Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use muster in a sentence

40 example sentences · noun, verb

Muster means an assemblage or display; a gathering, collection of people or things. Example: “I couldn't muster the courage to tell him.”

Examples of muster by meaning

nounA roundup of livestock for inspection, branding, drenching, shearing etc.

  • McGuire took the two of them out to Kidman's Bore on the Sylvester River where about two dozen stockmen from different stations had gathered to tend the muster along the edge of the Simpson Desert.2006, John Gilfoyle, Bloody Jackaroos!, Boolarong Press

nounA group of peafowl, storks or sometimes other birds.

  • The muster of peafowl, known to occasionally wander off, made it unusually far this time.2024 May 27, Paige Austin, “Escaped Bronx Zoo Peacocks Keep Neighbors Busy: Report”, in Patch
  • Having seen a post by Linda on the Leelanau County Lost & Found Pets Page about the missing peacocks, the neighbor surmised it was from the Smith muster, grabbed the peahen by the tail and returned it to its home.2016 May 6, Lissa Edwards, “Leelanau County: Missing Peahen and Her Children”, in MyNorth.com, archived from the original on 01 Aug 2026
  • Again, on August 26th there was an exceptionally large muster of gulls, terns and waders at the Teesmouth1950, Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Tyneside Naturalists' Field Club, Transactions of the...

verbTo be gathered together for parade, inspection, exercise, or the like (especially of a military force); to come...

  • The whole male population, men and boys, mustered on the top of the hill.1900, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough, volume 3, page 268

verbTo collect, call or assemble together, such as troops or a group for inspection, orders, display etc.

  • England took 57 minutes to muster a shot on target and once again lived dangerously in defence, surviving anxious moments when Ghana hit them on the counter-attack as the contest became a disjointed affair.2026 June 23, Phil McNulty, “England 0-0 Ghana”, in BBC

verbTo look within oneself to summon (a particular positive quality, such as strength, energy or courage); see: muster up.

  • I couldn't muster the courage to tell him.
  • That which Walter Raleigh had not courage to tell, not one of these men could muster the courage to ask.1914, J. C. Snaith, chapter XXXIV, in Anne Feversham, page 278
  • She musters a smile for his nostalgic tale1978, Michael McDonald, Kenny Loggins, “What a Fool Believes”

nounSynonym of mustee.

  • Mixed bloods, they are suspended between two races, — mulattoes, quadroons, musters, mustafinas, cabres, griffies, zambis, quatravis, tresalvis, coyotes, saltatras, albarassados, cambusos, — neither white nor black, but Negroes.1925, Charles Spurgeon Johnson, Elmer Anderson Carter, Opportunity: Journal of Negro Life, page 291

