BOOT. (I) Profit or advantage (cf. Mod. Ger. Busse, "penance, fine," and "better," the comparative of "good"). The word survives in "bootless," i.e. useless or unavailing, and in such expressions, chiefly archaistic, as "what boots it?" "Bote," an old form, survives in some old compound legal words, such as "house-bote," "fire-bote," "hedge-bote," etc. (see EsTOVERS and COMMONS).
(2) A covering for the foot (0. Fr. bote, modern botte; Med. Lat. botta or bota). Properly a boot covers the whole lower part of the leg, sometimes reaching to or above the knee, but in common usage it is applied to one which reaches only above the ankle, and is thus distinguished from "shoe" (see COSTUME and SHOE).
The "boot" of a coach has the same derivation. It was origin ally applied to the fixed outside step, the French botte, then to the uncovered spaces on or beside the step on which the attend ants sat facing sideways. Both senses are now obsolete, the term being applied to the covered receptacles under the seats of the guard and coachman. For boot as an instrument of torture, see TORTURE.