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To move now in one direction and now in another; to be wavering or unsteady; to be irresolute or undetermined; to vacillate.

A motion like that of waves; a moving in this and that direction; as, the fluctuations of the sea.

An inclosed passage way for establishing and directing a current of air, gases, etc.; an air passage; esp.:

the face of, to insult; to assail; to set at defiance; to oppose with violence; to act in direct opposition to; to resist. -- To fly off, to separate, or become detached suddenly; to revolt. -- To fly on, to attack. -- To fly open, to open suddenly, or with violence. -- To fly out. (a) To rush out. (b) To burst int…

A point so related to a conic section and certain straight line called the directrix that the ratio of the distace between any point of the curve and the focus to the distance of the same point from the directrix is constant.

To go or come after; to move behind in the same path or direction; hence, to go with (a leader, guide, etc.); to accompany; to attend. It waves me forth again; I'll follow it. Shak.

(In the field of a telescope) In the direction from which stars are apparently moving (in consequence of the erth's rotation); as, a small star, north following or south following. In the direction toward which stars appear to move is called preceding.

Fundamental principle; basis; plan; -- used only in the singular. Answer directly upon the foot of dry reason. Berkeley.

Indicating the remoter and indirect object of an act; the end or final cause with reference to which anything is, acts, serves, or is done. The oak for nothing ill, The osier good for twigs, the poplar for the mill. Spenser. It was young counsel for the persons, and violent counsel for the matters. Bacon. Shall I think…

the day; the fore and of a wagon. The free will of the subject is preserved, while it is directed by the fore purpose of the state. Southey.

The milk secreted just before, or directly after, the birth of a child or of the young of an animal; colostrum.

Ready; directly forward; going before. [Obs.] "A foreright wind." Chapman.

To represent on a plane surface, as if extended in a direction toward the spectator or nearly so; to shorten by drawing in perspective.

except the backsight; any sight or bearing taken by a compass or theodolite in a forward direction.

The works where wrought iron is produced directly from the ore, or where iron is rendered malleable by puddling and shingling; a shingling mill.

Straight forward; in a straight direction. [Archaic] Sir P. Sidney.

Straightforwardness; explicitness; directness. [Archaic] Dante's concise forthrightness of phrase. Hawthorne.

Immediately; without delay; directly. Immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales; and he received sight forthwith. Acts ix. 18.

Allowing passage in either of four directions; as, a four-way cock, or valve. Francis. Four-way cock, a cock connected with four pipes or ports, and having two or more passages in the plug, by which the adjacent pipes or ports may be made to communicate; formerly used as a valve in the steam engine, and now for various…

by Benjamin Franklin, the peculiar feature of which was that a current of heated air was directly supplied to the room from an air box; -- now applied to other varieties of open stoves.