'To eat the wind out of a vessel' definitions:

Definition of 'To eat the wind out of a vessel'

From: GCIDE

Eat \Eat\ ([=e]t), v. t. [imp. Ate ([=a]t; 277), Obsolescent & Colloq. Eat ([e^]t); p. p. Eaten ([=e]t"'n), Obs. or Colloq. Eat ([e^]t); p. pr. & vb. n. Eating.] [OE. eten, AS. etan; akin to OS. etan, OFries. eta, D. eten, OHG. ezzan, G. essen, Icel. eta, Sw. [aum]ta, Dan. [ae]de, Goth. itan, Ir. & Gael. ith, W. ysu, L. edere, Gr. 'e`dein, Skr. ad. [root]6. Cf. Etch, Fret to rub, Edible.]
1. To chew and swallow as food; to devour; -- said especially of food not liquid; as, to eat bread. "To eat grass as oxen." --Dan. iv. 25. [1913 Webster]
They . . . ate the sacrifices of the dead. --Ps. cvi. 28. [1913 Webster]
The lean . . . did eat up the first seven fat kine. --Gen. xli. 20. [1913 Webster]
The lion had not eaten the carcass. --1 Kings xiii. 28. [1913 Webster]
With stories told of many a feat, How fairy Mab the junkets eat. --Milton. [1913 Webster]
The island princes overbold Have eat our substance. --Tennyson. [1913 Webster]
His wretched estate is eaten up with mortgages. --Thackeray. [1913 Webster]
2. To corrode, as metal, by rust; to consume the flesh, as a cancer; to waste or wear away; to destroy gradually; to cause to disappear. [1913 Webster]
To eat humble pie. See under Humble.
To eat of (partitive use). "Eat of the bread that can not waste." --Keble.
To eat one's words, to retract what one has said. (See the Citation under Blurt.)
To eat out, to consume completely. "Eat out the heart and comfort of it." --Tillotson.
To eat the wind out of a vessel (Naut.), to gain slowly to windward of her.
Syn: To consume; devour; gnaw; corrode. [1913 Webster]