hover

To keep (something, such as an aircraft) in a stationary state in the air.transitive

Of a bird: to shelter (chicks) under its body and wings; (by extension) of a thing: to cover or surround (something).transitive

• Castration has a ſtrange effect: it emaſculates both man, beaſt, and bird, and brings them to a near reſemblance of the other ſex. […] Capons have ſmall combs and gills, and look pallid about the head, like pullets; they alſo vvalk vvithout

Of a bird or insect: to flap (its wings) so it can remain stationary in the air.obsoletetransitive

• O'er the deer Corps ſomtimes her vvings ſhe [an eagle] hovers, / Somtimes the dead breſt vvith her breſt ſhe covers, […]
• Thus have I lain conceal'd like a vvinter Fly, hoping for ſome bleſt Sun-Shine to vvarm me into Life again, and make me hover my flagging VVings; […]

To remain stationary or float in the air.intransitive

• The hummingbird hovered by the plant.

Sometimes followed by over: to hang around or linger in a place, especially in an uncertain manner.figurativelyintransitive

• His pen hovered above the paper.
• The strange man hovered outside the gents’ toilet.

To be indecisive or uncertain; to vacillate, to waver.figurativelyintransitive

• Filling in the voting form, I hovered between Labour and Liberal Democrat.

Chiefly followed by over: to use a mouse or other device to place a cursor over something on a screen such as a hyperlink or icon without clicking, so as to produce a result (such as the appearance of a tooltip).intransitive

• A tooltip appears when you hover over this link.

To travel in a hovercraft as it moves above a water surface.intransitive

An act, or the state, of remaining stationary in the air or some other place.

A flock of birds fluttering in the air in one place.

An act, or the state, of being suspended; a suspension.figuratively

A cover; a protection; a shelter; specifically, an overhanging bank or stone under which fish can shelter; also, a shelter for hens brooding their eggs.Southern-England

• Oyſters grevv vpon boughs of trees (an Indian miracle) vvhich vvere caſt in [the pond] thither, to ſerue as a houer for the fiſh.
• Without the instinct of self-preservation, which causes the sea-anemone to contract its tentacles, or the fish to dash into its hover, species would be extermined wholesale by involuntary suicide.