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with out, the notion conveyed being to add to, or piece out by a laborious, inferior, or scanty addition; as, to eke out a scanty supply of one kind with some other. "To eke my pain." Spenser. He eked out by his wits an income of barely fifty pounds. Macaulay.

d; to take in; as, natural philosophy embraces many sciences. Not that my song, in such a scanty space, So large a subject fully can embrace. Dryden.

e of strength; to reduce the strength or force of; to weaken; to debilitate. Enfeebled by scanty subsistence and excessive toil. Prescott.

Scantiness; smallness; thinness. [R.] Boyle.

Scanty; small; slender; diminutive. [R.] "Exiguous resources." Carlyle. -- Ex*ig"uous*ness, n. [R.]

To enlarge in discourse or writing; to be copious in argument or discussion; to descant. He expatiated on the inconveniences of trade. Addison.

r utter extempore or off-hand; to prepare in great haste, under urgent necessity, or with scanty or unsuitable materials; as, to extemporize a dinner, a costume, etc. Themistocles . . . was of all men the best able to extemporize the right thing to be done. Jowett (Thucyd. ). Pitt, of whom it was said that he could ext…

ic movement of one or more parts or voices in the harmony; as, figurate counterpoint or descant. Figurate counterpoint or descant (Mus.), that which is not simple, or in which the parts do not move together tone for tone, but in which freer movement of one or more parts mingles passing discords with the harmony; -- cal…

ey wrote for a public familiar with painted form. J. A. Symonds. Figurative counterpointdescant. See under Figurate. -- Fig"ur*a*tive*ly, adv. -- Fig"ur*a*tive*ness, n.

Free and florid; as, a figured descant. See Figurate, 3.

Any scantling smaller than a batten.

And Heaven defend your good souls, that you think I will your serious and great business scant, For she with me. Shak.

The tune on which descants are raised; the plain song. Moore (Encyc.). On that ground I'll build a holy descant. Shak.

A genus of trees (Celtis) related to the elm, but bearing drupes with scanty, but often edible, pulp. C. occidentalis is common in the Eastern United States. Gray.

ich has been felled. This said, he led me over hoults and hags; Through thorns and bushes scant my legs I drew. Fairfax.

A woman's skirt so scant at the bottom as to restrain freedom of movement after the fashion of a hobble. -- Hob"ble-skirt`ed, a.

ess, richness, sufficiency, or productiveness; deficient in quality or contents; slender; scant; barren; bare; mean; -- used literally and figuratively; as, the lean harvest; a lean purse; a lean discourse; lean wages. "No lean wardrobe." Shak. Their lean and fiashy songs. Milton. What the land is, whether it be fat or…

To subdue the appetites of by poor and scanty diet; to mortify. Baker.

ertility, strength, or the like; defective in quantity, or poor in quality; poor; barren; scanty in ideas; wanting strength of diction or affluence of imagery. "Meager soil." Dryden. Of secular habits and meager religious belief. I. Taylor. His education had been but meager. Motley.

The state or quality of being meager; leanness; scantiness; barrenness.