Search the Dictionary

A painted tape, marked with linear dimensions, as inches, feet, etc., and often inclosed in a case, -- used for measuring.

A small wax candle; a small lighted wax candle; hence, a small light. Get me a taper in my study, Lucius. Shak.

Lighted with a taper or tapers; as, a tapered choir. [R.] T. Warton.

Becoming gradually smaller toward one end. -- Ta"per*ing*ly, adv.

The quality or state of being taper; tapering form; taper. Shenstone.

or wall hangings and the like. The term is also applied to different kinds of embroidery. Tapestry carpet, a kind of carpet, somewhat resembling Brussels, in which the warp is printed before weaving, so as to produce the figure in the cloth. -- Tapestry moth. (Zoöl.) Same as Carpet moth, under Carpet.…

A small black dermestoid beetle (Attagenus piceus) whose larva feeds on tapestry, carpets, silk, fur, flour, and various other goods.

Worked or figured stuff; tapestry. [R.] Spenser.

A small South American hare (Lepus Braziliensis).

mented layer of the choroid coat of the eye in many animals, which has an iridescent or metallic luster and helps to make the eye visible in the dark. Sometimes applied to the whole layer of pigmented epithelium of the choroid.

se toward the end of the body being much larger and longer than the anterior ones, and containing the fully developed sexual organs. The head is small, destitute of a mouth, but furnished with two or more suckers (which vary greatly in shape in different genera), and sometimes, also, with hooks for adhesion to the wall…

A house where liquors are retailed.

Same as Bothrenchyma.

A lurking or skulking. [Obs.] Gower.

A coarsely granular substance obtained by heating, and thus partly changing, the moistened starch obtained from the roots of the cassava. It is much used in puddings and as a thickening for soups. See Cassava.

Any one of several species of large odd-toed ungulates belonging to Tapirus, Elasmognathus, and allied genera. They have a long prehensile upper lip, short ears, short and stout legs, a short, thick tail, and short, close hair. They have three toes on the hind feet, and four toes on the fore feet, but the outermost toe…

Allied to the tapir, or the Tapir family.

Tapestry; formerly, the cover of a council table. On, or Upon, the tapis, on the table, or under consideration; as, to lay a motion in Parliament on the tapis.

A maker of tapestry; an upholsterer. [R.] Chaucer.

und, so as to be concealed; to squat; to crouch; hence, to hide one's self. [Written also tappis, tappish, tappice.] [Obs. or Prov. Eng.] As a hound that, having roused a hart, Although he tappish ne'er so soft. Chapman.