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That part of a gunlock which strikes the percussion cap, or firing pin; the cock; formerly, however, a piece of steel covering the pan of a flintlock musket and struck by the flint of the cock to ignite the priming.

Without a visible hammer; -- said of a gun having a cock or striker concealed from sight, and out of the way of an accidental touch.

The small part of a gunstock near the lock, which is grasped by the hand in taking aim.

ang fire (Mil.), to be slow in communicating fire through the vent to the charge; as, the gun hangs fire; hence, to hesitate, to hold back as if in suspense.

at, triangular head, sharpened at both edges, and is thrown by hand, or discharged from a gun. Harpoon fork, a kind of hayfork, consisting of bar with hinged barbs at one end a loop for a rope at the other end, used for lifting hay from the load by horse power. -- Harpoon gun, a gun used in the whale fishery for shoot…

A gunner's case or bag used carry cartridges from the ammunition chest to the piece in loading.

With child; pregnant. [R.] Heavy artillery. (Mil.) (a) Guns of great weight or large caliber, esp. siege, garrison, and seacoast guns. (b) Troops which serve heavy guns. -- Heavy cavalry. See under Cavalry. -- Heavy fire (Mil.), a continuous or destructive cannonading, or discharge of small arms. -- Heavy metal (Mil…

rom the bowsprit cap around the heel of the jib boom. -- Heel plate, the butt plate of a gun. -- Heel of a rafter. (Arch.) See Heel, n., 7. -- Heel ring, a ring for fastening a scythe blade to the snath. -- Neck and heels, the whole body. (Colloq.) -- To be at the heels of, to pursue closely; to follow hard: as, hu…

A small mortar on a gun carriage, in use before the howitzer.

l projection, a projection made on a plane parallel to the horizon. -- Horizontal range (Gunnery), the distance in a horizontal plane to which a gun will throw a projectile. -- Horizontal water wheel, a water wheel in which the axis is vertical, the buckets or floats revolving in a horizontal plane, as in most turbin…

A gun so short that the projectile, which was hollow, could be put in its place by hand; a kind of mortar. [Obs.]

imals; to chase; to pursue for the purpose of catching or killing; to follow with dogs or guns for sport or exercise; as, to hunt a deer. Like a dog, he hunts in dreams. Tennyson.

(Mil.) A piece of wood at the lower end of a platform, designed to prevent the wheels of gun carriages from injuring the parapet.

Want of perspicuity or clearness; vaguness; ambiguity.

test terrors that come in their way, are so far from making them quit the work they had begun, that they rather prove incentives to them to go on in it. South.

Recently, or just, begun; beginning; partially but not fully in existence or operation; existing in its elements; incomplete. -- In"cho*ate*ly, adv. Neither a substance perfect, nor a substance inchoate. Raleigh.

Begun; commenced; introduced to, or instructed in, the rudiments; newly admitted. To rise in science as in bliss, Initiate in the secrets of the skies. Young. Initiate tenant by courtesy (Law), said of a husband who becomes such in his wife's estate of inheritance by the birth of a child, but whose estate is not consum…

dium; agency. The instrumentality of faith in justification. Bp. Burnet. The discovery of gunpowder developed the science of attack and defense in a new instrumentality. J. H. Newman.

orius, and C. capsularis; also, the plant itself. The fiber is much used for making mats, gunny cloth, cordage, hangings, paper, etc.

The last and worst of the four ages of the world; -- considered to have begun B. C. 3102, and to last 432,000 years.