Noah Webster
Wink
WINK, verb intransitive [G. wink and wince are radically one word.]
1. To shut the eyes; to close the eyelids.
They are not blind, but they wink
2. To close and open the eyelids.
3. To give a hint by a motion of the eyelids.
WINK at the footman to leave him without a plate.
4. To close the eyelids and exclude the light.
Or wink as cowards and afraid.
5. To be dim; as a winking light.
To wink at, to connive at; to seem not to see; to tolerate; to overlook, as something not perfectly agreeable; as, to wink at faults.
WINK, noun
1. The act of closing the eyelids. I lay awake, and could not sleep a wink
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink
2. A hint given by shutting the eye with a significant cast.