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The ratio of the long to the short side of an aëroplane, aërocurve, or wing.

A line which approaches nearer to some curve than assignable distance, but, though infinitely extended, would never meet it. Asymptotes may be straight lines or curves. A rectilinear asymptote may be conceived as a tangent to the curve at an infinite distance.

-- Axis in peritrochio, the wheel and axle, one of the mechanical powers. -- Axis of a curve (Geom.), a straight line which bisects a system of parallel chords of a curve; called a principal axis, when cutting them at right angles, in which case it divides the curve into two symmetrical portions, as in the parabola,…

, sometimes domesticated; the Indian hog. Its upper canine teeth or tusks are large and recurved.

Bent; crooked; curved laterally, esp. with the convex side outward; as, a bandy leg.

longer leg shows the pressure of the atmosphere. -- Wheel barometer, a barometer with recurved tube, and a float, from which a cord passes over a pulley and moves an index.

t. (Man.) (a) To take in too little ground with the fore legs, as a horse. (b) To perform curvets too precipitately or too low. -- To beat the hoof, to walk; to go on foot. -- To beat the wing, to flutter; to move with fluttering agitation. -- To beat time, to measure or regulate time in music by the motion of the h…

The hollow part of a curved or bent timber, the convex part of which is the back. Belly doublet, a doublet of the 16th century, hanging down so as to cover the belly. Shak. -- Belly fretting, the chafing of a horse's belly with a girth. Johnson. -- Belly timber, food. [Ludicrous] Prior. -- Belly worm, a worm that br…

To strain or move out of a straight line; to crook by straining; to make crooked; to curve; to make ready for use by drawing into a curve; as, to bend a bow; to bend the knee.

The state of being curved, crooked, or inclined from a straight line; flexure; curvity; as, the bent of a bow. [Obs.] Wilkins.

Having, or consisting of, two superposed planes, aërocurves, or the like; of or pertaining to a biplane; as, a biplane rudder.

A papilionaceous plant, the Ornithopus, having a curved, cylindrical pod tipped with a short, clawlike point. Bird's-foot trefoil. (Bot.) (a) A genus of plants (Lotus) with clawlike pods. L. corniculatas, with yellow flowers, is very common in Great Britain.

A surgical instrument consisting of a slender knife, either straight or curved, generally used by introducing it beneath the part to be divided, and cutting towards the surface.

A line that touches a curve in two points.

ssile weapon used by the natives of Australia and in some parts of India. It is usually a curved stick of hard wood, from twenty to thirty inches in length, from two to three inches wide, and half or three quarters of an inch thick. When thrown from the hand with a quick rotary motion, it describes very remarkable curv…

A curved handle. Sir W. Scott.

To cause to deviate from straightness; to bend; to inflect; to make crooked or curved. We bow things the contrary way, to make them come to their natural straightness. Milton. The whole nation bowed their necks to the worst kind of tyranny. Prescott.

A vertical curved line connecting two or more words or lines, which are to be taken together; thus, boll, bowl; or, in music, used to connect staves.

A curve, in which a body, starting from a given point, and descending solely by the force of gravity, will reach another given point in a shorter time than it could by any other path. This curve of quickest descent, as it is sometimes called, is, in a vacuum, the same as the cycloid.

One of the portions of a curve that extends outwards to an indefinitely great distance; as, the branches of an hyperbola.