| 释义 |
nursery|ˈnɜːsərɪ|
Forms: 4–5 norcery, 5 norserye (6 -ie), 6–7 nourcery; nurcery (6 -ie); 6–7 nursserye (-ie), 5– nursery (6 -ye, 6–7 -ie).
[prob. ad. AF. *noricerie, f. norice nourice: see -ery, and cf. nouricery.]
†1.
a. Fosterage, upbringing, breeding; nursing. at nursery, at nurse. Obs.
a1400Chron. R. Glouc. (MS. C) 8938 Vor þis Mold was þe wule heo was ȝong to norcery ido In þe abbeye of rameseye. 1430–40Lydg. Bochas vii. ii. (1554) 166 One of his children, being at norcery,..Of aventure, or they could it espye, His Knightes slough. a1460Lybeaus Disc. (Kaluza) 960 Elene, þe messengere, Semeþ but a lavendere Of her norserie. 1605Shakes. Lear i. i. 126, I lou'd her most, and thought to set my rest On her kind nursery. 1653H. Whistler Upshot Inf. Baptisme 69 Allaying the tedious nights, and carefull daies of Nursery. a1671Casaubon Treat. Spirits (1672) 199 Two brothers preserved by the milk and nursery of a she-wolf.
†b. Relationship by having acted as nurse or foster-mother to one. Obs. rare—1.
c1613Cond. People Anglesey (1860) 17 An old impudent drabb..that can alleadge either kindred, alliance, nurserie, or some affinity or other, with all men.
†c. That which is nursed; a nursling. Obs. rare.
1642Fuller Holy & Prof. St. ii. xv. 106 The thriving of the nourcery is the best argument to prove the skill and care of the nource. 1650― Pisgah ii. viii. 177 A jolly dame.., as appears by the well battling of the plump boy her nursery.
2. a. The place or apartment which is given up to infants and young children with their nurse.
1499Promp. Parv. (Pynson), Norcery, where yonge children be kepte, brephotropheum. 1532G. Hervet tr. Xenophon's Œconomy (1768) 40, I shewed her the nourcery and the womens lodgyng, diuided from the mens lodgyng. 1577tr. Bullinger's Decades (1592) 156 For there is mention made of nourceries for children. 1611Shakes. Cymb. i. i. 59 He had two Sonnes..[who] from their Nursery Were stolne. 1641J. Jackson True Evang. T. ii. 162 Are wee the Lambs and Kids of Gods fold,..the Babes of his Nursery? 1720Swift Mod. Educ. Wks. 1751 V. 52 He is taught from the Nursery, that he must inherit a great Estate. 1784Cowper Tiroc. 117 Our parents..wisely store the nurs'ry by degrees With wholesome learning. 1803Med. Jrnl. IX. 529 Female domestics, and the inhabitants of the nursery, seldom escaped its influence. 1882M. E. Braddon Mt. Royal III. i. 17 Christabel carried him back to the nursery.
†b. (See quot.) Obs. rare—0.
1611Cotgr., Chambre des femmes, a Nurserie, or priuat roome onely for women.
3. a. A practice, institution, etc., in or by which something is fostered or developed.
1509Barclay Shyp of Folys (1570) 115 What els is daunsing but euen a nurcery..to purchase and mayntayne In yonge heartes the vile sinne of ribawdry? 1583Babington Commandm. 193 [Cloisters] became as we wel know dens of drones, and nurceries of vngodlinesse. 1604T. Wright Passions i. iv. 19 Passions..be the nurcery of vices, and pathway to all wickednesse. 1654Whitlock Zootomia 235 The Press..is Truths Armory, The Bank of Knowledge, and Nursery of Religion. 1725Berkeley Proposal Wks. 1871 III. 217 Until a nursery of learning for the education of the natives be founded. 1780Burke Œcon. Reform Wks. 1842 I. 234 That all subordinate treasuries, as the nurseries of mismanagement,..ought to be dissolved. 1846Keble Serm. xiii. (1848) 322 The other calamities..have been a great field and nursery for saintly hope. 1894H. Drummond Ascent Man 383 Family Life, the first and last nursery of the higher sympathies.
b. A place, sphere, etc., in which people are trained or educated; a school of, or for, certain professions, etc.
