DRUM

Definitions

1. 1. An instrument of percussion, consisting either of a hollow cylinder, over each end of which is stretched a piece of skin or vellum, to be beaten with a stick; or of a metallic hemisphere (kettledrum) with a single piece of skin to be so beaten; the common instrument for marking time in martial music; one of the pair of tympani in an orchestra, or cavalry band. The drums cry bud-a-dub. Gascoigne.
2. 2. Anything resembling a drum in form; as:
3. 3. A sheet iron radiator, often in the shape of a drum, for warming an apartment by means of heat received from a stovepipe, or a cylindrical receiver for steam, etc.
4. 4. A small cylindrical box in which figs, etc., are packed.
5. 5. One of the cylindrical, or nearly cylindrical, blocks, of which the shaft of a column is composed; also, a vertical wall, whether circular or polygonal in plan, carrying a cupola or dome. (e) (Mach.)
6. 6. A cylinder on a revolving shaft, generally for the purpose of driving several pulleys, by means of belts or straps passing around its periphery; also, the barrel of a hoisting machine, on which the rope or chain is wound.
7. 7. See Drumfish.
8. 8. A noisy, tumultuous assembly of fashionable people at a private house; a rout. [Archaic] Not unaptly styled a drum, from the noise and emptiness of the entertainment. Smollett.
9. 9. A tea party; a kettledrum. G. Eliot. Bass drum. See in the Vocabulary. -- Double drum. See under Double.