11. To reach in time; to come up with; as, to catch a train.
To catch fire,
to become inflamed or ignited. — to catch it to get a scolding or beating; to suffer punishment.
[Colloq.] — To catch one's eye, to interrupt captiously while speaking. [Colloq.] "You catch me up so
very short." Dickens. — To catch up, to snatch; to take up suddenly.
Catch
(Catch) v. i.
1. To attain possession. [Obs.]
Have is have, however men do catch.
Shak.
2. To be held or impeded by entanglement or a light obstruction; as, a kite catches in a tree; a door
catches so as not to open.
3. To take hold; as, the bolt does not catch.
4. To spread by, or as by, infecting; to communicate.
Does the sedition catch from man to man?
Addison.
To catch at,
to attempt to seize; to be eager to get or use. "[To] catch at all opportunities of subverting
the state." Addison. — To catch up with, to come up with; to overtake.
Catch
(Catch), n.
1. Act of seizing; a grasp. Sir P. Sidney.
2. That by which anything is caught or temporarily fastened; as, the catch of a gate.
3. The posture of seizing; a state of preparation to lay hold of, or of watching he opportunity to seize; as,
to lie on the catch. [Archaic] Addison.
The common and the canon law . . . lie at catch, and wait advantages one againt another.
T. Fuller.
4. That which is caught or taken; profit; gain; especially, the whole quantity caught or taken at one time; as,
a good catch of fish.
Hector shall have a great catch if he knock out either of your brains.
Shak.
5. Something desirable to be caught, esp. a husband or wife in matrimony. [Colloq.] Marryat.
6. pl. Passing opportunities seized; snatches.
It has been writ by catches with many intervals.
Locke.
7. A slight remembrance; a trace.
We retain a catch of those pretty stories.
Glanvill.
8. (Mus.) A humorous canon or round, so contrived that the singers catch up each other's words.
Catchable
(Catch"a*ble) a. Capable of being caught. [R.]
Catch-basin
(Catch"-ba`sin) n. A cistern or vault at the point where a street gutter discharges into a
sewer, to catch bulky matters which would not pass readily through the sewer. Knight.