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A kind of breechloading, center-fire rifle, or improved needle gun.

, along which the carriage of a barbette or casemate gum moves backward and forward. [See Gun carriage.]

sides, or which are similar and in pair; as, the cheeks (jaws) of a vise; the cheeks of a gun carriage, etc.

A machine for raising guns or mortar into their carriages.

A heavy casting of metal, usually fixed near the gunwale. It has two short horn-shaped arms curving inward, between which ropes or hawsers may pass for towing, mooring, etc.

To make a choke, as in a cartridge, or in the bore of the barrel of a shotgun. To choke off, to stop a person in the execution of a purpose; as, to choke off a speaker by uproar.

In a shotgun, a bore which is tapered to a slightly smaller diameter at a short distance (usually 2½ to 3 inches) to the rear of the muzzle, in order to prevent the rapid dispersion of the shot.

One who bandies words or is very argunentative. [Jocular] Shak.

bend by which a rope is made fast to the ring of an anchor, or the breeching of a ship's gun to the ringbolts.

A solution of pyroxylin (soluble gun cotton) in ether containing a varying proportion of alcohol. It is strongly adhesive, and is used by surgeons as a containing for wounds; but its chief application is as a vehicle for the sensitive film in photography. Collodion process (Photog.), a process in which a film of sensit…

A form of seacoast cannon; a long, chambered gun designed for throwing shot or shells with heavy charges of powder, at high angles of elevation.

The thumbpiece of the hammer of a gunlock, by which it may be cocked.

Importance; moment; consequence. Let every action of concernment to begun with prayer. Jer. Taylor.

ewsbury. Macaulay. What in the conduct of our life appears So well designed, so luckily begun, But when we have our wish, we wish undone Dryden.

he conjugal state; an expression of connubial tenderness. Some connubialities which had begun to pass between Mr. and Mrs. B. Dickens.

An assemblage of splendors or excellences. The constellations of genius had already begun to show itself . . . which was to shed a glory over the meridian and close of Philip's reign. Prescott.

down fundamental rules and principles for the conduct of affairs. Our constitution had begun to exist in times when statesmen were not much accustomed to frame exact definitions. Macaulay.

A change of character or use, as of smoothbore guns into rifles.

anslate. [Obs.] Which story . . . Catullus more elegantly converted. B. Jonson. Converted guns, cast-iron guns lined with wrought-iron or steel tubes. Farrow. -- Converting furnace (Steel Manuf.), a furnace in which wrought iron is converted into steel by cementation.

A smokeless powder composed of nitroglycerin, guncotton, and mineral jelly, and used by the British army and in other services. In making it the ingredients are mixed into a paste with the addition of acetone and pressed out into cords (of various diameters) resembling brown twine, which are dried and cut to length. A…