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Astringent   /əstrˈɪndʒənt/   Listen
Astringent

adjective
1.
Sour or bitter in taste.  Synonyms: acerb, acerbic.
2.
Tending to draw together or constrict soft organic tissue.






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"Astringent" Quotes from Famous Books



... package in the post at Crewe. Secretive and delightful little thing! After his recent experience beyond the bay he had imagined himself to be incapable of ever eating again, but it was not so. The lemon gave a peculiar astringent, appetising, settling quality to the chocolate. And he ate even with gusto. The result was that, instead of waiting for the nine o'clock boarding-house breakfast, he hurried energetically into the streets and called on a jobbing printer whom he had seen on the previous evening. As ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett

... started, the ultimate effects are forgotten in the apparent relief of the moment. In the case of tea, besides the stimulating effect, a certain substance known as tannin is developed, particularly when the tea is boiled, and this substance is really harmful on account of its strong astringent property, which acts injuriously on the membrane of the stomach. The bitter taste of the tannin is disguised when milk is used with the tea, and it has been pointed out that tea used without milk or cream is safer than tea with milk, ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden

... might endure for ages, a foundation was excavated to the depth of one hundred cubits, and the round stones were trampled by enormous elephants, whose feet were protected by leather cases. Over this the monarch spread the sacred clay, and on it laid the bricks, and over them a coating of astringent cement, above this a layer of sand-stones, and on all a plate of iron. Over this was a large pholika (crystallised stone), then a plate of brass, eight inches thick, embedded in a cement made of the gum of the wood-apple tree, diluted in the water ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... (Prunus emarginata, var. mollis) is a small, handsome tree seldom more than a foot in diameter at the base. It makes valuable lumber and its black, astringent fruit furnishes a rich resource as food for the birds. A smaller form is common in the Sierra, the fruit of which is eagerly eaten by the Indians and hunters in time ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir

... jessamine or mignionette, and are excellent for pies and tarts. The persimon is a fruit to which you are a stranger; it may be ranked with the plums, but has four stones, and is not fit to eat till bitten by the frost, when its austere and astringent taste disappears, and it becomes nearly transparent, and as rich and sweet as Guava jelly. The May-apple, or Mandrake, a wild fruit, is a favourite with our young folks; it grows on a single-steemed plant, usually ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19. Issue 548 - 26 May 1832 • Various

... Gideon Deane as he suddenly appeared before her, and gently relieved her of the bucket she was carrying. A quick flash of color over her brow and cheek-bone, as if a hot iron had passed there, and a certain astringent coyness, would have embarrassed any other ...
— By Shore and Sedge • Bret Harte

... within fifty yards of both of them, mysterious and withdrawn as ever, busy at something or other. And it was naught to Johnnie! By the thought of all this the woe in him was strengthened and embittered. Nevertheless his youth, aided by the astringent quality of the clear dawn, still struggled sturdily against it. And he ate six times more breakfast than his suffering and ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett

... All of those on our farms are Riehl varieties, hybrids, I think. All of our European chestnuts have an astringent pellicle, heavy with tannic acid. We classify as sweets any of those that have a pellicle that is sweet enough to be eaten. We label these the sweets and mark them as they go into the market. And while, I say, we don't seem to get a better price for the sweets ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Incorporated 39th Annual Report - at Norris, Tenn. September 13-15 1948 • Various

... thirty years of age, but has already become widely distributed, as well as a favourite fruit amongst many. It is a very showy fruit when well grown, but must be thoroughly ripe before it is eaten, as, if not, it is extremely astringent, and anyone who has tackled an unripe fruit has no wish to repeat the experience in a hurry. There are many varieties of this fruit, some of which are seedless, and others more or less seedy. The seedless kinds are usually preferred, as, as well as being ...
— Fruits of Queensland • Albert Benson

... acquaintance in the Bechuana country, where it is called "mositsane," and is a mere plant; here it becomes a tree, from fifteen to twenty feet high. The root is used for tanning; the bean is pounded, and then put into a sieve of bark cloth to extract, by repeated washings, the excessively astringent matter it contains. Where the people have plenty of water, as here, it is used copiously in various processes, among Bechuanas it is scarce, and its many uses unknown: the pod becomes from fifteen to eighteen inches long, ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone

... a small green spot covered with kinnikinic, a ground plant two inches high which bore red berries as big as a small pea. They were not red now, but green; bitter as gall, and contained an astringent tonic called ...
— The Grizzly King • James Oliver Curwood

... and snap do not seem to cover it. Emma McChesney stood on the bottom step, looking up and down Main Street and breathing in great draughts of that unadjectivable air. Her complexion stood the test of the merciless, astringent morning and came up triumphantly and healthily firm and pink and smooth. The town was still asleep. She started to walk briskly down the bare and ugly Main Street of the little town. In her big, ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various

... leaves, which had been boiled twice and would otherwise have been thrown away, relieved the pain if tied into some cotton and kept pressed against the eyes. The tannic acid in the tea acted as an astringent. A snowblind man can see practically nothing anyhow and so he is not much worse off if a handkerchief is tied over ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard

