beach wagon (bechwagon)

A light open wagon with two or more seats, used on beaches. beachyt (bē'chi), a. [ The beachy girdle of the ocean. Shak ., 2 Hen. IV., iii. 1. beacon (bē'kon or-kn), n. [ beken , bekene , beácen , bēcen , been , a sign, signal-standard, =OS. bōkan = OFries. bēken , bāken = D. baak = LG. bake (> G. bake ) = OHG. bouhhan , MHG. bouchen = Icel. bakn (after AS.), a sign. Hence beckon and beck2 .] 1. A guiding or warning signal; anything fixed or set up as a token; especially, a signal-fire, either in a cre et and placed on a pole, or lighted on a tower or an eminence. Such beacons were formerly much used to signal the approach of an enemy or to spread a call or warning for any purpose, a chain of them often conveying intelligence to great distances. Modest doubt is call'd The beacon of the wise. Shak ., T. and C., ii. 2. Uncertain, troubled, earnest wonderers beheld his intellectual fire as a beacon burning on a hill-top. Hawthorne, Old Manse, I. 2. A tower or hill formerly used for such purposes. Various hills in England and the older parts of the United States have the name of Beacon, from the fact that signal-fires were formerly lighted on them. 3. A lighthouse or other object placed conspicuously on a coast, or over a rock or shoal at IMG:content-1777.png:[blocks in formation] No, if other things as great in the Church and in the rule of life both economic all and politic all be not lookt into an d reform'd, we have lookt so long upon the blaze that Zwinglius and Calvin hath beacon'd up to us, that we are stark blind. Milton , Areopagitica, p. 44. IMG:content-1778.png:[blocks in formation] IMG:content-1779.png:[graphic] IMG:content-1780.png:[blocks in formation] counting counting prayers, = = OHG. gabet, MHG. G. gebet , gebet , neut.), a prayer, When holy and devout religious men Are at their beads , 'tis much to draw them thence; So sweet is zealous contemplation. Shak ., Rich. III., iii. 7. 2. One of the little balls, of wood, cocoanuts hell, pearl, gla , jewels, or other material, strung in a prescribed order, which form the chaplet or rosary in use in the devotions of Roman Catholics, Buddhists, etc., to keep count of the number of prayers said. See pair of beads, below. The commonest, though not the only, appliance for reckoning these prayers was, and still is, a string of beads so put together that every set of ten smaller ones for the "Hail Marys" is parted by a larger bead , to tell when the "Our Father" must be recited. Rock , Church of our Fathers, III. i. 320. 3. Anything resembling a rosary-bead, strung with others for ornament, as in necklaces or beadwork: as, gla , amber, metal, coral, or gla . amber other beads. With scarfs, and fans, and double change of bravery, With amber bracelets, beads, and all this knavery. Shak ., T. of the S., iv. 3. 4. Any small globular, cylindrical, or annular body, as the small projecting piece of metal at the end of a gun-barrel used as a sight, a drop of liquid, etc. Beads of sweat have stood upon thy brow. Shak ., 1 Hen. IV., ii. 3. He raised his piece gradually, until the bead of the barrel was brought to a line with the spot which he intended to hit. J. J. Audubon , Ornith. Biog., I. 293. 5. One of the circular markings of certain diatoms.-6. The bubble or ma of bubbles rising to the top or resting on the surface of a liquid when shaken or decanted: as, the bead of wines or spirits. Give me the wine of thought whose bead Sparkles along the page I read. Whittier , Lines on a Fly-Leaf. sparkling in the cup, effervesces soon and subsides. that immortal e ence, the beauteous bead Alcott, Table-Talk, p. 75. 7. A gla globule for trying the strength of alcoholic spirits. Beads are numbered according to their specific gravities, and the strength of the spirit is denominated by the number of that one which remains suspended in it, and neither sinks to the bottom nor floats on the surface. Beads, in determining the strength of spirits, are now for the most part superseded by the hydrometer. 8. In mineral., in the blowpipe examination of minerals, a globule of borax or other flux which is supported on a platinum wire, and in which the substance under examination is di olved in the blowpipe flame.