1581Mulcaster Positions xli. (1887) 255 This colledge for teachers, might proue an excellent nurserie for good schoolemaisters. 1596Spenser State Irel. Wks. (Globe) 678/1 This keeping of cowes is of it selfe a verye idle life, and a fitt nurserye of a theefe. a1618Raleigh Remains (1661) 198 A continual Nursery for breeding and encreasing our Mariners. 1654Whitlock Zootomia 95 In this Nursery..of Charlatans, or Mountebanks (as Doctor Primrose justly calleth England). 1701W. Wotton Hist. Rome 455 The Equestrian Order was the proper Nursery of the Senate. 1715M. Davies Athen. Brit. I. 18 The College of St. Mary the Virgin, a Nursery belonging then unto the Canon Regulars of the Order of St. Austin at Oxford. 1777Priestley Phil. Necess. Ded. p. ix, This world, we see, is an admirable nursery for great minds. 1839Thirlwall Greece li. VI. 258 His little kingdom was now chiefly valuable to him as a nursery of soldiers. 1876Freeman Norm. Conq. V. 135 Under William Rufus the Chancery became a nursery of clever and unscrupulous churchmen.
†c. A theatre established in London for the training of young players. Obs.
1664Pepys Diary 2 Aug., Tom Killigrew..is setting up a nursery; that is, is going to build a house in Moorefields, wherein he will have common plays acted. 1672Villiers (Dk. Buckm.) Rehearsal ii. ii. (Arb.) 55, I am resolv'd, hereafter, to bend all my thoughts for the service of the Nursery, and mump your proud Players, I gad. a1683Oldham Satyr Poems (1684) 179 Then slighted by the very Nursery, May'st thou at last be forc'd to starve, like me.
d. An establishment for training promising young players of a particular sport.
1950W. Hammond Cricketers' School viii. 80 Yorkshire does not run the usual cricket Nursery that a team like Middlesex maintains. 1954F. C. Avis Boxing Ref. Dict. 76 Nursery, a club in which boxing talent is developed. 1961― Sportsman's Gloss. 36/1 Nursery, a junior club taken under the wing of a bigger club to which talented nursery players graduate. 1962G. Scott in B. Glanville Footballer's Compan. 447 It seemed that lads who had been taken from the ‘nursery’ clubs by the slag heaps and the pits had weak heads for success.
4. a. A plot or piece of ground in which young plants or trees are reared until fit for transplantation; † a collection of such plants. Now usually a piece of ground of considerable extent in which the plants or trees are reared for sale; a nursery-garden.
1565Cooper Thesaurus, Nutrix, a nourcerie or place where men plante and graffe trees or hearbes, to thende afterward to remoue them. 1568Withals Dict. 24 b/1 A norserie, or place wherein groweth, or be kepte to increase yonge vines or trees, seminarium. 1622Bonoeil Art Making Silke 34 How to prepare the seed of Mulbery trees to make a Nurcery. 1664Evelyn Kal. Hort. (1729) 191 Set up your Traps for Vermine; especially in your Nurseries of Kernels and Stones. 1712J. James tr. Le Blond's Gardening 178 The Seed and young Plants you set in a Nursery. 1751Johnson Rambler No. 112 ⁋3 A plant transplanted to northern nurseries. 1808Phil. Trans. XCVIII. 315 A nursery of apple trees. 1860Hogg Fruit Man. Pref., A Manual of Fruits which..included most of the varieties found in nurseries and private gardens.
transf.1797Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3) III. 549/2 Whoever has a turn for making experiments..will find it much easier..to preserve and raise nurseries of the common ones [sorts of yeast], than to devise mixtures of others.
b. In figurative context.
