yard2 (yard)

[Also dial. (Sc.) yaird; E. garth1 ), = Dan. gaard, a yard, court, farm, = Norw. gaard, a yard, farm, = Sw. gård, a yard; also in a weak form, OS. gar do = OFries. garda OHG. gar to, MHG. garte, G. garten, garden, Goth. garda, inclosure, stall, = L. hortus, a garden, = Gr. χόρτος, a I found her seated in a little back parlor, the window of which looked out upon a yard about eight feet square, laid out as a flower-garden. Irving , Sketch-Book, p. 147. In the precincts of the chapel-yard, Among the knightly bra es of the graves. Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien. Most of the houses [at Concord, Ma .], especially the newer ones, stand in their own well-kept grounds or yards, facing the road, with no fence or hedge to sever them from the highway. Fortnightly Rev., N. S., XLIII. 679. 2. An inclosure within which any work or busine is carried on: as, a brick - yard; a wood yard; a tan- yard; a dock - yard; a stock - yard; a navy- yard. The yards , great fenced-in portions of the place opening into one another, the largest covering a few acres, conveying into smaller and smaller pens, which finally permit only one sheep abreast to pa up the narrow lane, at the top of which stands a swing gate and two series of pens distinct from one another. Percy Clarke , The New Chum in Australia, p. 174. 3. In railway usage, the space or tract adja- cent to a railway station or terminus, which is used for the switching or making up of trains, the accommodation of rolling-stock, and similar purposes. It includes all sidings and roundhouses, etc., and, at way-stations, extends from the most distant switch or signal-post in one direction of the line to the most distant signals in the opposite direction. 4. A garden; now, chiefly, a kitchen or cot- tage-garden: as, a kale- yard . [Prov. Eng. and Scotch.1 Vnto ane plesand grund cumin ar thay,.... The lusty or chart is and the halesum zardis Of happy saul is and wele fortunate. Gavin Douglas , tr. of Virgil, p. 187. He [Christ] said himself, quhen he was in the yaird afore he was takin, Tristis est anima mea usque mort is. Abp . Hamilton , Catechism (1552), fol. 102 b. ( Jamie son .) Lang syne, in Eden's bonnie yard , When youthfu' lovers first were pair'd. Burns, Addre to the De'il. 5. The winter pasture or browsing-ground of moose and deer; a moose-yard. [U. S. and Canada.] -6. A measure of land in England, varying locally: in Bucking hams hire, formerly, 28 to 40 acres; in Wilts hire, a quarter of an acre. Compare yard - land.