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in letters and the arts; Truth, in history and sciences. Brande & C. By criticism, as it was first instituted by Aristotle, was meant a standard of judging well. Dryden.

A king of Lydia who flourished in the 6th century b. c., and was renowned for his vast wealth; hence, a common appellation for a very rich man; as, he is veritable Croesus.

An old woman; -- usually in contempt. But still the crone was constant to her note. Dryden.

To hum or sing in a low tone; to murmur softly. Here an old grandmother was crooning over a sick child, and rocking it to and fro. Dickens.

s a T, or +, with the horizontal piece below the upper end of the upright, or as an X. It was anciently used in the execution of criminals. Nailed to the cross By his own nation. Milton.

Perverse; untractable; contrary. She was none of your crossgrained, termagant, scolding jades. Arbuthnot.

Rogation week, when the cross was borne in processions.

a white crystalline organic acid, C3H5.CO2H, of the ethylene, or acrylic acid series. It was so named because formerly supposed to exist in croton oil. Also, any acid metameric with crotonic acid proper.

side. See Crown office. -- Crown tax (Eccl. Hist.), a golden crown, or its value, which was required annually from the Jews by the king of Syria, in the time of the Maccabees. 1 Macc. x. 20. -- Crown wheel. See in the Vocabulary. -- Crown work. See in the Vocabulary. -- Pleas of the crown (Engl. law), criminal act…

ing; a chief end. [Obs.] O this false soul of Egypt! this grave charm . . . . Whose bosom was my crownet, my chief end. Shak.

Causing, or fitted to cause, pain, grief, or misery. Cruel wars, wasting the earth. Milton. Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath for it was cruel. Gen. xlix. 7.

To gather or contract into a hard crust; to become incrusted. The place that was burnt . . . crusted and healed. Temple.

in prayer; to implore. -- To cry you mercy, to beg your pardon. "I cry you mercy, madam; was it you" Shak.

he fixed stars and the primum mobile (or outer circle of the heavens, which by its motion was supposed to carry round all those within it), in order to explain certain movements of the heavently bodies. -- Crystalline lens (Anat.), the capsular lenslike body in the eye, serving to focus the rays of light. It consists…

The waste of the Pennsylvania anthracite mines, consisting of fine coal, dust, etc., and used as fuel. Raymond.

mbers, etc. The reptile race culminated in the secondary era. Dana. The house of Burgundy was rapidly culminating. Motley.

A system of religious belief and worship. That which was the religion of Moses is the ceremonial or cult of the religion of Christ. Coleridge.

vancement in physical, intellectual, or moral condition; refinement; culture. Italy . . . was but imperfectly reduced to cultivation before the irruption of the barbarians. Hallam.

e what avails him not in fight, And would but cumber and retard his flight Dryden. Martha was cumbered about much serving. Luke x. 40. Cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground Luke xiii. 7. The multiplying variety of arguments, especially frivolous ones, . . . but cumbers the memory. Locke.

truly blent, whose red and white Nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on. Shak. Esau was a cunning hunter. Gen xxv. 27.