was the father at all such as handle the harp 
Gen. iv. 21. 
handle 
handelen, handle, trade, = OHG. hantalon, han- 
dle, feel, touch, manage, MHG. handeln, G. 
handeln, treat, manage, deal, trade, = Icel. 
hondla, handle, = Sw. handla, trade, = Dan. 
handle, treat, use, trade), freq. verb, < hand, 
hand: see hand, n., and cf. handle, n., to which 
in def. 8 the verb is directly due. Cf. manage, 
ult. < Li. manus, the hand.] I. trans. 1. To 
touch or feel with the hand ; use the hand or 
hands upon. 
Lorde, kepe me owt of synne and woo, 
That I haue in myn lytfe doo, 
With handys handyld or on fote goo. 
Holy Rood (E. E. T. S.), p. 185. 
Happy, ye leaves ! when as those lilly hands . . . 
Shall handle you. Spenser, Sonnets, i. 
The hardness of the winters [in Flanders] forces the 
breeders there to house and handle their colts six months 
every year. Temple. 
2. To manage by hand; use or wield with 
manual skill; ply; manipulate; act upon or 
control by the hand: as, to handle one's colors; 
to handle the reins. 
Jubal . . 
and organ. 
The lesser picture is so passingly seemingly handled 
that the lower corners of it seeme ... to hang loose. 
Coryat, Crudities, I. 186. 
These men can handle their weapon so well that, if they 
design mischief, they will dexterously break a Leg or 
Thigh-bone, that being the place which they commonly 
strike at. Dampier, Voyages, II. i. 77. 
3. In general, to manage; direct; control; hold 
or keep in hand: as, to handle a fish when 
hooked ; to handle a dog in the field ; to handle 
troops in battle. 
She is a discreet, ingenious, pleasant, pious woman ; I 
wish she had the handling of you and Mrs. Modish. 
Steele, Spectator, No. 254. 
Tom, with East to handle him, . . . steps out on the 
turf. T. Hughes, Tom Brown at Rugby, p. 246. 
Learning how to handle gases led to the discovery of 
oxygen, and to modern chemistry, and to the notion of 
the indestructibility of matter. 
Huxley, Lay Sermons, p. 15. 
4. To act upon or toward; use in some way 
(with regard to conduct) ; treat ; deal with. 
At him they cast stones, . . . and sent him away shame- 
fully handled. Mark xii. 4. 
You shall see how I'll handle her. 
Shak., M. for M., v. 1. 
It will be nothing disagreeing from Christian meeknesse 
to handle such a one in a rougher accent. 
Milton, On Def. of Humb. Remonst., Pref. 
5. To treat of; discourse upon ; expound, as a 
topic. 
All things obserued by Naturall Philosophers in Greece 
had beene handled before, partly by the Brachmanes 
amongst the Indians, partly of those which in Syria are 
called lewes. Purchas, Pilgrimage, p. 453. 
Many of his [Chaucer's] bookes be but bare translations 
out of the Latin & French, yet are they wel handled. 
Puttenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie, p. 49. 
A subject which, though often handled, has not yet in 
my opinion been fully discussed. 
Goldsmith, National Concord. 
6. To make use of ; be concerned with ; have 
to do with. 
We hondlen no money, but menelich [meanly] faren. 
Piers Plowman's Crede (E. E. T. S.), 1. 109. 
They that handle the law knew me not. Jer. it 8. 
Among the earliest tools of any complicacy which a mau- 
of-letters gets to handle are his class-books. 
Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, ii. 3. 
7. To trade or deal in; buy and sell: as, to 
handle stationery, stocks, or real estate. 
He [a merchant] generally refused to handle the im- 
proved implements and mechanical devices by which la- 
bor and waste were to be saved. The Century, XXXV. 950. 
Books are of minor importance, and but few are "kept 
In stock." Indeed, bookselling is not a profitable part of 
the business ; it does not pay to handle books, or to keep 
the run of new publications. Harper's Hag., LXXVI. 776. 
8. [< handle, .] To furnish with a handle 
or handles : as, to handle a teacup. To handle 
without gloves or mittens. See glove. 
II. intrans. 1. To use the hands ; act or work 
by means of the hands. 
They have hands, but they handle not. Ps. cxv. 7. 
2. To act or give a result of any kind when 
handled. 
Two guns may be made exactly alike in length, bend, 
and cast-off, and yet if the balance is not the same, they 
will handle as if of different bends. 