1606Shakes. Tr. & Cr. i. iii. 319 The seeded Pride That hath to this maturity blowne vp..must or now be cropt, Or shedding breed a Nursery of like euil. 1653Baxter Peace Consc. Ep. Ded., When Satan hath a design to burn up those Nurseries, you are watering God's plants. 1719–20Swift Let. to Yng. Clergym. Wks. 1751 V. 22 Extracts of Theological and Moral Sentences..intended for Materials, or Nurseries to stock future Sermons. 1820Wordsw. Misc. Sonn. iii. ii, Ye sacred Nurseries of blooming Youth! 1877Sparrow Serm. xvi. 207 This world was meant to be only a nursery for the garden of the Lord of heaven.
c. Grass-land left uncut in summer, to serve as winter feed. rare—1.
1780A. Young Tour Irel. II. 86 The winter food..is to keep bottom lands through the summer, which they call a nursery, to which they bring the cattle down from the mountains when the weather becomes severe.
5. a. A place which breeds or supports animals.
1661Hickeringill Jamaica 13 Nor are the Woods a more Plentiful Nursery for the Hoggs then the Savana's are for the Beeves and wild Cattel. 1689Locke Govt. i. vi. (Rtldg.) 56 The dens of lions and nurseries of wolves.
b. In pisciculture, a pond or place in which the young fry are reared.
1771Phil. Trans. LXI. 320 The nurseries are the second kind of ponds intended for the bringing up the young fry. 1837Donovan Dom. Econ. II. 197 There ought in fact to be three ponds, a spawning pond, a nursery, and a pond for adult fish. 1868Peard Water-farm. v. 61 The instinct which carries the fish to the highest tributaries teaches us the importance of improving and creating such nurseries.
c. Of ants, etc.: The cells or chambers in which the larval and nymphal insects attain maturity.
1797Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3) XVIII. 387/1 The most striking parts of these structures are, the royal apartments, the nurseries. 1816Kirby & Sp. Entomol. xvii. (1818) II. 33 The office of..conveying the eggs when laid to what Smeathman calls the nurseries. 1830Insect Architecture (L.E.K.) xvi. 296 When the nest [of ants] is in the infant state, the nurseries are close to the royal chambers.
d. A place or part in which any form of animal life is developed.
1871T. R. Jones Anim. Kingd. (ed. 5) 93 The swimming⁓bell is converted into a chamber or nursery in which the embryo passes through its early stages of development. 1899Allbutt's Syst. Med. VIII. 762 The persistence of dry seborrhœa on the scalp appears to convert that part into a nursery of various kinds of microbes.
6. A race for two-year-old horses.
1883Daily Tel. 26 Oct. (Cassell), Winning three nurseries off the reel.
7. Billiards. (See quots.) Also attrib.
1869Buck Roberts on Billiards 135 Nursery, when the three balls are within an inch or two of one another, and a long score is likely. 1885Billiards Simplified (1889) 125 To play for a series of cannons, moving the balls as little as possible, such series being called ‘a nursery of cannons’. 1893Westm. Gaz. 17 May 5/2 He seems to depend almost entirely on nursery cannons, with little taste for hazards.
8. attrib. and Comb.
a. In a sense 2, as nursery bathroom, nursery bedroom, nursery-book, nursery chair, nursery child, nursery-door, nursery fender, nursery food, nursery-governess, nursery meal, nursery-rhyme, nursery-song, nursery story, nursery supper, nursery-tale, etc. nursery-girl, a nursery-maid; nursery language, a stylized form of language used in addressing small children; nursery word, a non-standard word used by a child or by an adult to address a child.
1949‘J. Tey’ Brat Farrar xii. 94 You can have the *nursery bathroom all to yourself, but do go slow on the hot water, will you?
1941T. S. Eliot Dry Salvages i. 7 His [sc. the river's] rhythm was present in the *nursery bedroom.
1818Keats Let. 23 Jan. (1958) I. 210, I was at Hunt's the other day, and he surprised me with a real authenticated Lock of Milton's Hair. I know you would like what I wrote thereon—so here it is—as they say of a Sheep in a *Nursery Book. 1870Emerson Soc. & Solit. x. 205 The very nursery⁓books, the ballads which delight boys.
