graddan (grad an)

[ gradel (grad), n. [In ME. repr. by gree2, q. v.; gradient, ingredient, gra ant, gra at i on, ag gre , congre , digre , egre , ingre , progre , regre , transgre , etc., grallatory, retrograde, plantigrade, etc.] 1. A step, degree, or rank in any series or order; relative position or standing as regards quantity, quality, office, etc. Teachers of every grade , from village schoolmasters to tutors in private families. Buckle , Civilization, II. vi. Hardly nigher made, Tho' scaling slow from grade to grade . Tennyson, Two Voices. Through color's dreamiest grades The yellow sunbeams pause and creep! Lowell , Apple dore. 2. In a road or railroad, the degree of inclination from the horizontal; also, a part of such a road inclined from the horizontal. It is expre ed in degrees, in feet per mile, or as a foot in a certain distance. In Great Britain the steepest grade allowed by law on a railway is 1 foot in 70 feet that is, an ascent or a descent of 1 foot in 70 feet of distance. Also gradient. [ Grade is most common in American use, and gradient in British.] 3. In zoological cla ification, any group or series of animals, with reference to their earlier or later branching off from the stem or stock from which they are presumed to have evolved. -4. An animal, particularly a cow or bull or a sheep, resulting from a cro between a parent of pure blood and one that is not pure-bred: as, an Alderney grade. [Also used as an adjective.] -At grade, on the same level: as, two railroads cro ing each other at grade. Grade cro ing. See cro ing. Grade of a type, in alg., ij - 2w, where i is the rank (that is, the degree) of the parent quantic, j is the order in the coefficients, and w is the weight in respect to the selected variable. gradel (grad), v. t.; pret. and pp. graded, ppr. grading. [ grade2 (grad), a. Same as graith. gradely (gråd'li), adv. Same as graithly. grader (gra'der), n. One who or that which grades. (a) One engaged in grading, as on the line of a railroad. The camps of the graders on the railroad line. The Century, XXIV. 772. (b) A heavy plow or an earth-scraper used in throwing up an embankment or in making a permanent way. (c) A grain-separator or sorter. See separator. From the grader the large wheat drops to the top rolls of the first break roller mill. The Engineer, LXV. 2. gradient(gra'di-ent), a.andn. [ IMG:content-2559.png:[blocks in formation] gradient II. n. 1. Same as grade1 , 2.-2. In physics , the rate at which a variable quantity, as temperature or pre ure, changes in value: as, thermometric gradient ; barometric gradient . Corresponding to the gradients of the normal tempera tures of latitude there are also gradients of normal pre ure of latitude, with corresponding wind velocities and directions. Report of Chief Signal Officer (1885), ii. 280.