Word.ws English Dictionary

paying for one's whistle

paying for one's whistle is the present participle and gerund of pay for one's whistle.

Meaning of pay for one's whistle

Verb

pay for one's whistle (third-person singular simple present pays for one's whistle, present participle paying for one's whistle, simple past and past participle paid for one's whistle)

  1. (dated) To pay dearly for one's caprice.
    • […] the ship may be on shore before the leader of the band can be convinced how dearly he has "paid for his whistle."1836, William Nugent Glascock, The Naval Service, page 239

Questions about paying for one's whistle

What is paying for one's whistle the present participle and gerund of?
Paying for one's whistle is the present participle and gerund of pay for one's whistle.

Words near paying for one's whistle in the dictionary

  1. paying back in someone's own coin
  2. paying dearly
  3. paying dividends
  4. paying down
  5. paying for itself
  6. paying for one's whistle
  7. paying forward
  8. paying good money after bad
  9. paying heed
  10. paying homage to
  11. paying home

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: paying for one's whistle (page history and authors); pay for one's whistle (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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