| 释义 |
▪ I. creeping, vbl. n.|ˈkriːpɪŋ|
[-ing1.]
1. a. The action of moving on the ground, as a reptile, or a human being on hands and knees.
a700Epinal Gloss. 696 Obreptione, criopungae. c1440Promp. Parv. 101 Crepynge, repcio, reptura. 1580Hollyband Treas. Fr. Tong, Rampement..sur terre, a raumping or creeping on the ground. 1813L. Hunt in Examiner 19 Apr. 242/2 Creepings in dust and wadings through mire.
b. creeping to the cross: see creep v. 1 c.
15..in Boorde Introd. Knowl. (1870) Introd. 92 The Order of the Kinge, on Good Friday, touchinge the..creepinge to the Crosse. 1511Will of Osborn (Somerset Ho.), At the tyme of the creping of the crosse. 1583Babington Commandm. ii. (1637) 23 With crossings and creepings, Paxes and Beads. 1924C. Mackenzie Heavenly Ladder x. 145 The only thing he regretted about this Good Friday was his cowardice over the ceremony of creeping to the Cross. 1957Oxf. Dict. Chr. Ch. 1411/2 Veneration of the Cross, a ceremony of the Latin Rite for Good Friday, sometimes also called Creeping to the Cross.
2. transf. and fig. The action of moving slowly, stealthily, or in a servile manner.
1565T. Stapleton Fortr. Faith 153 The creping in of these cancred heresies. 1665Boyle Occas. Refl. Introd. Pref. (1675) 22 A Writer in some cases may be allowed to..forbear Soaring, as well as avoid Creeping. 1736Neal Hist. Purit. III. 463 After great creepings and cringings to Archbishop Laud, he became his creature. 1840Thackeray Catherine xi, The man was well fitted for the creeping and niggling of his dastardly trade.
3. The sensation as of something creeping on the skin; cf. formication.
1799F. Burney Lett. 25 July, Your creepings are surely the effect of overlabour of the brain. 1855Robinson Whitby Gloss., Creepings, cold shivery sensations. 1879B. Taylor Stud. Germ. Lit. 362 We feel a creeping of the nerves.
4. Dragging with creepers or grapnels.
1886Pall Mall G. 7 Sept. 2/1 When they [ironclads] attempted to follow up the clearance effected by creeping and countermining, and to make the passage of the channel.
5. In Canada: Stalking the Moose-deer, etc.
1869C. Hardy Forest Life Acadie vi. 134 At the present day the animal [Cariboo] is shot by stalking or ‘creeping’ as it is locally termed, that is, advancing stealthily and in the footsteps of the Indian. 1879Ld. Dunraven in 19th Cent. July 60 Creeping or ‘still hunting’ as it would be termed in the States is as nearly as possible equivalent to the ordinary deer-stalking.
6. Comb. creeping-hole = creep-hole; creeping-sheet (see quot.).
1665J. Webb Stone-Heng (1725) 204 The Works of greatest Magnificence..this Doctor talks of, extended to no more than..a creeping Hole at best. 1849Sk. Nat. Hist., Mammalia IV. 72 Each burrow [of the hamster] has at least two openings, one descends obliquely, the other perpendicularly. The former is termed the ‘creeping-hole’. 1874Knight Dict. Mech., Creeping-sheet, the feeding-apron of a carding-machine.
▪ II. creeping, ppl. a.|ˈkriːpɪŋ|
[f. as prec. + -ing2.]
1. That creeps (as a reptile).
c1000ælfric Gen. i. 25 And eall creopende cynn on heora cynne. a1300Cursor M. 19849 (Cott.) All maner crepand beist. 1483Cath. Angl. 81 A Crepynge beste, reptile. 1611Bible Gen. viii. 19 Euery beast, euery creeping thing, and euery fowle. 1667Milton P.L. vii. 452 Cattel and Creeping things, and Beast of the Earth. 1784Cowper Task vi. 568 The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight.
2. transf. and fig.
a. Moving slowly, stealthily, or by imperceptible degrees. Also applied to a flaw or crack in steel.
c1340Cursor M. 3567 (Fairf.) Wiþ crepinge croulis in his bake. 1590Spenser F.Q. i. v. 12 The creeping deadly cold. 1600Shakes. A.Y.L. ii. vii. 112 The creeping houres of time. 1700Dryden Sigism. & Guisc. 748 The creeping death Benumbed her senses first, then stopped her breath. 1870Emerson Soc. & Solit., Farming Wks. (Bohn) III. 59 The invisible and creeping air. 1882Syd. Soc. Lex., Creeping sickness, a form of chronic Ergotism. 1902Daily Chron. 1 May 6/3 From an examination of the broken parts a ‘creeping’ flaw was found in the cross-section. 1914H. Brearly Case-hardening Steel 110 Such cracks, generally spoken of as ‘creeping cracks’, are not often found in brittle material.
b. Moving timidly or abjectly; acting meanly or servilely; cringing. creeping Jesus, a person who slinks about or hides himself from fear of being ill-treated; an abject, sycophantic, or servile person; one who is hypocritically pious. slang.
