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A custom, among certain barbarous tribes, that when a woman gives birth to a child her husband takes to his bed, as if ill. The world-wide custom of the couvade, where at childbirth the husband undergoes medical treatment, in many cases being put to bed for days. Tylor.

The promises of God as revealed in the Scriptures, conditioned on certain terms on the part of man, as obedience, repentance, faith, etc. I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee. Gen. xvi…

The female of certain large mammals, as whales, seals, etc.

Dromas ardeola). -- Crab's eyes, or Crab's stones, masses of calcareous matter found, at certain seasons of the year, on either side of the stomach of the European crawfishes, and formerly used in medicine for absorbent and antacid purposes; the gastroliths. -- Crab spider (Zoöl.), one of a group of spiders (Laterigr…

oins to or towards the ceiling of a room so that they shall fall as near as possible to a certain crack in the floor. [Gamblers' Cant, U. S.]

A condition produced in certain porcelain, fine earthenware, or glass, in which the glaze or enamel appears to be cracked in all directions, making a sort of reticulated surface; as, Chinese crackle; Bohemian crackle.

r to his correspondent, informing him that the person named therein is entitled to draw a certain sum of money; when addressed to several different correspondents, or when the money can be drawn in fractional sums in several different places, it is called a circular letter of credit. -- Public credit. (a) The reputati…

a, or of a river. Each creek and cavern of the dangerous shore. Cowper. They discovered a certain creek, with a shore. Acts xxvii. 39.

Flying in the twilight or evening, or before sunrise; -- said certain birds and insects. Others feed only in the twilight, as bats and owls, and are called crepuscular. Whewell.

iocy, accompanied by physical degeneracy and deformity (usually with goiter), frequent in certain mountain valleys, esp. of the Alps.

A peculiar perforated organ of certain spiders (Ciniflonidæ), used for spinning a special kind of silk.

Possessing a certain degree of firmness and freshness; in a fresh, unwilted condition. It [laurel] has been plucked nine months, and yet looks as hale and crisp as if it would last ninety years. Leigh Hunt.

A very slight convulsive or spasmodic contraction of certain muscles, external or internal. Few men can look down from a great height without creepings and crispations. O. W. Holmes.

m his most important work, the "Critique of Pure Reason." - - Critical point (Physics), a certain temperature, different for different gases, but always the same for each gas, regarded as the limit above which no amount of pressure can produce condensation to a liquid.

A certain reed stop in the organ, of a quality of tone resembling that of the oboe. [Corruptly written cromona.]

An instrument of a hooked form, used in certain cases in the extraction of a fetus. Dunglison.

The hinder part or buttocks of certain quadrupeds, especially of a horse; hence, the place behind the saddle. So light to the croup the fair lady he swung, So light to the saddle before her he sprung. Sir W. Scott.

variety of calcite, or crystallized calcium carbonate, brought from Iceland, and used in certain optical instruments, as the polariscope. -- Rock crystal, or Mountain crystal, any transparent crystal of quartz, particularly of limpid or colorless quartz.

which by its motion was supposed to carry round all those within it), in order to explain certain movements of the heavently bodies. -- Crystalline lens (Anat.), the capsular lenslike body in the eye, serving to focus the rays of light. It consists of rodlike cells derived from the external embryonic epithelium.…

e microscopic particles resembling crystals, consisting of protein matter, which occur in certain plant cells; -- called also protein crystal.