Stuff·ing, n.
 1. That which is used for filling anything; as, the stuffing of a saddle or cushion.
 2. Cookery Any seasoning preparation used to stuff meat; especially, a composition of bread, condiments, spices, etc.; forcemeat; dressing.
 3. A mixture of oil and tallow used in softening and dressing leather.
 Stuffing box, a device for rendering a joint impervious where there is a hole through which a movable cylindrical body, as the paston rod of a steam engine, or the plunger of a pump, slides back and forth, or in which a shaft turns. It usually consists of a box or chamber, made by an enlargement of part of the hole, forming a space around the rod or shaft for containing packing which is compressed and made to fill the space closely by means of a sleeve, called the gland, which fits loosely around the rod, and is pressed upon the packing by bolts or other means.

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 Gland n.
 1. Anat. (a) An organ for secreting something to be used in, or eliminated from, the body; as, the sebaceous glands of the skin; the salivary glands of the mouth. (b) An organ or part which resembles a secreting, or true, gland, as the ductless, lymphatic, pineal, and pituitary glands, the functions of which are very imperfectly known.
 Note: ☞ The true secreting glands are, in principle, narrow pouches of the mucous membranes, or of the integument, lined with a continuation of the epithelium, or of the epidermis, the cells of which produce the secretion from the blood. In the larger glands, the pouches are tubular, greatly elongated, and coiled, as in the sweat glands, or subdivided and branched, making compound and racemose glands, such as the pancreas.
 2. Bot. (a) A special organ of plants, usually minute and globular, which often secretes some kind of resinous, gummy, or aromatic product. (b) Any very small prominence.
 3. Steam Mach. The movable part of a stuffing box by which the packing is compressed; -- sometimes called a follower. See Illust. of Stuffing box, under Stuffing.
 4. Mach. The crosspiece of a bayonet clutch.

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 stuffing box
      n : a small chamber in which packing is compressed around a
          reciprocating shaft or piston to form a seal [syn: {packing
          box]