Search the Dictionary

Tread; step; especially, measured tread. Hark, I hear the footing of a man. Shak.

Food of any kind for animals, especially for horses and cattle, as grass, pasture, hay, corn, oats. Dryden. Forage cap. See under Cap. -- Forage master (Mil.), a person charged with providing forage and the means of transporting it. Farrow.

degree of strength or energy; capacity of exercising an influence or producing an effect; especially, power to persuade, or convince, or impose obligation; pertinency; validity; special signification; as, the force of an appeal, an argument, a contract, or a term. He was, in the full force of the words, a good man. Mac…

n upon, bodies which it would be inconvenient or impracticable to seize with the fingers, especially one for delicate operations, as those of watchmakers, surgeons, accoucheurs, dentists, etc.

To go before; to precede; -- used especially in the present and past participles. Pleasing remembrance of a thought foregone. Wordsworth. For which the very mother's face forewent The mother's special patience. Mrs. Browning. Foregone conclusion, one which has preceded argument or examination; one predetermined.…

To shoot ahead, especially when going in stays. R. H. Dana, Jr.

of game, preservation of timber, etc., in forests. -- Forest tree, a tree of the forest, especially a timber tree, as distinguished from a fruit tree.

A place or establishment where iron or other metals are wrought by heating and hammering; especially, a furnace, or a shop with its furnace, etc., where iron is heated and wrought; a smithy. In the quick forge and working house of thought. Shak.

Especially: One guilty of forgery; one who makes or issues a counterfeit document.

in fact; certainly; very well; -- formerly used as an expression of deference or respect, especially to woman; now used ironically or contemptuously. A fit man, forsooth, to govern a realm! Hayward. Our old English word forsooth has been changed for the French madam. Guardian.

That which fortifies; especially, a work or works erected to defend a place against attack; a fortified place; a fortress; a fort; a castle. Fortification agate, Scotch pebble.

hich comes as the result of an undertaking or of a course of action; good or ill success; especially, favorable issue; happy event; success; prosperity as reached partly by chance and partly by effort. Our equal crimes shall equal fortune give. Dryden. There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which, taken at the flood, l…

and the ends of the branches terminating abruptly as if cut off; -- said of an ordinary, especially of a cross.

The act of breaking, or state of being broken, especially by violence. [Obs.] Neither can the natural body of Christ be subject to any fraction or breaking up. Foxe.

A term applied, especially in England, to certain machines built upon or within framework; as, a stocking frame; lace frame; spinning frame, etc.

The lines of the spectrun; especially and properly, the dark lines of the solar spectrum, so called because first accurately observed and interpreted by Fraunhofer, a German physicist.

Peace; -- a word used in composition, especially in proper names; as, Alfred; Frederic.

That with which anything in fraught or laden for transportation; lading; cargo, especially of a ship, or a car on a railroad, etc.; as, a freight of cotton; a full freight.

novice; one in the rudiments of knowledge; especially, a student during his fist year in a college or university. He drank his glass and cracked his joke, And freshmen wondered as he spoke. Goldsmith. Freshman class, the lowest of the four classes in an American college. [ U. S.]

A brother or member of any religious order, but especially of one of the four mendicant orders, viz: (a) Minors, Gray Friars, or Franciscans. (b) Augustines. (c) Dominicans or Black Friars. (d) White Friars or Carmelites. See these names in the Vocabulary.