| 释义 |
quicksand
\ˈ ̷ ̷ˌ ̷ ̷\ noun
Usage: often attributive
Etymology: Middle English qwykkesand, from quik, quike quick + sand — more at quick, sand
1.
a.
(1) : a bed of sand which is usually saturated with upward flowing water and made up of smooth rounded grains with little tendency to mutual adherence and in which the admixture of smooth grains and water constitutes a soft highly mobile shifting mass that yields easily to pressure and that tends to suck down and engulf objects resting on its surface
(2) : an area marked by the presence of one or more such beds
b. : sand of the kind found in such a bed
2. : something treacherously shifting and mobile that tends to entrap and destroy
< the quicksands of human existence — Dorothy C. Fisher >
• quicksandy \(ˈ) ̷ ̷| ̷ ̷ ̷ ̷\ adjective |