slidable 
Slidable (sH'da-bl), a. [< slide + -iiltle.] Ca- 
pable of sliding or of being slid: as, a slidable 
bearing. The Engineer. LXV. 538. [Rare.] 
slidden (slid'n). Past participle of sliilf. 
sliddert (slid'er), a. [Early mod. E. also slider, 
slyder; < ME. slider, slirlir, slydyr, sleder, sclider, 
sclydyr, sklither, slippery, < AS. slidor, slippery, 
< slidan, slide: see slide. Cf. slender.] Slip- 
pery. 
Man, be war, the weye is sleder, 
Thou seal slyde, thou wost not qweder. 
MS. Sloane, 2595, If. &> (Cath. Ang., p. 322). 
To a dronke man the way is aider. 
Chaucer, Knight's Tale, 1. 406. 
slidder (slid'er), v. i. [< ME. slyderen, slidren, 
< AS. sliderian, slip (= MD. slideren, drag, train), 
< slidor, slippery: see slidder, a. Cf. slender.] 
To slip ; slide ; especially, to slide clumsily or 
in a gingerly, timorous way: as, he sliddered 
down as best he could. [Old and prov. Eng.] 
With that he dragg'd the trembling sire 
Slidd'ring through clotted blood. 
Dryden, JEneiA, iii. 
Feeling your foot didder over the hack of a toad, which 
you took for a stepping-stone, in your dark evening walk. 
Beresford, Miseries of Human Life, it 9. 
slidderlyt (slid'er-li), a. [< slidder + -ly 1 .] 
Slippery. 
slidderriesst (slid'er-nes), n. [< ME. slidernesse, 
slydirnesse, slydyrnessc, sclidyrnes; < slidder + 
-HP**.] Slipperiness. 
sliddery (slid'er-i), a. [< ME. slideryc, slideri, 
slid<TH, sliddrie (= Sw. sliddrig), slippery; as 
slidder + -y 1 .] Slippery. [Obsolete or provin- 
cial.] 
Be maad the weie of hem dercnessis, and slideri; and 
the aungel of the Lord pursuende hem. 
Wycltf, Ps. xxxiv. 6. 
slide (slid), v. ; pret. slid (formerly sometimes 
glided), pp. slid, slidden, ppr. sliding. [< ME. 
sliden, slyden, sclyden (pret. slode, slod, stood, pp. 
sliden, islide},(. AS. slidan (pret. sldd, pp. sliden), 
only in comp., slide ; also, in deriv. slidor, slip- 
pery (see slidder), akin to sled 1 (sledge 2 , steigh*) 
and to slender, etc. ; cf. IT. Gael, slaod, slide ; 
Lith. slidim, slippery, slysti, slide ; Buss, sliede, 
a foot-track ; prob. extended (like slip 1 ) < -^ *sli, 
slide, flow, Skt. / sar, flow, sriti, gliding, slid- 
ing: see slip 1 .'] I. intrans. 1. To move bodily 
along a surface without ceasing to touch it, the 
same points of the moving body remaining al- 
ways in contact with that surface; move con- 
tinuously along a surface without rolling: as, 
to slide down hill. 
His horse slode also with all foure feet that he also nil 
to the erthe. Merlin (E. E. T. 8.), iii. 570. 
2. Specifically, to glide over the surface of 
snow or ice on the feet, or (in former use) on 
skates, or on a sled, toboggan, or the like. 
Th' inchanting force of their sweet Eloquence 
Hurls headlong down their tender Audience, 
Aye (childe-like) sliding, in a foolish strife, 
On th' Icie down-Hils of this slippery Life. 
Sylvester, tr. of Du Bartas's Weeks, i. 2. 
To the Duke, and followed him into the Parke, where, 
though the ice was broken and dangerous, yet he would 
go slide upon his skeates, which I did not like, but he slides 
very well. Pepys, Diary, Dec. 15, 1662. 
But wild Ambition loves to slide, not stand, 
And Fortune's ice prefers to Virtue's land. 
