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From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) : [ web1913 ]
Nutshell \Nut"shell`\, n.
1. The shell or hard external covering in which the kernel of
a nut is inclosed.
2. Hence, a thing of little compass, or of little value.
3. (Zo["o]l.) A shell of the genus Nucula.
To be, or lie, in a nutshell, to be within a small
compass; to admit of very brief or simple determination or
statement. ``The remedy lay in a nutshell.'' --Macaulay.