... methods employed in early times. It seems fairly certain, however, that up to the 18th century these were of the most primitive kind. With regard to materials, we know that prior to the general introduction of the hop (see ALE) as a preservative and astringent, a number of other bitter and aromatic plants had been employed with this end in view. Thus J.L. Baker (The Brewing Industry) points out that the Cimbri used the Tamarix germanica, the Scandinavians the fruit of the sweet gale (Myrica gale), the Cauchi the fruit and ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various

... compounds have an extremely irritating effect on animal tissue. Sulphates of sodium and potassium are also objectionable. Aluminium hydroxide is soluble in the slightly acid gastric juice and has an astringent action on animal tissue, hindering digestion in a way similar to the alum itself. Many of the alum powders contain also mono-calcium phosphate; the reaction ...
— Human Foods and Their Nutritive Value • Harry Snyder

... Terre-Temperee, reaches to a height of several feet. Its fruit, which seldom gets ripe before it is eaten by the birds or larvae, is luscious, highly scented, and full of pips; they have the reputation of being antifebrile and astringent. When the shrub is cultivated, its appearance changes considerably; its branches grow longer, and are covered with leaves which are silvery on the back, and the fruit they yield are as large as lemons, which they ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart

... grassy-looking plants, with heads of bright lilac flowers, and on plucking one pulled up the root also. The root was about the size and shape of a large crocus: and on biting it, she found it far from disagreeable—sweet, and slightly astringent. It seemed to be a favourite root with the woodchucks, for she noticed that it grew about their burrows on dry, gravelly soil, and many of the stems were bitten and the roots eaten—a warrant, in full, of wholesomeness. Therefore, carrying ...
— Lost in the Backwoods • Catharine Parr Traill

... asparago. aspect : aspekto, vidigxo, fazo. aspen : tremolo. ass : azeno. assemble : kunveni, kunvoki. assert : aserti, konstati. assign : asigni. assure : certigi; asekuri. astonish : mirigi. ("to be -ed"), miri. astringent : adstringa. astute : sagaca. asylum : rifugxejo, azilo. athletic : atleta. atmosphere : atmosfero. atom : atomo. attach : alligi, kunigi. attain : atingi, trafi. attempt : provi; (criminal) atenco. attention : atento, ("pay"—) atenti. ...
— The Esperanto Teacher - A Simple Course for Non-Grammarians • Helen Fryer

... Malig. sect. iii. chap. 26. Dr. Huxham, in his Essay on Fevers, has the following very judicious Remark on the Use of Wine: "In this View, and in those above-mentioned, I cannot but recommend a generous red Wine as a most noble, natural sub-astringent Cordial, and perhaps Art can scarce supply a better. Of this I am confident, that sometimes at the State, and more frequently in the Decline of putrid Malignant Fevers, it is of the highest Service, especially when acidulated with ...
— An Account of the Diseases which were most frequent in the British military hospitals in Germany • Donald Monro

... it to be a combination of two weak, commonly used drugs, one a very mild antiseptic and the other a mild astringent. These were held together with cocoa butter into which a drop of carbolic acid may have been put. There is nothing unusual in the combination, nor has it any wonderful qualities which would justify the claims made in behalf of it. ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague

... shell pecan is as superior to the wild seedling as is American gold to Mexico's money. These wild seedlings are small in size artificially colored a bright red and have a sharp, astringent taste and have a commercial value only because they are used to lower ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Eleventh Annual Meeting - Washington, D. C. October 7 AND 8, 1920 • Various

... are many varieties of Cyprus wines, there is one prevailing rule: the white commanderia, a luscious high-flavoured wine, is grown upon the reddish chocolate-coloured soil of metamorphous rocks. The dark red, or black astringent wines, are produced upon the white marls and cretaceous limestone. The quantity produced is large, and the dark wines can be purchased retail in the villages for one penny the quart bottle!—and in my opinion are ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker

... attendant saw, and spread The ox-hide couch; then as he lay reclin'd, Patroclus, with his dagger, from the thigh Cut out the biting shaft; and from the wound With tepid water cleans'd the clotted blood; Then, pounded in his hands, a root applied Astringent, anodyne, which all his pain Allay'd; the wound was ...
— The Iliad • Homer

... before the door. The extreme sharpness of the air acted on his nerves like an astringent, and braced them swiftly. Presently, he not relaxing in his disordered walk, the images began to come clearer and stay longer in his fancy; and next the power of thought came back to him, and the horror and danger of his situation rooted him ...
— Tales and Fantasies • Robert Louis Stevenson

... pure in commerce in colorless transparent crystalline masses, having an acid, sweetish, astringent taste. It is soluble in 18 parts of water at 60 deg. F., and in its own weight of water at 212 deg. F.; but the excess crystallizes out upon cooling. The solution reddens litmus paper, and, when ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 401, September 8, 1883 • Various

... Box (Eucalyptus hemiphloia) and the Water Bush (Hakea leucoptera). To extract it the roots are dug up, cut into lengths of about a foot, and placed upright in a can; the lower ends being a few inches above the bottom. It is simply astonishing how much wholesome, if at times somewhat astringent, water may thus be obtained in a few ...
— Getting Gold • J. C. F. Johnson

... swellings, though they are very stubborn after they have once appeared. But an application every few hours keeps down the intolerable itching, which is the most annoying feature of sumach poisoning. In addition to this, the ordinary astringent ointments are useful, as is also that sovereign lotion, "lead-water and laudanum." Mr. Morris adds to these a ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols

