English

Noun

flood tide ‎(plural flood tides)

1. The period between low tide and the next high tide in which the sea is rising.
   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, Ch.16:

     Going forward and glancing over the weather bow, I perceived that the ship swinging to her anchor with the flood-tide, was now obliquely pointing towards the open ocean.

2. (by extension) The highest point of something; a climax.
   • 1907, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, “chapter I”, in The Younger Set (Project Gutenberg; EBook #14852), New York, N.Y.: A. L. Burt Company, published 1 February 2005 (Project Gutenberg version), OCLC 4241346:

     It was flood-tide along Fifth Avenue ; motor, brougham, and victoria swept by on the glittering current ; pretty women glanced out from limousine and tonneau ; young men of his own type, silk-hatted, frock-coated, the crooks of their walking sticks tucked up under their left arms, passed on the Park side.}}

Antonyms

• ebb tide