| 释义 |
▪ I. picket, n.1|ˈpɪkɪt|
Forms: α. 7 picquett, 8 piquett, 8– picquet, piquet; β. 7– picket.
[a. F. piquet pointed stake, also in other senses, f. piquer to prick, pierce, with dim. suffix: see -et1.]
I.
1. A pointed stake, post, or peg, driven into the ground; used for various purposes, e.g.
a. in the construction of a stockade or fence (fence picket = pale); b. to hold in position gabions, fascines, and other means of fortification; c. to mark positions in surveying, etc.; also, a triangular or arrow-shaped mark cut in turf or placed on masonry, used in making measurements. d. to fasten a rope or string to, esp. in order to tether a horse or other animal, also to secure a tent; e. sharpened also at the upper end, as a defence against cavalry or other assailants.
1702Military Dict., Picket, or Piquet, is a Stake sharp at the end, which serves to mark out the Ground, and Angles of a Fortification, when the Ingenier is laying down the Plan. They are commonly pointed with Iron. There are also large Piquets, which are drove into the Earth, to hold together the Fascines, or Faggots, in any Work cast up in haste. Pickets are also Stakes drove into the Ground, by the Tents of the Horse in the Field to tye their Horses to. 1711Lond. Gaz. No. 4871/2 Most of the Horses..breaking loose from their Pickets.., some were taken. 1762Sterne Tr. Shandy VI. xxi. 1803Wellington in Gurw. Desp. I. 487 One end of the cable must be..fixed to a picket or to any thing firm. 1807Hutton Course Math. II. 57 Sometimes pickets, or staves with flags, are set up as marks or objects of direction. 1834–47J. S. Macaulay Field Fortif. (1851) 88 The small branches cut from an abatis may be rendered useful by making pickets of them. 1838Civ. Eng. & Arch. Jrnl. I. 96/1 Marking the middle line, or axis of the road, by stakes or pickets, placed at equal intervals apart. Ibid. 98/1 The fascines are laid in alternate layers crosswise and lengthwise, and the layers..connected by pickets. 1859F. A. Griffiths Artil. Man. (1862) 218 Each horse standing at picket. 1869Parkman Discov. Gt. West (1883) 20 A square fort of cedar pickets. 1873Tristram Moab iv. 63 A lurking thief had cut the pickets of the horses. 1883E. Ingersoll in Harper's Mag. Jan. 208/2 Fence posts are made..and after these the rough split fence pickets so commonly used in this part of the State.
f. A stockade. rare.
1841Catlin N. Amer. Ind. I. xi. 81 The piquet is composed of timbers..eighteen feet high set firmly in the ground at sufficient distances from each other to admit of guns and other missiles to be fired between them.
2. A stake with pointed top, used in a military punishment in vogue in the 17th and 18th c.: see quot. 1706. Hence, a name for this punishment, and for similar forms of torture.
1690Royal Proclam. in Starke Obs. Milit Punishm. (1901) 5 If a trooper he shall stand three several times on the Picquett. 1702Military Dict. s.v. 1706Phillips, To Stand upon the Picket, is when a Horseman for some Offence, is sentenc'd to have one Hand ty'd up as high as it can reach, and then to stand on the Point of a Stake with the Toe of his opposite Foot; so that he can neither stand, nor hang well, nor ease himself by changing Feet. 1806M. Edgeworth Leonora xlv, If I put a poor fellow on the picket. 1843R. R. Madden United Irishmen Ser. ii. II. xvi. 353 The tortures of the lash, the picquet and the knotted cord. 1862Ld. Stanhope Pitt III. 116 Many of these unhappy men underwent the military punishments of the lash and the picket—this last consisting in being made to stand with one foot upon a pointed stake.
†3. A peg, pin, plug. Obs. rare.
1868Rep. to Govt. U.S. on Munitions War 14 (Boxer ammunition), The bullet has a picket of wood running through its centre half-way from the apex of the cone towards the base. Ibid. 16 The bullet, as in the Boxer, has the wooden picket through half its longer axis, and the clay plug in the base for expansion.
II.
