CUSHION

A case or bag stuffed with some soft and elastic material, and used to sit or recline upon; a soft pillow or pad. Two cushions stuffed with straw, the seat to raise. Dryden.

Anything resembling a cushion in properties or use; as:

a pad on which gilders cut gold leaf;

a mass of steam in the end of the cylinder of a steam engine to receive the impact of the piston;

the elastic edge of a billiard table.

A riotous kind of dance, formerly common at weddings; -- called also cushion dance. Halliwell. Cushion capital.(Arch.) A capital so sculptured as to appear like a cushion pressed down by the weight of its entablature. (b) A name given to a form of capital, much used in the Romanesque style, modeled like a bowl, the upper part of which is cut away on four sides, leaving vertical faces. -- Cushion star (Zoöl.) a pentagonal starfish belonging to Goniaster, Astrogonium, and other allied genera; -- so called from its form.

To seat or place on, or as on a cushion. Many who are cushioned on thrones would have remained in obscurity. Bolingbroke.

To furnish with cushions; as, to cushion a chaise.

To conceal or cover up, as under a cushion. Cushioned hammer, a dead-stroke hammer. See under Dead-stroke.