[f. as prec. + -ING1.]
1. The action of the verb SWEETEN. a. The imparting of a sweet taste or smell; † perfuming; the freeing from taint, staleness, or impurity.
1591. Wotton, Lett. (1907), I. 270. There is a certain English northern man in this town … lives now by sweetening of gloves.
1599. B. Jonson, Ev. Man out of Hum., III. i. Which sute (for the more sweetning) now lies in lavender.
1617. J. Taylor (Water P.), Trav. to Hamburgh, B j. As if her selfe … had layen seauen yeares in Lauender on sweetning in long Lane.
a. 1774. Tucker, Lt. Nat. (1834), II. 380. Some to be hung in the winds for sweetening, some plunged into rapid waters to wash away their filth.
1876. B. Martin, Messiah’s Kingd., I. iii. 31. The sweetening of the waters at Marah.
fig. 1740. Cheyne, Regimen, 339. To … pass over every Impulse, Sweetning, or Glance of Light.
1883. H. Drummond, Nat. Law in Spir. W. (1884), 192. The acrid humours that are breaking out all over the surface of his life are only to be subdued by a gradual sweetening of the inward spirit.
b. Painting and Drawing. (See SWEETEN 8 b.)
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, III. 149/2. Sweetning, is the working one colour into another with a soft Pencil: that they will look as one colour, though they be diverse.
c. 1790. Imison, Sch. Arts, II. 63. To use his crayon in sweetening as much, and his finger as little, as possible.
c. The action of rendering pleasant, alleviating, palliating, making gracious, etc.
1592. Nashe, P. Penilesse, F j b. If I were to paint Sloth (as I am not seene in the sweetening) … I would draw it like a Stationer that I know, with his thumb vnder his girdle.
1597. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., V. xxxviii. § 2. For the raysing vp of mens hearts, and the sweetning of their affections towards God.
1829. Newman, in Liddon, etc., Life Pusey (1893), I. viii. 167. You will be doing as much to the sweetening of your book … as by your humanities towards Mr. R.
d. slang. (See SWEETEN 9.)
1896. Lillard, Poker Stories, viii. 191. Then along came a big jack pot that had been enlarged by repeated sweetenings.
1903. [see SWEETEN 9].
1904. [see SWEETENER 3 b].
2. That which sweetens; something that imparts a sweet flavor.
Long sweetening, short sweetening: see LONG a. 18.
1819. Moore, Rhymes on Road, xv. 18. Him Whose bitter death-cup from above Had yet this sweetening [later altered to cordial] round the rim.
1872. Schele de Vere, Americanisms, 206. The backwoodsman finds at home, besides honey, the long and short sweetening, peculiar to the West.
1884. Roe, Nat. Ser. Story, ix. Berries, to which the sun had been adding sweetening.
1890. Boston (Mass.) Jrnl., 20 May, 2/2. I … made a year’s sweetening from maple sirup.
