Imp
[ɪmp]
Definition
(n.) A shoot; a scion; a bud; a slip; a graft.
(n.) An offspring; progeny; child; scion.
(n.) A young or inferior devil; a little, malignant spirit; a puny demon; a contemptible evil worker.
(n.) Something added to, or united with, another, to lengthen it out or repair it, -- as, an addition to a beehive; a feather inserted in a broken wing of a bird; a length of twisted hair in a fishing line.
(n.) To graft; to insert as a scion.
(n.) To graft with new feathers, as a wing; to splice a broken feather. Hence, Fig.: To repair; to extend; to increase; to strengthen to equip.
Checker: Rosalind
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. Sprite, hobgoblin, FLIBBERTIGIBBET, little demon or devil, malignant spirit.
Editor: Rena
Definition
n. a little devil or wicked spirit: a son offspring a pert child.—v.t. (falconry) to mend a broken or defective wing by inserting a feather: to qualify for flight.—adj. Imp′ish like an imp: fiendish.
Checker: Mollie
Unserious Contents or Definition
To see imps in your dream, signifies trouble from what seems a passing pleasure. To dream that you are an imp, denotes that folly and vice will bring you to poverty.
Edited by Fergus
Examples
- The brooding Lammle, with certain white dints coming and going in his palpitating nose, looked as if some tormenting imp were pinching it. Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- Curses on your head, and black death on your heart, you imp! Charles Dickens. Oliver Twist.
- Would he believe that I was both imp and hound in treacherous earnest, and had betrayed him? Charles Dickens. Great Expectations.
- Une femme superbe--une taille d'impératrice, des formes de Junon, mais une personne dont je ne voudrais ni pour femme, ni pour fille, ni pour soeur. Charlotte Bronte. Villette.
- The young imp cannot be found, said Dr. Trevelyan; the maid and the cook have just been searching for him. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
- Drink it, you perwerse imp; drink it! Charles Dickens. Oliver Twist.
- Fraud and robbery are high-sounding words--justified, you think, by a fancied resemblance in some young imp to an idle daub of a dead man's Brother! Charles Dickens. Oliver Twist.
- He had asked me if I was a deceiving imp, and he had said I should be a fierce young hound if I joined the hunt against him. Charles Dickens. Great Expectations.
- Martin, you are an evil cross between an imp and a page. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- I see him now, it is that imp Tina who makes me a fool with my cap. Louisa May Alcott. Little Women.
- But in spite of the comical red imps, sparkling elves, and the gorgeous princes and princesses, Jo's pleasure had a drop of bitterness in it. Louisa May Alcott. Little Women.
- But even though we desired it there would be no way of establishing any clear-cut difference in politics between the angels and the imps. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- I never feared man, and I as little fear the devil and his imps. Walter Scott. Ivanhoe.
Editor: Miles