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The capacity of being practically applied or used; relevancy; as, a rule of general application.

wing, advancing or being near; approach; also, the result of approximating. The largest capacity and the most noble dispositions are but an approximation to the proper standard and true symmetry of human nature. I. Taylor.

Naked spaces between the feathered areas of birds. See Pteryliæ.

A natural or acquired disposition or capacity for a particular purpose, or tendency to a particular action or effect; as, oil has an aptitude to burn. He seems to have had a peculiar aptitude for the management of irregular troops. Macaulay.

A kind of etching in which spaces are bitten by the use of aqua fortis, by which an effect is produced resembling a drawing in water colors or India ink; also, the engraving produced by this method.

ter. -- Aqueous humor (Anat.), one the humors of the eye; a limpid fluid, occupying the space between the crystalline lens and the cornea. (See Eye.) -- Aqueous rocks (Geol.), those which are deposited from water and lie in strata, as opposed to volcanic rocks, which are of igneous origin; -- called also sedimentary r…

The station or dignity of an archbishop; archiepiscopacy. Fuller.

face, as of the floor of a room or church, or of the ground within an inclosure; an open space in a building. The Alban lake . . . looks like the area of some vast amphitheater. Addison.

Of or pertaining to an area; as, areal interstices (the areas or spaces inclosed by the reticulate vessels of leaves).

An interstice or small space, as between the cracks of the surface in certain crustaceous lichens; or as between the fibers composing organs or vessels that interlace; or as between the nervures of an insect's wing.

form of fibrous connective tissue in which the fibers are loosely arranged with numerous spaces, or areolæ, between them.

Divided into small spaces or areolations, as the wings of insects, the leaves of plants, or the receptacle of compound flowers.

Any small space, bounded by some part different in color or structure, as the spaces bounded by the nervures of the wings of insects, or those by the veins of leaves; an areola.

A small inclosed area; esp. one of the small spaces on the wings of insects, circumscribed by the veins.

In a circuit; here and there within the surrounding space; all about; as, to travel around from town to town.

One of the body segments of Arthropods. See Arthrostraca. Packard.

One of the segments of an articulated appendage. Articles of Confederation, the compact which was first made by the original thirteen States of the United States. They were adopted March 1, 1781, and remained the supreme law until March, 1789. -- Articles of impeachment, an instrument which, in cases of impeachment, p…

Mineral pitch, Jews' pitch, or compact native bitumen. It is brittle, of a black or brown color and high luster on a surface of fracture; it melts and burns when heated, leaving no residue. It occurs on the surface and shores of the Dead Sea, which is therefore called Asphaltites, or the Asphaltic Lake. It is found als…

rative sense; to allay, mitigate, ease, or lessen, as heat, pain, or grief; to appease or pacify, as passion or tumult; to satisfy, as appetite or desire. Refreshing winds the summer's heat assuage. Addison. To assuage the sorrows of a desolate old man Burke. The fount at which the panting mind assuages Her thirst of k…

of attainting, or the state of being attainted; the extinction of the civil rights and capacities of a person, consequent upon sentence of death or outlawry; as, an act of attainder. Abbott.