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ed with reference to manner; or derly progress; procedure in a certain line of thought or action; as, the course of an argument. The course of true love never did run smooth. Shak.

or the administration of justice; an official assembly, legally met together for the transaction of judicial business; a judge or judges sitting for the hearing or trial of causes.

A form of action for the violation of a promise or contract under seal.

A contraction of cousin. Shak.

A spasmodic and painful involuntary contraction of a muscle or muscles, as of the leg. The cramp, divers nights, gripeth him in his legs. Sir T. More. Cramp bone, the patella of a sheep; -- formerly used as a charm for the cramp. Halliwell. "He could turn cramp bones into chess men." Dickens. -- Cramp ring, a ring for…

A contraction of two vowels (as the final and initial vowels of united words) into one long vowel, or into a dipthong; synæresis; as, cogo for coago.

losely related to creatin but more basic in its properties, formed from the latter by the action of acids, and occurring naturally in muscle tissue and in urine. [Written also kretinine.]

; when addressed to several different correspondents, or when the money can be drawn in fractional sums in several different places, it is called a circular letter of credit. -- Public credit. (a) The reputation of, or general confidence in, the ability or readiness of a government to fulfull its pecuniary engagements…

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.

Having the characteristics of a cretin. "Cretinous stupefaction." Ruskin.

ight of the subject . . . were in some cases liable to criminal process. Hallam. Criminal action (Law), an action or suit instituted to secure conviction and punishment for a crime. -- Criminal conversation (Law), unlawful intercourse with a married woman; adultery; -- usually abbreviated, crim. con. -- Criminal law,…

The point of time when it is to be decided whether any affair or course of action must go on, or be modified or terminate; the decisive moment; the turning point. This hour's the very crisis of your fate. Dryden. The very times of crisis for the fate of the country. Brougham.

A very slight convulsive or spasmodic contraction of certain muscles, external or internal. Few men can look down from a great height without creepings and crispations. O. W. Holmes.

Not parallel; lying or falling athwart; transverse; oblique; intersecting. The cross refraction of the second prism. Sir I. Newton.

A bar connecting the ends of the side rods or levers of a backaction or side-lever engine.

g the gun expands to a cross with a quarter ball at the end of each arm; -- used in naval actions for cutting the enemy's rigging.

An instrument of a hooked form, used in certain cases in the extraction of a fetus. Dunglison.

lary. -- Crown work. See in the Vocabulary. -- Pleas of the crown (Engl. law), criminal actions.

A word or phrase caught up by a party or faction and repeated for effect; as, the party cry of the Tories. All now depends upon a good cry. Beaconsfield.

ch a substance tends to assume in solidifying, through the inherent power of cohesive attraction. It is bounded by plane surfaces, symmetrically arranged, and each species of crystal has fixed axial ratios. See Crystallization.