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Bisque

A white soup made of crayfish.

Bissau

The capital city of Guinea-Bissau. Population (2000) = 200,000.

Bistort

An herbaceous plant of the genus Polygonum, section Bistorta; snakeweed; adderwort. Its root is used in medicine as an astringent.

Bistoury

A surgical instrument consisting of a slender knife, either straight or curved, generally used by introducing it beneath the part to be divided, and cutting towards the surface.

Bistre Bister

A dark brown pigment extracted from the soot of wood.

bistred

colored with or as if with bister.

bistro

a small informal restaurant, especially one serving alcoholic beverages.

Bisulphate

A sulphate in which but half the hydrogen of the acid is replaced by a positive element or radical, thus making the proportion of the acid to the positive or basic portion twice what it is in the normal sulphates; an acid sulphate.

Bisulphide

A sulphide having two atoms of sulphur in the molecule; a disulphide, as in iron pyrites, FeS2; -- less frequently called bisulphuret.

Bisulphite

A salt of sulphurous acid in which the base replaces but half the hydrogen of the acid; an acid sulphite.

Bit

3d sing. pr. of Bid, for biddeth.

Bitangent

Possessing the property of touching at two points. A line that touches a curve in two points.

Bitartrate

A salt of tartaric acid in which the base replaces but half the acid hydrogen; an acid tartrate, as cream of tartar.

Bitch

to complain in a whining or grumbling manner; to gripe.

bitching

an informal intensifier; as, we had a bitching good time.

bitchy

marked by or arising from malice.

Bite

The act of seizing with the teeth or mouth; the act of wounding or separating with the teeth or mouth; a seizure with the teeth or mouth, as of a bait; as, to give anything a hard bite.

Biter

One who, or that which, bites; that which bites often, or is inclined to bite, as a dog or fish.

Biternate

Doubly ternate, as when a petiole has three ternate leaflets.

Bitheism

Belief in the existence of two gods; dualism.

Biting

That bites; sharp; cutting; sarcastic; caustic.

Bito tree Bito

A small scrubby tree (Balanites /gyptiaca) growing in dry regions of tropical Africa and Asia.

Bitola

The second largest city of the Republic of Macedonia (the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia), population 84,002 (2000). It is also known as city of consuls. The city of Bitola is situated in Pelagonian flat, at the foot of Baba mountain. It was established by Slavs and it was given the slavic name Obitel - Bitola. It is assumed that the city got this name because of the many monasteries being built there. Later, during the rule of Turks, the Turks called it Monastir and it was a significant administrative and military center with 12 consulates. It managed to preserve the primacy of a leading city, especially in the XIX century when it rapidly grew to about 40.000 inhabitants. Bitola developed trading relations with Vienna, Paris, Leipzig, London and Thessalonika to the south. In that time Bitola exceeded Skopje, both in wealth and beauty. During World War II it was destroyed by heavy bombing. Bitola started to grow and develop economically only after liberation in 1945. See also Macedonia{2}.

Bitstock

A stock or handle for holding and rotating a bit; a brace.

Bitt

To put round the bitts; as, to bitt the cable, in order to fasten it or to slacken it gradually, which is called veering away.

Bitten

Terminating abruptly, as if bitten off; premorse.

bittercress

any of various herbs of the genus Cardamine, having usually pinnate leaves and racemes of white, pink or purple flowers; cosmopolitan except in the Antarctic.

Bittering

A bitter compound used in adulterating beer; bittern.

Bitterling

A roachlike European fish (Rhodima amarus).

Bittern

The brine which remains in salt works after the salt is concreted, having a bitter taste from the chloride of magnesium which it contains.

Bitterness

The quality or state of being bitter, sharp, or acrid, in either a literal or figurative sense; implacableness; resentfulness; severity; keenness of reproach or sarcasm; deep distress, grief, or vexation of mind.

Bitternut

The swamp hickory (Carya amara). Its thin-shelled nuts are bitter.

Bitterroot

A plant (Lewisia rediviva) allied to the purslane, but with fleshy, farinaceous roots, growing in the mountains of Idaho, Montana, etc. It gives the name to the Bitter Root mountains and river. The Indians call both the plant and the river Sp/t'lum.

Bitters

A liquor, generally spirituous in which a bitter herb, leaf, or root is steeped.

Bitterweed

A species of Ambrosia (Ambrosia artemisi/folia); Roman worm wood.

Bitterwood

A West Indian tree (Picr/na excelsa) from the wood of which the bitter drug Jamaica quassia is obtained.

Bitterwort

The yellow gentian (Gentiana lutea), which has a very bitter taste.

Bittock

A small bit of anything, of indefinite size or quantity; a short distance.

Bitts

A frame of two strong timbers fixed perpendicularly in the fore part of a ship, on which to fasten the cables as the ship rides at anchor, or in warping. Other bitts are used for belaying (belaying bitts), for sustaining the windlass (carrick bitts, winch bitts, or windlass bitts), to hold the pawls of the windlass (pawl bitts) etc.

