17-letter words containing h, f
- fishnet stockings — leg coverings for women, made from an open mesh fabric resembling netting
- flash photography — photography using a momentary flash of artificial light as a source of illumination.
- flight instrument — any instrument used to indicate the altitude, attitude, airspeed, drift, or direction of an aircraft.
- flight lieutenant — A flight lieutenant is an officer of middle rank in the British air force.
- flight of capital — When people lose confidence in a particular economy or market and withdraw their investment from it, you can refer to a flight of capital from that economy or market.
- flight supplement — an additional charge payable on the price of an air ticket
- flog a dead horse — a large, solid-hoofed, herbivorous quadruped, Equus caballus, domesticated since prehistoric times, bred in a number of varieties, and used for carrying or pulling loads, for riding, and for racing.
- florentine stitch — a straight stitch worked in a high and low relief pattern to form a variety of zigzag or oblique designs.
- flower-of-an-hour — a malvaceous Old World herbaceous plant, Hibiscus trionum, having pale yellow flowers with a bladder-like calyx
- fluorescent light — a fluorescent lamp in domestic or commercial use; a fluorescent strip
- foam at the mouth — a collection of minute bubbles formed on the surface of a liquid by agitation, fermentation, etc.: foam on a glass of beer.
- follow the hounds — to hunt a fox, etc. on horseback with hounds
- follow the leader — a child's game in which players, one behind the other, follow a leader and must repeat or follow everything he or she does.
- football hooligan — a noisy violent football supporter
- for all the world — the earth or globe, considered as a planet.
- for heaven's sake — expressing frustration
- for the most part — a portion or division of a whole that is separate or distinct; piece, fragment, fraction, or section; constituent: the rear part of the house; to glue the two parts together.
- fort walton beach — a city in NW Florida.
- fountain of youth — a fabled spring whose waters were supposed to restore health and youth, sought in the Bahamas and Florida by Ponce de León, Narváez, De Soto, and others.
- four on the floor — a four-speed manual transmission having the gearshift set into the floor.
- four-on-the-floor — a four-speed manual transmission having the gearshift set into the floor.
- four-part harmony — harmony in which each chord has four tones, creating, in sum, four melodic lines.
- fourfold purchase — a tackle that is composed of a rope passed through two fourfold blocks in such a way as to provide mechanical power in the ratio of 1 to 5 or 1 to 4, depending on whether hauling is done on the running or the standing block and without considering friction. Compare tackle (def 2).
- freedom of speech — the right of people to express their opinions publicly without governmental interference, subject to the laws against libel, incitement to violence or rebellion, etc.
- freight forwarder — a person or firm that arranges to pick up or deliver goods on instructions of a shipper or a consignee from or to a point by various necessary conveyances and common carriers.
- freight insurance — insurance paid on goods in transport
- french provincial — noting, pertaining to, or resembling a style of furnishings and decoration originating in the provinces of France in the 18th century, derived from but less ornate than styles then current in Paris and featuring simply carved wood furniture, often with decorative curved moldings.
- french revolution — the revolution that began in 1789, overthrew the absolute monarchy of the Bourbons and the system of aristocratic privileges, and ended with Napoleon's overthrow of the Directory and seizure of power in 1799.
- french somaliland — a former name of Djibouti (def 1).
- friend of dorothy — a male homosexual
- from hand to hand — the terminal, prehensile part of the upper limb in humans and other primates, consisting of the wrist, metacarpal area, fingers, and thumb.
- from head to foot — all over one's body
- from the rooftops — If you shout something from the rooftops, you say it or announce it in a very public way.
- front-wheel drive — a drive system in which engine power is transmitted through the front wheels only.
- functional change — a change in the grammatical function of a word, as in the use of the noun input as a verb or the noun fun as an adjective.
- furbish lousewort — any plant belonging to the genus Pedicularis, of the figwort family, as the wood betony, formerly supposed to cause lice in sheep feeding on it: one species, P. furbishiae (Furbish lousewort) of parts of Maine and New Brunswick, Canada, having finely toothed leaves and a cluster of yellow flowers, is endangered and was thought to be extinct until specimens were discovered in 1946 and again in 1976.
- further education — adult education.
- fuss and feathers — an excessively elaborate or pretentious display; ostentation.
- george whitefield — George, 1714–70, English Methodist evangelist.
- get off the grass — an exclamation of disbelief
- get the better of — of superior quality or excellence: a better coat; a better speech.
- gi bill of rights — any of various Congressional bills enacted to provide funds for college educations, home-buying loans, and other benefits for armed-services veterans.
- glory-of-the-snow — any of several plants belonging to the genus Chionodoxa, of the lily family, native to the Old World, having showy, blue, white, or pink flowers that bloom early in the spring.
- go for the collar — to go without a hit in a game
- go for the doctor — to make a great effort or move very fast, esp in a horse race
- go out of fashion — be dated
- go out of the way — to inconvenience oneself; do something that one would not ordinarily do, or that requires extra or deliberate effort or trouble
- grandfather clock — a pendulum floor clock having a case as tall as or taller than a person; tall-case clock; long-case clock.
- grandstand finish — a close or exciting ending to a sports match or competition
- great vowel shift — a series of changes in the quality of the long vowels between Middle and Modern English as a result of which all were raised, while the high vowels (ē) and (o̅o̅), already at the upper limit, underwent breaking to become the diphthongs (ī) and (ou).