CHASE, v.t.

1. Vehement pursuit; a running or driving after; as game, in hunting; a flying enemy, in war; a ship at sea, &c.
2. Pursuit with an ardent desire to obtain, as pleasure, profit, fame, &c.; earnest seeking.
3. That which may be chased; that which is usually taken by the chase; as, beasts of chase.
4. That which is pursued or hunted; as, seek some other chase. So at sea, a ship chased is called the chase.
5. In law, a driving of cattle to or from a place.
6. An open ground, or place of retreat for deer and other wild beasts; differing from a forest, which is not private property and is invested with privileges, and from a park which is inclosed. A chase is private property, and well stored with wild beasts or game.
7. [Fr. chasse; Sp. caxa; It. cassa. See Case and Cash.] An iron frame used by printers to confine types, when set in columns.
8. Chase of a gun, is the whole length of the bore.
9. A term in the game of tennis. Chase guns, in a ship of war, guns used in chasing an enemy or in defending a ship when chased. These have their ports at the head or stern. A gun at the head is called a bow-chase; at the stern, a stern-chase.

1. Literally, to drive, urge, press forward with vehemence; hence, to pursue for the purpose of taking, as game; to hunt.
2. To pursue, or drive, as a defeated or flying enemy. – Lev. xxvi. 7. Deut. xxxii. 30.
3. To follow or pursue as an object of desire; to pursue for the purpose of taking; as, to chase a ship.
4. To drive; to pursue. Chased by their brother's endless malice. – Knolles. To chase away, is to compel to depart; to disperse. To chase metals. [See Enchase.]

1. To pursue for the purpose of killing or taking, as an enemy, or game] to hunt.
   
   

   We are those which chased you from the field.
   Shak.

   Philologists, who chase
   A panting syllable through time and place.
   Cowper.

2. To give chase; to hunt; as, to chase around after a doctor.
   
   
   [Colloq.]
3. Vehement pursuit for the purpose of killing or capturing, as of an enemy, or game; an earnest seeking after any object greatly desired; the act or habit of hunting; a hunt.
   
   
   "This mad chase of fame." Dryden.

   You see this chase is hotly followed.
   Shak.

4. A rectangular iron frame in which pages or columns of type are imposed.
5. To ornament (a surface of metal) by embossing, cutting away parts, and the like.
6. To follow as if to catch; to pursue; to compel to move on; to drive by following; to cause to fly; -- often with away or off; as, to chase the hens away.
   
   

   Chased by their brother's endless malice from prince to prince and from place to place.
   Knolles.

7. That which is pursued or hunted.
   
   

   Nay, Warwick, seek thee out some other chase,
   For I myself must hunt this deer to death.
   Shak.

8. The part of a cannon from the reënforce or the trunnions to the swell of the muzzle. See Cannon.
9. To cut, so as to make a screw thread.
10. To pursue eagerly, as hunters pursue game.
    
    

    Chasing each other merrily.
    Tennyson.

11. An open hunting ground to which game resorts, and which is private properly, thus differing from a forest, which is not private property, and from a park, which is inclosed. Sometimes written chace.
    
    
    [Eng.]
12. A groove, or channel, as in the face of a wall; a trench, as for the reception of drain tile.
13. A division of the floor of a gallery, marked by a figure or otherwise; the spot where a ball falls, and between which and the dedans the adversary must drive his ball in order to gain a point.
    
    

    Chase gun (Naut.), a cannon placed at the bow or stern of an armed vessel, and used when pursuing an enemy, or in defending the vessel when pursued. -- Chase port (Naut.), a porthole from which a chase gun is fired. -- Stern chase (Naut.), a chase in which the pursuing vessel follows directly in the wake of the vessel pursued.

14. A kind of joint by which an overlap joint is changed to a flush joint, by means of a gradually deepening rabbet, as at the ends of clinker-built boats.