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for electioneering purposes; -- a phrase derived from the practice of using a stump for a speaker's platform in newly- settled districts. Hence also the phrases stump orator, stump speaker, stump speech, stump oratory, etc. [Colloq. U.S.]

To hesitate or stumble in uttering words; to speak with spasmodic repetition or pauses; to stammer. Trembling, stuttering, calling for his confessor. Macaulay.

One who is a master or a model of style, especially in writing or speaking; a critic of style. Distinguished as a stylist, for ease. Fitzed. Hall.

Sweetly speaking; using agreeable speech. [R.]

A grand or lofty style in speaking or writing; a style that expresses lofty conceptions. The sublime rises from the nobleness of thoughts, the magnificence of words, or the harmonious and lively turn of the phrase. Addison.

atisfy; to content; to be equal to the wants or demands of. Spenser. Let it suffice thee; speak no more unto me of this matter. Deut. iii. 26.

sed the hypocrites. Isa. xxxiii. 14. The castle of Macduff I will surprise. Shak. Who can speak The mingled passions that surprised his heart Thomson.

apid; quick; speedy; prompt. My beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. James i. 19. Swift of dispatch and easy of access. Dryden. And bring upon themselves swift destruction. 2 Pet. ii. 1.

or short; a particle. Before any syllable of the law of God was written. Hooker. Who dare speak One syllable against him Shak.

Habitually silent; not given to converse; not apt to talk or speak. -- Tac"i*turn*ly, adv.

Habilual silence, or reserve in speaking. The cause of Addison's taciturnity was a natural diffidence in the company of strangers. V. Knox. The taciturnity and the short answers which gave so much offense. Macaulay.

To utter words; esp., to converse familiarly; to speak, as in familiar discourse, when two or more persons interchange thoughts. I will buy with you, sell with you, talk with you, walk with you, and so following, but I will not eat with you. Shak.

to admonish. I shall myself to herbs teach you. Chaucer. They have taught their tongue to speak lies. Jer. ix. 5.

To produce; to bring forth. [R.] That [grief] of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker; Each minute teems a new one. Shak.

produce a marked effect; as, every shot tells; every expression tells. To tell of. (a) To speak of; to mention; to narrate or describe. (b) To inform against; to disclose some fault of. -- To tell on, to inform against. [Archaic & Colloq.] Lest they should tell on us, saying, So did David. 1 Sam. xxvii. 11.…

One of the people speaking the Telugu language.

nd of the taffrail. J. Knowels. In term, in set terms; in formal phrase. [Obs.] I can not speak in term. Chaucer. -- Term fee (Law) (a), a fee by the term, chargeable to a suitor, or by law fixed and taxable in the costs of a cause for each or any term it is in court. -- Terms of a proportion (Math.), the four members…

o bear witness to; to support the truth of by testimony; to affirm or declare solemny. We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. John iii. 11.

Of or pertaining to any of the Teutonic languages, or the peoples who speak these languages. Teutonic languages, a group of languages forming a division of the Indo-European, or Aryan, family, and embracing the High German, Low German, Gothic, and Scandinavian dialects and languages. -- Teutonic order, a military reli…

A subject or topic on which a person writes or speaks; a proposition for discussion or argument; a text. My theme is alway one and ever was. Chaucer. And when a soldier was the theme, my name Was not far off. Shak.