Sūit (sūt)1, n.
Sūit (sūt), n. [Fr. suite, O. Fr. suite, sieute, seute, from suivre, to follow. See SUE and SEW.]
Sense 1. The act of following or pursuing, as game; pursuit. [Obs.]
Sense 2. The act of suing; the process by which one endeavors to gain an end or object; attempt to attain a certain result; endeavor.
Thenceforth the suit of earthly conquest shone. Spencer.
Sense 3. Especially, the attempt to win a woman in marriage; courtship.
“Ye peers,” I cry, “who press to gain a heart, Where dread Ulysses claims no future part, Rebate your loves, each rival suit suspend, Till this funereal web my labors end.” Pope.
Sense 4. (Law.) The attempt to gain an end by legal process; an action or process for the recovery of a right or claim; legal application to a court for justice; prosecution of right before any tribunal; as, a civil suit; a criminal suit; a suit in chancery.
I arrest thee at the suit of Count Orsino. Shak.
In England the several suits, or remedial instruments of justice, are distinguished into three kinds — actions personal, real, and mixed. Blackstone.
Sense 5. That which follows as a retinue; a company of attendants or followers; the assembly of persons who officially attend upon a prince, magistrate, or other person of distinction.
In this and the following sense often written suite, and pronounced sweet.
Sense 6. Things that follow in a series or succession; the individuals collectively considered which constitute a series, as of rooms, buildings, cards, and the like.
To deal and shuffle, to divide and sort Her mingled suits. Cowper.
Sense 7. A number of things used together, and generally necessary to be united, in order to answer the purpose; a set; as, a suit of curtains; a suit of armor; sometimes with less dependence of the particular parts on each other, but still united in use; as, a suit of clothes. “Two rogues in buckram suits.” Shak.
Sense 8. Regular order. [Obs.]
Every five and thirty years the same kind and suit of weather comes again. Bacon.
Out of suits, having no correspondence. Shak.—Suit and service (Feudal Law), the duty of feudatories to attend the courts of their lords or superiors in time of peace, and in war to follow them and perform military service; called also suit-service. Blackstone.—Suit-broker, one who made a trade of obtaining the suits of petitioners at court. [Obs.]—Suit-court (Law), the court in which tenants owe attendance to their lord. Bailey.—Suit-covenant, a covenant to sue at a certain court. Bailey.—Suit custom, a service which is owed from time immemorial.—To bring suit. (a.) To bring secta, followers or witnesses, to prove the plaintiff’s demand. [Obs.] (b.) In modern usage, to institute an action.