rapier

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Will you travel further or farther for your summer vacation?
Take along our Concise Dictionary of English Usage and find out!
http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/book.pl?conusg.htm&6
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The Word of the Day for July 4 is:

rapier   \RAY-pee-er\   adjective
     : extremely sharp or keen  

Example sentence:
     In the June 1992 issue of _Field & Stream_ magazine, Dave Hughes offered 
the following fly-fishing advice: "In one fluid motion, lift the rod up and 
back, and drive it forward with a rapier thrust."

Did you know?
     A rapier is a straight, two-edged sword with a narrow pointed blade, 
designed especially for thrusting. According to _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, 
"the long rapier was beautifully balanced, excellent in attack, and superb for 
keeping an opponent at a distance." The word itself, which we borrowed in the 
16th century, is from Middle French "rapiere." (It has no connection to the 
word "rape.") The first time that "rapier" was used as an adjective in its 
figurative "cutting" sense, it described a smile: "Who can bear a rapier smile? 
A kiss that dooms the soul to death?" ("The Lover's Lament" by Sumner Lincoln 
Fairfield, 1824). Wit was first described as "rapier-like" by an author in 
1853, and, these days, the most common use of the adjective "rapier" is to 
describe wit.