2. (Univ. of Cambridge, Eng.) An allowance of food and drink
from the buttery, aside from the regular dinner at
commons; -- corresponding to battel at Oxford.
3. Extent of superficies or volume; bulk; bigness; magnitude;
as, the size of a tree or of a mast; the size of a ship or
of a rock.
4. Figurative bulk; condition as to rank, ability, character,
etc.; as, the office demands a man of larger size.
Men of a less size and quality. --L'Estrange.
The middling or lower size of people. --Swift.
5. A conventional relative measure of dimension, as for
shoes, gloves, and other articles made up for sale.
6. An instrument consisting of a number of perforated gauges
fastened together at one end by a rivet, -- used for
ascertaining the size of pearls. --Knight.
{Size roll}, a small piese of parchment added to a roll.
{Size stick}, a measuring stick used by shoemakers for
ascertaining the size of the foot.
Syn: Dimension; bigness; largeness; greatness; magnitude.
Our desires give them fashion, and so, As they wax
lesser, fall, as they size, grow. --Donne.
2. (Univ. of Cambridge, Eng.) To order food or drink from the
buttery; hence, to enter a score, as upon the buttery
book.
2. Any viscous substance, as gilder's varnish.
2. To adjust or arrange according to size or bulk.
Specifically:
(a) (Mil.) To take the height of men, in order to place
them in the ranks according to their stature.
(b) (Mining) To sift, as pieces of ore or metal, in order
to separate the finer from the coarser parts.
3. To swell; to increase the bulk of. --Beau. & Fl.
4. (Mech.) To bring or adjust anything exactly to a required
dimension, as by cutting.
{To size up}, to estimate or ascertain the character and
ability of. See 4th {Size}, 4. [Slang, U.S.]
We had to size up our fellow legislators. --The
Century.
2. (Law)
(a) A special kind of jury or inquest.
(b) A kind of writ or real action.
(c) A verdict or finding of a jury upon such writ.
(d) A statute or ordinance in general. Specifically: (1) A
statute regulating the weight, measure, and
proportions of ingredients and the price of articles
sold in the market; as, the assize of bread and other
provisions; (2) A statute fixing the standard of
weights and measures.
(e) Anything fixed or reduced to a certainty in point of
time, number, quantity, quality, weight, measure,
etc.; as, rent of assize. --Glanvill. --Spelman.
--Cowell. --Blackstone. --Tomlins. --Burrill.
Note: [This term is not now used in England in the sense of a
writ or real action, and seldom of a jury of any kind,
but in Scotch practice it is still technically applied
to the jury in criminal cases. --Stephen. --Burrill.
--Erskine.]
(f) A court, the sitting or session of a court, for the
trial of processes, whether civil or criminal, by a
judge and jury. --Blackstone. --Wharton. --Encyc.
Brit.
(g) The periodical sessions of the judges of the superior
courts in every county of England for the purpose of
administering justice in the trial and determination
of civil and criminal cases; -- usually in the plural.
--Brande. --Wharton. --Craig. --Burrill.
(h) The time or place of holding the court of assize; --
generally in the plural, assizes.
3. Measure; dimension; size. [In this sense now corrupted
into {size}.]
An hundred cubits high by just assize. --Spenser.
[Formerly written, as in French, {assise}.]