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Northwest Passage   /nˌɔrθwˈɛst pˈæsədʒ/   Listen
noun
Passage  n.  
1.
The act of passing; transit from one place to another; movement from point to point; a going by, over, across, or through; as, the passage of a man or a carriage; the passage of a ship or a bird; the passage of light; the passage of fluids through the pores or channels of the body. "What! are my doors opposed against my passage!"
2.
Transit by means of conveyance; journey, as by water, carriage, car, or the like; travel; right, liberty, or means, of passing; conveyance. "The ship in which he had taken passage."
3.
Price paid for the liberty to pass; fare; as, to pay one's passage.
4.
Removal from life; decease; departure; death. (R.) "Endure thy mortal passage." "When he is fit and season'd for his passage."
5.
Way; road; path; channel or course through or by which one passes; way of exit or entrance; way of access or transit. Hence, a common avenue to various apartments in a building; a hall; a corridor. "And with his pointed dart Explores the nearest passage to his heart." "The Persian army had advanced into the... passages of Cilicia."
6.
A continuous course, process, or progress; a connected or continuous series; as, the passage of time. "The conduct and passage of affairs." "The passage and whole carriage of this action."
7.
A separate part of a course, process, or series; an occurrence; an incident; an act or deed. "In thy passages of life." "The... almost incredible passage of their unbelief."
8.
A particular portion constituting a part of something continuous; esp., a portion of a book, speech, or musical composition; a paragraph; a clause. "How commentators each dark passage shun."
9.
Reception; currency. (Obs.)
10.
A pass or en encounter; as, a passage at arms. "No passages of love Betwixt us twain henceforward evermore."
11.
A movement or an evacuation of the bowels.
12.
In parliamentary proceedings:
(a)
The course of a proposition (bill, resolution, etc.) through the several stages of consideration and action; as, during its passage through Congress the bill was amended in both Houses.
(b)
The advancement of a bill or other proposition from one stage to another by an affirmative vote; esp., the final affirmative action of the body upon a proposition; hence, adoption; enactment; as, the passage of the bill to its third reading was delayed. "The passage of the Stamp Act." "The final question was then put upon its passage."
In passage, in passing; cursorily. "These... have been studied but in passage."
Middle passage, Northeast passage, Northwest passage. See under Middle, Northeast, etc.
Of passage, passing from one place, region, or climate, to another; migratory; said especially of birds. "Birds of passage."
Passage hawk, a hawk taken on its passage or migration.
Passage money, money paid for conveyance of a passenger, usually for carrying passengers by water.
Synonyms: Vestibule; hall; corridor. See Vestibule.


adjective
Northwest  adj.  
1.
Pertaining to, or in the direction of, the point between the north and west; being in the northwest; toward the northwest, or coming from the northwest; as, the northwest coast.
2.
Coming from the northwest; as, a northwest wind.
Northwest passage, a passage or communication by sea between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans along the north coast of America, long sought for by navigators.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Northwest passage" Quotes from Famous Books



... copies of a correspondence with the lady of Sir John Franklin, relative to the well-known expedition under his command to the arctic regions for the discovery of a northwest passage. On the receipt of her first letter imploring the aid of the American Government in a search for the missing ships engaged in an enterprise which interested all civilized nations, I anxiously sought the means of affording ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume - V, Part 1; Presidents Taylor and Fillmore • James D. Richardson
... a company of London merchants sent him to look for a northwest passage to China. These merchants knew that if such a passage could be found, the journey to China would be much shorter than by the overland route then used. It would take less time to sail around the earth ...
— Discoverers and Explorers • Edward R. Shaw
... Voyages made in search of the Northwest Passage. Explorations in the Arctic Zone by Lieut. DeHaven, Dr. Kane, Commodore Rodgers, Capt. Hall, Lieut. Schwatka and Lieut. DeLong; Wrangel Land as first reported by Capt. Long, and a brief account of the U.S. Expedition to the Antarctic seas under Capt. Wilkes. Compiled from official and ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Vol. II, No. 6, March, 1885 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... into error along this wretched causeway to heaven, I seem to be viewing Addison's bridge of human life, with its broken arches, at each of which thousands are falling through. This way to the "celestial city" ought to be called the "Northwest Passage"; it has one, and only one, trait of your Christian path: "there will be few that ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... embassador to her Majestie from Henry the Kinge of Portingale, tolde me here in London, the yere before his departure, that one Anus Corteriall, Capitaine of the Ile of Tercera, in the yere 1574. sente a shippe to discover the northwest passage, which, arryvinge on the coaste of America in 57. degrees of latitude, founde a greate entraunce very depe and broade, withoute impedimente of ise, into which they passed above xx leagues, and founde it alwayes to tende towardes the southe. The lande lay lowe and plaine on either side. They ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of - the English Nation. Vol. XIII. America. Part II. • Richard Hakluyt
... strait of Anian (for which name see Bancroft's History of Northwest Coast, i, pp. 53-56), was the supposed western terminus of the northwest passage, whose eastern terminus Cortereal was thought to have found in Hudson Strait. A kingdom marked Anian is shown On Ortelius's map (Theatrum orbis terrarum, Antwerp, 1574), with the strait just north of it, above 60 deg.. Both the kingdom and district are shown on ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVII, 1609-1616 • Various
... latitude to the shores of the Pacific Ocean. His objects were to ascertain the breadth of the continent at its broadest part, and to determine on some place on the shores of the Pacific, where government might establish a post to facilitate the discovery of a northwest passage, or a communication between Hudson's Bay and the Pacific Ocean. This place he presumed would be somewhere about the Straits of Annian, at which point he supposed the Oregon disembogued itself. It was his opinion, also, that a settlement on this extremity of America ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving
... Virginia, penetrating Delaware bay and river and sailing up that river crowned by the Palisades and the hights of the Catskills, honored with his name and whose waters bear the largest portion of the commercial wealth of our own country; still fascinated by the vision of a northwest passage that intrepid explorer penetrated into the waters of the unknown sea whose waves unseen dash along the coasts of Labrador from its westward to its northern shores and Cape Chudleigh. All these explorations he accomplished ...
— Bowdoin Boys in Labrador • Jonathan Prince (Jr.) Cilley


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