W. W. Greener, The Gun, p. 250. 
handle (han'dl), . [< ME. handel, handyl, 
handille, handle, hondle, < AS. handle, pi. han- 
dla, a handle, = Dan. handel (perhaps from 
E.), a handle; from the verb.] 1. That part 
of a thing which is intended to be grasped 
by the hand in using or moving it. The handles 
of many things have distinctive names. Thus, the ban- 
2705 
die of a sword is the hilt; of a plow, the staff or stilt; of 
an ax or hammer, the helve ; of a knife, the haft ; of a 
rake, the stale; of a scythe, the snath; of a rudder, the 
tiller; of a crab or winch, the crank; of a pump, the 
brake or lever; of a door or lock, the knoti; of a steam- 
engine, the hand-lever; of a boat-hook, lance, etc., the 
shaft; of a platen printing-press, the rounce, by which the 
bed is run in and out; of a kettle, the bail ; of a drill, bit, 
or gun, the stock. 
And for to smyte an Hors with the handille of a Whippe. 
Mandeville, Travels, p. 249. 
When mistress Bridget lost the handle of her fan, I 
took 't upon mine honour thou hadst it not. 
Shak., M. W. of W., ii. 2. 
A sword of King Salomons, whose handle was massie 
gold. Coryat, Crudities, I. 45. 
Of Bone the Handles of my Knives are made, 
Yet no ill Taste from thence affects the Blade. 
Congreve, tr. of Juvenal's Satires, xi. 
2. That by means of which anything is done ; 
the instrument of effecting a purpose : said of 
a person or thing. 
They overturned him in all his interests by the sure but 
fatal handle of his own good nature. South, Sermons. 
3. In l>o t., in the Characece, same as manubri- 
unt A handle to one's name, a title prefixed to one's 
name, as Lord, Col., Dr. [Colloq.] 
Lord Highgate had turned to me : "There was no rude- 
ness, you understand, intended, Mr. Pendennis ; but I am 
down here on some business, and don't care to wear the 
handle to my name." Thackeray, Newcomes, Ivii. 
Embrace handle, a handle, as of a knife or dagger, repre- 
senting two figures side by side embracing each other. 
Such handles were common in the sixteenth and seven- 
teenth centuries, carved in ivory or bone or cast in metal. 
Flush handle, a handle for a lock or latch which is 
placed in a recess, as of a door, sash, or berth, and does 
not project beyond the surface of the object to which it is 
attached. Car-Builder's Diet. To fly off the handle. 
See jlyi. To give a handle, to furnish an occasion or 
opportunity. 
The defence of Vatinius gave a plausible handle for some 
censure upon Cicero. 
Quoted in W. Melmoth's tr. of Cicero, ii. 17, note 5. 
He was ... a hot-tempered fellow, who would always 
give you a handle against him. 
George Eliot, Mill on the Floss, iii. 7. 
handleable (han'dl-a-bl), a. [(handle, v., + 
-aMe.'] Capable of being handled. Sherwood. 
hand-lead (hand'led), n. Naut., the lead used 
for sounding in rivers, harbors, or shoal water. 
It is much smaller than the deep-sea lead, be- 
ing from 5 to 9 pounds in weight. See lead. 
handled (han'dld), p. a. Having a handle : as, 
an iron-handled knife: used specifically in her- 
aldry when the handle of a weapon or a tool is 
of a different tincture from the blade : as, a 
sickle or, handled gules. 
handle-net (han'dl-net), n. A fishing-net with 
a handle, as a dip-net ; a kind of hoop-net or 
scoop-net. 
handler (hand' ler), . 1. A person employed 
in the transfer or placing of things by hand, 
or in some special kind of manipulation or 
management: as, a freight-handler; a handler 
of dogs or of game-cocks ; a handler of fish for 
propagation (used of one who selects the ripe 
fish from a catch). 2. The first bath or pit 
in a tannery. 
After colouring, the hides pass on to the handlers or 
handling pits, a round or series of which may consist of 
from four to twelve according to the mode of working. 
Encyc. Brit., XIV. 384. 
3. In ceram., a workman who attaches to the 
bodies of vessels the handles, which have pre- 
viously been molded in plaster-of-Paris molds. 
They are fixed by means of slip, and in most kinds of ware 
adhere immediately, so that the vessel may be lifted by 
them even before firing. 
handless (hand'les), a. [< ME. handles (= 
OFries. handlos = OHG. MHG. hantlos, G. hand- 
los = Icel. handlauss) ; < hand + -less.] 1 . With- 
out a hand or hands: as, a handless clock. 2. 
