| 释义 |
▪ I. weasel, n.|ˈwiːz(ə)l|
Forms: 1 uueosule, uuesulae, wesle, 4 wesill, 4–5 wesel(e, 4–6 wesell, -il, 5 wesyl(le, wees-, wessylle, weysyl, wezel, whesille, Sc. quhasill, 6 wesyll, weysell, 6–7 weazell, -ill, weesell, we(e)sill, 6–9 weesel, 7 weasell, -il, weassel, weesle, we(e)zill, weezle, wheezle, Sc. waesel, 7–8 weezel, Sc. whessell, 8–9 weasle, 9 dial. wizzel, 7– weasel.
[OE. wesule, wesle wk. fem. = NFris. wisel (WFris. wezel-, weezling), (M)Du. wezel, OHG. wisula, -ala (MHG. wisele, wisel, mod.G. wiesel fem.):—OTeut. *wisulōn-, of obscure origin.
From German dialects come the Icel. (hreysi)vísla, ‘(cairn-) weasel’, Sw. vesla, vessla, Da. væsel.]
1. a. A carnivorous animal (Putorius nivalis), the smallest European species of the genus (of the order Mustelidæ) which includes the polecat, stoat, etc. It is remarkable for its slender body, and for its ferocity and bloodthirstiness.
c725Corpus Gloss. M 337 Mustela, uueosule. c1000ælfric Gram. vi. (Z.) 19 Mustela, wesle. 11..Conf. Ecgbert xxxix. in Thorpe Ags. Laws II. 164 Ᵹif on hwylcne mycelne wætan mus oððe wesle onbefealle..sprenge mid haliᵹ wætere. c1325Gloss. W. de Bibbesw. in Wright Voc. 166 Ceste belette, a wesele. a1340Hampole Psalter xc. 13 Þe wesill ouercumys him [sc. the basilisk] & slas him. 1398Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xviii. lxxiv. (1495) 829 The wesell hathe a red and a whyte wombe and chaungeth colour. c1440Pallad. on Husb. i. 540 The wesil shal for this doon hem noon harm. c1480Henryson Mor. Fab. v. (Parl. Beasts) xvii, The quhirand quhitret with the quhasill went. 1577B. Googe Heresbach's Husb. iii. 156 b, I would..counsell you to destroy your Rattes and Mise with..Weesels. 1579Lyly Euphues (Arb.) 272 If thou be [be]witched with eyes, weare the eie of a wesill in a ring, which is an enchauntment against such charmes. 1606N. B[axter] Sydney's Ourania G 1, The Pole-catte, and wilde-catte, the Weezle, & Stoate. 1624Capt. J. Smith Virginia ii. 35 Of Weesels and other Vermines skins a good many. 1726Leoni Alberti's Archit. I. 97/2 Pole-cats, Weezels,..or the like Vermin. 1832L. Hunt Sir R. Esher (1850) 336 Staring like a weasel. 1844Jesse Scenes Country Life 357 Keepers have informed me that Weazles will sometimes kill and feed on Snakes. 1883Simmonds Dict. Useful Anim. s.v., The long-tailed weasel (Mustela longicauda). 1919Contemp. Rev. Aug. 183, I came across a bloodthirsty weasel, dragging a large buck rabbit after it.
transf. and fig.1599Shakes. Hen. V, i. ii. 170 For once the Eagle (England) being in prey, To her vnguarded Nest, the Weazell (Scot) Comes sneaking, and so sucks her Princely Egges. 1632Chapman & Shirley Ball i. (1639) A 4, Co. Dee not know him, tis the Court dancing Weesill. Ma. A Dancer, and so gay. 1633B. Jonson Tale Tub i. vi, Wherefore did I, Sir, bid him Be call'd, you Weazell, Vermin of a Huisher? 1638Ford Fancies ii. ii, Whoreson, lecherous weazle! 1790Wolcot (P. Pindar) Advice to Future Laureat ii. 39 Brudenell, thou stinkest! weasel, polecat, fly! 1886P. Robinson Teetotum Trees 39 A thin little weasel of a Bengalee Baboo.
b. In proverbial sayings. † to be bit by a barn weasel: to be drunk.
1673R. Head Canting Acad. 171 He is bit by a barn Weesel. 1825J. Neal Bro. Jonathan III. 269 ‘On with your story, will you; and if you are caught another time—’ ‘Caught! me!—..catch a weasel asleep!’ 1840Dickens Old C. Shop xxiii, I'm..as sharp as a ferret, and as cunning as a weazel.
