tick

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A light, sharp, clicking sound made repeatedly by a machine, such as a clock.
2. n. Chiefly British A moment.
3. n. A light mark used to check off or call attention to an item.
4. n. Informal A unit on a scale; a degree: when interest rates move up a tick.
5. v. To emit recurring clicking sounds: as the clock ticked.
6. v. To function characteristically or well: machines ticking away; curious about what makes people tick.
7. v. To count or record with or as if with the sound of ticks: a clock ticking the hours; a taxi meter ticking the fare.
8. v. To mark or check off (a listed item) with a tick: ticked off each name as the roll was called.
9. tick off Informal To make angry or annoyed: Constant delays ticked me off.
10. n. Any of numerous small bloodsucking parasitic arachnids of the family Ixodidae, many of which transmit febrile diseases, such as Rocky Mountain spotted fever and Lyme disease.
11. n. Any of various usually wingless, louselike insects of the family Hippobosciddae that are parasitic on sheep, goats, and other animals.
12. n. A cloth case for a mattress or pillow.
13. n. A light mattress without inner springs.
14. n. Ticking.
15. n. Chiefly British Credit or an amount of credit.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To touch or tap something lightly, or with a small sharp sound; tap slightly, as a bird when picking up its food; peck.
2. To emit a slight recurring click, like that of a watch or clock.
3. To touch lightly, as in the game of tag or tig; tag.
4. To place a dot on, over, or against; mark with or as with a tick or dot: as, to tick one's i's in writing; to set a dot against, as in checking off the items in a list or catalogue; check by writing down a small mark: generally with off.
5. To note or mark by or as by the regular clicking of a watch or clock.
6. n. A slight touch or tap; a pat.
7. n. A slight sharp sound, as that made by a light tap upon some hard object; also, a recurring click or beat, as of a watch or clock.
8. n. The game known in the United Kingdom as tig, and in the United States as tag. See tag.
9. n. A dot or slight mark: as, the tick over the letter i; the tick used in checking off the items in a list or catalogue.
10. n. A small spot or color- mark on the coat of an animal.
11. n. A speck; a particle; a very small quantity.
12. n. One of many different kinds of mites or acarines which are external parasites of various animals, including man. A mite of the family Ixodidæ, and especially of the genus Ixodes; a wood-tick; a dog-tick; a cattle-tick. There are many species, found in the woods and fields, capable of independent existence, but liable to fasten upon dogs, cattle, etc., forming temporary parasites. They bury the head in the skin of the host, and hang there sucking the blood until they swell up enormously, lose their hold, and drop off. They are annoying, but not poisonous or especially dangerous. The cattle-tick is Ixodes bovis; the seed-tick is the young form of the same species; the dogtick is I. ricinus. See Ixodes, and cut under Acarida.
13. n. Hence With a qualifying term, a member of the dipterous family Hippoboscidæ. Those of the genus Ornithomyia are bird-ticks; the sheep-tick is Melophagus ovinus (see cut under sheep-tick); the horse-tick is Hippobosca equina. The bat-ticks belong to the related dipterous family Nycteribiidæ.
14. n. The tick-bean.
15. n. The cover or case of a bed, which contains the feathers, hair, corn-shucks, moss, or other materials conferring softness and elasticity.
16. n. Ticking.
17. n. Credit; trust: as, to buy on tick.
18. n. A score, account, or reckoning.
19. To buy on tick or credit; live on credit.
20. To give tick or credit; trust one for goods supplied, etc.
21. n. In a horse, the malady or vice now called cribbing.
22. n. The whinchat.

Wiktionary

1. n. fauna A tiny woodland arthropod of the order Acarina.
2. n. A relatively quiet but sharp sound generally made repeatedly by moving machinery.
3. n. A mark on any scale of measurement; a unit of measurement.
4. n. computing A jiffy (unit of time defined by basic timer frequency).
5. n. colloquial A short period of time, particularly a second.
6. n. Australia, New Zealand, UK a mark (✓) made to indicate agreement, correctness or acknowledgement; checkmark
7. v. To make a clicking noise similar to the movement of the hands in an analog clock.
8. v. To make a tick mark.
9. v. informal To work or operate, especially mechanically.
10. n. uncountable Ticking.
11. n. A sheet that wraps around a mattress.
12. n. UK, colloquial Credit, trust.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. Credit; trust.
2. v. To go on trust, or credit.
3. v. To give tick; to trust.
4. n. Any one of numerous species of large parasitic mites which attach themselves to, and suck the blood of, cattle, dogs, and many other animals. When filled with blood they become ovate, much swollen, and usually livid red in color. Some of the species often attach themselves to the human body. The young are active and have at first but six legs.
5. n. Any one of several species of dipterous insects having a flattened and usually wingless body, as the bird ticks (see under bird) and sheep tick (see under sheep).
6. n. The cover, or case, of a bed, mattress, etc., which contains the straw, feathers, hair, or other filling.
7. n. Ticking. See Ticking, n.
8. v. To make a small or repeating noise by beating or otherwise, as a watch does; to beat.
9. v. To strike gently; to pat.
10. n. A quick, audible beat, as of a clock.
11. n. Any small mark intended to direct attention to something, or to serve as a check.
12. n. (Zoöl.), Prov. Eng. The whinchat; -- so called from its note.
13. v. To check off by means of a tick or any small mark; to score.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a metallic tapping sound
2. v. sew.
3. n. a mark indicating that something has been noted or completed etc.
4. n. a light mattress
5. n. any of two families of small parasitic arachnids with barbed proboscis; feed on blood of warm-blooded animals
6. v. make a clicking or ticking sound
7. v. put a check mark on or near or next to
8. v. make a sound like a clock or a timer