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The Collaborative International Dictionary
Festering

Fester \Fes"ter\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Festered; p. pr. & vb. n. Festering.] [OE. festern, fr. fester, n.; or fr. OF. festrir, fr. festre, n. See Fester, n.]

  1. To generate pus; to become imflamed and suppurate; as, a sore or a wound festers.

    Wounds immedicable Rankle, and fester, and gangrene.
    --Milton.

    Unkindness may give a wound that shall bleed and smart, but it is treachery that makes it fester.
    --South.

    Hatred . . . festered in the hearts of the children of the soil.
    --Macaulay.

  2. To be inflamed; to grow virulent, or malignant; to grow in intensity; to rankle.

Wiktionary
festering

n. The condition of something that festers. vb. (present participle of fester English)

WordNet
festering
  1. n. (medicine) the formation of morbific matter in an abscess or a vesicle and the discharge of pus [syn: suppuration, maturation]

  2. a fluid product of inflammation [syn: pus, purulence, suppuration, ichor, sanies]

Usage examples of "festering".

It was to Migel that Helen appealed in the festering dispute between Bob Barnett and Eric Boulter over the respective roles of the AFB and the AFOB.

The ceilidh was being held in a barnlike shack falling to rack and ruin down in the midst of the mangrove swamps festering about the mouth of the Dungloe River.

Why were there no words that would unlock what lay festering in the heart of Rowdy Dick Doolan, who needed so desperately to express what he could never even know needed expression?

He was a mite of a boy, nothing but skin-covered bones, his burned, freckled face in a mortar of tears and dust, his clothing unspeakably dirty, one great toe in a festering mass from a broken nail, and sores all over the visible portions of the small body.

A great festering wound, a gumma, had eaten away most of her nose and turned it into an open snout.

They make all manner of things from this naphtha, even some odd salves that keep wounds from festering, but one thing theyve found is the secret of making Quegan fire.

Having nurtured a festering resentment for this particular nobleman well before their introduction, Roger was as unwilling to accept the proffered hand as the man had been reluctant to extend it, but in so doing, he suffered a measurable shock as the long fingers closed about his own hand.

Those California goddamned clowns, both smelling of patchouli oil, and cheap sweet wine, and an angry festering vindictiveness.

She has sniffed the aroma of festering emotions and now she moves in to tweeze and scrape and dig.

With another beat of her festering wings, Umrae hopped and closed the distance.

He helped the physicians with binding woundwort and other medicinal herbs, including some mosses and clay, around open cuts to stop them festering.

He had summoned Rose to treat a festering cut on his left shin and was now receiving a thorough scolding from the angry simpler for waiting so long.

Neyther did it refuse or make resistance to anye sharpe and newe assaulte of loue, which in my stroken and sore wounded heart woulde lye festering and feeding of himselfe.

Braggen, well hardened for war by his festering grudges, and unburdened by initiate mage talent.

His face was a mass of unhealed scars and festering sores, his right ear missing.