¶c. Erroneously spoken of as a corn-eating animal.
c1600Distr. Emperor iii. i. in Bullen Old Pl. (1884) III. 208 True, daughter; love is like the weassel that went into the meale-chamber;..it growes plumpe and full of humor; it asks a crannye as bygg as a conye borrowe to gett out agayne. a1744Pope Imit. Hor. Ep. i. vii. 51 A Weasel once made shift to slink In at a Corn-loft thro' a Chink. [Hence1755Johnson, Weasel, a small animal that eats corn and kills mice.]
d. In some parts of England and Ireland confused with the stoat, which is sometimes called ermine weasel or (when wearing its winter coat) white weasel.
1607Topsell Four-f. Beasts 726 The white Weasel is called Minever. 1676Cotton Angler ii. viii. 75 A Flie called the Owl-Flie; the dubbing of a white Weesel's tail. 1774Goldsm. Nat. Hist. III. 358 This animal [sc. the ermine] is sometimes found white in Great Britain, and is then called a white weasel. 1891Fishing Gaz. 3 Jan. 7/2 The stoat, or ermine weasel (Mustela erminea)..in many parts of England is called a weasel. 1916Field 22 Apr. 661/3 The stoat..in many parts [of Ireland] is known as ‘weasel’.
2. Applied with qualifying words to various animals belonging to the family Mustelidæ, or having some marked resemblance to the weasel, as fisher w. (see fisher1 2 b); four-toed w. = suricate; Malacca w. = rasse; Mexican w. = kinkajou; water-w. (see water n. 30).
1771Pennant Syn. Quadr. 228 Four-toed Weesel. 1781― Hist. Quadr. II. 328 Fisher Weesel. Ibid. 338 Mexican Weesel. 1800Shaw Gen. Zool. I. ii. 406 Malacca Weesel.
†3. [transl. L. mustela (marina).] A fish, taken to be the lamprey. (Cf. weasel-fish, -ling in 8 b, and Fr. belette.) Obs.
1601Holland Pliny xxxii. ix. II. 445 The liver also of the fish named the Sea-cat or Weazill, is given in like case.
†4. The smew. Cf. weasel coot, duck in 8 b.
a1682Sir T. Browne Norf. Birds Wks. 1835 IV. 317 The..mustela variegata,..the variegated or party-coloured weasel, so called from the resemblance it beareth unto a weasel in the head.
5. U.S. A nickname for a native of S. Carolina.
1845in C. Cist Cincinnati Misc. I. 240 The inhabitants of..S. Carolina [are called] Weasels. 1875Chamb. Jrnl. 13 Mar. 171/2 South Carolina is Palmetto State, and the natives are Weasels.
6. A tracked vehicle capable of travelling over difficult terrain; spec. (a) a light cargo and personnel carrier (U.S. Mil.); (b) a snow tractor (see quot. 1958).
1944Yank 4 Aug. 17/2 Cargo carrier M29, nicknamed the Weasel, is now in full production. 1949[see snow-buggy s.v. snow n.1 8 b]. 1958Times 11 Nov. 6/7 The Weasel—one of the snow vehicles used by Sir Vivian Fuchs on his trans-Antarctic journey—was invented by a civilian, the late Mr. Geoffrey Pyke. 1964‘J. H. Roberts’ Q Document (1965) ix. 206 The hotels operated what the student referred to as ‘wesaru’—which..was the Japanese way of pronouncing ‘weasel’, a cross between a jeep and an army tank—to carry the guests. 1980Globe & Laurel July/Aug. 227/2 We in fact lost two vehicles doing this, one being my own command vehicle which was a cargo LVT with a weasel in the back.
7. An equivocal statement or claim, esp. one used in an intentionally misleading advertisement. See weasel word, sense 8 b below.
1959T. Griffith Waist-High Culture (1960) 83 The answer may have to be a ‘weasel’, the phrasing that avoids or begs the question. 1963D. Ogilvy Confessions Advert. Man xi. 155, I plead guilty to one act of suggestio falsi—what Madison Avenue calls a ‘weasel’. 1975Idle Moments (Austral.) Dec. 26/2 The ‘weasels’ are so cleverly written, so subtle, you hardly notice them at all.
