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A liquid measure formerly used in France and Great Britain, varying from half a pint to a wine quart.

Proceeding by the smaller intervals (half steps or semitones) of the scale, instead of the regular intervals of the diatonic scale.

A portable timekeeper, with a heavy compensation balance, and usually beating half seconds; -- intended to keep time with great accuracy for use an astronomical observations, in determining longitude, etc.

ross-grained; ungracious; surly; illiberal; niggardly. "Churlish benefits." Ld. Burleigh. Half mankind maintain a churlish strife. Cowper.

nt, or adroitness; expert. Though there were many clever men in England during the latter half of the seventeenth century, there were only two great creative minds. Macaulay. Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever. C. Kingsley.

The state of being close. Half stifled by the closeness of the room. Swift. We rise not against the piercing judgment of Augustus, nor the extreme caution or closeness of Tiberius. Bacon. An affectation of closeness and covetousness. Addison.

to fire; -- said of firearms, also, jocularly, of one prepared for instant action. -- At half cock. See under Half. -- Cock feather (Archery), the feather of an arrow at right angles to the direction of the cock or notch. Nares.

A rustic high shoe or half-boots. [Obs.] Drayton.

A mean, half-hearted fellow; a coward. [Slang, Eng.] It was in the second affair that poor little Barney showed he was a cocktail. Thackeray.

charge it without any burden to the queen's coffers, for honor sake. Bacon. Hold, here is half my coffer. Shak.

d or eclipsed by his light, as the moon or planets when not more than eight degrees and a half from the sun. [Obs.] Planets that are oft combust. Milton.

A small interval (the difference beyween a major and minor half step), seldom used except by tuners. Comma bacillus (Physiol.), a variety of bacillus shaped like a comma, found in the intestines of patients suffering from cholera. It is considered by some as having a special relation to the disease; -- called also chol…

To arch over; to vault. Of the upper beak an inch and a half consisteth of one concamerated bone. Grew.

Shaped like one half of a bivalve shell; shell-shaped.

Having elevations or depressions in form like one half of a bivalve shell; -- applied principally to a surface produced by fracture.

olcano, usually heaped up in a conical form. Now had Night measured with her shadowy cone Half way up hill this vast sublunar vault. Milton.

rticles of Confederation from 1781 till 1789. -- Congress boot or gaiter, a high shoe or half-boot, coming above the ankle, and having the sides made in part of some elastic material which stretches to allow the boot to be drawn on and off. [U.S.] -- Congress water, a saline mineral water from the Congress spring at S…

to conscience or reason; in reason; reasonably. "This is enough in conscience." Howell. "Half a dozen fools are, in all conscience, as many as you should require." Swift. -- To make conscience of, To make a matter of conscience, to act according to the dictates of conscience concerning (any matter), or to scruple to…

A bracket whose projection is not more than half its height.

A convex body or surface. Half heaven's convex glitters with the flame. Tickell.