Part 275

Pilch (?), n. [AS. pylce, pylece, LL. pellicia. See Pelisse, and Pelt skin.] A gown or case of skin, or one trimmed or lined with fur. [Obs.]

Pil"chard (?), n. [Cf. It. pilseir, W. pilcod minnows.] (Zoˆl.) A small European food fish (Clupea pilchardus) resembling the herring, but thicker and rounder. It is sometimes taken in great numbers on the coast of England.

Fools are as like husbands as pilchards are to herrings.

Shak.

Pilch"er (?), n. [From Pilch.] A scabbard, as of a sword. [Obs.] Shak.

Pilch"er, n. (Zoˆl.) The pilchard.

Pil"crow (?), n. [A corruption of Paragraph.] (Print.) a paragraph mark, ∂. [Obs.] Tusser.

Pile (?), n. [L. pilus hair. Cf. Peruke.] 1. A hair; hence, the fiber of wool, cotton, and the like; also, the nap when thick or heavy, as of carpeting and velvet.

Velvet soft, or plush with shaggy pile.

Cowper.

2. (Zoˆl.) A covering of hair or fur.

Pile, n. [L. pilum javelin. See Pile a stake.] The head of an arrow or spear. [Obs.] Chapman.

Pile, n. [AS. pl arrow, stake, L. pilum javelin; but cf. also L. pila pillar.] 1. A large stake, or piece of timber, pointed and driven into the earth, as at the bottom of a river, or in a harbor where the ground is soft, for the support of a building, a pier, or other superstructure, or to form a cofferdam, etc.

Tubular iron piles are now much used.

2. [Cf. F. pile.] (Her.) One of the ordinaries or subordinaries having the form of a wedge, usually placed palewise, with the broadest end uppermost.

Pile bridge, a bridge of which the roadway is supported on piles. -- Pile cap, a beam resting upon and connecting the heads of piles. -- Pile driver, or Pile engine, an apparatus for driving down piles, consisting usually of a high frame, with suitable appliances for raising to a height (by animal or steam power, the explosion of gunpowder, etc.) a heavy mass of iron, which falls upon the pile. -- Pile dwelling. See Lake dwelling, under Lake. -- Pile plank (Hydraul. Eng.), a thick plank used as a pile in sheet piling. See Sheet piling, under Piling. -- Pneumatic pile. See under Pneumatic. -- Screw pile, one with a screw at the lower end, and sunk by rotation aided by pressure.

Pile, v. t. To drive piles into; to fill with piles; to strengthen with piles.

To sheet-pile, to make sheet piling in or around. See Sheet piling, under 2nd Piling.

Pile, n. [F. pile, L. pila a pillar, a pier or mole of stone. Cf. Pillar.] 1. A mass of things heaped together; a heap; as, a pile of stones; a pile of wood.

2. A mass formed in layers; as, a pile of shot.

3. A funeral pile; a pyre. Dryden.

4. A large building, or mass of buildings.

The pile o'erlooked the town and drew the fight.

Dryden.

5. (Iron Manuf.) Same as Fagot, n., 2.

6. (Elec.) A vertical series of alternate disks of two dissimilar metals, as copper and zinc, laid up with disks of cloth or paper moistened with acid water between them, for producing a current of electricity; -- commonly called Volta's pile, voltaic pile, or galvanic pile.

The term is sometimes applied to other forms of apparatus designed to produce a current of electricity, or as synonymous with battery; as, for instance, to an apparatus for generating a current of electricity by the action of heat, usually called a thermopile.

7. [F. pile pile, an engraved die, L. pila a pillar.] The reverse of a coin. See Reverse.