oast (ost)

[ The hops are measured off, and taken to oast-houses twice a day, according to the construction and capacity of the oasts. J. C. Morton, Cyc. of Agriculture. 2. A drying-house or a building in which something, as tobacco, is dried and cured. And it ought to touch the heart of the most callous of conservative agriculturists to spend twenty minutes of fingering and sampling in the aromatic warmth of a well arranged tobacco oast - house , where the luxuriant crop hangs in long vistas of tawny-coloured ta els, each ta el "hand" composed of the wide fronds in their unbroken integrity, strung on a lath and hung points downwards! Nineteenth Century , XXIV. 572.