| 释义 |
wild goose
(Also with hyphen.) Forms: see wild a. and goose; also 7 wilgosse.
[Cf. (M)HG. wildgans, Sw. vildgås, Da. vildgaas.]
1. Any wild bird of the goose kind; an undomesticated goose; in Britain usually the greylag (Anser ferus or cinereus), in N. America the Canada goose (Bernicla canadensis).
c1050Voc. in Wr.-Wülcker 364/1 Cente, wilde gos. c1325Gloss. W. de Bibbesw. in Wright Voc. 165 Jo voy là une owe rossée [gloss a wilde-gos]. c1440Lydg. Hors, Shepe & G. 171 Whan wilde gees hihe in the ayer vp fleen. 1513Bradshaw St. Werburge i. 2619 A great multytude somtyme of wylde gees, Comunely called Gauntes. 1597Shakes. 2 Hen. IV, v. i. 79 They flocke together in consent, like so many Wilde-Geese. 1600― A.Y.L. ii. vii. 86 If he be free, Why then my taxing like a wild-goose flies Vnclaim'd of any man. 1752Hill Hist. Anim. 421 We have the wild goose flying over our heads, in the fens of Lincolnshire, in vast flocks. 1845Whittier Lumbermen ii, O'er us, to the southland heading, Screams the gray wild-goose.
2. fig.
a. Used of or in reference to a flighty or foolish person: cf. goose n. 1 f.b. Eng. Hist. (pl.) A nickname for the Irish Jacobites who went over to the Continent on the abdication of James II and later.
1592[see wild goose chase 2]. 1843M. J. Barry in Spirit of the Nation (Dublin 1845) 230 The wild geese—the wild geese,—'tis long since they flew, O'er the billowy ocean's bright bosom of blue. 1845Ibid. 231 note, The recruits for the Irish Brigade..were entered on the ship's books as ‘wild geese’. 1845M. O'Conor Milit. Hist. Irish Nation 367 note, Clare, it may be added, was a great recruiting county for the Brigade. On its stern coast the French used to land smuggled claret, brandy, &c., and take away wool, and, what was more precious, ‘Wild Geese,’ for such was the name usually given to the recruits for ‘The bold Brigade.’ 1872Tennyson Gareth & Lynette 36 Thou art but a wild-goose to question it. 1881Froude Eng. in Irel. ii. iii. I. 405 In 1715..Tens of thousands of young Irishmen were in the French service, and thousands more were continually recruited under the name of Wild Geese. 1902in Emily Lawless With the Wild Geese Pref. p. viii, The ‘Wild Geese’ was the name given..to the exiles who, like the wild birds..migrated to the Continent before and after the Battle of Aughrim, and the Surrender of Limerick in 1691.
3. attrib.
a. [after wild goose chase 2, as apprehended in later use.] Wild, fantastic, very foolish or risky.
1770Cumberland West Indian ii. xi, To fit him out upon some wild-goose expedition to the coast of Africa. 1781Cowper Anti-Thelyphthora 53 She tutor'd some in Dædalus's art, And promis'd they would act his wildgoose part. 1833T. Hook Parson's Dau. iii. vi, ‘All mad, wild-goose nonsense,’ said MacGopus. 1841Dickens Barn. Rudge iv, He'll..have gone away upon some wild-goose errand, seeking his fortune.
b. wild-goose plum, rye, names for N. American varieties of those plants raised from seeds found in the crops of wild geese; wild-goose race = next.
1909Month Dec. 599 A well-known American plum is called the ‘*wild-goose’ plum, because a plum-stone from which the whole race has been raised was found in the stomach of such a bird.
1594Willobie Avisa (1880) 83 As weary of this *wild-goose race That led askance, I know not where. 1624Gataker Transubst. 145 As one running the wild goose race, he windeth backe to a passage in the former argument.
1884Lisbon (Dakota) Star 15 Aug., The introduction of *wild goose rye into Dakota. |