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The act or process of opening; a beginning; commencement; first appearance; as, the opening of a speech. The opening of your glory was like that of light. Dryden.

ging to the Abdominales; as, abdominal fishes. Abdominal ring (Anat.), a fancied ringlike opening on each side of the abdomen, external and superior to the pubes; -- called also inguinal ring.

The mouth or anterior opening of a coelenterate animal.

An entrance or passage. Specifically: The nearly horizontal opening by which a mine is entered, or by which water and ores are carried away; -- called also drift and tunnel.

tic vapors, to increase the length of the neck of a retort, or to unite two vessels whose openings have different diameters. [Written also adapter.]

A recessed portion of a room, or a small room opening into a larger one; especially, a recess to contain a bed; a lateral recess in a library.

can not be amended. Shak. An instant emergency, granting no possibility for revision, or opening for amended thought. De Quincey. We shall cheer her sorrows, and amend her blood, by wedding her to a Norman. Sir W. Scott. To amend a bill, to make some change in the details or provisions of a bill or measure while on it…

ted States, having a serpentlike form, but with four minute limbs and two persistent gill openings; the Congo snake.

e all entered in a book called Domesday Book. -- Ancient lights (Law), windows and other openings which have been enjoined without molestation for more than twenty years. In England, and in some of the United States, they acquire a prescriptive right.

The posterior opening of the alimentary canal, through which the excrements are expelled.

Gently opening the bowels; laxative. -- n.

The act of opening; an opening; an aperture. [Archaic] Wiseman.

The act of opening. [Obs.]

he direction of the radii of the curve; used to support the wall or other weight above an opening. In this sense arches are segmental, round (i. e., semicircular), or pointed.

up of moldings, or other architectural member, above and on both sides of a door or other opening, especially if square in form.

The architectural member surrounding the curved opening of an arch, corresponding to the architrave in the case of a square opening.

An herbaceous grasslike plant (Triglochin palustre, and other species) with pods opening so as to suggest barbed arrowheads.

The opening of an artery, esp. for bloodletting.

the auditory nerve. See Ear. Auditory canal (Anat.), the tube from the auditory meatus or opening of the ear to the tympanic membrane.

A circle of feathers surrounding the opening of the ear of birds.