strait (str t)n.1. Abbr. Str. or St. A narrow channel joining two larger bodies of water. Often used in the plural with a singular verb. 2. A position of difficulty, perplexity, distress, or need. Often used in the plural: in desperate straits. adj.1. a. Difficult; stressful. b. Having or marked by limited funds or resources. 2. Archaic a. Narrow. b. Affording little space or room; confined. c. Fitting tightly; constricted. 3. Archaic Strict, rigid, or righteous.
[Middle English streit, narrow, a strait, from Old French estreit, tight, narrow, from Latin strictus, past participle of stringere, to draw tight; see streig- in Indo-European roots.]
strait ly adv. straitness n. |
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| The travellers crossed the ditch upon a drawbridge of only two planks breadth, the narrowness of which was matched with the straitness of the postern, and with a little wicket in the exterior palisade, which gave access to the forest. Is nothing more needed than to get a footing, by hook or by crook, in other people's houses to rule over the masters (and that, perhaps, after having been brought up in all the straitness of some seminary, and without having ever seen more of the world than may lie within twenty or thirty leagues round), to fit one to lay down the law rashly for chivalry, and pass judgment on knights-errant? Of this we have abundant proof in the ordinary experience of surgeons, who, by binding the arm with a tie of moderate straitness above the part where they open the vein, cause the blood to flow more copiously than it would have done without any ligature; whereas quite the contrary would happen were they to bind it below; that is, between the hand and the opening, or were to make the ligature above the opening very tight. |