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eneral. The moment had arrived when it was thought that the mask and the cothurn might be assumed with effect. Motley.

One who assumes a false appearance or semblance; one who makes false pretenses. Counterfeiters of devotion. Sherwood.

, as distinguished from right; as, a title given one by courtesy. Courtesy title, a title assumed by a person, or popularly conceded to him, to which he has no valid claim; as, the courtesy title of Lord prefixed to the names of the younger sons of noblemen.

To form or become covered with cream; to become thick like cream; to assume the appearance of cream; hence, to grow stiff or formal; to mantle. There are a sort of men whose visages Do cream and mantle like a standing pool. Shak.

The regular form which a substance tends to assume in solidifying, through the inherent power of cohesive attraction. It is bounded by plane surfaces, symmetrically arranged, and each species of crystal has fixed axial ratios. See Crystallization.

The act or process by which a substance in solidifying assumes the form and sructure of a crystal, or becomes crystallized.

To cause to form crystals, or to assume the crystalline form.

A form assumed by Protozoa inwhich they become saclike and quiescent. It generally precedes the production of germs. See Encystment.

Bacon. And let us not be dainty of leave taking, But shift away. Shak. To make dainty, to assume or affect delicacy or fastidiousness. [Obs.] Ah ha, my mistresses! which of you all Will now deny to dance She that makes dainty, She, I'll swear, hath corns. Shak.

The quantities or relations which are assumed to be given in any problem. Datum line (Surv.), the horizontal or base line, from which the heights of points are reckoned or measured, as in the plan of a railway, etc.

hed. Equal decrement of life. (a) The decrease of life in a group of persons in which the assumed law of mortality is such that of a given large number of persons, all being now of the same age, an equal number shall die each consecutive year. (b) The decrease of life in a group of persons in which the assumed law of m…

An attitude assumed in lying down; as, the dorsal decubitus.

A course of reasoning showing that a certain result is a necessary consequence of assumed premises; -- these premises being definitions, axioms, and previously established propositions. Direct, or Positive, demonstration (Logic & Math.), one in which the correct conclusion is the immediate sequence of reasoning from ax…

Money lodged with a party as earnest or security for the performance of a duty assumed by the person depositing.

The tendency of organs (as roots) of plants to assume a position oblique or transverse to a direction towards the center of the earth.

then was differentiated into the two forms then and than. Earle. Two or more of the forms assumed by the same original word become differentiated in signification. Dr. Murray.

The supposed act or tendency in being of every kind, whether organic or inorganic, to assume or produce a more complex structure or functions.

hickness; a solid. -- Space of four dimensions, as imaginary kind of extension, which is assumed to have length, breadth, thickness, and also a fourth imaginary dimension. Space of five or six, or more dimensions is also sometimes assumed in mathematics.

Artificial language or manner assumed for deception; false appearance; counterfeit semblance or show. That eye which glances through all disguises. D. Webster.

e that hateth dissembleth with his lips. Prov. xxvi. 24. He [an enemy] dissembles when he assumes an air of friendship. C. J. Smith.