Wordnet 3.0
ADJECTIVE (1)
1.
unable to find your way;
- Example: "found the straying sheep"
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Stray \Stray\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Strayed; p. pr. & vb. n.
Straying.] [OF. estraier, estraer, to stray, or as adj.,
stray, fr. (assumed) L. stratarius roving the streets, fr. L.
strata (sc. via) a paved road. See Street, and Stray, a.]
1. To wander, as from a direct course; to deviate, or go out
of the way.
[1913 Webster]
Thames among the wanton valleys strays. --Denham.
[1913 Webster]
2. To wander from company, or from the proper limits; to rove
at large; to roam; to go astray.
[1913 Webster]
Now, until the break of day,
Through this house each fairy stray. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
A sheep doth very often stray. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
3. Figuratively, to wander from the path of duty or
rectitude; to err.
[1913 Webster]
We have erred and strayed from thy ways. --??? of
Com. Prayer.
[1913 Webster]
While meaner things, whom instinct leads,
Are rarely known to stray. --Cowper.
[1913 Webster]
Syn: To deviate; err; swerve; rove; roam; wander.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
straying
adj 1: unable to find your way; "found the straying sheep"
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
164 Moby Thesaurus words for "straying":
Wanderjahr, aberrancy, aberrant, aberration, abnormal, abroad,
adrift, afoot and lighthearted, all abroad, all off, all wrong,
amiss, amorphous, anomalistic, anomalous, askew, astray, at fault,
awry, bend, beside the mark, bias, branching off, bumming,
circuitousness, circumforaneous, corner, corrupt, crook, curve,
deceptive, declination, defective, delusive, departure, detour,
deviance, deviancy, deviant, deviation, deviational, deviative,
deviousness, different, digression, discursion, discursive,
distorted, divagation, divagatory, divarication, divergence,
divergent, diversion, dogleg, double, drift, drifting, eccentric,
errant, errantry, erratic, erring, erroneous, excursion, excursus,
exorbitation, fallacious, false, faultful, faulty, flawed,
flitting, floating, footloose, footloose and fancy-free, formless,
fugitive, gadding, gypsy-like, gypsyish, hairpin, heretical,
heteroclite, heterodox, heteromorphic, hoboism, illogical,
illusory, indirection, irregular, itineracy, itinerancy,
landloping, meandering, migrational, migratory, nomad, nomadic,
nomadism, not right, not true, obliquity, off, off the track, out,
peccant, peregrination, pererration, perverse, perverted, ramble,
rambling, ranging, roam, roaming, rove, roving, self-contradictory,
shapeless, sheer, shift, shifting, shifting course, shifting path,
skew, slant, straggling, stray, strolling, subnormal, sweep,
swerve, swerving, swinging, tack, traipsing, transient, transitory,
transmigratory, turn, turning, twist, unfactual, unnatural,
unorthodox, unproved, untrue, vagabond, vagabondage, vagabondia,
vagabondism, vagrancy, vagrant, variation, veer, wandering,
wanderlust, warp, wayfaring, wide, wrong, yaw, zigzag