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A skilled worker; an artisan; esp., one who operates a machine in a mill or manufactory.

One who, or that which, operates or produces an effect.

A machine for use in making topographical maps. It is operated by being pushed across country, and not only records distances, like the perambulator, but also elevations.

A filtering machine operated by air pressure.

To treat with physic or medicine; to administer medicine to, esp. a cathartic; to operate on as a cathartic; to purge.

A small hand-operated valve to admit liquid to operate a valve difficult to turn by hand.

e in any manner; especially, to move regularly with alternate or reciprocating motion; to operate; to act; as, the fountain plays. The heart beats, the blood circulates, the lungs play. Cheyne.

nterests, of which courts do not take judicial notice; -- opposed to a general law, which operates on the whole community. -- Private nuisance or wrong. See Nuisance. -- Private soldier. See Private, n., 5. -- Private way, a right of private passage over another man's ground. Kent.

To have application or effect; to operate. This rule only proceeds and takes place when a person can not of common law condemn another by his sentence. Ayliffe.

To move or operate by the motion of drawing towards one; as, to pull a bell; to pull an oar.

To operate on as, or by means of, a cathartic medicine, or in a similar manner.

fecting what is past; retrospective. Beddoes. Retroactive law or statute (Law), one which operates to make criminal or punishable, or in any way expressly to affect, acts done prior to the passing of the law.

To operate upon by ricochet firing. See Ricochet, n. [R.]

violence; as, a horse runs away with a carriage. -- To run down. (a) To cease to work or operate on account of the exhaustion of the motive power; -- said of clocks, watches, etc. (b) To decline in condition; as, to run down in health. -- To run down a coast, to sail along it. -- To run for an office, to stand as a…

o make a small, quick profit by slight fluctuations of the market; -- said of brokers who operate in this way on their own account. [Cant]

A mechanism (usually one operated by electricity, compressed air, a spring, or an explosive gas), attached to an internal- combustion engine, as on an automobile, and used as a means of starting the engine without cranking it by hand.

One who manages or operates a semaphore.

To work; to operate; as, to serve the guns.

That which is sewed with the needle. Sewing horse (Harness making), a clamp, operated by the foot, for holding pieces of leather while being sewed. -- Sewing machine, a machine for sewing or stitching. -- Sewing press, or Sewing table (Bookbinding), a fixture or table having a frame in which are held the cords to whi…

of some toads, -- used in burrowing. -- Steam shovel, a machine with a scoop or scoops, operated by a steam engine, for excavating earth, as in making railway cuttings.