hie

present singular third person hies · participle present hying · participle present hieing · participle past hied · past hied · alternative obsolete heye · alternative obsolete high

1. intransitivepoeticTo hasten; to go quickly, to hurry.

   But after her lover Amyntas hied.

   1599, “Fair Phyllis”, John Farmer (music)

   4 more examples

   Hath pleased you, and eased you, and sweet slumber seized you. And now to bed I hie.

   1605, “Rest Sweet Nymphs”, Francis Pilkington (music)

   The youth, returning to his mistress, hies.

   1717, William Congreve, Samuel Croxall, John Dryden, Laurence Eusden, John Ozell, “Book X”, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC

   At break of morn she hies to yonder abbey

   1781, Horace Walpole, The Mysterious Mother, Act 1 Scene 2

   Would that I could clear out Hampton Court and the Tuileries for ye! But gulp down your tears and hie aloft to the royal-mast with your hearts; for your friends who have gone before are clearing out the seven-storied heavens, and making refugees of long-pampered Gabriel, Michael, and Raphael, against your coming.

   1851 November 14, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC

2. poeticreflexiveTo hurry (oneself).

   My husband hies him home.

   c. 1604–1605 (date written), William Shakespeare, “All’s Well, that Ends Well”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iv]

   1 more example

   Some have conjectured hastily that all Southerners in town hie themselves to cafés at nightfall.

   1906, O. Henry, A Cosmopolite in a Café

3. transitiveTo urge (a horse) to the left with a cry of "hie".

   Antonyms: hup

alternative obsolete heye · alternative obsolete high

1. dialectalA call to turn a horse to the left.

   Antonyms: hup