Definition of tender

• n. - One who tends; one who takes care of any person or thing; a nurse.
• n. - A vessel employed to attend other vessels, to supply them with provisions and other stores, to convey intelligence, or the like.
• n. - A car attached to a locomotive, for carrying a supply of fuel and water.
• v. t. - To offer in payment or satisfaction of a demand, in order to save a penalty or forfeiture; as, to tender the amount of rent or debt.
• v. t. - To offer in words; to present for acceptance.
• n. - An offer, either of money to pay a debt, or of service to be performed, in order to save a penalty or forfeiture, which would be incurred by nonpayment or nonperformance; as, the tender of rent due, or of the amount of a note, with interest.
• n. - Any offer or proposal made for acceptance; as, a tender of a loan, of service, or of friendship; a tender of a bid for a contract.
• n. - The thing offered; especially, money offered in payment of an obligation.
• superl. - Easily impressed, broken, bruised, or injured; not firm or hard; delicate; as, tender plants; tender flesh; tender fruit.
• superl. - Sensible to impression and pain; easily pained.
• superl. - Physically weak; not hardly or able to endure hardship; immature; effeminate.
• superl. - Susceptible of the softer passions, as love, compassion, kindness; compassionate; pitiful; anxious for another's good; easily excited to pity, forgiveness, or favor; sympathetic.
• superl. - Exciting kind concern; dear; precious.
• superl. - Careful to save inviolate, or not to injure; -- with of.
• superl. - Unwilling to cause pain; gentle; mild.
• superl. - Adapted to excite feeling or sympathy; expressive of the softer passions; pathetic; as, tender expressions; tender expostulations; a tender strain.
• superl. - Apt to give pain; causing grief or pain; delicate; as, a tender subject.
• superl. - Heeling over too easily when under sail; -- said of a vessel.
• n. - Regard; care; kind concern.
• v. t. - To have a care of; to be tender toward; hence, to regard; to esteem; to value.