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tensive order of insects having only two functional wings and two balancers, as the house fly, mosquito, etc. They have a suctorial proboscis, often including two pairs of sharp organs (mandibles and maxillæ) with which they pierce the skin of animals. They undergo a complete metamorphosis, their larvæ (called maggots)…

To let fly, as a missile; to shoot. They do discharge their shot of courtesy. Shak.

ir) to hang loosely or disorderly; to spread or throw (the hair) in disorder; -- used chiefly in the passive participle. With garments rent and hair disheveled, Wringing her hands and making piteous moan. Spenser.

dyes. Pope. Childe Harold basked him in the noontide sun, Disporting there like any other fly. Byron.

atural or proper one; to stain; to discolor; to sully; to tarnish; to defile; -- used chiefly in poetry. "Distained with dirt and blood." Spenser. [She] hath . . . distained her honorable blood. Spenser. The worthiness of praise distains his worth. Shak.

A morbid state of the animal system; indisposition; malady; disorder; -- at present chiefly applied to diseases of brutes; as, a distemper in dogs; the horse distemper; the horn distemper in cattle. They heighten distempers to diseases. Suckling.

A division of Lepidoptera, including the butterflies; -- so called because they fly only in the daytime.

A sort of stone, found in the mines with the true alum rock, chiefly of silica and iron.

Dolphin fly (Zoöl.), the black, bean, or collier, Aphis (Aphis fable), destructive to beans. -- Dolphin striker (Naut.), a short vertical spar under the bowsprit.

A building; a house; an edifice; -- used chiefly in poetry. Approach the dome, the social banquet share. Pope.

munities named from him. Dominican nuns, an order of nuns founded by St. Dominic, and chiefly employed in teaching. -- Dominican tertiaries (the third order of St. Dominic). See Tertiary.

Given; executed; issued; made public; -- used chiefly in the clause giving the date of a proclamation or public act.

rge European scaraboid beetle (Geotrupes stercorarius), which makes a droning noise while flying. The name is also applied to allied American species, as the June bug. Called also dorr, dorbeetle, or dorrbeetle, dorbug, dorrfly, and buzzard clock.

dow, to distinguish her from the wife of her husband's heir bearing the same name; -- chiefly applied to widows of personages of rank. With prudes for proctors, dowagers for deans. Tennyson. Queen dowager, the widow of a king.

or, sandy, undulating or hilly land near the sea, covered with fine turf which serves chiefly for the grazing of sheep; -- usually in the plural. [Eng.] Seven thousand broad-tailed sheep grazed on his downs. Sandys.

of wing. These prolongations aid them in making long leaps from tree to tree. Called also flying lizard.

The drake fly. The drake will mount steeple height into the air. Walton. Drake fly, a kind of fly, sometimes used in angling. The dark drake fly, good in August. Walton.

To rush and press with violence; to move furiously. Fierce Boreas drove against his flying sails. Dryden. Under cover of the night and a driving tempest. Prescott. Time driveth onward fast, And in a little while our lips are dumb. Tennyson.

One who, or that which, drops. Specif.: (Fishing) A fly that drops from the leaden above the bob or end fly.

One of a people and religious sect dwelling chiefly in the Lebanon mountains of Syria. The Druses separated from the Mohammedan Arabs in the 9th century. Their characteristic dogma is the unity of God. Am. Cyc.