daringly 
daringly (dai'ing-li), adr. 1. With boldness or 
audacity; boldly; courageously; fearlessly. 
Your brother, fired with success, 
Too darinffli/ upon the foe did press. 
Lord Halifax, On Prince of Denmark's Marriage. 
2. Defiantly. 
Some of the great principles of religion are every day 
openly urnl darinnty attacked from the press. 
Bp. Atterbury. 
daringness (dar'ing-nes), n. Boldness; cou- 
rageousness ; audaciousness. 
The greatness and darhtynesx of our crimes. 
Bp. Atterbnry, Works, IV. iv. 
dark 1 (diirk), . and n. [< ME. dark, derk, deork. 
a. and n., < AS. deorc, a., dark. Connections 
uncertain.] I. a. 1. Without light; marked 
by the absence of light ; unilluminated ; shad- 
owy : as, a dark night ; a dark room. 
And aftre thei maken the nyght so derk that no man 
may see no thing. Mandev&t, Travels, p. 237. 
2. Not radiating or reflecting light ; wholly or 
partially black or gray in appearance ; having 
the quality opposite to light or white : as, a 
dark object ; a dark color. 
The sun to me is dark, 
And silent as the moon. 
Milton, S. A., 1. 86. 
Lovely in your strength, as is the light 
Of a dark eye in woman ! 
Byron, Ohilde Harold, iii. 92. 
A dusky barge, 
Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern. 
Tennyson, Morte d' Arthur. 
3. Not fair: applied to the complexion : as, the 
dart-skinned races. 
And round about the keel with faces pale, 
Dark faces pale against that rosy flame, 
The mild-eyed melancholy Lotos-eaters came. 
Tennyion, Lotos-Eaters. 
Differing only as sisters may differ, as when one is of 
lighter and another of darker complexion. 
Gladstone, quoted in S. Dowell's Taxes in England, II. 343. 
4. Lacking in light or brightness; shaded; 
obscure: as, a dark day ; the dark recesses of a 
forest. Hence 6. Characterized by or produ- 
cing gloom ; dreary ; cheerless : as, a dark time 
in the affairs of the country. 
So dark a mind within me dwells. 
Tennyson, Maud, xv. 
There is, in every true woman's heart, a spark of heav- 
enly fire, which . . . beams and blazes in the dark hour 
of adversity. Irving, Sketch-Book, p. 39. 
Alone, in that dark sorrow, hour after hour crept by. 
Whittler, Cassandra Sonthwick. 
6. Threatening ; frowning ; gloomy ; morose : 
as, a dark scowl. 
All men of dark tempers, according to their degree of 
melancholy or enthusiasm, may find convents fitted to their 
humours. Addison, Travels in Italy. 
So all in wrath he got to horse and went ; 
While Arthur to the banquet, dark in mood, 
Past, thinking "Is it Lancelot who hath come?" 
Tennyson, Lancelot and Elaine. 
7. Obscure ; not easily perceived or understood ; 
difficult to interpret or explain: as, a dark say- 
ing; a dark passage in an author. 
What may seem dark at the first will afterward be found 
more plain. Hooker, Eccles. Polity, i. 1. 
What's your dark meaning, mouse, of this light word? 
Shak., L. L. L., v. 2. 
Wise philosophers hold all writings to be fruitful in the 
proportion they are dark. Snrift, Tale of a Tub, x. 
Hence 8. Concealed; secret; mysterious; in- 
scrutable : as, keep it dark. 
Day, mark d as with some hideous crime, 
When the dark hand struck down thro' time, 
And cancell'd nature's best. 
Tennymn, In Memoriam, Ixxii. 
Precisely what is to be the manner and measure of our 
knowledge, in this fuller and more glorious revelation of 
the future, is not clear to us now, for that is one of the 
dark things, or mysteries, of our present state. 
Bushnell, Sermons for New Life, p. 159. 
9f. Blind; sightless. 
I, dark in light, exposed 
To daily fraud, contempt, abuse, and wrong. 
Milton, S. A., 1. 75. 
Dr. Heylin (author of ye Geography) preach'd at ye Abbey. 
. . . He was, I think, at this time quite darke, and so had 
ben for some yeares. Evelyn, Diary, March 29, 1661. 
Thou wretehed daughter of a dark old man, 
Conduct my weary steps. Dryden and Lee, (Edipus. 
10. Unenlightened, either mentally or spiritu- 
ally ; characterized by backwardness in learn- 
ing, art, science, or religion ; destitute of know- 
ledge or culture ; ignorant ; uninstructed ; rude ; 
uncivilized : as, the dark places of the earth ; 
the dark ages. 
How many waste places are left as darke as Gallic of the 
Gentiles, sitting in the region and shadow of death ; with- 
out preaching Minister, without light ! 
Milton, Apology for Smectymnuus. 
1456 
The age wherein he [Homer] liv'd was dark; but he 
Could not want sight who taught the world to see. 
