SPRUCE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Spruce

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noun

Spruce n.

1.

(Bot.) Any coniferous tree of the genus Picea, as the Norway spruce (Picea excelsa), and the white and black spruces of America (Picea alba and Picea nigra), besides several others in the far Northwest. See Picea.

2.

The wood or timber of the spruce tree.

3.

Prussia leather; pruce. (Obs.) "Spruce, a sort of leather corruptly so called for Prussia leather."

Douglas spruce (Bot.), a valuable timber tree (Pseudotsuga Douglasii) of Northwestern America.

Essence of spruce, a thick, dark-colored, bitterish, and acidulous liquid made by evaporating a decoction of the young branches of spruce.

Hemlock spruce (Bot.), a graceful coniferous tree (Tsuga Canadensis) of North America. Its timber is valuable, and the bark is largely used in tanning leather.

Spruce beer. A kind of beer which is tinctured or flavored with spruce, either by means of the extract or by decoction.

Spruce grouse. (Zool.) Same as Spruce partridge, below.

Spruce leather. See Spruce, n., 3.

Spruce partridge (Zool.), a handsome American grouse (Dendragapus Canadensis) found in Canada and the Northern United States; called also Canada grouse.

verb

Spruce v. t. (past & past part. spruced; pres. part. sprucing) To dress with affected neatness; to trim; to make spruce; often used with up; as, to spruce up the house for Company.

Spruce v. i. To dress one's self with affected neatness; as, to spruce up.

adjective

Spruce adj. (compar. sprucer; superl. sprucest)

1.

Neat, without elegance or dignity; smart; trim; formerly applied to things with a serious meaning; now chiefly applied to persons. "Neat and spruce array."

2.

Sprightly; dashing. (Obs.) "Now, my spruce companions." "He is so spruce that he can never be genteel."

Synonyms: Finical; neat; trim. See Finical.

See images of 'Spruce'

Etymology of 'Spruce'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Spruce" Quotes from Famous Books

... into slate again, and the night had come. It was but twenty-four hours since they had sat in their canvas chairs discussing politics by starlight on the saloon deck of the Korosko; only twelve since they had breakfasted there and had started spruce and fresh upon their last pleasure trip. What a world of fresh impressions had come upon them since then! How rudely they had been jostled out of their take-it-for-granted complacency! The same shimmering ...

— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle

... to our ornamental plantings, and aid in enriching the winter coloring. The Austrian pine and the Scotch pine are welcome additions to our own pine family. In these days of economic chemistry and a deficient rag supply, every reader of these words is probably in close proximity to an important spruce product—paper. The manufacturers say, with hand on heart, that they do not use much wood pulp, but when one has passed a great paper-mill flanked on all sides by piles of spruce logs, with no bales of rags in sight anywhere, he is tempted to think otherwise! Modern forestry ...

— Getting Acquainted with the Trees • J. Horace McFarland

... him acrost the flat, with their tongues out; so he soopled himself up a bit with a few jumps and made for that there big down spruce. He lands on the trunk and runs along it to where the top begins. He has it all worked out. He's saying: "If this here is a joke, all right; but if it ain't a joke I better have some place back of me ...

— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... to see her for a moment! To leave my work and go without food was the least of it! I must traverse the streets of Paris without getting splashed, run to escape showers, and reach her rooms at last, as neat and spruce as any of the coxcombs about her. For a poet and a distracted wooer the difficulties of this task were endless. My happiness, the course of my love, might be affected by a speck of mud upon my only white waistcoat! ...

— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac

... so snug and homelike. She paused before she came to the door, to watch the smoke curling up from the chimney straight as a column, for there was not a breath of air stirring. The sun was almost gone, and the strong bluish light was settling on everything, giving even the green spruce-trees a ...

— Northern Lights • Gilbert Parker

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