soak

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• intransitive verb To immerse in liquid for a period of time.
• intransitive verb To make thoroughly wet or saturated.
• intransitive verb To absorb (liquid, for example) through pores or interstices.
• intransitive verb To be exposed to.
• intransitive verb Informal To experience or take in mentally, especially eagerly and easily.
• intransitive verb To remove (a stain, for example) by continued immersion.
• intransitive verb To drink (alcoholic liquor), especially to excess.
• intransitive verb To make (a person) drunk.
• intransitive verb Slang To charge (a person) an inordinate amount for something.
• intransitive verb To be immersed in liquid.
• intransitive verb To seep into or permeate something.
• intransitive verb To be taken in mentally.
• intransitive verb Slang To drink to excess.
• noun The act or process of soaking.
• noun Liquid in which something may be soaked.
• noun Slang A drunkard.

from The Century Dictionary.

• noun A slough.
• noun In tanning, a tank or vat of water for soaking hides or skins.
• noun A soaking, in any sense of the verb.
• noun Specifically, a drinking-bout; a spree.
• noun That in which anything is soaked; a steep.
• noun One who or that which soaks.
• noun A landspring.
• noun A tippler; a hard drinker.
• noun An over-stocking, with or without a foot, worn over the long stocking for warmth or protection from dirt. Compare boot-hose, stirruphose.
• To lie in and become saturated with water or some other liquid; steep.
• To pass, especially to enter, as a liquid, through pores or interstices; penetrate thoroughly by saturation: followed by in or through.
• To flow.
• To drink intemperately and habitually, especially strong drink; booze; be continually under the influence of liquor.
• To become drained or dry. Compare soak, v. t., 7.
• To sit over the fire absorbing the heat.
• Hence To receive a prolonged baking; bake thoroughly: said of bread.
• To cause to lie immersed in a liquid until thoroughly saturated; steep: as, to soak rice in water; to soak a sponge.
• To flood; saturate; drench; steep.
• To take up by absorption; absorb through pores or other openings; suck in, as a liquid or other fluid: followed by in or up.
• Hence, to drink; especially, to drink immoderately; guzzle.
• To penetrate, work, or accomplish by wetting thoroughly: often with through.
• To make soft as by steeping; hence, to enfeeble; enervate.
• To suck dry; exhaust; drain.
• To bake thoroughly: said of the lengthened baking given, in particular, to bread, so that the cooking may be complete.
• To “put in soak”; pawn; pledge: as, he soaked his watch for ten dollars.
• To place in a furnace, or soaking pit, with the object of equalizing the temperature rather than causing an increase: especially applied to ingots of steel which, soon after casting, have a solid exterior or shell and a molten interior, and are therefore unfit for rolling until solid and of a nearly uniform temperature throughout.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• transitive verb To cause or suffer to lie in a fluid till the substance has imbibed what it can contain; to macerate in water or other liquid; to steep, as for the purpose of softening or freshening
• transitive verb To drench; to wet thoroughly.
• transitive verb To draw in by the pores, or through small passages
• transitive verb To make (its way) by entering pores or interstices; -- often with through.