1. [n]  a stiff switch used to hit students as punishment
2. [n]  a stick that people can lean on to help them walk
3. [n]  a strong slender often flexible stem as of bamboos, reeds, rattans, or sugar cane
4. [v]  beat with a cane

Cane
Poetic sketches and stories stemming from the Harlem Renaissance author's teaching experience in rural Georgia communicate his feelings about nature's beauty and man's greed and bigotry

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1. \Cane\, n. [OE. cane, canne, OF. cane, F. canne, L. canna,
   fr. Gr. ?, ?; prob. of Semitic origin; cf. Heb. q[=a]neh
   reed. Cf. {Canister}, {canon}, 1st {Cannon}.]
   1. (Bot.)
      (a) A name given to several peculiar palms, species of
          {Calamus} and {D[ae]manorops}, having very long,
          smooth flexible stems, commonly called rattans.
      (b) Any plant with long, hard, elastic stems, as reeds and
          bamboos of many kinds; also, the sugar cane.
      (c) Stems of other plants are sometimes called canes; as,
          the canes of a raspberry.
                Like light canes, that first rise big and brave.
                                                  --B. Jonson.
   Note: In the Southern United States {great cane} is the
         {Arundinaria macrosperma}, and {small cane} is. {A.
         tecta}.
   2. A walking stick; a staff; -- so called because originally
      made of one the species of cane.
            Stir the fire with your master's cane. --Swift.
   3. A lance or dart made of cane. [R.]
            Judgelike thou sitt'st, to praise or to arraign The
            flying skirmish of the darted cane.   --Dryden.
   4. A local European measure of length. See {Canna}.
   {Cane borer} (Zo["o].), A beetle {(Oberea bimaculata)} which,
      in the larval state, bores into pith and destroy the canes
      or stalks of the raspberry, blackberry, etc.
   {Cane mill}, a mill for grinding sugar canes, for the
      manufacture of sugar.
   {Cane trash}, the crushed stalks and other refuse of sugar
      cane, used for fuel, etc.
   

2. \Cane\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Caned}; p. pr. & vb. n.
   {Caning}.]
   1. To beat with a cane. --Macaulay.
   2. To make or furnish with cane or rattan; as, to cane
      chairs.
   

a tall sedgy plant with a hollow stem, growing in moist places. In Isa. 43:24; Jer. 6:20, the Hebrew word _kaneh_ is thus rendered, giving its name to the plant. It is rendered "reed" in 1 Kings 14:15; Job 40:21; Isa. 19:6; 35:7. In Ps. 68:30 the expression "company of spearmen" is in the margin and the Revised Version "beasts of the reeds," referring probably to the crocodile or the hippopotamus as a symbol of Egypt. In 2 Kings 18:21; Isa. 36:6; Ezek. 29:6, 7, the reference is to the weak, fragile nature of the reed. (See CALAMUS.)