Sir J. Denham, Progress of Learning. 
There are dark regions of the earth where we do not ex- 
pect to find a righteous man. 
BMiotheca Sacra, XLIII. 430. 
11. Morally black; atrocious ; wicked ; sinister. 
Fit vessel, fittest imp of fraud, in whom 
To enter, and his dark suggestions hide. 
Milton, P. L., ix. 90. 
Shame from our hearts 
Unworthy arts, 
The fraud designed, the purpose dart. 
Whittier, Eve of Election. 
Dark ages. See ar/e.~ Dark days, specifically, days on 
which the sun is so completely obscured by clouds or dry 
mists that artificial lights have to be used for one or 
more days continuously, and day seems literally turned 
into night. Such a day was May 19th, 1780, in New Eng- 
land ; and others of less extent were August 9th, 1732, 
and October 21st. 1816. The most remarkable case on 
record is the dry fog of 1783, when the sun was obscured 
by a bluish haze for many days in the summer, through- 
out Europe, northern Africa, and to some extent in Asia 
and North America. Dark heat, the heat due to the in- 
visible ultra-red heat-rays of the spectrum. See spectrum. 
-Dark horse. See horse. Dark moon. See moon. 
Dark room, in photon., ft room from which all actinic rays 
of light have been excluded, used in the processes connected 
with the sensitizing of plates for exposure, for placing the 
plates in and taking them from the plate-holders or dark 
slides in which they are transported and exposed in the 
camera, and for the development of the picture after ex- 
posure. 
It is most essential in all photographic processes to em- 
ploy what is termed a dark room. . . . This dark room is 
not without light, but its light is of a quality such as in no 
way affects the plate. Span, Encyc. Manllf., p. 1536. 
To keep dark, to be quiet, silent, or secret concerning a 
matter. 
II. . 1. The absence of light; darkness. 
Till the derke was don, & the day sprange, 
And the sun in his sercle set vppo lofte. 
Destruction of Troy (E. E. T. S.), 1. 6062. 
I believe that men are generally still a little afraid of 
the dark. Thoreau, Walden, p. 142. 
Morn broaden'd on the borders of the dark. 
Tennyson, Fair Women. 
2. A dark place. 
So I wilt in the wod and the wilde holtis, 
ffer fro my feres, and no freike herde, 
Till I drogh to a derke. and the dere lost. 
Datnution of Troy (E. E. T. S.), 1. 2861. 
It is not the shallow mystery of those small dark* which 
are enclosed by caves and crumbling dungeons ; it is the 
unfathomable mystery of the sunlight and the sun. 
S. Lanifr, The English Novel, p. 47. 
3. A dark hue ; a dark spot or part. 
Some darks had been discovered. Shirley. 
With the small touches, efface the edges, reinforce the 
darks, and work the whole delicately together. 
Raskin, Elements of Drawing, p. 61. 
4. A state of concealment ; secrecy : as, things 
done in the dark. 
I am in the dark to all the world, and my nearest friends 
behold me but in a cloud. 
Sir T. Broime, Religio Medici, ii. 4. 
5. An obscured or unenlightened state or con- 
dition; obscurity; a state of ignorance: as, I 
am still in the dark regarding his intentions. 
While men are in the dark they will be always quarrel- 
ling. StUKnyjItet, Sermons, I. iii. 
As to its [the city of Quinam's] distance from the Sea, its 
bigness, strength, riches, AT.. I am yet in the dark. 
Dampier, Voyages, II. i. 7. 
We are . . . in the dark respecting the office of the large 
viscus called the spleen. 
Huxley and Yvumans, Physiol., 156. 
Dark of the moon. See moon. 
dark 1 (dark), adv. [< dark 1 , a.} In the dark; 
without light. 
I see no more in you 
Than without candle may go dark to bed. 
Shak., As you Like it, iii. 5. 
darkM (dark), r. [< ME. darken, derken, < AS. 
*deorcian, in comp. *a~deorcian (Somner), make 
dark, < deorc, dark: see darkl, a.] I. intratis. 
1 . To grow or become dark ; darken. 
The sonne darked & withdrewe his lyght. 
Joseph of Arimathie (E. E. T. S.), p. 40. 
2. To remain in the dark; lurk; lie hidden or 
concealed. 
And ther she syt and darketh wonder stille. 
Chaucer, Good Women, 1. 816. 
All day the bestes darked in here den stille. 
William of Palernt (E. E. T. S.), 1. 2723. 
II. trans. To make dark; darken; obscure. 
Fair when that cloud of pride, which oft doth dark 
Her goodly light, with smiles she drives away. Spenser. 
Pagan Poets that audaciously 
Haue sought to dark the ever Memory 
Of Gods greeat works. 
Sylvester, tr. of Du Bartas's Weeks, ii., Eden. 
Dark thy clear glass with old Falernian wine. 
