[f. next.]
1. A rounded bend or circuit of a stream. dial.
c. 1630. Risdon, Surv. Devon, § 253 (1810), 261. In the trend of Touridge,… stands Meeth.
a. 1874. Madox-Brown, Dwale Bluth, I. iv. (1876), I. 87. We’d dew best ter palch [note run] along ter th’ trend i’ th’ holler hinder [note yonder].
2. Wool (partly cleaned) wound in tops for spinning: cf. next, 2 b. dial.
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Trend, clean wool.
3. Naut. a. That part of the shank of an anchor where it thickens towards the crown.
1794. Rigging & Seamanship, I. 79. Several parts of the anchor are governed by the size of the trend, which is marked on the shank at the same distance from the inside of the throat as the arm measures … to the extremity of the bill.
1867. Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., Trend of an Anchor, the lower end of the shank, where it thickens towards the arms, usually at one-third from the crown.
b. The angle between the direction of the anchor-cable and that of the ship’s keel.
1879. in Webster, Suppl.
4. The way something trends or bends away; the general direction that a stream or current, a coast, mountain-range, valley, stratum, etc., tends to take.
1777. Horæ Subsecivæ, 438 (E.D.D.).
1803. W. Taylor, in Ann. Rev., I. 438. Tracing the course of streams, or the trend of coasts.
1854. Murchison, Siluria, xii. 305. The trend and character of the marine currents.
1872. C. King, Mountain. Sierra Nev., i. 2. Numerous ridges … having a general northeast trend.
1876. A. H. Green, Phys. Geol. (1877), 316. As we recede … along the trend of a belt of shale.
b. fig. The general course, tendency, or drift (of action, thought, etc.).
1884. Chr. Commw., 12 June, 823/2. The trend of the thought and action of the churches is … towards the consecration of every department of life.
1912. Lady Burghclere, Life Jas., 1st Dk. Ormonde, I. xii. 377. The general trend of affairs in Munster.
