Chapter Sheepfold to Shell of S by Webster's Dictionary (1913 Edition)

2. Any one of the American mergansers.

The name is also loosely applied to other ducks, as the canvasback, and the shoveler.

Shelduck
(Shel"duck`) n. [Sheld variegated + duck.] (Zoöl.) The sheldrake. [Written also shellduck.]

Shelf
(Shelf) n.; pl. Shelves [OE. shelfe, schelfe, AS. scylfe; akin to G. schelfe, Icel. skjalf. In senses 2 & 3, perhaps a different word (cf. Shelve, v. i.).]

1. (Arch.) A flat tablet or ledge of any material set horizontally at a distance from the floor, to hold objects of use or ornament.

2. A sand bank in the sea, or a rock, or ledge of rocks, rendering the water shallow, and dangerous to ships.

On the tawny sands and shelves.

Milton.

On the secret shelves with fury cast.

Dryden.

3. (Mining) A stratum lying in a very even manner; a flat, projecting layer of rock.

4. (Naut.) A piece of timber running the whole length of a vessel inside the timberheads. D. Kemp.

To lay on the shelf, to lay aside as unnecessary or useless; to dismiss; to discard.

Shelfy
(Shelf"y) a.

1. Abounding in shelves; full of dangerous shallows. "A shelfy coast." Dryden.

2. Full of strata of rock. [Obs.]

The tillable fields are in some places . . . so shelfy that the corn hath much ado to fasten its root.

Carew.

Shell
(Shell) n. [OE. shelle, schelle, AS. scell, scyll; akin to D. shel, Icel. skel, Goth. skalja a tile, and E. skill. Cf. Scale of fishes, Shale, Skill.]

1. A hard outside covering, as of a fruit or an animal. Specifically: (a) The covering, or outside part, of a nut; as, a hazelnut shell. (b) A pod. (c) The hard covering of an egg.

Think him as a serpent's egg, . . .
And kill him in the shell.

Shak.

(d) (Zoöl.) The hard calcareous or chitinous external covering of mollusks, crustaceans, and some other invertebrates. In some mollusks, as the cuttlefishes, it is internal, or concealed by the mantle. Also, the hard covering of some vertebrates, as the armadillo, the tortoise, and the like. (e) (Zoöl.) Hence, by extension, any mollusks having such a covering.

2. (Mil.) A hollow projectile, of various shapes, adapted for a mortar or a cannon, and containing an explosive substance, ignited with a fuse or by percussion, by means of which the projectile is burst and its fragments scattered. See Bomb.

3. The case which holds the powder, or charge of powder and shot, used with breechloading small arms.

4. Any slight hollow structure; a framework, or exterior structure, regarded as not complete or filled in; as, the shell of a house.

5. A coarse kind of coffin; also, a thin interior coffin inclosed in a more substantial one. Knight.