Dryden, Abs. and Achit., i. 198. 
3. To slip or pass smoothly ; glide onward. 
Her subtle form can through all dangers xlidf. 
Sir J. Dames, Immortal, of Soul, xxxi. 
And here, besides other streames, slideth Thermodon, 
sometime made famous by the bordering Amazones. 
Punhas, Pilgrimage, p. 319. 
4. To pass gradually from one state or condi- 
tion to another. 
Nor could they have slid into those brutish immorali- 
ties. South, Sermons. 
5. In music, to pass or progress from tone to 
tone without perceptible step or skip that is, 
by means of a portamento. 6. To go without 
thought or attention ; pass unheeded or with- 
out attention or consideration ; be unheeded or 
disregarded ; take care of itself (or of them- 
selves): used only with let: as, to let things 
slide. 
So sholdestow endure and laten slyde 
The time, and fonde to be glad and light. 
Chaucer, Troilus, v. 357. 
And vyne or tree to channge yf thon wolt doo, 
From leene land to fatte thou must him gide. 
From fatte to leene is nought ; lette that crafte slyde. 
Palladium, Husbondrie (E. E. T. S.), p. 64. 
Let the world slide. Shak., T. of the S., Ind., i. 6. 
7. To slip away : as, the ladder slid from under 
him. 
5694 
The declivities grew more precipitous, and the sand 
elided from beneath my feet 
Johnson, Vision of Theodore. 
Especially 8. To slip away quietly or in such 
a way as not to attract attention ; make off 
quietly. 
I think he will be found . . . 
Not to die so much as slide out of life. 
Brmcning, King and Book, I. 323. 
And then the girl slid away, flying up-stairs as soon as 
she was safely out of sight, to cry with happiness in her 
own room where nobody could see. 
Mrs. Oliphant, Poor Gentleman, xliii. 
0. To disappear just when wanted, as by the 
police; "slope"; "skip." [Slang.] 10. To 
make a slip; commit a fault; backslide. See 
sliding, n., 4 Satellite sliding rule, an instrument 
invented by Dr. John Bevis (died 1771) to calculate the 
eclipses of Jupiter's satellites. Sliding rule, a mathe- 
matical instrument or scale, consisting of two parts, one 
of which slides along the other, and each having certain 
sets of numbers engraved on it, so arranged that when a 
given number on the one scale is brought to coincide 
with a given number on the other, the product or some 
other function of the two numbers is obtained by inspec- 
tion. The numbers may be adapted to answer many pur- 
poses, but the instrument is particularly used in gaging 
and for the measuring of timber. Sliding scale, (a) A 
scale or rate of payment which varies under certain con- 
ditions. (1) A scale for raising or lowering imposts in 
proportion to the fall and rise in the prices of the goods. 
In 1828 a sliding scale, was established, under which a 
duty of 25. Sd. was imposed upon wheat when the price 
was under 62. 5. Domll, Taxes in England, IV. 12. 
(2) A scale of wages which rises and falls with the market 
price of the goods turned out. (3) A scale of prices for 
manufactured goods which is regulated by the rise and 
fall in price of the raw material, etc. (b) Same as sliding- 
rule. Sliding tongs, a form of pliers closed by a ferrule 
drawn down the stem. =8yn. 1 and 2. Slide, Slip, Glide. 
We xli<l<> or slip on a smooth surface : we slide by inten- 
tion ; we slip in spite of ourselves. In the Bible slide is 
used for slip. Slide generally refers to a longer move- 
ment: as, to elide down hill ; to slip on the ice. We glide 
by a smooth and easy motion, as in a boat over or through 
the water. 
II. trans. 1 . To cause to glide or move along 
a surface without bounding, rolling, stepping, 
etc.; thrust or push along in contact with a sur- 
face. 
The two images of the paper sheet are slidden over each 
other. Le Conte, Sight, p. 246. 
2. To slip gently; push, thrust, or put quietly 
or imperceptibly. 
