Search the Dictionary

x instrument or appliance, mechanical or chemical, for a specific action or operation; machinery; mechanism.

end; an apparatus or device; as, to use various appliances; a mechanical appliance; a machine with its appliances.

losely; to engage and employ diligently, or with attention; to attach; to incline. Apply thine heart unto instruction. Prov. xxiii. 12.

A calculating machine.

A slender part of an instrument or machine, projecting from a trunk, axis, or fulcrum; as, the arm of a steelyard.

let or ring; consisting of rings or circles. Armillary sphere, an ancient astronomical machine composed of an assemblage of rings, all circles of the same sphere, designed to represent the positions of the important circles of the celestial sphere. Nichol.

See Arshine.

Pertaining to, coming from, or resembling, the stars; starry; starlike. Shines only with an astral luster. I. Taylor. Some astral forms I must invoke by prayer. Dryden. Astral lamp, an Argand lamp so constructed that no shadow is cast upon the table by the flattened ring-shaped reservoir in which the oil is contained.…

Something attached; some adjunct attached to an instrument, machine, or other object; as, a sewing machine attachment (i. e., a device attached to a sewing machine to enable it to do special work, as tucking, etc.).

Attentive; heedful. [Archaic] Let thine ears be attent unto the prayer. 2 Chron. vi. 40.

n automaton; self-acting or self-regulating under fixed conditions; -- esp. applied to machinery or devices in which certain things formerly or usually done by hand are done by the machine or device itself; as, the automatic feed of a lathe; automatic gas lighting; an automatic engine or switch; an automatic mouse.…

A self-moving machine, or one which has its motive power within itself; -- applied chiefly to machines which appear to imitate spontaneously the motions of living beings, such as men, birds, etc.

To treat revengefully; to wreak vengeance on. [Obs.] Thy judgment in avenging thine enemies. Bp. Hall.

To fly, or navigate the air, in an aëroplane or heavier-than- air flying machine. [Colloq.]

A flying machine.

A heavier-than-air flying machine in which the motive power is furnished solely by the aviator.

[More fully chenille Axminster.] A variety of Turkey carpet, woven by machine or, when more than 27 inches wide, on a hand loom, and consisting of strips of worsted chenille so colored as to produce a pattern on a stout jute backing. It has a fine soft pile. So called from Axminster, England, where it was formerly (175…

A kind of wine made at Bacharach on the Rhine.

The distance through which one part of connected machinery, as a wheel, piston, or screw, can be moved without moving the connected parts, resulting from looseness in fitting or from wear; also, the jarring or reflex motion caused in badly fitting machinery by irregularities in velocity or a reverse of motion.…

An evergreen Chinese shrub of the Magnolia family (Illicium anisatum), and its aromatic seeds; Chinese anise; star anise.