a1618Raleigh Instruct. Sonne iii. in Rem. (1661) 89 Flatterers..are ever base, creeping, cowardly persons. 1706Jer. Collier Refl. Ridic. 112 Others of a mean and creeping Soul. 1769Gray Ode for Music 9 Nor Envy base nor creeping Gain. c1818Blake Everlasting Gospel in Wks. (1927) 137 If he [sc. Christ] had been Antichrist, Creeping Jesus, He'd have done any thing to please us. 1827― Lett. in Wks. (1927) 1138 God keep you and me from the divinity of yes and no too—the yea, nay, creeping Jesus. 1854H. Miller Sch. & Schm. xv. (1860) 159/1 The mean vices,—such as theft, and the grosser and more creeping forms of untruthfulness and dishonesty. 1871G. P. R. Pulman Rustic Sketches (ed. 3) 88 Creeping-jesus, applied to a person who seeks to hide himself in pursuit of sport or otherwise. ‘Jack crawled āāder the weeld ducks lik' a creeping-jesus.’ 1934R. Campbell Broken Record 56 The Zulus naturally despise the creeping Jesus type who sucks up to them. 1937‘G. Orwell’ Road to Wigan Pier x. 194 The outer-suburban creeping Jesus. 1945A. Huxley Time must have Stop xxiv. 226 That fool who believed in Gaseous Vertebrates, that creeping Jesus who tried to convert people to his own idiocies! 1966‘L. Lane’ ABZ of Scouse 23 Creepin' Jesus, applied to a person who enjoys bad health or constant misfortune; somebody who solicits sympathy by wearing an air of patient martyrdom.
c. creeping barrage (Mil.): see barrage n. and add examples.
1916H. W. Yoxall Let. 22 Sept. in Fashion of Life (1966) iv. 32 The creeping barrage which went in front of our assaulting lines was almost geometrically straight, and lifted each time to the second. 1919G. K. Rose 2/4th Oxf. & Bucks Lt. Infty. 129 Our methods of attack..consisted, broadly speaking, in the advance of lines of Infantry behind a creeping barrage. 1957Encycl. Brit. VI. 663/2 The limitation of the standing barrage was that the curtain of shells did not move with the troops; and while a creeping barrage made short bounds of 50 to 100 yards, a jumping barrage made longer ones.
d. creeping paralysis: locomotor ataxia. Also fig.
1913in Dorland Med. Dict. (ed. 7) s.v. Paralysis. 1925W. Deeping Sorrell & Son i. 10 He remembered that he had won his M.C. by ‘doing something’ as a protest against the creeping paralysis of intense fear. 1926H. J. Laski Let. 30 May (1953) II. 843 The miners are still out, and industry, as a result, is afflicted with a kind of creeping paralysis. 1932Discovery Apr. 112/1 A single glance at the film gives information concerning creeping paralysis (disseminated sclerosis). 1964G. Durrell Menagerie Manor v. 103 The creeping paralysis, a terrible complaint that attacks principally the New World monkeys.
3. Having the sensation of a nervous shiver.
[Cf.1340in 2 a.] 1814Byron Corsair iii. x, So thrill'd—so shudder'd every creeping vein. 1815― Hebrew Mel., ‘A Spirit pass'd’ 5 Along my bones the creeping flesh did quake. 1881G. M. Beard Sea-sickness 24 Creeping chills up and down the spine.
4. a. Of plants: Having a stem or stems which extend themselves horizontally along the surface of the ground, and throw out roots at intervals. It is often popularly applied, instead of ‘climbing’ or ‘clinging’, to plants that cling to and ascend trees, walls, or hedges: cf. creeper 4.
creeping root, a popular name for a rhizome or subterranean stem that grows horizontally and throws out shoots and roots at the joints, as in Wild Convolvulus.
[1552Huloet, Creapyng here and there lyke a vyne, errans.] 1697Dryden Virg. Past. ix. 57 With..creeping Vines on Arbours weav'd around. 1784Cowper Task iv. 762 The casements lined with creeping herbs. 1807J. E. Smith Phys. Bot. 111 I[ris] florentina and I. germanica..have more properly creeping roots. 1810Scott Lady of L. i. xi, Creeping shrubs of thousand dyes. 1882Vines Sachs' Bot. 156 The underground creeping shoots of Pteris aquilina.
b. In the names of many plants with aerial creeping stems, as creeping ivy (the procumbent form of Hedera Helix), creeping Jack, a local name of Sedum acre, creeping Jenny (Lysimachia Nummularia, and other plants), creeping sailor (Saxifraga sarmentosa and Sedum acre), creeping wheat (Triticum repens), etc.; creeping willow, a shrub, Salix repens, native to Europe and Asia.
1776Withering Brit. Plants (1796) III. 683 Creeping Mouse-ear. Mouse-ear Hawkweed. 1816Keith Phys. Bot. I. 45 The common Creeping Cinquefoil. 1819W. C. Wentworth Descr. N.S.W. 91 The creeping wheat, however, may be sown in the commencement of February. Ibid. 92 To the farmer..who keeps large flocks of sheep, the cultivation of the creeping wheat is highly advantageous; since in addition to its yielding as great a crop as any other species of wheat, it supersedes the necessity of growing..food for the support of his stock. 1861Miss Pratt Flower. Pl. VI. 124 Creeping Wheat, or Couch⁓grass. 1882Garden 12 Aug. 138/2 The common Money⁓wort, or Creeping Jenny as it is called. 1894W. Robinson Wild Garden (ed. 4) xvi. 262 Dwarf willows..such as the Creeping Willow in its various forms, and the Woolly Willow, a dwarf silvery shrub. 1952A. G. L. Hellyer Sanders' Encycl. Gardening (ed. 22) 434 [Salix] repens, ‘Creeping Willow’, to 3 ft., Britain, Europe, Asia. |