Webster's Unabridged Dictionary - Letter B - Page 4

Bacteria (n.p.) See Bacterium.

Bacterial (a.) Of or pertaining to bacteria.

Bactericidal (a.) Destructive of bacteria.

Bactericide (n.) Same as Germicide.

Bacteriological (a.) Of or pertaining to bacteriology; as, bacteriological studies.

Bacteriologist (n.) One skilled in bacteriology.

Bacteriology (n.) The science relating to bacteria.

Bacterioscopic (a.) Relating to bacterioscopy; as, a bacterioscopic examination.

Bacterioscopist (n.) One skilled in bacterioscopic examinations.

Bacterioscopy (n.) The application of a knowledge of bacteria for their detection and identification, as in the examination of polluted water.

Bacteria (pl. ) of Bacterium

Bacterium (n.) A microscopic vegetable organism, belonging to the class Algae, usually in the form of a jointed rodlike filament, and found in putrefying organic infusions. Bacteria are destitute of chlorophyll, and are the smallest of microscopic organisms. They are very widely diffused in nature, and multiply with marvelous rapidity, both by fission and by spores. Certain species are active agents in fermentation, while others appear to be the cause of certain infectious diseases. See Bacillus.

Bacteroid (a.) Alt. of Bacteroidal

Bacteroidal (a.) Resembling bacteria; as, bacteroid particles.

Bactrian (a.) Of or pertaining to Bactria in Asia.

Bactrian (n.) A native of Bactria.

Bacule (n.) See Bascule.

Baculine (a.) Of or pertaining to the rod or punishment with the rod.

Baculite (n.) A cephalopod of the extinct genus Baculites, found fossil in the Cretaceous rocks. It is like an uncoiled ammonite.

Baculometry (n.) Measurement of distance or altitude by a staff or staffs.

Bad (imp.) Bade.

Bad (superl.) Wanting good qualities, whether physical or moral; injurious, hurtful, inconvenient, offensive, painful, unfavorable, or defective, either physically or morally; evil; vicious; wicked; -- the opposite of good; as, a bad man; bad conduct; bad habits; bad soil; bad health; bad crop; bad news.

Badder () compar. of Bad, a.

Badderlocks (n.) A large black seaweed (Alaria esculenta) sometimes eaten in Europe; -- also called murlins, honeyware, and henware.

Baddish (a.) Somewhat bad; inferior.

Bade () A form of the pat tense of Bid.

Badge (n.) A distinctive mark, token, sign, or cognizance, worn on the person; as, the badge of a society; the badge of a policeman.

Badge (n.) Something characteristic; a mark; a token.

Badge (n.) A carved ornament on the stern of a vessel, containing a window or the representation of one.

Badge (v. t.) To mark or distinguish with a badge.

Badgeless (a.) Having no badge.

Badger (n.) An itinerant licensed dealer in commodities used for food; a hawker; a huckster; -- formerly applied especially to one who bought grain in one place and sold it in another.

Badger (n.) A carnivorous quadruped of the genus Meles or of an allied genus. It is a burrowing animal, with short, thick legs, and long claws on the fore feet. One species (M. vulgaris), called also brock, inhabits the north of Europe and Asia; another species (Taxidea Americana / Labradorica) inhabits the northern parts of North America. See Teledu.

Badger (n.) A brush made of badgers' hair, used by artists.

Badgered (imp. & p. p.) of Badger

Badgering (p. pr. & vb. n.) of Badger

Badger (v. t.) To tease or annoy, as a badger when baited; to worry or irritate persistently.

Badger (v. t.) To beat down; to cheapen; to barter; to bargain.

Badgerer (n.) One who badgers.

Badgerer (n.) A kind of dog used in badger baiting.

Badgering (n.) The act of one who badgers.

Badgering (n.) The practice of buying wheat and other kinds of food in one place and selling them in another for a profit.

Badger-legged (a.) Having legs of unequal length, as the badger was thought to have.

Badiaga (n.) A fresh-water sponge (Spongilla), common in the north of Europe, the powder of which is used to take away the livid marks of bruises.

Badian (n.) An evergreen Chinese shrub of the Magnolia family (Illicium anisatum), and its aromatic seeds; Chinese anise; star anise.

Badigeon (n.) A cement or paste (as of plaster and freestone, or of sawdust and glue or lime) used by sculptors, builders, and workers in wood or stone, to fill holes, cover defects, or finish a surface.

