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A straight line or plane drawn from any point of a curve or surface so as to be perpendicular to the curve or surface at that point.

to authority; willing to obey; submissive to restraint, control, or command. And floating straight, obedient to the stream. Shak. The chief his orders gives; the obedient band, With due observance, wait the chief's command. Pope.

Not straightforward; indirect; obscure; hence, disingenuous; underhand; perverse; sinister. The love we bear our friends... Hath in it certain oblique ends. Drayton. This mode of oblique research, when a more direct one is denied, we find to be the only one in our power. De Quincey. Then would be closed the restless, o…

The distance of any point in a curve or a straight line, measured on a line called the axis of ordinates or on a line parallel to it, from another line called the axis of abscissas, on which the corresponding abscissa of the point is measured.

A combining form signifying straight, right, upright, correct, regular; as, orthodromy, orthodiagonal, orthodox, orthographic.

An extinct genus of Paleozoic Cephalopoda, having a long, straight, conical shell. The interior is divided into numerous chambers by transverse septa.

Having the seeds straight, as in the fruits of some umbelliferous plants; -- opposed to coelospermous. Darwin.

A chiton, or loose, ungirded tunic, falling in straight folds.

Having the axis of an ovule or seed straight from the hilum and chalaza to the orifice or the micropyle; atropous.

A species of palm (Borassus flabelliformis) having a straight, black, upright trunk, with palmate leaves. It is found native along the entire northern shores of the Indian Ocean, from the mouth of the Tigris to New Guinea. More than eight hundred uses to which it is put are enumerated by native writers. Its wood is lar…

, any point of which is equally distant from a fixed point, called the focus, and a fixed straight line, called the directrix. See Focus.

reciprocating piece, as a piston rod, may be guided, either approximately or exactly in a straight line. Rankine. (b) (Mus.) The ascending or descending of two or more parts at fixed intervals, as thirds or sixths. -- Parallel rod (Locomotive Eng.), a metal rod that connects the crank pins of two or more driving wheel…

Colloq. U. S.] There was a tricksy girl, I wot, albeit clad in gray, As peart as bird, as straight as bolt, as fresh as flowers in May. Warner (1592).

ace which is the locus of the feet of perpendiculars let fall from a fixed point upon the straight lines tangent to a given curve, or upon the planes tangent to a given surface. -- Pedal note (Mus.), the note which is held or sustained through an organ point. See Organ point, under Organ. -- Pedal organ (Mus.), an or…

e hair is woolly, and ash-gray on the back and sides. The horns are black, long, slender, straight, nearly smooth, and very sharp. Called also rheeboc, and rehboc.

To draw, bend, or straighten, as metal, by blows with the peen of a hammer or sledge.

To make trim or smart; to straighten up; to erect; to make a jaunty or saucy display of; as, to perk the ears; to perk up one's head. Cowper. Sherburne.

Something hanging straight down; a plumb line. [Obs.]

levations or depressions; flat; level; smooth; even. See Plane. The crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain. Isa. xl. 4.

A surface, real or imaginary, in which, if any two points are taken, the straight line which joins them lies wholly in that surface; or a surface, any section of which by a like surface is a straight line; a surface without curvature.