Search the Dictionary

e vehicle in which, or means by which, anything is carried from one place to another; as, stagecoaches, omnibuses, etc., are conveyances; a canal or aqueduct is a conveyance for water. There pipes and these conveyances of our blood. Shak.

A buskin anciently used by tragic actors on the stage; hence, tragedy in general. The moment had arrived when it was thought that the mask and the cothurn might be assumed with effect. Motley.

One of the side scenes of the stage in a theater, or the space included between the side scenes.

s consequences; hence, of doubtful issue; attended with risk; dangerous; as, the critical stage of a fever; a critical situation. Our circumstances are indeed critical. Burke. The small moment, the exact point, the critical minute, on which every good work so much depends. South. Critical angle (Optics), that angle of…

d a bed or at a window; in theaters, and like places, a movable screen for concealing the stage.

es. -- To cut a play (Drama), to shorten it by leaving out passages, to adapt it for the stage. -- To cut rates (Railroads, etc.), to reduce the charges for transportation below the rates established between competing lines. -- To cut short, to arrest or check abruptly; to bring to a sudden termination. "Achilles cu…

, a mail boat. Percy Smith. -- Dak bungalow, a traveler's rest-house at the and of a dak stage. -- To travel by dak, to travel by relays of palanquines or other carriage, as fast as the post along a road.

Falling off, or subject to fall or be shed, at a certain season, or a certain stage or interval of growth, as leaves (except of evergreens) in autumn, or as parts of animals, such as hair, teeth, antlers, etc.; also, shedding leaves or parts at certain seasons, stages, or intervals; as, deciduous trees; the deciduous m…

The subsidence of a febrile process; as, the stage of defervescence in pneumonia.

s of progressive steps upward or downward, in quality, rank, acquirement, and the like; a stage in progression; grade; gradation; as, degrees of vice and virtue; to advance by slow degrees; degree of comparison.

nsfer of the body or substance of a thing; distribution; as, the delivery of a fort, of hostages, of a criminal, of goods, of letters.

fold gradually, as a flower from a bud; hence, to bring through a succession of states or stages, each of which is preparatory to the next; to form or expand by a process of growth; to cause to change gradually from an embryo, or a lower state, to a higher state or form of being; as, sunshine and rain develop the bud i…

the doctrine that animals and plants possess the power of passing by slow and successive stages from a lower to a higher state of organization, and that all the higher forms of life now in existence were thus developed by uniform laws from lower forms, and are not the result of special creative acts. See the Note unde…

A four-wheeled public stagecoach, used in France.

A kind of stagecoach. "The Derby dilly." J. H. Frere.

A mail requiring double postage. -- Double note (Mus.), a note of double the length of the semibreve; a breve. See Breve. -- Double octave (Mus.), an interval composed of two octaves, or fifteen notes, in diatonic progression; a fifteenth. -- Double pica. See under Pica. -- Double play (Baseball), a play by which t…

me striking result. It is commonly designed to be spoken and represented by actors on the stage. A divine pastoral drama in the Song of Solomon. Milton.

in a carriage; to convey in a vehicle drawn by beasts; as, to drive a pair of horses or a stage; to drive a person to his own door. How . . . proud he was to drive such a brother! Thackeray.

A curtain which drops or falls in front of the stage of a theater, etc.

organs, but especially in the liver and lungs, which often cause death. It is the larval stage of the Tænia echinococcus, a small tapeworm peculiar to the dog.