<B>springbok, </B>noun, pl. <B>-boks</B> or (collectively) <B>-bok.</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a small antelope of southern Africa. It leaps almost directly upward when excited or disturbed. <BR> <I>Ex. If you are lucky you will see a springbok standing still and graceful before he leaps away (Allan Gordon).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springbuck">
<B>springbuck, </B>noun, pl. <B>-bucks</B> or (collectively) <B>-buck.</B> =springbok.</DL>
<A NAME="springcankerworm">
<B>spring cankerworm,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the caterpillar of a geometrid moth. </DL>
<A NAME="springchicken">
<B>spring chicken,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a young chicken, especially one only a few months old, used for frying or broiling because of its tenderness. <DD><B> 2. </B>(Slang, Figurative.) a young person. <BR> <I>Ex. "She's no spring chicken," she would say of another woman (New Yorker). He's no spring chicken, 30 years old, but ... the envy of his younger rivals (Sunday Times).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springclean">
<B>spring-clean, </B>transitive verb.<DL COMPACT><DD> to clean thoroughly when mild weather sets in. <BR> <I>Ex. It's time to spring-clean the office and open up a few more windows (Punch).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springcleaning">
<B>spring-cleaning, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>the general cleaning of a house, or other building or office, when mild weather sets in. <DD><B> 2. </B>(Figurative:) <BR> <I>Ex. [He] has called for "a good spring-cleaning" within the N.A.T.O. alliance (Manchester Guardian Weekly).</I> (SYN) cleanup. </DL>
<A NAME="springclip">
<B>spring clip,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a clip fitted with a spring. <BR> <I>Ex. the spring clip of a clipboard.</I> </DL>
<B>springe, </B>noun, verb, <B>springed,</B> <B>springing.</B><DL COMPACT><DD><I>noun </I> a snare for catching small game, especially a noose attached to a twig bent over and released by a trigger. <DD><I>v.t. </I> to catch in a springe; snare. <DD><I>v.i. </I> to set a springe or springes. </DL>
<A NAME="springer">
<B>springer, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a person or thing that springs. <DD><B> 2. </B>the support or impost from which an arch springs. <DD><B> 3. </B>the stone at each end of an arch next to this. <DD><B> 4. </B><B>=springer spaniel.</B> <DD><B> 5. </B><B>=springbok.</B> <DD><B> 6. </B><B>=grampus.</B> <DD><B> 7. </B><B>=spring chicken.</B> <DD><B> 8. </B><B>=spring lamb.</B> <DD><B> 9. </B>a tin can containing spoiled food that has forced the ends of the can to bulge; swell. </DL>
<A NAME="springerspaniel">
<B>springer spaniel,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> any one of certain of the larger breeds of field spaniels used to spring or flush game, such as the English springer spaniel and the Welsh springer spaniel. </DL>
<A NAME="springfever">
<B>spring fever,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a listless, lazy, or restless feeling felt by some people during the first sudden warm weather of spring. <BR> <I>Ex. It's spring fever ... when you've got it you want--oh, you don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so (Mark Twain).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springfieldrifle">
<B>Springfield rifle,<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. </B>a type of breechloading rifle, .30 caliber, with bolt action, adopted by the U.S. Army in 1903. <DD><B> 2. </B>a muzzleloading, single-shot rifle, .58 caliber, used by the U.S. Army in the Civil War. </DL>
<A NAME="springformpan">
<B>spring-form pan,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a baking pan with a round, high rim that can be loosened and removed by opening a clamp or clip on the side. Spring-form pans are used for baking cheese cakes and other cakes of delicate texture that are hard to remove from the pan after baking. </DL>
<B>spring garden,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Especially British.) a public pleasure garden, as formerly in Hyde Park and at Vauxhall, London. </DL>
<A NAME="springgun">
<B>spring gun,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a gun fixed in place as a booby trap to fire at the person or animal who touches a trip wire attached to the trigger. <BR> <I>Ex. So it went on, a gripping chronicle of folly and ill-fortune ... gamekeepers tripping over their own spring guns (Punch).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>a gun in which the missile is discharged by the release of a spring. <BR> <I>Ex. They wore rubber flippers, underwater goggles, and carried spring guns with which to slaughter anything submarine (Manchester Guardian).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springhaas">
<B>springhaas, </B>noun. =jumping hare.</DL>
<A NAME="springhalt">
<B>springhalt, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a diseased condition of the hind legs of a horse; stringhalt. </DL>
<A NAME="springhare">
<B>spring hare,</B> =jumping hare.</DL>
<A NAME="springhead">
<B>springhead, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a fountainhead; wellspring. </DL>
<A NAME="springheeled">
