Search the Dictionary

A roll of hair, silk, etc., passed through the flesh of horses, answering to a seton in human surgery.

To answer or discharge, as a claim, debt, legal demand, or the like; to give compensation for; to pay off; to requitte; as, to satisfy a claim or an execution.

To speak; to express an opinion; to make answer; to reply. You have said; but whether wisely or no, let the forest judge. Shak. To this argument we shall soon have said; for what concerns it us to hear a husband divulge his household privacies Milton.

I pray thee, see whether it be well with thy brethren. Gen. xxxvii. 14. Jesus saw that he answered discreetly. Mark xii. 34. Who 's so gross That seeth not this palpable device Shak.

mely; decorous. He had a seemly nose. Chaucer. I am a woman, lacking wit To make a seemly answer to such persons. Shak. Suspense of judgment and exercise of charity were safer and seemlier for Christian men than the hot pursuit of these controversies. Hooker.

Formerly, in England, an officer nearly answering to the more modern bailiff of the hundred; also, an officer whose duty was to attend on the king, and on the lord high steward in court, to arrest traitors and other offenders. He is now called sergeant-at-arms, and two of these officers, by allowance of the sovereign,…

To answer or be (in the place of something) to; as, a sofa serves one for a seat and a couch.

r more that join, or are joined, in one writ; the putting in several or separate pleas or answers by two or more disjointly; the destruction of the unity of interest in a joint estate. Bouvier.

ource of obligation is of course transferred to the person addressed; as, "Shall you go" (answer, "I shall go"); "Shall he go" i. e., "Do you require or promise his going" (answer, "He shall go".) The same relation is transferred to either second or third person in such phrases as "You say, or think, you shall go;" "He…

n pl., the book itself. To this the following sheets are intended for a full and distinct answer. Waterland.

Abrupt; brief; pointed; petulant; as, he gave a short answer to the question.

That which covers or shelters like a shroud. Jura answers through her misty shroud. Byron.

Performed by one person, or one on each side; as, a single combat. These shifts refuted, answer thy appellant, . . . Who now defles thee thrice ti single fight. Milton.

The wheather; the climate. Thou wert better in thy grave than to answer with thy uncovered body this extremity of the skies. Shak.

or boat slides through the water. Ages shall slide away without perceiving. Dryden. Parts answering parts shall slide into a whole. Pope.

ten little snatches of sunshine. Spectator. Leave me your snatches, and yield me a direct answer. Shak.

That which finishes or ends a matter; a settler; a poser, as a heavy blow, a conclusive answer, and the like. [Slang, U.S.]

ness, tenderness, or the like; mild; conciliatory; courteous; kind; as, soft eyes. A soft answer turneth away wrath. Prov. xv. 1. A face with gladness overspread, Soft smiles, by human kindness bred. Wordsworth.

weighty; firm; strong; valid; just; genuine. The solid purpose of a sincere and virtuous answer. Milton. These, wanting wit, affect gravity, and go by the name of solid men. Dryden. The genius of the Italians wrought by solid toil what the myth-making imagination of the Germans had projected in a poem. J. A. Symonds.…

full of life or vigor; lively; full of spirit or fire; as, a spirited oration; a spirited answer.