What is "lent an ear"

Usage examples of "lent an ear".

Thenardier, not being able to distinguish their visages, lent an ear to their words with the desperate attention of a wretch who feels himself lost.

Roberto lent an ear to this talk, but he was thinking more about the moon—.

Little wonder that in the tender melancholy of their faded, aging glory they lent an ear to the secret doctrines of Moslem mystics, hieratic guardians of hidden treasures.

If he lent an ear to another man's story, it was because he was in immediate want of a hearer for one of his own.

He stole to his window and lent an ear, hut the voices were receding, and to his vexation he caught nothing of what was said.

To Renard, she protested bitterly that it 'would burden her conscience too heavily to allow Elizabeth to succeed, for she only went to mass out of hypocrisy, she had not a single servant or maid-of-honour who was not a heretic, she talked every day with heretics and lent an ear to their evil designs, and it would be a disgrace to the kingdom to allow her to succeed.