| 释义 |
white ant, n.
[f. white a. + ant.]
1. A very destructive social insect of the Neuropterous order, also called Termite.
[c1328,1713: see ant 3.] 1684Locke Jrnl. 17 Nov. in K. Dewhurst Locke (1963) 265 Told me of a sort of white ants that there mightily infests them. 1699W. Dampier Voy. 127 Abundance of Ants of several sorts, and Woodlice, called by the English in the East Indies White Ants. 1729, etc. [see ant 3]. 1849E. B. Eastwick Dry Leaves 86 The never-to-be-sufficiently execrated white ants, who, if they had their will, would reduce all created things to impalpable dust. 1908E. J. Banfield Confessions of Beachcomber i. vii. 227 The ‘white ant’ (which is not an ant)..would literally eat us out of house and home. 1928R. Campbell Wayzgoose i. 20 White-ants and borers, turning boards to dust. 1938X. Herbert Capricornia (1939) viii. 102 The white-ants have eaten the wheels of my buck⁓board. 1974D. Stuart Prince of my Country v. 40 The wind and the rain and the white ants will level the camps.
2. In pl. With allusion to the supposed destruction of the brain by white ants, implying loss of sanity, sense, or intelligence. Austral. slang.
1908H. Fletcher Dads & Dan: between Smokes 64 It wants a fool or a very sane cove indeed ter live in ther lonely bush an' keep ther white ants out o' his napper. 1926L. C. E. Gee Bushtracks & Goldfields 65 And so he rambles on..and in the unsteady glance of his honest, old eyes and his disconnected speech, I read the mark of the Australian solitudes—‘white ants’ they call it up north. 1938H. Drake-Brockman Men without Wives 27 ‘‘Get the white ants?’ What do you mean?’ ‘Go ratty. Mad.’ 1948V. Palmer Golconda vii. 49 They had a definite respect for Christy. He might have a few kinks..but there was something dinkum about him, and if there were white ants behind his forehead they had a lot of work ahead of them. a1951E. Hill in Murdock & Drake-Brockman Austral. Short Stories (1951) 292 My brownie days are over... I reckon I've got white ants. |