swatch

1. (figuratively) A clump or portion of something.Examples: "I found myself truly moved by a stage event for the first time in years. I found myself humming tunes that one might not rightfully call tunes. Days later, I still remember these musical phrasings in little swatches of sound."; "Mix ultramarine blue and alizarin crimson in your palette until you get a rich purple, then paint a swatch on dry watercolor paper [...]. Next paint a swatch of ultramarine blue on dry watercolor paper. While this is still wet, add alizarin crimson to the lower part of the blue wash, and watch the colors connect and blend [...]. Compare the two swatches."; "A swatch of hair, cleaned with a cosmetic treatment (shampoo, conditioner, etc.), is wetted, combed and then tangled according to a standardized protocol. The combing forces on the swatch are measured with an extensometer."figuratively

2. (figuratively) A demonstration, an example, a proof.Examples: "Pray Sir, pay off the Old Debt, before I truſt you more New. This is a Swatch of Your Faith, and how much You are a Man of Your Word."; "There were about nine score strangers in Midgehop; four score of them William Blaik entertained, [...]. And I believe their neighbour, Robert Bigger would be much the same. This I record once for all, for a swatch of the hospitality of the parish; for God has given this people a largeness of heart, to communicate of their substance, on these and other occasions also."; "Their choosing such a moderator, so guilty of our national defections, of commissions and omissions, was a swatch of what members in the first assembly was made up of; men who had sinned away zeal and faithfulness, by wallowing in that sink and puddle of our national abominations of indulgences and toleration, and many otherwise guilty of sinful and shameful silence and unfaithfulness; [...]"figuratively

3. (Northern England, obsolete) A tag or other small object attached to another item as a means of identifying its owner; a tally; specifically the counterfoil of a tally.Examples: "ITEM that the said Clerkis of the Brevements entre all the Taillis of the Furniunturs in the Jornall Booke in the Countynghous every day furthwith after the Brede be delyveret to the Pantre and then the Stoke [i.e., main part] of the Taill to by delyveret to the Baker and the Swache to the Pantler. … ITEM that the said Clerkis of the Brevements entre all the Taills of the Brasyantors in the Jornall Booke in the Countynghous at every tyme furthwith after the Bere be delyveret into the Buttry and then the Stoke of the Taill to be delyveret to the Brewar and the Swatche to the Butler."; "A SWACHE, A Tally. N[orth] C[ountry]"; "Swatch, s[ubstantive] a pattern, a sample, a tally. V[ide] Ray [Collection of English Words (London, 1691)], swache."Northern-Englandobsolete