Search the Dictionary

The law that the force exerted between two electric or magnetic charges is directly proportional to the product of the charges and inversely to the square of the distance between them.

To take a counter proof of, or a copy in reverse, by taking an impression directly from the face of an original. See Counter proof, under Counter.

To burn; to reduce to ashes by the action of fire, either directly or in an oven or retort; to incremate or incinerate; as, to cremate a corpse, instead of burying it.

The reading of the lines of a newspaper directly across the page, instead of down the columns, thus producing a ludicrous combination of ideas.

To reach its highest point of altitude; to come to the meridian; to be vertical or directly overhead. As when his beams at noon Culminate from the equator. Milton.

A thin layer of peculiar contractile tissue directly beneath the skin of the scrotum.

g motion or power; as, the dead spindle of a lathe, etc. See Spindle. Dead ahead (Naut.), directly ahead; -- said of a ship or any object, esp. of the wind when blowing from that point toward which a vessel would go. -- Dead angle (Mil.), an angle or space which can not be seen or defended from behind the parapet. --…

Direct; proving directly; -- applied to reasoning, and opposed to elenchtic or refutative.

In a manner to show or point out; directly; absolutely; definitely. When Christ spake it deictically. Hammond.

Deltoid muscle (Anat.), a triangular muscle in the shoulder which serves to move the arm directly upward.

Government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is retained and directly exercised by the people.

A human being possessed by a demon or evil spirit; one whose faculties are directly controlled by a demon. The demoniac in the gospel was sometimes cast into the fire. Bates.

ification of the circulation found in some parts of the body, in which the arteries empty directly into the veins without the interposition of capillaries. Flint. -- De*riv"a*tive*ly, adv. -- De*riv"a*tive*ness, n.

As remote as possible, as if at the opposite end of a diameter; directly adverse.

In a diametrical manner; directly; as, diametrically opposite. Whose principles were diametrically opposed to his. Macaulay.

red crystalline nitrogenous substance or artificial production, which by reduction passes directly to indigo.

termining the units of other physical quantities. Thus, since the unit of velocity varies directly as the unit of length and inversely as the unit of time, the dimensions of velocity are said to be length ÷ time; the dimensions of work are mass × (length)2 ÷ (time)2; the dimensions of density are mass ÷ (length)3. Dime…

orking condition by a single process from the ore. Knight. -- Direct tax, a tax assessed directly on lands, etc., and polls, distinguished from taxes on merchandise, or customs, and from excise.

Acting directly, as one part upon another, without the intervention of other working parts. Direct-acting steam engine, one in which motion is transmitted to the crank without the intervention of a beam or lever; -- also called direct-action steam engine. -- Direct-acting steam pump, one in which the steam piston rod…

Drawn directly from the barrel, or other receptacle, in distinction from bottled; on draught; -- said of ale, cider, and the like.