Blush \Blush\ (bl[u^]sh) v. i. [imp. & p. p. {Blushed} (bl[u^]sht); p. pr. & vb. n. {Blushing}.] [OE. bluschen to shine, look, turn red, AS. blyscan to glow; akin to blysa a torch, [=a]bl[=y]sian to blush, D. blozen, Dan. blusse to blaze, blush.] 1. To become suffused with red in the cheeks, as from a sense of shame, modesty, or confusion; to become red from such cause, as the cheeks or face.
To the nuptial bower I led her blushing like the morn. --Milton.
In the presence of the shameless and unblushing, the young offender is ashamed to blush. --Buckminster.
He would stroke The head of modest and ingenuous worth, That blushed at its own praise. --Cowper.
2. To grow red; to have a red or rosy color.
The sun of heaven, methought, was loth to set, But stayed, and made the western welkin blush. --Shak.
3. To have a warm and delicate color, as some roses and other flowers.
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen. --T. Gray.
Blush \Blush\, v. t. 1. To suffuse with a blush; to redden; to make roseate. [Obs.]
To blush and beautify the cheek again. --Shak.
2. To express or make known by blushing.
I'll blush you thanks. --Shak.
Blush \Blush\, n. 1. A suffusion of the cheeks or face with red, as from a sense of shame, confusion, or modesty.
The rosy blush of love. --Trumbull.
2. A red or reddish color; a rosy tint.
Light's last blushes tinged the distant hills. --Lyttleton.
{At first blush}, or {At the first blush}, at the first appearance or view. ``At the first blush, we thought they had been ships come from France.'' --Hakluyt.
Note: This phrase is used now more of ideas, opinions, etc., than of material things. ``All purely identical propositions, obviously, and at first blush, appear,'' etc. --Locke.
{To put to the blush}, to cause to blush with shame; to put to shame.
A lean operation with six employees, a handful of consultants and a mere $13 million in capital, it has toted up a record that might make an orthodox venture capitalist blush.
The Atlanta Constitution recently editorialized that "Atlanta's nude dancing is so prim it would blush if it found itself amid some of the raucous goings-on in the best little House of Representatives in Georgia."
At first blush, it was a plain-vanilla transaction: Texas Air Corp. would inject $225 million into its ailing Eastern Airlines subsidiary, remove Eastern's highly profitable shuttle operations and install them in a newly created unit of Texas Air.
"If somebody walked on her lawn, she'd cuss at them in language that would make a sailor blush," McIntire said.
The stage is thus set for the highly centralised British government to trumpet its allegiance to subsidiarity in Edinburgh today without a blush.
Her performance would make parents blush at a high school theatrical.
For example, there was still a blush of color on the cheeks when the portrait was daubed with a wet sponge.
There is the merest blush of pink and an evenness of lustre.
At least Mr. Greenspan knows to blush when promoting a tax increase as an economic stimulus.
"At first blush, it looks all right," said John Gordon of Deltec Securities Corp., who heads a steering committee of Southland security holders.
At first blush, Mr. Simmons's serious demeanor and low-key personality seem out of sync with such an aggressive vocation.
At first blush, it sounds like a pretty good deal.
Net banking income jumped by 7 per cent to FFr606m, and total assets stood at FFr11.19bn. But Mr Gerard Pfauwadel, chairman, sees no reason to blush at the apparent embarrassment of riches.
What the storm proved, at first blush, was that landmarks do not have to endure," he says.