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A European sandpiper or snipe (Totanus canescens); -- called also greater plover.

The pit of a theater. [Obs.] B. Jonson. Ground angling, angling with a weighted line without a float. -- Ground annual (Scots Law), an estate created in land by a vassal who instead of selling his land outright reserves an annual ground rent, which becomes a perpetual charge upon the land. -- Ground ash. (Bot.) See G…

A spectator in the pit of a theater, which formerly was on the ground, and without floor or benches. No comic buffoon to make the groundlings laugh. Coleridge.

do make our entrance several ways. Shak. But in known images of life I guess The labor greater. Pope.

A greedy eater; a glutton. [Obs.]

One who habitually frequents a place; as, an habitué of a theater.

The greater shearwater or hagdon. See Hagdon.

One of several species of sea birds of the genus Puffinus; esp., P. major, the greater shearwarter, and P. Stricklandi, the black hagdon or sooty shearwater; -- called also hagdown, haglin, and hag. See Shearwater.

ly, a droll rogue of Italian comedy. Percy Smith. As dumb harlequin is exhibited in our theaters. Johnson. Harlequin bat (Zoöl.), an Indian bat (Scotophilus ornatus), curiously variegated with white spots. -- Harlequin beetle (Zoöl.), a very large South American beetle (Acrocinus longimanus) having very long legs and…

The greater part or bulk of anything; as, the heft of the crop was spoiled. [Colloq. U. S.] J. Pickering.

Progress toward eminence; grade; degree. Social duties are carried to greater heights, and enforced with stronger motives by the principles of our religion. Addison.

Eaters of horseflesh.

Sacrifice or loss of many lives, as by the burning of a theater or a ship.

See Honey eater, under Honey.

An audience; an assembly of hearers, as at a lecture, a theater, etc.; as, a thin or a full house.

To hasten; to impel to greater speed; to urge on. Impetuous lust hurries him on. South. They hurried him abroad a bark. Shak.

A curve formed by a section of a cone, when the cutting plane makes a greater angle with the base than the side of the cone makes. It is a plane curve such that the difference of the distances from any point of it to two fixed points, called foci, is equal to a given distance. See Focus. If the cutting plane be produce…

tion of the meaning intended to be conveyed, or by which things are represented as much greater or less, better or worse, than they really are; a statement exaggerated fancifully, through excitement, or for effect. Our common forms of compliment are almost all of them extravagant hyperboles. Blair. Somebody has said of…

The long, branching filaments of which the mycelium (and the greater part of the plant) of a fungus is formed. They are also found enveloping the gonidia of lichens, making up a large part of their structure.

The subterraneous portion of a building, as in amphitheaters, for the service of the games; also, subterranean galleries, as the catacombs.