| 释义 |
▪ I. see-saw, int., n. and a.|ˈsiːsɔː|
[A reduplicating formation symbolic of alternating movement; the particular form may be suggested by saw v., to which the oldest example refers. Cf. sitisot.]
A. int. Used as part of a rhythmical jingle, apparently sung by sawyers, or by children imitating sawyers at their work. Hence in nursery songs serving as accompaniment to alternating movements in games.
1640Brome Antipodes ii. ii, Let me not see you act now, In your Scholasticke way, you brought to towne wi' yee, With see saw sacke a downe, like a Sawyer. c1685MS. Douce 357 lf. 124 See saw, sack a day; Monmouth is a pretie Boy. 17..in Ritson's Gammer Gurton's Garl. (1783) 48 See Saw, sacaradown, Which is the way to London town? Ibid. 51 See saw, Margery Daw Sold her old bed to lay on straw. 18..in Halliwell Nursery Rhymes (1842) 88 See saw, Margery Daw, Jackey shall have a new master.
B. n.
1. The motion of going up one moment and down the next, or of swaying backwards and forwards. to play (at) see-saw: a sport or child's amusement in which children sit one or more at each end of a board or piece of timber balanced so that the ends move alternately up and down.
A wholly different game, a form of cat's cradle, is known in some parts of England as see-saw, with reference to the backward and forward movements of the hands.
1704Swift Mechan. Operat. Spirit Misc. 297 Then, as they sit, they are in a perpetual Motion of See-saw. 1712― Let. to Mrs. Hill July, One who knows your constitution very well, advises you by all means against sitting in the dusk at your window, or on the ground, leaning on your hand, or at see-saw in your chair. 1792F. Burney Diary Jan., I thought by his see-saw he was going to interrupt the speech. a1806H. K. White Lett. (1837) 338 The delicious see-saw of a post-chaise. 1821Clare Vill. Minstr. II. 77 Play at see-saw on the pasture-gate. 1877Blackmore Erema liv. III. 237 The butt-ends of the three old streets..were dipped as if playing see-saw in the surf.
b. transf. and fig.
1714Shaftesbury Charac. (1737) III. 25 The common Amble or Canterbury is not, I am persuaded, more tiresom to a good Rider, than this See-saw of Essay-Writers is to an able Reader. 1748Richardson Clarissa III. 99 To see..what can be done by the amorous See-saw; now humble; now proud; now expecting, or demanding [etc.]. Ibid. IV. 280. 1827 Disraeli Viv. Grey v. xiii, He had persisted obstinately against a run on the red; then floundered and got entangled in a see-saw, which alone cost him a thousand. 1838Sir W. Hamilton Logic xxiv. (1860) II. 18 The ancients called the circular definition also by the name of Diallelon... In probation there is a similar vice which bears the same names. We may, I think, call them by the homely English appellation of the Seesaw. 1860Emerson Cond. Life i. Fate (1860) 39 If a man has a seesaw in his voice, it will run into his sentences. a1870W. Stubbs Lect. Europ. Hist. i. i. (1904) 8 Charles's wars with France are a regular see-saw.
c. Whist. = cross-ruff n. 2.
1746Hoyle Whist (ed. 6) 36 See-Saw, is when each Partner trumps a Suit, and they play those Suits to one another to trump. 1876A. Campbell-Walker Correct Card (1880) Gloss., See-saw.—Partners trumping each a suit, and leading to each other for that purpose.
2. A plank arranged for playing see-saw.
1824Carlyle Wilhelm Meister, Trav. xvii[i], A large swing-wheel..other see-saws [etc.]. 1844L. S. Costello Béarn & Pyr. I. x. 177 Swings and see-saws for the exercise of youthful bathers after their dips. 1884Harper's Mag. Apr. 771/1 The long cemented play-ground below, with a seesaw for the children.
fig.1855Thackeray Newcomes II. 140, I began by siding with Mrs. Grundy and the world and at the next turn of the seesaw have lighted down on Ethel's side.
3. nonce-use. ? One whose life is passed in monotonous repetition of the same incident.
