Emily Dickinson Lexicon

SEX'U-AL-LY, adv.

In a sexual manner.

SFOR-ZA'TO, a. [It.]

In music, a direction placed over a note, to signify to the performer that it must be struck with peculiar force.

SHAB, v.i.

To play mean tricks. In some parts of New England it signifies to reject or dismiss; as, a woman shabs her suitor. It is however very vulgar and nearly obsolete.

SHAB'BI-LY, adv. [from shabby.]

1. Raggedly; with rent or ragged clothes; as, to be clothed shabbily.
2. Meanly; in a despicable manner.

SHAB'BI-NESS, n.

1. Raggedness; as, the shabbiness of a garment.
2. Meanness; paltriness.

SHAB'BY, a. [D. schabbig; G. schäbig, from schaben, to rub, to shave, to scratch; schabe, a moth, a shaving tool, a scab. This is a different orthography of Scabby.]

1. Ragged; torn or worn to rags; as, a shabby coat; shabby clothes.
2. Clothed with ragged garments. The dean was so shabby. – Swift.
3. Mean; paltry; despicable; as, a shabby fellow; shabby treatment. – Clarendon. [For the idea expressed by shabby, there is not a better word in the language.]

SHAB'RACK, n. [Hungarian.]

The cloth furniture of the charger of a cavalry officer.

SHACK, n.

In ancient customs of England, a liberty of winter pasturage. In Norfolk and Suffolk, the lord of a manor has shack, that is, liberty of feeding his sheep at pleasure on his tenants' lands during the six winter months. In Norfolk, shack extends to the common for hogs, in all men's grounds, from harvest to seed-time; whence to go a-shack is to feed at large. – Cowel. Encyc. In New England, shack is used in a somewhat similar sense for mast or the food of swine, and for feeding at large or in the forest, [for we have no manors,] and I have heard a shiftless fellow, a low itinerant beggar, a vagabond, called a shack.

SHACK, v.i.

1. To shed, as corn at harvest. [Local.] – Grose.
2. To feed in stubble, or upon the waste corn of the field. [Local.] – Pegge.

SHACK'LE, n.

Stubble. [In Scotish, shag is the refuse of barley, or that which is not well filled, and is given to horses. The word shack then is probably from a root which signifies to break, to reject, or to waste, or it may be allied to shag and shake.]

SHACK'LE, or SHACK'LES, n. [generally used in the plural.]

1. Fetters, gyves, handcuffs, cords or something else that confines the limbs so as to restrain the use of them, or prevent free motion. – Dryden.
2. That which obstructs or embarrasses free action. His very will seems to be in bonds and shackles. – South.

SHACK'LE, v.t. [Sax. sceacul; D. schakel, a link or mesh; Sax. sceac-line, a rope to fasten the foot of a sail. Qu. the root שוך, Class Sg, No. 74. But we find the word perhaps in the Ar. شَكَالٌ from شَكَلَ shakala, to tie the feet of a beast or bird.]

1. To chain; to fetter; to tie or confine the limbs so as to prevent free motion. So the stretch'd cord the shackled dancer tries, / As prone to fall as impotent to rise. – Smith.
2. To bind or confine so as to obstruct or embarrass action. You must not shackle him with rules about indifferent matters. – Locke.

SHACK'LED, pp.

Tied; confined; embarrassed.

SHACK'LING, ppr.

Fettering; binding; confining.

SHAD, n. [It has no plural termination. Shad is singular or plural. G. schade. In W. ysgadan, Ir. sgadan, is a herring.]

A fish, a species of Clupea. Shad enter the rivers in England and America in the spring in immense numbers.

SHAD'DOCK, n. [The name of the man who first carried this fruit from the East to the West Indies.]

A large species of orange, Citrus decumana. – Ed. Encyc.

SHADE, n. [Sax. scad, scead, sced, shade; sceadan, to separate, divide or shade; G. schatten, shadow, and to shade; D. schaduw, schaduwen; Dan. skatterer, to shade a picture; W. ysgawd, a shade; ysgodi, to shade or shelter; cysgodi, id.; Corn. skod or skez; Ir. sgath, and sgatham, to cut off, to shade. The Gr. σκια is probably the same word contracted, and perhaps σκοτος, darkness. In the sense of cutting off or separating, this word coincides exactly, as it does in elements, with the G. scheiden, L. scindo, for scido, which is formed on cædo, to strike off. Hence Sax. gescead, distinction, L. scutum, a shield, Sp. escudo; that which cuts off or intercepts. Owen deduces the Welsh word from cawd, something that incloses; but probably the sense is that which cuts off or defends.]

1. Literally, the interception, cutting off or interruption of the rays of light; hence, the obscurity which is caused by such interception. Shade differs from shadow, as it implies no particular form or definite limit; whereas a shadow represents in form the object which intercepts the light. Hence, when we say, let us resort to the shade of a tree, we have no reference to its form; but when we speak of measuring a pyramid or other object by its shadow, we have reference to its extent.
2. Darkness; obscurity; as, the shades of night. The shade of the earth constitutes the darkness of night.
3. An obscure place, properly in a grove or close wood, which precludes the sun's rays; and hence, a secluded retreat. Let us seek out some desolate shade, and there / Weep our sad bosoms empty. – Wick.
4. A screen; something that intercepts light or heat.
5. Protection; shelter. [See Shadow.]
6. In painting, the dark part of a picture. – Dryden.
7. Degree or gradation of light. White, red, yellow, blue, with their several degrees or shades and mixtures, as green, come only in by the eyes. – Locke.
8. A shadow. [See Shadow.] Envy will merit, as its shade, pursue. – Pope. [This is allowable in poetry.]
9. The soul, after its separation from the body; so called because the ancients supposed it to be perceptible to the sight, not to the touch; a spirit; a ghost; as, the shades of departed heroes. Swift as thought the flitting shade. – Dryden.

SHADE, v.t. [Sax. sceadan, gesceadan, to separate, to divide, to shade.]

1. To shelter or screen from light by intercepting its rays; sail when applied to the rays of the sun, it signifies to shelter from light and heat; as, a large tree shades the plants under its branches; shaded vegetables rarely come to perfection. I went to crop the sylvan scenes, / And shade our altars with their leafy greens. – Dryden.
2. To overspread with darkness or obscurity; to obscure. Thou shad'st / The full blaze of thy beams. – Milton.
3. To shelter; to hide. Ere in our own house I do shade my bead. – Shak.
4. To cover from injury; to protect; to screen. – Milton.
5. To paint in obscure colors; to darken.
6. To mask with gradations of color; as, the shading pencil. – Milton.
7. To darken; to obscure.

SHAD-ED, pp.

Defended from the rays of the sun; darkened.

SHAD-ER, n.

He or that which shades.

SHADES, n. [plur.]

1. The lower region or place of the dead. Hence,
2. Deep obscurity; total darkness.

SHAD'FLY, n.

An insect.

SHAD'I-LY, adv.

Umbrageously.

SHAD-I-NESS, n. [from shady.]

The state of being shady; umbrageousness; as, the shadiness of the forest.

SHAD-ING, n.

The act or process of making a shade. – Scott.