| 释义 |
Texas|ˈtɛksəs|
The name of one of the United States, formerly a province of Mexico, then for a short time an independent republic.
1. Also texas.
a. Western U.S. The uppermost structure of a river-steamer, containing the officers' quarters. Also attrib.
1853Pen & Pencil I. 789/2 The roof of the cabin which offered a splendid promenade, and the spectacle of a second edifice of state-rooms, surrounded by a broad promenade and curiously denominated ‘Texas’. 1857F. L. Olmsted Journey Texas 27 To this Texas, inveterate card-players retire on Sundays. 1872Schele de Vere Americanisms 128 The cabins below this [the upper deck] and above the grand saloon, where the officers of the boat are accommodated, also belong to Texas. 1875‘Mark Twain’ in Atlantic Monthly Feb. 220/2 A tidy, white-aproned, black ‘texas-tender’, to bring up tarts and ices and coffee. 1883― Life on Mississippi iv. 43 The boiler deck, the hurricane deck, and the texas deck are fenced and ornamented with clean white railings. 1889Farmer Dict. Amer., Texas tender, the waiter on the Texas or upper deck of a Mississippi steamer. 1901W. Churchill Crisis xxi, He escorted the ladies to quarters in the texas.
b. ‘The elevated gallery, resembling a louver or clearstory, in a grain-elevator’.
1909in Cent. Dict. Suppl.
2. In names of native Texan plants, animals, etc.:
as Texas bead-tree, Texas blue-grass, Texas flax, Texas grackle, Texas millet, Texas snakeroot, etc. Texas fever, a North American form of bovine piroplasmosis (red-water) first identified in Texas, indicated by a high fever, reddish urine, and an enlarged spleen, and caused by a protozoan parasite, Babesia bigemina, which is transmitted by the cattle tick; Texas leaguer Baseball (now rare), a fly ball that falls to the ground between the infield and the outfield and results in a base hit; Texas longhorn, a bull or cow belonging to a breed once common in Texas, distinguished by long horns and able to thrive in dry regions; also transf. (see quot. 1908); Texas Ranger [ranger n.1 3 a], a member of the state constabulary of Texas (formerly, of certain locally mustered regiments in the federal service during the Mexican War); Texas Tower [so called from its resemblance to a Texas oil rig], one of a chain of radar towers built along the eastern coast of the U.S.
18662nd Ann. Rep. Missouri State Board of Agric. (1867) 16 Another pest..is the *Texas fever’,..or ‘Texas murrain’, as it is variously known. 1902Westm. Gaz. 2 June 10/2 It is officially announced that the cattle disease prevailing in Rhodesia is Texas fever which is spread by ticks.
1905Sporting Life (Philad.) 7 Oct. 9/4 A bit of bad coaching euchered him out of one bingle the other afternoon, when a *Texas Leaguer from his bat had to be chalked down a force out instead of a hit. 1935J. T. Farrell Judgement Day viii. 185 A dumpy texas-leaguer over third base placed runners on first and second. 1977Verbatim May 5/2 We are no longer besieged with such terms as ‘hot corner’, ‘keystone’, ‘Texas Leaguer’, ‘flyhawk’, ‘maskman’, and ‘grasscutter’.
1908Pacific Monthly July 19/1 Pink got here about the same time but he come of old *Texas-longhorn stock. a1918G. Stuart Forty Years on Frontier (1925) II. 178 None of our cattle were Texas longhorns. 1946Nat. Geogr. Mag. Jan. 17/1 Cattle then were the rangy Texas longhorns—more head, horns, and tail than thick, juicy steaks. 1972K. Bonfiglioli Don't point that Thing at Me xiii. 101 The bleached skeleton of a Texas Longhorn..beside a faint track.
1858Simmonds Dict. Trade, *Texas Millet, the Sorghum cernuum, a prolific bread-corn cultivated in the tropics.
1846Whig Almanac 1847 19/1 Capt. Samuel Walker, at the head of a small company of *Texas Rangers, left Point Isabel. 1911Everybody's Mag. Sept. 354/1 Two Texas rangers faced Antonio Carrasco and his seventeen thieves sometime in December of 1910. 1943B. House I give you Texas 31 A city was threatened by mob violence, so a telegram was sent to the governor to rush a force of Texas Rangers to the scene. 1980E. Behr Getting Even x. 114 The Chairman was wearing a Texas Ranger hat the American President had given him.
1954Tuscaloosa (Alabama) News 13 Aug. 3 (caption) Here is a closeup of a section of one of the ‘*Texas Towers’..being built offshore along the Atlantic coast. Towers, named for oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, will be built along the continental shelf. 1971S. E. Morison European Discovery Amer.: Northern Voy. xix. 653 The Gulf Stream flows within twelve miles of Cape Hatteras, and the counter-currents, strong winds, and shifting sands are a menace to navigation even today. A Texas Tower was established off Diamond Shoals, the most dangerous, in 1966.
3. Used in various depreciatory collocations.
1905, etc. [see Texas Leaguer, sense 2 above]. 1942Berrey & Van den Bark Amer. Thes. Slang §926/1 Texas butter, a gravy made with flour and water in meat grease. 1944R. F. Adams Western Words 164/2 Texas cakewalk, a hanging. Ibid., Texas gate, a makeshift gate made of barbed wire fastened to a pole. 1962Amer. Speech XXXVII. 266 Arizona stop; Texas stop, n. Slowing down, but not making a full stop at a stop sign. 1968–70Current Slang (Univ. S. Dakota) III–IV. 125 Texas strawberries, n. Red beans.—New Mexico State. 1969Britannica Bk. of Year (U.S) 801/1 Texas toast, a thick slice of bread warmed and covered with butter. 1975D. Bagley Snow Tiger xi. 97 A Texas nightingale isn't a bird... It's a donkey. This is a similar New Zealand joke. 1976Boot & Thomas Jamaica 76/2 It certainly had more flair than old LBJ taking a table of journalists and staffers into the men's room, there to reduce them to awe and wonderment at the size of his whopping great Texas trouser snake. 1979G. Swarthout Skeletons 172 They call it a ‘Texas horserace’. Blaise and his deputies sneaked the Mexicans..to the edge of town and told them to hot-foot it for the line. They'd give them an hour's head start. Then they'd come after them, mounted... If Blaise and his boys caught up with them on this side, it was their bad luck... The Mexs didn't make it.
▸ Texas Hold 'Em n. Poker = Hold 'Em n.
1975Reno (Nevada) Evening Gaz. 14 Aug. 39 (advt.) Presenting the 1st annual Palace Club *Texas Hold-Em Tournament. 2003Time 18 Apr. 83/1 God may play dice with the universe..but serious gamblers..prefer no-limit Texas hold'em. |