8. a. attrib. and Comb., as weasel family, weasel kind, weasel tribe (designations for the order Mustelidæ); weasel-colour, weasel-mind, weasel-run, weasel-skin, weasel-whelp; similative, as weasel-† becked (= beaked), weasel-eyed, weasel-faced, weasel-headed, weasel-like adjs.
1587Harrison England ii. vii. 172/1 in Holinshed, If a man..be *wesell becked then much heare left on the cheekes will make the owner looke big like a bowdled hen.
1585Higins Junius' Nomencl. 177/2 Fuluus,..fox or *weazill colour.
1922*Weasel-eyed [see peanut-brained adj. s.v. peanut 3 a]. 1985C. FitzGibbon Love lies a Loss v. 59 The weasel-eyed creditors lined the dock.
1596Nashe Saffron-Walden X 1 b, Mounsieur Fregeuile Gautius, that prating *weazell fac'd vermin, is one of the Pipers in this consort. 1807–8W. Irving Salmagundi (1824) 148 A little meagre, weazel-faced Frenchman.
1877Cassell's Nat. Hist. II. 182 The *Weasel Family.
1681Grew Musæum i. §ii. i. 19 The *Weesle-Headed Armadillo, Tatu Mustelinus.
1768Pennant Brit. Zool. I. 82 This species is the least of the *weesel kind.
1899F. V. Kirby Sport E.C. Africa 322 Their..*weasel-like slenderness of body.
1923Chambers's Jrnl. Feb. 88/1 Simon would have dallied by the way, his *weasel-mind alert to draw news of the hindering from this Heseltine.
1901‘Linesman’ Words by Eyewitness 153 Setting his traps in a *weasel run.
1583Rates Custome ho. F ij b, *Wesel skinnes the dosen, iiij. d.
1800Shaw Gen. Zool. I. ii. 378 The *Weesel tribe.
1398Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xviii. lxxiii. (Bodl. MS.), Ȝif þe *wesel whelpes falleþ bi ony happe in chynnes..þe wesel heleþ ham wiþ a certeyne herbe.
b. Special comb.: weasel-coot, -duck, the female or young male of the smew; † weasel-fish, a rockling (cf. whistle-fish); weasel-lemur, a small short-tailed lemur (Lepilemur mustelinus); † weasel-ling, a kind of rockling; † weasel-monger, one who hunts rats, etc., with weasels; weasel-snout, the yellow dead-nettle or archangel (Lamium Galeobdolon), from the shape of the corolla; weasel word orig. U.S., an equivocating or ambiguous word which takes away the force or meaning of the concept being expressed; hence weasel-worded a.
1804T. Bewick Brit. Birds II. 266 Red-headed Smew, or *Weesel Coot.
1885Swainson Prov. Names Birds 165 *Weasel ducks or Weasel coots.
1773Gentl. Mag. XLIII. 220 The Bladder Fish, and the *Weasel Fish.
1877Cassell's Nat. Hist. I. 223 This *Weasel Lemur..has fair-sized ears, and its colours are of all sorts of shades of red, grey, white, and yellow.
a1682Sir T. Browne Norf. Fishes Wks. 1835 IV. 328 Mustela Marina; called by some a *weazel ling, which, salted and dried, becomes a good Lenten dish.
1591? Peele Sp. to Q. Eliz. at Theobalds, Gard. Sp., This *weasel-monger [i.e. a mole-catcher].
1796Withering Brit. Plants (ed. 3) III. 530 Yellow Archangel. Yellow Dead Nettle, or *Weasel snout.
1900S. Chaplin in Century Mag. June 306/2 ‘The public should be protected—’ ‘Duly protected,’ said Gamage, ‘That's always a good *weasel word.’ 1916N.Y. Times 1 June 1/2 Colonel Roosevelt began the day's speechmaking by opening his guns upon President Wilson... He accused Mr. Wilson of using ‘weaselwords’ in advocating universal military training, but ‘only the compulsion of the spirit of America’. A weasel, the Colonel explained, would suck all the meat out of an egg and leave it an empty shell. 1939Florida (Federal Writers' Project) i. 125 There were no ‘weasel word’ qualifications, such as ‘it is alleged’. 1952G. Sarton Hist. Sci. I. xvi. 404 It is perhaps a little ambiguous to call them idealists. [Note] The weasel word idealist is sometimes understood as the opposite of realist. 1977P. Johnson Enemies of Society viii. 108 Whereas in the spheres of advertising, education and economics the use of weasel words tends to be towards gross overstatement, in the field of killing and mass destruction, the tendency is to understate and minimize.