<B>spring-heeled, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Especially British.) <DD><B> 1. </B>having a spring in one's step; light-footed. <BR> <I>Ex. Kath is forty-one but gallivants about the sitting room ... like a spring-heeled eurhythmics teacher (Punch).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>(Figurative.) sprightly; jaunty. <BR> <I>Ex. The orchestra sounded both suave and spring-heeled (Charles Reid).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springhouse">
<B>spring house,</B> or <B>springhouse, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (U.S.) a small outbuilding constructed over a spring or brook, used as a dairy or a place to keep milk, meat, or other perishables, cool. </DL>
<A NAME="springing">
<B>springing, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>the spring of an arch. <DD><B> 2. </B>an arrangement of springs; fitting of a spring or springs. <BR> <I>Ex. Many auto men consider independent front springing ... as the last major advance in softening auto riding (Wall Street Journal).</I> </DL>
<B>spring lamb,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a young and tender lamb, originally one born after January 1st and brought to market in April. </DL>
<A NAME="springlet">
<B>springlet, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a little spring (of water). <BR> <I>Ex. Out from the little hill Oozes the slender springlet still (Scott).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springlike">
<B>springlike, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> of or characteristic of the spring; vernal. <BR> <I>Ex. a drowsy springlike sultriness, mild springlike days.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springlizard">
<B>spring lizard,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (U.S. Dialect.) a salamander (def. 1). </DL>
<A NAME="springloaded">
<B>spring-loaded, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> held in place or operated by a spring. </DL>
<A NAME="springlock">
<B>spring lock,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a lock that fastens automatically by a spring. </DL>
<A NAME="springpeeper">
<B>spring peeper,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a small, brown tree frog with a dark patch across the face, whose peeping call is heard early in the spring. <BR> <I>Ex. The first faint, hesitant announcement by the spring peeper that the earth's sleep is not the sleep of death (Atlantic).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springsalmon">
<B>spring salmon,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the Chinook salmon, a large salmon of the Pacific coast. </DL>
<A NAME="springtail">
<B>springtail, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> any one of an order of small, wingless insects that have forked, taillike appendages at the end of the abdomen under the body which act as a spring, giving them great jumping ability; collembola. </DL>
<A NAME="springtide">
<B>springtide, </B>noun. =springtime.</DL>
<A NAME="springtide">
<B>spring tide,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>the exceptionally high and low tides which come at the time of the new moon or the full moon, especially the highest level of high tide. <BR> <I>Ex. Approximately twice monthly the sun, moon, and earth are nearly in line and at these times the sun and moon combine their tide-raising forces to produce the greatest tides, called spring tides (Wasley S. Krogdahl).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>(Figurative.) any great flood, swell, or rush; copious flow. <BR> <I>Ex. With Kleist we are on the spring tide of German romanticism (London Times).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springtime">
<B>springtime, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>the season of spring. <BR> <I>Ex. Flowers bloom in the springtime.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>(Figurative.) the first or earliest period. <BR> <I>Ex. the springtime of life.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springtoothharrow">
<B>spring-tooth harrow,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a harrow with hooklike teeth made of springs that tear into the soil when the harrow moves. </DL>
<A NAME="springwater">
<B>spring water,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> water issuing or obtained from a spring. <BR> <I>Ex. Spring water usually reaches the surface through either hydrostatic pressure or gravity flow (White and Renner).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springwheat">
<B>spring wheat,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a variety of wheat sown in the spring. </DL>
<A NAME="springwood">
<B>springwood, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a light ring or layer of wood formed around a tree each spring. It has large open spaces and thin cell walls to allow for the rapid passage of water to the growing parts. <DD><B> 2. </B>a wood or thicket of young trees. <BR> <I>Ex. the wide expanse of country beyond the cypress groves and springwoods (Sir Osbert Sitwell).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="springy">
<B>springy, </B>adjective, <B>springier,</B> <B>springiest.</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>that springs; elastic; resilient. <BR> <I>Ex. Her step was springy. Curves in the backbone give it a springy quality.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>having many springs of water. <DD><B> 3. </B>spongy with moisture, such as soil in the area of a subterranean spring or springs. adv. <B>springily.</B> noun <B>springiness.</B> </DL>
