sb. [See SWEET a. and MEAT sb. Cf. OE. swétmettas, swótmettas delicacies.]
1. collect. pl. (and † sing.) † Sweet food, as sugared cakes or pastry, confectionery (obs.); preserved or candied fruits, sugared nuts, etc.; also, globules, lozenges, ‘drops,’ or ‘sticks’ made of sugar with fruit or other flavoring or filling; sing. one of these.
c. 1480. Henryson, Test. Cress., 420. The sweit Meitis, seruit in plaittis clene, With Saipheron sals of ane gud sessoun.
a. 1500[?]. Chester Pl. (Shaks. Soc.), I. 143. I knowe that in thy childehoode Thou wylte for sweete meate loke.
1584. Lyly, Sappho, V. ii. 9. Giue him some sweete meates.
1592. Shaks., Rom. & Jul., I. iv. 76. Their breath with Sweet meats tainted are.
1626. Bacon, Sylva, § 756. Teeth are much hurt by Sweetmeats.
1640. A. Rigby, in Rushw., Hist. Coll. (1721), IV. 129. Or, like little Children, when we have been whipt and beaten, be pleased again with Sweetmeats.
1683. Tryon, Way to Health, 469. Nor [is it] lawful for any of us to eat Sweet-Meats or delicious Tarts, after we have eaten sufficiently of other simple & natural Food.
a. 1700. Evelyn, Diary, 10 Sept. 1677. To the Towne-house, where they presented us a collation of dried sweet meates and wine.
1750. Johnson, Rambler, No. 51, ¶ 6. She should be ashamed to set before company … sweetmeats of so dark a colour as she had often seen at Mistress Sprightly’s.
1812. Shelley, Devil’s Walk, xiv. Tired, [he] gives his sweetmeat, and again Cries for it, like a humoured boy.
1825. J. Neal, Bro. Jonathan, I. 76. Here were ‘sweetmeats,’ i.e. preserved plums.
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Sweetmeats, a general name for succades; fruits preserved in sugar, and confectionery articles made of sugar.
1880. ‘Ouida,’ Moths, i. You eat heaps of sweetmeats. You take too much tea, too much ice, too much soup, too much wine!
fig. 1690. C. Nesse, Hist. & Myst. O. & N. Test., I. 49. This is Satan’s sweet-meat to make Sinners like filthy dogs.
1854. Thackeray, Newcomes, I. 168. Gandish was always handing him sweetmeats of compliments.
2. A varnish, consisting principally of linseed oil, used in the preparation of patent leather.
1875. Knight, Dict. Mech., s.v. Patent Leather.
3. attrib. and Comb., as sweetmeat pan, pot, shop, spoon; sweetmeat-seller.
1669. R. Montagu, in Buccleuch MSS. (Hist. MSS. Comm.), I. 448. One sweetmeat pan, with a skimmer.
1705. Lond. Gaz., No. 4104/4. 2 Sweet-meat Spoons forked.
1769. Mrs. Raffald, Eng. Housekpr. (1778), 225. Put it into flat sweetmeat pots, and tie it down with brandy paper.
1895. Kipling, 2nd Jungle Bk., 92. It was the wife of the sweetmeat-seller.
Hence Sweetmeat v. (nonce-wd.) trans., to furnish with sweetmeats.
1764. H. Walpole, Lett. to Earl Hertford, 24 Feb. The fairies had so improved upon it, had so be-garlanded, so sweetmeated, and so desserted it [sc. a supper room], that it looked like a vision.
