| 释义 |
white house
[house n.1]
1. (With capital initials.)
a. The popular name for the official residence of the President of the United States at Washington; hence, the President or his office.
1811F. J. Jackson Let. 24 Apr. in H. Adams Documents New-Eng. Federalism (1877) 385 [Foster] goes..to act as a sort of political conductor to attract the lightning that may issue from the clouds round the Capitol and the White House at Washington. 1812A. Bigelow Let. 18 Mar. in Proc. Amer. Antiquarian Soc. (1930) XL. 331 There is much trouble at the white house, as we call it, I mean the President's. 1833T. Hamilton Men & Manners Amer. (1843) 300 The President..having politely intimated that he received company every evening, I ventured..to present myself..at the ‘White House’. 1884Century Mag. Apr. 803/1 There is no building quite as satisfying to my eye as the White House. 1927S. Bent Ballyhoo iii. 80 Conversationally they referred to the ‘White House Spokesman’, when he existed, as the Executive Larynx or the Presidential Ghost. 1950Daily Ardmoreite (Ardmore, Okla.) 14 Feb. 1/7 The White House said no further action on its part is contemplated at this time. 1958New Statesman 11 Jan. 30/1 He has no influence in the White House, and in recent months the requests for his advice have been little more than perfunctory. 1977M. Edelman Political Lang. vi. 111 The White House tapes exemplify this common form of public language.
b. transf. Applied to other buildings serving as official residences.
1860Southern Enterprise 3 Oct. 2/5 He announces himself, in the event of Lincoln's election, as candidate for ‘the White House’ of the independent State of Georgia! 1878Trans. Illinois Dept. Agric. XIV. 146 Tecumseh had his thousands of braves encamped above and below Vincennes, Indiana, where Gen. Harrison occupied the ‘White House’ of this great Northwest. 1947F. D. Downey Our Lusty Forefathers 101 George Washington had been elected President, inaugurated in New York, and had established his ‘White House’ at No. 3 Cherry Street. 1974Encycl. Brit. Micropædia VIII. 844/1 It [sc. San Clemente] gained national prominence in 1969 when Pres. Richard M. Nixon purchased property there for use as a summer White House. 1975Caribbean Contact Feb. 16/1 Speaking with Mr. Ebenezer Joshua at his ‘white house’ home overlooking the prison compound—as I did during my visit to St. Vincent to cover the recent election—one immediately appreciates the feelings of St. Vincent's radical and disenchanted youth.
2. Sc. In north-western Scotland and the Hebrides, a house built of mortared stone; spec. one having single-thickness walls cemented with lime mortar. Cf. black house 2. Obs. exc. Hist.
1824J. Macculloch Highlands & Western Isles I. 112 The true white house consists of masonry and slate..but the heteroclite, ‘kind of white house’, is covered with thatch, and, what is much more essential, possesses a chimney. 1870Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scotland VII. 154 The distinctive terms for a house built with lime-mortar, or without it, remain the same... In the northern islands it is still a White-house, and in the Western Highlands it is Tigh-gal. 1955A. Geddes Isle of Lewis & Harris i. 27 Here and there new houses stand out, the ‘white houses’ (tighean geala)..are usually grey... These dwellings have generally been stone-built and were often slate-roofed. 1974Northern Stud. IV. 22 The 1924 [Crofters] Act afforded an opportunity to improve housing and in the next decade the ‘white house’ began to replace the traditional ‘black house’ or ‘taigh dubh’. |