Definition of "collation" [col•la•tion]

• The act or process of collating. (noun)
• A light meal permitted on fast days. (noun)
• A light meal. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "But fast as they run they stay there so long as if they wanted not time to finish the race; for it is usual here to find some of the young company till midnight; and the thickets of the garden seem to be contrived to all advantages of gallantry; after they have been refreshed with the collation, which is here seldom omitted, at"
• "The collation was a sumptuous one, for when Belfast nabobs do anything, they do it."
• "MSS. which must have been at least as old as the vth century, it exhibits the result of what may be called a collation of copies made at a time when only four of our extant uncials were in existence."