1739G. Ogle Gualtherus & Griselda 106 Vain talk for Children! *Nursery Cant of Sprites!
1869C. L. Eastlake Hints on Household Taste (ed. 2) viii. 191 The rush-bottomed ‘*nursery’ chairs, of which the wood-work is stained black, with low seats and high backs..are still to be bought in the East of London. 1896Heal & Son Catal. 153 Nursery Chair, low cane seat and high back.
1817Jane Austen Let. 13 Mar. (1952) 484 When Caroline was sent to School some years, Miss Bell was still retained, though the others were then mere *Nursery Children. 1973Guardian 22 May 13/1 Nanny's pride, the nursery child, ringletted, smocked and sashed, is no more.
1875Tennyson Q. Mary ii. ii, The *nursery-cocker'd child will jeer at aught That may seem strange beyond his nursery.
1718Prior Hans Carvel vii, The Devil..stands before the *Nurs'ry Doors, To take the naughty Boy that roars.
1796Bp. Watson Apol. Bible x. (1799) 379 They presently get rid of their *nursery faith, and are seldom sedulous in the acquisition of another.
1907Yesterday's Shopping (1969) 177/1 *Nursery Fenders... Brass top, japanned diamond wire work, black bottom plate. 1913C. Mackenzie Sinister St. I, i. i. 10 Round the fire was a nursery fender on which hung perpetually various cloths and clothes and blankets and sheets. 1926–7Army & Navy Stores Catal. 275/2 Nursery fender, with..brass top. 3/8 in. mesh..30 in. high with 12 in. return ends.
1949A. Christie Crooked House v. 29 Proper wholesome *nursery food—not those queer spiced rice dishes. 1965D. Francis Odds Against vi. 84 A tiny service lift used long ago to take nursery food to top floor children.
1861C. M. Yonge Stokesley Secret xii. 193 She..suspected Rhoda, the little *nursery-girl, who was quite a child, and had not long been in the house. 1873― Pillars of House I. v. 96 Why, you might as well turn nursery-girl at once.
1820M. Wilmot Let. 4 May (1935) 60 The loss of a most valuable little french *Nursery Governess. 1835Eliz. Napier (title), The Nursery Governess. 1884J. Hall Christ. Home 58 Family arrangements will have to be different where nursery-governesses and tutors are called in.
1742Richardson Pamela IV. 320 What *Nursery Impertinencies are these, to trouble a Man with!
1845F. A. Kemble Let. 8 Dec. in Rec. Later Life (1882) III. 95 In *nursery language, I peacified the good old lady to the best of my ability. 1925O. Jespersen Mankind, Nation & Individual vii. 145 Another dialect used with regard to the person addressed is that more or less affected nursery-language which many mothers and nurses..use with small children—where ‘stomach’ is ‘tum-tum’, ‘horse’ is ‘gee-gee’, ‘thank-you’ is ‘ta’ etc. 1968Trans. Philol. Soc. 107 The special structures and lexical items employed by adults when talking to young children, which we can conveniently group together under the label of Nursery Language.
1677Compl. Servant-Maid Title-p., Chamber-maid, Cook-maid, *Nursery-maid, Dairy-maid. 1799Underwood Diseases Children (ed. 4) III. 102 Nursery-maids are often indiscreet in keeping them too long in the air at a time. 1869R. T. Claridge Cold Water Cure 39 At a spring the nursery-maid asked me if she might give the child water.
1942Mrs. Belloc Lowndes Let. 15 Apr. (1971) 229 Many people..live in their country houses with relations, children, and so on. I know of one where there are three sets of *nursery meals! 1953H. Nicolson Diary 6 May (1968) III. 240 Dull nursery meals—beef, mutton, and milk-puddings.
