n. pl. & sing. [Jap.] In the former feudal system of Japan, the class or a member of the class, of military retainers of the daimios, constituting the gentry or lesser nobility. They possessed power of life and death over the commoners, and wore two swords as their distinguishing mark. Their special rights and privileges were abolished with the fall of feudalism in 1871.

Also Knight’s service . 
1. (Feud. Law) The military service by rendering which a knight held his lands also the tenure of lands held on condition of performing military service. “By far the greater part of England [in the 13th century] is held of the king by knight’s service… . In order to understand this tenure we must form the conception of a unit of military service. That unit seems to be the service of one knight or fully armed horseman (servitium unius militis) to be done to the king in his army for forty days in the year if it be called for… . The limit of forty days seems to have existed rather in theory than practice.” Pollock & Mait. 
2. Service such as a knight can or should render; hence, good or valuable service.

n. 1. An ancient kind of military catapult. 
2. In court tennis, the rebound of a ball from a wall of the court; also the side stroke or play by which the ball is driven against the wall; hence, fig., indirect action or stroke. 
3. (Billiards) A shot in which the cue ball is driven first against the cushion.

v. i. [imp. & p. p. Trooped p. pr. & vb. n. Trooping.] 
1. To move in numbers; to come or gather in crowds or troops. ´Armies … troop to their standard.´ Milton. 
2. To march on; to go forward in haste. “Nor do I, as an enemy to peace,
Troop in the throngs of military men.” Shak.

a. Capable of being touched; tangible. [R.] ´They [women] being created to be both tractable and tactable.´ Massinger. { Tac´tic , Tac´tic•al } a. [Gr. . See tactics.] Of or pertaining to the art of military and naval tactics. — Tac´tic•al•ly, adv.

n. [Gr. : cf. F. strategie. See Stratagem.] 
1. The science of military command, or the science of projecting campaigns and directing great military movements; generalship. 
2. The use of stratagem or artifice.

n. [OE. souldier, soudiour, souder, OF. soldier, soldoier, soldeier, sodoier, soudoier, soudier, fr. L. solidus a piece of money (hence applied to the pay of a soldier), fr. solidus solid. See Solid, and cf. Sold, n.] 
1. One who is engaged in military service as an officer or a private; one who serves in an army; one of an organized body of combatants. “I am a soldier and unapt to weep.” Shak. 
2. Especially, a private in military service, as distinguished from an officer. “It were meet that any one, before he came to be a captain, should have been a soldier.” Spenser. 
3. A brave warrior; a man of military experience and skill, or a man of distinguished valor; — used by way of emphasis or distinction. Shak. 
4. (Zoöl.) The red or cuckoo gurnard (Trigla pini.) [Prov. Eng.] 
5. (Zoöl.) One of the asexual polymorphic forms of white ants, or termites, in which the head and jaws are very large and strong. The soldiers serve to defend the nest. See Termite. Soldier beetle (Zoöl.), an American carabid beetle (Chauliognathus Americanus) whose larva feeds upon other insects, such as the plum curculio. — Soldier bug (Zoöl.), any hemipterous insect of the genus Podisus and allied genera, as the spined soldier bug (Podius spinosus). These bugs suck the blood of other insects. — Soldier crab (Zoöl.) (a) The hermit crab. (b) The fiddler crab. — Soldier fish (Zoöl.), a bright-colored etheostomoid fish (Etheostoma cœruleum) found in the Mississippi River; — called also blue darter, and rainbow darter. — Soldier fly (Zoöl.), any one of numerous species of small dipterous flies of the genus Stratyomys and allied genera. They are often bright green, with a metallic luster, and are ornamented on the sides of the back with markings of yellow, like epaulets or shoulder straps. — Soldier moth (Zoöl.), a large geometrid moth (Euschema militaris), having the wings bright yellow with bluish black lines and spots. — Soldier orchis (Bot.), a kind of orchis (Orchis militaris).

n. [Hung. csákó: cf. F. shako, schako.] A kind of military cap or headdress.

n. [L. penuria; cf. Gr. hunger, poverty, need, one who works for his daily bread, a poor man, to work for one’s daily bread, to be poor: cf. F. penurie.] 
1. Absence of resources; want; privation; indigence; extreme poverty; destitution. ´A penury of military forces.´ Bacon. “They were exposed to hardship and penury.” Sprat. “It arises in neither from penury of thought.” Landor. 
2. Penuriousness; miserliness. [Obs.] Jer. Taylor.

a. [L. militaris, militarius, from miles, militis, soldier: cf. F. militaire.] 
1. Of or pertaining to soldiers, to arms, or to war; belonging to, engaged in, or appropriate to, the affairs of war; as a military parade; military discipline; military bravery; military conduct; military renown. “Nor do I, as an enemy to peace,
Troop in the throngs of military men.” Shak. 
2. Performed or made by soldiers; as a military election; a military expedition. Bacon. Military law. See Martial law, under Martial. — Military order. (a) A command proceeding from a military superior. (b) An association of military persons under a bond of certain peculiar rules; especially, such an association of knights in the Middle Ages, or a body in modern times taking a similar form, membership of which confers some distinction. — Military tenure, tenure of land, on condition of performing military service.