Pick

n.
  1. A sharp-pointed tool for picking; -- often used in composition; as, a toothpick; a picklock.
  2. (Mining & Mech.) A heavy iron tool, curved and sometimes pointed at both ends, wielded by means of a wooden handle inserted in the middle, -- used for digging ino the ground by quarrymen, roadmakers, etc.; also, a pointed hammer used for dressing millstones.
  3. A pike or spike; the sharp point fixed in the center of a buckler.
  4. Choice; right of selection; as, to have one's pick; in cat breeding, the owner of a stud gets the pick of the litter.
  5. (Print.) A particle of ink or paper imbedded in the hollow of a letter, filling up its face, and occasioning a spot on a printed sheet.
  6. (Painting) That which is picked in, as with a pointed pencil, to correct an unevenness in a picture.
  7. (Weaving) The blow which drives the shuttle, -- the rate of speed of a loom being reckoned as so many picks per minute;
    8. Pick dressing (Arch.),
    in cut stonework, a facing made by a pointed tool, leaving the surface in little pits or depressions.
    Pick hammer ,
    a pick with one end sharp and the other blunt, used by miners.