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tuning fork, arranged to make and break a circuit at rapidly recurring intervals, by the action of the current itself.

The plot or romance; a complicated scheme of designs, actions, and events. Pope.

pposed to extrinsic; as, the intrinsic value of gold or silver; the intrinsic merit of an action; the intrinsic worth or goodness of a person. He was better qualified than they to estimate justly the intrinsic value of Grecian philosophy and refinement. I. Taylor.

o enlarge or expand with heat; to swell; specifically, to swell up or bubble up under the action of heat, as before the blowpipe. In a higher heat, it intumesces, and melts into a yellowish black mass. Kirwan.

te of being swollen; expansion; tumidity; especially, the swelling up of bodies under the action of heat. The intumescence of nations. Johnson.

The act or process by which cane sugar (sucrose), under the action of heat and acids or ferments (as diastase), is broken or split up into grape sugar (dextrose), and fruit sugar (levulose); also, less properly, the process by which starch is converted into grape sugar (dextrose).

An adjustable diaphragm, suggesting the iris of the eye in its action, for regulating the aperture of a lens, consisting of a number of thin pieces fastened to a ring. It is used in cameras and microscopes.

Endowed with irritability; susceptible of irritation; capable of being excited to action by the application of certain stimuli.

-- Pure irritant (Toxicology), a poison that produces inflammation without any corrosive action upon the tissues.

To increase the action or violence of; to heighten excitement in; to intensify; to stimulate. Cold maketh the spirits vigorous and irritateth them. Bacon.

The act of exciting, or the condition of being excited to action, by stimulation; -- as, the condition of an organ of sense, when its nerve is affected by some external body; esp., the act of exciting muscle fibers to contraction, by artificial stimulation; as, the irritation of a motor nerve by electricity; also, the…

Accompanied with, or produced by, increased action or irritation; as, an irritative fever. E. Darwin.

designating, an acid, HO.C2H4.SO3H, obtained as an oily or crystalline substance, by the action of sulphur trioxide on alcohol or ether. It is derivative of sulphuric acid.

r weights, and the same ultimate constitution), are yet physically different, as in their action on polarized light, as dextro- and lævo-tartaric acids. In such compounds there is usually at least one unsymmetrical carbon atom. See Unsymmetrical.

wer animals, as the horse and ox. -- Sugar baker's itch, a variety of eczema, due to the action of sugar upon the skin. -- Washerwoman's itch, eczema of the hands and arms, occurring among washerwomen.

nd in jaborandi leaves, from which it is extracted as a white amorphous substance. In its action it resembles atropine.

In the harpsichord, an intermediate piece communicating the action of the key to the quill; -- called also hopper.

Fig.: Anything resembling the jaw of an animal in form or action; esp., pl., the mouth or way of entrance; as, the jaws of a pass; the jaws of darkness; the jaws of death. Shak.

A deed; an action; a gest. [Obs.] The jests or actions of princes. Sir T. Elyot.

ng. (b) (Metal Working) A machine with a rotary milling cutter and a templet by which the action of the cutter is guided or limited; -- used for forming the profile of an irregularly shaped piece; a profiling machine.