v. Also 6–9 streighten, 8–9 straiten. [f. STRAIGHT a. + -EN5.]
1. trans. To make straight (what is bent or crooked). Also with out.
1542. Udall, trans. Erasm. Apoph., 235. A thing is said in latin corrigi, & in englyshe to be emended or streightened, yt is reproued or disallowed, and also that of crooked is made straight.
1594. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., IV. viii. § 3. A crooked stick is not streightned vnlesse it be [etc.].
1641. Quarles, Enchir., IV. xcix. While he [a child] is a tender Twigge, streighten him.
1697. Dryden, Virg. Georg., I. 684. The crooked Scythes are streightned into Swords.
1727. H. Bland, Milit. Discipl., 41. The Soldiers are immediately to straiten their Ranks and Files.
1742. Young, Nt. Th., III. 371. Virtue … straitens nature’s circle to a line.
1751. Bankton, Instit. Laws Scot., I. 282. The incloser may apply to the judge ordinary … to visit the ground, straiten and regulate the marches with the best conveniency.
1765. Angelo, Sch. Fencing, 7. In these motions the arm should be straitned.
1775. Adair, Amer. Ind., 425. They can fresh stock their guns … and streighten the barrels, so as to shoot with proper direction.
1841–71. T. R. Jones, Anim. Kingd., 38. The delicate … stems of the Vorticellæ, which on the slightest touch shrink into spiral folds, and again straighten themselves to their full extent.
1844. Kinglake, Eöthen, xix. I straightened myself in my stirrups.
1856. Kane, Arctic Expl., II. vii. 76. He is sitting up congratulating himself that he can nearly straighten his worst leg.
1904. E. H. Coleridge, Life Ld. Coleridge, II. 287. He did not like hard work, but he straightened himself and bowed to the yoke.
b. In hand wool-combing: To comb wool for the second time.
1886. W. Cudworth, Rambles round Horton, vii. 75. She ‘jigged’ and he ‘straightened.’
2. To unravel, disentangle, clear up (what is confused or intricate). Now chiefly with out.
1577. trans. Bullinger’s Decades, II. viii. 193. So that to iudge, is to streighten and to make plaine.
1894. D. L. Moody, in W. R. Moody, Life (1900), Pref. 5. What I want is that you should correct inaccuracies and misstatements that it would be difficult to straighten out during my life.
1898. ‘H. S. Merriman,’ Roden’s Corner, xxxii. 341. Marguerite took occasion to congratulate herself,… in the fact that … ‘things’ were beginning to straighten themselves out.
1900. H. C. Beeching, in Monthly Rev., Nov., 88. There are not a few moral questions that I should like to hear straightened out.
3. To put in order, tidy up.
1867. in J. Lucas, Stud. Nidderdale (1852), 281. Cum don on thi’ bonnet an shawl, An’ streighten thi’ cap an’ thi’ hair.
1884. Manch. Exam., 28 Nov., 5/2. An English mob … eager to straighten up their difficulties and begone before the Riot Act was read.
1890. ‘R. Boldrewood,’ Col. Reformer, xiii. We straightened the horses after a bit—there was two dead and one with a broken leg.
1901. Antrobus, Wildersmoor, 297. I ’ll send Granny up here to straighten things a bit.
4. intr. To become straight. To straighten up (U.S.): to rise to an erect posture; also slang to adopt an honest course of life.
1891. Kipling, Light that Failed, xiii. 256. Dick’s shoulders straightened again, for the words lashed like a whip.
1897. Trans. Amer. Pediatric Soc., IX. 168. After a series of such oscillations … he straightens up, regains his breath, and the paroxysm ends with a long, sighing inspiration.
1907. Jean Webster, Four-Pools Myst., xix. (1916), 198. He has been dishonest, but unintentionally so. He wishes to straighten up and lead a respectable life.
Hence Straightened ppl. a.
1665. Dryden, Ind. Emp., V. ii. Fasten the Engines; stretch ’em at their length, And pull the straightned Cords with all your strength. [They fasten them to the rack, and then pull them.]
1897. Mary Kingsley, W. Africa, 125. In which case offer him a straightened-out hairpin.
