Talk:fee

Latest comment: 12 years ago by DCDuring in topic Verb

Verb

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I've heard "fee" used as a verb, as in "the banks are going to fee them out of existence", meaning something like "charge (someone) a fee" or "diminish (an account) by deducting fees from it". I can't find durably archived uses, though. - -sche (discuss) 16:13, 5 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

It is hard to search in Google Books because of those long esses ("what am I ſeeing?"), but I just found this (not the exact sense you have suggested): 1853, The legal observer, digest, and journal of jurisprudence: Volume 45 (page 353): "The practice of feeing the counsel's clerk as well as his master, your Committee consider to be very undesirable. They think that the fee to the counsel should always be a sufficient remuneration to him" Equinox 16:16, 5 June 2012 (UTC)Reply
A cite for yet another sense, "set a price for", contrasting with the sense of "charging a fee for", I think:
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DCDuring TALK 16:54, 5 June 2012 (UTC)Reply
Webster's 1913 has
Fee (?), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Feed (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Feeing.] To reward for services performed, or to be performed; to recompense; to hire or keep in hire; hence, to bribe.
The patient . . . fees the doctor. Dryden.
There's not a one of them but in his house I keep a servant feed. Shak.
DCDuring TALK 17:01, 5 June 2012 (UTC)Reply
Interesting; the line from Shakespeare is sufficient to add that sense, if we accept Webster's interpretation (definition) of it. Dictionary.com has two verb senses, "to give a fee [payment] to" and "(Chiefly Scot.) to hire; employ", which agree with what Webster has. I'm not sure how to interpret the 1853 citation. The 1850 citation could be using the word in Webster's sense, "to reward, recompense". - -sche (discuss) 17:15, 5 June 2012 (UTC)Reply
We could probably clean up [[feeing]], which has the Scotland sense as a noun. DCDuring TALK 17:51, 5 June 2012 (UTC)Reply