... at home in a greater variety of soils than the blackwalnut as well as being hardier than the black walnut or the hickory. It ripens so early that the nuts always have plenty of time to mature while the richly flavored kernels are rarely shrunken and never astringent. Despite these good qualities, a search through the publications of the Northern Nut Growers' Association for the past thirty years proves that comparatively little interest has been manifested in it. It would seem quite in order to inquire into the reasons for this neglect. Five of them come ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Thirty-Fourth Annual Report 1943 • Various

... which is an alkaloid, and always found in combination with tannin. They also contain a volatile oil, which is the source of the aroma, and in addition possess a sedative quality. Tannin is a powerful astringent, and hence is strongly provocative of constipation. Its action upon the mucous surface of the stomach is highly detrimental to that organ, as it arrests the excretion of the gastric juice by its contractile effect upon the glands. ...
— The Royal Road to Health • Chas. A. Tyrrell

... of resisting the action of fire, the reader will not need to be reminded of many seemingly well-authenticated cases of escape from the fire-ordeal. It has been usual to ascribe the preservation of those who have walked bare-footed over heated ploughshares to the use of astringent lotions: and where opportunity existed for preparation of that kind, their escape may perhaps be so explained. But in most instances the accused was in the custody of the accusers, and not likely to have access to such phylacteries. ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various

... him with an astringent "How d'you do, Mr. Babbitt. Tanis tells me you're a very prominent man, and I'm honored by being allowed to drive with you. Of course I'm not accustomed to associating with society people like you, so I don't know how to act in ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis

... to us as soon as it became dusk, but as we did not encourage their advances they left us after a short visit. The native who had killed the talpero, skinned it the moment he arrived in the camp, and, having first moistened them, stuffed the skin with the leaves of a plant of very astringent properties. All these natives were very poor, particularly the men, nor do I think that at this season of the year they can have much animal food of any kind to subsist on. Their principal food appeared to be seeds of various kinds, as of the box-tree, and grass ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt

... him a bowl of soup," Hsi Jen continued, "and of this he has had a few mouthfuls. He shouted and shouted that his mouth was parched and fancied a decoction of sour plums, but remembering that sour plums are astringent things, that he had been thrashed only a short time before, and that not having been allowed to groan, he must, of course, have been so hard pressed that fiery virus and heated blood must unavoidably have accumulated in the heart, ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... be dusted over with very fine powder of gum sandarach, and then replaced. Astringent fomentations; as an infusion of oak-bark, or a slight solution of alum. Horizontal rest ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin

... to—you have to, I suppose," he said. "I understand. I can give you an astringent mixture that will shrink the chords, and may relieve some of the inflammation. It may enable you to go on—but at the risk of permanent injury to ...
— The Moving Picture Girls - First Appearances in Photo Dramas • Laura Lee Hope

... four-parted, petals none, styles two to four, short, papillose. Fruit oblong, or obovoid, the husk separating into four parts; nut smooth or angled, bony, incompletely two to four-celled. Seed oily, sweet, edible or bitter and astringent. Natives of eastern ...
— The Pecan and its Culture • H. Harold Hume

... by an evil eye, in case the Obeah- bottle which hangs from the Mango-tree, charged with toad and spider, dirty water, and so forth, has no terrors for his secret enemy. He will have a Libidibi {314e} tree, too, for astringent medicine; and his hedge will be composed, if he be a man of taste— as he often seems to be—of Hibiscus bushes, whose magnificent crimson flowers contrast with the bright yellow bunches of the common Cassia, and the scarlet flowers of the Jumby-bead bush, {314f} and blue and white ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley

... will not discuss with you some substances indigenous to the country which are already in use, whether in medicine, or in the arts—of eucalyptus gum, for example, which is at once astringent and tonic to a very high degree, and is likely soon to become one of our most energetic drugs. Nor will I say much about the resin furnished by the tree which the English mis-name gourmier,* (* Note 35: Peron's word.) a resin ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott

... which at first will be every few minutes. The pain will immediately cease, and after twenty-four hours of this treatment the burn will be healed; especially if commenced before blisters are formed. The astringent and drying qualities of the alum will entirely prevent their formation. 4. Glycerine, five ounces; white of egg, four ounces; tincture of arnica, three ounces. Mix the glycerine and white of egg thoroughly in a ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs

... dressed with astringent herbs, and his broken leg put into splints in accordance with the rude but not ineffective surgery of the time, he was placed on a rough litter of interlaced branches and carried back by the reluctant warriors ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts

... some sharp swish of a branch— there is no scent of resin in this place, no taste of bark, of coarse weeds, aromatic, astringent— only border on border of ...
— Sea Garden • Hilda Doolittle

... its retaining a glare on the surface when hardened, and the undesirable aspect is given of polished spots where repairs have been going on. There is only one way of counteracting this—by mixing other gums or resins that have less or but little glare when hard. Those of a very astringent quality should be avoided, as when dry their pulling power or contraction is very great, and a cracked surface not at all like the rich fused appearance of many of the old masters, but dry and uninteresting, will ...
— The Repairing & Restoration of Violins - 'The Strad' Library, No. XII. • Horace Petherick