Badinage (n.) Playful raillery; banter.

Bad lands () Barren regions, especially in the western United States, where horizontal strata (Tertiary deposits) have been often eroded into fantastic forms, and much intersected by ca–ons, and where lack of wood, water, and forage increases the difficulty of traversing the country, whence the name, first given by the Canadian French, Mauvaises Terres (bad lands).

Badly (adv.) In a bad manner; poorly; not well; unskillfully; imperfectly; unfortunately; grievously; so as to cause harm; disagreeably; seriously.

Badminton (n.) A game, similar to lawn tennis, played with shuttlecocks.

Badminton (n.) A preparation of claret, spiced and sweetened.

Badness (n.) The state of being bad.

Baenomere (n.) One of the somites (arthromeres) that make up the thorax of Arthropods.

Baenopod (n.) One of the thoracic legs of Arthropods.

Baenosome (n.) The thorax of Arthropods.

Baff (n.) A blow; a stroke.

Baffled (imp. & p. p.) of Baffle

Baffling (p. pr. & vb. n.) of Baffle

Baffle (v. t.) To cause to undergo a disgraceful punishment, as a recreant knight.

Baffle (v. t.) To check by shifts and turns; to elude; to foil.

Baffle (v. t.) To check by perplexing; to disconcert, frustrate, or defeat; to thwart.

Baffle (v. i.) To practice deceit.

Baffle (v. i.) To struggle against in vain; as, a ship baffles with the winds.

Baffle (n.) A defeat by artifice, shifts, and turns; discomfiture.

Bafflement (n.) The process or act of baffling, or of being baffled; frustration; check.

Baffler (n.) One who, or that which, baffles.

Baffling (a.) Frustrating; discomfiting; disconcerting; as, baffling currents, winds, tasks.

Baft (n.) Same as Bafta.

Bafta (n.) A coarse stuff, usually of cotton, originally made in India. Also, an imitation of this fabric made for export.

Bag (n.) A sack or pouch, used for holding anything; as, a bag of meal or of money.

Bag (n.) A sac, or dependent gland, in animal bodies, containing some fluid or other substance; as, the bag of poison in the mouth of some serpents; the bag of a cow.

Bag (n.) A sort of silken purse formerly tied about men's hair behind, by way of ornament.

Bag (n.) The quantity of game bagged.

Bag (n.) A certain quantity of a commodity, such as it is customary to carry to market in a sack; as, a bag of pepper or hops; a bag of coffee.

Bagged (imp. & p. p.) of Bag

Bagging (p. pr. & vb. n.) of Bag

Bag (v. t.) To put into a bag; as, to bag hops.

Bag (v. t.) To seize, capture, or entrap; as, to bag an army; to bag game.

Bag (v. t.) To furnish or load with a bag or with a well filled bag.

Bag (v. i.) To swell or hang down like a full bag; as, the skin bags from containing morbid matter.

Bag (v. i.) To swell with arrogance.

Bag (v. i.) To become pregnant.

Bagasse (n.) Sugar cane, as it comes crushed from the mill. It is then dried and used as fuel. Also extended to the refuse of beetroot sugar.

Bagatelle (n.) A trifle; a thing of no importance.

Bagatelle (n.) A game played on an oblong board, having, at one end, cups or arches into or through which balls are to be driven by a rod held in the hand of the player.

Baggage (n.) The clothes, tents, utensils, and provisions of an army.

Baggage (n.) The trunks, valises, satchels, etc., which a traveler carries with him on a journey; luggage.

Baggage (n.) Purulent matter.

Baggage (n.) Trashy talk.

Baggage (n.) A man of bad character.

Baggage (n.) A woman of loose morals; a prostitute.

Baggage (n.) A romping, saucy girl.

Baggage master () One who has charge of the baggage at a railway station or upon a line of public travel.

Baggager (n.) One who takes care of baggage; a camp follower.

Baggala (n.) A two-masted Arab or Indian trading vessel, used in Indian Ocean.

Baggily (adv.) In a loose, baggy way.

Bagging (n.) Cloth or other material for bags.

Bagging (n.) The act of putting anything into, or as into, a bag.

Bagging (n.) The act of swelling; swelling.

Bagging (n.) Reaping peas, beans, wheat, etc., with a chopping stroke.

[previous page] [Index] [next page]