Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An optical device used for viewing objects far below the surface of water.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A kind of water-clock or instrument formerly used for measuring time, consisting of a cylindrical graduated tube, form which water slowly escaped through an aperture in the conical bottom, the subsidence of the water marking the lapse of time.
  • noun A hygroscope.
  • noun An apparatus for observing objects in the sea or on the sea-bottom.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun An instrument designed to mark the presence of water, especially in air.
  • noun A kind of water clock, used anciently for measuring time, the water tricking from an orifice at the end of a graduated tube.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A device for viewing objects below the surface of the water.

Etymologies

Sorry, no etymologies found.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word hydroscope.

Examples

  • MAHMOUD EL KHZNDAN, SHIFA HOSPITAL: So much people killed simply because you have no test tube, no hydroscope, no tube, no I.V. lines, no narcotics for no crushed injuries.

    CNN Transcript Dec 30, 2008 2008

  • It might be said that he divined the course of seams in the depths of the coal mine as a hydroscope reveals springs in the bowels of the earth.

    The Underground City 2003

  • He knelt for some time longer, watching the fish, before he resigned the hydroscope to me.

    Police!!! Henry Hutt 1899

  • It looks to me through the hydroscope, at this distance, exactly like a tiny, silvery minnow.

    Police!!! Henry Hutt 1899

  • At first I scarcely noticed them, supposing them to be vast beds of silvery bottom sand glittering under the electric pencil of the hydroscope.

    Police!!! Henry Hutt 1899

  • Later I heard him clamping the hood on the hydroscope; but I was too disgusted for any further words, and I dug away at the water with my paddle.

    Police!!! Henry Hutt 1899

  • Brown had lugged the pneumatic raft down to the shore where he was now pumping it full: I followed with the paddles, pole, and hydroscope.

    Police!!! Henry Hutt 1899

  • Astounded, I continued to adjust the hydroscope to a range incredible, turning the screw to focus at a mile and a half, at two miles, at two and a quarter, a half, three-quarters, three miles, three miles and a quarter -- click!

    Police!!! Henry Hutt 1899

  • I was unscrewing the centre-plug from the raft and screwing into the empty socket the lens of the hydroscope and attaching the battery, while

    Police!!! Henry Hutt 1899

  • It might be said that he divined the course of seams in the depths of the coal mine as a hydroscope reveals springs in the bowels of the earth.

    The Underground City 1877

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.