4. a. Mil. A small detached body of troops, sent out to watch for the approach of the enemy or his scouts (outlying picket), or held in quarters in readiness for such service (inlying picket); also applied to a single soldier so employed. In the Army Regulations spelt piquet.
1761Brit. Mag. II. 105 A vanguard, composed of the piquets, which were formed into battalions and squadrons, for securing the head of their cantonments. 1781in Simes Milit. Guide (ed. 3) 8 [The Adjutant-general] may..visit them at their posts, and always see that the piquets are in good order. 1799Wellington in Gurw. Desp. I. 22 The advanced picquets of the British army were attacked by the enemy. 1844Regul. & Ord. Army 1 If an Officer's Tour of Duty happen when he is on the Inlying Piquet,..his Tour upon the Piquet is to pass him. 1844H. H. Wilson Brit. India II. 384 The village of Yuva..was guarded by a strong picquet of cavalry and infantry. 1861Mrs. E. Beers All Quiet along the Potomac, Now and then a stray picket Is shot as he walks on his beat to and fro. 1884Sat. Rev. 26 July 126/2, 600 Chasseurs of the Imperial Guard..attacked our picquets, but were repulsed.
b. A camp-guard, sent out to bring in men who have exceeded their leave.
1787Gentl. Mag. LVII. ii. 1199/2 The piquets and double patroles abandoned their officers, and joined their mutinous comrades. 1851Dixon W. Penn iv. 135 A sergeant and piquet of soldiers entered the room. 1886Pall Mall G. 7 Oct. 9/1 A serious military riot..occurred in the streets of Aldershot..last evening... The military police and pickets had to be reinforced.
c. transf. and fig. A party of watchers or sentinels, an outpost; an outlying post.
1847–8H. Miller First Impr. xiv. (1857) 228 Two insulated outliers, that..form the outer piquets of the newer and higher system. 1860G. H. K. in Vac. Tour 173 There, two miles off, are lying deer,..pickets of keen eyed and keener scented hinds thrown out in every direction. 1866Neale Seq. & Hymns 52 The picquets of the Spirit-host.
d. Short for picket duty.
1775J. Hallam Let. 10 Dec. in H. P. Johnston Nathan Hale (1901) 158 Your being on Picquet is a sufficient excuse that you wrote no more. 1834Chambers's Edin. Jrnl. III. 167/2 For three weeks I have been on picquet every night. 1861O. W. Norton Army Lett. (1903) 34, I have just returned from picket. 1944J. S. Pennell Hist. Rome Hanks 41 You're on picket, aren't you?
5. (usually pl.) Applied to people acting in a body or singly who are stationed by a trades-union or the like, to watch people going to work during a strike or in non-union workshops, and to endeavour to dissuade or deter them. Similarly applied to a person or group conducting a demonstration at particular premises, a particular installation, etc. Also collective sing. Also, the conduct or activity of pickets; an instance of picketing.
1867Times 22 Aug. 8/3 The pickets kept their places from early morning till night; they reviled the workmen who went in and out; they forced women to call upon the police for protection; they threatened that those who took work..should have none when the Union was triumphant. 1869Pall Mall G. 31 Aug. 1 We will assume..that they issue positive orders to the pickets to resort to nothing in the shape of coercion. 1885Even. Standard 19 Dec., The strikers have posted pickets at all stations. 1886Globe 2 Feb. 6/5 In connection with a strike, the defendant acting as a ‘picket’. 1891Newcastle Even. Chron. 17 Jan. 4/1 To..prevent the pickets of the strikers from indulging in demonstrations against the loyal men. 1938Sun (Baltimore) 7 Sept. 2/2 Patient parish pickets, determined to retain the Rev. Simon Borkowski as pastor of St. Barbara's Catholic Church, kept their vigil today as they have for more than three weeks to prevent him from fulfilling a transfer order. 1973Freedom 12 May 4/4 (Advt.), Stop the French tests. Regular picket, and London-Paris walk 14th May–3rd June. 1977New Society 30 June 655/2 The picket's mood turned restive, apprehensive. Ibid. 657/1 Comment on the picket has almost entirely missed the point by concentrating on how the law might be changed to reconcile heavy strike-breaking vehicles and mass pickets.
