| 释义 |
▪ I. scrubber1|ˈskrʌbə(r)|
[f. scrub v.1 + -er1.]
1. One who, or something which scrubs.
1839Mrs. Kirkland in Griswold Prose Writers Amer. (1847) 464 Her floor is scoured every night, after all are in bed but the unlucky scrubber, Betsey, the maid of all work. a1864Gesner Coal, Petrol. etc. (1865) 166 Steam at forty lbs. is an excellent scrubber.
2. An instrument for scrubbing.
a. A scrubbing-brush. (In mod. Dicts.)
b. An apparatus for cleansing coal-gas from impurities. More widely, any apparatus or installation for scrubbing (scrub v.1 5).
1853S. Hughes Gas-works 42 The scrubber or breeze condenser is used for the same purpose. 1876Engineering 16 June 514/2 It was yet an open question which were the better, washers or scrubbers. 1948Petroleum Handbk. (ed. 3) xvi. 231 The crude product is then neutralized in a caustic scrubber and fractionated to remove light gases. 1974L. Deighton Spy Story xv. 154 The CO2 scrubber that cleans the air in an atomic submarine before recirculating it. 1975N.Y. Times 14 Apr. 49/2 The air standards..require utilities..to install costly pollution-control systems called scrubbers to clean emissions from coal with a high sulphur content. 1977Lancet 9 July 76/2 The gas containing benzene was..passed through a wet scrubber, and channelled into an activated-charcoal absorber unit, where benzene was recovered and recycled.
▪ II. scrubber2|ˈskrʌbə(r)|
[f. scrub n.1 + -er1.]
1. Austral. and N.Z.
a. A person or animal that lives in the scrub.
1859H. Kingsley G. Hamlyn xxix, The captain was getting in the ‘scrubbers’—cattle which had been left..to run wild in the mountains. 1869in Occas. Papers Univ. Sydney Austral. Lang. Res. Centre (1980) No. 17. 55 ‘Were there any scrubbers—croppies—out here thin?’.. ‘Four—murra [= very] wicked fellows!’ 1890‘R. Boldrewood’ Col. Reformer (1891) 411 Don't you stick at home all your life, like a mallee scrubber. 1897D. McK. Wright in Chapman & Bennett Anthol. N.Z. Verse (1956) 42 New fences climb the warm brown spurs to guard the scrubber ewes. 1966Sunday Mail Mag. (Brisbane) 9 Oct. 4/2 At the start of every cattle movement the ‘scrubbers’ (delinquent cattle) are noted, and are disciplined fast. 1978O. White Silent Reach v. 54 Scrubber bulls have been turned into stud paddocks.
b. fig. An ill-bred or degenerate animal; an ill-favoured, despicable person.
1876D. Kennedy Colonial Travel xviii. 249 We four adventurers..each..mounted on the shaggiest of small ‘scrubbers’, with a pannikin and a coil of rope dangling..at his saddle-bow. 1941Baker Dict. Austral. Slang 64 Scrubbers, cattle or horses that have run wild in the scrub and have deteriorated in condition. (2) Any weedy or unpleasant person. 1966― Austral. Lang. (ed. 2) iii. 66 Scrubber, a poor-looking, ill-bred horse. 1966G. W. Turner Eng. Lang. Austral. & N.Z. iii. 54 Scrubbers, ‘cattle that have run wild and deteriorated in condition’, suggested figurative uses. It may mean urchin: I remember as a child hearing the phrase ‘dirty little scrubber’, and, not knowing the bush sense of the word, thinking it illogical.
c. The grey kangaroo, Macropus giganteus.
1968K. Weatherly Roo Shooter 137 Scrubber is the name that shooters give to the grey kangaroo. 1977J. L. Harper Population Biol. Plants xiii. 422 The grey kangaroo or scrubber..and..the red kangaroo..are regarded as pests by some sheep farmers.
2. slang. [Perh. properly related to scrubber1.] A prostitute, a tart (see also quot. 1965); an untidy, slatternly girl or woman.
1959Encounter May 30 ‘The scrubbers’: very young girls who follow jazz bands round the country. 1962R. Cook Crust on its Uppers ii. 29 This aged scrubber, Mrs. Marengo..she was so old, forty. 1965G. Melly Owning Up xiv. 172 The word ‘scrubber’ has cropped up quite frequently in this story, and perhaps the time has come to attempt a precise definition of what it means, or rather meant, for I understand that in the beat world it has become debased and now means a prostitute. In our day this was not the case. A scrubber was a girl who slept with a jazzman but for her own satisfaction as much as his. 1968J. Mitchell Undiscovered Country i. 134 ‘She's only a scrubber.’ ‘A what?’ ‘It's the new word for ‘short-term sexual partner’.’ 1970G. Greer Female Eunuch 264 The most recent case in which contempt for menial labour has devised a new term of abuse for women is the usage of scrubber for a girl of easy virtue. 1973B. Mather Snowline viii. 95 ‘She looked a scrubber. That means—’ ‘A mare that runs wild in the scrub country, copulating indiscriminately with stray stallions. Derivation Australian, but also applied to women of similar propensities in other parts of English-speaking world.’ 1974H. J. Parker View from Boys 213 Scrubber, used instead of ‘tart’ which has a non-derogatory meaning. ‘A right scrubber’ is a girl who's rough-looking, whore-like. |