Slacken | Webster's Dictionary (1865)

Slăck or Slăck'en, v. i.

verbintransitive

(slăk'n), v. i. [imp. & p. p. SLACKED (slăkt), SLACKENED; p. pr. & vb. n. SLACKING, SLACKENING.] [A-S. sleacian, slacian, D. slaken, O. D. slaecken, Icel. & Sw. slakna.]

To become slack; to be made less tense, firm, or rigid; to decrease in tension; as, a wet cord slackens in dry weather.
To be remiss or backward; to neglect.
To lose cohesion, or the quality of adhesion; as, lime slacks and crumbles into powder.
To abate; to become less violent.

Whence these raging fires Will slacken, if his breath stir not their flames. Milton.

To lose rapidity; to become more slow; as, a current of water slackens; the tide slackens.
To languish; to fall; to flag.

Slāck or Slāck’en, v. t.

verbtransitive

v. t. 1. To render slack; to lessen the tension of; to make less tense or tight; as, to slacken a rope or a bandage.

Sense 2. Especially, to render less earnest, violent, energetic, rapid, or decided;—applied to exertion, gait, heat, pain, and the like.

In this business of growing rich, men should slack their pace. South.

Well pleased, they slack their course. Milton.

Sense 3. To withhold; to use less liberally.

Sense 4. To deprive of cohesion by combining with water; to slake; as, to slack lime. See SLAKE.

Sense 5. To repress; to check.

I should be grieved, young prince, to think my presence Unbent your thoughts and slackened ’em to arms. Addison.

Sense 6. To neglect; to put off. [Obs.]

Slack not the good presage. Dryden.

Air-slacked lime, lime slacked or reduced to powder by exposure to the air, in consequence of the absorption of carbonic acid and water, by which it is converted into carbonate of lime and hydrate of lime, in equal proportion by equivalents.

Slāck'en, n.

noun

(slāk'n), n. A spongy, semi-vitrified substance which miners or smelters mix with the ores of metals to prevent their fusion. [Written also slakin.]

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