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An unmarried or single woman; -- used in legal proceedings as a title, or addition to the surname. If a gentlewoman be termed a spinster, she may abate the writ. Coke.

singly, or apart from other things of the same kind, or in scattered instances; separate; single; as, a sporadic fireball; a sporadic case of disease; a sporadic example of a flower. Sporadic disease (Med.), a disease which occurs in single and scattered cases. See the Note under Endemic, a.

racer, a pugilist, a gambler, or the like. -- Sporting plant (Bot.), a plant in which a single bud or offset suddenly assumes a new, and sometimes very different, character from that of the rest of the plant. Darwin.

The projected spot or circle of light used to illuminate brilliantly a single person or object or group on the stage; leaving the rest of the stage more or less unilluminated; hence, conspicuous public notice. [Cant or Colloq.]

Any single insulated and prominent structure, or upright pipe, which affords a conduit for smoke; as, the brick smokestack of a factory; the smokestack of a steam vessel. (Computer programming)

ns of a superintendant or manager; as, the staff of a newspaper. Jacob's staff (Surv.), a single straight rod or staff, pointed and iron-shod at the bottom, for penetrating the ground, and having a socket joint at the top, used, instead of a tripod, for supporting a compass. -- Staff angle (Arch.), a square rod of woo…

his phrase, having its old meaning of a set. See Pair, n., 1. -- Run of stars (Arch.), a single set of stairs, or section of a stairway, from one platform to the next. -- Stair rod, a rod, usually of metal, for holding a stair carpet to its place. -- Up stairs. See Upstairs in the Vocabulary.

nnected together. -- Stand of arms. (Mil.) See under Arms. -- Stand of colors (Mil.), a single color, or flag. Wilhelm (Mil. Dict.) -- To be at a stand, to be stationary or motionless; to be at a standstill; hence, to be perplexed; to be embarrassed. -- To make a stand, to halt for the purpose of offering resistance…

ay." Milton. Trees serve as so many stays for their vines. Addison. Lord Liverpool is the single stay of this ministry. Coleridge.

foot in ascending or descending, as a stair, or a round of a ladder. The breadth of every single step or stair should be never less than one foot. Sir H. Wotton.

An instrument with two lenses, by which an image of a single picture projected upon a screen of ground glass is made to present an appearance of relief, and may be viewed by several persons at once.

A single pass of a needle in sewing; the loop or turn of the thread thus made.

A single seat with three or four legs and without a back, made in various forms for various uses.

A light two-wheeled carriage for a single person.

le of being overcome or conquered; surmountable. Antipathies are generally superable by a single effort. Johnson. -- Su"per*a*ble*ness, n. -- Su"per*a*bly, adv.

under Regard. -- Trigonometrical survey, a survey of a portion of country by measuring a single base, and connecting it with various points in the tract surveyed by a series of triangles, the angles of which are carefully measured, the relative positions and distances of all parts being computed from these data.…

A whiffletree, or whippletree. See Singletree.

An elementary sound, or a combination of elementary sounds, uttered together, or with a single effort or impulse of the voice, and constituting a word or a part of a word. In other terms, it is a vowel or a diphtong, either by itself or flanked by one or more consonants, the whole produced by a single impulse or uttera…

er. When there is bodily union (in extreme cases so close that the two form practically a single body, as in the union of algæ and fungi to form lichens, and in the inclusion of algæ in radiolarians) it is called conjunctive symbiosis; if there is no actual union of the organisms (as in the association of ants with myr…

; to correspond; to harmonize. The pleasing of color symbolizeth with the pleasing of any single tone to the ear; but the pleasing of order doth symbolize with harmony. Bacon. They both symbolize in this, that they love to look upon themselves through multiplying glasses. Howell.