| 释义 |
ˈskinflint
Also 7–9 skin-flint.
[f. skin v. 4 c + flint n.]
One who would skin a flint to save or gain something; an avaricious, penurious, mean or niggardly person; a miser.
a1700B. E. Dict. Cant. Crew, Skin-flint, a griping,..close-fisted Fellow. 1761A. Murphy Citizen ii. i. An old miserly good for nothing skin-flint. 1791A. Wilson Laurel Disputed Poet. Wks. (1846) 125 How skin-flint graned his pocks o' goud to loss. 1816Scott Antiquary xi, It would have been long..ere my womankind could have made such a reasonable bargain with that old skinflint. 1840Thackeray Catherine x, It is a pity that old skinflint should be in the way of both your fortunes. 1891C. Roberts Adrift Amer. 226 Which sum the captain, who was a regular skinflint, said was far too much.
b. attrib. or as adj. Miserly, mean.
1789Parker Life's Painter xiv. 114 The miser, that skin-flint old elf. 1854H. Miller Sch. & Schm. v. (1857) 86 The skin-flint wife of a ‘paper minister’. 1895Zangwill Master ii. vii, By persuading some small skinflint dealer to cheat him.
Hence ˈskinflinty a., niggardly; ˈskinflintily adv., in a niggardly manner; ˈskinflintiness, ˈskinflintism, niggardliness, parsimony.
1861Lond. Rev. 16 Feb. 170 Love of approbation,..for the time, conquers her native skinflintiness. 1886F. R. Stockton Casting away of Mrs. Lecks & Mrs. Aleshine ii. 122 If he undertook to be skinflinty he'd better try it on somebody else besides us. 1893Columbus (Ohio) Disp. 10 July, The rewards of ‘skinflintism’ are not great in the long run. 1899Daily News 19 Sept. 6/1 He behaved skin-flintily to Max Müller. 1901Munsey's Mag. XXV. 431/2 The man with the skinflinty heart. |