checker1 (cheker)

t. [Also written chequer; The gray-ey'd morn smiles on the frowning night, Checkering the eastern clouds with streaks of light. Shak ., R. and J., ii. 3. 2. Figuratively, to variegate with different qualities, scenes, or events; diversify; impart variety to; give a character of both good and evil or happine and unhappine to. Our minds are, as it were, chequered with truth and Add is on, Spectator, No. 237. falsehood. Happy the man who sees a God employ'd In all the good and ill that checker life! Cowper, The Task, ii. checker2 (chek'er), n. [ berries (-iz). [Also chequer berry, chick a berry; Our American plant Gaultheria is called in some sections Wintergreen, in others Chequer berry . T. Hill , True Order of Studies, p. 81. checker-board (chek'er-bord), n. A board divided into sixty-four small squares, thirty-two of one color and thirty-two of another, and arranged so that no two of the same color are side by side, on which checkers and che are played. Also called draught - board , che - board , checkered (chek'érd), p . a . [ checker1 + -ed2.] 1. Marked with squares or checkers, like a checker-board; exhibiting squares of different colors; hence, broken into different colors or into lights and shadows. When the merry bells ring round, And the jocund rebecks sound To many a youth, and many a maid, Dancing in the chequer'd shade. Milton, L'Allegro, 1. 96. 2. Figuratively, variegated with different qualities, scenes, or events; cro ed with good and bad fortune. A checkered day of sunshine and of showers, Fading to twilight and dark night at last. William Morris , Earthly Paradise, I. 42. The struggles of his curiously checkered early life. furnish the materials of a biography po e ing all the interest of a romance. Everett, Orations, II. 2.