[f. BOLT v.2] The act of bolting.
1. A sudden spring or start.
1550. Lyndesay, Sqr. Meldrum, 146. Bot with ane bolt on thame he bendit.
1577. Hellowes, Gueuara’s Chron., 335. The two Consuls gaue a boylt aloft on their chariots.
2. The act of suddenly breaking away; breaking away from a political party (U.S. colloq.).
a. 1859. De Quincey, Whiggism, Wks. VI. 64. He suddenly made a bolt to the very opposite party.
1867. F. Francis, Angling, i. (1880), 62. He will make a bolt to his hold.
1884. Pall Mall Gaz., 7 July, 11/2. It is the ‘Blaine bolt’ which lends so extraordinary an interest to the Chicago Convention.
3. The act of bolting food.
1835. J. Wilson, in Blackw. Mag., XXXVII. 133. The difference between a civilized swallow and a barbarous bolt.
4. Comb. bolt-hole = bolting-hole.
