Definition of "ayre"

It is precisely to this—not destruction, but dissolution—(for dissolve is the poet's word) this melting into thin ayre, of the world itself, that Tooke maintains the word rack, i. e. reek, to be most- appropriate. And I think he was right in so doing.

1856, Notes and Queries, page 425

... Thus giues his sorrowes passage from his brest ; Sweet leaues (qd. he) which with the ayre doe tremble, Oh how your motions do my thoughts resemble, With that milde breath by which onely moue, Whisper my words in silence to my Loue ...

1870, Michael Drayton, Endimion and Phoebe: Ideas Latmus