1832A. Fonblanque England under Seven Admins. (1837) II. 304 The man of Thessaly, famed for wondrous wisdom in *nursery rhymes, who, having scratched his eyes out by jumping into one hedge, jumped into another to scratch them in again. 1841Halliwell Nursery Rhymes (1843) 1 The traditional Nursery Rhymes of England commence with a legendary satire on King Cole. 1972(title) The bedtime book of 365 nursery rhymes.
c1820S. Rogers Italy (1839) 201 Singing the *nursery-song he learnt so soon. 1927W. E. Collinson Contemporary Eng. 9, I mention these nursery-songs. 1971A. Mizener Saddest Story xxvi. 358 Ford led them in a round dance on the [Avignon] bridge to the tune of the nursery song.
1834G. Crabbe Jr. Life of Rev. George Crabbe in Poetical Works & Life of Crabbe I. x. 304 Little tales, as nearly resembling those which had delighted his own infancy as modern systems permit..the German *Nursery Stories. 1848Thackeray Van. Fair xxv. 219 It was as in the old nursery-story, when the stick forgot to beat the dog. 1966B. Ireson (title) The Faber book of nursery stories.
1857C. M. Yonge Dynevor Terrace II. xii. 186 She often comes down after our dinner to find something for the *nursery supper. 1971J. Drummond Farewell Party xxi. 117, I was given a huge nursery supper by old Bertha.
1741Richardson Pamela IV. lxiv. 451 You desired me to send you a little Specimen of my *Nursery Tales and Stories, with which..I entertain..my little Boys. 1822Scott in Lockhart (1839) VII. 7 It was to me a nursery-tale, often told by Mrs. Margaret Swinton. 1871Froude in Devon Assoc. Trans. IV. 21 Legends grew as nursery tales grow now.
1888Kipling Story of Gadsbys 4 Miss T... Won't you have some eggs? Captain G... Eggs! (Aside.) Oh Hades! She must have a *nursery-tea at this hour. 1939T. S. Eliot Family Reunion i. i. 17 Harry must often have remembered Wishwood—The nursery tea, the school holiday. 1958M. Stewart Nine Coaches Waiting iii. 33 A little pantry with an electric stove for making nursery tea.
1790Cowper Mother's Picture 30, I,..turning from my *nurs'ry window, drew A long, long sigh. 1828Miss Mitford Village Ser. iii. (1863) 31 A certain..Sophy, who died..by falling out of the nursery-window.
1933L. Bloomfield Language ix. 157 In English almost any doubled syllable may be used, in almost any meaning, as a *nursery-word. 1957R. W. Zandvoort Handbk. Eng. Gram. ix. i. 287 Many of them are nursery words... Georgy-Porgy, piggie-wiggie, tootsy-wootsies (feet), etc.
b. In sense 4, as nursery-bed, nursery-garden, nursery-gardener, nursery-ground, nursery-monger, nursery-tree.
1719London & Wise Compl. Gard. 215 To place them near together afterward in another *Nursery-Bed, and cover them up with long Litter. 1880C. R. Markham Peruv. Bark x. 398 A large number of seedlings were raised in nursery-beds and in the propagating-house during 1872.
1757Phil. Trans. L. 434 Most of the plants in the *nursery⁓gardens about London. 1887C. A. Moloney Forest. W. Afr. 70 The establishment of Botanic Stations, Model Farms, or Nursery-gardens.
1766Compl. Farmer s.v. Nursery 5 R 3/2 All good *nursery-gardeners shift and change their land, from time to time. 1859Edin. Rev. CIX. 302/1 There are the florists and nursery-gardeners,—not infrequently quakers.
1789Mrs. Piozzi Journ. France I. 335 They were watering.., just as we do in a *nursery-ground about London. 1868Rep. U.S. Commissioner Agric. (1869) 252 Suitable for vegetable and flower gardens, and nursery grounds.
1693Evelyn De La Quint. Compl. Gard. I. 139 With the hazard of incurring the displeasure of a great many of our *Nursery Mongers.
1707Mortimer Husb. (1721) II. 40 They are manag'd like other *Nursery Trees, and may, when they are big enough, be planted out for Walks or other occasions.
c. In sense 3, as nursery education; nursery class, a class attached to a primary or other school for the education of children usu. between the ages of three and five years; nursery nurse, a person trained to care for babies and young children; so nursery nursing; nursery school, a school for children usu. between the ages of two and five years; also attrib. and fig.; so nursery schooling; nursery slope Skiing, a gentle slope considered most suitable for beginners; also in extended uses (see quots.).
