health 
States or of any State, city, or town, to make regulations 
for preventing the spread of contagious or infectious dis- 
eases, to promote or regulate sanitary conditions in par- 
ticular cases, and in other ways to care for the public 
health. The National Board of Health consists of several 
members appointed by the Resident, one medical officer 
of the army, one of the navy, one of the marine hospital 
service, and one officer of the department of justice. It 
cooperates with State and municipal hoards, and reports 
upon and endeavors to increase their efficiency. Figure 
Of health. See fiijure. Health laws, statutes regulat- 
ing the general sanitary conditions by the organization of 
boards of health. 
healthful (helth'ful), a. [< health + -ful] 1. 
Pull of or in the enjoyment of health; free 
from disease; healthy: as, a healthful body or 
a healthful condition. [In this sense healthy is 
more common.] 
The virtue which the world wants is a healthful virtue, 
not a valetudinarian virtue. Macaulay, Leigh Hunt. 
2. Serving to promote health; salubrious; 
wholesome ; salutary : as, a healthful air or cli- 
mate ; a healthful diet. 
Send down . . . the healthful spirit of thy grace. 
Book of Common Prayer, Prayer for Clergy and People. 
In books, or work, or healthful play, 
Let my first years be past. 
Watts, How doth the Little Busy Bee. 
A few cheerful companions in our walks will render 
them abundantly more healtliful. V. Knux, Essays, c. 
3. Well disposed ; cheerful. [Rare.] 
Gave health/ul welcome to their ship-wrack'd guests. 
Shale., C. of ., i. 1. 
=Syn. 1 and 2. Wholesome, etc. See healthy. 
healthfully (helth'fiil-i), adv. In a healthful 
manner; wholesomely. 
healthfulness (helth'ful-nes), n. The state 
of being healthful or healthy; wholesomeness; 
salubrity. 
This verse sets forth the healthfulness and vigour of the 
inhabitants of that fertile country. 
Up. Patrick, Paraphrases and Com., Gen. xllx. 12. 
health-guard (helth'gard), . In Great Brit- 
ain, officers appointed to enforce the quaran- 
tine regulations. 
healthily (hel'thi-li), adv. In a healthy con- 
dition; so as to be healthy or to promote 
health. 
healthiness (hel'thi-nes), . The state of being 
healthy ; soundness ; freedom from disease : as, 
the healthiness of an animal or a plant. 
healthless (helth'les), . [< health + -less.] 
1. Infirm; sickly. 
O wisdom, with how sweet an art doth thy wine and 
oil restore health to my healthless soul ! 
St. Gregory, Pastoral, quoted in Quarles's Emblems, ill. 3. 
2. Unwholesome; unhealthy. [Rare.] 
He that spends his time in sports, and calls it recreation, 
is like him whose garment is all made of fringes, and his 
meat nothing but sauces ; they are healthless, chargeable, 
and useless. Jer. Taylor, Holy Living, 1. 1. 
healthlessness (helth'les-nes), n. The state 
of being healthless, sickly, or unwholesome/. 
A merry meeting, or a looser feast, calls upon the man 
to act a scene of folly and madness, and healthleisness 
and dishonour. Jer. Taylor, Works (ed. 1835), I. 704. 
health-lift (helth'lift), H. An apparatus for 
exercising the muscles by raising a weight by a 
direct upward lift. It is sometimes so arranged, by 
means of levers, that the body of the person lif ting serves 
as the weight lifted. 
health-officer (helth'of "i-ser), n. An officer 
charged with the administration of the health 
laws and the enforcement of sanitary regula- 
tions. 
healthsomet(helth'sum), a. [< health + -some.'] 
Wholesome. 
healthsomenesst (helth'sum-nes), . Whole- 
someuess. 
He [Csesar] himself made so many iorneyes as he thought 
sufficient for chaunge of the places for healthsotnenesse. 
Golding, tr. of Csesar, fol. 271. 
healthy (hel'thi), a. [< health + -yi.] 1. Be- 
ing in a sound state ; possessing health of body 
or mind; hale; sound. 
Asks what thou lackest, thought resign'd, 
A healthy frame, a quiet mind. 
Tennyson, Two Voices. 
If a healthy body contributes to the health of the mind, 
so also a healthy mind keeps the body well. 
J. F. Clarice, Self-Culture, p. 58. 
2. Conducive to health; wholesome; salubri- 
ous ; healthful. [In this sense healthful is gen- 
erally preferred.] 
Gardening or husbandry, and working in wood, are fit 
and healthy recreations for a man of study or business. 
Locke. 
And therefore that love of action which would put death 
out of sight is to be counted good, as a holy and healthy 
thing (one word, whose meanings have become unduly 
severed). W. K. Clifford, Lectures, I. 237. 
