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The pulpy fruit of Persea gratissima, a tree of tropical America. It is about the size and shape of a large pear; -- called also avocado pear, alligator pear, midshipman's butter.

Odd; out of order; perverse. [Obs.]

In an unlucky (left-handed) or perverse manner. [Obs.] Holland.

Perverse; adverse; untoward. [Obs.] "Awkward casualties." "Awkward wind." Shak. O blind guides, which being of an awkward religion, do strain out a gnat, and swallow up a cancel. Udall.

int; with oblique vision; as, to glance awry. "Your crown's awry." Shak. Blows them transverse, ten thousand leagues awry. Into the devious air. Milton.

se are the major axis and the minor axis, and the two axes of the hyperbola are the transverse axis and the conjugate axis. -- Axis of a lens, the straight line passing through its center and perpendicular to its surfaces. -- Axis of a telescope or microscope, the straight line with which coincide the axes of the sev…

A transverse bar or shaft connecting the opposite wheels of a car or carriage; an axletree.

ant, issued in another county, to apprehend an offender. -- To back water (Naut.), to reverse the action of the oars, paddles, or propeller, so as to force the boat or ship backward.

ring the exhaust or the compression stroke, tending to drive the piston in a direction reverse to that in which it should travel; also, an explosion in the exhaust passages of such ah engine.

hing which brings misfortune upon one, or causes failure in an effort or enterprise; a reverse. [Scot.]

or reflex motion caused in badly fitting machinery by irregularities in velocity or a reverse of motion.

An instrument formerly used for taking the altitude of the heavenly bodies, but now superseded by the quadrant and sextant; -- so called because the observer turned his back to the body observed.

Unwilling; averse; reluctant; hesitating; loath. For wiser brutes were backward to be slaves. Pope.

In a contrary or reverse manner, way, or direction; contrarily; as, to read backwards. We might have . . . beat them backward home. Shak.

Reluctantly; slowly; aversely. [Obs.] Sir P. Sidney.

ontal strata (Tertiary deposits) have been often eroded into fantastic forms, and much intersected by canons, and where lack of wood, water, and forage increases the difficulty of traversing the country, whence the name, first given by the Canadian French, Mauvaises Terres (bad lands).

An overseer or under steward of an estate, who directs husbandry operations, collects rents, etc. [Eng.]

a handle called a ballstock; -- formerly used by printers for inking the form, but now superseded by the roller.

A stripe, streak, or other mark transverse to the axis of the body.

al poet and singer, as among the ancient Celts, whose occupation was to compose and sing verses in honor of the heroic achievements of princes and brave men.