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Sly   /slaɪ/   Listen
adjective
Sly  adj.  (compar. slyer or slier; superl. slyest or sliest)  
1.
Dexterous in performing an action, so as to escape notice; nimble; skillful; cautious; shrewd; knowing; in a good sense. "Be ye sly as serpents, and simple as doves." "Whom graver age And long experience hath made wise and sly."
2.
Artfully cunning; secretly mischievous; wily. "For my sly wiles and subtle craftiness, The litle of the kingdom I possess."
3.
Done with, and marked by, artful and dexterous secrecy; subtle; as, a sly trick. "Envy works in a sly and imperceptible manner."
4.
Light or delicate; slight; thin. (Obs.)
By the sly, or On the sly, in a sly or secret manner. (Colloq.) "Gazed on Hetty's charms by the sly."
Sly goose (Zool.), the common sheldrake; so named from its craftiness.
Synonyms: Cunning; crafty; subtile; wily. See Cunning.



adverb
Sly  adv.  Slyly. (Obs. or Poetic)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Sly" Quotes from Famous Books



... grins, sort of sly and sheepish, like they wasn't used to indulgin' in such frivolity. They seemed to enjoy it, though, and the first thing I know I'm bein' put through a sort of highbrow third degree, the object being to show up what an empty loft I ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford

... inch of it on the tip, black. The colour of the body was dirty white, bordering on cream colour; the hair on the belly rather whiter, softer and longer than on the rest of the body. His look was sly and wily; he built his nest on trees, and did not burrow ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 286, December 8, 1827 • Various

... sound somewhat sly, but French children, before Rousseau had made them the fashion, were kept in the background, and were reduced to picking up intelligence as best they could without any sense of its being dishonourable to ...
— A Modern Telemachus • Charlotte M. Yonge

... to remark anything—sly puss!" said the major, laughing heartily. "My dear Mrs. Mayburn, I shall ask for your congratulations tonight. I know we shall have yours, Mr. Graham, for Grace has informed me that Hilland is your best and nearest ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe

... mulatto, with a large head, bushy hair, and having the broad forehead and high nose of the European, with the thick lips and heavy jaws of the African; with an ashen gray complexion, and a penetrating, keen and sly expression of the eyes. With this strange combination of features he had also the European intellect with the African utterance. He was a very gifted original, whose singularities of genius and character will reveal themselves in the course of this history, and he was also one of those favored ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth


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