Crossword Dictionary

What's The Definition Of Foreign?

\For"eign\, a. [OE. forein, F. forain, LL. foraneus, fr. L. foras, foris, out of doors, abroad, without; akin to fores doors, and E. door. See {Door}, and cf. {Foreclose}, {Forfeit}, {Forest}, {Forum}.] 1. Outside; extraneous; separated; alien; as, a foreign country; a foreign government. ``Foreign worlds.'' --Milton. 2. Not native or belonging to a certain country; born in or belonging to another country, nation, sovereignty, or locality; as, a foreign language; foreign fruits. ``Domestic and foreign writers.'' --Atterbury. Hail, foreign wonder! Whom certain these rough shades did never breed. --Milton. 3. Remote; distant; strange; not belonging; not connected; not pertaining or pertient; not appropriate; not harmonious; not agreeable; not congenial; -- with to or from; as, foreign to the purpose; foreign to one's nature. This design is not foreign from some people's thoughts. --Swift. 4. Held at a distance; excluded; exiled. [Obs.] Kept him a foreign man still; which so grieved him, That he ran mad and died. --Shak. {Foreign attachment} (Law), a process by which the property of a foreign or absent debtor is attached for the satisfaction of a debt due from him to the plaintiff; an attachment of the goods, effects, or credits of a debtor in the hands of a third person; -- called in some States trustee, in others factorizing, and in others garnishee process. --Kent. --Tomlins. --Cowell. {Foreign bill}, a bill drawn in one country, and payable in another, as distinguished from an inland bill, which is one drawn and payable in the same country. In this latter, as well as in several other points of view, the different States of the United States are foreign to each other. See {Exchange}, n., 4. --Kent. --Story. {Foreign body} (Med.), a substance occurring in any part of the body where it does not belong, and usually introduced from without. {Foreign office}, that department of the government of Great Britain which has charge British interests in foreign countries. Syn: Outlandish; alien; exotic; remote; distant; extraneous; extrinsic.