To take a departure

Departure De*par"ture (?; 135), n. [From {Depart}.] 1. Division; separation; putting away. [Obs.] [1913 Webster]

No other remedy . . . but absolute departure. --Milton. [1913 Webster]

2. Separation or removal from a place; the act or process of departing or going away. [1913 Webster]

Departure from this happy place. --Milton. [1913 Webster]

3. Removal from the present life; death; decease. [1913 Webster]

The time of my departure is at hand. --2 Tim. iv. 6. [1913 Webster]

His timely departure . . . barred him from the knowledge of his son's miseries. --Sir P. Sidney. [1913 Webster]

4. Deviation or abandonment, as from or of a rule or course of action, a plan, or a purpose. [1913 Webster]

Any departure from a national standard. --Prescott. [1913 Webster]

5. (Law) The desertion by a party to any pleading of the ground taken by him in his last antecedent pleading, and the adoption of another. --Bouvier. [1913 Webster]

6. (Nav. & Surv.) The distance due east or west which a person or ship passes over in going along an oblique line. [1913 Webster]

Note: Since the meridians sensibly converge, the departure in navigation is not measured from the beginning nor from the end of the ship's course, but is regarded as the total easting or westing made by the ship or person as he travels over the course. [1913 Webster]

{To take a departure} (Nav. & Surv.), to ascertain, usually by taking bearings from a landmark, the position of a vessel at the beginning of a voyage as a point from which to begin her dead reckoning; as, the ship took her departure from Sandy Hook.

Syn: Death; demise; release. See {Death}. [1913 Webster]