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t recoil; deadbeat. Dead-stroke hammer (Mach.), a power hammer having a spring interposed between the driving mechanism and the hammer head, or helve, to lessen the recoil of the hammer and reduce the shock upon the mechanism.

intermediary in business or any affairs; to manage; to make arrangements; -- followed by between or with. Sometimes he that deals between man and man, raiseth his own credit with both, by pretending greater interest than he hath in either. Bacon.

stion or dispute; as, a debatable question. The Debatable Land or Ground, a tract of land between the Esk and the Sark, claimed by both England and Scotland; the Batable Ground.

ment be; thyself hast decided it. 1 Kings xx. 40. The quarrel toucheth none but us alone; Betwixt ourselves let us decide it then. Shak.

A heap or store. [Obs.] Who . . . hath such trinkets Ready in the deck. Massinger. Between decks. See under Between. -- Deck bridge (Railroad Engineering), a bridge which carries the track upon the upper chords; -- distinguished from a through bridge, which carries the track upon the lower chords, between the girders.…

The arc of the horizon, contained between the vertical plane and the prime vertical circle, if reckoned from the east or west, or between the meridian and the plane, reckoned from the north or south.

To injure; to damage. "None can my life defect." [R.] Troubles of Q. Elizabeth (1639).

To furnish with defenses; to fortify. [Obs.] [Written also defence.] Better manned and more strongly defensed. Hales.

ense, as in fencing, boxing, etc. A man of great defense. Spenser. By how much defense is better than no skill. Shak.

rge in which troops can march only in a file, or with a narrow front; a long, narrow pass between hills, rocks, etc.

icacy, or value; degeneration; deterioration. The development and degradation of the alphabetic forms can be traced. I. Taylor (The Alphabet).

The mistress of Samson, who betrayed him (Judges xvi.); hence, a harlot; a temptress. Other Delilahs on a smaller scale Burns met with during his Dumfries sojourn. J. C. Shairp.

A work constructed beyond the main ditch of a fortress, and in front of the curtain between two bastions, intended to defend the curtain; a ravelin. See Ravelin.

A half wolf; a mongrel dog, between a dog and a wolf.

A spirit, or immaterial being, holding a middle place between men and deities in pagan mythology. The demon kind is of an inSydenham.

Of or pertaining to the people; popular; common. Demotic alphabet or character, a form of writing used in Egypt after six or seven centuries before Christ, for books, deeds, and other such writings; a simplified form of the hieratic character; -- called also epistolographic character, and enchorial character. See Encho…

decree denationalizes, as he calls it, all ships that have touched at a British port. Cobbett. An expatriated, denationalized race. G. Eliot.

gn or name of; to indicate; to point out; as, the hands of the clock denote the hour. The better to denote her to the doctor. Shak.

Having a form intermediate between dentate and sinuate.

To make bad or worse; to vitiate; to corrupt. Whose pride depraves each other better part. Spenser.