Search the Dictionary

A swelling on the back part of the hind leg of a horse, just behind the lowest part of the hock joint, generally causing lameness. James Law. Curb bit, a stiff bit having branches by which a leverage is obtained upon the jaws of horse. Knight. -- Curb pins (Horology), the pins on the regulator which restrain the hairs…

A flag; an ensign; -- in contempt. [Obs.] Shak. Behind the curtain, in concealment; in secret. -- Curtain lecture, a querulous lecture given by a wife to her husband within the bed curtains, or in bed. Jerrold. A curtain lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the virtues of patience and long-suffer…

shut up; to stop up; to close; to restrain. The strait pass was dammed With dead men hurt behind, and cowards. Shak. To dam out, to keep out by means of a dam.

would go. -- Dead angle (Mil.), an angle or space which can not be seen or defended from behind the parapet. -- Dead block, either of two wooden or iron blocks intended to serve instead of buffers at the end of a freight car. -- Dead calm (Naut.), no wind at all. -- Dead center, or Dead point (Mach.), either of two…

A seat behind a carriage, for a servant.

To outstrip by as much as a distance (see Distance, n., 3); to leave far behind; to surpass greatly. He distanced the most skillful of his contemporaries. Milner.

plicity. Now cometh the sin of double-tongue, such as speak fair before folk and wickedly behind. Chaucer.

A coat with skirts behind only, as distinct from the frock coat, of which the skirts surround the body. It is worn on occasions of ceremony. The dress coat of officers of the United States army is a full-skirted frock coat.

drops seventeen yards. To drop astern (Naut.), to go astern of another vessel; to be left behind; to slacken the speed of a vessel so as to fall behind and to let another pass a head. -- To drop down (Naut.), to sail, row, or move down a river, or toward the sea. -- To drop off, to fall asleep gently; also, to die. […

h; the effective men in a regiment. They are not effective of anything, nor leave no work behind them. Bacon. Whosoever is an effective, real cause of doing his heighbor wrong, is criminal. Jer. Taylor.

led; to issue and appear; as, to emerge from the water or the ocean; the sun emerges from behind the moon in an eclipse; to emerge from poverty or obscurity. "Thetis . . . emerging from the deep." Dryden. Those who have emerged from very low, some from the lowest, classes of society. Burke.

n; as, the emersion of the moon from the shadow of the earth; the emersion of a star from behind the moon.

or fort; to place or hide securely; to conceal. She shall not see me: I will ensconce me behind the arras. Shak.

The segment of the brain next behind the midbrain, including the cerebellum and pons; the hindbrain. Sometimes abbreviated to epen.

In insects: The lateral piece behind the episternum. [Written also epimerum.]

A stub, like soft horn, about the size of a chestnut, situated behind and below the pastern joint.

re from danger; -- often followed by from or out of. Haste, for thy life escape, nor look behindKeble.

The depression behind the beak of certain bivalves; the ligamental area. Escutcheon of pretense, an escutcheon used in English heraldry to display the arms of the bearer's wife; -- not commonly used unless she an heiress. Cf. Impalement.

To make thin or slender; to draw out so as to lessen the thickness. His body behind the head becomes broad, from whence it is again extenuated all the way to the tail. Grew.

One of the small sesamoid bones situated behind the condyles of the femur, in some mammals.