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lly as a dark brown amorphous powder, or as a dark crystalline substance with a meetallic luster. Its oxide is silica, or common quartz, and in this form, or as silicates, it is, next to oxygen, the most abundant element of the earth's crust. Silicon is characteristically the element of the mineral kingdom, as carbon i…

Of or pertaining to silk; made of, or resembling, silk; silken; silklike; as, a silky luster.

Anything having the luster or appearance of silver.

Having a gray color with a silvery luster; as, silver-gray hair.

Resembling, or having the luster of, silver; grayish white and lustrous; of a mild luster; bright. All the enameled race, whose silvery wing Waves to the tepid zephyrs of the spring. Pope.

ht cellular or fibrous opal; especially, geyserite (see Geyserite). It has often a pearly luster, and is then called pearl sinter.

Sisarum). It is a native of Asia, but has been long cultivated in Europe for its edible clustered tuberous roots, which are very sweet.

A mineral of a bright metallic luster and tin-white to pale lead-gray color. It consist of arsenic and cobalt.

atification; foliated rocks. -- Slate spar (Min.), a variety of calcite of silvery white luster and of a slaty structure. -- Transparent slate, a plate of translucent material, as ground glass, upon which a copy of a picture, placed beneath it, can be made by tracing.

A tin-white or gray mineral of metallic luster. It is an arsenide of cobalt, nickel, and iron. Called also speiskobalt.

rolled; self- possessed. There was not a sober person to be had; all was tempestuous and blustering. Druden. No sober man would put himself into danger for the applause of escaping without breaking his neck. Dryden.

s of the genus Stratyomys and allied genera. They are often bright green, with a metallic luster, and are ornamented on the sides of the back with markings of yellow, like epaulets or shoulder straps. -- Soldier moth (Zoöl.), a large geometrid moth (Euschema militaris), having the wings bright yellow with bluish black…

One of the fruit dots, or small clusters of sporangia, on the back of the fronds of ferns.

Brilliancy; luster; as, the sparkle of a diamond.

A kind of flower cluster in which sessile flowers are arranged on an unbranched elongated axis. Spike grass (Bot.), either of two tall perennial American grasses (Uniola paniculata, and U. latifolia) having broad leaves and large flattened spikelets. -- Spike rush. (Bot.) See under Rush. -- Spike shell (Zoöl.), any p…

ming with light; lustrous; as, splendent planets; splendent metals. See the Note under 3d Luster, 4.

Great brightness; brilliant luster; brilliancy; as, the splendor ot the sun. B. Jonson.

A blustering demonstration, or great effort; a great display. [Slang, U.S.] Bartlett.

An American shrub (Andromeda Mariana) having clusters of nodding white flowers. It grows in low, sandy places, and is said to poison lambs and calves. Gray.

A flight of stairs with their supporting framework, casing, balusters, etc. To make a complete staircase is a curious piece of architecture. Sir H. Wotton. Staircase shell. (Zoöl.) (a) Any scalaria, or wentletrap. (b) Any species of Solarium, or perspective shell.