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rts of a substance from the more fixed; specifically, the operation of driving off gas or vapor from volatile liquids or solids, by heat in a retort or still, and the condensation of the products as far as possible by a cool receiver, alembic, or condenser; rectification; vaporization; condensation; as, the distillatio…

A jet or current of water or vapor directed upon some part of the body to benefit it medicinally; a douche bath.

To evaporate wholly; to be exhaled; -- said of moisture, or a liquid; -- sometimes with up; as, the stream dries, or dries up.

or bubbling up of a liquid; the motion produced in a liquid by its rapid conversion into vapor.

The capability of flying off in fumes or vapor. [Obs.] Boyle.

ll directions on the removal of external pressure, as the air, steam, and other gases and vapors. -- Elastic limit (Mech.), the limit of distortion, by bending, stretching, etc., that a body can undergo and yet return to its original form when relieved from stress; also, the unit force or stress required to produce th…

r. -- Ether engine (Mach.), a condensing engine like a steam engine, but operated by the vapor of ether instead of by steam.

To vanish away; to because dissipated and disappear, like vapor. I believe him to have evanesced or evaporated. De Quincey.

The act or state of vanishing away; disappearance; as, the evanescence of vapor, of a dream, of earthly plants or hopes. Rambler.

Liable to vanish or pass away like vapor; vanishing; fleeting; as, evanescent joys. So evanescent are the fashions of the world in these particulars. Hawthorne.

Capable of being exhaled or evaporated. Boyle.

Having the quality of exhaling or evaporating.

The act or process of exhaling, or sending forth in the form of steam or vapor; evaporation.

To breathe out. Hence: To emit, as vapor; to send out, as an odor; to evaporate; as, the earth exhales vapor; marshes exhale noxious effluvia. Less fragrant scents the unfolding rose exhales. Pope.

ompletely; as, to exhaust the water of a well; the moisture of the earth is exhausted by evaporation.

The passage of gases, vapors, or liquids thought membranes or porous media from within outward, in the phenomena of osmose; -- opposed to endosmose. See Osmose.

To give forth insensibly or gently, as a fluid or vapor; to emit in minute particles; to exhale; as, the earth expires a damp vapor; plants expire odors. The expiring of cold out of the inward parts of the earth in winter. Bacon.

To become suddenly expanded into a great volume of gas or vapor; to burst violently into flame; as gunpowder explodes.

To exhaust or evaporate moisture from; to dry up. Sir T. Browne.

The act of operation of drying; evaporation or expulsion of moisture; state of being dried up; dryness. Sir T. Browne.