2754 
3. Safe; prudent. [Slang. ] = syn. 1. Vigorous, 
hearty, robust, strong; Healthy, Healthful, Wholesome, 
Salubrious, Salutary. A distinction between healthy said 
healthful is nearly established. Healthy is applicable to 
the condition of body or mind ; healthful to that which 
produces health. Wholesome is sometimes preferred to 
healthful on the ground of euphony, but commonly applies 
chiefly to food, as salubrious applies chiefly to air, climate, 
and the like. Salutary has mainly a moral significance : 
as, a salutary effect ; salutary influence. Healthy and 
wholesome are often used figuratively ; the others are not. 
heam (hem), n. A dialectal form of /iamt-1. 
heap (hep), n. [< ME. heep, a heap, crowd, 
multitude, < AS. heap, a band, troop, crowd, 
multitude (of persons), rarely a pile (of things), 
= OS. hop =OFries. hdp = D. hoop = MLG. hop, 
LG. hoop, hope, also hupe, hiipe = OHG. houf 
and Mfo, MHG. houf, houfe, and huf, hufe, G. 
haufe = Icel. hopr = Sw. hop = Dan. hob (the 
vowel in the Scand. words being conformed to 
that of the LG.), a troop, crowd, multitude. 
Cf. OBulg. kupu, Russ. Pol. kupa, Lith. kaupas, 
a crowd, heap (Slav, and LG. p do not reg. cor- 
respond). Doublet hope, in the phrase forlorn 
hope : see forlorn.] 1 . A great number of per- 
sons or animals ; a troop; a crowd; a multitude. 
[In this (the original) sense now rare except col- 
loquially.] 
Now is not that of God a ful fair grace, 
That swich a lewed mannes wit shall pace 
The wisdom of an hepe of learned men ? 
Chaucer, Gen. Prol. to C. T., 1. 575. 
They haue hills consecrated to Idols, whither they re- 
sort in heapes on pilgrimage. Purchas, Pilgrimage, p. 445. 
2. A great number of things; a large accu- 
mulation, stock, or store of any kind ; a large 
quantity ; a great deal : as, a heap of money ; 
the frost destroyed a heap of fruit. [Now chief- 
ly colloquial.] 
Touch. Yet was not the knight forsworn. 
Cel. How prove you that, in the great heapol your know- 
ledge ? Shale. , As you lake it, i. 2. 
Thou now one heap of beauty art. 
Cou-ley, The Mistress, Clad all in White. 
Heapi of comment have recently been written about 
Wordsworth s way of dealing with nature. 
J. C. Shairp, Aspects of Poetry, p. 110. 
3. A collection of things laid in a body so as 
to form an elevation; a pile or raised mass: 
as, a heap of earth or stones. In some places a 
heap of limestone was formerly 4} cubic yards. 
There is an heep of Stones aboute the place, where the 
Body of hire was put of the Angles. 
Mandemlle, Travels, p. 62. 
They doe . . . raise certalne heaps of sand, mudde, clay, 
or some other such matter to repell the water. 
Coryat, Crudities, I. 206. 
There is seene a ruinous shape of a shapelesse heape and 
building. Purchas, Pilgrimage, p. 58. 
It was a crumbling heap, whose portal dark 
With blooming ivy-trails was overgrown. 
Shelley, Revolt of Islam, iv. 1. 
4. In math., a collection of objects all related 
in the same way one to another A heap, used 
adverbially, a great deal ; very much : exceedingly : as, 
he goes a heap too often ; to like one a heap. Also, by ab- 
breviation, heap, a locution commonly ascribed to Amer- 
ican Indians speaking English. [Colloq.J 
To go to church in New York in any kind of tolerable 
style costs o heap a year. Dow't Patent Sermons. 
He is a big man, heap big man. 
Speech of Hole-in-the-Sky at Washington, 1868. 
In a heap, close together. Chaucer. To strike all of 
a heap, to throw into bewilderment or confusion ; aston- 
ish or confound. See aheap. [Colloq.J 
Now was I again struck all of a heap. However, soon 
recollecting myself, "Sir," said I, "I have not the pre- 
sumption to hope such an honor." 
Richardson, Pamela, I. 297. 
heap (hep), v. t. [< ME. hcpcn, < AS. hedpian 
(= D. hoopen = OHG. houfoii, MHG. houfen, G. 
haufen = Sw. hopa = Dan. (op-)hobe), heap, < 
hedp, aheap: see heap, n.] 1. To cast, lay, or 
gather in a heap ; pile ; accumulate ; amass : as, 
to heap stones or ore : often with up or on : as, 
to heap up treasures ; to heap on wood or coal. 
Eke heep uppe everie root* of feme and brieres, 
And everie weed, as used everi where is. 
Palladius, Husbondrie (E. E. T. S.), p. 47. 
Though he heap up silver as the dust. Job xxvii. 16. 
"One, two, three, four," said Mr. lacker, heaping that 
number of black cloaks upon his left arm. 
Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit, xix. 
Her brother ran in his rage to the gate, 
He came with the babe-faced lord ; 
Heap'd on her terms of disgrace. 
Tennyson, Maud, xxiii. 1. 
2. To round or form into a heap, as in mea- 
suring ; give or fill with overflowing measure. 
Nay, strew, with free and joyous sweep, 
The seed upon the expecting soil: 
For hence the plenteous year shall heap 
The garners of the men who toil. 
Bryant, Song of the Sower. 
hear 
3. To bestow a heap or large quantity upon. 
Never had man more joyf ull day then this, 
Whom heaven would heape with blis. 
