Call

To command or request to come or be present; to summon; as, to call a servant.

To summon to the discharge of a particular duty; to designate for an office, or employment, especially of a religious character; -- often used of a divine summons; as, to be called to the ministry; sometimes, to invite; as, to call a minister to be the pastor of a church.

To invite or command to meet; to convoke; -- often with together; as, the President called Congress together; to appoint and summon; as, to call a meeting of the Board of Aldermen.

To give name to; to name; to address, or speak of, by a specifed name.

To regard or characterize as of a certain kind; to denominate; to designate.

To state, or estimate, approximately or loosely; to characterize without strict regard to fact; as, they call the distance ten miles; he called it a full day's work.

To show or disclose the class, character, or nationality of.

To utter in a loud or distinct voice; -- often with off; as, to call, or call off, the items of an account; to call the roll of a military company.

To invoke; to appeal to.

To rouse from sleep; to awaken.

To speak in loud voice; to cry out; to address by name; -- sometimes with to.

To make a demand, requirement, or request.

To make a brief visit; also, to stop at some place designated, as for orders.

The act of calling; -- usually with the voice, but often otherwise, as by signs, the sound of some instrument, or by writing; a summons; an entreaty; an invitation; as, a call for help; the bugle's call.

A signal, as on a drum, bugle, trumpet, or pipe, to summon soldiers or sailors to duty.

An invitation to take charge of or serve a church as its pastor.

A requirement or appeal arising from the circumstances of the case; a moral requirement or appeal.

A divine vocation or summons.

Vocation; employment.

A short visit; as, to make a call on a neighbor; also, the daily coming of a tradesman to solicit orders.

A note blown on the horn to encourage the hounds.

A whistle or pipe, used by the boatswain and his mate, to summon the sailors to duty.

The cry of a bird; also a noise or cry in imitation of a bird; or a pipe to call birds by imitating their note or cry.

A reference to, or statement of, an object, course, distance, or other matter of description in a survey or grant requiring or calling for a corresponding object, etc., on the land.

The privilege to demand the delivery of stock, grain, or any commodity, at a fixed, price, at or within a certain time agreed on.

See Assessment, 4.

(sports) the decision made by an umpire or referee; "he was ejected for protesting the call"

make a prediction about; tell in advance; "Call the outcome of an election"

a special disposition (as if from a divine source) to pursue a particular course; "he was disappointed that he had not heard the Call"

the option to buy a given stock (or stock index or commodity future) at a given price before a given date

an instruction that interrupts the program being executed; "Pascal performs calls by simply giving the name of the routine to be executed"

a request; "many calls for Christmas stories"; "not many calls for buggywhips"