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Drift   /drɪft/   Listen
noun
Drift  n.  
1.
A driving; a violent movement. "The dragon drew him (self) away with drift of his wings."
2.
The act or motion of drifting; the force which impels or drives; an overpowering influence or impulse. "A bad man, being under the drift of any passion, will follow the impulse of it till something interpose."
3.
Course or direction along which anything is driven; setting. "Our drift was south."
4.
The tendency of an act, argument, course of conduct, or the like; object aimed at or intended; intention; hence, also, import or meaning of a sentence or discourse; aim. "He has made the drift of the whole poem a compliment on his country in general." "Now thou knowest my drift."
5.
That which is driven, forced, or urged along; as:
(a)
Anything driven at random. "Some log... a useless drift."
(b)
A mass of matter which has been driven or forced onward together in a body, or thrown together in a heap, etc., esp. by wind or water; as, a drift of snow, of ice, of sand, and the like. "Drifts of rising dust involve the sky." "We got the brig a good bed in the rushing drift (of ice)."
(c)
A drove or flock, as of cattle, sheep, birds. (Obs.) "Cattle coming over the bridge (with their great drift doing much damage to the high ways)."
6.
(Arch.) The horizontal thrust or pressure of an arch or vault upon the abutments. (R.)
7.
(Geol.) A collection of loose earth and rocks, or boulders, which have been distributed over large portions of the earth's surface, especially in latitudes north of forty degrees, by the agency of ice.
8.
In South Africa, a ford in a river.
9.
(Mech.) A slightly tapered tool of steel for enlarging or shaping a hole in metal, by being forced or driven into or through it; a broach.
10.
(Mil.)
(a)
A tool used in driving down compactly the composition contained in a rocket, or like firework.
(b)
A deviation from the line of fire, peculiar to oblong projectiles.
11.
(Mining) A passage driven or cut between shaft and shaft; a driftway; a small subterranean gallery; an adit or tunnel.
12.
(Naut.)
(a)
The distance through which a current flows in a given time.
(b)
The angle which the line of a ship's motion makes with the meridian, in drifting.
(c)
The distance to which a vessel is carried off from her desired course by the wind, currents, or other causes.
(d)
The place in a deep-waisted vessel where the sheer is raised and the rail is cut off, and usually terminated with a scroll, or driftpiece.
(e)
The distance between the two blocks of a tackle.
13.
The difference between the size of a bolt and the hole into which it is driven, or between the circumference of a hoop and that of the mast on which it is to be driven.
14.
(Phys. Geog.) One of the slower movements of oceanic circulation; a general tendency of the water, subject to occasional or frequent diversion or reversal by the wind; as, the easterly drift of the North Pacific.
15.
(Aeronautics) The horizontal component of the pressure of the air on the sustaining surfaces of a flying machine. The lift is the corresponding vertical component, which sustains the machine in the air. Note: Drift is used also either adjectively or as the first part of a compound. See Drift, a.
Drift of the forest (O. Eng. Law), an examination or view of the cattle in a forest, in order to see whose they are, whether they are commonable, and to determine whether or not the forest is surcharged.
continental drift (Geology), the very slow (ca. 1-5 cm per year) movement of the continents and parts of continents relative to each other and to the points of upwelling of magma in the viscous layers beneath the continents; causing, for example, the opening of the South Atlantic Ocean by the movement of Africa and South America away from each other. See also plate tectonics.


verb
Drift  v. t.  
1.
To drive or carry, as currents do a floating body.
2.
To drive into heaps; as, a current of wind drifts snow or sand.
3.
(Mach.) To enlarge or shape, as a hole, with a drift.


Drift  v. i.  (past & past part. drifted; pres. part. drifting)  
1.
To float or be driven along by, or as by, a current of water or air; as, the ship drifted astern; a raft drifted ashore; the balloon drifts slowly east. "We drifted o'er the harbor bar."
2.
To accumulate in heaps by the force of wind; to be driven into heaps; as, snow or sand drifts.
3.
(mining) To make a drift; to examine a vein or ledge for the purpose of ascertaining the presence of metals or ores; to follow a vein; to prospect. (U.S.)


adjective
Drift  adj.  That causes drifting or that is drifted; movable by wind or currents; as, drift currents; drift ice; drift mud.
Drift anchor. See Sea anchor, and also Drag sail, under Drag, n.
Drift epoch (Geol.), the glacial epoch.
Drift net, a kind of fishing net.
Drift sail. Same as Drag sail. See under Drag, n.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Drift" Quotes from Famous Books



... crowded together in the corner of the ruined hut, and snow as well as "light" came in "through the chinks that time had made." Owing to a change in the wind, the smoke of the fire outside drifted in; and there was evidence of a worse drift—that of the snow, which before nightfall I daresay may have buried ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... the boat, when four men, armed with long spears, emerged from the wood, and threw themselves upon it to take possession of it. They would have succeeded with ease, had not the crew of the boat out at sea perceived them, and cried out to the lads to let it drift with the current. They were pursued so closely by the enemy, that the master of the pinnace discharged his gun over the ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... waved aside the idea of a suit. "The whole thing," said he, "is merely a question of tactics. Things are going along very satisfactorily as they are. There's a drift on, a tendency—you might say. The clothing people have come in. Magees have come in. Why, they've agreed to do every blessed thing you asked—fireproofed stairways and fire-doors, ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... the sandy beach abreast of the anchorage; in doing this the boat filled, and the instruments were so wetted, that they were left on the beach to dry during our absence. Our ascent, from the hill being steep, and composed of a very loose drift sand, was difficult and fatiguing; but the beautiful flowers and plants, with which the surface of the hill was strewed, repaid us for our toil. These being all new to Mr. Cunningham fully occupied his attention, ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... house has been converted into a surplus club for half the fellows in the station; and if you are going to spend your time 'getting inside' other men with a view to painting their portraits, we shall simply drift apart as the Nortons did. Conditions of life out here make that sort of thing fatally easy to fall into. But I tell you plainly that if there is to be no attempt at amalgamation, if we are each to go our own way, then—we must lead separate lives. ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver


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