Trāf'fic1, n.
n. [Fr. trafic, Pr. trafec, trafey, Sp. trafico, trafago, Pg. trafego, It. traffico, L. Lat. trafficum, traffica. See infra.]
Sense 1. Commerce, either by barter or by buying and selling; trade.
A merchant of great traffic through the world. Shak.
The traffic in honors, places, and pardons was incessant. Macaulay.
☞ This word, like trade, comprehends every species of dealing in the exchange or passing of goods or merchandise from hand to hand for an equivalent, unless the business of retailing may be excepted. It signifies appropriately foreign trade, but is not limited to that.
Sense 2. Commodities for market. [Rare.]
You'll see a draggled damsel From Billingsgate her fishy traffic bear. Gay.
Sense 3. The business done upon a railway with reference to the number of passengers or the amount of freight carried.
Traffic-return, a periodical statement of the receipts for goods and passengers on a railway line. Simmonds. — Traffic-taker, a computer of the returns of traffic on a particular line of road. Simmonds.