The Collaborative International Dictionary
Few \Few\ (f[=u]),
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[Compar. Fewer (f[=u]"[~e]r); superl. Fewest.] [OE. fewe, feawe, AS. fe['a], pl. fe['a]we; akin to OS. f[=a]h, OHG. f[=o] fao, Icel. f[=a]r, Sw. f[*a], pl., Dan. faa, pl., Goth. faus, L. paucus, cf. Gr. pay^ros. Cf. Paucity.] Not many; small, limited, or confined in number; -- indicating a small portion of units or individuals constituting a whole; often, by ellipsis of a noun, a few people. ``Are not my days few?''
--Job x. 20.Few know and fewer care.
--Prover -
Note: Few is often used partitively; as, few of them.
A few, a small number.
In few, in a few words; briefly.
--Shak.No few, not few; more than a few; many.
--Cowper.The few, the minority; -- opposed to the many or the majority.
Usage examples of "in few".
Here, one moved through a mediaeval landscape, through poverty of a kind to be found in few places in Europe.
A sincere Hindu, he has become increasingly strict and very much an ascetic, indulging in few pleasures and much contemplation, abstaining from sex, from meat, from most worldly pleasures, with the exception of an abiding taste for elaborate pastries the results of which are evident and the reason for which he will explain at length but which are beyond the logic abilities of any other human or computer to follow.
Thereafter sent Christopher for Jack of the Tofts, and told him in few words what had betid, and that Rolf the traitor was dead.
Then he sent for a priest, and for the Marshal of the host, who was a great lord, and the son of his father's brother, and in few words bade him look to the babe whom his wife bore about, and if it were a man, to cherish him and do him to learn all that a king ought to know.