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xed to the Christian name of a knight or a baronet. Sir Horace Vere, his brother, was the principal in the active part. Bacon.

The framework of anything; the principal parts that support the rest, but without the appendages. The great skeleton of the world. Sir M. Hale.

To plan or describe by giving the principal points or ideas of.

Fig.: To read or examine superficially and rapidly, in order to cull the principal facts or thoughts; as, to skim a book or a newspaper.

grace consisting of two or more small notes moving by conjoint degrees, and leading to a principal note either above or below.

The air sung by any of the principal characters in an opera on entering.

Chromatic spectrum, the visible colored rays of the solar spectrum, exhibiting the seven principal colors in their order, and covering the central and larger portion of the space of the whole spectrum. -- Continous spectrum, a spectrum not broken by bands or lines, but having the colors shaded into each other contino…

One of the large or principal roots of a tree. Shak.

Whatever constitutes the principal strength or support of anything; power of endurance; backbone; vigor; as, the stamina of a constitution or of life; the stamina of a State. He succeeded to great captains who had sapped the whole stamina and resistance of the contest. De Quincey.

The principal commodity of traffic in a market; a principal commodity or production of a country or district; as, wheat, maize, and cotton are great staples of the United States. We should now say, Cotton is the great staple, that is, the established merchandize, of Manchester. Trench.

The principal persons in a government. The bold design Pleased highly those infernal states. Milton.

The principal gold coin of ancient Grece. It varied much in value, the stater best known at Athens being worth about £1 2s., or about $5.35. The Attic silver tetradrachm was in later times called stater.

The principal body of a tree, shrub, or plant, of any kind; the main stock; the part which supports the branches or the head or top. After they are shot up thirty feet in length, they spread a very large top, having no bough nor twig in the trunk or the stem. Sir W. Raleigh. The lowering spring, with lavish rain, Beats…

The principal supporting part; the part in which others are inserted, or to which they are attached. Specifically: --

masses of tin ore found in alluvial ground; -- so called because a stream of water is the principal agent used in separating the ore from the sand and gravel. -- Stream works (Cornish Mining), a place where an alluvial deposit of tin ore is worked. Ure. -- To float with the stream, figuratively, to drift with the cur…

xlvi. 1. What they boded would be a mischief to us, you are providing shall be one of our principal strengths. Sprat. Certainly there is not a greater strength against temptation. Jer. Taylor.

o strew flowers over a grave. And strewed his mangled limbs about the field. Dryden. On a principal table a desk was open and many papers [were] strewn about. Beaconsfield.

Any part of a machine or structure, of which the principal function is to hold things apart; a brace subjected to compressive stress; -- the opposite of stay, and tie.

A light sail set at the side of a principal or square sail of a vessel in free winds, to increase her speed. Its head is bent to a small spar which is called the studding-sail boom. See Illust. of Sail. Toten.

The principal river of the lower world, which had to be crossed in passing to the regions of the dead.