More sentences with muster

  • To get a raise, an employee must pass muster with the boss.From the entry pass muster
  • I mustered up all my remaining willpower.From the entry muster up
  • "Hey," he said, mustering the bravery to provide some comforting hoverhand just above her shoulder.2017, Scott Kenemore, Zombie-in-Chief: Eater of the Free World: A Novel Take on a Brain-Dead Election, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN. From the entry hover hand
  • Her black eye made her face even paler as she mustered a weak smile.2012 April 17, Mary Alice Monroe, The Butterfly's Daughter, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 136. From the entry luz
  • Eventually, after mustering an army, he evicted the Dandarid king and took his power.2012, Tacitus (translated by Cynthia Damon), Annals. From the entry Dandarid
  • I mustered up courage to shake the box, but not to enter the office.2009, Aaron Chynn, Memoirs of an Ordinary Man: A Yorkshireman's Tale, page 49. From the entry hrrmph
  • Yet the muster books are notoriously uneven in quality as an historical source.2008, Nicholas Rogers, The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and its opponents in Georgian Britain, A&C Black, →ISBN, page 4. From the entry pressed
  • Her work saw her doing everything from cattle mustering to cleaning toilets.2007, Allan M. Nixon, Bush Aussies, unnumbered page. From the entry jillaroo
  • Those doddards couldn’t muster an Imperial Host if Hypat itself had barbarians climbing the First Walls.”2006, E. E. Knight [pseudonym; Eric Frisch], Dragon Avenger (Age of Fire; 2), New York, N.Y.: Roc, →ISBN, page 164. From the entry doddard
  • Claire jumped from her chair and smiled the warmest-blooded smile that she could muster.2003, Adele Griffin, Witch Twins and Melody Malady, New York, N.Y.: Hyperion Books for Children, →ISBN, page 27. From the entry warm-blooded
  • Bolstered claims of mustering a simple majority are an integral part of electionspeak.1999, India Today International, volume 24, page 276. From the entry electionspeak
  • He rode back around the common, mustering every mob of horses except those which contained belled stock.1945, Tom Ronan, Strangers on the Ophir, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 125. From the entry belled
  • Life yielded easily to intelligence and effort, or to what proportion could be mustered of both.1936 Feb., F. Scott Fitzgerald, "The Crack-Up", Esquire. From the entry life
  • Are his patrons simply too giddy in this post-pandemic moment to muster sustained outrage over his outré behavior?2021 July 17, Jacob Bernstein, “Keith McNally Stirs the Pot”, in The New York Times. From the entry outré
  • But might environmental scholars and activists find it in themselves to muster some sympathy for these, shall we say, "complicated" stances?2018, Nicole Seymour, Bad Environmentalism, page 42. From the entry postfactual
  • I don't think an entire mustering of storks would have been able to peck away at her hostility.2017, Karen Duffy, Backbone, Arcade Publishing, page 55. From the entry mustering
  • Supple yet tough, these nylon pants can take a week of bushwhacking and still pass muster at a dress-code restaurant.2009 March, “Field Test: Global Apparel”, in Backpacker. From the entry pass muster
  • How can one explain the hypocrisy, chop logic and outright lying now being mustered daily in defence of hunting with hounds?2000 December 28, David McKie, “Special report: the hunting debate”, in The Guardian, retrieved 06 Jun 2008. From the entry chop logic
  • Clutching their Starbucks grandes, guarding their garment bags with practiced eyes—how much sympathy could they be expected to muster?1998, Doug Guinan, California Screaming, Simon & Schuster, →ISBN, page 287. From the entry grande
  • He stood in front of Vonnie Kyle and his eyes examined hers with every skerrick of judgment he could muster.1982, Paul John Radley, chapter 12, in My Blue-checker Corker and Me, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Ticknor & Fields, published…. From the entry skerrick
  • Such containment tactics can prove high risk but the only threat England could muster was a shot from Aluko which flew high and wide.2015 June 9, “Women’s World Cup 2015: England beaten by France in Group F opener”, in The Guardian (London). From the entry emblematic
  • This production, which takes all the focus I can muster in my precaffeinated haze, results in about two ounces of good, strong coffee.2009 January 4, Pete Wells, “Orange Genius”, in New York Times. From the entry precaffeinated
  • The most obvious source for tracking pressed men is the muster books of the individual ships, for these encompass those impressed both afloat and ashore.2008, Nicholas Rogers, The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and its opponents in Georgian Britain, A&C Black, →ISBN, page 4. From the entry pressed
  • Her father summoned all the courage he could muster, loaded his Dane gun, and asked his daughter to take him to this secret hole.2007, Makuchi, The Sacred Door and Other Stories, page 61. From the entry Dane gun
  • Still the would-be drugbusters stomp about, trying to muster posses to ride out, hang the fiends high, and purge the land of demon dope.1988 November 18, Eric Scigliano, “How to Win the War on Drugs”, in Chicago Reader, archived from the original on 12 Nov 2015. From the entry drugbuster
  • Midler's self-pleasure in the merriment and mesmerism she can muster is nicely tempered by her ability to laugh at and with herself.1983 April 9, Walta Borawski, “Midler in Boston”, in Gay Community News, page 12. From the entry self-pleasure
  • Investigation shows that during the period studied, five properties made no accurate count of breeders (bangtail muster), while two made one count.1965, Australian Veterinary Association, Australian Veterinary Journal, volume 41, page 352. From the entry bangtail muster
  • An experimental metaphysics, rather than preformatting the world, encourages the untidy proliferation of as many objects and actors as the universe (or, better, pluriverse) can muster.2013, Adam S. Miller, Speculative Grace: Bruno Latour and Object-Oriented Theology, →ISBN, page 15. From the entry pluriverse
  • National Day in China is like the Fourth of July at home — firecrackers and fireworks, picnics and outings, patriotic speeches and all the pomp that circumstance can muster.1985 October 1, James Friend, edited by Beverly Friend, China Journal: A World of Difference, volume I, Lincolnwood, Ill.: Friendly Books…. From the entry Langya
  • It's almost time for us to leave this foulsome planet, and we'll be needing all the help we can muster.” “It's not a foulsome planet!” Rita snapped.1983, Ben Bova, Gremlins Go Home. From the entry foulsome

Meaning of muster

  1. noun An assemblage or display; a gathering, collection of people or things.
  2. noun An assembling or review of troops, as for parade, verification of numbers, inspection, exercise, or introduction into service.
  3. noun The sum total of an army when assembled for review and inspection; the whole number of effective men in an army.

Full definition of muster

Questions about muster in a sentence

How do you use muster in a sentence?
Muster is used as a noun and verb. For example: “I couldn't muster the courage to tell him.”
What is a short sentence with muster?
“I mustered up all my remaining willpower.”
What does muster mean?
Muster means an assemblage or display; a gathering, collection of people or things.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: muster (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use muster in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/muster. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.