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To preoccupy, as ground or land; to take previous possession of. Dryden.

clusive or peculiar privilege; prior and indefeasible right; fundamental and essential possession; -- used generally of an official and hereditary right which may be asserted without question, and for the exercise of which there is no responsibility or accountability as to the fact and the manner of its exercise. The t…

itle to a thing by virtue immemorial use and enjoyment; the right or title acquired by possession had during the time and in the manner fixed by law. Bacon. That profound reverence for law and prescription which has long been characteristic of Englishmen. Macaulay.

in view, or under consideration; being at this time; not past or future; as, the present session of Congress; the present state of affairs; the present instance. I'll bring thee to the present business Shak.

Prejudice; prepossession. [A Gallicism] Dryden.

ht's fee, to receive of the heir, if of full age, one year's profits of the land if in possession, and half a year's profits if the land was in reversion expectant on an estate for life; -- now abolished. Blackstone.

Anything worth striving for; a valuable possession held or in prospect. I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Phil. iii. 14.

To bring into possession; to cause to accrue to, or to come into possession of; to acquire or provide for one's self or for another; to gain; to get; to obtain by any means, as by purchase or loan. If we procure not to ourselves more woe. Milton.

Belonging to one; one's own; individual. "His proper good" [i. e., his own possessions]. Chaucer. "My proper son." Shak. Now learn the difference, at your proper cost, Betwixt true valor and an empty boast. Dryden.

That to which a person has a legal title, whether in his possession or not; thing owned; an estate, whether in lands, goods, or money; as, a man of large property, or small property.

One who has the legal right or exclusive title to anything, whether in possession or not; an owner; as, the proprietor of farm or of a mill.

The act of proroguing; the ending of the session of Parliament, and postponing of its business, by the command of the sovereign. [Eng.]

To end the session of a parliament by an order of the sovereign, thus deferring its business. Parliament was prorogued to [meet at] Westminster. Bp. Hall. The Parliament was again prorogued to a distant day. Macaulay.

which is obtained, got, or acquired, in any manner, honestly or dishonestly; property; possession; acquisition. Chaucer. B. Jonson. We met with little purchase upon this coast, except two small vessels of Golconda. De Foe. A beauty-waning and distressed widow . . . Made prize and purchase of his lustful eye. Shak.…

her like a purse. Mortimer. Purse pride, pride of money; insolence proceeding from the possession of wealth. Bp. Hall. -- Purse rat. (Zoöl.) See Pocket gopher, under Pocket. -- Sword and purse, the military power and financial resources of a nation.

Affected with purse pride; puffed up with the possession of riches.

any character with success; an enabling quality or circumstance; requisite capacity or possession. There is no qualification for government but virtue and wisdom, actual or presumptive. Burke.

e approval of the executive. Qualified property (Law), that which depends on temporary possession, as that in wild animals reclaimed, or as in the case of a bailment.

He had qualified himself for municipal office by taking the oaths to the sovereigns in possession. Macaulay.

the top of the stern to the gangway, serving as a fence to the quarter-deck. -- Quarter sessions (Eng. Law), a general court of criminal jurisdiction held quarterly by the justices of peace in counties and by the recorders in boroughs. -- Quarter square (Math.), the fourth part of the square of a number. Tables of q…