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To engage and attach; to please; to charm. The soothing arts that catch the fair. Dryden.

An invitation to engage in a contest or controversy of any kind; a defiance; specifically, a summons to fight a duel; also, the letter or message conveying the summons. A challenge to controversy. Goldsmith.

One who engages in any contest; esp. one who in ancient times contended in single combat in behalf of another's honor or rights; or one who acts or speaks in behalf of a person or a cause; a defender; an advocate; a hero. A stouter champion never handled sword. Shak. Champions of law and liberty. Fisher Ames.…

like flowers. Wordsworth. Sisters of Charity (R. C. Ch.), a sisterhood of religious women engaged in works of mercy, esp. in nursing the sick; -- a popular designation. There are various orders of the Sisters of Charity.

One who is engaged in chromolithography.

or the safe transmission of secrets; also, a writing in such characters. His father . . . engaged him when he was very young to write all his letters to England in cipher. Bp. Burnet. Cipher key, a key to assist in reading writings in cipher.

or To clear for action (Naut.), to remove incumbrances from the decks, and prepare for an engagement. -- To clear the land (Naut.), to gain such a distance from shore as to have sea room, and be out of danger from the land. -- To clear hawse (Naut.), to disentangle the cables when twisted. -- To clear up, to explain…

point of a cogwell tooth and the bottom of a space between teeth of a wheel with which it engages. Clearance space (Steam engine), the space inclosed in one end of the cylinder, between the valve or valves and the piston, at the beginning of a stroke; waste room. It includes the space caused by the piston's clearance a…

rs with loopholes, formerly erected on the deck of a vessel to shelter the men in a close engagement with an enemy's boarders; -- called also close quarters. [Obs.]

which is used for coupling shafting, etc., so as to transmit motion, and which may be disengaged at pleasure.

A vessel employed in sailing along a coast, or engaged in the coasting trade.

That part of a war vessel appropriated to the wounded during an engagement.

To engage in continuous thought; to think. He that calleth a thing into his mind, whether by impression or recordation, cogitateth and considereth, and he that employeth the faculty of his fancy also cogitateth. Bacon.

-- To slip the collar, to get free; to disentangle one's self from difficulty, labor, or engagement. Spenser.

A collection, body, or society of persons engaged in common pursuits, or having common duties and interests, and sometimes, by charter, peculiar rights and privileges; as, a college of heralds; a college of electors; a college of bishops. The college of the cardinals. Shak. Then they made colleges of sufferers; persons…

One engaged in the business of digging mineral coal or making charcoal, or in transporting or dealing in coal.

An engagement of no great magnitude; or one in which the parties engaged are not armies. Single combat, one in which a single combatant meets a single opponent, as in the case of David and Goliath; also a duel.

One who engages in combat. "The mighty combatants." Milton. A controversy which long survived the original combatants. Macaulay

g; the act of exposing, endangering, or compromising; also, the state of being pledged or engaged. Hamilton.

us contest; rivalry, as for approbation, for a prize, or as where two or more persons are engaged in the same business and each seeking patronage; -- followed by for before the object sought, and with before the person or thing competed with. Competition to the crown there is none, nor can be. Bacon. A portrait, with w…