Bitumen

Mineral pitch; a black, tarry substance, burning with a bright flame; Jew's pitch. It occurs as an abundant natural product in many places, as on the shores of the Dead and Caspian Seas. It is used in cements, in the construction of pavements, etc. See Asphalt.

Bituminate

To treat or impregnate with bitumen; to cement with bitumen.

Bituminize

To prepare, treat, impregnate, or coat with bitumen.

Bituminous

Having the qualities of bitumen; compounded with bitumen; containing bitumen.

Biuret

A white, crystalline, nitrogenous substance, C2O2N3H5, formed by heating urea. It is intermediate between urea and cyanuric acid.

Bivalent

Equivalent in combining or displacing power to two atoms of hydrogen; dyad.

Bivalve

Having two shells or valves which open and shut, as the oyster and certain seed vessels.

Bivalved

Having two valves, as the oyster and some seed pods; bivalve.

Bivector

A term made up of the two parts / + /1 /-1, where / and /1 are vectors.

Biventral

Having two bellies or protuberances; as, a biventral, or digastric, muscle, or the biventral lobe of the cerebellum.

Bivial

Of or relating to the bivium.

Bivious

Having, or leading, two ways.

Bivium

One side of an echinoderm, including a pair of ambulacra, in distinction from the opposite side (trivium), which includes three ambulacra.

Bivouac

To watch at night or be on guard, as a whole army. To encamp for the night without tents or covering.

Biweekly

Occurring or appearing once every two weeks; fortnightly. A publication issued every two weeks.

Bizarre

Odd in manner or appearance; fantastic; whimsical; extravagant; grotesque.

bize

a dry cold north wind in southeastern France.

Bizet

The upper faceted portion of a brilliant-cut diamond, which projects from the setting and occupies the zone between the girdle and the table. See Brilliant, n.

bizonal

relating to or concerned with the combined affairs of two administrative zones.

Bk

the chemical symbol for berkelium.

Blab

One who blabs; a babbler; a telltale.

Blabber

one who blabr; a tattler; a telltale.

blabby

same as blabbermouthed 1.

Blaberus

a genus of insects consisting of giant cockroaches.

Black

That which is destitute of light or whiteness; the darkest color, or rather a destitution of all color; as, a cloth has a good black.

black and blue

the dark color of a bruise in the flesh, which is accompanied with a mixture of blue.

black and white black-and-white

depicted only in black and white colors, or in shades of gray; also called monochromatic and monochrome; -- of images. Opposite of color or in color, and contrasting with polychrome technicolor three-color; as, a black-and-white TV; black-and-white film; the movie /Schindler's List/ was shot in black and white.

Black belt

a comedy that treats of morbid, tragic, gloomy, or grotesque situations as a major element of the plot.

Black box

any electronic instrument or part of an instrument whose function is defined, but which is treated as a unit without consideration of the internal mechanisms; broadly, any device whose internal workings are considered as incomprehensible or mysterious by the user; as, to treat the meter as a black box and take its readings on faith.

Black comedy

a comedy that treats of morbid, tragic, gloomy, or grotesque situations as a major element of the plot.

black lung disease black lung

the popular name for a form of the chronic lung disease pneumoconiosis which is observed among coal miners, and is caused by the inhalation of coal dust. It is thus named because of the black appearance of the lungs (pneumomelanosis) of those affected with the disease. See also the related condition anthracosis.

black market

the illicit buying and selling of goods, in violation of price controls, rationing, tax laws, prohibition of sale, etc.

black out

to cause to become black, such as a stage, a computer screen, or a city.

Black-browed

Having black eyebrows. Hence: Gloomy; dismal; threatening; forbidding.

Black-faced

Having a black, dark, or gloomy face or aspect.

Black-footed ferret

a weasellike mammal (Mustela nigripes) inhabiting the western North American prairie, having dark feet, a dark-tipped tail, and a dark face on a yellowish-brown coat. It is an endangered species.

black-hearted

Having a wicked, malignant disposition; morally bad.

Black-jack

A name given by English miners to sphalerite, or zinc blende; -- called also false galena. See Blende.

Black-letter

Written or printed in black letter; as, a black-letter manuscript or book.

black-tie

requiring semiformal evening clothes, e. g. a black bowtie and a tuxedo or dinner jacket for men, and a formal dress for women; contrasted with white-tie, for a fully formal occasion, and with informal, and casual.

Blackball

To vote against, by putting a black ball into a ballot box; to reject or exclude, as by voting against with black balls; to ostracize.

Blackband

An earthy carbonate of iron containing considerable carbonaceous matter; -- valuable as an iron ore.

Blackberry

The fruit of several species of bramble (Rubus); also, the plant itself. Rubus fruticosus is the blackberry of England; Rubus villosus and Rubus Canadensis are the high blackberry and low blackberry of the United States. There are also other kinds.

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