释义 |
hen-roost [f. hen n. + roost n.] a. A place where domestic fowls roost at night.
a1100Gerefa in Anglia IX. 262 ᵹe eac henna hrost. 1611Cotgr., Poulailler, a Henne-house, or Henne-roost. 1620J. Wilkinson Coroners & Sherifes 120 Walkers by night to steale..Hennes from Henrouse, or any other thing. 1711Addison Spect. No. 130 ⁋1 If a Man prosecutes them [Gipsies] with Severity, his Hen-roost is sure to pay for it. 1855Macaulay Hist. Eng. xviii. IV. 150 A boy who had robbed a henroost. b. fig. A source of plunder: in allusion to a political speech referring to ‘the robbing of hen-roosts’.
1909Westm. Gaz. 16 Apr. 5/1 Mr. Lloyd George's now historic reference to ‘hen-roosts’. 1928Britain's Industr. Future (Lib. Ind. Inq.) v. xxix. §2. 420 Apart from the public hen-roosts which Mr. Churchill has raided, it is impossible for an outsider to estimate what private hen-roosts inside the Treasury he has also helped himself to. |