Part 98

Belknap.

3. (Bot.) Having pistils and no stamens; pistillate; or, in cryptogamous plants, capable of receiving fertilization.

Female rhymes (Pros.), double rhymes, or rhymes (called in French feminine rhymes because they end in e weak, or feminine) in which two syllables, an accented and an unaccented one, correspond at the end of each line.

A rhyme, in which the final syllables only agree (strain, complain) is called a male rhyme; one in which the two final syllables of each verse agree, the last being short (motion, ocean), is called female. Brande & C.

-- Female screw, the spiral-threaded cavity into which another, or male, screw turns. Nicholson. -- Female fern (Bot.), a common species of fern with large decompound fronds (Asplenium FilixfÊmina), growing in many countries; lady fern.

The names male fern and female fern were anciently given to two common ferns; but it is now understood that neither has any sexual character.

Syn. -- Female, Feminine. We apply female to the sex or individual, as opposed to male; also, to the distinctive belongings of women; as, female dress, female form, female character, etc.; feminine, to things appropriate to, or affected by, women; as, feminine studies, employments, accomplishments, etc. "Female applies to sex rather than gender, and is a physiological rather than a grammatical term. Feminine applies to gender rather than sex, and is grammatical rather than physiological." Latham.

Fe"mal*ist (?), n. A gallant. [Obs.]

Courting her smoothly like a femalist.

Marston.

Fe"mal*ize (?), v. t. To make, or to describe as, female or feminine. Shaftesbury.

||Feme (fm or fm), n. [OF. feme, F. femme.] (Old Law) A woman. Burrill.

Feme covert (Law), a married woman. See Covert, a., 3. -- Feme sole (Law), a single or unmarried woman; a woman who has never been married, or who has been divorced, or whose husband is dead. -- Feme sole trader or merchant (Eng. Law), a married woman, who, by the custom of London, engages in business on her own account, inpendently of her husband.

Fem"er*al (?), n. (Arch.) See Femerell.

Fem"er*ell (?), n. [OF. fumeraille part of a chimney. See Fume.] (Arch.) A lantern, or louver covering, placed on a roof, for ventilation or escape of smoke.

Fem"i*nal (?), a. Feminine. [Obs.] West.

Fem`i*nal"i*ty (?), n. Feminity.

Fem"i*nate (?), a. [L. feminatus effeminate.] Feminine. [Obs.]

Fem`i*ne"i*ty (?), n. [L. femineus womanly.] Womanliness; femininity. C. Reade.

Fem"i*nine (?), a. [L. femininus, fr. femina woman; prob. akin to L. fetus, or to Gr. qh^sqai to suck, qh^sai to suckle, Skr. dh to suck; cf. AS. fmme woman, maid: cf. F. fÈminin. See Fetus.] 1. Of or pertaining to a woman, or to women; characteristic of a woman; womanish; womanly.

Her letters are remarkably deficient in feminine ease and grace.

Macaulay.

2. Having the qualities of a woman; becoming or appropriate to the female sex; as, in a good sense, modest, graceful, affectionate, confiding; or, in a bad sense, weak, nerveless, timid, pleasure-loving, effeminate.

Her heavenly form Angelic, but more soft and feminine.

Milton.

Ninus being esteemed no man of war at all, but altogether feminine, and subject to ease and delicacy.

Sir W. Raleigh.

Feminine rhyme. (Pros.) See Female rhyme, under Female, a.