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person or thing; that for which a person is specially distinguished; an object of special attention; a special occupation or object of attention; a specialty. On these two general heads all other specialities are depedent. Hooker. Strive, while improving your one talent, to enrich your whole capital as a man. It is in…

is distinguished, in which he is specially versed, or which he makes an object of special attention; a speciality. Men of boundless knowledge, like Humbold, must have had once their specialty, their pet subject. C. Kingsley.

To consider attentively; as, to speculate the nature of a thing. [R.] Sir W. Hamilton.

[Obs.] "All of spirit would deprive." Spenser. The mild air, with season moderate, Gently attempered, and disposed eo well, That still it breathed foorth sweet spirit. Spenser.

gh the agency of persons commonly called mediums, by means of physical phenomena; one who attempts to maintain such intercourse; a spiritist.

To attend to a spit; to use a spit. [Obs.] She's spitting in the kitchen. Old Play.

king, At whose command we perish, and we spring Dryden. To spring at, to leap toward; to attempt to reach by a leap. -- To spring forth, to leap out; to rush out. -- To spring in, to rush in; to enter with a leap or in haste. -- To spring on or upon, to leap on; to rush on with haste or violence; to assault.…

A sudden violent gust of wind often attended with rain or snow. The gray skirts of a lifting squall. Tennyson. Black squall, a squall attended with dark, heavy clouds. -- Thick squall, a black squall accompanied by rain, hail, sleet, or snow. Totten. -- White squall, a squall which comes unexpectedly, without being m…

A shield-bearer or armor-bearer who attended a knight.

A boy or man who attends in a stable; a groom; a hostler.

An attendant bearing a staff. [Obs.] "Staffiers on foot." Hudibras.

A disease of horses and other animals, attended by reeling, unsteady gait or sudden falling; as, parasitic staggers; appopletic or sleepy staggers.

be fixed, steady, or firm; to take a position in resistance or opposition. "The standing pattern of their imitation." South. The king granted the Jews . . . to gather themselves together, and to stand for their life. Esther viii. 11.

A composition of combustible matter used in the heading of rockets, in mines, etc., which, exploding of a air, presents a starlike appearance.

The act or practice of observing the stars with attention; contemplation of the stars as connected with astrology or astronomy. Swift.

sting or lowering heavy articles over the side. -- To miss stays (Naut.), to fail in the attempt to go about. Totten. -- Triatic stay (Naut.), a rope secured at the ends to the heads of the foremast and mainmast with thimbles spliced to its bight into which the stay tackles hook.

cer who provides food for the students and superintends the kitchen; also, an officer who attends to the accounts of the students.

A female steward; specifically, a woman employed in passenger vessels to attend to the wants of female passengers.

Strong; active; -- said especially of morbid states attended with excessive action of the heart and blood vessels, and characterized by strength and activity of the muscular and nervous system; as, a sthenic fever. Sthenic theory. See Stimulism (a).

especially after sleep; as, an early stirrer. Shak. Stirrer up, an instigator or inciter. Atterbury.