from
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Nurse \Nurse\ (n[^u]rs), n. [OE. nourse, nurice, norice, OF.
nurrice, norrice, nourrice, F. nourrice, fr. L. nutricia
nurse, prop., fem. of nutricius that nourishes; akin to
nutrix, -icis, nurse, fr. nutrire to nourish. See {Nourish},
and cf. {Nutritious}.]
1. One who nourishes; a person who supplies food, tends, or
brings up; as:
(a) A woman who has the care of young children;
especially, one who suckles an infant not her own.
(b) A person, especially a woman, who has the care of the
sick or infirm.
[1913 Webster]
2. One who, or that which, brings up, rears, causes to grow,
trains, fosters, or the like.
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The nurse of manly sentiment and heroic enterprise.
--Burke.
[1913 Webster]
3. (Naut.) A lieutenant or first officer, who is the real
commander when the captain is unfit for his place.
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4. (Zool.)
(a) A peculiar larva of certain trematodes which produces
cercariae by asexual reproduction. See {Cercaria}, and
{Redia}.
(b) Either one of the nurse sharks.
[1913 Webster]
{Nurse shark}. (Zool.)
(a) A large arctic shark ({Somniosus microcephalus}),
having small teeth and feeble jaws; -- called also
{sleeper shark}, and {ground shark}.
(b) A large shark ({Ginglymostoma cirratum}), native of
the West Indies and Gulf of Mexico, having the dorsal
fins situated behind the ventral fins.
{To put to nurse}, or {To put out to nurse}, to send away to
be nursed; to place in the care of a nurse.
{Wet nurse}, {Dry nurse}. See {Wet nurse}, and {Dry nurse},
in the Vocabulary.
[1913 Webster]
from
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0
35 Moby Thesaurus words for "dry nurse":
aliment, amah, ayah, breast-feed, care for, cherish, coddle,
cosset, cradle, cultivate, fatten, fatten up, feed, fondle,
force-feed, foster, lactate, lavish care on, mammy, mother, nanny,
nourish, nurse, nursemaid, nurserymaid, nurture, nutrify, pamper,
sitter, spoon-feed, stuff, suckle, sustain, wet nurse, wet-nurse