soft patch

Webster's Dictionary (GCIDE)

1.A piece of cloth, or other suitable material, sewed or otherwise fixed upon a garment to repair or strengthen it, esp. upon an old garment to cover a hole. [1913 Webster]

Patches set upon a little breach.— Shak.[1913 Webster]

2.Hence: A small piece of anything used to repair a breach; as, a patch on a kettle, a roof, etc. [1913 Webster]

3.A small piece of black silk stuck on the face, or neck, to hide a defect, or to heighten beauty. [1913 Webster]

Your black patches you wear variously.— Beau. & Fl.[1913 Webster]

4.(Gun.) A piece of greased cloth or leather used as wrapping for a rifle ball, to make it fit the bore. [1913 Webster]

5.Fig.: Anything regarded as a patch; a small piece of ground; a tract; a plot; as, scattered patches of trees or growing corn. [1913 Webster]

Employed about this patch of ground.— Bunyan.[1913 Webster]

6.(Mil.) A block on the muzzle of a gun, to do away with the effect of dispart, in sighting. [1913 Webster]

7.A paltry fellow; a rogue; a ninny; a fool. [Obs. or Colloq.] "Thou scurvy patch." --Shak. [1913 Webster]

Patch ice, ice in overlapping pieces in the sea.

Soft patch, a patch for covering a crack in a metallic vessel, as a steam boiler, consisting of soft material, as putty, covered and held in place by a plate bolted or riveted fast. [1913 Webster]