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allowance to a person, esp. to a public officer; a perquisite; -- properly only in the plural. [Obs.] An expense proportioned to his appointments and fortune is necessary. Chesterfield.

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.

e, in the heart of the Peloponnesus, whose people were distinguished for contentment and rural happiness.

Of or pertaining to Arcadia; pastoral; ideally rural; as, Arcadian simplicity or scenery.

A secret; a mystery; -- generally used in the plural. Inquiries into the arcana of the Godhead. Warburton.

bulary corresponding (in point of archaism and remoteness from ordinary use) to our Scriptural vocabulary. De Quincey.

The plan or fundamental structure on which a natural group of animals or plants or their systems of organs are assumed to have been constructed; as, the vertebrate archetype.

The group of moldings, or other architectural member, above and on both sides of a door or other opening, especially if square in form.

The architectural member surrounding the curved opening of an arch, corresponding to the architrave in the case of a square opening.

A chief priest; also, a kind of vicar, or a rural dean.

Constriction or contraction of some natural passage, as in constipation from inflammation.

The present indicative plural of the substantive verb to be; but etymologically a different word from be, or was. Am, art, are, and is, all come from the root as.

ance which remains due when some part has been paid; arrearage; -- commonly used in the plural, as, arrears of rent, wages, or taxes. Locke. For much I dread due payment by the Greeks Of yesterday's arrear. Cowper. I have a large arrear of letters to write. J. D. Forbes. In arrear or In arrears, behind; backward; behin…

The attainment or reaching of any object, by effort, or in natural course; as, our arrival at this conclusion was wholly unexpected.

ve mode, present tense, of the substantive verb Be; but formed after the analogy of the plural are, with the ending -t, as in thou shalt, wilt, orig. an ending of the second person sing. pret. Cf. Be. Now used only in solemn or poetical style.

An affection characterized by pain in or about a joint, not dependent upon structural disease.

nship; -- applied esp. to the simpler products of aboriginal art as distinguished from natural objects.

e or contrived by art; produced or modified by human skill and labor, in opposition to natural; as, artificial heat or light, gems, salts, minerals, fountains, flowers. Artificial strife Lives in these touches, livelier than life. Shak.

To make resemble. [Obs.] If I was a philosopher, says Montaigne, I would naturalize art instead of artilizing nature. Bolingbroke.

Specifically: The remains of the human body when burnt, or when "returned to dust" by natural decay. Their martyred blood and ashes sow. Milton. The coffins were broken open. The ashes were scattered to the winds. Macaulay.