All 6 Uses
breech
in
Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson
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- And to be sure, as soon as he had taken off the great-coat, he showed forth mighty fine for the round-house of a merchant brig: having a hat with feathers, a red waistcoat, breeches of black plush, and a blue coat with silver buttons and handsome silver lace; costly clothes, though somewhat spoiled with the fog and being slept in.†
Chpt 9breeches = pants
- He said they all wore rough great-coats; but to be sure, the first of them, the one that came alone, wore breeches and stockings, while the rest had sailors' trousers.†
Chpt 15
- It was strange indeed to see this valley, which had lain so solitary in the hour of dawn, bristling with arms and dotted with the red coats and breeches.†
Chpt 20 *
- Alan was advertised as "a small, pock-marked, active man of thirty-five or thereby, dressed in a feathered hat, a French side-coat of blue with silver buttons, and lace a great deal tarnished, a red waistcoat and breeches of black, shag;" and I as "a tall strong lad of about eighteen, wearing an old blue coat, very ragged, an old Highland bonnet, a long homespun waistcoat, blue breeches; his legs bare, low-country shoes, wanting the toes; speaks like a Lowlander, and has no beard."†
Chpt 21
- Alan was advertised as "a small, pock-marked, active man of thirty-five or thereby, dressed in a feathered hat, a French side-coat of blue with silver buttons, and lace a great deal tarnished, a red waistcoat and breeches of black, shag;" and I as "a tall strong lad of about eighteen, wearing an old blue coat, very ragged, an old Highland bonnet, a long homespun waistcoat, blue breeches; his legs bare, low-country shoes, wanting the toes; speaks like a Lowlander, and has no beard."†
Chpt 21
- Alan had stopped opposite to me, his hat cocked, his hands in his breeches pockets, his head a little on one side.†
Chpt 24
Definitions:
-
(1)
(breech) rear
Most commonly used today in the phrase breech birth in reference to a baby who comes out of the birth canal butt-first rather than head-first.More-archaic senses seen in classic literature include:- breechcloth -- a form of loincloth consisting in a strip of material passed between the thighs and held up in front and behind by a belt or string
- breeches -- pants
- a cannon's breech -- the rear of a gun
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(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) More rarely,
breech can refer to the lower part of a pulley block.