Spenser, Epithalamion, 1. 247. 
Heaped measure, a quantity overfilling the measuring. 
vessel, a cone of the commodity being formed above the 
top of the vessel. Such measure is used for coal, pota- 
toes, fruit, or other articles of merchandise which do not 
lie compactly in the measuring-vessel. To heap coals 
of fire on one's head. See coal. 
heap-cloud (hep'kloud), n. Same as cumulus, 1. 
I will take the case of the common cumulus or heap- 
cloud. Nature, XXXIX. 226. 
heaper (he'per), n. One who heaps, piles, or 
amasses. 
heap-flood! (hep'flud), n. A heavy sea. 
One ship that Lycius dyd shrowd with faithful Orontes 
In sight of captayne was swasht wyth a roysterus heape- 
fiud. Stanihurtt, MneiA, L 124. 
heap-keeper (hep'ke'per), n. A miner who 
attends to the cleaning of coal on the surface. 
heapmealt, adv. In heaps: also, as if a noun, 
in the phrase by heapmeal. 
They got together spices and odours of all sorts, . . . 
and thereon pour the same forth by heape-meal. 
Holland, tr. of Camden's Britain, p. 71. 
heapy (he'pi), . [< heap + -yl.] Gathered in 
heaps. 
The weaker banks opprest retreat* 
And sink beneath the heapy water's weight. 
Rowe, tr. of Lucan, vi. 
Where a dim gleam the paly lanthorn throws 
O'er the mid pavement, heapy rubbish grows. 
Gay, Trivia, ill. 386. 
hear (her), v.; pret. and pp. heard, ppr. hearing. 
[< ME. heren, heeren (pret. herde, pp. herd),< AS. 
hieran, heran, hyran (pret. hyrde, pp. hyred)=OS. 
horian = OFries. hera, liora = D. hooren = MLG. 
horen, LG. horen, hiiren = OHG. horen, MHG. G. 
horen = Icel. hcura = Sw. hora = Dan. hore (all 
these forms with r for orig. s) = Goth, hausjan, 
hear. It is hard to see the suggested connection 
with Gr. anoveiv (tOT*aKovojetv, orig. *Kovajeiv1 
of. Koav for anoveiv in Hesychius), hear. Some 
take Teut. h-, Gr. an-, K-, as a reduced pre- 
fix, and connect the verb with L. audire (orig. 
"ausdire ?), hear, auscultare, listen, Goth, auso, 
etc., = E. ear=z Gr. ovf (UT-, orig. *ovaar-), ear: 
see acoustic, audience, audit, etc.. auscultation, 
ear 1 . Hence ult. hark, harken.] I. trans. 1. To 
perceive by the ear; receive an impression of 
through the auditory sense; take cognizance 
of by barkening. 
Not knowing whether nose, or ears, or eyes, 
Smelt, hard, or saw, more sauours, sounds, or Dies. 
Sylvester, tr. of Du Bartas's Weeks, ii., Eden. 
O friends ! I hear the tread of nimble feet. 
Milton, P. L., iv. 866. 
Where you stand you cannot hear 
From the groves within 
The wild-bird's din. 
Tennyson, The Poet's Mind. 
2. To pay regard to by listening ; give ear to ; 
give audience to; mark and consider what is 
said by ; listen to for the purpose of learning, 
awarding, judging, determining, etc. : as, to 
hear prayer; to hear a lesson or an argument; 
to hear an advocate or a cause, as a judge. 
There is the Awtier, where oure Lady herde the Aungeles 
synge Messe. Ifandeville, Travels, p. 91. 
Hear my cry, O God ; attend unto my prayer. 
Ps. Ixi. 1. 
He sent for Paul, and heard him concerning the faith in 
Christ. Acts xxiv. 24. 
Hear, all ye Trojans, all ye Grecian bands, 
What Paris, author of the war, demands. 
Pope, Iliad, Hi. 
3. To listen to understandingly ; learn or com- 
prehend by harkening ; hence, to learn by ver- 
bal statement or report. 
Sir, do rede this letter that my lorde hath the sente, and 
than shalt thou heren his wille and his corage. 
Merlin (E. E. T. 8.), iii. 620. 
He began with right a mery chere 
His tale anon, and saide as ye shul 
Chaucer, Gen. Prol. to C. T., 1. 860. 
This is an hard saying ; who can hear it? John vi. 60. 
Toward the evening, a relation of the sheik's came from 
Bayreut, where, he said, he had heard that I walked about 
the city, and had observed every thing very curiously, 
which had alarmed the people. 
Pococke, Description of the East, II. i. 97. 
4. To be a hearer of ; attend usually the min- 
istrations of : as, what minister do you hear f 
[Colloq.] 5f. To be called. [A Latinism.] 
Bright effluence of bright essence increate, 
Or hear'st thou rather [wouldst thou rather hear thyself 
called] pure ethereal stream, 
Whose fountain who shall tell? Milton, P. L., iii. 7. 
To hear a bird sing. See Wrrfi. To hear a bookt. 
See book. To hear say, to hear a person say ; learn by 
general report. [Obsolete or colloquial.] 
