Hack
[hæk]
Definition
(noun.) a saddle horse used for transportation rather than sport etc..
(noun.) a horse kept for hire.
(noun.) an old or over-worked horse.
(noun.) a tool (as a hoe or pick or mattock) used for breaking up the surface of the soil.
(noun.) one who works hard at boring tasks.
(noun.) a mediocre and disdained writer.
(verb.) cough spasmodically; 'The patient with emphysema is hacking all day'.
(verb.) significantly cut up a manuscript.
(verb.) fix a computer program piecemeal until it works; 'I'm not very good at hacking but I'll give it my best'.
(verb.) kick on the shins.
(verb.) kick on the arms.
(verb.) cut away; 'he hacked his way through the forest'.
(verb.) be able to manage or manage successfully; 'I can't hack it anymore'; 'she could not cut the long days in the office'.
Checked by Andrew--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) A frame or grating of various kinds; as, a frame for drying bricks, fish, or cheese; a rack for feeding cattle; a grating in a mill race, etc.
(n.) Unburned brick or tile, stacked up for drying.
(v. t.) To cut irregulary, without skill or definite purpose; to notch; to mangle by repeated strokes of a cutting instrument; as, to hack a post.
(v. t.) Fig.: To mangle in speaking.
(v. i.) To cough faintly and frequently, or in a short, broken manner; as, a hacking cough.
(n.) A notch; a cut.
(n.) An implement for cutting a notch; a large pick used in breaking stone.
(n.) A hacking; a catch in speaking; a short, broken cough.
(n.) A kick on the shins.
(n.) A horse, hackneyed or let out for common hire; also, a horse used in all kinds of work, or a saddle horse, as distinguished from hunting and carriage horses.
(n.) A coach or carriage let for hire; particularly, a a coach with two seats inside facing each other; a hackney coach.
(n.) A bookmaker who hires himself out for any sort of literary work; an overworked man; a drudge.
(n.) A procuress.
(a.) Hackneyed; hired; mercenary.
(v. t.) To use as a hack; to let out for hire.
(v. t.) To use frequently and indiscriminately, so as to render trite and commonplace.
(v. i.) To be exposed or offered or to common use for hire; to turn prostitute.
(v. i.) To live the life of a drudge or hack.
Typist: Melville
Synonyms and Synonymous
v. a. Cut (clumsily), hew, chop, mangle, hackle.
n. [1]. Notch, cut.[2]. Hired horse, worn-out horse.[3]. Drudge, over-worked man.[4]. Hackney-coach.
a. Hired, mercenary, hireling, hackney.
Inputed by Deborah
Definition
n. a grated frame as a rack for feeding cattle a place for drying bricks &c.
n. a horse kept for hire esp. a poor one: any person overworked on hire: a literary drudge.—adj. hired mercenary: used up.—v.t. to offer for hire: to use roughly.—n. Hack′-work literary drudgery for which a person is hired by a publisher as making dictionaries &c.
v.t. to cut: to chop or mangle: to notch: to kick (another) at football.—n. a cut made by hacking: a kick on the shin.—n. Hack′ing the operation of picking a worn grindstone &c. with a hack-hammer.—adj. short and interrupted as a broken troublesome cough.—n. Hack′-log a chopping-block.
Checker: Willa
Examples
- From the point of view of the political hack, Judge Lindsey made a most distressing use of the red herring. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- He has been laid up with a hack, and once he slipped his knee-cap, but that was nothing. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Return of Sherlock Holmes.
- Hence the degradation which the Colonel had almost suffered, of being obliged to enter the presence of his Sovereign in a hack cab. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- For himself he only wanted a useful hack, which would draw upon occasion; being about to marry and to give up hunting. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- He took her to the Arion Ball, and had a hack for her both ways. Edith Wharton. The House of Mirth.
- Undaunted he continued his experiments, finding that he could hack and hew splinters of wood from the table and chairs with this new toy. Edgar Rice Burroughs. Tarzan of the Apes.
- The hack drove to the wharf. Harriet Beecher Stowe. Uncle Tom's Cabin.
- It had been hacked or torn right out from the roots. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.
- She had the ransacking of the wardrobes of the two defunct ladies, and cut and hacked their posthumous finery so as to suit her own tastes and figure. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- He never liked to see me mend pens; my knife was always dull-edged--my hand, too, was unskilful; I hacked and chipped. Charlotte Bronte. Villette.
- But the new thing did not fit into the little outlines and verbosities which served as a philosophy for our political hacks. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
Checker: Sabina