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A class of Mollusca including all those that have bivalve shells, as the clams, oysters, mussels, etc.

nceolatus), remarkable for the rudimentary condition of its organs. It is the type of the class Leptocardia. See Amphioxus, Leptocardia.

Being after all the others, similarly classed or considered, in time, place, or order of succession; following all the rest; final; hindmost; farthest; as, the last year of a century; the last man in a line of soldiers; the last page in a book; his last chance. Also day by day, from the first day unto the last day, he…

A group of orders inferior to a class. Legion of honor, an order instituted by the French government in 1802, when Bonaparte was First Consul, as a reward for merit, both civil and military.

legitimate combination of colors. Tillotson still keeps his place as a legitimate English classic. Macaulay.

Having leisure. "The leisured classes." Gladstone.

The lowest class of Vertebrata, including only the Amphioxus. The heart is represented only by a simple pulsating vessel. The blood is colorless; the brain, renal organs, and limbs are wanting, and the backbone is represented only by a simple, unsegmented notochord. See Amphioxus. [Written also Leptocardii.]…

Belonging to the lower classes, or the rabble; idle and lawless; bad; vicious. [Archaic] Chaucer. But the Jews, which believed not, . . . took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, . . . and assaulted the house of Jason. Acts xvii. 5. Too lewd to work, and ready for any kind of mischief. Southey .…

us; not confined or restricted to the literal sense; free; as, a liberal translation of a classic, or a liberal construction of law or of language.

One of a class of cellular, flowerless plants, (technically called Lichenes), having no distinction of leaf and stem, usually of scaly, expanded, frond-like forms, but sometimes erect or pendulous and variously branched. They derive their nourishment from the air, and generate by means of spores. The species are very w…

cupation, etc.; hence, human affairs; also, lives, considered collectively, as a distinct class or type; as, low life; a good or evil life; the life of Indians, or of miners. That which before us lies in daily life. Milton. By experience of life abroad in the world. Ascham. Lives of great men all remind us We can make…

To utter with spirit, animation, or gayety; to sing with spirit and liveliness. A classic lecture, rich in sentiment, With scraps of thundrous epic lilted out By violet-hooded doctors. Tennyson.

An extramundane region where certain classes of souls were supposed to await the judgment. As far from help as Limbo is from bliss. Shak. A Limbo large and broad, since called The Paradise of fools. Milton.

A series of various qualities and values of the same general class of articles; as, a full line of hosiery; a line of merinos, etc. McElrath.

Linnæus, the celebrated Swedish botanist. Linnaean system (Bot.), the system in which the classes are founded mainly upon the stamens, and the orders upon the pistils; the artificial or sexual system.

study of literary trifles, esp. trifles belonging to the literature of a former age. That class of subjects which are interesting to the regular literator or black-letter " bibliomane," simply because they have once been interesting. De Quincey.

The class of writings distinguished for beauty of style or expression, as poetry, essays, or history, in distinction from scientific treatises and works which contain positive knowledge; belles-lettres.

The science which treats of rocks, as regards their mineral constitution and classification, and their mode of occurrence in nature.

others in London, for the collection and diffusion of marine intelligence, the insurance, classification, registration, and certifying of vessels, and the transaction of business of various kinds connected with shipping.

One of a class of auxiliary numbers, devised by John Napier, of Merchiston, Scotland (1550-1617), to abridge arithmetical calculations, by the use of addition and subtraction in place of multiplication and division.