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A series of real events invested with a dramatic unity and interest. "The drama of war." Thackeray. Westward the course of empire takes its way; The four first acts already past, A fifth shall close the drama with the day; Time's noblest offspring is the last. Berkeley. The drama and contrivances of God's providence. S…

t; to obtain the lead or increase it; to draw back, to retreat; to draw level, to move up even (with another); to come up to or overtake another; to draw off, to retire or retreat; to draw on, to advance; to draw up, to form in array; to draw near, nigh, or towards, to approach; to draw together, to come together, to c…

A tool used for the purpose of making an incision along the path a saw is to follow, to prevent it from tearing the surface of the wood.

To be deep in extent; to descend perpendicularly; as, her main topsail drops seventeen yards. To drop astern (Naut.), to go astern of another vessel; to be left behind; to slacken the speed of a vessel so as to fall behind and to let another pass a head. -- To drop down (Naut.), to sail, row, or move down a river, or…

Free from dross. Stevens.

of rain or of water; especially, such dryness of the weather as affects the earth, and prevents the growth of plants; aridity. The drought of March hath pierced to the root. Chaucer. In a drought the thirsty creatures cry. Dryden.

To make to cease, as a stream of talk. Their sources of revenue were dried up. Jowett (Thucyd. ) -- To dry, or dry up, a cow, to cause a cow to cease secreting milk. Tylor.

a fishing fly. [Prov. Eng.] Halliwell. -- To dub out (Plastering), to fill out, as an uneven surface, to a plane, or to carry out a series of small projections.

Of uncertain event or issue; as, in dubious battle.

ech; unable; to utter articulate sounds; as, the dumb brutes. To unloose the very tongues even of dumb creatures. Hooker.

dark prison, commondonjon or keep of a castle, these being used as prisons. Down with him even into the deep dungeon. Tyndale. Year after year he lay patiently in a dungeon. Macaulay.

ose materials of any kind, laid on the bottom of the hold for the cargo to rest upon to prevent injury by water, or stowed among casks and other cargo to prevent their motion.

fect obscurity; a middle degree between light and darkness; twilight; as, the dusk of the evening.

To hinder from growing to the natural size; to make or keep small; to stunt. Addison. Even the most common moral ideas and affections . . . would be stunted and dwarfed, if cut off from a spiritual background. J. C. Shairp.

.), to dye firmly; to imbue thoroughly. He might truly be termed a legitimate son of the revenue system dyed in the wool. Hawthorne.

A contraction for even. See Even. I have e'en done with you. L'Estrange.

Coming in the first part of a period of time, or among the first of successive acts, events, etc. Seen in life's early morning sky. Keble. The forms of its earlier manhood. Longfellow. The earliest poem he composed was in his seventeenth summer. J. C. Shairp. Early English (Philol.) See the Note under English. -- Earl…

e gradually. -- To ease a ship (Naut.), to put the helm hard, or regulate the sail, to prevent pitching when closehauled. -- To ease the helm (Naut.), to put the helm more nearly amidships, to lessen the effect on the ship, or the strain on the wheel rope. Ham. Nav. Encyc.

With ease; without difficulty or much effort; as, this task may be easily performed; that event might have been easily foreseen.

patriarch of Antioch, and the Holy Synod of Russia. The Eastern Church accepts the first seven ecumenical councils (and is hence styled only schismatic, not heretical, by the Roman Catholic Church), has as its creed the Niceno- Constantinopolitan (without the later addition of the filioque, which, with the doctrine it…