Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
Walk \Walk\, v. t.
1. To pass through, over, or upon; to traverse; to
perambulate; as, to walk the streets.
As we walk our earthly round. --Keble.
2. To cause to walk; to lead, drive, or ride with a slow
pace; as to walk one's horses. `` I will rather trust . .
. a thief to walk my ambling gelding.'' --Shak.
3. [AS. wealcan to roll. See {Walk} to move on foot.] To
subject, as cloth or yarn, to the fulling process; to
full. [Obs. or Scot.]
{To walk the plank}, to walk off the plank into the water and
be drowned; -- an expression derived from the practice of
pirates who extended a plank from the side of a ship, and
compelled those whom they would drown to walk off into the
water; figuratively, to vacate an office by compulsion.
--Bartlett.
Plank \Plank\, n. [OE. planke, OF. planque, planche, F. planche,
fr. L. planca; cf. Gr. ?, ?, anything flat and broad. Cf.
{Planch}.]
1. A broad piece of sawed timber, differing from a board only
in being thicker. See {Board}.
2. Fig.: That which supports or upholds, as a board does a
swimmer.
His charity is a better plank than the faith of an
intolerant and bitter-minded bigot. --Southey.
3. One of the separate articles in a declaration of the
principles of a party or cause; as, a plank in the
national platform. [Cant]
{Plank road}, or {Plank way}, a road surface formed of
planks. [U.S.]
{To walk the plank}, to walk along a plank laid across the
bulwark of a ship, until one overbalances it and falls
into the sea; -- a method of disposing of captives
practiced by pirates.