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A kind of short-barreled pocket pistol, of very large caliber, often carrying a half-ounce ball.

A deserted or forsaken region; a barren tract incapable of supporting population, as the vast sand plains of Asia and Africa are destitute and vegetation. A dreary desert and a gloomy waste. Pope.

Full of design; scheming. [R.] -- De*sign"ful*ness, n. [R.] Barrow.

ob; to pillage; to strip; to divest; -- usually followed by of. The clothed earth is then bare, Despoiled is the summer fair. Gower. A law which restored to them an immense domain of which they had been despoiled. Macaulay. Despoiled of innocence, of faith, of bliss. Milton.

A bar, connected with a switch, longer than the distance between any two consecutive wheels of a train (45 to 50 feet), laid inside a rail and operated by the wheels so that the switch cannot be thrown until all the train is past the switch.

A charge made to students and barristers for incidental repairs of the rooms they occupy. [Eng.]

an (Blackw. Mag.). -- Devil worship, worship of the power of evil; -- still practiced by barbarians who believe that the good and evil forces of nature are of equal power. -- Printer's devil, the youngest apprentice in a printing office, who runs on errands, does dirty work (as washing the ink rollers and sweeping),…

A little devil. [R.] Barham.

A chaffering, barter, or exchange, of small wares; as, to make a dicker. [U.S.] For peddling dicker, not for honest sales. Whittier.

to one leg of the tube. -- Differential windlass, or Chinese windlass, a windlass whose barrel has two parts of different diameters. The hoisting rope winds upon one part as it unwinds from the other, and a pulley sustaining the weight to be lifted hangs in the bight of the rope. It is an ancient example of a differe…

llel bands or fringes of prismatic colors, as by the action of a grating of fine lines or bars. Remarked by Grimaldi (1665), and referred by him to a property of light which he called diffraction. Whewell. Diffraction grating. (Optics) See under Grating. -- Diffraction spectrum. (Optics) See under Spectrum.…

A kind of food, made from the almondlike seeds of the Irvingia Barteri, much used by natives of the west coast of Africa; -- called also dika bread.

o lessen; -- opposed to augment or increase. Not diminish, but rather increase, the debt. Barrow.

Leave to depart; a dismissing. [Obs.] Barrow.

A liquid, as a sauce or gravy, served at table with a ladle or spoon. [Local, U.S.] Bartlett.

Having two poles, as a magnetic bar.

vern; showing the way. Hooker. The precepts directive of our practice in relation to God. Barrow.

To expel from the bar, or the legal profession; to deprive (an attorney, barrister, or counselor) of his status and privileges as such. Abbott.

To disembark. Pope.

Unshod; barefooted; -- in distinction from calced. "The foundation of houses of discalced friars." Cardinal Manning's St. Teresa.