- To walk the plank
- Walk Walk, v. t.
1. To pass through, over, or upon; to traverse; to
perambulate; as, to walk the streets.
[1913 Webster]
As we walk our earthly round. --Keble. [1913 Webster]
2. To cause to walk; to lead, drive, or ride with a slow pace; as, to walk one's horses; to walk the dog. `` I will rather trust . . . a thief to walk my ambling gelding.'' --Shak. [1913 Webster +PJC]
3. [AS. wealcan to roll. See {Walk} to move on foot.] To subject, as cloth or yarn, to the fulling process; to full. [Obs. or Scot.] [1913 Webster]
4. (Sporting) To put or keep (a puppy) in a walk; to train (puppies) in a walk. [Cant] [Webster 1913 Suppl.]
5. To move in a manner likened to walking. [Colloq.]
She walked a spinning wheel into the house, making it use first one and then the other of its own spindling legs to achieve progression rather than lifting it by main force. --C. E. Craddock.
{To walk one's chalks}, to make off; take French leave.
{To walk the plank}, to walk off the plank into the water and be drowned; -- an expression derived from the practice of pirates who extended a plank from the side of a ship, and compelled those whom they would drown to walk off into the water; figuratively, to vacate an office by compulsion. --Bartlett. [1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English. 2000.