III. 6. An elongated rifle bullet, with a conoidal front; a cylindro-conoidal bullet.
(Said in E. S. Farrow, American Small Arms (1904) 56, to have been ‘made for Col. Pickett, the well-known grizzly bear killer’.)
1858Deane Hist. & Sc. Fire-arms 263 A form of conical projectile used and called a ‘picket’ in the United States, and also used in several of the German states. 1859J. Scoffern Projectile Weapons (ed. 4) 219 note, The Americans term the new elongated projectile conoids ‘pickets’; and a very good term it is. 1874Knight Dict. Mech. 402/1. 1881 Greener Gun 177 The regulation Martini-Henry rifling would send a long-range picket clean through an elephant. 1901T. F. Fremantle Bk. Rifle 38 The pointed bullet with a flat base, known as a ‘flat-ended picket’.
IV.
7. attrib. and Comb., as (sense 1) picket-fence, picket fort, picket-gate, picket-machine, picket-pin, picket-rope, picket-strap, picket tent, picket work; (senses 4, 5) picket duty, picket system, picket trench; picket-boat, -launch, -ship, a vessel employed for reconnoitring, or scouting in advance of the fleet, or on a river in military operations; picket-clamp, a clamp for holding fence-pickets while being pointed; picket-guard, an inlying picket, also a picket protecting a position; picket-header, -pointer, a machine for pointing fence-pickets; picket-house, in a garrison, the building where a picket is stationed; picket-launch: see picket-boat; picket line, (a) a tether; (b) a line held by pickets; picket-pin (gopher) U.S., a ground squirrel of the genus Citellus, esp. C. richardsoni, found in parts of western North America; picket-pointer: see picket-header; picket-ship: see picket-boat.
1866Oregon State Jrnl. 13 Jan. 1/4 For the capture of the Albermarle [sic], by Lieu[t]. Cushing's *picket-boats, the crew netted $100 per man. 1885Daily News 23 Jan. 6/2 He will have with him [on the Nile] the picket boats commanded by Lieutenants Montgomerie and Tyler. 1890Pall Mall G. 2 June 2/1 The large steam-launches known in the navy as ‘picket-boats’ are perfectly adapted for the purpose. 1942R.A.F. Jrnl. 13 June 28 On the far side of the harbour, was the dockyard, with its cranes and bustling tugs and picket boats. 1975Times Lit. Suppl. 22 Aug. 936/2 As a fifteen-year-old midshipman in HMS Bacchante, he commanded a picket boat during and after the landings [at Gallipoli in 1915].
1862O. W. Norton Army Lett. (1903) 112 Very little drill or other duty, no *picket duty or trenching. 1867Times 23 Aug. 9/2 Flood and nearly all the rest of the prisoners did picket duty there. 1871Daily News 18 Jan., This extra piquet duty from other companies forms a separate roster.
[1800Carpenters' Rules of Work (Boston) 32 Plain picket open fence.] 1817S. R. Brown Western Gazetteer 66 A garden..with high, substantial *picket fences to prevent the thefts of the Indians. 1857R. Tomes Amer. in Japan ix. 207 Cottages..surrounded by either stone walls or bamboo picket fences. 1946D. C. Peattie Road of Naturalist iii. 36 At home, in fertile Illinois, with the clean snow on the picket fences of Galena, they would be cooking goose. 1951J. Frame Lagoon 126 We were sitting in little brown summer-houses, and touching the brown picket-fences. 1972Evening Telegram (St. John's, Newfoundland) 24 June 9/6 Grand Beach is..a clean place with picket fences.
1775in Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll. (1814) 2nd Ser II. 230 This fort consists of two large block houses, and a large barrack, which is enclosed with a *picket fort. 1846T. L. McKenney Mem. I. vi. 127 The old picket fort standing on the plain..quite a ruin.
1857R. Tomes Amer. in Japan xiv. 317 The streets of Hakodadi..are subdivided into various wards by means of *picket-gates.
1703Lond. Gaz. No. 3923/2 Our *Piquet Guard was..ordered out to attack them. 1866Longfellow Killed at Ford ii, As we rode along..To visit the picket-guard at the ford.
