Search the Dictionary

A device or contrivance which serves to couple or connect adjacent parts or objects; as, a belt coupling, which connects the ends of a belt; a car coupling, which connects the cars in a train; a shaft coupling, which connects the ends of shafts. Box coupling, Chain coupling. See under Box, Chain. -- Coupling box, a co…

oses; artifice; guile; skill or dexterity employed to effect purposes by deceit or shrewd devices. You have that crooked wisdom which is called craft. Hobbes. The chief priets and the scribes sought how they might take him by craft, and put him to death. Mark xiv. 1.

A device, usually of iron bent at the ends, used to hold together blocks of stone, timbers, etc.; a cramp iron.

A spurlike device strapped to the boot, which enables one to climb a tree or pole; -- called often telegraph creepers.

or frame over which the upper of a boot or shoe is stretched to the required shape. (b) A device for giving hair a wavy apperance. (c) A machine for crimping or ruffling textile fabrics.

An artifice; trick; tricky device; subterfuge. For all yuor brags, hooks, and crooks. Cranmer.

An appendage or ornament or anything in the form of a cross; a badge or ornamental device of the general shape of a cross; hence, such an ornament, even when varying considerably from that form; thus, the Cross of the British Order of St. George and St. Michael consist of a central medallion with seven arms radiating f…

Any device for stopping or changing a current, as of grain or water in a spout.

Any device for detecting the presence of electric waves. The influence of electric waves on the resistance of a particular kind of electric circuit, on the magnetization of steel, on the polarization of an electrolytic cell, or on the electric condition of a vacuum has been applied in the various cymoscopes.…

That with which one dabs; hence, a pad or other device used by printers, engravers, etc., as for dabbing type or engraved plates with ink.

other, or causes him to believe what is false; a contrivance to entrap; deception; a wily device; fraud. Making the ephah small and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit. Amos viii. 5. Friendly to man, far from deceit or guile. Milton. Yet still we hug the dear deceit. N. Cotton.

A device for restoring a coherer to its normal condition after it has been affected by an electric wave, a process usually accomplished by some method of tapping or shaking, or by rotation of the coherer.

To deprive of some right, interest, or property, by a deceitful device; to withhold from wrongfully; to injure by embezzlement; to cheat; to overreach; as, to defraud a servant, or a creditor, or the state; -- with of before the thing taken or withheld. We have defrauded no man. 2 Cor. vii. 2. Churches seem injured and…

Device. See Device. [Obs.]

A telephonic instrument for office or other similar use, having a sound-magnifying device enabling the ordinary mouthpiece to be dispensed with. Much use has been made of it for overhearing, or for recording, conversations for the purpose of obtaining evidence for use in litigation.

of a pair) so cut or shaped as to give a certain desired form to, or impress any desired device on, an object or surface, by pressure or by a blow; used in forging metals, coining, striking up sheet metal, etc.

To evade a duty by low craft; to practice mean shifts; to use tricky devices; to play fast and loose; to quibble. Some dodging casuist with more craft than sincerity. Milton.

One who dodges or evades; one who plays fast and loose, or uses tricky devices. Smart.

A dynamometer to which is attached a device for automatically registering muscular power.

g of birds, is commonly used as an heraldic emblem, and also for standards and emblematic devices. See Bald eagle, Harpy, and Golden eagle.