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Insect   /ˈɪnsˌɛkt/   Listen
noun
Insect  n.  
1.
(Zool.) One of the Insecta; esp., one of the Hexapoda. See Insecta. Note: The hexapod insects pass through three stages during their growth, viz., the larva, pupa, and imago or adult, but in some of the orders the larva differs little from the imago, except in lacking wings, and the active pupa is very much like the larva, except in having rudiments of wings. In the higher orders, the larva is usually a grub, maggot, or caterpillar, totally unlike the adult, while the pupa is very different from both larva and imago and is inactive, taking no food.
2.
(Zool.) Any air-breathing arthropod, as a spider or scorpion.
3.
(Zool.) Any small crustacean. In a wider sense, the word is often loosely applied to various small invertebrates.
4.
Fig.: Any small, trivial, or contemptible person or thing.
Insect powder,a powder used for the extermination of insects; esp., the powdered flowers of certain species of Pyrethrum, a genus now merged in Chrysanthemum. Called also Persian powder.



adjective
Insect  adj.  
1.
Of or pertaining to an insect or insects.
2.
Like an insect; small; mean; ephemeral.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Insect" Quotes from Famous Books



... out of their gold, and give them gin and smallpox in exchange. But, so soon as true servants of Heaven shall enter these Edens, and the Spirit of God enter with them, another spirit will also be breathed into the physical air; and the stinging insect, and venomous snake, and poisonous tree, pass away before the power ...
— Proserpina, Volume 2 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin

... dollars would have purchased everything in sight. The floor was bare, while the walls and ceiling were literally covered with blood marks and splotches. Each mark represented a violent death—of an insect, for the place swarmed with vermin, a plague with which no person could ...
— The People of the Abyss • Jack London

... places of which they told me, none captivated and charmed my imagination so much as the Coral Islands of the Southern Seas. They told me of thousands of beautiful fertile islands that had been formed by a small creature called the coral insect, where summer reigned nearly all the year round,—where the trees were laden with a constant harvest of luxuriant fruit,—where the climate was almost perpetually delightful,—yet where, strange to say, men were wild, bloodthirsty ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne

... earth came the scent of living growing things. The leaves of the great maples in the court-house grounds rustled in the spring breeze, there was the soft incessant hum of insect life, and over all the white wonderful moonlight. But he had no part in this universal renewal—he was to die his purposeless unheroic death in the morning. For himself he could almost believe he no longer cared; he had fully accepted the idea. He had even taken his farewell of the few in ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester

... such piercing sorrow mars The pewee's life of cheerful ease! He sings, or leaves his song to seize An insect sporting in the bars Of mild bright light that gild the trees. A very poet he! For him All pleasant places still and dim: His heart, a spark of heavenly fire, Burns with undying, sweet desire: And so he sings; and so his song, Though heard not by the hurrying throng, Is solace to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various


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