Unhandy; awkward. [Scotch.] 
hand-letter (hand'lef'er), n. In bookbinding, 
an impress on a book-cover by movable types 
from a hand-stamp, in opposition to an impress 
by a machine from an engraved stamp. 
hand-lever (hand'lev"er), n. The lever or 
handle by which a steam-engine is started, 
stopped, or reversed. 
hand-line (hand'lin), . A fishing-line worked 
by hand without a rod. It may be a single line with 
one or more hooks baited and sunk to or near the bottom, 
or thrown to any desired distance by means of a weight, 
and managed from the shore, or from a boat anchored or 
moving slowly ; or the line may be drawn rapidly over the 
surface of the water behind a sail-boat, as in the capture of 
bluefish, Spanish mackerel, striped-bass, black-bass, etc., 
either with a bait or with only some shining object to 
lure the fish, as in trawling or trolling. 
handliner (hand'li'ner), n. One who uses a 
hand-line for fishing. 
handling (hand'liug), n. [< ME. handlinge, 
liondlunge, < AS. handlung, a touching, han- 
hand-mill 
dling (= D. handeling = G. handlung = Sw. Dan. 
handling, action), verbal n. of handlian, handle : 
see handle, .] 1. A touching, fingering, or 
using with the hand; manipulation; touch: 
either literally or figuratively : as, the handling 
of the bow in violin-playing; an artist's han- 
dling of his subject. 
Then you must learn the use 
And handling of your silver fork at meals. 
B. Jonson, Volpone, iv. 1. 
Afterwards, his innocency appearing, he was delivered, 
and escaped those severe handlings that some of the duke's 
friends and retainers underwent. Strype, Sir T. Smith, iv. 
If the Athenians, as some say, made their small deeds 
great and renowned by their eloquent writers, England 
hath had her noble atchievments made small by the un- 
skilfull handling of monks and mechanicks. 
Milton, Church-Government, Pref., ii. 
2. The act of supplying with a handle or han- 
dles ; the operation of putting a handle on : as, 
the handling of pottery, or of saws, 
handlings!, adv. [ME. handlinges, with adv. 
gen. suffix -es l , < AS. handlinga, with the hands, 
< hand, hand, 4- -linga = E. -ling 2 .'] With the 
hands. 
In hand an angel has he [Jacob] laght 
That sammen [together] handlinges [var. togeder in han- 
dis, in honde] wristeled thai 
Al the night. Cursor Mundi, 1. 3932. (Co.) 
handlining (hand'll // ning), n. The use of a 
hand-line ; the act or method of catching fish 
with a hand-line. 
Mr. Earl . . . speaks of the importance of obtaining 
and preserving bait with so large a fleet engaged wholly 
in handlining and trawling. 
Fortnightly Rev., N. S., XLI. 464. 
hand-list (hand'list), n. 1. A concise list for 
easy reference. 
A new " Britannia Romana " we shall have long to wait 
for ; but surely a hand-list might be compiled from the 
book before us and the transactions of the various archce- 
ological societies of all the places where undoubted Roman 
remains have been found. N. and Q., 7th ser., III. 440. 
2. Same as check-list, 2. 
handlocked (hand'lokt), a. Handcuffed. Dek- 
ker; Hattiwell. 
hand-loom (hand'lom), . A weavers' loom 
worked by hand, as distinguished from a power- 
loom. 
hand-made (hand'mad), a. Manufactured by 
hand, and not by a machine : as, hand-made 
paper. 
handmaid (hand'mad), n. [< hand + maid. 
In earlier form handmaiden, q. v.] A female 
servant or personal attendant; a female as- 
sistant : often used figuratively. 
Laban gave unto his daughter Leah Zilpah his maid for 
an handmaid. Gen. xxix. 24. 
Nature, the Handmaid of God Almighty, doth nothing 
but with good Advice. Howell, Letters, ii. 8. 
For Jove's great Handmaid, Power, must Jove's Decrees 
pursue. Prior, Ode to the Queen, st. 10. 
She hath no handmaid fair 
To draw her curled gold hair 
Through rings of gold. 
Swinburne, Madonna Mia. 
handmaiden (hand'ma"dn), n. [< ME. hande- 
mayden; < hand + 
maiden.'] An earlier 
form of handmaid. 
handmaid-moth 
(hand'mad-moth), . 
A moth, Datana mi- 
nistra, of the fam- 
ily Jiombycida:, of a 
light-brown color, 
the head and a large 
spot on the thorax 
dark-brown, and the 
fore wings with from 
3 to 5 narrow trans- 
verse dark 
lines, its 
larva,known 
as the yel- 
low-necked 
apple-tree 
caterpillar, 
is about 2 
inches long, 
with a large 
black head, 
the next seg- 
ment dull- 
orange, and 
the rest of 
the body 
striped with 
black and 
yellow, 
hand-makingt (hand'ma'king), n. The act of 
pilfering; theft. Latimer. 
hand-mill (hand'mil), n. A mill for grinding 
grain, pepper, coffee, etc., worked by hand, 
Handmaid-moth (Datana mfnistra). 
a, larva ; I', moth (both natural size) ; f, eggs, 
natural size ; <f, an egg, enlarged. 
