Hop·per n.
1. One who, or that which, hops.
2. A chute, box, or receptacle, usually funnel-shaped with an opening at the lower part, for delivering or feeding any material, as to a machine; as, the wooden box with its trough through which grain passes into a mill by joining or shaking, or a funnel through which fuel passes into a furnace, or coal, etc., into a car.
3. Mus. See Grasshopper, 2.
4. pl. A game. See Hopscotch.
5. Zool. (a) See Grasshopper, and Frog hopper, Grape hopper, Leaf hopper, Tree hopper, under Frog, Grape, Leaf, and Tree. (b) The larva of a cheese fly.
6. Naut. A vessel for carrying waste, garbage, etc., out to sea, so constructed as to discharge its load by a mechanical contrivance; -- called also dumping scow.
Bell and hopper Metal., the apparatus at the top of a blast furnace, through which the charge is introduced, while the gases are retained.
Hopper boy, a rake in a mill, moving in a circle to spread meal for drying, and to draw it over an opening in the floor, through which it falls.
Hopper closet, a water-closet, without a movable pan, in which the receptacle is a funnel standing on a draintrap.
Hopper cock, a faucet or valve for flushing the hopper of a water-closet.
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