1921Act 11 & 12 Geo. V c. 51 §21 Supplying..nursery schools (which expression shall include nursery classes) for children over two or under five years of age. 1943Educational Reconstruction 5 A certain number of children enter..nursery classes attached to infants' schools, at an earlier age on a voluntary basis. 1970J. & P. Kent Nursery Schools for All ii. iv. 94 Nursery classes are..defined..as ‘a class mainly for children who have attained the age of three years but not the age of five years’, and which is part of a primary school for infants or juniors.
1938P. E. Cusden English Nursery School xvii. 257 The general provision of facilities for nursery education. 1969Guardian 17 Jan. 9/2 Under the new Urban Aid Scheme {pstlg}3 million are promised for more nursery education. 1974Ibid. 24 Jan. 13/2 Mrs. Thatcher has announced a programme of expanding nursery education.
1947A. B. Meering Handbk. for Nursery Nurses 1 The Nursery Nurse who prefers the care of individual children..may become a nanny in a private family. 1967V. C. Jones in P. J. Cunningham Nursery Nursing 13 Nursery nurses..care for the young child in its earliest and most impressionable years. 1972Guardian 30 Aug. 11/3 The nanny or nursery nurse of today is trained in child care... Norland..describes nursery nursing as a growing profession. 1973E. Lemarchand Let or Hindrance ii. 16 She was in training as a nursery nurse, and had one more year to go.
1835D. W. Webber Let. in I. Butler Eldest Brother (1973) i. ii. 29 It was..in the year 1765 that Lord Wellesley was brought to school... It was quite a nursery school... As a kind of Preparatory School it was in great Fashion. 1891Michaelis & Moore tr. Froebel's Lett. 30 He [sc. Froebel] thinks of christening it ‘Nursery School for Little Children’ or ‘Self-teaching Institution’. 1918Act 8 & 9 Geo. V c. 39 The Board shall have regard to the adequacy of the provision of nursery schools for the area. 1958Economist 24 Oct. 303/1 His [sc. Gaitskell's] back-benchers still belong to the nursery school of political manœuvre. 1967O. Wynd Walk Softly iii. 33 A nursery-school teacher who has happily dedicated a whole life to very young minds. 1970J. & P. Kent Nursery Schools for All i. i. 28 From that time the nursery school problem assumed the distinctive character which it still has today. 1974Times 14 Oct. 4/1 Nursery school grants rejected by councils. Mrs. Thatcher introduced a {pstlg}34m programme in 1971..to make nursery schooling available to half the three to five age group by 1980.
1924K. Furse Ski-Running p. vi, Every beginner should be content to devote two or three of his first days to the Nursery slopes. 1924W. Le Queux Crystal Claw i. 21 She had been three times before to winter sports, and had long passed the period when she practiced her ‘telemarks’ and ‘stemmings’ on the ‘nursery slopes’. 1943Hunt & Pringle Service Slang 47 Nursery slopes, the easy targets allotted to beginners on bombing tests. 1959Daily Mail 14 Oct. 12/6 If you do not limber up before you go [skiing] you may find your second or third day on the nursery slopes surprisingly painful. 1972M. Yorke Silent Witness ii. 12 The lifts, and even the cable-car.., had stopped... Only the two short drags on the nursery slopes were working. 1975Daily Tel. 15 Jan. 13 (caption) An early flight [in hang-gliding] lasting about 45 seconds down a nursery slope, straight into wind.
Hence ˈnursery v., to rear or tend with care. ˈnurserydom, nurseries taken collectively. ˈnurseryful, the fill of a nursery.
1885–94R. Bridges Eros & Psyche Mar. i, The land..Where grave Demeter nurseried her wheat. 1886H. F. Lester Under two Fig Trees 195 He was multitudinously a married man having a nurseryful of children. 1892Daily News 14 May 2/1 They are little suited to the ways of English nurserydom. |