RUMMAGING
Verb
rummaging
present participle of rummage
Noun
rummaging (plural rummagings)
The act of one who rummages.
Source: Wiktionary
RUMMAGE
Rum"mage (; 48), n. Etym: [For roomage, fr. room; hence originally, a
making room, a packing away closely. See Room.]
1. (Naut.)
Definition: A place or room for the stowage of cargo in a ship; also, the
act of stowing cargo; the pulling and moving about of packages
incident to close stowage; -- formerly written romage. [Obs.]
2. A searching carefully by looking into every corner, and by turning
things over.
He has such a general rummage and reform in the office of matrimony.
Walpole.
Rummage sale, a clearance sale of unclaimed goods in a public store,
or of odds and ends which have accumulated in a shop. Simmonds.
Rum"mage, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Rummaged; p. pr. & vb. n. Rummaging.]
1. (Naut.)
Definition: To make room in, as a ship, for the cargo; to move about, as
packages, ballast, so as to permit close stowage; to stow closely; to
pack; -- formerly written roomage, and romage. [Obs.]
They night bring away a great deal more than they do, if they would
take pain in the romaging. Hakluyt.
2. To search or examine thoroughly by looking into every corner, and
turning over or removing goods or other things; to examine, as a
book, carefully, turning over leaf after leaf.
He . . . searcheth his pockets, and taketh his keys, and so rummageth
all his closets and trunks. Howell.
What schoolboy of us has not rummaged his Greek dictionary in vain
for a satisfactory account! M. Arnold.
Rum"mage, v. i.
Definition: To search a place narrowly.
I have often rummaged for old books in Little Britain and Duck Lane.
Swift.
[His house] was haunted with a jolly ghost, that . . . . . . rummaged
like a rat. Tennyson.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition