n. [ L., fr. abigere to drive away; ab + agere to drive. ] (Law) One who steals and drives away cattle or beasts by herds or droves. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L. actor, fr. agere to act. ] 1. One who acts, or takes part in any affair; a doer. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A theatrical performer; a stageplayer. [ 1913 Webster ]

After a well graced actor leaves the stage. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. (Law) (a) An advocate or proctor in civil courts or causes. Jacobs. (b) One who institutes a suit; plaintiff or complainant. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. One who, or that which, attracts. Sir T. Browne [ 1913 Webster ]

pos>n. [ L. ] One who confers a benefit or benefits. Bacon. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. an apparatus in which a suspension of microorganisms in a liquid are used to perform chemical reactions, as in synthesis of pharmaceutical agents or the conversion of harmful waste to less harmful substances. The reactor consists of a vessel to contain the suspension of microorganisms, plus a variety of attached devices used to control the reaction. [ PJC ]

n. A heater; one who, or that which, makes hot, as a stove, etc. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ L. calefactorius. ] Making hot; producing or communicating heat. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. (Eccl.) An apartment in a monastery, warmed and used as a sitting room. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A hollow sphere of metal, filled with hot water, or a chafing dish, placed on the altar in cold weather for the priest to warm his hands with. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. a therapist who practics chiropractic. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

adj. producing or converting into chyle.
Syn. -- chylific, chylifactive. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. [ L. ] One who contracts; one of the parties to a bargain; one who covenants to do anything for another; specifically, one who contracts to perform work on a rather large scale, at a certain price or rate, as in building houses or making a railroad. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L.: cf. F. détracteur. ] One who detracts; a derogator; a defamer. [ 1913 Webster ]

His detractors were noisy and scurrilous. Macaulay.

Syn. -- Slanderer; calumniator; defamer; vilifier. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Defamatory by denial of desert; derogatory; calumnious. Sir T. Browne. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Causing dissatisfaction; unable to give content; unsatisfactory; displeasing. [ 1913 Webster ]

To have reduced the different qualifications in the different States to one uniform rule, would probably have been as dissatisfactory to some of the States, as difficult for the Convention. A. Hamilton.

-- Dis*sat`is*fac"to*ri*ness n. [1913 Webster]

n. One who enacts a law; one who decrees or establishes as a law. Atterbury. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L.: cf. F. exacteur. ] One who exacts or demands by authority or right; hence, an extortioner; also, one unreasonably severe in injunctions or demands. Jer. Taylor. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ L. excalfactorius. ] Heating; warming. [ Obs. ] Holland. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. One who, or that which, extracts; as: (a) (Surg.) A forceps or instrument for extracting substances. (b) (Breech-loading Firearms) A device for withdrawing a cartridge or spent cartridge shell from the chamber of the barrel. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A centrifugal drying machine. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

3. (Apiculture) A machine for clearing combs of honey; also, a device for rendering wax. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

n. [ L. factor a doer: cf. F. facteur a factor. See Fact. ] 1. (Law) One who transacts business for another; an agent; a substitute; especially, a mercantile agent who buys and sells goods and transacts business for others in commission; a commission merchant or consignee. He may be a home factor or a foreign factor. He may buy and sell in his own name, and he is intrusted with the possession and control of the goods; and in these respects he differs from a broker. Story. Wharton. [ 1913 Webster ]

My factor sends me word, a merchant's fled
That owes me for a hundred tun of wine. Marlowe. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A steward or bailiff of an estate. [ Scot. ] Sir W. Scott. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. (Math.) One of the elements or quantities which, when multiplied together, form a product. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. One of the elements, circumstances, or influences which contribute to produce a result; a constituent; a contributory cause. [ 1913 Webster +PJC ]

The materal and dynamical factors of nutrition. H. Spencer. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. [ imp. & p. p. Factored p. pr. & vb. n. Factoring. ] (Mach.) To resolve (a quantity) into its factors. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ Cf. F. factorage. ] The allowance given to a factor, as a compensation for his services; -- called also a commission. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A factor who is a woman. [ R. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

a. 1. Of or pertaining to a factory. Buchanan. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. (Math.) Related to factorials. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. (Math.) (a) pl. A name given to the factors of a continued product when the former are derivable from one and the same function F(x) by successively imparting a constant increment or decrement h to the independent variable. Thus the product F(x).F(x + h).F(x + 2h) . . . F[ x + (n-1)h ] is called a factorial term, and its several factors take the name of factorials. Brande & C.

(b) The product of the consecutive whole numbers from unity up to any given number; thus, 5 factorial is the product of 5 times four times three times two times one, or 120. [ 1913 Webster +PJC ]

n. (Math.) The act of resolving into factors. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. 1. to resolve into factors, as of a polynomial; same as factorize. [ mostly Brit. ]
Syn. -- factorize. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

v. t. [ imp. & p. p. Factorized p. pr. & vb. n. Factorizing ] 1. (Law) (a) To give warning to; -- said of a person in whose hands the effects of another are attached, the warning being to the effect that he shall not pay the money or deliver the property of the defendant in his hands to him, but appear and answer the suit of the plaintiff. (b) To attach (the effects of a debtor) in the hands of a third person; to garnish. See Garnish. [ Vt. & Conn. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

2. (Math.) to resolve (a complex expression, such as a polynomial) into factors.
Syn. -- factorise. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. The business of a factor. [ 1913 Webster ]

n.; pl. Factories [ Cf. F. factorerie. ] 1. A house or place where factors, or commercial agents, reside, to transact business for their employers. “The Company's factory at Madras.” Burke. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. The body of factors in any place; as, a chaplain to a British factory. W. Guthrie. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. A building, or collection of buildings, appropriated to the manufacture of goods; the place where workmen are employed in fabricating goods, wares, or utensils; a manufactory; as, a cotton factory. [ 1913 Webster ]

Factory leg (Med.), a variety of bandy leg, associated with partial dislocation of the tibia, produced in young children by working in factories. [ 1913 Webster ]

adj. made in a factory. Contrasted with homemade. [ Narrower terms: boughten, store-bought ; mass-produced ] [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. a term or factor inserted into a calculation to compensate for anticipated errors, or to arbitrarily make the result conform to some desired conclusion. [ PJC ]

n. [ Hydro-, 1 + extractor. ] An apparatus for drying anything, as yarn, cloth, sugar, etc., by centrifugal force; a centrifugal. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ Cf. F. infracteur. ] One who infracts or infringes; a violator; a breaker. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Lactiferous. [ Obs. ] “Lactory or milky plants.” Sir T. Browne. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L., fr. malefacere to do evil; male ill, evil + facere to do. See Malice, and Fact. ] 1. An evil doer; one who commits a crime; one subject to public prosecution and punishment; a criminal. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. One who does wrong by injuring another, although not a criminal. Opposite of benefactor. H. Brooke. Fuller.
“Malefactors of great wealth.” [ 1913 Webster +PJC ]

Syn. -- Evil doer; criminal; culprit; felon; convict. [ 1913 Webster ]

n.; pl. -ries [ Cf. L. factorium an oil press, properly, place where something is made. See Manufacture. ] 1. Manufacture. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A building or place where anything is manufactured; a factory. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Pertaining to manufacturing. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. (phys.) Any of several devices that maintain and control a sustained nuclear fission chain reaction, for the production of energy, heat, or artificial elements, or for research purposes. The main fuel sustaining the reaction and consumed by the process is typically uranium or plutonium. Syn. -- reactor, atomic pile, fission reactor, nuclear pile [ WordNet 1.5 +PJC ]

n. A smelling organ; a nose. [ R. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ L. olfactus, p. p. of olfacere to smell; olere to have a smell + facere to make. See Odor, and Fact. ] (Physiol.) Of, pertaining to, or connected with, the sense of smell; as, the olfactory nerves; the olfactory cells. [ 1913 Webster ]

Olfactory organ (Anat.), an organ for smelling. In vertebrates the olfactory organs are more or less complicated sacs, situated in the front part of the head and lined with epithelium innervated by the olfactory (or first cranial) nerves, and sensitive to odoriferous particles conveyed to it in the air or in water. [ 1913 Webster ]

n.; pl. Olfactories An olfactory organ; also, the sense of smell; -- usually in the plural. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. One who, or that which, protracts, or causes protraction. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A mathematical instrument for laying down and measuring angles on paper, used in drawing or in plotting. It is of various forms, semicircular, rectangular, or circular. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. (Surg.) An instrument formerly used in extracting foreign or offensive matter from a wound. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. (Anat.) A muscle which extends an organ or part; -- opposed to retractor. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. An adjustable pattern used by tailors. Knight. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. (Elec.) A choking coil. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

2. A nuclear reactor. [ PJC ]

n. One who redacts; one who prepares matter for publication; an editor. Carlyle. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. Anything that refracts; specifically: (Opt.) A refracting telescope, in which the image to be viewed is formed by the refraction of light in passing through a convex lens. [ 1913 Webster ]

adv. In a refractory manner; perversely; obstinately. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. The quality or condition of being refractory. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ L. refractorius, fr. refringere: cf. F. refractaire. See Refract. ] 1. Obstinate in disobedience; contumacious; stubborn; unmanageable; as, a refractory child; a refractory beast. [ 1913 Webster ]

Raging appetites that are
Most disobedient and refractory. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Resisting ordinary treatment; difficult of fusion, reduction, or the like; -- said especially of metals and the like, which do not readily yield to heat, or to the hammer; as, a refractory ore. [ 1913 Webster ]

Syn. -- Perverse; contumacious; unruly; stubborn; obstinate; unyielding; ungovernable; unmanageable. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. A refractory person. Bp. Hall. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Refractoriness. [ Obs. ] Jer. TAylor. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. OPottery) A piece of ware covered with a vaporable flux and placed in a kiln, to communicate a glaze to the other articles. Knight. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. One who, or that which, retracts. Specifically: (a) In breech-loading firearms, a device for withdrawing a cartridge shell from the barrel. (b) (Surg.) An instrument for holding apart the edges of a wound during amputation. (c) (Surg.) A bandage to protect the soft parts from injury by the saw during amputation. (d) (Anat. & Zool.) A muscle serving to draw in any organ or part. See Illust. under Phylactolaemata. [ 1913 Webster ]