whitewash (hwitwosh)

1. A wash or liquid composition for whitening something. Especially - (a) A wash for making the skin fair. The clergy.. were very much taken up in reforming the female world; I have heard a whole sermon against a whitewash . Add is on, Guardian, No. 116. (b) A composition of quicklime and water, or, for more careful work, of whiting, size, and water, used for whitening the plaster of walls, woodwork, etc., or as a freshening coating for any surface. It is not used for fine work. Some dilapidations there are to be made good;... but a little glazing, painting, whitewash , and plaster will make it [a house] last thy time. Vanbrugh, Relapse, v. 3. 2. False coloring, as of character, alleged services, etc.; the covering up of wrong-doing or defects: as, the investigating committee applied a thick coat of whitewash. [Colloq.] 3. In base - ball and other games, a contest in which one side fails to score. [Colloq.] whitewash (hwit'wosh), v.; pret. and pp. white washed, ppr. whitewashing. [ There were workmen pulling down some of the old hangings and replacing them with others, altering, repairing, scrubbing, painting, and white-washing. Scott, Heart of Mid-Lothian, xliii. 2. To make white; give a fair external appearance to; attempt to clear from imputations; attempt to restore the reputation of. [Colloq.] A white - washed Jacobite; that is, one who, having been long a non-juror, had lately qualified himself to act as a justice, by taking the oaths to Government. IMG:content-2337.jpg:[graphic] Scott , Rob Roy, vii. Whitewashed, he quits the politician's strife At ease in mind, with pockets filled for life. Lowell, Tempora Mutantur. 3. To clear by a judicial proce (an insolvent or bankrupt) of the debts he owes. [Colloq.] -4. In base - ball, etc., to beat in a game in which the opponents fail to score. II. in trans. To become coated with a white inflorescence, as some bricks. The bricks made from them [clays on the Hudson River] usually " whitewash " or "saltpetre" upon exposure to the weather. C. T. Davis , Bricks, etc., ii. 44. whitewasher (hwit' wosher), n. [