... of it that can be made; but a substitute may be found in the following composition. Boil a quart of water with a quart of new milk, an ounce of white sugar-candy, half an ounce of eringo-root, and half an ounce of conserve of roses, till the quantity be half wasted. As this is an astringent, the doses must be proportioned accordingly, and the mixture is wholesome only while it remains sweet.—Another way. Mix two spoonfuls of boiling water, two of milk, and an egg well beaten. Sweeten with ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton

... no trace of sentimentalism. Their masculine mood both of body and mind left no room for it, and hence the bracing quality of their literature compared with that of recent times, its tonic property, that seems almost too astringent to palates relaxed by a daintier diet. The first great example of the degenerate modern tendency was Petrarch, who may be said to have given it impulse and direction. A more perfect specimen of the type has not since appeared. An intellectual ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell

... stood before him smiling rather uncertainly. The sweetness and cleanness of that smile after his recent ordeal washed over his tortured mind like a cooling astringent, and he smiled gratefully up at her. She put a cool palm on his forehead and as she started to withdraw it he clutched it in an emaciated fist and mumbled indistinctly through cracked ...
— Faithfully Yours • Lou Tabakow

... but as the little canoe careered wildly down the slope from one lake to the next with, in the beginning, many a scrape on the rocks of the river bed, my nervous system contracted steadily till, at the foot where we slipped out into smooth water again, it felt as if dipped into an astringent. ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)

... began in the Vedic age, and the Sanhita of the Sama-Veda consists of hymns to be sung at the moon-plant sacrifice.[51] This ceremony is still practised occasionally in India, and Dr. Hang has tasted this sacred beverage, which he describes as astringent, bitter, intoxicating, and very disagreeable.[52] It is stated by Manu that no one has a right to drink this sacred juice who does not properly provide for his own household. He encourages sacrifices by declaring that they are ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke

... not worth while to say much. They are far from being one's best hours. And then, more often than not, will come another blessed two hours, or even more, of unconsciousness, before the first purple grey forecasts of a new day call me out into the bush for my morning lesson in serenity: Nature's astringent message to egoists and all the sedentary, introspective tribe, that bids us note our own infinite insignificance, our utter and microscopical unimportance in her great scheme of things, and her sublime indifference to our individual ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson

... the spruces retained, imperfectly, their shape and form. Thurston was country bred, and, lifting high his feet to clear bramble trailer and fallen twig, he walked by feeling instead of sight. The beck moaned a little more loudly, and there was a heavy astringent odor of damp earth and decaying leaves. When beast and bird were still again it seemed as if Nature, worn out by the productive effort of summer, were sinking under solemn ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss

... an infusion should be made by adding boiling water to the leaves, and permitting them to steep for a few minutes only, for a concentrated decoction, made by boiling for a long time, liberates the astringent and bitter principles and drives off the agreeable aroma which resides in ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... the stomach; while those of other places, if eaten in the smallest excess, are apt to occasion surfeits. The mangostein is a delicious fruit, almost in the shape of an apple. Its skin is thick and red, and when dried is an excellent astringent. The kernels, if they may be so called, are like cloves of garlic, of a most agreeable taste, but very cold. The rambostan is a fruit about the size of a walnut, with a tough skin beset with capillaments,[3] and the pulp ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr

... day he feigned sick and sent for Osmond. That worthy prescribed a pill and a draught, the former laxative, the latter astringent. This ceremony performed, Mr. Hardie gossipped with him; and, after a detour or two, glided to his real anxiety. "Sampson tells me you know more about Captain Dodd's case than he does: he is not very clear as to the cause of the poor man's ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade

... open, and disopilate; neither doth it so, untill it be helped by Art, as it is ground, stirred, and made fine, in the preparing of it; the Sulphurous parts, and those of quick-silver, being thinne, active, and penetrative, they mingle, at the last with those parts, which are Earthy and astringent: Insomuch, that they being mingled after this manner one with another, we cannot now say, that the steele is astringent, but rather, that it is penetrative, attenuating and opening. Let us prove this Doctrine by Authorities; and let the first ...
— Chocolate: or, An Indian Drinke • Antonio Colmenero de Ledesma

... water this forms a thick glutinous mass, with a rather astringent taste, and is eaten with salt, limes, and chilies. Sago-bread is made in large quantities, by baking it into cakes in a small clay oven containing six or eight slits side by side, each about three-quarters of an inch wide, and six or eight inches square. The raw sago is broken ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... caution you not to use the same remedy rashly, and without the most skillful advice you can find, where you are; for if your swelling proceeds from a gouty, or rheumatic humor, there may be great danger in applying so powerful an astringent, and perhaps REPELLANT as brine. So go piano, and not without the best advice, upon a view of ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield

... many other remedies, as not onely procuring these evacuations; but also (which is more to be noted) staying them, when they grow to any excesse. For seeing that here are minerals contained both hot, cold, dry, aperitive, astringent, &c. there is none so simple but must needs thinke and grant, that it cannot otherwise bee but good and wholesome in grievances, and diseases, which in ...
— Spadacrene Anglica - The English Spa Fountain • Edmund Deane

... is considered good for sore throats, and for inflammation of the gums and tonsils. We are also told, that the young green shoots, eaten as salad, will fix teeth which are loose; probably (if it be so) it is from the astringent qualities in the juice strengthening and hardening the gums. The leaves pounded, are said to be a cure for the ringworm; and they are also made into tea by some of the cottagers, which is very useful in some ailments; ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 462 - Volume 18, New Series, November 6, 1852 • Various