-9. In arch. and join ery, a small convex molding, in section a semicircle or greater than a semicircle; properly, a plain molding, but often synonymous with astragal, which is better reserved for a small convex molding cut into the form of a string of penters' work to the finest kinds of joinery and cabinet-work. Among joiners the bead is variously introduced; as: (a) bead and butt (fig. 1), framed work in which the panel is flush with the framing and has a bead run on two edges in the direction of the grain only, while ends are left plain; (b) bead and flush (fig. 2), framed work in which a bead is run on the edge of the framing; (c) bead and quirk Bead as used beneath a capital.- Abbey th church of Vézelay, Yonne, France; century. (From Viollet-le-Duc's "Dict. de l'Architecture.") (fig. 3), the edge of a piece of stuff on which a bead is formed, or stuck, as it is called, flush with the surface; (d) bead and double quirk, or return IMG:content-1781.png:[blocks in formation] bead (ing.) the angle of a piece of stuff on which a bead is stuck and quirked or relieved on both surfaces; (e) bead, butt, and square work, panel which has beads on two of its edges on one side only, while the other side is plain. (f) bead, flush, and square, framing which is beaded on one side only. 10. In bookbinding, shoemaking, etc., any cordlike prominence, as the roll on the head-band of a book, the seam of a shoe, etc. - Baily's beads, big row of bright beads, seen moon's limb in a total solar eclipse about the instant of internal contact. The phenomenon is due to diffraction and irradiation, and is much exaggerated in case the telescope is imperfect or out of focus. So called from the English astronomer Francis Baily, who observed these objects the annular eclipse of May 15, 1836. - Druidical bead, Same as adder - stone. Pair of beads [ME. peire of bedes ], that is, "set of beads" ( Shak., Rich. II., iii. 3), a rosary; now, specifically, a chaplet of five decades, that is, a third part of the rosary. A chaplet or pair of beads, as thus restricted, is the form in common use under the name of the beads. The large beads between the decades were formerly called gaudies (see gaud, gaudy ); each separate bead, or grain, as it is now termed, Tyndale calls a stone. Of smal coral aboute hir arm she bar A peire of bedes gauded al with grene. Chaucer, Gen. Prol. to C. Т., 1. 159. The beads for saying the rosary went by several names, "a pair of beads "; "a pair of Pater nosters"; "ave beads"; but never were they called a rosary. Quoted in Rock's Church of our Fathers, III. i. 327, note. St. Cuthbert's beads, or fairy beads, the small perforated joints of the stems of fo il encrinites, formerly much used in rosaries. - To bid (one's) beads (formerly also in singular, to bid a bead ) [ME. bidden or beden a bede or bedes ], literally, to offer (one's) prayers; hence the later equivalent phrases to say or recite ( one's ) beads, now with reference, as literally in the phrase to tell ( one's ) beads, to counting off prayers by means of the beads on the rosary. The phrases to count and to number ( one's ) beads are merely literary. A peire of bed is eke she bere Upon a lace, alle of white threde, On which that she hir bedes bede. Rom . of the Rose , 1. 7372. To draw a bead on, to take deliberate aim at, with a musket or other firearm. (See def. 4.) bead (bed), v. t. [ Keats, Ode to a Nightingale. Tennyson, In Memoriam, xcv. 2. Provided with or formed of beads, or of small bodies having the appearance of beads: as, a beaded necklace or bracelet.-3. In bot., moniliform: said of ve els that are deeply constricted so as to resemble strings of beads. 4. Having a bead: as, beaded ale. - Beaded lace, lace through which beads are woven in the pattern.Beaded wire, wire ornamented with bead-like swellings. beader (be'der), n. A tool for raising ornamental beadwork on metal boxes. bead-furnace (bēd'fernās), n. A furnace in which the small gla cylinders from which beads are made are rounded. The cylinders are placed in a drum over a fire sufficiently hot to soften the gla , and the rounding is effected by revolving the drum. beadhook