Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Sponging
Spon′ging
(-jĭng)
,
Sponging house
(Eng. Law)
, a bailiff’s or other house in which debtors are put before being taken to jail, or until they compromise with their creditors. At these houses extortionate charges are commonly made for food, lodging, etc.
Definition 2024
sponging
sponging
English
Verb
sponging
- present participle of sponge
- 1883: Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island – I'm to be a poor, crawling beggar, sponging for rum, when I might be rolling in a coach!
Noun
sponging (plural spongings)
- The application of a sponge.
- 1815, William Shearman, New Medical and Physical Journal
- I have employed cold air, and very often spongings with cold water, in order to moderate the preternatural heat of the skin, and to check the increased velocity of the circulation.
- 1815, William Shearman, New Medical and Physical Journal