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A soft, downy substance, resembling fine wool, consisting of the unicellular twisted hairs which grow on the seeds of the cotton plant. Long-staple cotton has a fiber sometimes almost two inches long; short-staple, from two thirds of an inch to an inch and a half.

A thin, crimped stuff, made of raw silk gummed and twisted on the mill. Black crape is much used for mourning garments, also for the dress of some clergymen. A saint in crape is twice a saint in lawn. Pope. Crape myrtle (Bot.), a very ornamental shrub (Lagerströmia Indica) from the East Indies, often planted in the Sou…

Worsted yarn,, slackly twisted, used for embroidery.

Having a crisped appearance; irregularly curled or twisted.

Characterized by a crook or curve; not straight; turning; bent; twisted; deformed. "Crooked paths." Locke. he is deformed, crooked, old, and sere. Shak.

A kind of sweet cake cut in strips and curled or twisted, and fried crisp in boiling fat. [Also written kruller.]

he other points of the curve. Any other curve is called a curve of double curvature, or a twisted curve.

iron, or Damascus twist, metal formed of thin bars or wires of iron and steel elaborately twisted and welded together; used for making gun barrels, etc., of high quality, in which the surface, when polished and acted upon by acid, has a damasc appearance. -- Damascus steel. See Damask steel, under Damask, a.…

To free from being entwined or twisted. Shelley.

The state of being distorted, or twisted out of shape or out of true position; crookedness; perversion.

Consisting of two threads twisted together; using two threads.

rent property of returning to the form from which a substance is bent, drawn, pressed, or twisted; springy; having the power of rebounding; as, a bow is elastic; the air is elastic; India rubber is elastic. Capable of being drawn out by force like a piece of elastic gum, and by its own elasticity returning, when the fo…

Hair matted, or twisted into a knot, as if by elves.

To be twisted or twined. With whose imperial laurels might entwine no cypress. De Quincey.

al services or drudgery, for another, as in some English schools. To fag out, to become untwisted or frayed, as the end of a rope, or the edge of canvas.

of poorer quality, or in a spoiled condition, as the coarser end of a web of cloth, the untwisted end of a rope, ect.

A carved ornament consisting of flowers, and leaves, intermixed or twisted together, wound with a ribbon, and hanging or depending in a natural curve. See Illust. of Bucranium.

Capable of being flexed or bent; admitting of being turned, bowed, or twisted, without breaking; pliable; yielding to pressure; not stiff or brittle. When the splitting wind Makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks. Shak.

Untwisted filaments of silk, used in embroidering. Floss silk, silk that has been twisted, and which retains its loose and downy character. It is much used in embroidery. Called also floxed silk. -- Floss thread, a kind of soft flaxen yarn or thread, used for embroidery; -- called also linen floss, and floss yarn. McE…

lot. -- Forelock hook (Rope Making), a winch or whirl by which a bunch of three yarns is twisted into a standard. Knight. -- To take time, or occasion, by the forelock, to make prompt use of anything; not to let slip an opportunity. Time is painted with a lock before and bald behind, signifying thereby that we must t…