Rattle

Definition of Rattle

Rat´tle   Pronunciation: răt´t'l
v. i.1.To make a quick succession of sharp, inharmonious noises, as by the collision of hard and not very sonorous bodies shaken together; to clatter.
[imp. & p. p. Rattled (-t'ld); p. pr. & vb. n. Rattling (-tlĭng).]
And the rude hail in rattling tempest forms.
- Addison.
'T was but the wind,
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street.
- Byron.
2.To drive or ride briskly, so as to make a clattering; as, we rattled along for a couple of miles.
3.To make a clatter with the voice; to talk rapidly and idly; to clatter; - with on or away; as, she rattled on for an hour.
v. t.1.To cause to make a rattling or clattering sound; as, to rattle a chain.
2.To assail, annoy, or stun with a rattling noise.
Sound but another [drum], and another shall
As loud as thine rattle the welkin's ear.
- Shak.
3.Hence, to disconcert; to confuse; as, to rattle one's judgment; to rattle a player in a game.
4.To scold; to rail at.
To rattle off
a - To tell glibly or noisily; as, to rattle off a story.
b - To rail at; to scold.
- Arbuthnot.
n.1.A rapid succession of sharp, clattering sounds; as, the rattle of a drum.
2.Noisy, rapid talk.
All this ado about the golden age is but an empty rattle and frivolous conceit.
- Hakewill.
3.An instrument with which a rattling sound is made; especially, a child's toy that rattles when shaken.
The rattles of Isis and the cymbals of Brasilea nearly enough resemble each other.
- Sir W. Raleigh.
Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.
- Pope.
4.A noisy, senseless talker; a jabberer.
It may seem strange that a man who wrote with so much perspicuity, vivacity, and grace, should have been, whenever he took a part in conversation, an empty, noisy, blundering rattle.
- Macaulay.
5.A scolding; a sharp rebuke.
6.(Zool.) Any organ of an animal having a structure adapted to produce a rattling sound.
7.The noise in the throat produced by the air in passing through mucus which the lungs are unable to expel; - chiefly observable at the approach of death, when it is called the death rattle. See Râle.
To spring a rattle
to cause it to sound.
Yellow rattle
(Bot.) a yellow-flowered herb (Rhinanthus Crista-galli), the ripe seeds of which rattle in the inflated calyx.

Related Words

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