They . . . ate the sacrifices of the dead. Ps. cvi. 28.

The lean . . . did eat up the first seven fat kine. Gen. xli. 20.

The lion had not eaten the carcass. 1 Kings xiii. 28.

With stories told of many a feat,
How fairy Mab the junkets eat. Milton.

The island princes overbold
Have eat our substance. Tennyson.

His wretched estate is eaten up with mortgages. Thackeray.

To eat humble pie. See under Humble. -- To eat of (partitive use). "Eat of the bread that can not waste." Keble. -- To eat one's words, to retract what one has said. (See the Citation under Blurt.) -- To eat out, to consume completely. "Eat out the heart and comfort of it." Tillotson. -- To eat the wind out of a vessel (Naut.), to gain slowly to windward of her.

Syn. -- To consume; devour; gnaw; corrode.

He did eat continually at the king's table. 2 Sam. ix. 13.

To eat, To eat in or into, to make way by corrosion; to gnaw; to consume. "A sword laid by, which eats into itself." Byron. -- To eat to windward (Naut.), to keep the course when closehauled with but little steering; -- said of a vessel.