Slide we in this note by the way. Donne, Sermons, v. 
Their eyes met, and in an instant Norah slid her hand 
in his. Whyte Melville, White Rose, II. xxviii. 
3f. To glide over or through. 
The idle vessel slides that wat'ry way, 
Without the blast or tug of wind or oar. 
ijiiiirlm. Emblems, iv. 3. 
slide (slid), 11. [< slide, r.] 1. A smooth and 
easy passage. 
Kings that have able men of their nobility shall find 
ease in employing them, and a better slide into their busi- 
ness : for people naturally bend to them, as bom in some 
sort to command. Bacon, Nobility (ed. 1887). 
2. Flow ; even course ; fluency. 
Certainly there be whose fortunes are like Homer's verses, 
that have a slide and an easiness more than the verses of 
other poets. Bacon, Fortune (ed. 1887). 
3. In music: (a) A melodic embellishment or 
grace, consisting of an upward or a downward 
series of three or more tones, the last of which 
is the principal tone. It may be considered as 
an extension of an appoggiatura. Also sliding- 
relish. (b) Same as portamento. 4. The transi- 
tion of one articulate sound into another; a 
glide: an occasional use. 5. A smooth sur- 
face, especially of ice, for sliding on. 
Mr. Pickwick ... at last took another run, and went 
slowly and gravely down the slide, with his feet about a 
yard and a quarter apart, amid the gratified shouts of all 
the spectators. Dickens, Pickwick, xxx. 
And I can do butter-and-eggs all down the long slide. 
. . . The feat of butter-and-eggs . . . consists in going 
down the slide on one foot and beating with the heel and 
toe of the other at short intervals. 
T. Hughes, The Ashen Faggot, ii. 
6. An inclined plane for facilitating the descent 
of heavy bodies by the force of gravity; a shoot, 
as a timber-shoot, a shoot (mill or pass) in a 
mine, etc. 
The descending logs in long slides attain such velocity 
that they sometimes shoot hundreds of feet through the 
air with the impetus of a cannon-ball. 
Scribner"! Mag., IV. 655. 
7. Aland-slip; an avalanche. 8. In mining, a. 
fissure or crack, either empty or filled with flu- 
can, crossing the lode and throwing it slightly 
out of its position. In Cornwall, as the term is fre- 
quently used, slide is very nearly synonymous with cross- 
Jhiean; but, more properly, a slide is distinguished from 
a cross-course or cross-flucan by having a course approxi- 
slider 
mately parallel to that of the lodes, although differing 
from them and heaving them in their underlay. Cross- 
courses and cross-flucans, on the other hand, have & course 
approximately at right angles to that of the lodes. 
9. That part of an instrument or apparatus 
which slides or is slipped into or out of place, 
(a) A glass with a microscopic object, or a picture shown 
by the stereoscope, nui^'ic lantern, or the like, mounted 
on it. (b) One of the guide-bars on the cross head of a 
steam-engine, (c) In musical instruments of the trumpet 
class, a U-shaped section of the tube, which can he pushed 
in or out so as to alter the length of the air-column, and 
thus the pitch of the tones. The slide is the distinctive 
feature of the trombone ; but it is also used in the true 
trumpet, and occasionally in the French horn. As facili- 
tating alterations of pitch in pure intonation, it has de- 
cided advantages over both keys and valves. A special 
form of slide, called the tuning-slide, is used in almost all 
metal wind-instruments simply to bring them into accu- 
rate tune with others. See cut under trombone, (d) In 
organ-building, same as slideri, !{/). (e) In racing boats, 
a sliding seat. Also slider. 
10. A slip or inadvertence. 
The least blemish, the least slide, the least error, the 
least offence, is exasperated, made capital. - 
Ford, Line of Life. 
11. Some arrangement on which anything 
slides, as (in the plural) slides, a term used in 
some mines as the equivalent of edge-guides. 
