wheel about

English

Verb

wheel about (third-person singular simple present wheels about, present participle wheeling about, simple past and past participle wheeled about)

1. (intransitive) To change direction quickly, turn, pivot, whirl about.
   • c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iv]:

     Thus hath the course of justice wheel’d about,
     And left thee but a very prey to time;
     Having no more but thought of what thou wert,
     To torture thee the more, being what thou art.

   • 1761, [Laurence Sterne], chapter 43, in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, volume IV, London: […] R[obert] and J[ames] Dodsley […], →OCLC:

     I see him with the knot of his scarfe just shot off, infusing fresh spirits into poor Galway’s regiment—riding along the line—then wheeling about, and charging Conti at the head of it—Brave, brave, by heaven!

   • 1849, Francis Parkman, chapter 20, in The Oregon Trail: Sketches of Prairie and Rocky-Mountain Life‎:

     The number of prairie dogs was absolutely astounding. […] Some of the bolder dogs—though in fact they are no dogs at all, but little marmots rather smaller than a rabbit—would sit yelping at us on the top of their mounds, jerking their tails emphatically with every shrill cry they uttered. As the danger grew nearer they would wheel about, toss their heels into the air, and dive in a twinkling down into their burrows.

   • 1914, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “Kidnapped”, in The Beasts of Tarzan, Chicago, Ill.: A[lexander] C[aldwell] McClurg & Co., published March 1916, →OCLC, page 10:

     The ape-man wheeled about and followed the other into the ill-lit alley, which custom had dignified with the title of thoroughfare.

2. (transitive) To transport someone or something to various locations by pushing a wheeled transporter such as a wheelchair, wheelbarrow or trolley.
   • 1862 August – 1863 March, Charles Kingsley, “(please specify the page)”, in The Water-Babies: A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby, London, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Macmillan and Co., published 1863, →OCLC:

     Then she called up all the careless nurserymaids, and stuck pins into them all over, and wheeled them about in perambulators with tight straps across their stomachs and their heads and arms hanging over the side, till they were quite sick and stupid […]

Synonyms

• wheel around