Search the Dictionary

To strike with a quick, light blow; to tap. If any man happened by long sitting to sleep . . . he was suddenly bobbed on the face by the servants. Elyot.

destroy the continuity of; to dissolve or terminate; as, to break silence; to break one's sleep; to break one's journey. Go, release them, Ariel; My charms I'll break, their senses I'll restore. Shak.

To sleep on the same bed without undressing; -- applied to the custom of a man and woman, especially lovers, thus sleeping. Bartlett. Van Corlear stopped occasionally in the villages to eat pumpkin pies, dance at country frolics, and bundle with the Yankee lasses. W. Irving.

To rouse from sleep; to awaken. If thou canst awake by four o' the clock. I prithee call me. Sleep hath seized me wholly. Shak. To call a bond, to give notice that the amount of the bond will be paid. -- To call a party (Law), to cry aloud his name in open court, and command him to come in and perform some duty requir…

or other power upon rails laid in the streets. [U. S.] -- Palace car, Drawing- room car, Sleeping car, Parior caretc. , (Railroad), cars especially designed and furnished for the comfort of travelers.

; concern; solicitude. Care keeps his wath in every old man's eye, And where care lodges, sleep will never lie. Shak.

Free from care or anxiety. hence, cheerful; light-hearted. Spenser. Sleep she as sound as careless infancy. Shak.

d. -- Cat hook (Naut.), a strong hook attached to a cat block. -- Cat nap, a very short sleep. [Colloq.] -- Cat o' nine tails, an instrument of punishment consisting of nine pieces of knotted line or cord fastened to a handle; -- formerly used to flog offenders on the bare back. -- Cat's cradle, game played, esp. by…

An iron blok used on railways to support the rails and secure them to the sleepers. Chair days, days of repose and age. -- To put into the chair, to elect as president, or as chairman of a meeting. Macaulay. -- To take the chair, to assume the position of president, or of chairman of a meeting.

A retired room, esp. an upper room used for sleeping; a bedroom; as, the house had four chambers.

rate, a white crystalline substance, obtained by treating chloral with water. It produces sleep when taken internally or hypodermically; -- called also chloral.

A compound of chloral and formic amide used to produce sleep.

A first-class passenger car, as distinguished from a drawing- room car, sleeping car, etc. It is sometimes loosely applied to any passenger car.

Relating to, or resembling, coma; drowsy; lethargic; as, comatose sleep; comatose fever.

To force to yield; to overpower; to subjugate. Easy sleep their weary limbs compelled. Dryden. I compel all creatures to my will. Tennyson.

Curiously contrived or designed; fanciful. [Obs.] A conceited chair to sleep in. Evelyn.

The act of sleeping, or of lulling, to sleep. [Obs.] Pope.

Lulled to sleep. [Obs.] Dr. H. More.

A kind of frenzy in which the patient is tormented by fantastic visions and want of sleep. Dunglison.

A sleeping place of limited size; a little bed; a cradle; a piece of canvas extended by a frame, used as a bed. [Written also cott.]