[f. as prec. + -ING2.] That trembles, in various senses of the verb.
a. 1400–50. Alexander, 4914 (Ashm. MS.). Þe testre trased full of trones with trimballand wingis.
1526. Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W., 1531), 257. With tremblynge herte and holy fere, thynkyng hym selfe vnworthy to touche that moost holy body.
c. 1614. Sir W. Mure, Dido & Æneas, I. 269. A contrare blast Doth force his saile against the trembling mast.
a. 1628. Sir J. Beaumont, Bosworth F., 66. Which like a twinkling Star, with trembling Light Sends radiant Lustre through the darksome Air.
1634. Sir T. Herbert, Trav., 207. The lookers on incessantly warble out soft trembling Musique.
1797. Mrs. Radcliffe, Italian, xi. It was delivered in … low and trembling accents.
1877. Froude, Short Stud. (1883), IV. I. x. 122. [He] let in the trembling wretches who had been shut out.
b. transf. Characterized or accompanied by trembling.
c. 1430. Lydg., Min. Poems, Pater Noster. Atwyxe dred and tremblyng reuerence Astoned I am.
1613. Shaks., Hen. VIII., I. ii. 95. Sixt part of each? A trembling contribution.
1794. Blake, Songs Exper., Little Boy Lost, 10. In trembling zeal he seized his hair.
1818. Scott, Br. Lamm., xxxv. To the butler’s trembling entreaties … he at first returned no answer.
c. In specific applications: trembling aixies or exies (cf. ACCESS 10), the ague (Sc.); trembling beef, some dish of boiled beef (? obs.); cf. trembling-piece; trembling bog, bog-land formed over water or soft mud, which shakes at every tread, a quaking bog; so trembling prairie, in Louisiana, U.S.A.; trembling-chair: see quot.; trembling eel, the gymnotus; trembling-grass, quaking-grass (Briza media); trembling-ill, the ague in sheep (Sc.); trembling palsy, paralysis characterized by trembling of the extremities or the head (Syd. Soc. Lex., 1899); trembling-piece [F. pièce tremblante], a joint of beef so interlarded with fat as to quiver; trembling-poplar, the Aspen, Populus tremula, also the N. American P. tremuloides.
1808–18. Jamieson, Trembling Feuers, the ague, Ang. *Trembling Aixes [ed. 1825 Exies].
1818. Scott, Br. Lamm., xi. The cookmaid in the trembling exies.
1806. A. Hunter, Culina (ed. 3), 238. *Trembling Beef. Take a brisket of beef, and boil it gently [etc.].
1697. Dryden, Virg. Georg., III. 653. He lives on standing Lakes, and *trembling Bogs.
1899. Syd. Soc. Lex., *Trembling chair, a vibrating chair used in the treatment of paralysis.
1807. Joyce, Sci. Dialogues, xvi. (1846), 397 (Electricity). In Firmin’s ‘Natural History of Surinam’ is some account of the *trembling eel.
1853. G. Johnston, Bot. E. Bord., 216. Briza media, *Trembling-grass: Quaking-grass.
1833. Wilson, Fr. & Eng. Dict., s.v. Tremblant, *Trembling-piece.
1861. Miss Pratt, Flower. Pl., V. 120. (Aspen, or *Trembling Poplar) … is a middle-sized tree.
1852. New Orleans Weekly Delta, 4 July, 1/2. The projected Canal will cross over the neck of *Trembling Prairie.
