Hap"py (hăp"p?), a.
[Compar. Happier (-pĭ*ẽr);
superl. Happiest.] [From Hap chance.]
1. Favored by hap, luck, or fortune; lucky;
fortunate; successful; prosperous; satisfying desire; as, a
happy expedient; a happy effort; a happy
venture; a happy omen.
Chymists have been more happy in finding
experiments than the causes of them.
Boyle.
2. Experiencing the effect of favorable
fortune; having the feeling arising from the consciousness of well-
being or of enjoyment; enjoying good of any kind, as peace,
tranquillity, comfort; contented; joyous; as, happy hours,
happy thoughts.
Happy is that people, whose God is the
Lord.
Ps. cxliv. 15.
The learned is happy Nature to explore,
The fool is happy that he knows no more.
Pope.
3. Dexterous; ready; apt;
felicitous.
One gentleman is happy at a reply, another
excels in a rejoinder.
Swift.
Happy family, a collection of animals of
different and hostile propensities living peaceably together in one
cage. Used ironically of conventional alliances of persons who are in
fact mutually repugnant. -- Happy-go-lucky,
trusting to hap or luck; improvident; easy-going. "Happy-
go-lucky carelessness." W. Black.