1883E. Ingersoll in Harper's Mag. Jan. 208/2 Planers, shingle machines, *picket headers.
1901Westm. Gaz. 14 Mar. 6/1 A draft of about fifty men..in Guernsey..attacked the *picquet house on the pier at St. Peter's Port.
1856R. Glisan Jrnl. Army Life (1874) xx. 277 Indians broke through the *picket line. 1867Latham Black & White 105 The opposing lines were not more than two hundred yards apart, and between these were the picket lines, about one hundred yards from one another. 1899Scribner's Mag. XXV. 19/1 It was no easy matter to handle them on the picket-lines, and to provide for feeding and watering. 1945A. Huxley Let. 13 Oct. (1969) 536 Matthew was fortunately absent when the violence broke out on the picket line, but he got arrested. 1973Guardian 11 June 13/8 The manual workers at Salford will hold a mass meeting to decide if they will cross the picket line. 1978Guardian Weekly 29 Jan. 17/2 It violates the basic military axiom of not putting the main body of troops on the picket line. Crowding the bulk of NATO's troops along the front line shows the Soviets where the alliance is strong and where it is weak.
1867Times 23 Aug. 9/2 Many of the *picket men had behaved illegally.
1851Mayne Reid Scalp Hunt. iv. 28 The *picket-pins [were] driven home. 1859Marcy Prairie Trav. iii. 91 The picket-pins, of iron, fifteen inches long, with ring and swivel at top.
[1893V. Bailey Prairie Ground Squirrels 32 Striped Prairie Spermophile... The little Striped Spermophile..is seen standing upright on its hind feet, straight and motionless as a stick... At a little distance it is impossible to distinguish it from an old picket pin or tent stake.] 1901E. T. Seton Lives of Hunted 214 The darling ambition of his life..was to catch one of the *Picket-pin Gophers... These little animals have a trick of sitting bolt upright on their hind legs, with their paws held close in, so that at a distance they look exactly like picket-pins. 1936Univ. Arizona Gen. Bull. iii. 79 Last of the ground squirrels to be mentioned are the small ones..variously known over the West as spermophiles, picket-pin gophers, or simply ground squirrels. 1947V. H. Cahalane Mammals N. Amer. 342 They spend a great deal of time sitting straight up on their haunches, their backs and necks as straight as ramrods. For this reason they are often called ‘picket pins’. 1962W. Stegner Wolf Willow ii. i. 41 The earth was densely peopled with small creatures as with large—prairie dogs, picket-pin gophers, field mice. 1967D. L. Allen Life of Prairies 78 Overlapping the prairie country..is the realm of a truly abundant grassland rodent, the Richardson's ground squirrel. Sometimes we count dozens or even hundreds to the acre as each squirrel stands high on its hind feet beside a mound of fresh earth. It is evident why this creature will be called ‘picket pin’.
1834in New Mexico Hist. Rev. (1927) II. 298 The Acting Asst. Qr Master will have prepared a suitable number of wooden posts for the support of the *Picket rope. 1946Sierra Club Bull. (San Francisco) Dec. 4 We had carried with us all of our pack and picket ropes that could be spared. 1961C. Farrell Trail of Tattered Star xvi. 171 Mike ran down the line, slashing picket ropes with the bayonet.
1898Daily News 9 May 6/3 It is supposed..that the Spanish fleet was probably following its *picket ship.
1872Baker Nile Tribut. x. 165 Each horse was furnished with..a long leathern thong as a *picket strap.
1866Sat. Rev. 20 July 59 The victims of the *picket system are..men who are outside the pale of the Trades Unions.
1862O. W. Norton Army Lett. (1903) 59 We pitched our *picket tents..on the ground lately ocupied by a secesh regiment.
1804Lewis & Clark Orig. Jrnls. Lewis & Clark Expedition (1904) I. 208 The [Mandan] Village..containes houses in a kind of *Picket work.
▪ II. picket, n.2
A local name of the tern: cf. pictarne.
1831Montagu's Ornith. Dict. 508 Tern..Provincial. Pirr...Kirmew. Picket.
▪ III. picket, v.|ˈpɪkɪt|
[f. picket n.1]
1. a. trans. To enclose or secure with pickets or stakes; to palisade; to fix down by means of pickets.
