| 释义 |
catbird|ˈkætbɜːd|
[See quot. 1885.]
1. a. An American thrush (Mimus Carolinensis).
1731Mortimer in Phil. Trans. XXXVII. 175 Muscicapa vertice nigro. The Cat-Bird. 1858O. W. Holmes Aut. Breakf.-t. 230, I hear the whispering voice of Spring, The thrush's trill, the cat-bird's cry. a1879Lowell Poet. Wks. (1879) 38 The cat-bird croons in the lilac-bush. 1885Pall Mall G. 21 May 4/2 The ‘cat-bird’..derives its name from its ordinary cry of alarm, which somewhat resembles the mew of a cat.
b. The name given to several species of Australian birds whose cry resembles the mewing of a cat.
1848J. Gould Birds Australia IV. pl. 11 Ptilonorhynchus Smithii... Cat Bird. Ibid., Situations suitable to the Regent and Satin Birds are equally adapted to the habits of the Cat Bird. 1887D. Macdonald Gum Boughs 36 One of the most peculiar of birds' eggs found about the Murray is that of the locally-termed ‘cat-bird’, the shell of which is veined thickly with dark thin threads as though covered with a spider's web. 1889R. B. Anderson tr. Lumholtz's Among Cannibals vii. 96 The cat-bird (ælurædus maculosus), which makes its appearance towards evening, and has a voice strikingly like the mewing of a cat. 1957Encycl. Brit. V. 24/2 Catbird... In Australia, a name given to any of several bowerbirds, especially to Ailuroedus crassirostris, which builds no bower.
2. Phr. the catbird seat: a superior or advantageous position. U.S. slang.
1942J. Thurber in 55 Short Stories from New Yorker (1949) 61 ‘Sitting in the catbird seat’ meant sitting pretty, like a batter with three balls and no strikes on him. 1958Wodehouse Cocktail Time xiii. 114 ‘I get you. If we swing it, we'll be sitting pretty,’ ‘In the catbird seat.’ |