Search the Dictionary

omparative relation with infinity; for whatever is less than infinite is still infinitely distant from infinity; and lower than infinite distance the lowest or least can not sink. H. Brooke.

That part of a line, or of a plane, or of space, which is infinitely distant. In modern geometry, parallel lines or planes are sometimes treated as lines or planes meeting at infinity. Circle at infinity, an imaginary circle at infinity, through which, in geometry of three dimensions, every sphere is imagined to pass.…

interior; as, an inland town. "This wide inland sea." Spenser. From inland regions to the distant main. Cowper.

That which is insinuated; a hint; a suggestion or intimation by distant allusion; as, slander may be conveyed by insinuations. I scorn your coarse insinuation. Cowper.

r this new stimulus, Burn's previous Jacobitism passed towards the opposite, but not very distant, extreme of Jacobinism. J. C. Shairp.

A tribe of Indians distantly related to the Shoshones. They formerly inhabited the region about the head waters of the North Platte.

propelled by sails. -- Land blink, a peculiar atmospheric brightness seen from sea over distant snow-covered land in arctic regions. See Ice blink. -- Land breeze. See under Breeze. -- Land chain. See Gunter's chain. -- Land crab (Zoöl.), any one of various species of crabs which live much on the land, and resort…

's name or influence. Cato, lend me for a while thy patience. Addison. Mountain lines and distant horizons lend space and largeness to his compositions. J. A. Symonds.

ter; -- this is the true level, and is a curve or surface in which all points are equally distant from the center of the earth, or rather would be so if the earth were an exact sphere.

llumining their outlines. The appearance is sometimes due to the reflection of light from distant flashes of lightning by the nearer clouds.

With respect to place; in place; as, to be locally separated or distant.

Occurring or coming after an extended interval; distant in time; far away. The we may us reserve both fresh and strong Against the tournament, which is not long. Spenser.

e surface either of sea or land, or to appear enlarged, or distorted and indistinct, as a distant object, a ship at sea, or a mountain, esp. from atmospheric influences; as, the ship looms large; the land looms high. Awful she looms, the terror of the main. H. J. Pye.

Near, or not very distant from, the equator; as, in the low northern latitudes.

come. His (the pope's) commands, his rebukes, his menaces. Milman. The dark menace of the distant war. Dryden.

Equally distant from the extreme either of a number of things or of one thing; mean; medial; as, the middle house in a row; a middle rank or station in life; flowers of middle summer; men of middle age.

Of middle rank, state, size, or quality; about equally distant from the extremes; medium; moderate; mediocre; ordinary. "A town of but middling size." Hallam. Plainly furnished, as beseemed the middling circumstances of its inhabitants. Hawthorne. -- Mid"dling*ly, adv. -- Mid"dling*ness, n.

Being in the interior country; distant from the coast or seashore; as, midland towns or inhabitants. Howell.

To make a low continued noise, like the hum of bees, a stream of water, distant waves, or the wind in a forest. They murmured as doth a swarm of bees. Chaucer.

Nearsightedness; shortsightedness; a condition of the eye in which the rays from distant object are brought to a focus before they reach the retina, and hence form an indistinct image; while the rays from very near objects are normally converged so as to produce a distinct image. It is corrected by the use of a concave…