| 释义 |
dropper|ˈdrɒpə(r)|
[f. drop v. + -er1.]
1. a. One who drops or lets fall in drops; in quot. 1700 = distiller (slang). b. One who drops seeds into the holes made by a dibbler.
a1700B. E. Dict. Cant. Crew, Rum-dropper, a Vintner. 1768–74Tucker Lt. Nat. (1852) II. 415 The greatest droppers of beads were often the worst men. 1770–4A. Hunter Georg. Ess. (1804) II. 356 An active dibbler..with three droppers at seven-pence per day. 1789Trans. Soc. Arts (ed. 2) II. 45 With two dibbers and seven droppers.
c. One who passes counterfeit money, cheques, etc. (cf. drop v. 16 b). slang.
1938F. D. Sharpe Sharpe of Flying Squad xxix. 297 These [cheques] are then passed on to other members of the gang..known as ‘droppers’. Their job is to present the cheques at the banks. 1959‘C. Hare’ Best Detective Stories 236 The functionary whose mission it is to put forged currency into circulation is known technically as a dropper.
d. One who delivers goods, liquor, etc., from market or store to retailers; a ‘shop-dropper’. local Austral. and N.Z. colloq.
1949F. Sargeson I Saw in Dream ii. xv. 255 [The Police] reckoned they'd got her [sly-grogging] this time, because they'd found out a dropper had been through the town a few nights before on his lorry. 1957Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 26 Nov. 2 A shop owner has only to telephone an order to a ‘dropper’ and within a few hours it is delivered to his door.
2. A dog that drops down when it sights game; a setter. Cf. drop v. 4 b.
3. Angling. An artificial fly adjusted to a leader above the stretcher fly. Also drop-fly, dropper-fly.
1746Bowlker Angling (1833) 112 The first dropper about a yard from the leading fly; the second dropper about eighteen inches above the first. 1875‘Stonehenge’ Brit. Sports i. v. iv. §3. 350 If more than two droppers are used, the single gut length is increased to eight feet.
4. dropper-in: one who drops in or pays a casual visit.
1805Ann. Rev. III. 58 The laundress is a costly dropper in. 1825New Monthly Mag. XVI. 264 Endless, purposeless visitants; droppers in, as they are called. 1898Elizabeth & her German Garden 37 Either you or the dropper-in will say something..better left unsaid. 1941V. Woolf Between Acts 48 Uninvited, unexpected, droppers-in, lured off the high road. 1969J. Cooper How to stay Married 44 The droppers-in will be so embarrassed that they'll apologise and make themselves scarce.
5. a. A pendant; cf. drop n. 10 a. b. A glass tube with an india-rubber top on one end, and a small opening at the other, for dropping liquid. c. A contrivance in some reaping-machines for depositing the cut grain in gavels on the ground; also the machine itself. d. Mining. (See quot. 1864.)
c1825Houlston Juv. Tracts No. 18 Imag. Troubles 4 She had..a ring on her finger, and long droppers in her ears. 1864Webster, Dropper (Mining), a branch vein which drops off from, or leaves, the main lode. 1869R. B. Smyth Goldfields of Victoria 609 Dropper, a spur dropping into the lode. A feeder. 1874Knight Dict. Mech. I. 754/2 Simultaneously with the bringing into action of the dropper, a cut-off is brought down to arrest the falling grain till the platform is reinstated. 1886Sci. Amer. LV. 373/3 Grain..cut with a ‘dropper’ or a self-raking reaper. 1889Anthony's Photogr. Bull. II. 12 The dropper is filled with alkali solution from the wide-mouthed bottle.
e. Hort. A young bulb of certain bulbous plants, esp. a small bulb developed at the apex of a downward shoot growing from the base of the parent bulb.
1900B. D. Jackson Gloss. Bot. Terms, Dropper, the young bulb of a tulip, not of flowering size. 1907Ann. Bot. XX. 429 The ‘Droppers’ of Tulipa and Erythronium. 1929A. D. Hall Bk. Tulip 22 Occasionally also it will be noticed..that a stolon has started away from the base of the old bulb, turned downward and formed a bulb at the extremity... These bulbs are called ‘droppers’ and differ in no respect from other offsets. 1951Dict. Gardening (R. Hort. Soc.) IV. 2163/1 A peculiar type of natural propagation is seen in the ‘droppers’ which are sometimes formed.
f. A vertical member of a fence or the like; spec. a light lath used between the main uprights of a fence to keep the wires spaced. Chiefly Austral., N.Z., and S. Afr.
1904‘G. B. Lancaster’ Sons o' Men 93 [He] had prayed for slotted droppers [in the fence]. a1935G. L. Meredith Adventuring in Maoriland vii. 68 Between the posts the wires are stapled to ‘droppers’, consisting of about three by one battens. 1950N.Z. Jrnl. Agric. Nov. 458/3 The materials are likely to be more easily obtained than wooden droppers. 1967Coast to Coast 1965–6 150 ‘D'you know what a Mallee gate is, Bob?’ ‘Yes, it's a short loose panel, just droppers and wires.’
6. Comb., as dropper-fly = 3.
1834Medwin Angler in Wales II. 113 Select..a small gentle, and apply it at the end of his dropper fly. 1875‘Stonehenge’ Brit. Sports i. v. iv. §3. 350 Take a few turns round the dropper-gut to make all secure. |