s line.
1855. Prescott, Philip II. (1857), 68. A reverential deference, which augured well for the success of his mission.
4. trans. (also with in) To induct into office or usher in with auguries; to inaugurate.
1549. Latimer, Serm. bef. Edw. VI. (Arb.), 46. Numa Pompilus, who was augured and created king [of] the Romaynes next after Romulus.
1865. Reader, 11 Feb., 157. Profuse promises have augured in its birth.
