Meaning

2 senses
  1. (UK, historical, not comparable)Of a Royal Navy ship of the line in the Napoleonic Era: having 50–60 guns across two gun decks, a complement of 320–420, and weighing approximately 1,000 tons burthen.

  2. (idiomatic, not comparable, uncommon)Terrible, awful; less than third-rate.

fourth-rate — meaning, examples, forms, synonyms | Krumeto