2. An alley; a narrow path or walk cut through woods,
shrubbery, or the like. [Obs.]
In a trench, forth in the park, goeth she.
--Chaucer.
3. (Fort.) An excavation made during a siege, for the purpose
of covering the troops as they advance toward the besieged
place. The term includes the parallels and the approaches.
{To open the trenches} (Mil.), to begin to dig or to form the
lines of approach.
{Trench cavalier} (Fort.), an elevation constructed (by a
besieger) of gabions, fascines, earth, and the like, about
half way up the glacis, in order to discover and enfilade
the covered way.
{Trench plow}, or {Trench plough}, a kind of plow for opening
land to a greater depth than that of common furrows.
The wide wound that the boar had trenched In his
soft flank. --Shak.
This weak impress of love is as a figure Trenched in
ice, which with an hour's heat Dissolves to water,
and doth lose its form. --Shak.
2. (Fort.) To fortify by cutting a ditch, and raising a
rampart or breastwork with the earth thrown out of the
ditch; to intrench. --Pope.
No more shall trenching war channel her fields.
--Shak.
3. To cut furrows or ditches in; as, to trench land for the
purpose of draining it.
4. To dig or cultivate very deeply, usually by digging
parallel contiguous trenches in succession, filling each
from the next; as, to trench a garden for certain crops.
Does it not seem as if for a creature to challenge
to itself a boundless attribute, were to trench upon
the prerogative of the divine nature? --I. Taylor.
2. To have direction; to aim or tend. [R.] --Bacon.
{To trench at}, to make trenches against; to approach by
trenches, as a town in besieging it. [Obs.]
Like powerful armies, trenching at a town By slow
and silent, but resistless, sap. --Young.