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Not tense, firm, or rigid; loose; slack; as, a lax bandage; lax fiber. The flesh of that sort of fish being lax and spongy. Ray.

The act of loosening or slackening, or the state of being loosened or slackened.

Having a tendency to loosen or relax. Milton.

The quality of being laxative.

That which loosens; -- esp., a muscle which by its contraction loosens some part.

The state or quality of being lax; want of tenseness, strictness, or exactness.

The state or quality of being lax; want of tenseness, strictness, or exactness.

In a lax manner.

The state of being lax; laxity.

Failure of the due secretion of milk after childbirth.

A variety of asbestus. See Amianthus.

Cavillation; a caviling. [Obs.] Cranmer.

The skin or fibrous part of the flax plant, when broken and cleaned by hatcheling or combing. Earth flax (Min.), amianthus. -- Flax brake, a machine for removing the woody portion of flax from the fibrous. -- Flax comb, a hatchel, hackle, or heckle. -- Flax cotton, the fiber of flax, reduced by steeping in bicarbina…

A plant in new Zealand (Phormium tenax), allied to the lilies and aloes. The leaves are two inches wide and several feet long, and furnish a fiber which is used for making ropes, mats, and coarse cloth.

Made of flax; resembling flax or its fibers; of the color of flax; of a light soft straw color; fair and flowing, like flax or tow; as, flaxen thread; flaxen hair.

The seed of the flax; linseed.

See Toadflax.

Like flax; flaxen. Sir M. Sandys.

The Milky Way; that luminous tract, or belt, which is seen at night stretching across the heavens, and which is composed of innumerable stars, so distant and blended as to be distinguishable only with the telescope. The term has recently been used for remote clusters of stars. Nichol.

To soften by kneading or stirring with some thinner substance. [R.]