1923Ld. Charnwood Theodore Roosevelt x. 215 It is even comically reminiscent of the writer's own criticisms later of Mr. Wilson's ‘*weasel-worded’ phrases. 1981N.Y. Times 29 Mar. 4/1 The facts it contained did not support what one official termed the agency's ‘weasel-worded’ conclusion.
c. attrib. or as adj., after weasel word, above. Of a statement, etc.: equivocating, ambiguous, quibbling.
1912T. Roosevelt in Outlook 27 July 662/2 The weasel sentence about States' rights could well have been suggested by the astuteness of Mr. Bryan's fellow-Democrat Mr. Ryan. 1965M. Naylor Your Money x. 59 If..other things remain equal.., the price will rise... It is now time to deal with that weasel qualification, ‘other things being equal’. 1974R. M. Pirsig Zen & Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1976) iv. xxviii. 337 The whole business seemed to many of them merely a new and pretentious jargon of weasel concepts. 1979Financial Rev. (Melbourne) 27 Apr. 2 The probability is that the commission will deliver another of its weasel judgements, recognising merit on all sides.
▪ II. ˈweasel, v. colloq. (orig. U.S.).
[f. the n.]
1. a. trans. To render (a word, phrase, etc.) ambiguous or equivocal; to remove or detract from (its meaning) intentionally.
1900Century Mag. June 305/2 I've seen him take his pen, and go through a proposed plank or resolution, and weasel every flat-footed word in it. 1919T. Roosevelt in Maine, my State (Maine Writers Research Club) 20 ‘His words weasel the meaning of the words in front of them,’ said David, ‘just like a weasel when he sucks the meat out of an egg and leaves nothing but the shell’.
b. intr. To equivocate or prevaricate, to use weasel words.
1956[see dirt n. 6 e]. 1963D. Ogilvy Confessions Advert. Man v. 99 If you tell lies, weasel, you do your client a disservice. 1972C. Weston Poor, Poor Ophelia xxv. 151 He listened to the younger detective weaseling at the other end.
2. a. To extricate oneself from or get out of a place in the manner of a weasel. Also with in (with movement in the opposite direction).
1925J. Bone London Perambulator 162 How to weasel out of London, north, south, east and west, with the fewest possible obstructions. 1963T. Pynchon V. vii. 171, I was always weaseling in, you know, on some show where you wouldn't expect to find naval personnel. 1968P. Dickinson Skin Deep ix. 176 Pibble weaseled out of the car and ran across the road.
b. To escape from or extricate oneself out (of a situation, obligation, etc.), esp. dishonourably; to welsh on. Also with one's way.
1956Washington Post 7 Aug., For this country to weasel on its obligation would be both to fracture the Atlantic alliance and to engage in the most offensive and immoral sort of appeasement. 1962N. Maxwell Witch-Doctor's Apprentice ii. 10, I wanted to commit myself publicly to it so that it would be hard to weasel out after only a day or two. 1973New Yorker 3 Mar. 85/1 Canterbury is one of the ‘decadent’ communities that gradually weaseled out of the Shaker strictures against ornament and luxury. 1978M. Puzo Fools Die xxi. 239 A real fucking claim agent weaseling out of his obligations. 1980Logophile IV. i. 46/1 It required weaseling his way into the confidence of his bank-manager. 1981Spectator 6 June 16/2 Jilly Cooper was too kind-hearted to name those who weaseled out of the exercise.
3. trans. To obtain or extract (something) out of another, esp. by cunning.
1975L. Deighton Yesterday's Spy xii. 99 He..‘weaseled’ luggage for the boat-train passengers and was not above stealing the occasional camera. 1975Observer 30 Nov. 22/4 My sole achievement was weaselling a medical certificate out of my G.P.
Hence ˈweaselling ppl. a. and vbl. n.
1956H. Kurnitz Invasion of Privacy xii. 81 Never could get along with lawyers... Bunch of weaseling doubletalkers. 1969Listener 31 July 132/2 ‘Legitimate puffery’ is often plain lying. At best, it encourages ‘weaselling’—the use of meaningless and unverifiable formulae like ‘Bloggo is better’; at worst, it is demonstrably fraudulent. 1978N.Y. Times 30 Mar. d 18/1 Arum says there has been heavy pressure for a return bout from all over the world. He offers this as justification for his weaseling out of a commitment to match Spinks with Ken Norton. |