COMPLEMENT, noun

1. Fulness; completion; whence, perfection.

They as they feasted had their fill,

For a full complement of all their ill.

2. Full quantity or number; the quantity or number limited; as, a company has its complement of men; a ship has its complement of stores.

3. That which is added, not as necessary, but as ornamental; something adventitious to the main thing; ceremony. [See Compliment.]

garnished and decked in modest complement

4. In geometry, what remains of the quadrant of a circle, or of ninety degrees, after any arch has been taken from it. Thus if the arch taken is thirty degrees, its complement is sixty.

5. In astronomy, the distance of a star from the zenith.

6. Arithmetical complement of a logarithm, is what the logarithm wants of 10, 000, 000.

7. In fortification, the complement of the curtain is that part in the interior side which makes the demigorge.