Emily Dickinson Lexicon

FAF'FEL, v.i.

To stammer. [Not in use.] Barret.

FAG, n.

A slave; one who works hard. [Not in use.]

FAG, n.

A knot in cloth. [Not in use.]

FAG, v.i. [Scot. faik. Qu. Heb. Ch. Syr. פוג, to fail, to languish. See Class Bg, No. 44, 60, 76.]

To become weary; to fail in strength; to be faint with weariness. The Italians began to fag. Mackenzie. [A vulgar word.]

FAG, v.t.

To beat. [Not in use.]

FAG-END', a. [fag and end. See Fag, v. i. supra.]

1. The end of a web of cloth, generally of coarser materials. Johnson.
2. The refuse or meaner part of any thing. Collier.
3. Among seamen, the untwisted end of a rope; hence, to fag out, is to become untwisted and loose. Mar. Dict. We observe that the use of this word among seamen leads to the true sense of the verb, as well as the noun. The sense is, to open by receding, or to yield and become lax, and hence weak.

FAG'GOT, n. [W. fagod; Gr. φακελλος, connected with W. fag, that which unites or meets; fagiad, a gathering round a point; Scot. faik, to fold, to grasp; fake, in seamen's language, a coil; allied to Sax. fægan, gefegan, to unite. See Fadge. The sense is a bundle or collection, like pack.]

1. A bundle of sticks, twigs or small branches of trees, used for fuel, or for raising batteries, filling ditches, and other purposes in fortification. The French use fascine, from the L. fascis, a bundle; a term now adopted in English.
2. A person hired to appear at musters in a company not full and hide the deficiency. Encyc.

FAG'OT, v.t.

To tie together; to bind in a bundle; to collect promiscuously. Dryden.

FAG'OT-ED, pp.

Bound together; tied in bundles.

FAG'OT-ING, ppr.

Binding together.

FAH'LERZ, n.

Gray copper, or gray copper ore, called by Jameson tetrahedral copper pyrite. This mineral is easily broken, and its fracture usually uneven, but sometimes little conchoidal. It is found amorphous and in regular crystals. Cleaveland.

FAH'LUN-ITE, n. [from Fahlun in Sweden.]

A mineral of a greenish color, occurring in six-sided prisms.

FAIL, n.

1. Omission; non-performance. He will without fail drive out from before you the Canaanites. Josh. iii.
2. Miscarriage; failure; deficiency; want; death. [In this sense little used.]

FAIL, v.i. [Fr. faillir. W. faelu, or pallu and aballu; Scot. failye; It. fallire; Sp. falir, faltar; Port. falhar; L. fallo. Ir. feallam; Gr. φηλεω, φηλοω, whence σφαλλω; D. feilen, faalen; G. fehlen; Sw. fela; Dan. fejler; Arm. fallaat, fellel, whence falloni, wickedness, Eng. felony. It seems to be allied to fall, fallow, pale, and many other words. See Class Bl, No. 6, 7, 8, 13, 18, 21, 28.]

1. To become deficient; to be insufficient; to cease to be abundant for supply; or to be entirely wanting. We say, in a dry season, the springs and streams fail, or are failing, before they are entirely exhausted. We say also, the springs failed, when they entirely ceased to flow. Crops fail wholly or partially.
2. To decay; to decline; to sink; to be diminished. We say of a sick person, his strength fails daily.
3. To decline; to decay; sink; to become weaker; as, the patient fails every hour.
4. To be extinct; to cease; to be entirely wanting; to be no longer produced. Help, Lord, for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men. Ps. xii.
5. To be entirely exhausted; to be wanting; to cease from supply. Money failed in the land of Egypt. Gen. xlvii.
6. To cease; to perish; to be lost. Lest the remembrance of his grief should fail. Addison.
7. To die. They shall all fail together. Is. xxxi.
8. To decay; to decline; as, the sight fails in old age.
9. To become deficient or wanting; as, the heart or the courage fails.
10. To miss; not to produce the effect. The experiment was made with care, but failed, or failed to produce the effect, or failed of the effect.
11. To be deficient in duty; to omit or neglect. The debtor failed to fulfill his promise. .
12. To miss; to miscarry; to be frustrated or disappointed. The enemy attacked the fort, but failed in his design, or failed of success.
13. To be neglected; to fall short; not to be executed. The promises of a man of probity seldom fail. The soul or the spirit fails, when a person is discouraged. The eyes fail, when the desires and expectations are long delayed, and the person is disappointed.
14. To become insolvent or bankrupt. When merchants and traders fail, they are said to become bankrupt. When other men fail, they are said to become insolvent.

FAIL, v.t.

1. To desert; disappoint; to cease or to neglect or omit to afford aid, supply or strength. It is said, fortune never fails the brave. Our friends sometimes fail us, when we most need them. The aged attempt to walk, when their limbs fail them. In bold enterprises, courage should never fail the hero.
2. To omit; not to perform. The inventive God, who never fails his part. Dryden.
3. To be wanting to. There shall never fail thee a man on the throne. 1 Kings ii. [In the transitive use of this verb, there is really an ellipsis of from or to, or other word. In strictness, the verb is not transitive, and the passive participle is, I believe, never used.]

FAIL'ANCE, n.

Fault; failure. [Obs.]

FAIL'ED, pp. [of fail.]

Become deficient; having ceased.

FAIL'ING, n.

1. The act of failing; deficiency; imperfection; lapse; fault. Failings, in a moral sense, are minor faults, proceeding rather from weakness of intellect or from carelessness, than from bad motives. But the word is often abusively applied to vices of the grosser kind.
2. The act of failing or becoming insolvent.

FAIL'ING, ppr.

Becoming deficient or insufficient; becoming weaker; decaying; declining; omitting; not executing, or performing; miscarrying; neglecting; wanting; becoming bankrupt or insolvent.

FAIL'ING-LY, adv.

By failing.

FAIL'URE, n. [fa'ilyur.]

1. A failing; deficience; cessation of a supply, or total defect; as, the failure of springs or streams; failure of rain; failure of crops.
2. Omission; non-performance; as, the failure of a promise; a man's failure in the execution of a trust.
3. Decay, or defect from decay; as, the failure of memory or of sight.
4. A breaking, or becoming insolvent. At the close of a war, the prices of commodities fall, and innumerable failures succeed.
5. A failing; a slight fault. [Little used.]

FAIN, a. [Sax. fagen, fægan, glad; fagnian, Goth. faginon, to rejoice; Sw. fägen. Class Bg, No. 3, 43, 77.]

Glad; pleased; rejoiced. But the appropriate sense of the word is glad or pleased to do something under some kind of necessity; that is, glad to evade evil or secure good. Thus, says Locke, "The learned Castalio was fain to make trenches at Basil, to keep himself from starving." This appropriation of the word, which is modern, led Dr. Johnson into a mistake in defining the word. The proper signification is glad, joyful.

FAIN, adv.

Gladly; with joy or pleasure. He would fain flee out of his hand. Job xxvii. He would fain have filled his belly with husks. Luke xv.

FAIN, v.i.

To wish or desire. [Not used.]

FAIN'ING, ppr.

Wishing; desiring fondly. In his faining eye. Spenser.