Search the Dictionary

rrow. Rise from the ground like feathered Mercury. Shak. Nonsense feathered with soft and delicate phrases and pointed with pathetic accent. Dr. J. Scott.

stance by rolling and pressure, with lees or size, without spinning or weaving. It were a delicate stratagem to shoe A troop of horse with felt. Shak .

One of the delicate, threadlike portions of which the tissues of plants and animals are in part constituted; as, the fiber of flax or of muscle.

gold and silver to which the wire is soldered, being arranged in designs frequently of a delicate and intricate arabesque pattern.

Nice; delicate; subtle; exquisite; artful; skillful; dexterous. The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine! Pope. The nicest and most delicate touches of satire consist in fine raillery. Dryden. He has as fine a hand at picking a pocket as a woman. T. Gray.

To execute, as any delicate work.

Delicate work made with the fingers. Spenser.

A variety of aragonite, occuring in delicate white coralloidal forms; -- common in beds of iron ore.

h it would be inconvenient or impracticable to seize with the fingers, especially one for delicate operations, as those of watchmakers, surgeons, accoucheurs, dentists, etc.

Easily broken; brittle; frail; delicate; easily destroyed. The state of ivy is tough, and not fragile. Bacon.

f the ash (Fraxinus) and along with esculin in the bark of the horse-chestnut. It shows a delicate fluorescence in alkaline solutions; -- called also paviin.

The figurework, often fantastic and delicate, which moisture sometimes forms in freezing, as upon a window pane or a flagstone.

To make hot; to flush. [Poetic] Fans, whose wind did seem To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool. Shak.

One of numerous species of slender and delicate fossils, of the genus Graptolites and allied genera, found in the Silurian rocks. They belong to an extinct group (Graptolithina) supposed to be hydroids.

In a gross or indelicate manner. [Obs.] You talk greasily; your lips grow foul. Shak.

Gross; indelicate; indecent. [Obs.] Marston.

Coarse; rough; not fine or delicate.

A form of the above apparatus, invented by M. Foucault, mounted so delicately as to render visible the rotation of the earth, through the tendency of the rotating wheel to preserve a constant plane of rotation, independently of the earth's motion.

An instrument devised originally for measuring the diameter of the sun; now employed for delicate measurements of the distance and relative direction of two stars too far apart to be easily measured in the field of view of an ordinary telescope.

Resembling glass; vitriform; transparent; hyaline; as, the hyaloid membrane, a very delicate membrane inclosing the vitreous humor of the eye.