Kettle
['ket(ə)l] or ['kɛtl]
Definition
(noun.) a metal pot for stewing or boiling; usually has a lid.
(noun.) a large hemispherical brass or copper percussion instrument with a drumhead that can be tuned by adjusting the tension on it.
(noun.) the quantity a kettle will hold.
Editor: Matt--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) A metallic vessel, with a wide mouth, often without a cover, used for heating and boiling water or other liguids.
Checked by Cindy
Definition
n. a vessel of metal for heating or boiling liquids: a cavity like a kettle in rock sand &c.: (Shak.) kettle-drum.—ns. Kett′le-drum a musical instrument now used chiefly in orchestras and in cavalry bands consisting of a hollow brass hemisphere with a parchment head sounded by soft-headed elastic drumsticks: a tea-party; Kett′le-drum′mer; Kett′le-hold′er a little mat &c. for holding a kettle when hot.—n.pl. Kett′le-pins skittle-pins.—A kettle of fish or A pretty kettle of fish a task of great difficulty an awkward mess—most probably in this sense connected with kiddle.
Typist: Wesley
Unserious Contents or Definition
To see kettles in your dream, denotes great and laborious work before you. To see a kettle of boiling water, your struggles will soon end and a change will come to you. To see a broken kettle, denotes failure after a mighty effort to work out a path to success. For a young woman to dream of handling dark kettles, foretells disappointment in love and marriage; but a light-colored kettle brings to her absolute freedom from care, and her husband will be handsome and worthy.
Checker: Susie
Examples
- The tea-things were set upon the table, and the kettle was boiling on the hob. Charles Dickens. David Copperfield.
- I took off the kettle and blew out the lamp, for the water was spurting over the floor. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
- Every housewife knows that if a kettle is filled with cold water to begin with, there will be an overflow as soon as the water becomes heated. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
- There was a kettle on the hob, as there had been night and day for fifteen years. Charles Dickens. Little Dorrit.
- The whitening is done by boiling the pins in a large copper kettle, which also contains layers of grained tin and a solution of argol or bitartrate of potash. Various. The Wonder Book of Knowledge.
- The common one is by applying extraneous heat, as under a tea kettle, in which case the evaporated vapor is hot by virtue of the heat absorbed from the fire. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
- This crust is due to the accumulation in the kettle of mineral matter which was in solution in the water, but which was left behind when the water evaporated. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
- I planned to spend mine in new music, said Beth, with a little sigh, which no one heard but the hearth brush and kettle-holder. Louisa May Alcott. Little Women.
- For example, if 100 pints of ice water is heated in a kettle, the 100 pints will steadily expand until, at the boiling point, it will occupy as much space as 104 pints of ice water. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
- The impurities remain behind in the kettle. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
- It is next passed to the cooking department and placed in huge steam-jacketed kettles, which revolve continually and thus keep the chicle from scorching. Various. The Wonder Book of Knowledge.
- A fire was burning under a pollard thorn a few paces off, over which three kettles hung in a row. Thomas Hardy. The Return of the Native.
- Tell 'em to put on all the kettles! Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- You poor little earthenware pipkin, you want to swim down the stream along with the great copper kettles. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- My man's gone afield, and the little girl's seeing to the kettles. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- The driving engine and shafting are compactly placed at one end or side of the room, with boilers and kettles conveniently adjacent. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- While it is being cooked in these large kettles sugar is added, and as soon as the gum is done it is placed in a kneading machine. Various. The Wonder Book of Knowledge.
- Only the pure leaf lard, which is supposed to be the choicest fat of the hog, is cooked in these kettles. Various. The Wonder Book of Knowledge.
- The kettles revolve until a sufficient coating of the liquid sugar has adhered. Various. The Wonder Book of Knowledge.
- We know that water contains some mineral matter, because kettles in which water is boiled acquire in a short time a crust or coating on the inside. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
Inputed by Billy