| 释义 |
fatten, v.|ˈfæt(ə)n|
[f. fat a. + -en5.]
1. trans. To make fat or plump. Also to fatten up. Usually: To feed (animals) for market, make fit to kill. Const. on.
1552Huloet, Fatten or make fatte, crasso. 1622Massinger Virg. Mart. ii. i, You snatch the meat out of the prisoner's mouth, To fatten harlots. 1632Lithgow Trav. iii. 95 Wandring Laton..In spight of Juno, fatned with Joves balme. 1745tr. Columella's Husb. viii. i, Such fowls as are shut up in coops, and fattened. 1777F. Burney Early Diary (1889) II. 284 His legs..have been fattened up by the gout. 1849Cobden Speeches 3 His idea seems to be that men in time of peace were only being fattened up for a speedy slaughter. 1853A. Soyer Pantroph. 165 To fatten turkeys..give them mashed potatoes [etc.]. 1873Tristram Moab viii. 148 Myriads of larks in combined flocks fattening themselves upon them.
absol.1650Bulwer Anthropomet. 241 All Bodies may be made lean; but it is impossible to fatten, where, etc.
b. Said of the food.
c1590Greene Fr. Bacon x. 59 Whose battling pastures fatten all my flockes. 1665Sir T. Herbert Trav. (1677) 299 Wine and Music fattens them [Persian women]. 1781Gibbon Decl. & F. III. 213 The forests of Lucania, whose acorns fattened large droves of wild hogs. 1834Brit. Husb. III. xiii. 59 The same food is given..to fatten cows or oxen.
c. transf. and fig. to fatten into: to bring into a certain state by pampering (rare). to fatten out: to drive out by fattening.
1566Drant Hor. Sat. ii. vi, I..praye him..to fatten all I haue, excepte my witte alone. 1634Sir T. Herbert Trav. (1638) 235 Choosing rather to fatten themselves by a contented Notion, than by curious inquisition to perplex their other recreations. 1784Cowper Task iv. 504 The excise is fattened with the rich result Of all this riot. 1840Arnold Let. in Stanley Life (1881) II. ix. 163 It is then quite too late to try to fatten them [men] into obedience. 1848Lowell Biglow P. Poems 1890 II. 36 John Bull has suffered the idea of the Invisible to be very much fattened out of him.
2. intr. To grow or become fat. Const. † in, on. † Of a letter type: To become thicker. Obs.
1676Moxon Print Lett. 49 The Belly fattens downwards. 1693Dryden Juvenal xiv. 210 The good Old man and Thrifty Husewife spent Their Days in Peace, and Fatten'd with Content. 1712Granville Poems 100 Tygers and Woves shall in the Ocean breed, The Whale and Dolphin fatten on the Mead. 1745E. Heywood Female Spectator (1748) III. 132 They..rejoice and fatten in the blood of slaughtered millions. 1755in World No. 113 ⁋12, I therefore propose to you that..we severally endeavour..you to fatten, and I to waste. 1790–1811Coombe Devil upon Two Sticks (1817) III. 271 After having, for some years, fattened in the ruin of others, he was at length ruined himself. 1813Shelley Q. Mab i. 273 The meanest worm That..fattens on the dead. 1854Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc. XV. i. 252 The ewes readily fatten.
b. fig.
1638Baker tr. Balzac's Lett. II. 13 Methinkes..shee fattens and grows gracefull with these prayses you give her. 1761–2Hume Hist. Eng. (1806) IV. lvii. 357 Such persons, who fatten on the calamities of their country. 1813Shelley Q. Mab iii. 108 Those gilded flies That, basking in the sunshine of a court, Fatten on its corruption! 1867Freeman Norm. Conq. (1876) I. v. 318 Foreigners who..were to fatten on English estates and honours.
3. trans. To enrich (the soil) with nutritious or stimulating elements; to fertilize.
1563Fulke Meteors (1640) 50 The river Nilus, whose overflowings doe marveylously fatten the earth. 1583Stubbes Anat. Abus. ii. (1882) 44 They are not ignorant also..what kind of dung is best to fatten the same againe. 1697Dryden Virg. Georg. i. 661 Just Heav'n thought good To fatten twice those Fields with Roman blood. 1709Swift Merlin's Prophecy, One kind of stuff used to fatten land is called Marle. 1809–10Coleridge Friend (1865) 190 Genuine philanthropy, which, like the olive tree..fattens not exhausts the soil from which it sprang.
transf. and fig.1697Dryden Juvenal Sat. iii. 112 Obscene Orontes..fattens Italy with foreign Whores. 1707Curios. in Husb. & Gard. 259 How efficacious Water is, when it has been fatten'd and heated by Dung. 1842Tennyson Golden Year 34 Wealth..shall slowly melt In many streams to fatten lower lands. |