Mattress
['mætrɪs] or ['mætrəs]
Definition
(noun.) a large thick pad filled with resilient material and often incorporating coiled springs, used as a bed or part of a bed.
Inputed by DeWitt--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) A quilted bed; a bed stuffed with hair, moss, or other suitable material, and quilted or otherwise fastened.
(n.) A mass of interwoven brush, poles, etc., to protect a bank from being worn away by currents or waves.
Checker: Lorenzo
Definition
n. a bed made of a bag stuffed with wool horse-hair &c.: a mass of brushwood &c. used to form a foundation for roads &c. or for the walls of embankments &c.—Spring mattress a mattress in which springs of twisted wire are used to support the stuffed part; Wire mattress one whose elasticity is produced by a sheet of tightly-stretched wire.
Editor: Lorna
Unserious Contents or Definition
To dream of a mattress, denotes that new duties and responsibilities will shortly be assumed. To sleep on a new mattress, signifies contentment with present surroundings. To dream of a mattress factory, denotes that you will be connected in business with thrifty partners and will soon amass wealth.
Checked by Alden
Examples
- The recess beneath the counter in which his flock mattress was thrust, looked like a grave. Charles Dickens. Oliver Twist.
- And again the woman anxiously and actively fingered the mattress and added up in her mind and bargained with the old, unclean man. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- There were in the cell, a chair, a table, and a straw mattress. Charles Dickens. A Tale of Two Cities.
- Stretched upon a mattress on the floor, lay Noah Claypole, fast asleep. Charles Dickens. Oliver Twist.
- Looking in, I saw a lighted candle on a table, a bench, and a mattress on a truckle bedstead. Charles Dickens. Great Expectations.
- The mattress was firm and comfortable and I lay without moving, hardly breathing, happy in feeling the pain lessen. Ernest Hemingway. A Farewell To Arms.
- Well, now, the under sheet you must bring over the bolster,--so--and tuck it clear down under the mattress nice and smooth,--so,--do you see? Harriet Beecher Stowe. Uncle Tom's Cabin.
- No bed may be without an inexpensive steel spring frame or mattress for the support of the bedding. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- They consisted of a sort of saw-buck with a small mattress on it, and this furniture covered about half the donkey. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- Our guide there fidgeted about as if he had swallowed a spring mattress. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- The Syrian saddle-blanket is a quilted mattress two or three inches thick. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- Phil cannot even go straight to bed, but finds it necessary to shoulder round two sides of the gallery and then tack off at his mattress. Charles Dickens. Bleak House.
- When they had felt the mattress, the young woman asked the old man seated on a stool among his wares, how much it was. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- It's in the lining of the mattress, Charley. Charles Dickens. David Copperfield.
- I have a little brass bed in a dressing-room, and a little hair mattress like an anchorite. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- The mattresses were laid 35 to 50 feet wide at the bottom, which width was considerably increased by the superimposed layer of stone, and the jetties extended 2? miles into the sea. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
- She hit into the mattresses as if she was boxing. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- They arise, roll up and stow away their mattresses. Charles Dickens. Bleak House.
- This was effected by sinking mattresses of willow branches bound together and weighted with stone. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
Checked by Horatio