What is "to deal by"

Deal \Deal\, v. i.

1. To make distribution; to share out in portions, as cards to the players.

2. To do a distributing or retailing business, as distinguished from that of a manufacturer or producer; to traffic; to trade; to do business; as, he deals in flour.

   They buy and sell, they deal and traffic.
   --South.

   This is to drive to wholesale trade, when all other petty merchants deal but for parcels.
   --Dr. H. More.

3. To act as an intermediary in business or any affairs; to manage; to make arrangements; -- followed by between or with.

   Sometimes he that deals between man and man, raiseth his own credit with both, by pretending greater interest than he hath in either.
   --Bacon.

4. To conduct one's self; to behave or act in any affair or towards any one; to treat.

   If he will deal clearly and impartially, . . . he will acknowledge all this to be true.
   --Tillotson.

5. To contend (with); to treat (with), by way of opposition, check, or correction; as, he has turbulent passions to deal with. To deal by, to treat, either well or ill; as, to deal well by servants. ``Such an one deals not fairly by his own mind.'' --Locke. To deal in.

   1. To have to do with; to be engaged in; to practice; as, they deal in political matters.

   2. To buy and sell; to furnish, as a retailer or wholesaler; as, they deal in fish. To deal with.

      1. To treat in any manner; to use, whether well or ill; to have to do with; specifically, to trade with. ``Dealing with witches.''
         --Shak.

      2. To reprove solemnly; to expostulate with.

         The deacons of his church, who, to use their own phrase, ``dealt with him'' on the sin of rejecting the aid which Providence so manifestly held out.
         --Hawthorne.

         Return . . . and I will deal well with thee.
         --Gen. xxxii. 9.