12. An object holding by friction upon a band, 
tag, cord, or the like, and serving to hold its 
parts or strands in place, (a) A utensil like abuckle, 
but without a tongue, used for shoe-latchets, pocketbook- 
straps, etc. (6) A rounded body, usually small, pierced 
with a hole, and sliding on a watch-guard, a cordfor an 
eye-glass, or the like. 
13. A slide-valve. [Eng.] Dark slide, a photo- 
graphic plate-holder. Life-and-current slide, a micro- 
scope-slide with two oval cells connected by a shallow 
channel. Pressure on the cover sends the contents of one 
cell through the channel into the other, and the thin film 
can be observed during the passage. Long Slide, in a 
steam-engine, a slide-valve of sufficient length to control 
the ports at both ends of the cylinder, its hollow hack 
forming an exhaust-pipe. Also called long valve. 
slide-action (slid'ak"shon), n. In musical in- 
struments of the trumpet class, a method of 
construction in which a slide is used to deter- 
mine the pitch of the tones produced, as in the 
trombone. 
slide-bar (slld'bar), n. 1. A bar which can be 
slid over the draft-opening of a furnace. 2. 
The slide of a stamping- or drawing-press 
which carries the movable die. 
slide-box (slid'boks), n. In a steam-engine, the 
slide-valve chest. E. H. Knight. 
slide-case (slid'kas), n. In a steam-engine, the 
chamber in which the slide-valve works. E. 
H. Knight. 
slide-culture (slid'kul'tur), n. See the quota- 
tion, and compare slide', n., 9 (n). 
The slide with the drop containing the germ serves as 
the origin for the culture, and, on this account, has re- 
ceived the name of ''slide-culture," to distinguish it from 
other forms of culture. 
Hueppe, Bacteriological Investigations (trans.), p. 108. 
slide-groatt (slid'grot), . Same as shovel-board, 
1 and 2. 
slide-head (slid'hed), . In a lathe, a support 
for a tool or for a piece of work, etc. E. H. 
Knigh t. 
slide-knife (slid'nif), n. See knife. 
slide-knot (slld'not). . A slip-knot; distinc- 
tively, two half-hitches used by anglers on a 
casting-line, for holding a drop and for chang- 
ing drops at will. 
slide-lathe (slid'laTH), . In metal-working, a 
lathe in which the tool-rest is made to traverse 
the bed from end to end by means of a screw. 
E. H. Knight. 
Slider 1 (sll'der), n. [< slide + -er 1 .] 1. One 
who or that which slides. Specifically (a) A part 
of an instrument, apparatus, or machine that slides, (b) 
Theat., one of the narrow strips of board which close the 
stage over the spaces where scenes are sunk, (c) In a lock, 
a tumbler moving horizontally. E. U. Knight, (d) In a 
vehicle, a bar connecting the rear ends of the fore hounds, 
and sliding beneath the coupling-pole, (e) A utensil like 
a buckle, but without a tongue, or simply a ring, used to 
keep in place a part of the costume, as a neckerchief, 
or a plait of hair. Compare slide, 12 (a). ( /) In organ- 
building, a thin strip of wood perforated with holes corre- 
sponding to the disposition of the pipes of a stop or set, 
and inserted between the two upper boards of a wind-chest. 
It may be moved from side to side so as either to admit 
the air from the pallet* to the pipes or to cut them off en- 
tirely. The position of a slider is controlled by a stop- 
knob at the keyboard. By drawing the knob the slider of 
a set of pipes is pushed into such position that they may 
be sounded by the digitals. Also slide. See oroani, stop, 
and wind-chest, (a) in racing boats, a sliding seat. 
2. The potter, skilpot, red-fender, or red-bel- 
lied terrapin, Pseudemys rtigosa (or Chrysemys 
rnhrireiitris), an inferior kind of terrapin or 
turtle sometimes cooked in place of the genu- 
ine Malacoclemmi/s palttstris, or diamond-back. 
It is found chiefly along the eastern coast of the United 
States, about the Susquehanna river and other streams 
