Search the Dictionary

Destitute of shape or regular form; wanting symmetry of dimensions; misshapen; -- opposed to Ant: shapely. -- Shape"less*ness, n. The shapeless rock, or hanging precipice. Pope.

Well-formed; having a regular shape; comely; symmetrical. T. Warton. Waste sandy valleys, once perplexed with thorn, The spiry fir and shapely box adorn. Pope. Where the shapely column stood. Couper.

Sprouting or coming up freely and regularly. [Prev. Eng.] Grose.

Short of, or lacking the regular number of, servants or helpers.

ition to one's principal articles of trade; a course of business pursued aside from one's regular occupation.

A ridge of mountain and craggy rocks, with a serrated or irregular outline; as, the Sierra Nevada. The wild sierra overhead. Whitter.

To take the irrregular gait called single-foot;- said of a horse. See Single-foot. Many very fleet horses, when overdriven, adopt a disagreeable gait, which seems to be a cross between a pace and a trot, in which the two legs of one side are raised almost but not quite, simultaneously. Such horses are said to single, o…

An irregular gait of a horse; -- called also single-footed pace. See Single, v. i. Single-foot is an irregular pace, rather rare, distinguished by the posterior extremities moving in the order of a fast walk, and the anterior extremities in that of a slow trot. Stillman (The Horse in Motion.)

An allowance of food and drink from the buttery, aside from the regular dinner at commons; -- corresponding to battel at Oxford.

Any one of numerous species of regularly scaled harmless lizards of the family Scincidæ, common in the warmer parts of all the continents.

An irregularly shaped piece of metal, used as a missile for a gun.

A knot or irregularity in yarn. Knight.

of Prussia, and so called because these yachts do not conform to the restrictions for the regular classes established by the rules of the International Yacht Racing Union. In yachts of the sonderclass, as prescribed for the season of 1911, the aggregate of the length on water line, extreme beam, and extreme draft must…

to use or require a greater number of some particular letters, figures, or marks than the regular proportion, as, for example, in making an index.

pace line (Print.), a thin piece of metal used by printers to open the lines of type to a regular distance from each other, and for other purposes; a lead. Hansard. -- Space rule (Print.), a fine, thin, short metal rule of the same height as the type, used in printing short lines in tabular matter.

To reduce, as irregular blocks of stone, to an approximately level surface by hammering.

The irregular triangular space between the curve of an arch and the inclosing right angle; or the space between the outer moldings of two contiguous arches and a horizontal line above them, or another arch above and inclosing them.

Placed irregularly and distantly; scattered; -- applied to branches, leaves, peduncles, and the like.

An order of irregular sea urchins, usually having a more or less heart-shaped shell with four or five petal-like ambulacra above. The mouth is edentulous and situated anteriorly, on the under side.

, etc.; as, a speculative dealer or enterprise. The speculative merchant exercises no one regular, established, or well-known branch of business. A. Smith. -- Spec"u*la*tive*ly, adv. -- Spec"u*la*tive*ness, n.