English sailors expressing a feeling of resentment (4)
I believe the answer is:
envy
'feeling of resentment' is the definition.
(envy is a feeling of resentment)
'english sailors expressing a' is the wordplay.
'english' becomes 'E' (abbreviation).
'sailors' becomes 'navy' (group of sailors).
'expressing' is a deletion indicator.
'navy' with 'a' taken away is 'nvy'.
'e'+'nvy'='ENVY'
(Other definitions for envy that I've seen before include "Resentful feeling" , "Covetousness" , "One of 7 vices" , "One of seven deadly sins" , "One of the 7 deadly sins" .)