A

DICTIONARY

OF THE

ENGLISH LANGUAGE.

K A Y

1^ A letter borrowed by the English * from the Greek alphabet. It hasbefore all the vowels one invariablesound: as, keen, icen, kill. It is usedafter c at the end of words: as, knock,clack, crack, back, brick, stick, pluck,check, which were written ancientlywith e final: as, clocke, checke, tricke.It is also in use between a vowel andthe silent e final: as, cloke, broke, brake,pike, duke, eke. It likewise ends aword afteradiphthong: as, look, break,shook, leek. The English never usec at the end of a word. K is silent inthe present pronunciation before n: as,knife, knee, knell.

Ka'j.endar. n. s. [now written calendar .]An account of time.

Let this pernicious hour

Stand as accursed in the kalender. Shakesp. Mach.

Ka'li. n. s. [an Arabick word.] Seaweed,of the ashes of which glass was made;whence the word alkali.

The ashes of the weed kali are sold to the Vene-tians for their glass works. Bacon .

Kam. adj. Crooked. Kam, in Erse , issquint eyed, and applied to any thingawry: clean kam signifies crooked,athwart, awry, cross from the purpose.A-schembo, ItaE hence our English a-kimbo. Clean kam is, by vulgar pro-nunciation, brought to kim, kam.

This is clean kam; merely awry. Shakesp.

To Kaw. t>. n. [from the sound.] To cryas a raven, crow, or rook.

Jack-daws kawing and fluttering about thenests, set all their young ones a-gaping: buthaving nothing in their mouths hut air, leave themas hungry as before. Locke.

Kaw. n. s. [from the verb.] The cry ofa raven or crow. j

The dastard crow that to the wood made wing,With her loud kaws her craven kind doth bring,Who, safe ill numbers, cuff the noble bird. Dryd.

Kayle. n.s. [quille , Fr.]

1. Ninepin ; kettlepins, of which skittlesseems a corruption.

Vol. II.

K E D

And now at keels they try a harmless chance,And now their cur they teach to fetch and dance.

Sidney.

The residue of the time they wear out at coits,kayles, or the like idle exercises. Carew.

2. A kind of play still retained in Scot-land , in which nine holes ranged inthree’s are made in the ground, and aniron bullet rolled in among them.

To Keck. v. n. [kecken, Dut.] To heavethe stomach ; to reach at vomiting.

All those diets do dry up humours and rheums,which they first attenuate, and while the humouris attenuated it troubleth the body a great dealmore; and therefore patients must not keck atthem at the first. Bacon 's Nat. Hist .,

The faction, is it not notorious ? j

Keck at the memory of glorious. Swift. \

To Ke'ckle. v. a. To defend a cableround with rope. Ainsworth.

Ke'cksy. n. s. [commonly kex, cigur, Fr.cicuta, Lat. Skinner .] Skinner seemsto think kecksy or kex the same as hem-lock. It is used in Staffordshire bothfor hemlock, and any other hollow-jointed plant.

Nothing teems

But hateful docks, rough thistles,kechsies, burs,Losing both beauty and utility. Shak. Hen . V.

Ke'cky. adj. [from kex.] Resembling akex.

An Indian sceptre, made of a sort of cane, with-out any joint, and perfectly round, consisteth ofhard and blackish cylinders, mixed with a softkecky body ; so as at the end cut transversely, itlooks as a bundle of wires. Grew.

To Kedge. v. a. [kaghe, a small vessel,

Dut.]

In bringing a ship up or down a narrow river,when the wind is contrary to the tide, they set1 the foresail, or foretop-sail and mizen, and so lether drive with the tide. The sails are to flat herabout, if she comes too near the shore. They alsocarry out ail anchor in the head of the boat, witha hawser that comes from the ship; which anchor,if the ship comes too near the shore, they let fallin the stream, and so wind her head about it •then weigh the anchor again when she is about!which is called kedging, and from this use theanchor a kedger. Harris.

K E E

Ke'dger. n. s. [from hedge.] A smallanchor used in a river. See Kedge.

Kee. The provincial plural of cow, pro-perly kim.

A lass that Cic’ly hight had won his heart,Cic’ly the western lass that tends the kec. Gay.

Kedlack. n.s. A weed among corn;charnock. Tusser.

Keel. n. s. [ccele, Sax, kid, Dut. quille,Fr.] The bottom of the ship.

Portunus

Heav’d up his lighten’d keel, and sunk the sand,And steer’d the sacred vessel. Dry den.

Her sharp bill serves for a keel to cut the airbefore her, her tail she useth as her rudder. Grew.

Your cables burst, and you must quickly feelThe waves impetuous ent’ring at your keel. Swift.

Keels, the same with kayles; which see.

To Keel. v. a. [cselan, Sax .] This word,which is preserved in Shakespeare , Han-mer explains thus: To keel seems tomean to drink so deep, as to turn upthe bottom of the pot, like turning upthe keel of a ship.—In Ireland , to keelthe pot is to scum it.

While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. Shakesp.

Ke'elfat. n.s. [ccelan, Sax. to cool, andfat or vat a vessel.] Cooler; tub inwhich liquor is let to cool.

Ke elson, n. s. The next piece of timberin a ship to her keel, lying right over itnext above the floor timber. Harris.

To Ke'elhale. v. a. [keel and hale.] Topunish in the seamen’s way, by draggingthe criminal under water on one side ofthe ship and up again on the other.

Keen. adj. [cene, Sax . kuhn, Germkoen Dut.]

1. Sharp; well edged; not blunt. Wesay keen of an edge, and sharp eitherof edge or point.

I Come, thick night,

That my keen knife *ee not the wound it makes.

Shakesp

B

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