1745Jrnl. Siege Louisburg in W. Shirley Let. (1746) 18 A Blockhouse..picketted without, and defended by eight Cannon. 1847Nation. Cycl. I. 10 The trees are picketed to the ground. 1884Mil. Engineering (ed. 3) I. ii. 55 The hides are laid on the ground and picketed firmly down; the sandbags are then built up..to such a height as to allow each hide to be drawn well over the top row and round the ends, which are then picketed into the parapet.
b. To tether (a horse, etc.) to a picket or peg fixed in the ground.
1814Scott Wav. xlvi, Their horses, saddled and picqueted behind them. 1857Livingstone Trav. vii. 138 The goat is picketed to a stake in the bottom [of a pit]. 1868Regul. & Ord. Army §872 The guards of the Cavalry will be mounted, and the horses picketed.
2. To punish or torture with the picket. Obs. exc. Hist.
1746–7Hervey Medit. (1818) 252 Others..act the part of their own tormentors: they even picquet themselves, and call it amusement. 1762Sterne Tr. Shandy V. xxi, I would be picquetted to death, cried the corporal,..before I would suffer the woman to come to any harm. 1839–1860 [see picketing].
3. a. Mil. To post as a picket. b. intr. (for refl.) To post oneself as a picket; to act on picket duty.
1775J. Brown in Sparks Corr. Amer. Rev. (1853) I. 462 They have intrenched and picketed out some distance from their other works. 1859F. A. Griffiths Artil. Man. (1862) 154 To encamp and picket expeditiously. 1880Dixon Windsor IV. xxii. 201 These men were picketed in the town.
4. In a labour dispute:
a. intr. To act as a picket;
b. trans. to beset or molest with pickets. See picket n.1 5 and picketing b.
1867Times 22 Aug. 11/1 His employer's shop was picketed by about two or three men in the morning. Ibid., He recognized the defendants..in company with others, picketing daily. 1885Daily Tel. 21 Oct. (Cassell), They picketed the men coming to and going from Mr. R.'s shops. 1941B. Schulberg What makes Sammy Run? viii. 156 Wilson ought to picket in front of Sammy's office... Sammy Glick Is Unfair to Organized Double-Crossers! 1972Daily Tel. 25 Jan. 6/2 The power station is being picketed by miners attempting to stop oil supplies used to ignite coal in its boilers. 1977Times 27 June 2/5 Six strikers..were picketing near the main gates.
Hence ˈpicketed ppl. a.; ˈpicketer, a person engaged in picketing during a strike; also, one engaged in a demonstration at particular premises, etc.
1758Essex Inst. Hist. Coll. (1881) XVIII. 102 Two *Piquitted Forts or Garisons and A Hospetle. 1817S. R. Brown Western Gazetteer 27 Almost every house has a spacious picketed garden in its rear. 1818Scott Rob Roy xxxii, The appearance of the picqueted horses, feeding in this little vale. 1870Emerson Soc. & Solit. vi. 121 There is a great deal of enchantment in a chestnut rail or picketed pine boards. 1885Even. Standard 4 Nov. (Cassell), The old picketed and bastioned forts are disappearing. 1890Kipling Barrack-Room Ballads (1892) 97 The picketed ponies, shag and wild, Strained at their ropes as the feed was piled. 1905H. Cohen Law Strikes & Lock-Outs 16 He was watching the employed coming from the picketed works.
1867Times 23 Aug. 9/1 Even if all the gaols of the country were filled with *picketers the system must be continued. 1898Westm. Gaz. 9 Sept. 4/1 A stronger contingent of picketers arrived on the spot to relieve the sandwich-men. 1930Times Educ. Suppl. 19 July 325/4 The picketers broke a barrier on the stairway. 1972W. P. McGivern Caprifoil (1973) i. 8 They are vocal liberals. Marchers, picketers, demonstrators. 1975Time Out 17 Oct. 5/1 Many of the morning's picketers had lined up behind the main banners. 1978S. Brill Teamsters v. 181 The truck sped wildly toward the gate, with the picketers in full view.
▪ IV. picket, pickette
obs. forms of piquet. |