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A complete course or vibration; time of vibration, as of a pendulum. [Obs.] Locke.

A method of surveying, especially in mines, in which the bearings of the courses, or the angles which they make with each other, are determined by means of the circumferentor.

To discourse in dialogue. Fotherby.

or the expression of ideas; the construction, disposition, and application of words in discourse, with regard to clearness, accuracy, variety, etc.; mode of expression; language; as, the diction of Chaucer's poems. His diction blazes up into a sudden explosion of prophetic grandeur. De Quincey.

Course of living or nourishment; what is eaten and drunk habitually; food; victuals; fare. "No inconvenient diet." Milton.

To have sexual intercourse with. [Obs.] Chaucer.

; to deviate; to swerve; especially, to turn aside from the main subject of attention, or course of argument, in writing or speaking. Moreover she beginneth to digress in latitude. Holland. In the pursuit of an argument there is hardly room to digress into a particular definition as often as a man varies the significat…

The act of digressing or deviating, esp. from the main subject of a discourse; hence, a part of a discourse deviating from its main design or subject. The digressions I can not excuse otherwise, than by the confidence that no man will read them. Sir W. Temple.

Prolixity; diffuse discourse. [Obs.] "What needeth greater dilatation" Chaucer.

vils or obstacles present themselves on every side, and it is difficult to determine what course to pursue; a vexatious alternative or predicament; a difficult choice or position. A strong dilemma in a desperate case! To act with infamy, or quit the place. Swift. Horns of a dilemma, alternatives, each of which is equal…

er; -- said of coarse and imperfectly stratified deposits along ancient or existing water courses. Similar unstratified deposits were formed by the agency of ice. The time of deposition has been called the Diluvian epoch.

f the motion of a celestial body. Direct action. (Mach.) See Direct-acting. -- Direct discourse (Gram.), the language of any one quoted without change in its form; as, he said "I can not come;" -- correlative to indirect discourse, in which there is change of form; as, he said that he could not come. They are often ca…

The line or course upon which anything is moving or aimed to move, or in which anything is lying or pointing; aim; line or point of tendency; direct line or course; as, the ship sailed in a southeasterly direction.

In a direct manner; in a straight line or course. "To run directly on." Shak. Indirectly and directly too Thou hast contrived against the very life Of the defendant. Shak.

Pertaining to discipline; intended for discipline; corrective; belonging to a course of training. Those canons . . . were only disciplinary. Bp. Ferne. The evils of the . . . are disciplinary and remedial. Buckminster.

uity; breaking off; cessation; interruption; as, a discontinuance of conversation or intercourse; discontinuance of a highway or of travel.

A discourser. [Obs.] L. Addison.

To exclude from fellowship; to refuse intercourse with, as an associate. An attempt to disfellowship an evil, but to fellowship the evildoer. Freewill Bapt. Quart.

blot. Uncommon expressions . . . are a disfigurement rather than any embellishment of discourse. Hume.

possession of any property or right, which, by law or custom, would devolve on him in the course of descent. Of how fair a portion Adam disinherited his whole posterity! South.