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A parasite. [Obs.] Massinger.

To flatter; to wheedle. [Obs.] Some slavish, glavering, flattering parasite. South.

The larva or young of the mussel, formerly thought to be a parasite upon the parent's gills.

To flatter; to wheedle; to fawn; to talk smoothly. Chaucer. A false, glozing parasite. South. So glozed the tempter, and his proem tuned. Milton.

A parasite inhabiting the blood; esp.:

Destitute of feeling or affection; unsympathetic; cruel. "The heartless parasites." Byron. -- Heart"less*ly, adv. -- Heart"less*ness, n.

An intestinal worm, or wormlike intestinal parasite; one of the Helminthes.

An abject flatterer or parasite. Theodore Hook.

at amoboid, produced by segmentation of the schizonts of certain Sporozoa, as the malaria parasite.

A group of very lowly organized, wormlike parasites, including the Dicyemata. They are found in cephalopods. See Dicyemata.

f worms, having a long, round, and generally smooth body; the roundworms. they are mostly parasites. Called also Nematodea, and Nematoda.

or the eggs of birds, insects, etc.; a breeding place; esp., the place or substance where parasites or the germs of a disease effect lodgment or are developed.

to introduce an inference or an explanation. How shall any man distinguish now betwixt a parasite and a man of honor L'Estrange. Why should he live, now nature bankrupt is Shak. Then cried they all again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now, Barabbas was a robber. John xviii. 40. The other great and undoing mischi…

ly or meanly attentive; compliant to excess; cringing; fawning; as, obsequious flatterer, parasite. There lies ever in "obsequious" at the present the sense of an observance which is overdone, of an unmanly readiness to fall in with the will of another. Trench.

A division of copepod Crustacea, having a sucking mouth, as the lerneans. They are mostly parasites on fishes. Called also Siphonostomata.

Of or pertaining to parasites; parasitic.

Of the nature of a parasite; fawning for food or favors; sycophantic. "Parasitic preachers." Milton.

Anything used to destroy parasites. Quain.

The state or behavior of a parasite; the act of a parasite. "Court parasitism." Milton.

A minute parasite, usually the young of Gregarinæ, in the pseudonavicula stage.