1753Richardson Grandison (1754) III. xviii. 159 Let me alone Harriet: Now a quarrel; now a reconciliation; I warrant I shall be happier than any of the yawning see⁓saws in the kingdom. Everlasting summers would be a grievance.
C. adj. Moving up and down, or backwards and forwards, in the manner of a see-saw. Also fig.
1735Pope Prol. Sat. 323 His wit all see-saw, between that and this, Now high, now low, now master up, now miss. 1760Lloyd Actor 148 When desperate heroines grieve with tedious moan, And whine their sorrows in a see-saw tone. 1772Mason Her. Epist. to Sir W. Chambers 22 Let D**d H*e, from the remotest North, In see-saw sceptic scruples hint his worth. 1796E. Darwin Zoon. II. 389 Some elderly people acquire a see-saw motion of their bodies from one side to the other, as they sit, like the oscillation of a pendulum. 1812Byron Waltz To Publisher, Turning round to a d―d see-saw up-and-down sort of tune. 1854H. Miller Sch. & Schm. (1858) 375, I lived on for years in a sort of uneasy, see-saw condition, without any middle ground between the two extremes, on which I could at once reason and believe. 1878S. Walpole Hist. Eng. II. 434 They did not tolerate a see-saw Government.
▪ II. ˈsee-saw, v.
[f. see-saw n.]
1. intr.
a. lit. To move up and down, or backwards and forwards; to undergo a see-saw motion; also to play see-saw.
1712Arbuthnot John Bull iv. vii, So they went see-sawing up and down, from one End of the Room to the other. 1778F. Burney Diary 23 Aug., ‘Why, ay, true’, cried the doctor [Johnson], see-sawing very solemnly. 1835Willis Pencillings I. xxiii. 161 A decrepid nun was see-sawing backwards and forwards. 1853Kane Grinnell Exp. xlix. (1856) 469 It see-sawed with him a good deal, but he jumped for it safely. 1860Geo. Eliot Mill on Fl. i. vi, She was seesawing on the elder bough. 1898Fraser in Daily News 15 June 5/2 Our way lay east, over a road see⁓sawing continuously between altitudes of 5,000 and 8,000 feet.
b. fig.
1826Jas. Mill in Westm. Rev. VI. 259 To see-saw between these two horrible conditions, with one half of our population always in misery, is a grand item in the present state of the nation. 1835Lady Granville Lett. 7 Sept. (1894) II. 195 He..then has to see-saw between Peel and the Ultras. 1856De Quincey Confess. (ed. 2) Wks. V. 135 Dialogues that loitered painfully, or see-sawed unprofitably. 1894G. Parker Trail of Sword xx. (1897) 280 It is curious how their fortunes had see-sawed one against the other for twelve years.
2. trans. To cause to move in a see-saw motion.
1754Richardson Grandison VI. 285 Your nurse, in your infancy see-sawed you. 1801in Spirit Publ. Jrnls. IX. 377 He sits cocking his chin, and see-sawing his right arm. 1813Coleridge Remorse ii. i, A poor idiot boy..See-saws his voice in inarticulate noises. 1832Lytton Eugene A. i. ix, He ponders, he see-saws him⁓self to and fro. 1873M. E. Braddon Str. & Pilgr. iii. xiii, Dr. Cameron see-sawed the matter in his most delicate way. 1873R. Broughton Nancy iv, Bobby, stop see-sawing that chair, it makes me feel deadly sick.
Hence ˈsee-ˌsawing vbl. n. and ppl. a.
1793Laity's Directory 20 The shameful act of see-sawing in their chairs. 1827Carlyle Germ. Rom. III. 246 To mount a plank over a beam, and commence seesawing. 1832Lytton Eugene A. i. ii, A certain lolling, see-sawing method of balancing his body upon his chair. 1876A. J. Evans Through Bosnia ii. 50 Two Croats..imparted a see-sawing motion to it. 1906B. von Hutten What became of Pam ii. viii. 166 He seemed..so above all mental see-sawing. |