The helmsman, who did not speak English or Italian fluently, responded, “Hard to Starboard?”
He painted her, as fluently as Sargent or Boldini might have, then wrapped the painting, and tied up the package.
My father practiced his new signature until he could write it fluently.
How many 72-year-olds do you know who can speak that fluently?
He spoke easily, fluently, and calmly: a man supremely self-controlled.
You speak foreign languages—at least, French and German—fluently.
She spoke French and Italian as fluently as she did English.
He said this with a slightly foreign accent, but fluently and easily.
Then the great man began to swear, and did it well and fluently, with gusto.
Father Pedro says you are getting on fluently with your translations.
1580s, "flowing freely" (of water, also of speech), from Latin fluentem (nominative fluens) "lax, relaxed," figuratively "flowing, fluent," present participle of fluere "to flow, stream, run, melt," from PIE *bhleugw-, extended form of *bhleu- "to swell, well up, overflow" (cf. Latin flumen "river;" Greek phluein "to boil over, bubble up," phlein "to abound"), an extension of root *bhel- (2) "to blow, inflate, swell;" see bole. Used interchangeably with fluid in Elizabethan times. Related: Fluently.
