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Ambiguous; doubtful. [Obs.] Never was there such an amphibolous quarrel -- both parties declaring themselves for the king. Howell.

Sharp; keen; stimulated. [R.] I never ate with angrier appetite. Tennyson.

sung alternately by a choir or congregation divided into two parts. Also figuratively. O! never more for me shall winds intone, With all your tops, a vast antiphony. R. Browning.

How he apes his sire." Addison. The people of England will not ape the fashions they have never tried. Burke.

The mark ['] used to denote that a word is contracted (as in ne'er for never, can't for can not), and as sign of the possessive, singular and plural; as, a boy's hat, boys' hats. In the latter use it originally marked the omission of the letter e.

ouse, barn, garden, or orchard, to a house or messuage. In a strict legal sense, land can never pass as an appurtenance to land. Tomlins. Bouvier. Burrill. Globes . . . provided as appurtenances to astronomy. Bacon. The structure of the eye, and of its appurtenances. Reid.

the correlatives so and such. [Obs.] I can place thee in such abject state, as help shall never find thee. Rowe. So as, so that. [Obs.] The relations are so uncertain as they require a great deal of examination. Bacon.

of remuneration or return, or as a matter of necessity; as, what price do you ask Ask me never so much dowry. Gen. xxxiv. 12. To whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more. Luke xii. 48. An exigence of state asks a much longer time to conduct a design to maturity. Addison.

hes nearer to some curve than assignable distance, but, though infinitely extended, would never meet it. Asymptotes may be straight lines or curves. A rectilinear asymptote may be conceived as a tangent to the curve at an infinite distance.

sical or mental disease or with moral contagion; to taint or corrupt. My tender youth was never yet attaint With any passion of inflaming love. Shak.

tion in which the law-executing power is a party, and to advise this supreme executive whenever required. Wharton.

tells events by omens; a soothsayer; a diviner; a prophet. Augur of ill, whose tongue was never found Without a priestly curse or boding sound. Dryden.

lpine mountains cold. Milton. He had avenged himself on them by havoc such as England had never before seen. Macaulay.

nscious; as, he was aware of the enemy's designs. Aware of nothing arduous in a task They never undertook. Cowper.

Firmness; moral principle; steadfastness. Shelley's thought never had any backbone. Shairp. To the backbone, through and through; thoroughly; entirely. "Staunch to the backbone." Lord Lytton.

infants at their baptism); to give a name to; to name. I'll be new baptized; Henceforth I never will be Romeo. Shak.

To make partaker of one's bed; to cohabit with. I'll to the Tuscan wars, and never bed her. Shak.

At or during pleasure. For our English judges there never was . . . any bene placito as their tenure. F. Harrison.

To asperse with calumny or reproach. Whom never faction could bespatter. Swift.

In a higher or greater degree; more; as, to love one better than another. Never was monarch better feared, and loved. Shak.