Hypertext Webster Gateway: "brooding"
From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) (web1913)
Brood \Brood\ (br[=o]ch), v. i. [imp. & p. p. {Brooded}; p. pr.
& vb. n. {Brooding}.]
1. To sit on and cover eggs, as a fowl, for the purpose of
warming them and hatching the young; or to sit over and
cover young, as a hen her chickens, in order to warm and
protect them; hence, to sit quietly, as if brooding.
Birds of calm sir brooding on the charmed wave.
--Milton.
2. To have the mind dwell continuously or moodily on a
subject; to think long and anxiously; to be in a state of
gloomy, serious thought; -- usually followed by over or
on; as, to brood over misfortunes.
Brooding on unprofitable gold. --Dryden.
Brooding over all these matters, the mother felt
like one who has evoked a spirit. --Hawthorne.
When with downcast eyes we muse and brood.
--Tennyson.
From WordNet (r) 1.7 (wn)
brooding
adj 1: persistently or morbidly thoughtful [syn: {broody}, {contemplative},
{meditative}, {musing}, {pensive}, {pondering}, {reflective},
{ruminative}]
2: good at incubating eggs especially a fowl kept for that
purpose; "a brood hen" [syn: {brood}, {hatching}]
n 1: sitting on eggs so as to hatch them by the warmth of the
body [syn: {incubation}]
2: persistent morbid meditation on a problem [syn: {pensiveness}]
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