Library / English Dictionary |
SENTRY
Pronunciation (US): | (GB): |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A person employed to keep watch for some anticipated event
Synonyms:
lookout; lookout man; picket; scout; sentinel; sentry; spotter; watch
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("sentry" is a kind of...):
security guard; watcher; watchman (a guard who keeps watch)
Context examples:
I sought no shelter, therefore, but the sky; and toiling into Chatham,—which, in that night's aspect, is a mere dream of chalk, and drawbridges, and mastless ships in a muddy river, roofed like Noah's arks,—crept, at last, upon a sort of grass-grown battery overhanging a lane, where a sentry was walking to and fro.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
Tired though we all were, two were sent out for firewood; two more were set to dig a grave for Redruth; the doctor was named cook; I was put sentry at the door; and the captain himself went from one to another, keeping up our spirits and lending a hand wherever it was wanted.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
I never in my life saw men so careless of the morrow; hand to mouth is the only word that can describe their way of doing; and what with wasted food and sleeping sentries, though they were bold enough for a brush and be done with it, I could see their entire unfitness for anything like a prolonged campaign.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)