| 释义 |
Kit-cat2|ˈkɪtkæt|
Also 8–9 kit-kat.
[f. Kit (= Christopher) Cat or Catling, the keeper of the pie-house in Shire Lane, by Temple Bar, where the club originally met.]
1. attrib. with Club: A club of Whig politicians and men of letters founded in the reign of James II.
1705Hearne Collect. 6 Dec. (O.H.S.) I. 116 The Kit Cat Club came to have it's Name from one Christopher Catling. [Note, a Pudding Pye man.] 1710Acc. Tom Whig 31 Your Kit-Cat Clubs, Calf's-Head Clubs, Junto's, and other infernal Cabals. 1821(title) Portrait and Memoirs of the Celebrated Persons composing the Kit-Cat Club. 1829Lytton Devereux ii. vi, That evening we were engaged at the Kit-Cat Club.
b. absol. in same sense.
1704Faction Displ. 15, I am the founder of your lov'd Kit-Kat, A Club that gave Direction to the State. 1719D'Urfey Pills VI. 349 The Kit Cat, and the Toasters, Did never care a Fig. 1749Fielding Tom Jones iv. ii, Thou mayest remember each bright Churchill of the gallaxy, and all the toasts of the Kit-cat.
attrib.c1706Blackmore Poem Kit-cat Club, Hence did th' Assembly's Title first arise, And Kit-Cat Wits spring first from Kit-Cat's Pyes.
c. A member of this club.
1704Faction Displ. 14 Tosters, Kit-Kats, Divines, Buffoons and Wits. 1722M. Astell Enq. after Wit Ded., To the most Illustrious Society of the Kit-Cats. 1883Harper's Mag. July 181/2 The Kit-Kats were the greatest gentlemen of the day.
2. attrib. with size, portrait, etc.: A particular size of portrait, less than half-length, but including the hands.
Said to have been so called because the dining-room of the club at Barn Elms was hung with portraits of the members and was too low for half-size portraits.
1754A. Drummond Trav. i. 31 There is..a kit-cat size of St. Ignatius holding a crucifix. 1778Pennant Tours in Wales (1883) I. 15 Here is another picture..a kit-cat length of Sir Roger Mostyn. 1875M. E. Braddon Strange World II. i. 4 It was a kit-kat picture of a lad in undress uniform.
b. absol. in same sense.
1800Malone Dryden 534 note, The canvas for a Kit-kat is thirty-six inches long, and twenty-eight wide. 1840Polytechnic Jrnl. II. 322 The portraits..will be of the proportion of what is termed a Kit-Kat. 1883D. C. Murray Hearts I. 92 All the portraits in the Shire Hall are Kit-cats.
c. fig.
1803Edin. Rev. II. 427 As Virgil did with his verses, leaving some half lengths, others kit-cat. 1822Coleridge Lett., Convers., etc. II. 144, I destroyed the Kit-cat or bust at least of the letter I had meant to have sent you. |