... Gaert.) is a fruit of the pear form, and dark-brown in color. The rind is tough and elastic, but not very thick. The edible substance, which is soft and green, encloses a kernel resembling a chestnut in form and color. This fruit is very astringent and bitter, and on being cut, a juice flows from it which is at first yellow, but soon turns black. The taste is peculiar, and at first not agreeable to a foreigner; but it is generally much liked when the palate becomes accustomed to it. The fruit of the ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi

... he describes as cold 1^o, and dry in 2^o, binding and astringent. Good against spitting of blood or haemorrhage of the nose, and other fluxes of the bowels. The leaves, of which [dr.]j. in powder may be given. The juice inspissate, drunk with wine, helps ague. A cataplasm applied in inflammations, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 193, July 9, 1853 • Various

... washerwoman's dip. Everyone who is anyone will be here, if not on one night then on another, in a jovial fraternity steeped in the spirit of democracy. Revelry will be sustained on lemonade and a resinous astringent known locally as beer, while a sense of doing the forbidden will be in the air. For commercial reasons it will be needful to keep it in the air, since in the proceedings themselves there will be nothing more occult, or more inciting to iniquity, ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King

... it a protection," said the doctor. "It keeps the system slightly stimulated; and is, besides, a good astringent." ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur

... Cotton and linen are more difficult to dye than wool or silk. Their fibre is not so porous and will not hold the dye stuff without a more complicated preparation. The usual method of preparing linen or cotton is to boil it first with some astringent. The use of astringents in dyeing depends upon the tannic acid they contain. In combination with ordinary mordants, tannic acid aids the attraction of the colouring matter to the fibre and adds brilliancy to the colours. The astringents mostly used are tannic acid, gall ...
— Vegetable Dyes - Being a Book of Recipes and Other Information Useful to the Dyer • Ethel M. Mairet

... to her Essex and left her sister all the better for the astringent she had imparted. Lucy did not agree with her by any means; it made her hot with annoyance to realise that anybody could so think of James. At the same time she felt that she must steady herself. After all, a man might kiss his wife if he pleased, and he ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett

... scraped off the bottoms of old ships, and thought to be astringent and good for ulcers. Also, a highly preservative varnish in use by the ancients for ships' ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth

... low; for you are in the hands of a living God. In the Book of Job, for example, the impotence of man and the omnipotence of God is the exclusive burden of its author's mind. "It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do?—deeper than hell; what canst thou know?" There is an astringent relish about the truth of this conviction which some men can feel, and which for them is as near an approach as can be made to the ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James

... shoulders. This, then, with a very long and full beard, in which all the people here take pride, is plastered with a thick paste, of the consistence of hog's lard, and not less than two pounds weight of which is sometimes used on one person. It possesses a strongly astringent and penetrating quality, and requires great skill in the use of it, to avoid doing considerable mischief. As the eye-brows are plastered with it, as well as the rest of the hair, and as it softens by the heat of the room and of the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 565 - Vol. 20, No. 565., Saturday, September 8, 1832 • Various

... and who eat too great a quantity: thus several of our people were attacked with diarrhoea in a few days after we began to make this fish our ordinary sustenance; but they found a remedy in the raspberries of the country which have an astringent property. ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere

... varying from yellow to nearly black, commonly bright red, edible, but more or less astringent; stem somewhat persistent after ...
— Handbook of the Trees of New England • Lorin Low Dame

... been pointed out, is unwise, but the water may be removed to some extent by "clearing the throat." The reduction of swelling at the entrance of the Eustachian tube in the back of the nose can be properly treated only by an expert, as some astringent (glycerite of tannin) must be applied on cotton wound on a curved applicator, and the instrument passed above and behind the roof of the mouth into the region back of ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume II (of VI) • Various

... their calling. They tan and dress leather with very great expedition, by steeping the hide first in a mixture of wood-ashes and water, until it parts with the hair; and afterwards by using the pounded leaves of a tree called goo, as an astringent. They are at great pains to render the hide as soft and pliant as possible, by rubbing it frequently between their hands, and beating it upon a stone. The hides of bullocks are converted chiefly into sandals, and therefore require less care ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park

... him, facts more than remote enough, consequences unrelated to their causes; he lived in a mist, and opium thickened the mist to a dense yellow fog. Opium might have helped to make Southey a poet; it left Coleridge the prisoner of a cobweb-net of dreams. What he wanted was some astringent force in things, to tighten, not to loosen, the always expanding and uncontrollable limits of his mind. Opium did but confirm what the natural habits of his constitution had bred in him: an overwhelming indolence, out of which the energies that still ...
— Poems of Coleridge • Coleridge, ed Arthur Symons

... him not a sedative but a stimulant, he had little doubt as he went slowly on his way to the gallery: but of the astringent nature of that mixture he had equally small idea, until he turned the last corner, and came in sight of the Countess's face. There was an aspect of the avenging angel about Lady Oxford, as she stood up, tall and stately, in that corner of the gallery, ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt

... element of the tea leaf, and it varies greatly in percentage in different teas, and increases with the age of the growing leaf. It is the cause of the rasping, puckering, astringent effect upon the tongue ...
— Tea Leaves • Francis Leggett & Co.

