Search the Dictionary

An animal of the seal tribe, moving by short feet that serve as paddles.

iece which either is moved by, or moves against, fluid pressure. It usually consists of a short cylinder fitting within a cylindrical vessel along which it moves, back and forth. It is used in steam engines to receive motion from the steam, and in pumps to transmit motion to a fluid; also for other purposes. Piston hea…

. This pithy speech prevailed, and all agreed. Dryden. In all these Goodman Fact was very short, but pithy. Addison. Pithy gall (Zoöl.), a large, rough, furrowed, oblong gall, formed on blackberry canes by a small gallfly (Diastrophus nebulosus).

A fixed pin or short axis, on the end of which a wheel or other body turns.

A broad way in a city; an open space; an area; a court or short part of a street open only at one end. "Hangman boys in the market place." Shak.

In a plain manner; plainly. "To speak short and pleyn." Chaucer. "To tell you plain." Shak.

An extinct genus of marine reptiles allied to Plesiosaurus, but having a much shorter neck.

Fat and short; pudgy.

A short conceit or motto engraved on a ring or other thing; a posy. Bacon.

d or bad points of a man, a horse, a book, a story, etc. He told him, point for point, in short and plain. Chaucer. In point of religion and in point of honor. Bacon. Shalt thou dispute With Him the points of liberty Milton.

Anciently, a kind of battle-ax with a long handle; later, an ax or hatchet with a short handle, and a head variously patterned; -- used by soldiers, and also by sailors in boarding a vessel.

several bellies; -- applied to muscles which are made up of several bellies separated by short tendons.

and related genera, native of America. They are related to the true porcupines, but have shorter spines, and are arboreal in their habits. The Canada porcupine (Erethizon dorsatus) is a well known species. Porcupine ant-eater (Zoöl.), the echidna. -- Porcupine crab (Zoöl.), a large spiny Japanese crab (Acantholithode…

Nearsighted; shortsighted; purblind. [Obs.] Bacon.

sky or blackish above, paler beneath. They are closely allied to the dolphins, but have a shorter snout. Called also harbor porpoise, herring hag, puffing pig, and snuffer.

quare corner in a room separated from the rest of the apartment by wainscoting, forming a short passage to another apartment.

A short homily or commentary on a passage of Scripture; as, the first postils were composed by order of Charlemagne.

eely or wholly. I . . . have poured out my soul before the Lord. 1 Sam. i. 15. Now will I shortly pour out my fury upon thee. Ezek. vii. 8. London doth pour out her citizens ! Shak. Wherefore did Nature pour her bounties forth With such a full and unwithdrawing hand Milton.

idea of. In a dead plain the way seemeth the longer, because the eye hath preconceived it shorter than the truth. Bacon.

eaves (Bot.), such as have an abrupt, ragged, and irregular termination, as if bitten off short.