B. Jonson, tr. of Martial's Epigrams, viii. 77. 
dark 2 t (dark), n. [The more orig. form of darg, 
ult. a contr. of day-work: see darg.} An obso- 
lete form of darg. 
darkle 
dark-apostrophe (diirk'a-pos'tro-fe), . See 
apoiitrophe 1 , '2. 
dark-arches (dark'ar"chez), w. A British 
noctuid moth, Hadena i>i<i>>i//i//>lt<i. 
darkemon, . Same as adarkon. 
darken (diir'kn), '. [< dark 1 + -en 1 . (.'(. ilurk 1 , 
'.] I. intrans. 1. To grow dark or darker. 
Some little of this marvel he too saw, 
Returning o'er the plain that then began 
To darken under Camelot. Tennyson, Holy <!r;til. 
The autumnal evening darkens round. 
M . A mold, The Grande Chartreuse. 
2. To grow less white or clear ; assume a darker 
hue or appearance: as, white paper dark fax 
with age. 
II. traits. 1. To deprive of light ; make dark 
or darker: as, to darken a room by closing the 
shutters. 
They [the locusts] covered the face of the whole earth, 
so that the land was darkened. Ex. x. 15. 
Whether the darken'd room to muse invite, 
Or whiten 'd wall provoke the skewer to write. 
Pope, Imit. of Horace, II. i. 07. \ 
Returned to London, she [Mrs. Browning] began the life 
which she continued for so many years, confined to one 
large and commodious, but darkened chamber. 
Pen Portraits of Literary Women, II. 101. 
2. To obscure or shut out the light of. 
It blows also sometimes very hard from the south west ; 
and when these winds are high, .it raises the sand in such 
a manner that it darkens the sun, and one cannot see the 
distance of a quarter of a mile. 
Pococke, Description of the Eaat, I. 195. 
Mr. Bucket came out again, exhorting the others to be 
vigilant, darkened his lantern, and once more took his seat. 
Dickens, Bleak House, Ivii. 
3. To render less white or clear ; impart a 
darker hue to : as, exposure to the sun darkens 
the complexion. 
A picture of his little cousin, truthfully painted, her 
face, darkened by the sun, contrasting strongly with the 
clear white of her dress, veil, and garland. 
St. Nicholas, XV. 10. 
4. To obscure or cloud the meaning or intelli- 
gence of; perplex; render vague or uncertain. 
Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without 
knowledge? Job xxxviii. 2. 
Love is the tyrant of the heart ; it darkens Reason, con- 
founds discretion. Ford, Lover's Melancholy, iii. 3. 
Such was his wisdom, that his confidence did seldom 
darken his foresight, especially in things near hand. 
Bacon, Hist. Hen. VII. 
5. To render gloomy ; sadden. 
All joy is darkened, the mirth of the land is gone. 
Isa. xxiv. 11. 
Calvin, whose life was darkened by disease, had a mor- 
bid and gloomy element in his theology. 
J. F. Clarke, Self-Culture, p. 54. 
6. To deprive of vision; strike with blindness. 
Let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see. 
Rom. xi. 10. 
Hence 7. To deprive of intellectual or spir- 
itual light; sink in darkness or ignorance. 
Their foolish heart was darkened. Rom. i. 21. 
8. To sully; make foul; make less bright or 
lustrous. 
I must not think there are 
Evils enow to darken all his goodness. 
Shak., A. and ('., i. 4. 
You are darken'd in this action, sir, 
Even by your own. Shak., Cor., iv. 7. 
9. To hide ; conceal. 
The veil that darkened from our sidelong glance 
The inexorable face. Lowell, Agassiz, i. 1. 
To darken one's door, to enter one's house or room as 
a visitor : generally or always with an implication that 
the visit is unwelcome. 
Oh, pity me then, when, day by day, 
The stout fiend darkens my parlor door. 
Wliittier, Demon of the Study. 
darkener (dar'kn-er), ii. One who or that 
which darkens. 
He [Sumner] was no darkener of counsel by words with- 
out knowledge. X. A. Rev., CXXVI. 23. 
darkey, n. See darky. 
darkfult (dark'ful), a. [ME. derkful; < dark 1 . 
n., + -ful, 1.] Full of darkness. 
All thy body shall be darkfltl. H't/c/if, Luke xi. 34. 
darkheadt, w. [ME. de<irkln-<lr, </<r/-/Wf. tlurc- 
hede; < dark 1 + -Jtead.'] Darkness. 
Al o tide of the dai we were iti ii/n-i-1" 1 '!''. 
St. Braiulan, p. 2. 
dark-houset, M. A mad-house. 
Love is merely a madness, and, I tell you, deserves as 
well a dark house and a whip as madmen do. 
Shak., As you Like it, iii. 2. 
darkle (dai-'kl), r. /'. ; pret. and pp. darkled, 
ppr. darkling. [Assumed from darkling, adr., 
regarded as a ppr.] 1. To appear dark ; show 
indistinctly. 
