(mercies)
1.
If someone in authority shows ~, they choose not to harm someone they have power over, or they forgive someone they have the right to punish.
Neither side took prisoners or showed any ~...
They cried for ~ but their pleas were met with abuse and laughter...
N-UNCOUNT
2.
Mercy is used to describe a special journey to help someone in great need, such as people who are sick or made homeless by war. (JOURNALISM)
She vanished nine months ago while on a ~ mission to West Africa...
ADJ: ADJ n
3.
If you refer to an event or situation as a ~, you mean that it makes you feel happy or relieved, usually because it stops something unpleasant happening.
It really was a ~ that he’d died so rapidly at the end...
N-COUNT: usu a N
4.
If one person or thing is at the ~ of another, the first person or thing is in a situation where they cannot prevent themselves being harmed or affected by the second.
Buildings are left to decay at the ~ of vandals and the weather...
PHRASE: with poss, usu PHR after v, v-link PHR
5.
If you tell someone who is in an unpleasant situation that they should be grateful or thankful for small mercies, you mean that although their situation is bad, it could be even worse, and so they should be happy.
But so low has morale sunk that the team and the fans would have been grateful for small mercies.
PHRASE: usu v-link PHR