[sohl-jer] 
| 1. | a person who serves in an army; a person engaged in military service. |
| 2. | an enlisted man or woman, as distinguished from a commissioned officer: the soldiers' mess and the officers' mess. |
| 3. | a person of military skill or experience: George Washington was a great soldier. |
| 4. | a person who contends or serves in any cause: a soldier of the Lord. |
| 5. | Also called button man. Slang. a low-ranking member of a crime organization or syndicate. |
| 6. | Entomology. a member of a caste of sexually underdeveloped female ants or termites specialized, as with powerful jaws, to defend the colony from invaders. |
| 7. | a brick laid vertically with the narrower long face out. Compare rowlock (def. 2). |
| 8. | Informal. a person who avoids work or pretends to work; loafer; malingerer. |
| 9. | to act or serve as a soldier. |
| 10. | Informal. to loaf while pretending to work; malinger: He was soldiering on the job. |
| 11. | soldier on, to persist steadfastly in one's work; persevere: to soldier on until the work is done. |
| button man n. A low-ranking member of an organized crime syndicate. [From a comparison between such a man and a soldier (wearing a uniform with buttons).] |
soldier
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