_peer_
Intransitive verb.
Pronunciation: pɪə(r).
Etymology: of uncertain origin.
Preterite tense: peered; preterite participle: peered; present
participle: peering.
1. To look intently, or curiously, particularly, with
an intention of discerning something or someone that looms.
Translation: regarder curieusement, in French; mirar curiosamente, in Spanish;
guardare curiosamente, in Italian.
Synonyms: to pore, spy, pry.
[…]
fifty times a day had she listened for some sound, or peered through the windows of the circular room to discover
some object.
Horace Smith… Brambletye house
Wishing,
one evening, to ask of him some trifling favor, I entered his room unheard, and
found him with his back to me, leaning intently over his writing; Half-mischievous,
half-curious, I peered over his shoulder to know what
dull problem so absorbed his attention.
The Knickerbocker.
She
went to the window and began to peer through the blinds to see the
old housemaid.
Walter… My secret life
An
irrepressible tremor gradually pervaded my frame […]. I uplifted myself upon
the pillows, and, peering earnestly within the intense
darkness of the chamber, harkened […] to certain low and indefinite sounds
which came, through the pauses of the storm, at long intervals, I knew not
whence.
Edgar Poe
As
we rode up to the gate-way, I perceived it slightly open, and the visage of a
man peering through.
Edgar Poe
Stealing
along like a guilty thing, she approached the door of his private library; and,
stooping down, peered through the keyhole.
John Stanyan… Alfred Staunton
It
rather ludicrously occurred to us, that any old lady who was not well versed in
natural history, upon reading the title, might exclaim, as she peered through her spectacles, " Well, I wonder who can
those two young gentlemen be with such hard names.”
The Metropolitan, Vol. 11
-) With the preposition into, or at + a noun, by which the object is designated:
We stand upon the brink of a precipice. We peer into the abyss -- we grow sick and dizzy. Our first
impulse is to shrink from the danger. Unaccountably we remain.
Edgar Poe
The
little vale into which I thus peered down from under the fog canopy could not have been
more than four hundred yards long; while in breadth it varied from fifty to one
hundred and fifty or perhaps two hundred.
Edgar Poe
I
was peering into the trees and shrubs around
to discover a newcomer.
Frederick Marryat… The Little
Savage
Joe
shaded his eyes with his hand and peered into the corner, but could make
out nothing.
Charles Dickens… Barnaby Rudge
[…]
the searchers marched into the inner room, and proceeded to its careful
examination. The hangings were pulled aside; the old oak armoire was opened;
the closets peered into—but nothing was found.
William Ainsworth… Ovingdean
Grange
A
suspicious twitch flitted about the corners of her mouth, as she peered over her spectacles at the beef, the potatoes, and
the spinach, but she told Emily so kindly how she ought to have done.
Peterson's Magazine, Vol. 27-28
Miss
Patty peered over her spectacles at John Smith; and laying her hand on Daisy's arm, she whispered, “Is not
that a son of Sam Smith, that drove a hackney-coach, when he first came to New
York?”
Catharine Sedgwick… Clarence
[…]
the fond mother peered through her glasses at her son's careworn countenance.
The Monthly chronicle
[…]
approaching the fair reader from behind, she stretched forth her long, and
somewhat meagre neck, and peered over her shoulder at the papers on the table.
George Payne… Rose D'Albret
2. (Of
a thing) to
appear partly. Walter Skeat stated: it is merely short for “appear.”
Synonym: to peep.
And,
here and there, in groves about this grass, […] sprang up fantastic trees,
whose tall slender stems stood not upright, but slanted gracefully toward the
light that peered at noon-day into the centre
of the valley.
Edgar Poe
[…]
the effect was that of looking out at the first dawn of day, when, under a grey
sky, white objects begin to peer through the obscurity of
night.
The Visitor: Or, Monthly Instructor
[…]
the daylight already peered through the window curtains.
Edward Lytton… Night and Morning
