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l feathers are usually decidedly longer than the rest. Called also boatswain, and marline-spike bird. The name is also applied to the skua, or Arctic gull (Megalestris skua).

A slender, nearly leafless, American herb (Polygonum articulatum), with jointed spikes of small flowers.

-Jovis. -- Jupiter's staff (Bot.), the common mullein; -- so called from its long, rigid spike of yellow blossoms.

ra), common in the south of Europe. It yields and oil used in medicine and perfumery. The Spike lavender (L. Spica) yields a coarser oil (oil of spike), used in the arts.

genus of labiate plants (Leonurus); -- so called from a fancied resemblance of its flower spikes to the tuft of a lion's tail. L. Cardiaca is the common motherwort.

(S. cernuus), growing in marshes, and having white flowers crowded in a slender terminal spike, somewhat resembling in form a lizard's tail; whence the name. Gray.

The spikelet or flower cluster of grasses. Gray.

A heavy staff or club of metal; a spiked club; -- used as weapon in war before the general use of firearms, especially in the Middle Ages, for breaking metal armor. Chaucer. Death with his mace petrific . . . smote. Milton.

a rope, with marline, marking a pecular hitch at each turn to prevent unwinding. Marling spike. (Naut.) See under Marline.

for winding around ropes and cables, to prevent their being weakened by fretting. Marline spike, Marling spike (Naut.), an iron tool tapering to a point, used to separate the strands of a rope in splicing and in marling. It has an eye in the thick end to which a lanyard is attached. See Fid. [Written also marlin spike]…

A weapon consisting of a heavy ball set with spikes, either attached to a staff or suspended from one by a chain. -- Morning watch (Naut.), the watch between four A. M. and eight A. M..

the genus Verbascum. They are tall herbs having coarse leaves, and large flowers in dense spikes. The common species, with densely woolly leaves, is Verbascum Thapsus. Moth mullein. See under Moth. -- Mullein foxglove, an American herb (Seymeria macrophylla) with coarse leaves and yellow tubular flowers with a spreadi…

To spike, as a cannon. [Obs.] Crabb. To nail a lie or an assertion, etc., to detect and expose it, so as to put a stop to its currency; -- an expression probably derived from the former practice of shopkeepers, who were accustomed to nail bad or counterfeit pieces of money to the counter.

An ointment prepared partly from this plant. See Spikenard.

ect. Nit grass (Bot.), a pretty annual European grass (Gastridium lendigerum), with small spikelets somewhat resembling a nit. It is also found in California and Chili.

A cant hook having the end of its lever armed with a spike.

, an East Indian woody climber (Piper nigrum), with ovate leaves and apetalous flowers in spikes opposite the leaves. The berries are red when ripe. Also, by extension, any one of the several hundred species of the genus Piper, widely dispersed throughout the tropical and subtropical regions of the earth.…

A pike or spike; the sharp point fixed in the center of a buckler. [Obs.] "Take down my buckler . . . and grind the pick on 't." Beau. & Fl.

A pointed head or spike; esp., one in the center of a shield or target. Beau. & Fl.

A staff with a spike in the lower end, to guard against slipping. Sir W. Scott.