[f. BATTEN v.1]
1. intr. Feeding to advantage, or with a relish; growing fat.
1593. Drayton, Eclog., ix. 70. Their batning Flocks on grassy Leaes to hold.
1714. Gay, Sheph. Week, Friday 156. Battening hogs roll in the sinking mire.
1765. Beattie, Judgm. Paris, lxxxii. Battening Avarice mocks his tuneless lyre.
2. trans. Fattening; fertilizing.
1612. Drayton, Poly-olb., xii. 206. Twixt Trent and batning Dove.
1708. J. Philips, Cyder, I. 34. The Meadows here, with bat’ning ooze enrich’d.
