tender

1. Care, kind concern, regard.
2. The inner flight muscle (pectoralis minor) of poultry.

1. Sensitive or painful to the touch.
2. Easily bruised or injured; not firm or hard; delicate.

   tender plants; tender flesh; tender fruit

3. Physically weak; not able to endure hardship.
4. (of food) Soft and easily chewed.
5. Sensible to impression and pain; easily pained.
6. Fond, loving, gentle, sweet.

   Suzanne was such a tender mother to her children.

7. Young and inexperienced.
8. Adapted to excite feeling or sympathy; expressive of the softer passions; pathetic.

   tender expressions; tender expostulations; a tender strain

9. Apt to give pain; causing grief or pain; delicate.

   a tender subject

10. Heeling over too easily when under sail; said of a vessel.
11. Exciting kind concern; dear; precious.
12. Careful to keep inviolate, or not to injure; used with of.

adverb

Tenderly

1. To make tender or delicate; to weaken.
2. To feel tenderly towards; to regard fondly or with consideration.

1. Someone who tends or waits on someone.
2. A railroad car towed behind a steam engine to carry fuel and water.
3. A naval ship that functions as a mobile base for other ships.

   destroyer tender

4. A smaller boat used for transportation between a large ship and the shore.

verb

To work on a tender.

1. Anything which is offered, proffered, put forth or bid with the expectation of a response, answer, or reply.

   You offer me the sword of my father, the very man whose bones, because of your perfidy, lie under the sod of Crecy. Aye, I'll surely take it, and just as surely you shall die with your tender through your heart!

2. A means of payment such as a check or cheque, cash or credit card.

   Your credit card has been declined so you need to provide some other tender such as cash.

3. A formal offer to buy or sell something.

   We will submit our tender to you within the week.

4. Any offer or proposal made for acceptance.

1. To offer, to give.

   to tender one’s resignation

2. To offer a payment, as at sales or auctions.