BARNACLE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Barnacle

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/bˈɑrnəkəl/ Listen

noun

Barnacle n. (Zool.) Any cirriped crustacean adhering to rocks, floating timber, ships, etc., esp.

(a)

the sessile species (genus Balanus and allies), and

(b)

the stalked or goose barnacles (genus Lepas and allies). See Cirripedia, and Goose barnacle.

Barnacle eater (Zool.), the orange filefish.

Barnacle scale (Zool.), a bark louse (Ceroplastes cirripediformis) of the orange and quince trees in Florida. The female scale curiously resembles a sessile barnacle in form.

Barnacle n. A bernicle goose.

Barnacle n.

pl. (Far.) An instrument for pinching a horse's nose, and thus restraining him. Note: (Formerly used in the sing.) "The barnacles... give pain almost equal to that of the switch."

pl. Spectacles; so called from their resemblance to the barnacles used by farriers. (Cant, Eng.)

Bernicle n. (Written also barnacle) A bernicle goose.

Bernicle goose (Zool.), a goose (Branta leucopsis), of Arctic Europe and America. It was formerly believed that it hatched from the cirripeds of the sea (Lepas), which were, therefore, called barnacles, goose barnacles, or Anatifers. The name is also applied to other related species. See Anatifa and Cirripedia.

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Etymology of 'Barnacle'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Barnacle" Quotes from Famous Books

... of univalves are wanderers, many bivalves are free, and multivalves become fixed at an early stage of existence. The goose-necked barnacle, with its five valves, comes in its myriads attached to derelict coco-nuts, floating logs, and pumice-stone. The species owes its name to the fabulous belief that it was the preliminary state of the barnacle goose of the Arctic regions, the filaments representing the plumage and the valves ...

— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield

... when I put this view of the matter to him I did not get much sympathy. He was a practical young man, without a stitch of romance in his whole make-up, and he only laughed at my suggestion and said that anybody who tried to push into that mess just for the sake of seeing some barnacle-covered logs, or perhaps a rotting hulk or two, would be a good deal of a fool. And so I did not press my fancy on him, and our talks went on about ...

— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier

... than afore, for he saw na fische in it bot ane perfit schapin foule. This clerk, knawin us richt desirous of sic uncouth thingis, came haistely, and opinit it iwith all circumstance afore rehersit." So far the venerable "Chanon of Aberdene." The West Highlanders still believe in the barnacle origin of ...

— Notes and Queries 1850.03.23 • Various

... Madagascar had not come within my purview; its distance had not "lent enchantment to the view." I gave it some thought, but could not perceive that I had been so annoyingly persistent to merit a response from the President, not unlike that given by Mr. Blaine to one Mr. Tite Barnacle, who was willing to compromise on a foreign appointment. "Certainly," was the reply; the "foreigner the better." I concluded, however, that the bard may have been right when he wrote "There is a destiny that shapes our ends," for it often happens that what a man desires is just what he ought ...

— Shadow and Light - An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century • Mifflin Wistar Gibbs

... interesting to see how each living thing bears about in its body the story of its degradation, or the history of its rise and exaltation. Even in things that creep and crawl, the whole life-history is swept together in the animal body. The ship barnacle began its career with two splendid eyes. But it used its vision to find an easy place upon the side of pier or ship. Giving up locomotion, it grew sleek and fat, and finally its big eyes grew dull through ...

— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis

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