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To lay waste; to ruin; to ravage; as, a fire desolates a city. Constructed in the very heart of a desolating war. Sparks.

The art of constructing dials; the science which treats of measuring time by dials. [Written also dialling.]

A dark box constructed for viewing transparent pictures, with or without a lens.

Choice of words for the expression of ideas; the construction, disposition, and application of words in discourse, with regard to clearness, accuracy, variety, etc.; mode of expression; language; as, the diction of Chaucer's poems. His diction blazes up into a sudden explosion of prophetic grandeur. De Quincey.…

hindrance; prejudice to interest, fame, credit, profit, or other good. They would throw a construction on his conduct, to his disadvantage before the public. Bancroft.

nd by action; to perform completely; to finish; to accomplish; -- a sense conveyed by the construction, which is that of the past participle done. "Ere summer half be done." "I have done weeping." Shak.

nry and communicating with deep water, but having appliances for excluding it; -- used in constructing or repairing ships. The name includes structures used for the examination, repairing, or building of vessels, as graving docks, floating docks, hydraulic docks, etc. -- Floating dock, a dock which is made to become b…

A compact, narrow-gauge locomotive used for moving construction trains, switching, etc.

A sofa, open carriage, or the like, so constructed that the occupants sit back to back.

e articles, by the bushel, peck, etc. -- Dry pile (Physics), a form of the Voltaic pile, constructed without the use of a liquid, affording a feeble current, and chiefly useful in the construction of electroscopes of great delicacy; -- called also Zamboni's , from the names of the two earliest constructors of it. --…

Constructed of uncemented stone. "Dry-stone walls." Sir W. Scott.

ysius, a kind of ear trumpet with a flexible tube; -- named from the Sicilian tyrant, who constructed a device to overhear the prisoners in his dungeons. -- Ear sand (Anat.), otoliths. See Otolith. -- Ear snail (Zoöl.), any snail of the genus Auricula and allied genera. -- Ear stones (Anat.), otoliths. See Otolith.…

ves; -- called also earthdin, earthquave, and earthshock. Earthquake alarm, a bell signal constructed to operate on the theory that a few seconds before the occurrence of an earthquake the magnet temporarily loses its power.

Any construction, whether a temporary breastwork or permanent fortification, for attack or defense, the material of which is chiefly earth.

. Eccentric anomaly. (Astron.) See Anomaly. -- Eccentric chuck (Mach.), a lathe chuck so constructed that the work held by it may be altered as to its center of motion, so as to produce combinations of eccentric combinations of eccentric circles. -- Eccentric gear. (Mach.) (a) The whole apparatus, strap, and other pa…

An arrangement of a fleet in a wedge or Encyc. Dict. Echelon lens (Optics), a large lens constructed in several parts or layers, extending in a succession of annular rings beyond the central lens; - - used in lighthouses.

The art of constructing vaults to produce echoes.

Building; constructing. [R.] Dugard.

To build; to construct. [Archaic] There was a holy chapel edified. Spenser.

Serving or tending to elaborate; constructing with labor and minute attention to details. Elaborative faculty (Metaph.), the intellectual power of discerning relations and of viewing objects by means of, or in, relations; the discursive faculty; thought.