verb
definition
To bend; to fold; to mould; to adapt, to modify; to change (a person's) mind, to cause (a person) to submit.
definition
To bend, to flex; to be bent by something, to give way or yield (to a force, etc.).
verb
definition
To work at (something) diligently.
example
He plied his trade as carpenter for forty-three years.
definition
To wield or use (a tool, a weapon, etc.) steadily or vigorously.
example
He plied his ax with bloody results.
definition
To press upon; to urge persistently.
example
to ply someone with questions or solicitations
definition
To persist in offering something to, especially for the purpose of inducement or persuasion.
example
to ply someone with drink
definition
To travel over (a route) regularly.
example
The steamer plies between several ports on the coast.
definition
To work diligently.
definition
To manoeuvre a sailing vessel so that the direction of the wind changes from one side of the vessel to the other; to work to windward, to beat, to tack.
Examples of plied in a Sentence
Axes and choppers were plied all around.
Steamers plied on the Irrawaddy as far as Thayetmyo.
In the original design sup plied for the 36-in.
Born at Honfleur he was cabinboy for a while on board the rickety steamer that plied between Havre and Honfleur across the estuary of the Seine.
He wisely refrained from putting his arm round me, just kept me plied with coffee.
Such designs violated the conventions by which the machinists plied their trade.
The 700 year old harbor had been extensively used by the sailing hoys which regularly plied their trade from London.
Day two Clyde-built ships plied the seaways between Britain and North America, moving people and goods back and fore.
Division was accomplished by multiplying the divisor until the dividend was reached; the answer being the number of times the divisor was so multi- I plied.
Twain's home was considered whimsical since it resembled one of the steam riverboats that plied up and down the Mississippi River.
The cords of the skirt are thickly plied and knotted at the bottom, so that the skirt "must have had quite a swing to it" (Barber, p. 57).
On shows where you put men and women together like Big Brother, The Real World and Rock of Love someone's bound to get naked, especially when plied with alcohol.
He plied her lips gently, testing and encouraging, and she felt herself respond despite her indignation.
She recalled with bitterness how he'd plied her with potion, falsely igniting her deep seeded passions until there was no turning back from his rampant lust.
By 1718 he had made some reputation as a writer of occasional verse, which he published in broadsheets, and then (or a year earlier) he turned bookseller in the premises where he had hitherto plied his craft of wig-making.
In 1900, one hundred and thirty private and several crown steamers plied on the Ob-Irtysh river system as far as Semipalatinsk on the Irtysh, Biysk on the Ob, and Achinsk on the Chulym.
This was the most powerful argument with which he had plied the emperor and the members of the French government, and which he had found most efficacious with them.
They are occupied by a small tribe of about 80 Eskimo, who have from early times plied the trade of middlemen between Asia and America.
Beyond this city the navigation is conducted by native craft, - the modern facilities for traffic by rail and the increasing shoals in the river having put an end to the previous steamer communication, which plied until about 1860 as high up as Allahabad.
The queen of Sheba who visited Solomon may have come with a caravan trading to Gaza, to see the great king whose ships plied on the Red Sea.
The lake swarms with fish, which are caught with nets by a gild of fishermen, whose boats are the only representatives of the many ships and boats which plied on the lake as late as the 10th century.
In the paper which he left signed, and to which he referred in answer to the questions wherewith the busy bishops plied him, he expressed his sorrow for having assumed the royal style, and at the last moment confessed that Charles had denied to him privately, as he had publicly, that he was ever married to Lucy Walters.
Merchant vessels must of course have plied between England and France or Frisia.
Three ferries plied incessantly between Richborough and Calais and Dunkirk, connecting railhead in England with railhead in France.
But the friends of Narses continually plied him with suggestions that he, a great officer of the household, in the secrets of the emperor, had been sent to Italy, not to serve as a subaltern, but to hold independent command and win military glory for himself.
In Sambas, Montrado and some parts of Pontianak, the greater density of the population is due to the greater fertility of the soil, the opening of mines, the navigation and trade plied on the larger rivers, and the concentration of the population at the junctions of rivers, the mouths of rivers and the seats of government.
Gregory plied every one with questions, and in this way gathered a great mass of detailed information.
The first steam navigation company was established in Dumbarton in 1815, when the "Duke of Wellington" (built in the town) plied between Dumbarton and Glasgow.
He devoted no less attention to the increase of Corinthian commerce, which in his days plied busily on both eastern and western seas.
The deputies having been dazzled by I tes anc reviews, Talleyrand and Marescalchi, ministers of foreign affain at Paris and Milan, plied them with hints as to the course to th followed by the consulta; and, despite the rage of the mon democratic of their number, everything corresponded to thi wishes of the First Consul.
Half a century later a party of trappers of the Hudson's Bay Company entered Nevada and plied their trade along the Humboldt river.