fluctuoust (fluktuus)

[=F. fluctueux = Sp. Pg. fluctuoso = It. fluttuoso, Madona A mph i trite's fluctuous demeans. Nashe , Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., VI. 151). fluctuate. The mind may for some time fluctuate between [two feelings], but it can never entertain both at once. Goldsmith, The Bee, No. 3. The population is therefore constantly fluctuating. D. Webster, Speech, Plymouth, Dec. 22, 1820. The standard of antiquity fluctuates. E. A. Freeman , Amer. Lects., p. 171. =Syn. Fluctuate , Vacillate , Waver, Oscillate, Undulate , apply to literal or figurative movements to and fro, or up and down; but undulate is used only physically, as of the sea, sound-waves, etc. Fluctuate , waver , and undulate in their figurative uses are founded upon the rise and fall of waves; oscillate refers to the swinging of a pendulum. Vacillate, and next to it waver , suggests the most of mental or moral indecision. Oscillate naturally suggests the most regular alternations of movement to and fro. Vacil late and waver are now rarely used of physical things; waver is also used of a hesitation that seems likely to end in yielding. haps connected with MD. D. vloegh, grooves, channels, the flutes of a fluted column. There is no evidence to connect the word with OF. flue, fluie, a flowing, a stream ( flue 9th. To the old and ragged city of Leicester, large and pleasantly situated, but despicably built, ye chimney flues like so many smith's forges. Evelyn , Memoirs, Aug. 9, 1654. He wrote on a pane of gla how I'd climb, if the way I only knew, And she writ beneath, if your heart's afeared, don't venture up the lue. Hood, The Sweep's Complaint, (c) A pipe or tube for conveying heat to water in certain kinds of steam-boilers. (d) A pa age in a wall for the purpose of conducting heated air from one part of a building to another. 2. [See etym.) The winding hollow of a seashell. [Rare.] Him Tryton combrous bare, that gale on blew with whelkid shell, Whose wrinckly wreathed flue [Latin concha ] did fearful shril in seas outyell. Phaer, Eneid, x. 3. In organ- building, a flute-pipe as distinguished from a mouth-pipe or reed-pipe.-4. The coping of a gable or end-wall of a house, etc. Hall i well. [Prov. Eng.]- Dead flue, a flue which is no longer used. - Flash-flue, a form of flue, without turns or obstructions, for a steam-boiler.