King James Bible Dictionary

FLOAT, noun

1. That which swims or is borne on water; as a float of weeds and rushes. But particularly, a body or collection of timber, boards or planks fastened together and conveyed down a stream; a raft. [The latter word is more generally used in the United States.]

2. The cork or quill used on an angling line, to support it and discover the bite of a fish.

3. The act of flowing; flux; flood; the primary sense, but obsolete.

4. A quantity of earth, eighteen feet square and one deep.

5. A wave. [Latin fuctus.]

FLOAT, verb intransitive [Latin fluo, to flow.]

1. To be borne or sustained on the surface of a fluid; to swim; to be buoyed up; not to sink; not to be aground. We say, the water is so shallow, the ship will not float

2. To move or be conveyed on water; to swim. The raft floats down the river.

Three blustering nights, borne by the southern blast, I floated.

3. To be buoyed up and moved or conveyed in a fluid, as in air.

They stretch their plumes and float upon the wind.

4. To move with a light irregular course.

FLOAT, verb transitive

1. To cause to pass by swimming; to cause to be conveyed on water. The tide floated the ship into the harbor.

2. To flood; to inundate; to overflow; to cover with water.

Proud Pactolus floats the fruitful lands.

FLO'ATAGE, noun Any thing that floats on the water.

FLO'AT-BOARD, noun A board of the water-wheel of undershot mills, which receives the impulse of the stream, by which the wheel is driven.

FLO'ATED, participle passive

1. Flooded; overflowed.

2. Borne on water.

FLO'ATER, noun One that floats or swims.

FLO'ATING, participle present tense

1. Swimming; conveying on water; overflowing.

2. Lying flat on the surface of the water; as a floating leaf.

FLOAT'ING-BRIDGE, noun

1. In the United States, a bridge, consisting of logs or timber with a floor of plank, supported wholly by the water.

2. In war, a kind of double bridge, the upper one projecting beyond the lower one, and capable of being moved forward by pulleys, used for carrying troops over narrow moats in attacking the outworks of a fort.

FLO'ATSTONE, noun Swimming flint, spungiform quartz, a mineral of a spungy texture, of a whitish gray color, often with a tinge of yellow. It frequently contains a nucleus of common flint.

FLO'ATY, adjective Buoyant; swimming on the surface; light.