Emily Dickinson Lexicon

LAB'OR-A-TO-RY, n. [Fr. laboratoire, from labor.]

1. A house or place where operations and experiments in chimistry, pharmacy, pyrotechny, &c., are performed.
2. A place where arms are manufactured or repaired, or fireworks prepared; as, the laboratory in Springfield, in Massachusetts.
3. A place where work is performed, or any thing is prepared for use. Hence the stomach is called the grand laboratory of the human body; the liver, the laboratory of the bile.