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from Laugh, v. i. Laughing falcon (Zoöl.), a South American hawk (Herpetotheres cachinnans); -- so called from its notes, which resemble a shrill laughing. -- Laughing gas (Chem.), hyponitrous oxide, or protoxide of nitrogen; -- so called from the exhilaration and laughing which it sometimes produces when inhaled. It…

With laughter or merriment.

ridicule; a butt of sport. Shak. When he talked, he talked nonsense, and made himself the laughingstock of his hearers. Macaulay.

dying" Heb. xi. 21. "We'll a birding together." " It was a doing." Shak. "He burst out a laughing." Macaulay. The hyphen may be used to connect a with the verbal substantive (as, a-hunting, a-building) or the words may be written separately. This form of expression is now for the most part obsolete, the a being omitte…

An inhabitant of Abdera, in Thrace. The Abderite, Democritus, the Laughing Philosopher.

A woman of loose morals; a prostitute. A disreputable, daring, laughing, painted French baggage. Thackeray.

er fair, So buxom, blithe, and debonair. Milton. A parcel of buxom bonny dames, that were laughing, singing, dancing, and as merry as the day was long. Tatler. -- Bux"om*ly, adv. -- Bux"om*ness, n.

iliar talk; conversation; gossip. Snuff, or fan, supply each pause of chat, With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that. Pope.

which is conceived, imagined, or formed in the mind; idea; thought; image; conception. In laughing, there ever procedeth a conceit of somewhat ridiculous. Bacon. A man wise in his own conceit. Prov. xxvi. 12.

Pertaining, or peculiar, to one's own country. She, bowing herself towards him, laughing the cruel tyrant to scorn, spake in her country language. 2 Macc. vii. 27.

An object of derision or scorn; a laughing-stock. I was a derision to all my people. Lam. iii. 14.

A state of excitement, passion, or hilarity. The ladies, laughing heartily, were fast getting into what, in New England, is sometimes called a gale. Brooke (Eastford). Topgallant gale (Naut.), one in which a ship may carry her topgallant sails.

Laughing gas.

Pertaining to laughter; used in laughing. "Gelastic muscles." Sir T. Browne.

laugh in a light, affected, or silly manner; to titter with childish levity. Giggling and laughing with all their might At the piteous hap of the fairy wight. J. R. Drake.

of interjecting or throwing between; also, that which is interjected. The interjection of laughing. Bacon.

That which intoxicates; an intoxicating agent; as, alcohol, opium, and laughing gas are intoxicants.

The act of laughing at another; derision. This being spoken scepticè, or by way of irrision. Chapman.

he Falkland Islands. They make a noise like the braying of an ass; -- hence the name. -- Laughing jackass. (Zoöl.) See under Laughing.

The object of laughter or sport; a laughingstock. Then let me be your jest; I deserve it. Shak. In jest, for mere sport or diversion; not in truth and reality; not in earnest. And given in earnest what I begged in jest. Shak. -- Jest book, a book containing a collection of jests, jokes, and amusing anecdotes; a Joe Mil…