Definition of "spruce" [spruce]

• Any of various coniferous evergreen trees of the genus Picea, having needlelike foliage, drooping cones, and soft wood often used for paper pulp. (noun)
• Any of various similar or related trees. (noun)
• The wood of any of these trees. (noun)
• A grayish green to dark greenish black. (noun)
• Neat, trim, and smart in appearance: "a good-looking man; spruce and dapper, and very tidy” ( Anthony Trollope). (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The "black" or "double spruce" (_Pinus nigra_), is that species from the twigs of which is extracted the essence that gives its peculiar flavour to the well-known "_spruce beer_.""
• "Such is the bacillus Thurigiensis which is currently under investigation and may well prove to be an effective agent against the budworm disease in spruce, which is at present devastating some of our eastern forests."
• "Prussia, which we call spruce, and Norway (especially from Gottenberg) and about Riga, are the best; unless we had more commerce of them from our Plantations in New England, which are preferable to any of them; there lying rotting at present at Pascataway, a mast of such prodigious dimensions, as no body will adventure to ship, and bring away."