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To seize; to lay fast hold of; to attack at close quarters: as, to grapple an antagonist.

A grappling; close fight or embrace. [Obs.] Spenser.

To grapple. [Obs.]

To seize; to clutch; to grapple. [Obs.] Drayton.

hman. "Good-looking young John Bull." W. D.Howells. -- To take the bull by the horns, to grapple with a difficulty instead of avoiding it.

To grapple; to engange in hand-to-hand fight. They boldly closed in a hand-to-hand contest. Prescott. To close on or upon, to come to a mutual agreement; to agree on or join in. "Would induce France and Holland to close upon some measures between them to our disadvantage." Sir W. Temple. -- To close with. (a) To acced…

h. And round about in reel and rout, The death fires danced at night. Coleridge. -- Death grapple, a grapple or struggle for life. -- Death in life, a condition but little removed from death; a living death. [Poetic] "Lay lingering out a five years' death in life." Tennyson. -- Death knell, a stroke or tolling of a b…

e flukes or claws, used to hold boats or small vessels; hence, any instrument designed to grapple or hold; a grappling iron; a grab; -- written also grapline, and crapnel.

A grapple; a struggle. A match for yards in fight, in grappling for the bear. Dryden. Grappling iron, a hooked iron used for grappling and holding fast a vessel or other object. -- Grappling tongs, broad-mouthed tongs for gathering oysters.

e joy to; to congratulate. [Obs.] "Joy us of our conquest." Dryden. To joy the friend, or grapple with the foe. Prior.

A grapple in wrestling. Milton. Detector lock, a lock containing a contrivance for showing whether it as has been tampered with. -- Lock bay (Canals), the body of water in a lock chamber. -- Lock chamber, the inclosed space between the gates of a canal lock. -- Lock nut. See Check nut, under Check. -- Lock plate, a…

To strive or struggle with a close grapple; to wrestle in a rough fashion.

to stop; to hold. Him backward overthrew and down him stayed With their rude hands grisly grapplement. Spenser. All that may stay their minds from thinking that true which they heartly wish were false. Hooker.

To seize; to lay hold of; to grapple; as, a wrestler tackles his antagonist; a dog tackles the game. The greatest poetess of our day has wasted her time and strength in tackling windmills under conditions the most fitted to insure her defeat. Dublin Univ. Mag.

The grapple plant.