Sponging

3 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Sponge \Sponge\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Sponged} (sp[u^]njd); p.
     pr. & vb. n. {Sponging} (sp[u^]n"j[i^]ng).]
     1. To cleanse or wipe with a sponge; as, to sponge a slate or
        a cannon; to wet with a sponge; as, to sponge cloth.
        [1913 Webster]
  


     2. To wipe out with a sponge, as letters or writing; to
        efface; to destroy all trace of. --Hooker.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     3. Fig.: To deprive of something by imposition. "How came
        such multitudes of our nation . . . to be sponged of their
        plate and their money?" --South.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     4. Fig.: To get by imposition or mean arts without cost; as,
        to sponge a breakfast. --Swift.
        [1913 Webster]

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Sponging \Spon"ging\ (-j[i^]ng),
     a. & n. from {Sponge}, v.
     [1913 Webster]
  
     {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.
        [1913 Webster]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  122 Moby Thesaurus words for "sponging":
     abject, ablution, absorbency, absorbent, absorption, adsorbent,
     adsorption, apple-polishing, ass-kissing, assimilation,
     backscratching, beggarly, blotter, blotting, blotting paper,
     bone-lazy, bootlicking, brown-nosing, cadging, chemisorption,
     chemosorption, cleaning out, cowering, crawling, cringing,
     crouching, digestion, dilatory, do-nothing, doless, douche,
     douching, dronish, drony, easy, elution, elutriation, endosmosis,
     enema, engrossment, ergophobic, exosmosis, faineant, fawnery,
     fawning, flattering, flunkyism, flush, flushing, flushing out,
     footlicking, good-for-nothing, groveling, handshaking, hangdog,
     indolent, infiltration, ingratiating, ingratiation, insinuation,
     irrigation, laggard, lathering, lavabo, lavage, lavation, laving,
     lax, lazy, mealymouthed, mealymouthedness, mopping, mopping up,
     nonaggressive, obeisance, obeisant, obsequious, obsequiousness,
     on bended knee, osmosis, parasitic, parasitism, percolation,
     procrastinative, prostrate, prostration, remiss, rinse, rinsing,
     scouring, scrounging, scrub, scrubbing, scrubbing up, seepage,
     shampoo, shiftless, slack, slothful, slow, sniveling, soaping,
     sorption, sponge, swabbing, sycophancy, sycophantic, timeserving,
     toadeating, toadying, toadyish, toadyism, truckling, tufthunting,
     unenterprising, wash, washing, washing up, washout, washup,
     wiping up, work-shy