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elopment; an unfinished beginning. but I will bring thee where thou soon shalt quit Those rudiments, and see before thine eyes The monarchies of the earth. Milton. the single leaf is the rudiment of beauty in landscape. I. Taylor.

Rudimentary. Addison.

Of or pertaining to rudiments; consisting in first principles; elementary; initial; as, rudimental essays.

The simplest rudiments of any subject; as, the A B C of finance. A B C book, a primer. Shak.

Pertaining to, or formed by, the letters of the alphabet; alphabetic; hence, rudimentary. Abecedarian psalms, hymns, etc., compositions in which (like the 119th psalm in Hebrew) distinct portions or verses commence with successive letters of the alphabet. Hook.

A primer; the first principle or rudiment of anything. [R.] Fuller.

To become checked in normal development, so as either to remain rudimentary or shrink away wholly; to become sterile.

Imperfectly formed or developed; rudimentary; sterile; as, an abortive organ, stamen, ovule, etc.

Not existing; lacking; as, the part was rudimental or absent.

The accidents, of inflections of words; the rudiments of grammar. Milton.

The simplest rudiments; elements. The very alphabet of our law. Macaulay. Deaf and dumb alphabet. See Dactylology.

Characterized by containing the rudiments of both flowers and leaves; -- applied to a bud.

A small lemuroid mammal (Arctocebus Calabarensis) of Africa. It has only a rudimentary tail.

A genus of New Zealand birds about the size of a hen, with only short rudiments of wings, armed with a claw and without a tail; the kiwi. It is allied to the gigantic extinct moas of the same country. Five species are known.

A genus of American monkeys with prehensile tails, and having the thumb wanting or rudimentary. See Spider monkey, and Coaita.

fected with atrophy, as a tissue or organ; arrested in development at a very early stage; rudimentary.

In Diptera, the rudimentary posterior wing.

That which is begun; a rudiment or element. Mighty things from small beginnings grow. Dryden.

Relating to the blastema; rudimentary.

- Blind snake (Zoöl.), a small, harmless, burrowing snake, of the family Typhlopidæ, with rudimentary eyes. -- Blind spot (Anat.), the point in the retina of the eye where the optic nerve enters, and which is insensible to light. -- Blind tooling, in bookbinding and leather work, the indented impression of heated too…