shroud (shroud)n.1. A cloth used to wrap a body for burial; a winding sheet. 2. Something that conceals, protects, or screens: under a shroud of fog. 3. a. Nautical One of a set of ropes or wire cables stretched from the masthead to the sides of a vessel to support the mast. b. A similar supporting line for a smokestack or comparable structure. c. One of the ropes connecting the harness and canopy of a parachute. v. shroud·ed, shroud·ing, shrouds v.tr.1. To wrap (a corpse) in burial clothing. 2. To shut off from sight; screen. See Synonyms at block. 3. Archaic To shelter; protect. v.intr. Archaic To take cover; find shelter.
[Middle English schrud, garment, from Old English scr d.] |
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| All the members of that family, especially the feminine half, were pictured by him, as it were, wrapped about with a mysterious poetical veil, and he not only perceived no defects whatever in them, but under the poetical veil that shrouded them he assumed the existence of the loftiest sentiments and every possible perfection. The seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black velvet tapestries that hung all over the ceiling and down the walls, falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material and hue. Passepartout jumped off the box and followed his master, who, after paying the cabman, was about to enter the station, when a poor beggar-woman, with a child in her arms, her naked feet smeared with mud, her head covered with a wretched bonnet, from which hung a tattered feather, and her shoulders shrouded in a ragged shawl, approached, and mournfully asked for alms. |