... that they were commonly eaten with the thus Syriacum, a certain anodyne and astringent seed, which qualified the purgative nature of the fish. This learned physician gave them to understand, that though this was reckoned a luxurious fish in the zenith of the Roman taste, it was by no means comparable, in point of expense, to some preparations in vogue about the time of that absurd ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... may be added, or lemon juice and sugar. Barley water is an astringent or demulcent drink used to reduce ...
— The Suffrage Cook Book • L. O. Kleber

... constipation is often aggravated. I have hardly ever seen, excepting in cases of mechanical obstruction, a severe and troublesome case of constipation that had not been caused by the use of cathartic remedies. So if we give an opiate, or an astringent, for a diarrhoea, we can see that it is a direct effort to restrain the disease by force, as it were, and we necessarily have to give large doses; and, if the vital forces react against this medicinal intrusion, the reaction ...
— Personal Experience of a Physician • John Ellis

... upon the tissues and especially upon the nervous system. But this theory has not led to any effective treatment. Drugs in great variety were tried in the continental hospitals in 1892, but without any distinct success. The old controversy between the aperient and the astringent treatment reappeared. In Russia the former, which aims at evacuating the poison, was more generally adopted; in Germany the latter, which tries to conserve strength by stopping the flux, found more favour. Two ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various

... from the husk of the grape, they being used during fermentation; on the contrary, the colourless wines are those where the husk of the grape is not used during the process of fermentation. The colouring matter produced from the husks is highly astringent, consequently the red and white wines are very different in their qualities, and very different in their ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 366 - Vol. XIII, No. 366., Saturday, April 18, 1829 • Various

... fulfilment; as his best critic[5] says he brought nothing to the literature he became a part of but himself. His daring and splendid genius made the local universal, raised out of rough and cynical satirizing a style as rich and humorous and astringent as that of Rabelais, lent inevitableness and pathos and romance to lyric and song. But he was content to better the work of other men. He made ...
— English Literature: Modern - Home University Library Of Modern Knowledge • G. H. Mair

... forest. These palms were planted either by the Manbos themselves or by their ancestors. The nuts are found in scarcely sufficient quantity to supply the demand. When they can not be obtained, other plants [13] are used, but they are an inferior substitute. In taste the betel nut is exceedingly astringent and can not be used except in combination with the betel leaf and lime. As a rule the green and tender nut is preferred by the mountain Manbos, but the ripe nut seems to be the choice of those who have come in contact with Christianized Manbos or ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan

... Severe rubbing and rolling of the flesh between the fingers will gradually dissolve the fatty tissues. The flesh will then become soft and flabby, and the skin will be likely to fall into tiny lines unless an astringent wash, like weak alum water (used hot), is applied to tighten and harden it slightly, and so make the flesh firm. If the massage is continued, the flabby flesh will also be reduced, especially when the astringent wash is applied to help the hardening process. When ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans

... on this subject, the author has grown cotton under glass, and analyzed it at various stages of its life history. In the early stage of unripeness he has found an astringent substance in the fiber. This substance disappears as the plant ripens, and seems to closely resemble some forms of tannin. Doubtless the presence of this body in cotton put upon the market in an unripe condition may account for certain dark stains ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 620, November 19,1887 • Various

... an astringent of vegetable origin which exists in tea, is also found in coffee and wines, and is very injurious. Tea is a preparation made from the leaves of a shrub called Thea. The difference between black and green tea is due to the mode of preparation, and not to separate ...
— Public School Domestic Science • Mrs. J. Hoodless

... on his. Mrs. Phillips noticed these minor familiarities and remarked on them to Foster, who had lately wheeled his chair in. Foster, a few days later, passed the comment on to Randolph, with an astringent comment of his own.—At all events, Amy Leffingwell remained in the distance, and George Pearson ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller

... reticence of personal attitude which Miss Cather only shares with Sherwood Anderson among her American compatriots. She is more assured in the traditional quality of her work than Anderson, but hardly less astringent. I regard this book as one of the most important contributions to the American short story published during the past year, and personally I consider it more significant than ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... into November, frequently flowing fast in these trees, as in Maples in the spring; and apparently their bright tints, now that most other Oaks are withered, are connected with this phenomenon. They are full of life. It has a pleasantly astringent, acorn-like taste, this strong Oak-wine, as I find on tapping ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau

... path and persists in walking along it, soon loses his very life as the consequence. The man who, destitute of exertion, tills his land, disregarding the season of rain, never succeeds in obtaining a harvest. He who takes every day food that is nutritive, be it bitter or astringent or palatable or sweet, enjoys a long life. He, on the other hand, who disregards wholesome food and takes that which is injurious without an eye to consequences, soon meets with death. Destiny and exertion exist, depending upon each other. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... or salt from the water of rocks. They procured dyes of various colours for their clothes, both from the juice of plants and from mineral earths, and had discovered the art of fixing them by means of the polcura, an aluminous or astringent mineral. Instead of soap, they used the back of the quillai, which is an excellent substitute. In their language there are many words discriminative of various kinds of baskets and mats, which they manufactured from various vegetables. From a plant called gnocchia, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr

... attributed to the healthiness of the place, and the fresh provisions it afforded. The beer certainly contributed not a little. As I have already observed, we at first made it of a decoction of the spruce leaves; but finding that this alone made the beer too astringent, we afterwards mixed with it an equal quantity of the tea plant (a name it obtained in my former voyage, from our using it as tea then as we also did now,) which partly destroyed the astringency of the other, and made the beer exceedingly palatable, and esteemed by every one on ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr

... tartar. Oxalic Oxalic acid Acid of sorel. Acetic {Acetous acid Vinegar, or acid of vinegar. {Acetic acid Radical vinegar. Succinic Succinic acid Volatile salt of amber. Benzoic Benzotic acid Flowers of benzoin. Camphoric Camphoric acid Unknown till lately. Gallic Gallic acid {The astringent ...
— Elements of Chemistry, - In a New Systematic Order, Containing all the Modern Discoveries • Antoine Lavoisier

... plastered must and fortified with brandy, before it is shipped. Let us leave him in blissful ignorance. We tasted many samples before we left, but I own I have no liking for sherries, simple or doctored. Among Spanish wines I far prefer the full-bodied astringent sub-acidity of the common Val de Penas, beloved of Cervantes. But the Queen of wines is sound Bordeaux. To that Queen, however, a delicate etherous Amontillado might be admitted as Spanish maid-of-honour, preceding the royal footsteps, while the syrupy Malaga from the Doradillo ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea

... than the summer fruit. And some, that, like the Winter-Nelis, have been hard and uninviting until all the rest have had their season, get their glow and perfume long after the frost and snow have done their worst with the orchards. Beware of rash criticisms; the rough and astringent fruit you condemn may be an autumn or a winter pear, and that which you picked up beneath the same bough in August may have been only its worm-eaten windfalls. Milton was a Saint-Germain with a graft of the roseate Early-Catherine. Rich, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various

... hemorrhoids (piles) the treatment is to correct the accompanying constipation, then take an enema or injection of warm water morning and evening, using the water as hot as can be borne and allowing it to run in and out the rectum for some time. Following this, an astringent and soothing ...
— Herself - Talks with Women Concerning Themselves • E. B. Lowry

... Raw and astringent as a schoolgirl—of the old order—young May breathed austerely among the budding trees. Vallance buttoned his coat, lighted his last cigarette and took his seat upon a bench. For three minutes he mildly regretted the last hundred of his last thousand ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry

... (Polygonum bistorta) with cylindrical spikes of pink flowers and a rhizome used as an astringent ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter

... the contemporary reception of Gulliver's Travels exhibit two sides of Jonathan Swift's character—the pleasant (that is, merry, witty, amusing) and the unpleasant (that is, sarcastic, envious, disaffected). A person with a powerful ego and astringent sense of humor, Swift must have been a delightful friend, if somewhat difficult, but also a dangerous enemy. A Letter from a Clergyman (1726), here reproduced in a facsimile of its first and only edition, is a reaction typical of those who regard Swift ...
— A Letter From a Clergyman to his Friend, - with an Account of the Travels of Captain Lemuel Gulliver • Anonymous

... it does, largely through forests and past vegetable banks, takes up a large quantity of albuminous matter, which is so great in quantity that the atmosphere, or the oxygen in the air, cannot purify it by the time it reaches us, so that if any astringent matter like oak, or birch, or beech, or even alum, is put in the water it will cause the albumen to precipitate. In the district of La Gironde, France, the waters of the Landes are naturally very impure from these causes, but ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Exploring the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay

... windows. While the sea surroundings were brought indoors and on the centre of the dinner table the mirror was edged by a border of sea-sand, glistening pebbles and little shells were arranged as a background instead of mosses and lichens, and rich brown seaweeds still moist with the astringent tonic sea breath edged this frame, and the more delicate rose-coloured and pale green weeds seemed floating upon the glass, that held a giant periwinkle shell filled with the pink star-shaped sabbatia, ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright

... dolcxigi. Assume supozi. Assurance, self memfido. Assure certigi. Assure (life etc.) asekuri. Asterisk steleto. Asthma malfacila spirado. Astonish mirigi. Astonished, to be miri. Astonishing mira. Astonishment miro. Astound miregi. Astral astra. Astray, to go erarigxi. Astringent kuntira. Astrologer astrologiisto. Astrology astrologio. Astronomer astronomiisto. Astronomy astronomio. Astute ruza. Asunder aparte. Asylum rifugxejo. At cxe, je. At (house of) cxe. At all events kio ajn okazos. At any time iam. Atheist ateisto. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... interpretation of this word. He says there are numerous instances of the use of d'd' (which he transliterates doudouiou) in the medical papyri. In the Ebers papyrus "doudou d'Elephantine broye" is prescribed as a remedy for external application in diseases of the heart, and as an astringent and emollient dressing for ulcers. He says the substance was brought to Elephantine from the interior of Africa and the coasts ...
— The Evolution of the Dragon • G. Elliot Smith

... with oxygen, which neutralises the injurious tannin. Every pound of ordinary tea contains about two ounces of tannin. Tannin is a powerful astringent substance to tan skins into leather. The tannin in ordinary tea tans, or hardens, the lining of the digestive organs, also the food eaten. This prevents the healthful nourishment of the body, and undoubtedly ...
— Reform Cookery Book (4th edition) - Up-To-Date Health Cookery for the Twentieth Century. • Mrs. Mill

