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/hˈɛmlˌɑk/ Listen

noun

Hemlock n.

(Bot.) The name of several poisonous umbelliferous herbs having finely cut leaves and small white flowers, as the Cicuta maculata, Cicuta bulbifera, and Cicuta virosa, and the Conium maculatum. See Conium. Note: The potion of hemlock administered to Socrates is by some thought to have been a decoction of Cicuta virosa, or water hemlock, by others, of Conium maculatum.

(Bot.) An evergreen tree common in North America (Abies Canadensis or Tsuga Canadensis); hemlock spruce. "The murmuring pines and the hemlocks."

The wood or timber of the hemlock tree.

Ground hemlock, or Dwarf hemlock. See under Ground.

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Etymology of 'Hemlock'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Hemlock" Quotes from Famous Books

... forest, and in the meadow, and in the night in which the corn grows. We require an infusion of hemlock, spruce or arbor vitae in our tea. There is a difference between eating and drinking for strength and from mere gluttony. The Hottentots eagerly devour the marrow of the koodoo and other antelopes raw, as a matter of course. Some of our northern Indians eat ...

— Walking • Henry David Thoreau

... there: the other two sides were thick wooded forests of pines and hemlocks. Nothing could exceed in loveliness the situation of this lake. Two roads led to it: one from the Springton, the other from the Welbury side; both running through the hemlock forests. In the winter these were used for carrying out ice, which was cut in great quantities on the lake. In the summer, no one crossed these roads, except parties of pleasure-seekers who went to sail or row on ...

— Hetty's Strange History • Anonymous

... The hemlock-tree (as they call it in New-England) is a kind of spruce: In the Scottish Highlands are trees of wonderful altitude (though not altogether so tall, thick, and fine as the former) which grow upon places so unaccessible, and far from ...

— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn

... may have been due to a desire to postpone his end until the proper time, as indicated by "Mine hour is not yet come", but when the time did come, Jesus did not bear his approaching death bravely, as Socrates did when about to drink the cup of hemlock. Jesus was much afraid, "and prayed, saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless, not my will but thine ...

— The Mistakes of Jesus • William Floyd

... thing good is to express certain affinities between that thing and the speaker; and if this is done with self-knowledge and with knowledge of the thing, so that the felt affinity is a real one, the judgment is invulnerable and cannot be asked to rescind itself. Thus if a man said hemlock was good to drink, we might say he was mistaken; but if he explained that he meant good to drink in committing suicide, there would be nothing pertinent left to say: for to adduce that to commit suicide is not good ...

— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

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