Breed — Defs

01 v. t. To produce as offspring; to bring forth; to bear; to procreate; to generate; to beget; to hatch.

imp. & p. p. Bred; p. pr. & vb. n. Breeding

1.
To produce as offspring; to bring forth; to bear; to procreate; to generate; to beget; to hatch.
“Yet every mother breeds not sons alike.” — Shak.

“If the sun breed maggots in a dead dog.” — Shak.
2.
To take care of in infancy, and through the age of youth; to bring up; to nurse and foster.
“To bring thee forth with pain, with care to breed.” — Dryden.

“Born and bred on the verge of the wilderness.” — Everett.
3.
To educate; to instruct; to form by education; to train; -- sometimes followed by up.
“But no care was taken to breed him a Protestant.” — Bp. Burnet.

“His farm may not remove his children too far from him, or the trade he breeds them up in.” — Locke.
4.
To engender; to cause; to occasion; to originate; to produce; as, to breed a storm; to breed disease.
“Lest the place And my quaint habits breed astonishment.” — Milton.
5.
To give birth to; to be the native place of; as, a pond breeds fish; a northern country breeds stout men.
6.
To raise, as any kind of stock.
7.
To produce or obtain by any natural process.[Obs.]
“Children would breed their teeth with less danger.” — Locke.

02 v. i. To bear and nourish young; to reproduce or multiply itself; to be pregnant.

1.
To bear and nourish young; to reproduce or multiply itself; to be pregnant.
“That they breed abundantly in the earth.” — Gen. viii. 17.

“The mother had never bred before.” — Carpenter.

“Ant. Is your gold and silver ewes and rams? Shy. I can not tell. I make it breed as fast.” — Shak.
2.
To be formed in the parent or dam; to be generated, or to grow, as young before birth.
3.
To have birth; to be produced or multiplied.
“Heavens rain grace On that which breeds between them.” — Shak.
4.
To raise a breed; to get progeny.
“The kind of animal which you wish to breed from.” — Gardner.

Phrases & compounds

To breed in and in — to breed from animals of the same stock that are closely related.

03 n. A race or variety of men or other animals (or of plants), perpetuating its special or distinctive characteristics by inheritance.

1.
A race or variety of men or other animals (or of plants), perpetuating its special or distinctive characteristics by inheritance.
“Twice fifteen thousand hearts of England's breed.” — Shak.

“Greyhounds of the best breed.” — Carpenter.
2.
Class; sort; kind; -- of men, things, or qualities.
“Are these the breed of wits so wondered at?” — Shak.

“This courtesy is not of the right breed.” — Shak.
3.
A number produced at once; a brood.[Obs.]