... sharper harshness of articulation in stray passengers told us that we were approaching the vocal influence of the name Androscoggin. People talked as if, instead of ivory ring or coral rattle to develop their infantile teeth, they had bitten upon pine knots. Voices were resinous and astringent. An opera, with a chorus drummed up in those regions, could ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... husk, and no meal would be considered to be properly set out without the red lacquer box containing betel, which is universally chewed. Betel is the nut of the areca-palm, and before being used is rolled between leaves on which a little lime is spread. The flavour is astringent and produces excessive expectoration, and, by its irritation, gives to the tongue and lips a curious bright pink colour. Still, it is considered an excellent stomach tonic, and so far as one can judge has no worse effect than to blacken the ...
— Burma - Peeps at Many Lands • R.Talbot Kelly

... of dry bread and a tin of water for its supper. This diet in the case of a strong grown man is always productive of illness of some kind, chiefly of course diarrhoea, with its attendant weakness. In fact, in a big prison astringent medicines are served out regularly by the warders as a matter of course. In the case of a child, the child is, as a rule, incapable of eating the food at all. Any one who knows anything about children knows how easily a child's ...
— The People of the Abyss • Jack London

... infant be purged during teething or indeed, during any other time, do you approve of either absorbent or astringent medicines ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse

... by its astringency in contracting the fibres of the muscles, and so excludes the action of air on the interior of the substance of the meat. The last-mentioned operation of salt as an antiseptic is evinced by the diminution of the volume of meat to which it is applied. The astringent action of saltpetre on meat is much greater than that of salt, and thereby renders meat to which it is applied very hard; but, in small quantities, it considerably assists the antiseptic action of salt, and also prevents the destruction of ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton

... How amusingly Elly had acquired as only a child could acquire an accent, the exact astringent, controlled brevity of ...
— The Brimming Cup • Dorothy Canfield Fisher

... the world does not know how the other half lives. Noticing a pot of areca nut toothpaste on a chemist's counter, I asked him what the peculiar properties of the areca nut were—in short, what was it good for. He replied that it was an astringent and acted beneficially on the gums, but he had never heard that it was used for any other purpose than the manufacture of an elegant dentifrice. I felt inclined to question him about the camel in order to see whether he would tell me that it was a tropical animal, chiefly noted for the fine quality ...
— Concerning Animals and Other Matters • E.H. Aitken, (AKA Edward Hamilton)

... Astringent Cones most useful remedy for all forms of womb complaints. Sold only in boxes, $1.00 per box at drug stores or direct from the ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens

... rasa (taste), that quality of things which can be apprehended only by the tongue; these are sweet, sour, pungent (ka@tu), astringent (ka@saya) and bitter (tikta). Only k@siti and ap have taste. The natural taste of ap is sweetness. Rasa like rupa also denotes the genus rasatva, and rasa as quality must be distinguished from rasa as genus, though both of them are apprehended by ...
— A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1 • Surendranath Dasgupta

... well to shut—at least, sometimes— The women up—because, in sad reality, Their chastity in these unhappy climes[fz] Is not a thing of that astringent quality Which in the North prevents precocious crimes, And makes our snow less pure than our morality; The Sun, which yearly melts the polar ice, Has quite the ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... our clerics and our scientists. I, not being a man of science, still continue to do what I said I did in Alps and Sanctuaries, and make it a rule to earnestly and patiently and carefully swallow a few of the smallest gnats I can find several times a day, as the best astringent for the ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler

... culture; apples and pears that in England we should have no hesitation in pronouncing execrably bad; and a species of fruit unknown to all of us which the Chinese called Zee-ts, of a sweet sickly taste when ripe, otherwise most insufferably astringent. Some of the gentlemen thought they saw hazel nuts among the shruberry, but it is more than probable they were mistaken. A few bad grapes were sometimes brought to us, but the party who went from hence to Chu-san met with abundance of this fruit, and ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow

... superstition supposes that the sole of the left shoe of a person of the same age, but opposite sex, to the patient, reduced to ashes is a cure for St. Anthony's fire. I have seen it applied with success, but suppose its efficacy is due to some astringent principle in ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 201, September 3, 1853 • Various

... would change in appearance! They would change much more if interpreted by the intellect of the grub. What have the lessons of touch and taste contributed to that rudimentary receptacle of impressions? Very little; almost nothing. The animal knows that the best bits possess an astringent flavour; that the sides of a passage not carefully planed are painful to the skin. This is the utmost limit of its acquired wisdom. In comparison, the statue with the sensitive nostrils was a marvel of knowledge, a paragon too ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre

... transformation resulted from the means of gratifying elegant tastes, the comfort, luxury, and culture which came with Lovegrove's retirement on a fortune. They had mellowed on the sunny shelves of prosperity, like every good thing which has an astringent skin when it is green. They would greatly have liked to see Daniel shine in society. Of his erudition they were proud, even to worship. The young man never had any business, and his father never seemed to think of giving him any; knowing, ...
— A Brace Of Boys - 1867, From "Little Brother" • Fitz Hugh Ludlow



Words linked to "Astringent" :   acerbic, astringe, medicament, astringence, medication, astringency, hemostatic, medicinal drug, nonastringent, alum, sour, stypsis, medicine



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