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birds their eggs. [Obs.] Not being able to cove or sit upon them [eggs], she [the female tortoise] bestoweth them in the gravel. Holland.

To brood; to incubate. [Obs.] [Tortoises] covey a whole year before they hatch. Holland.

To burn; to reduce to ashes by the action of fire, either directly or in an oven or retort; to incremate or incinerate; as, to cremate a corpse, instead of burying it.

To contract; to draw together; to cause to shrink or wrinkle; to distort. [Obs.] Till like a boy you see him cringe his face, And whine aloud for mercy. Shak.

Not straightforward; deviating from rectitude; distorted from the right. They are a perverse and crooked generation. Deut. xxxii. 5.

To torture; to torment. [Obs.] See Excruciate. Bale.

The act of torturing; torture; torment. [Obs.] Bp. Hall.

To twist or make onto coils, as a serpent's body. Of his tortuous train, Curled many a wanton wreath in sight of Eve. Milton.

Unnatural or distorted in form; having a deformity; misshapen; disfigured; as, a deformed person; a deformed head. -- De*form"ed*ly, adv. -- De*form"ed*ness, n.

state of being deformed; want of proper form or symmetry; any unnatural form or shape; distortion; irregularity of shape or features; ugliness. To make an envious mountain on my back, Where sits deformity to mock my body. Shak.

ess this clause is inserted word for word; -- a precaution to guard against later wills extorted by violence, or obtained by suggestion.

Same as Detortion.

To torture; to excruciate. [Obs.] Discruciate a man in deep distress. Herrick.

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 distillation of illuminating gas and coal, of alcohol from sour m…

s hunt the person whom they address to, dogging him from place to place, till they even extort an answer to their rude requests. South.

id and devastating incursion; dragoonade. He learnt it as he watched the dragonnades, the tortures, the massacres of the Netherlands. C. Kingsley.

The oval or roundish body laid by domestic poultry and other birds, tortoises, etc. It consists of a yolk, usually surrounded by the "white" or albumen, and inclosed in a shell or strong membrane.

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 this distortion. Within the elastic limit the distort…

massive rootstock covered with a kind of bark cracked with deep fissures; -- called also tortoise plant. The interior part is barely edible, whence the plant is also called Hottentot's bread. (b) A genus (Elephantopus) of coarse, composite weeds. -- Elephant's tusk (Zoöl.), the tooth shell. See Dentalium.…

), the epoch distinguished by the existence of large pachyderms. Mantell. -- Elephantine tortoise (Zoöl.), a huge land tortoise; esp., Testudo elephantina, from islands in the Indian Ocean; and T. elephantopus, from the Galapagos Islands.